Do I need to just get rid of Attack!?

So I've been waiting awhile for these forums to become available, so I can get an exclusively Ameritrash view on the game Attack!.

Maybe about a year ago I traded away Star Wars Risk for Attack! and its Expansion, with high hopes. The game looked like everything I would enjoy in a world conquest game.

Ive only tried to play it once. The group of 6 people I got together had a miserable time, because of the incredible downtime between turns. Player 1 literally had over 2 hours between her first turn and her second turn. She could have left, gone to the movies, came back and not missed anything.

Now granted, it was a first game with lots of rules look ups, but it moved real slow. And I've read it speeds up if you get it down, and there's some people who recommend reworking the rules for threaded turns...but my question is, is all this worth it? Every time I try to make myself pull out Attack! again, I just grab Axis and Allies instead.

Is it worth going through the trouble to rework this game, and spending time to convince my player friends to give it another shot, or are there simply a lot more and better world conquest games out there that make Attack! obsolete?

Good question. I've been a little curious about Attack! for the past year or so but I've never had the chance to play it. I've wanted a game to replace Axis and Allies for a while now, and I liked the idea of Attack! because of the similar time period and that you can be any country with any kind of government.

But would I just be better off playing something like Dust, TI3, Starcraft or A Game of Thrones?

If A&A still doesn't do it for you there is a game called The War Game: World War 2

www.thewargame.com/game_page.html

Basically expanded A&A. Eight nations are represented but all use the same german mini's. The pieces look nice however. I'm not sure if this sort of thing is necessary over A&A which still does a fine job imo. Perhaps looking into other wargames of a different scope and scale will do the trick for you.

A game store a while back had both Attack! and expansion and I was always tempted to get them but just passed them by.

I've heard so many middling things about Attack, and how other games just do the same thing better, that I never got around to it. That's a shame, since Eagle Games are nothing if not beautifully produced.


Then again, I heard a LOT of bad press about Age of Mythology (from both sides of the AT/Euro divide), but I got it in trade and I've been very impressed with it.


But sounds like you've played it and had a really bad time, and you don't always need three or four plays to know a game's not for you. I can personally vouch for TI:3 and Game of Thrones as excellent titles, and downtime is not so severe in those because turns are threaded (and almost everyone is involved or partially involved in the action at almost all times).


If you're having some doubt in your gut, resolve to set one more game night for it. Promise everyone if it goes badly, you'll toss it in the box after an hour or so and play something else. Have no ego about it, and if everyone wants to bail let them know it won't hurt your feelings.

Make sure you've studied the rules and are giving the game a once-more fair and final shake.


If it still bombs for you, send 'er on her way.


Or, repurpose the minis.



(This is one of the great myths that AT'ers actually believe. "I'll repurpose those minis." We don't. We never do.)

I just received TI:3 as a gift and really want to play it but I don't think I can get a full game in with my crowd. They would get too loaded before the damn mid game. With the right crowd I think it would be agreat game but needs allot of time. I can see that the interaction between turns is built in nicely. I always looked at Attack! and the initial Ooohs wore off once I saw it was a generic A&A. People I spoke to also complained mightily about the downtime.

The pieces are just about useless for any other purpose unless you redesign the rules for simplicity, but in that case just whip out revised A&A.

Pat wrote:

If A&A still doesn't do it for you there is a game called The War Game: World War 2

www.thewargame.com/game_page.html

Basically expanded A&A. Eight nations are represented but all use the same german mini's. The pieces look nice however. I'm not sure if this sort of thing is necessary over A&A which still does a fine job imo. Perhaps looking into other wargames of a different scope and scale will do the trick for you.

Wow, that game actually looks a lot like A&A. I really like A&A but I've just played it so many times and most games unfold the same way.

So I guess what I'm looking for is a fun wargame with different armies, economy and unit production, and nation/world/galaxy domination.

Well I'm a huge fan of TI3 and play it whenever I can break it out. In fact I'm in the first annual F:AT online TI3 game!

I have Game of Thrones, and while I like it, noone else ever seems to and I don't think its as great of a game as many people hyped it.

But I was specifically talking about world (earth) conquest games, you know big militaries crashing against each other in the WW1/WW2 kind of period, and whether there was some hidden gem deep inside the game Attack! that I was missing out on. For example, if someone posted this same question about TI3, I would tell them they had to get the rules down and give it another shot, because it is one of the best games out there that really runs smooth with high levels of fun once you have the game down.

If anyone knows of a great game is hidden inside Attack!, worth the time and effort to re-tune it and using all those tasty plastic pieces, I figure it was you plastic-hounds here at F:AT.

I bought Attack and the Expansion when it came out, to be honest mainly just because of the theme, the bits and the giant board. Granted I have never played A&A.

Maybe because I never played A&A, but only Risk, I was looking forward to playing it and of course we played from the beginning with all the rules the whole map and - I think - 5 people. This game can last forever and there were some issues I was not too fond of (e.g. I did try to research for several turns - the only player, who did so - and got my technology snatched away, as soon as I had it, by a spy card).

But nonetheless, I liked the game quite a bit. The conflict and the battles were tense and enjoyable. There was a considerable amount of downtime, but it was fun enough for other players to watch, when it wasn't their turn. I can recommend - from my memory, it's been a while since played - to play with one map only, so that players connect with each other very early in the game and play with Economic Tokens . regarding the downtime, I am sure it will get better, once the rules are clearer, although if you play with the expansion you'll have a hard time here as there are so many possibilities to explore. Also really play with threaded turns, I just remembered that we used it and it worked very well:

The first action-round, every player who wants to take an action pays 1 oil, the second action/round two, etc. Players can take an action even if they've skipped previous action-rounds, but must play the current amount.

Try it, it works.

TI:3 might be a good game, but it's just not WWII. Waiting to get AGoT to the table as well, but again that's a fantasy setting.

Anyhoo, I was asking myself a similar question, and if I had the time I would get the game out again and try it. There could be a classic AT game hidden in there somewhere.

I have played Attack with its expansion and I have to say its not worth the money. I have found Eagle games to be very strong thematically and graphically but they just really suck at game rules.

Trying to distill how to actually play the game from the rules is a chore and then once you actually start playing you realize what a poor game those rules create, the oil system is bad the neutral nation system is stifling, the different combat systems for land, air and sea combat are silly.

The only thing I actually like about the game was the political spectrum system, but even that went through revision in the expansion.

I too passed on Attack, Those early eagle games require a lot of love to play. I made the mistake of WAR:AoI and SM:Civ, both of those are not worth the effort to get on the table and I was always afraid attack would be more of the same with different shaped bits.

-M

Hmm, thanks for all the input guys. Some great comments in there. If I get the itch to do some WW2 era smashing...but want my commies in North Dakota...I might open this back up and give it one more shot.

I'm back where I started I guess, with Attack! sitting gathering dust on my shelf...but at least I know thats where it belongs.