Which made a certain kind of sense.
The thing is, that spurred an Illuminated Shangri-la to control Japan, and then use the Center for Weird Studies' High Energy Cheese Lab to enable Japan to take control of the Moonies. Which is escalation. Which is never good. Shangri-La tried to calm things down by declaring Peace In Our Time, but the Society of Assassins jumped in; a Hidden City enticed the Big Media on to their side. Once that happened, they were ready to begin their campaign of Political Correctness.
Well, Political Correctness is a form of thought control, and that never goes unanswered. The gnomes launched some Orbital Mind Control Lasers, enacted Gun Control and the Tobacco Companies used the distraction to take over Brazil. The Network tried using their Midas Mill to seduce Al Gore over to their side, but failed, allowing Shangri-La and their new ally Newt Gingrich to assist Japan in winning Gore over to their side.
'Twas but a brief victory, however, as the Big Media used an agent inside the Gore camp to gain the former VP's aligence. This was but the first of many blows to Japan, as a crazed, violent Brazil, obviously under the influence of the Orbital Mind Control Lasers, used a Censorship campaign to assist Big Tobacco in gaining hostile control of Japan, and with them, the Moonies. That was bad enough, and things only seemed to be getting worse when the Network sent a bunch of Wargamers to the Moonbase.
Then all Hell really broke loose. The Assassins sent a sniper after Gingrich, but he failed. Shangri-La gained the support of the Congressional Wives, who in turn narrowly failed to capture control of the Moral Minority, and then declared that to be the first sign of The End Of The World. That appeared to become a fulfilled prophecy when Japan was instantly consumed by a plague of The Oregon Crud, collapsing in upon the Moonies, and destroying both. The Assassins followed up by controlling the Savings & Loan industry, but failed in their attempt to gain control of the Cattle Mutilators due to interference from the Gnomes, who then used their Mind Control Lasers to convince the Wargamers (and Everyone Else) that they (the Wargamers) were in fact a Government Agency. Big Tobacco wanted to control the Government Wargamers, but there was no way that Newt Gingrich would allow that to happen under his "Newt World Order".
With The End of the World still in full effect, it was a little surprising that not just one, but two Meteors narrowly missed the Moonbase.
So it was a narrow, temporary victory for the Gnomes of Zurich.
What does this all mean?
Well, Japan and the Moonies have just been destroyed, and so will be unavailable for our next game, due to Campaign Rules. The next game will also begin with Gun Control and The End Of the World in full effect. Due to cataclysmic upheaval, however, the pre-existing power structures will be smashed.
Fnord.
And, how was the game? Personally, I think that the "One Big Deck" rules (hereafter OBD) that we used certainly make things more unpredictable, as I hope was illustrated in the little narrative above. It was craziness, which was fun in a way. I do think that this method is inferior two using individual "crafted" decks, but is useful to destroy the advantage that can exist when all decks have been assembled by one player. One approach towards streamlining the OBD rules would be just to weed out some wee groups and rarely-useful plots, which I think is something I'll do before teh next round of INWO.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Shemp... It was fun but specialized "rarely useful" cards bogged things down a bit. I think it's worth trying again, though, because it would make the game much more accessible to casual play if we can make the "one big deck" rules work. The addition of campaign rules, added just now it seems, is interesting as well. This game is always a good time, expecially if you take the time to follow the narative of what's happening!!!
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