Critical Collapse

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Version 2.37a

Overview

All of these "rules" are subject to modifications, if you want to change something or add something new please do, think of them as an outline.

Critical Collapse is a game that all the players, a few, one or even no one can win at. One will find many similarities to other strategy board games, computer sim games, role-playing games and even real life games, so in this respect Critical Collapse is not unique, and yet each gaming session is quite unique. Each player assumes the role of the entire government of a nation, setting the direction and attitude of the nation they are creating. Game play elements include; Sponsored and Independent Foreign Aid, Intelligence and Counter Intelligence Operations, Technical, Economic and Military Research, Economic System dynamics, World Market, Open and Private Markets, Ecological and Global Disasters and Solutions, Strategic Warfare, Politics, Thievery and Diplomacy.

The playing field or game board was originally a fictitious world with fictitious continents, but was changed in version 2.27+ to a map of our world. The change was made to set a greater connection between the players and the game, originally I had wanted to allow the players freedom from preconceived political influences, but I had to revise my position on that concept because they are factors that do influence our decision process, real or imagined

The core mechanics of the game are its Economic Point system and Political Point system, EP's and PP's for short.

EP's are the life blood of the game. One accomplishes everything with EP's, from research to bribery. EP's are the currency of each nation; some nations will have more so obviously some will have less.

Political Points represent everything from a Nation's morale to governmental efficiency, regulations and propaganda. Political Points influence not only the social and financial destiny of a Nation but also the fate of the game world. A good analogy of Political Points is that of a barometer of the attitude of a nation and the game world. Political Points are dynamic, that is they are always in a state of flux. During a single game turn Political Points will rise and fall many times. There two types of Political Points, Positive and Negative.

Positive Political Points can be spent to increase rolls for certain Resources and Research, attacking combat units, defending combat units, development and or disposal of nuclear and biological weapons, space technology, Intelligence and Counter Intelligence Operations, and the negation of Negative Political Points.

Negative Political Points may be nullified by Positive Political Points if the player wishes to do so, and although it is advised to do so, many players take their chances with the accumulation of Negative Political Points. The danger lies in the insidious nature of Negative Political Points. At first Negative Political Points may seem harmless with the loss of a few EP's or a Conditional Unit here and there, but eventually they can lead to social deterioration, Terrorism (non-state threats) and even revolution.



Playing Pieces

Dice will be covered later, for the most part they are self explanatory.

The player is presented with six classes of playing pieces, Industrial, Resource, Military, Nationality, War and Conditional.



Each player has a unit that identifies territories they own, these are known as Nationality Units of which there are eight, and their sole purpose is a declaration of ownership. A territory (hex) that contains a Nationality Unit belongs to the player that has that color and letter.




Since Critical Collapse can also be a game of war there are seven basic playing pieces known as Military Units. Infantry, Armor, Sea-Transport, Air-Transport, Missiles, Sponsored Foreign Aid and Independent Foreign Aid.

There are seven basic Industrial Units each for the eight nations and for the Independent Foreign Aid Nation which only comes into play under special conditions. They are the University, City, Mining, Refinery, Factory, Bio-City and Bio-Factory. Although Industrial Units are not Military Units or Resource Units, they do complement or inhibit each other. Some Military Units and Resource Units are dependent upon Industrial Units. Some Industrial Units are dependent upon Resource Units.



Resource Units influence nearly every playing piece in the game and fuel the Economic System. Without Resource Units many playing pieces cannot be made or moved. There are four types of Resource Units.

Conditional Units come into play under special conditions, such as radiation from nuclear war, global freezing etc. The players may or may not be responsible for Conditional Units coming into play. There are ten types of Conditional Units. Conditional Events are going to happen, after the first turn there is a one chance in 20 of a possible Event taking place. On turn 3 there are two chances in 20 of a possible Event, and so on. By turn 20 an Event or multiple Events will most likely have happened, although it is possible that the players can make it to turn 20 without an Event occurring it is highly unlikely.
The Game (World) Board, is representation of our real world. There are continents and oceans that separate the land masses from each other, there are polar ice caps (these have to be placed on the board however). For all general purposes it is our world but without the preconceived concepts of national boarders that exist on our world. The board is where the much of all play is visualized. Sea spaces are blue, land territories are green. You may wish to create your own map and add current issues, one source of info for this is below.

World Conflict Map:This site aims to help shed light on wars and other armed conflicts around the globe. It contains summary information, links to more resources, and, most importantly, continuously updated lists of relevant news articles. We hope to make it easier to learn where wars are happening, who's involved, and what's going on right now, especially for smaller conflicts that may not be well covered in large media outlets. For those with a specific interest in conflicts, we hope to make it easier to follow the large volume of news in this field. Link below.

ConflictMap






The Markets

The Markets are divided into three types; the World Market, the Open Market and the Private Market. There is actually a fourth member of the Market, the World Bank, which we will discuss later.

The World Market is where Resources from every part of the game world can be bought and/or sold, this is done through a bidding process. Some sources are evident such as the player's nations, other sources are more abstract such as territories not controlled by the players. The market value of Resource Units on the World Market is fairly stable and usually quite predictable. Bidding or selling is done before the actual Market value of the Resource Unit(s) are known (with the exception of insider information gained through Intelligence Operations).

The Open Market is where players auction Resource and or Military Units to each other to the highest bidder. Delivery of the products and EP's are instantaneous to the buyer and seller.

The Private Market is where a player is selling a product to another player and wants no one else involved with the negotiation. For physical products such as Units, the delivery must be done with a Sea, Land or Air-Transport during the player's Movement Phase of the turn. For anything else the delivery is instantaneous. The type of products the players may sell to each other on the Private Market is limited only to the imagination of the players (of course they must posses the information, product or capability in order to offer it. Examples include; One or more of one's territories, Levels of Research, EP's and Positive Political Points. The danger of the Private Market is that somebody may fail to deliver the promise!

The World Bank, a part of the World Market and at the same time apart from the World Market. The World Bank is probably the potentially most powerful entity in the game with the exception of the players and Conditional Events. If a player has EP's in the World Bank, even if the player doesn't own a single territory, the player is still in the game.

Economic, Technical and Military Research

These three research categories (ER. TR and MR) are needed to insure the survival of the Game World, ironically they can also be a catalyst that ends the Game World. Levels of Research cost the players EP's, there are also prerequisites that must be met in order to utilize some of the options each Level of Research offers.

The Player Record Sheet and Charts.

The Player Record Sheet is a tool to assist the player with the vast amounts of information that will be accumulated during play. It is important to keep accurate records because the other players are allowed to view each other's sheets to insure integrity of play. The Charts facilitate many of the rules by simplifying them down to their essentials.

The game is turn based on phases, each turn is divided into 20 phases some of these phases have sub-phases. When the players complete all the phases in a turn this completes a turn cycle. There is no accurate measurement of time in game terms for a turn. A turn could represent a century, a year, a month and even final minutes. It is all relative to the participants and always will be.

Victory Conditions are quite simple, Survive for 20 turns. Although quite simple in concept it is the players whom create the odds.

Well this completes the general overview, you now have a vague concept of the elements of the game theme and its mechanics.


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