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Win with purple - a roman job


The latest games played during the French Britannia Championship '97 showed that a purple victory is quite possible, even though it might be achievable only for the better - or luckier - players. Each purple victory originated from good cooperation between all purple peoples, especially between Scots & Romans.

More than with all other colors, the purple player has coordinate the actions of his different peoples without sacrificing the points of one for the other. The other key to victory is exercising control of the general direction of play with his few counters on the map. It needs a good evaluation of forces and a superior understanding of the game to nudge the game to a profitable direction for him.

From another point of view, it might be interesting to give purple to an apprentice player in order to teach him the tricks of the trade and the different strategies of his peoples showing up on the map.

Of the different purple peoples the Romans are the most important in the eyes of most players. They plunge three out of four players right into the action at the start of the game and fight the first decisive battles. I will therefore show you in this article a good timetable for the roman invasion.

This timetable takes into account the contradictory aims of the purple player (building as many forts as possible, cripple the Picts & come back in time to protect the forts in the south) and the roman forces (the strong but too few legions and the more vulnerable forts, if left undefended).

  • Turn 1 (major invasion) : Destruction of the Belgae (and all of the Belgae!), driving back the Welsh to their native mountains, taking the Pennines & make the Brigantes submit. If possible during the second move, attack Devon to impress the Welsh & deprive them of a reinforcement during their second turn.

  • Turn 2 : All out attack versus the Brigantes to get their submission (or extermination), taking Dunedin and Dalridia or Alban if things go well, as a special bonus, have a little preemtive strike at the Welsh...

  • Turn 3 : Taking of Alban & Dalridia, attacking concentrations of pict forces (in order to make it easier for the Scots to get ashore), getting back to defend the southern forts from turn 4 on & being able to submit the Welsh. A courtesy visit to the Caledonians might be amusing if not lucrative...

  • Turns 4 & 5 : Surviving the raiders on all coasts, pushing them back to the sea if they settle down and hold Downlands, Lindsey & Pennines (Devon too) to make the installation of the Romano-British easier.

    Romain
    This timetable is ideal (should be, at least) and might be actually applied by somebody, sometime. I would be quite surprised if I managed it, but I continue to hope...

    The Roman plays versus time & population increase of the other peoples at the start, later he plays for his forts. The principal weakness of the Romans is their inability to stage large concentrations of troops because of the large number of territories they have to conquer & hold in order to score their points.

    The Romans succumb to the numbers, which has, at least in part, been the historical evolution of things. Some well placed stacks of enenmy counters can bind a large number of legions and prove fatal to all Roman strategies. Also during turns 4 & 5, raiders attack the forts at numerical superiority, even when they're protected by a legion...

    To migitate these inconveniences, there's one solution: the eradication. In the first place the one of opposing peoples in order to be left alone, in the second that of raiders before they attack more forts. In all cases the purple player has to reign the british plains and to keep them safe (at least until turn 5).

    Francois Sommaire
    July 1997

    Translation by Joachim Ring
    January 2000