Feature: A Day in the Life of Matt Thrower’s Game Collection

[Our series on the collections of our writers continues! Today it’s the turn of long-time contributor Matt Thrower. If you missed our previous entries, you can now navigate to them using those buttons on the right. Enjoy, everybody!]

Thrower: Well hello there! Nice of you to stop by. Hope you had a good journey. It’s rare we get the chance to entertain adult visitors, with all the space the children take up. So, please, let me show you round the house.

The first thing you learn as a parent is that every other parent lives in a pristine house. Even when chasing after kids has left them looking like exhausted pandas, their houses are still clean and tidy. Naturally, ours has to be the same. We’d all be happier if everyone could drop this charade and wallow in their familial filth. Anyway, it’s nice to have someone here who might appreciate the results.

Hang your coat up over there…

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Review: Here I Stand

Review: Here I Stand

Quinns: Matt? I need a second opinion on this beret. Hey, what’choo guys doing in this basement?

Thrower: INFIDEL! Remove that at ONCE! Can’t you see this is a Holy Place?

Quinns: I did wonder who all the menacingly hooded, chanting figures were.

Thrower: This is a shrine dedicated to the worship of the one true wargame mechanic: the card-driven game. And tonight, from our multitudinous pantheon, we are worshipping the many-headed and many-handed goddess. Mistress of lies and deceit, changer of the ways and the patron succubus of politicians: Here I Stand.

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Here I Stand

Here I Stand

Here I Stand: Wars of the Reformation 1517-1555 is the first game in over 25 years to cover the political and religious conflicts of early 16th Century Europe. Few realize that the greatest feats of Martin Luther, John Calvin, Ignatius Loyola, Henry VIII, Charles V, Francis I, Suleiman the Magnificent, Ferdinand Magellan, Hernando Cortes, and Nicolaus Copernicus all fall within this narrow 40-year period of history. This game covers all the action of the period using a unique card-driven game system that models both the political and religious conflicts of the period on a single point-to-point map.

There are six main powers in the game, each with a unique path to victory :

The Ottomans
The Habsburgs
The English
The Valois Dynasty of France
The Papacy
The Protestants

Here I Stand is the first card-driven game to prominently feature secret deal-making. A true six-sided diplomatic struggle, the game places a heavy emphasis on successful alliance-building through negotiations that occur away from the table during the pre-turn Diplomacy Phase. Set during the period in which Niccolò Machiavelli published his masterpiece “The Prince,” backstabbing is always possible, especially because the card deck is loaded with event and response cards that can be played by any power to disrupt the plans of the powers in the lead.

Here I Stand integrates religion, politics, economics and diplomacy in a card-driven design. Games vary in length from 3-4 hours for a tournament scenario up to full campaign games that run about twice the time. Rules to play games with 3, 4, or 5 players are also included. The 3-player game is just as well balanced as the standard 6-player configuration, taking advantage of the natural alliances of the period.

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