Tactics Tuesday!
I’ve been playing Night of Man, a small-unit tactical game from 2015 set on a future Earth which has been invaded by aliens. A plucky cadre of fighters, some of whom have evolved telepathic powers, lead the resistance.
The counters are massive and pleasant to play. I think it is traditional with this game to show a counter, plus one from another semi-obscure game, for scale :) The smaller counter is 3/4" here:
The counters (a selection pictured) also have very bold, cartoony art, but it seems to be a fully-fledged, crunchy tactical system (Mark H. Walker, ex-Lock’n’Load, Flying Pig Games, is the designer). Blue for the baddies, green for the goodies. Some cool stuff involved - the Meca on the top row are just dudes in flimsy exoskeletons, but there is a proper Mecha (Cheetah) down below. Note that you are given a certain amount of build points for your Mechas, and you can add the teeny little counters on the corners to beef up weapons, armour etc :)
Note also that the little white-bordered squares on the left of the counter are abilities (so close combat+1, suppression etc) while the circles at the bottom of the counters are Powers which can be activated if you have the means (Iskara has Confusion - Shake one unit within three squares, Infantry have Explosive Rounds).
The boards (there are 4 of these which can be pushed together etc) are actually nicely detailed in some respects, and horrible in others (the mountain art, blech). This is the first scenario, which I’ve played three times so far (haven’t played further yet).
Rather than rolling dice, all actions are taken care of by drawing cards. This works reasonably well and there’s a bunch of info on the cards governing hits etc, which I have unfortunately left off in the pic below. There’s a sizeable hand management aspect to play. A turn ends when both players pass (I’m playing both sides; there is a solitaire expansion which is impossible to get over here, though there is a print’n’play version available for $15) or when you draw 3 End Turn Cards. Card play becomes second nature fast.
As mentioned, I’ve played a few games to get a handle on the rules, and had a good time. The rule book is not great, so if you are a Tartar for that kind of thing, it could cause some issues. The problems are mainly around finding the correct rule/situation. Having played a few games, I haven’t even engaged fully with all the stuff you can do - for example that first scenario seems to be geared towards close quarters combat and I haven’t done that yet :) Seems like it’s a good game to whip out when you have just an hour to play.
