First off, this series is being done as a bit of a lark as wargaming has absolutely nothing to do with Christmas so if anyone is offended, please just stop reading now.
On the 11th day of Christmas War Gaming, my true love gave to me…
11 Union Pacific Railroad Segments Constructed
Plains Indian Wars is a lite dice chucker with fairly simple rules that adopts aspects of the Birth of America Series from Academy Games to create an interesting and challenging game about managing your resources and using your cards wisely to get the best results from your limited opportunities. The game can be played by 1-4 players and each player will take a side involved in this battle for the plains including Northern Plains Indians (NPT), Southern Plains Indians (SPT), southwest and Canadian Indian Tribes known as Enemies, Settlers, Wagon Trains and the mighty US Cavalry. I have heard a lot of talk about how the game is insensitive and doesn’t portray the Native Americans in a good light but I feel totally different. Yes it doesn’t provide a lot of detail on the various cultural aspects of the Plains people but what it does do is gives them a place at the table to fight for the preservation of their way of life. This game will stay in my collection as a lite strategy game with some interesting elements. It is also a beautiful production and well worth the time to learn and play.
The railroad is built on the map from two different directions as at the time the major railroads were in somewhat of a race to be the first to get through their territory and connect up with the other. The Union Pacific begins from St. Louis in the East which is located on the far right side of the board. Cubes for the Union Pacific are built and placed on the board in consecutive spaces starting with the space adjacent to the St Louis Box. The Central Pacific begins from Sacramento and the Rockies in the West at the far left end of the board. Cubes for the Central Pacific are built and placed on consecutive spaces starting with the spaces marked with an M that are adjacent to the Sacramento Box. These M spaces represent the peaks of the Rocky Mountains and have a totally different set of rules that govern their placement. The last completed rail space at each end of the railroad is considered a railhead. Black cubes may be placed to extend the railhead of each railroad when certain conditions are met. A maximum of six black cubes may be placed each turn when the black faction disc is drawn, three per each of the railheads. This placing of black cubes extending the railroad is not inevitable as there are conditions that must be met for successful construction. These conditions differ on each end of the railroad and represent the relative difficulty of each of the projects.
The Union Pacific is built by the black faction which represents the Transcontinental Railroad. This faction works together with the Settlers as they provide the muscle to build the track and must focus on moving their cubes west from St. Louis to the farther point where the line stops called the railhead. When the black disc is drawn, the Settlers player extends the rail line one black cube for every brown cube present in a region adjacent to the railhead—up to a maximum of 3 cubes per railhead. This becomes a numbers game. The Settlers will try to have at least 3 brown cubes in the next available region where the railhead is each turn and the NPT and SPT player has to be aware of this fact and attack those cubes to make sure they cannot progress the railroad 3 full spaces. If the Settlers player is left alone to do what they want to and are not harassed, they can accomplish the railroad in 9 turns with some luck (3 cubes per turn). This becomes a very important timer and all players should be aware of its progress.
I wrote a fairly detailed and in-depth First Impression post for Plains Indian Wars and you can read that at the following link: https://theplayersaid.com/2022/07/26/first-impressions-plains-indian-wars-from-gmt-games/
Here is our video review of Plains Indian Wars:
If you are interested in Plains Indian Wars, you can order a copy from the GMT Games website for $65.00 from the following link: https://www.gmtgames.com/p-654-plains-indian-wars.aspx
You can catch up on the posts in this series to date at the following links:
A Patriot Militia Caught in the Open – Liberty or Death: The American Insurrection from GMT Games
2 Barrages Exploding – SCS Ardennes II from Multi-Man Publishing
3 Columns Shifting – The Russian Campaign Deluxe 5th Edition from GMT Games
4 Relief Convoys Incoming – The Mog: Mogadishu 1994 from White Dog Games
5 Dug-In German Soldiers – Imperial Tide: The Great War, 1914-1918 from Compass Games
6 Zeroes Patrolling – Fighters of the Pacific from Capsicum Games
8 Menominee Warriors Defending – The Battle of Mackinac Island from SNAFU Design
9 Army Groups Advancing – Iron, Blood, Snow & Mud from PHALANX
-Grant
The Players' Aid 