Across the series, each player controls either Axis or Allied forces. Your specific units are represented by tokens on the board, and those tokens are controlled by cards. Each round, both players draw a hand of four cards, choosing one to discard as a bid for initiative. Highest initiative goes first, which can be a big deal depending on the state of the board. It’s almost always better to be setting the immediate terms than it is to be responding to them. The Undaunted titles are what many of my wargaming friends call hidden gems. Some would argue they are not “true” wargames. This comes down to what you consider to constitute war, and wargames in general. Undaunted: Reinforcements is a modular expansion that introduces a range of new rules, scenarios, and units. Unleash the might of the German and American tanks and see how your new squad options fare against them in Undaunted: Normandy, or make use of mines, assault aircraft, and other new units as you attempt to outfox your opponent in Undaunted: North Africa. Whether you have one Undaunted game or the other, with Reinforcements you can play for the first time in a four-player mode, or test your mettle in a solo mode by Dávid Turczi and David Digby. There’s two main ways to do war on the tabletop. Many like to attempt a simulation. Hundreds of tokens or miniatures, rules for every part of the conflict from reloading to morale, and a sense of a complete machine being turned by your hand. The other is abstraction, focusing on the broad strokes and, in truth, getting to the most meaningful parts of conflict.

DT: One thing that also helped us, I think, is that Duncan Malloy [who signed the game to Osprey Games] actually commissioned Undaunted: North Africa before Normandy was ever even released. So Trevor and I have worked on Undaunted games two years out. We were done with the design for North Africa before Undaunted: Normandy released. Having that prepped and ready to within a year of Normandy being well received and released, I think that helped, too. This also makes the choice of objectives to pursue important. Is that weakly defended structure the Itallians have already taken control of a better target, or getting into a firefight over a two point objective which, if they capture it, wins them the scenario. Destroying either prevents the win. Which one provides better odds? guidare che ci permette di spostarci nelle tessere che lo consentono (alcune sono inaccessibili ai veicoli);A big thing in terms of the design was making sure they added to the game, but they didn’t take over the roles of any of the existing stuff. We experimented with allowing them to control things, but if they can do that, it makes the rifleman less relevant. And they have a decent suppress, but it’s not as good as the Machine Gunner suppress action. So we had to make sure that all of the other units still have their place.

Everything you loved about Undaunted: Normandy is here, with polish, and a sprinkle of novel new features. There are few war games that are accessible while remaining ‘truly’ a war game. This one is nearly perfect, and with enough community scenarios in the future, might be the only one you need. PLAY IT? MUST-PLAY When we finished, I felt drained. It was a mighty battle, and we talked for hours afterwards about what we had just done. What it must have been like. How we were astounded how little we both knew about this part of the War. And how we really wanted to just play again! “This is a war of people and causes.” With how much we enjoyed playing Undaunted: Normandy, and with us both having ownership of a copy of Undaunted: North Africa (I’m still needing to get Normandy at some point…), we decided a few weeks ago to do a PBEM (actually, text…) of the first scenario in Undaunted: North Africa. Carl had things ready long before I did, and was all excited, asking who would be the fascists – well, I didn’t know which side that was but I had the higher roll so I was pegged to be them…and would later learn that I had Italy – and we played the game in relatively short time. The PBEM works well with this one, assuming neither of us cheats the system on revealing our initiative cards. I trust Carl enough to roll with it. The differences between the featured factions are more pronounced than they would have been in Normandy.Undaunted: North Africa is the second, and driest, installment in the series. The moisture content in this box, when compared to the beaches of Normandy or the snow-covered streets of Stalingrad or the skies above Great Britain, is objectively lower. There are other things to consider when choosing a board game, of course, but it feels worth specifying that you’ll want a tub of Pond’s and some Neutrogena sunscreen handy. As David says we need more plays. We typically shoot for five prior to doing the actual review. This is true with the Undaunted series as different units are introduced over the course of play. David mentioned that as the LRDG (British) you often get VP for blowing up buildings. This can be done by certain units such as engineers and sabouters. In the first scenario you haveoneengineer. The need to guard and protect units becomes very important. Osprey games and designers Trevor Benjamin and David Thompson are on to a winner with this series. I can see this running for many more years. There are so many stories to tell, and this mechanic does justice to not only the stories that unfold, but also the genre and industry. This game has done, and will continue to, open modern tabletop gaming to many more players over many more years. And in doing so, will keep alive the memory of the many people who made the ultimate sacrifice. I for one will follow this series closely and hope to play them all in their entirety. Undaunted: Reinforcements really brings the design for Normandy and North Africa to conclusion. It allows us to give players what they've been asking for from the first days of Normandy 's release. From the both of us, as well as Dávid Turczi, David Digby, and the entire Osprey team, we hope you all are as excited to play Reinforcements as we are!