This game wasn’t much to look at, but is notable in the mistakes that were made. Because of this, I’ve decided to present it and then discuss some of the issues involved. This should serve as an excellent learning tool for new players as well as an example of what not to do.

Fremen troops deployed in equal numbers to both False Wall West and False Wall South, leaving Sietch Tabyr undefended.

Starting setup:



Turn 1

The storm crouched on the shield wall like an angry animal, threatening to wipe the shining cities of Man from the face of Arrakis.
A spice blow was detected in the Rock Outcropping and the mechanized wheels of war ground into motion…

A small force of 3 Fremen units marched out of the deep desert to the Rock Outcropping, in a feeble effort to grab the spice. The Emperor wasn’t concerned with the spice at all as he dropped 8 units into his home-away-from-home at Habbanya Ridge Sietch, but the Atreides were having none of it. Paul Muad’dib decided that Atreides troops needed a little target practice and so shipped 4 fresh units to Arrakeen and sent a force of 6 units aboard ornithopters and headed for the Rock Outcroppings.
The Harkonnen shipped 2 units to Carthag and sent a force of 4 units to claim Sietch Tabyr, daring anyone to take it away from them, while the Guild chose only to ship through Sietch Tabyr, moving their force of 6 observers into the Plastic Basin.

Battle 1
In the Rock Outcropping, Gurney Halleck gunned down the Shadout Mapes to win the battle with no losses. The Atreides collected 3 spice from Mapes, 6 spice from the Outcropping, and 2 spice from Arrakeen.

Map at end of Turn 1:



Turn 2

The storm moved to cover Carthag and the spice blew in the Great Flat.

The Emperor, desiring to keep spice out of the hands of his enemies, shipped 7 units to Sietch Tabyr and then moved them onto the Great Flat (using the Hajir). Atreides ambassadors stuck a deal with the Emperor (at gunpoint) for a share of the spice (should he collect any). That done, they moved from the Rock Outcropping to the Plastic Basin to weather the storm and to prod the Guild into action. The Baron shipped 4 units into the newly-won Sietch Tabyr and then moved a force of 5 from Sietch Tabyr to join the Emperor on the Great Flat and the Fremen, not wanting to miss a party, marched a force of 7 onto the Great Flat to challenge both the Emperor and the Harkonnen.
Guild troops on the Plastic Basin, wanting nothing to do with the all-too-dangerous Atreides, cross-shipped to the False Wall South to challenge the Fremen troops threatening their only stronghold.

Battle 1
On the False Wall South, Staban Tuek with his projectile weapon and wailing out “la la la” took on Otheym and his poison weapon. But Staban was a traitor in the pay of the Fremen and so the Guild lost everything. Staban’s only reward was a trip to the tanks.

Battle 2
On the Great Flat, lovely Feyd showed up with his poison weapon and shield, but lowly Bashar pulled out a lasgun and ruined everyone’s day. BOOM!

Map at end of Turn 2:



Turn 3

The storm (now clearly in the pay of the Harkonnen) moved to cover Sietch Tabyr, while the Broken Land produced a spice blow.

The Emperor, content with the mayhem of the recent battle, elected to sit out the turn.
Atreides forces in the Plastic Basin heeded the irresistible siren’s call of the spice in the Broken Land.
One Harkonnen unit shipped into Habbanya Ridge Sietch to have words with the Emperor (clearly fishing for traitors), while the Fremen deployed 6 units (including one Fedaykin) into Sietch Tabyr.
The Guild, not really knowing what to do about events, shipped 2 units into Arrakeen and then moved them into the Imperial Basin.

Battle 1
In Habbanya Sietch, Uman Kudu needed no weapon or defense to remind Caid and his snooper that the Baron was still holding incriminating pictures of him and his Kulon. Caid’s treachery lost the Emperor the sietch.

Battle 2
In Sietch Tabyr, Nefud and Otheym murdered each other, leaving the battle down to the troops – but the Fremen had only committed 1 unit to the battle and so Baron Vladimir Harkonnen emerged victorious.

Map at end of Turn 3:



ANALYSIS

[A couple comments about this analysis being too harsh is all it takes for me to get a clue. Let's see if I can make it more cold and analytical so that no one gets the wrong impression.]

[The analysis given is my opinon only and not meant as a scathing rebuke, but rather as an example of mistakes that were made, why they were mistakes, and how to avoid them. Well, maybe the dialing a one thing deserves a scolding - but that's it.]

The Emperor was being played by a first-time player.
The Fremen were being played by a 'veteran' of 7 games.


Turn 1

As pointed out in my article on Fremen strategy, this was a mistake. His 3 token move was inadequate to discourage other factions from showing up to stomp his grapes and take the spice. A force in the neighborhood of 8 would have been much better, being not only enough to fight off any first turn force but also being a strong enough force to be of use should a worm show up on turn 2, and given that he knew his tokens were in no danger of the storm, it would have been a safer move still.

The second mistake was by the Guild. With no one taking Sietch Tabyr, and a pocketful of spice, he should have moved into the stronghold before the Harkonnen got their hands on it. It is much easier to discourage the Harkonnen from moving into a stronghold that it is to take one away from them once they have taken it. Also, a big move by the Guild would have set them up nicely for the ‘loaded gun’ scenario I’ve discussed in my Guild article. The move into the Plastic Basin was useless and therefore a waste of spice. The Guild needs to keep a careful eye on how they manage spice.

The Atreides were sitting on top of the world after turn 1 with a bucketload of spice, a weapon and a defense, and having held the Harkonnen to one card purchase in the bidding round. The Atreides, Harkonnen and Fremen will all be chasing spice early in the game. If you are playing one of these factions and manage to be the one to grab it, your position will be greatly enhanced.

Turn 2

The Emperor’s move for the spice was entirely reasonable. I won’t debate whether or not it was optimal, but it certainly wasn’t a bad move. His deal to pay off the Atreides 3 spice not to mess with him was also reasonable. It was a battle that he would have lost one way or another, and the already spice-rich Atreides would have just been one small battle away from the Kwisatz even if he managed to wipe them out.

The Harkonnen move for the Emperor was a function of his hand. Holding only four cards (a small hand for the Harks), it wasn’t clear if he was in a position to spend his diminished resources on a fight. His hand was really good though, so we moved to take on the Emperor and grab the much-needed spice.

The Fremen were clearly hoping to pick up whatever scraps were left. He knew (or should have) that the Emperor had to take on the Harks first and so thought that he might have a chance. Why the Harks first? Because the Harkonnen, with his 4 cards and leader-stealing ability, was a much more dangerous opponent than the Fremen with his 1 card. The Emperor would not have been able to take on the Harkonnen after being weakened by the Fremen, so he had to fight the Harks first.
Therefore, the move was an good one. The Fremen had little to lose and everything to gain. Be careful when trying this, but it can pay off it done right (and if you aren't standing next to a lasgun/shield explosion).

The Guild’s move to attack the Fremen was questionable, if not downright foolish. Given the fact that the Atreides and Harkonnen were doing little shipping, I just don’t think that he had the spice to spend on unnecessary attacks. The prospect of thinning (or eliminating) the Fremen presence on the ‘far side’ of Dune is tempting though, and so I can see why he did it. The Guild player admitted afterward that he probably shouldn't have made this move.

The Fremen player was way too quick to call traitor in this battle. He realized it almost immediately after he said it (admitting he got excited). The Guild had dialed a 0 while the Fremen dialed a 4 and both leaders killed each other. That’s 10 spice for leaders and still a Fremen victory. Take a memo boys and girls – always check out the results of a battle before calling a traitor!

The Emperor’s lasgun play was awesome. And by awesome I mean, highly entertaining. He made a mistake in his battle plan (this being his first battle ever) in dialing too low, but I think there were some things he didn’t yet understand and it all turned out okay in any event.

Turn 3

The Atreides, holding a truthtrance in his full hand of cards, waited until the treachery cards were dealt before using the truthtrance to ask the Harkonnen if he had any Atreides traitors. This meant that only 4 cards were dealt and it was fairly easy to keep them all out of the hands of the Harkonnen.

The new guy sitting out a turn was completely reasonable. The Emperor is rarely pressured to do anything, and so little is ever lost when he takes a breath.

The Harkonnen had 2 traitors from the Emperor, and so knew that he had a 50-50 chance to win outright in Habbanya Ridge Sietch. With the storm locking him in at Sietch Tabyr and a good amount of tokens still in Carthag, this was an excellent move – especially given the fact that his cards were all but gone and his spice was running very low.

The Fremen deployed into the storm-covered Sietch Tabyr to prevent the game from ending.

The first battle took place in Habbanya Ridge Sietch. The Emperor had plenty of tokens to kick out the Harkonnen and was holding a Cheap Hero. I wrote a note to the Emperor to remind him to use his Cheap Hero and he indicated that he understood. Unfortunately, being a new player he had forgotten what a “Cheap Hero” was and did and though I was telling him to use a cheap Hero, so he played Caid and lost the battle when the Harkonnen called traitor. Remember new players – KNOW YOUR CARDS. Having discussed Cheap Heroes at length before the game, it hadn’t occurred to me that he might not know what I was talking about. Oh well. I suppose I now know to be much more explicit with new players, but I'm sure his head was swimming with all of the information that he had taken in before and during the game.
Other than the traitor issue, the Emperor’s battle plan was fine. He played a small leader and dialed a 3. He knew (or should have) that the Harkonnen was fishing for a traitor and likely wouldn’t play his single card (which he knew to be a proj weap) against him, and so his total of 5 would beat even the Beast (who would need to dial a 0).

The second battle was a shoe-in. We all told the Fremen player to dial all his tokens (the aggressor Harkonnen had only 3 tokens to the Fremen’s 4). I told him this because I knew that the leaders would likely kill one another (if they both played their weapons – which they would). The leaders did, in fact, kill each other – but the whole table was shocked to discover that the Fremen had only dialed a one!

Now the vets can stop reading at this point (the details will be obvious to them), but new players need to think about these things. Why was this such a bad play? Let’s look at the options…

In the worst case, the Harkonnen kill the Fremen leader and play the Beast Rabban – giving the Harkonnen a total of 6 (they can only play 2 tokens if they want to win). There’s no way the Fremen can beat that, so they just can’t worry about that case – just like they can’t worry about traitors. There’s no accounting for it.

The second case is where the Fremen kill the Harkonnen leader and the Fremen leader lives. Tokens aren’t even necessary for this as most Fremen leaders can win in this case without any tokens at all.

The third case is where both leaders live. The Harkonnen again have a max total of 6, so the Fremen have to come up with a total of 7. They can play Stilgar with 0 tokens; Chani with 1 token; Otheym with 2 tokens; etc.

The fourth case is where the Fremen and Harkonnen leaders kill each other. In this case, it’s just tokens verses tokens, and the Fremen will need at least 3 to beat the 2 that the Harkonnen can field.

So the Fremen can’t win in one case, and can win in the other three by playing a reasonable leader and dialing 3 to cover all three situations. But let’s take this a step further. What happens if the Harkonnen realize they can’t win and just dial a 3? If the Fremen only count on them dialing a 2 then they will lose and the Harkonnen, while not winning the game, can potentially reap 9-11 spice from dead leaders (assuming the Fremen play a big leader). This puts them right back in the game – which is bad. For this reason, the Fremen should just go ahead and dial the last token just to make sure that no nonsense happens. Three of the tokens will come back for free on the next turn (which means that only 5 of his tokens would be in the tanks), so the cost isn’t even that great to practically guarantee that the game will continue.

Playing Otheym with one token, however, loses in THREE of the four cases. The only way that it could win would be if Otheym killed the Harkonnen leader AND survived (and I was trying to indicate to him that that wouldn’t happen).


[Oh well, these things happen. Just remember to do the math before you reveal your battle plan, and take in as much information as you can from the other players - especially when the game is on the line.

Hope this ammended version is kinder than the first. Writing the strategy articles has gotten me in an analytical mode, and I'll have to go back and point out some of the heinous mistakes that I'VE made in the past.]