by ChubbsS
10 Reasons Why I Enjoy Conquest of the Empire II1. The Diplomacy – The diplomacy rules in the new edition, in my opinion, the best part of the game. Players bid on alliances and turn order every campaign season. Players are forced into alliances with others unless they pony up enough talents to outbid someone else. In a recent session involving 6 players I saw the bids for the 3rd campaign season go up to 40 talents or more each time. That means that players are spending money to make alliances, break alliances, or put themselves in a certain play order. Nothing crushes the best laid plans better than suddenly being allied with a player you had planned on crushing.
2. The influence system – This is the meat and potatoes of the ruleset. A player becomes master of Rome by having the most Victory Points. Players gain VP by having influence in key provinces in the Mediterranean. Influence can be bought in a province when that provinces token is pulled at the beginning of a campaign season. A player replaces the unclaimed one with one of their own. The most fun part of the game is when a player buys an opposing players influence. This happens when a player does not have any troops to protect his/her influence tokens. At the end of each campaign whoever has the most influence tokens collects VP. Italia is worth the most at 25 but other provinces are usually worth 15 or 10. The player with the second most influence in areas also collects VP too but usually only at 5 VP.
3. The Senate Vote cards – The cards are very handy and can play an important role in the game. There are 5 cards which must be bought by players. Once owned a player can call a vote on the card they possess. I have seen many a game tipped in favor of one player or another due to vote cards. The cards add extra events to the game and really captures the importance of controlling Rome and the senate. The best part thing about the cards is that they can be used every campaign season.
4. Limited Actions - Each campaign season is limited to 4 turns and a games lasts only 4 or 5 campaign seasons. Players are only allowed to perform 2 actions per turn. This really limits the amount of things that a player can make and really makes decision making important. I like the limit because it means that a player has to make sure they are committed to the action they perform. It makes the game intense! I always have a dozen actions I want to perform but can only settle for 2. Do I buy up the unclaimed influence in Asia? Do I invade Italia with my forces? Do I take the senator card and hopefully use it win a vote? So many options. Not enough actions.
5. The Event Cards - A player uses an action on their turn to claim an event card. These cards can help out in a number of different ways. My favorites are the barbarians at the gate cards. Players either get free money, troops, or victory points by claiming these cards. Some other good ones are army training, ally cards, build a city, or senator cards. A recent game saw a player build two cities in the first campaign season. This meant he was making more money at the end of every season and was controlling the alliance bidding almost every turn.
6. Simple Combat rules - The combat rules are quick and easy. In a large scale games like CotE II it makes battle quick and decisive. A player rolls 3 dice and adds one if their army is accompanied by a leader, and add another one if you have army training. A player just has to match symbols on the dice to the kind of troops they have to cause hits. Easy as that!
7. The Map – The Map is huge! And totally awesome! The map is easy to read although only the important provinces see much action in the game the map looks great!
8. The Chaos points system – Players accumulate chaos for doing thing that the people don't like or by loosing battles. The easiest way to make the masses hate you is by taxing them. The big drawback to having a lot of chaos is that the player with the most chaos at the end of a campaign season looses 10 victory points and the second highest looses 5. This means that players have to watch their accumulated chaos or suffer penalties. I have seen a game lost by a player because they lost 10 VP due to high chaos.
9. The figures – I love miniatures and Eagle Games made some pretty cool figs to play the game with. The legionnaires are my favorites. The classic legionnaire armed with a pilum and shield looks good on the table. The only downside is that they do not paint up very well since they are soft plastic. Also the plastic talents are really cool too!!
10. It Rome! - I enjoy the ancient Roman era and Eagle Games has made a fun game that focuses not only on the violent nature of ancient Rome but also how important diplomacy is. The game captures the crazy and hectic nature of the era.