Technical Specifications
Game: Battle Cry of Freedom
Pub: Decision Games
Des: David Smith
Yr: 2002
Players: 2
Time: 1-3 hours

Overview
BCOF (Battle cry of freedom) is a wargame played completely with cards. There is no map per se nor are there any counters to move around. It is a game about the American Civil War, 1861-1865, both on the strategic and tactical levels. This is a diceless game.

In da box
When you buy the game, you'll get a standard wargame sized box like you would have come to expect in the TSR/Avalon Hill days. Inside you will find 300 playing cards. One deck, with light blue backs, are the Union play deck. The Confederate deck is as one would expect, grey. Additionally, there are reference cards that go in the center of the table that allow you to keep track of which Theater cards are being played in and Command Point tracks. There is another deck of cards with a tan color that are called Battle Cards. A reference sheet and a rule book are included. If I recall correctly there are no markers for CP's for each side, so you have to provide these.

The Rulebook
This item is 24 pages, but don't let this scare you off. The actual rules only take up pages 2-9. After this is an Appendix with a very needed and useful play example. Next come scenario setups (there are 3). Then there are some player notes and finally, there is a long description through the designer's eye about the genesis of this game. I find this last part VERY fascinating, and something that every game would benefit from including.

Unfortunately, the short rules could benefit from some cleaning up. Information is all there, but you have to hunt for it at times. For example, there is information in the glossary section that you only find there instead of replicated in the proper pertinant section of the sequence of play. The glossary is also labeled "key concepts," so is somewhat misleading, because I often think of a glossary as somewhere you can refer to for clarification as needed, instead of an area you really must read straight through.

After a complete readthrough of the rules a couple of times, and with study of the detailed sequence of play and example of play, you should be ready to go.

Gameplay
Its very much out of the scope of this review for me to tell you all the details of the game. The short and sweet is that this is a game of hand management and to some extend bluff. To summarize the key steps however...

The objective of the game is for the the Union to capture all three Victory condition cities (represented on battle cards) before either player has gone through their deck of cards twice. Therefore, it behooves the Rebs to draw lots of cards and delay the Union's ability to capture battle cards. Alternatively, the Union needs 2 victory cities and to play the 1864 elections before second deck expires for either player.

Each turn, players will draw cards to start the turn and then go through a series of phases some of which allow card play to represent strategic and political events of the war and others that represent allocation of resources to the west and/or east theater of operations, and yet others that represent actual combat.

Fog of war is represented by the unknown factor of what cards your opponent holds, and the unknown factor of where they are allocating their command points. These command points become the number of cards that player can draw into their hand for the upcoming battle.

Each turn, the Union will place a 'battle card' which represents what major battle they are seeking. The Rebs can then 'block' that battle by replacing it with a battle that leads up to it. Therefore, the Union will need to fight a series of battles, collecting these blocking cards, until they can fight the big one. There are command point penalties to the losing side, and even worse ones if they lose in a major way.

Cards will list resource/strategic events and/or battlefield tactical events. Each card represents a choice. The top of the card will give one option and the bottom an alternate, but you can only use one or the other. And the usual is that a card will have two excellent options, and you will agonize which you want to use the card for.

Other cards represent generals, which are placed in the west or east and may transfer between them. These generals allow you to use your tactical cards. To get the good attacks, you have to engage a good general. This is abstracted by a number of stars on the card. A 3 star tactical option will require you to engage a 3 star general for example. Once engaged, that general is spent (there are cards however that can be played to give a surprise 'refresh' of the general).

Battle is determined by modifiers. Essentially, you add up positive bonuses and negative factors and find out who wins. The attacker wins if they get a value that exceeds the defenders total. As an example, if I engaged a 2 star leader to play the Union card "XXV Corps assaults in a column of brigades +2" my total at the moment is +2. My opponent could play a special event "Defend: Ridge Crest -2" (which does not require leader activation) which would subtract 2 from the attacker total, and so forth. Play goes back and forth, with each player playing cards until both players pass, which will end the battle.

Outside of the battle sequence, an example of a "Resource Events" might be if the Uinon played "Industrial Production" +1 Command Point. This event increases the CP available to the Union, and therefore increases the draw of cards for battle. Note however, that the same card holds the "Ind Prod" option as well as the "XXV Corps..." option, so you can only use it for one or the other.

I'm sure this isn't entirely clear, but bottom line is that there is a lot of flavor in the game for the Political and Strategic level, as well as giving you the ability to fight individual battles and see pictures of your favorite generals. Yes, the General cards all have a picture of the General on them for extra flavor.

At the end of each turn, players must discard any cards in excess of 9, so your hand may be huge during the turn, but will decrease to a more manageable number by the next turn start. One part of strategy is to draw lots of cards for combat, in an attempt to find good cards you will keep in hand until next turn's resource phase, knowing good and well you may lose the battle regardless.

Card combinations will start to be recognized as you learn the cards during subsequent games, and trying to guess your opponent's direction of play is challenging and fun. Also, cards aren't always 'no brainers' to play so you'll find yourself worrying if now is the time to play a card or not because many card plays are a trade off on something you won't be able to do later if you use it for another effect now. And, some card plays are risky...Emancipation for instance...its not always the best play for the North just 'cause its in your hand.

Support
The game designer is available on consimworld and by email to support his game; Yes, even after 6 years from time of game release.

My Impression
The rules could be better and a second ed. rulebook would really help this game. All the information is there...its just not often where you would expect it. The cards are standard card size and easy to shuffle. The game is completely portable if you decide you need to fight the civil war in a pinch however, you won't be able to fight the war on an airplane tray. You need some table space.

Its a pretty easy game to understand once you get through the rules and play a couple of turns. Strategy is not easy to get a grip on, because you will hold so many damned cards at times during the turn, but after a couple of plays, you'll see the more subtle aspects come alive, as you learn to hold cards in hand for later use and to develop card combinations.

Play from the Union side feels different than the Rebs. You really do feel the time pressure on you as the war enters its second deck. As the Rebels, you really want to hurry through your deck as quickly as you can, and take advantage of your better leadership while it lasts. You'll often be losing battles, but you do so with the intent to just hang on and to try and burn lots of cards.

Each side gets their moment of glory. Deck one will see the Rebs have the ability to put the pinch on the Union, but once you hit deck two, the going gets tough as the Union juggernaut gets rolling.

It can be dizzying at times trying to add up the combat totals, what with all the pluses and minuses, and some of them being conditional modifiers that may lose their effect when the condition in question is no longer met. This part of the game can at times cause a slight headache. I find it easier to keep a running total on a separate piece of paper, AND to make sure you place your cards on the table as you play them such that if they are active they are right side up, but if not, place them sideways.

The game is a very unique mixture of a CCG feel and a wargame. Perhaps the similarity to a CCG is only because the game uses cards only and no dice, but I think the 'activation' of leaders to pay for the battle events gives it that 'spending mana' flavor. Not having a map in front of you will take getting used to if you are used to them...you'll have to keep in mind that the map is abstracted into battle cards. There is no doubt during the game that you are fighting a war though, and you won't forget what its all about while getting into the actual playing of the game. The theme is very well blended with the play.

The components are adequate, but not lots of eye candy. I feel it is spartan a bit, and the symbols for what is a battle event and what is a special event, etc. aren't intuitive. I guess it may not have been possible to add much else to the cards though with so much data on each one. Pictures of the generals on the cards adds lots of flavor, so is a plus.

You can play this game out of the box, after getting grip on the rules, in about 4 hours as a first timer, but I suspect the box listing of gametime is accurate once you know what the heck is going on.

Comparison with Blue vs Grey
There is another card game called Blue vs Grey from QED games/GMT. It too is a card game on the civil war, but it is very different than BCOF. I won't go into any detail on this, but I would say in summary form that you get a totally different experience with each, and its not a matter of owning 'one or the other' BvG does not have the tactical feel you get with this one. BvG is much more of a grand strategy game whereas this game seems to have a nice mix of the grand with the small. Both games have a 'fiddly' component to them, but I think there is a bit more of that in BvG. The chaos factor seems higher in BCOF, and for me this is a plus.

Overall
This is a fun game, and its very replayable because you will get dealt different cards each game. You won't always play the same card for the same choice printed on it, because its so situational. Quality of components is good. Its 40 bucks at DG website, which I think is just a tad high for a game consisting totally of cards. But its a wargame...and the market is restrictive, which means higher overhead. I'd pay 40 bucks for another copy if I had to, having played the game and enjoyed it. Luck comes just in what cards you draw, but there are no dice to piss you off and the winner will almost always be the more skilled player rather than the lucky one. You probably won't play this in 1-3 hours, probably a bit longer for the campaign first few games. This is a sleeper that you really shouldn't miss if you enjoy the civil war.

out of 5
Overall
Replayability
Components/Art (mostly down due to rulebook and lack of markers provided)
Originality
Simulation success 1/2 *
Gameplay

*To expand briefly on sim success - Confederates seem a bit stronger in early war than perhaps they should (but this may be just the way I've played the game and opponent-driven). Also, I would have liked to see a bit more detail on the political aspects of leader placements, esp for the Union, since there seems to be not so much frustration for the Union as I would like to see w/ mule-headed generals. Overall, the game does have a good civil war feel and there is a lot of history packed into the game. This portion of rating subject to increase w/ more plays.