"MAURICE Lite is Here (and free!)" Topic

In advance of the full Maurice game book and cards, I am offering a free, introductory "Lite" version of the game, with everything you need on PDF. For those of you who are eager to get started and learn the game's basic systems, this will provide a fun and easy introduction. This will get you through the long Winter months while waiting for Maurice to emerge at the end of Spring. (Or for our Antipodean friends… I suppose that's the Autumn.)

For the free Maurice Lite game… or if you have no idea what I'm talking about and want to read the introductory flyer first… Go here:

link

best,

Sam Mustafa

Fantastic, Sam! This is very exciting!

Maurice is the game I might actually play _before_ it is officially released! Needless to say, I cannot wait for the final product. Thank you for such a generous preview.

Adolfo

Trying to forestall the whiners who have a half page of the CRT and proclaim that the game sucks, without having read any of the game?

Oh, well, now I have to go out and buy that black printer cartridge…
And, thank you for not making the downloads color intense!

Oooh, nice! Thank you!

Well that does all look very interesting and enjoyable…

Looks intriguing!! Thanks Sam!

Is it Christmas already? Many thanks Sam!

Excellent

Intriguing!

James

Thank you, Sam!
Your kindness in making this available is much appreciated – I think this might be the set of rules for my ImagiNations armies.

Thank you! I'll try it!

Fabrizio

Nice ideas,

Thank you Sam.

Very nice indeed. Thank you.

Thanks.

Wow, 500 downloads in 12 hours… I guess the price was right!

Well done Sam.

Its a great idea and it shows some real forward thinking.

I get the feeling that you will win a lot of support because of this idea.

Raglan

Thanks – this looks excellent.

not having either and looking to start the period, how does this differ from Might & Reason?

Thanks!

Sam,

Bona kit geezer, very progressive of you. Cheers!

Might & Reason, every unit is a brigade. Given good command, you might be able to move your entire army in one turn.

Maurice seems to be one unit is an infantry battallion/cavalry regiment though that may be me reading too much into it. You are highly unlikely to get your whole force moving in one turn – and then only if you have the right card and your army is divided in no more than two forces. No card play in Might & Reason. The combat system seesm to owe more to LaSalle than Might & Reason.

I hope to test-drive this next week. I've got Austrians and Prussians staring across the table at each other.

Maurice seems to be one unit is an infantry battallion/cavalry regiment though that may be me reading too much into it. You are highly unlikely to get your whole force moving in one turn – and then only if you have the right card and your army is divided in no more than two forces. No card play in Might & Reason. The combat system seesm to owe more to LaSalle than Might & Reason.

Actually units are abstract – it's easiest to think of them as Infantry Battalions/Regiments and Cavalry Squadrons/Regiments but in fact they might each represent 8 battalions/regiments (e.g. 2 Brigades or so) of real troops in a scaled down game of Blenheim or such. As such some of the mechanics can see a bit unusual – I just had my first game and quite liked most aspects of it (certainly for WSS anyway) – although there are a couple of oddities that may take getting use to…

It is very much one of those games that will go through about 3 phases for each player – as their knowledge of the rule mechanics improves, then their perceived OTA develops, and then the true level of subtlety and ability to manage their army develops. But don't expect at any stage all aspects will match the conventional wargamer's view of the world.

The ability to move your whole force is essentially impossible in a single turn (at least unless your whole army is all one type of troop, all in the same formation, and all units are close enough together) – so players need to get rid of any conceptions of being able to move and shoot everything each turn. It is comparable to games like Crossfire (where not a lot can happen in some parts of the battlefield for some time by the players choice) but without the semi-random effect that can sometimes occur in other systems (like some versions of Piquet for example).

And yes the combat system is similar to Lasalle, although the shooting is a bit more flexible (by base instead of unit) and the Close Combat is less critical about sequence (as you resolve combat scores for all units before determining outcomes for each in multi-unit combats)…

Sam has made an effort to try and create the ebb and flow feel of battles and incentive for players to not always be super-aggressive or such. I suspect over time there will develop a lot of subtlety involved in how and when cards are used and such, but how successful he has been will be yet to be seen.

Also due to the abstract nature of the game scale (units could just be Companies & Squadrons, or might be Infantry Battalions & Cavalry Regiments, or might yet be representing 6, 8, or more real units each) there will be some times in the game a mechanic or action will probably seem a bit 'odd' for the scale you have chosen to play at – but if you keep in mind the abstract scale, and also the slightly Old School/Charles Grant and Imagi-Nation type aspects, it seems to make sense. It likely won't please all the rivet-counters per se, but with the full flexibility the full version is going to have should give most people the ability to play enjoyable 18th Century games with fairly historical effects and troops… In fact I've already started musing over whether it might be backwards compatible 50 years or so with just a little modification to do ECW and similar (late renaissance conflicts) where the rise of the musket & decline of the pike first began…

John
Wargaming.info

MANY THANKS!!!

I've now posted a link to a full first impressions in the following thread: Maurice – First Game Impressions.

Hopefully of some interest.

From what I've read so far, given the level of abstraction I don't see why the rules shouldn't be useable for mid-17th C. conflicts, especially as rules for pikes are promised for the full version.

Many thanks, Sam.