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In Ideologoy: The War of Ideas, each player represents one of the 20th Century's most powerful Ideologies: Capitalism, Communism, Fascism, Imperialism, and Islamic Fundamentalism.
Beginning with one global region completely under its sway, each Ideology uses Military, Economic, and Cultural Influence cards to purchase advancements, devolop controlled regions, and gain control of new regions. The Ideology that chieves the highest global influence wins the game!
Ideology is a brisk, interactive strategy game for 2-5 players ages 12 and up. Usually plays in 1-2 hours.
Contents:
1 World Map
225 Influence Cards
85 Advancement Cards
43 Region Cards
5 Ideology Cards
100+ Counters
1 Rule Book
$24.95 (US)
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After readind the back of the box, how could I not want to pick this up? So I did. Fast forwards a few months, I was finally able to play it.
First thing I loved about this game. Randomness is almost completely absent. The only radom element is in the resource cards you use to improve your controlled regions, gain control of independent ones, replace other players influence cards, and upgrade your technology. But with only 3 kinds of influence; Military, Economic, and Cultural. Its really not all that big of a deal, and since you can discard and draw equal to the number of regions you control, its even less of an issue. But you can have a bad turn with them. It's just rare.
The goal of the game is to be the first nation to get a global influence of 12. You do this by gaining control of regions, spending influence to make them worth more, and building WMDs. Simple enough goal.
Each of the five Ideologies has one technology already learned, a boon and a bane. Each Ideaology is pretty balanced in larger player games, but in a two player game, the book recommends balanced pairs.
Each turn consists of 8 different phases:
The first two phases, Resource, and Trading, allow you to draw cards equil to your global influence, and discard some to draw others. So if you need Ecomics, and all you draw is Military, you can discard some military and hopefully get some ecomics. Usually you do. Unless its late game, and most of your cards are already on the table.
Each player, starting with the person with the most global influence gets to devolop his regions, and buy tech advancements, or a WMD.
After this phase, is the foreign phase. During this phase, a new region is added to the independent area, then each player may add influence to it one card at a time. You can also remove influence from oppenent controlled nations to devalue their property.
The conflict phase is next. Its kind of a bidding system where you can replace an influence card of an opposing Ideolody with your own. Gaving you more control over the region. Should you ever have more influence in a region any other player, you control it. So if Communism has 3 influence in Canada, Capitalism has 2 and Imperialism has 2, Communism has control over it. Should Capitalism be able to replace one of Communisms influence there, it would become the propery of the Capitalists. It may sound confusing becuase I'm terrible at discribing things, but its really simple. Also in this phase, you may fire a WMD. This removes 3 Influence cards from any adjacent region that you control. Making the nuked region worth less. Possably stopping someone from winning.
Fallowed by Diplomacy, There is where all the players talk about their relations. There are three levels of relations. Peace, nuetral and war. Each level allows for different kinds of conflicts. While at peace, you can only do Cultural conflicts, while nuetral you can also do Economical, and war enables War aswell as the other two. So the more peaceful you are with another Ideology, the less you have to worry about conflict wise.
Assesment and the Turn Order phases are counting points, and compairing them. Highest Global Influence goes first in any turn taking phases, so all the other players can see what the world super power does, to make it easier to plot against him. If you have 12 global influence in this phase, you win.
And thats a very basic over view of the game. Its more complex, though not much more. There is alot of stratagy involved, and you have to keep track of your resources. That is the hardest part of the game. I lost the second game because I forgot I had so much invested in I believe South Africa. If I pulled out my influence, it would have been worth less, and I could have won :P
The game could be considered really dry. As its 2 hour playing length, and lack of options may turn some off. But the simplicaty combined with the stratagy involved really makes this title shine for me. And again, little randomness makes it more of a thinking game. Something I truely enjoy.
The only complaint I have against the game is the components. A large map that is way to big to be practical, and it's useless anyways. All it is there for is keeping track of what Ideology controls what region. But I can see who controls what by looking at their region cards. Its not hard to keep track of mentally. On the sides of the map are a Turn Order reference for keeping track of who goes first, a Phase Summery, and a Diplomacy Chart. The Turn Order at the top is useless, As people can generally remember who goes in what order. In two games, it was never an issue. The Phase Summery is also pretty much useless. Each Ideology card has a phase summery on it. The one on the map goes into a little more detail. For example:
On the Map: Resource Phase (simultaneous). Draw or discard Influence cards until your hand size = Global Influence (sum of all Conrolled Regions' Development Levels +WMD's)
On the Card: Resource Phase (simultaneous). Draw Influence Cards.
Not that much use. Atleast I dont think so.
The Diplomacy Chart is acually useful. Keeps track of the three levels of diplomacy between all 5 Ideologies. As it seriously effects how the game is played, I wish they inclused one not in the map. But as it is, I just semi fold out the map to get that chart.
The resource and tech cards are small card stock. The size isnt a bad thing, as if they where larger it would take up more space on the table. And I cannot comment on how they will look in a few years. Hopefully well. And they give you enough of them usually isnt a problem... Untill late game, where everyone is at 8-11 influence. Me and my friend both ran out of cards to draw. But there was enough to win the game. I'm not sure if I could say the same. Another 9 cards per Influence deck would have been nice.
Overall: Best $30 I ever spent. I can see this providing lots of great fun over the years, and No stress due to bad luck. If you draw a crap load of military, just increase your Military Influence where ever you can, or military conflits. Sure it can hinder your plans, but unlike some games, a bad run of luck for a turn will not destroy all chances of winning. Infact, that was one of the biggest praises at the table. Also the stratagy allows for all sorts of good tactical choices, and bad ones too. Another one is that it would be hard to eliminate a player from the game. So there isn't much threat of someone not doing anything for an hour as the rest of the group finishes up.
Bottom Line: If you enjoy strategy, and diplomacy. I highly recommend this game. If you are more into rolling dice, and face paced action, look for a different title, and this will have little to keep you interested.
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Posted Sun Jan 30,2005 04:33 pm
