Imperial. The Euro-themed Euro from 2006 that celebrates “circular wandering.” But seriously – I doubt many have heard of this in-your-face masterpiece from Mac Gerdts. If you’ve never played Imperial, you’re not alone. In fact, you are probably picturing Twilight Imperium – the Ameritrash space epic that combines multiple worlds including Star Wars, Dune and the hit musical Cats – you just know those penny-pinching Hacan Emirates lack buttholes.
But Imperial is nothing like that. Instead of following fictional characters throughout the galaxy, you play as the actual immoral rich European whites who accidentally triggered World War I. They, however, had buttholes. Big ones that swallowed up history with their aptitude for “Peace through violence.” The game takes place during those months just before that beloved bullet magnet, Franz Ferdinand, set the record for “Most assassinations avoided on the same day as he was assassinated.” A real pro that one.
It is a war game with no random elements besides human nature. It is a war game in which you can control your enemy. A war game where you don’t want a real war to start. But most importantly, it’s a war game where the rich rule, and the petty flourish.
Gameplay
Imperial is a war game between the 6 pre-WWI European nations (Austria-Hungary, Italy, France, Great Britain, the German Empire, and Russia). Countries take turns in a set order – the player who has the most bonds in the country controls the country’s turn. It is possible to control more than one country and it is possible to lose control of your only country. On a country’s turn, the controlling player will advance its action token along a roundel. The piece can advance 1-3 spaces clockwise, only taking the action space it lands on. Additionally, players can advance it 4-6 spaces, instead, if the player pays out of their own pocket. The actions are:
- Factory: The country spends its own money to build a factory
- Production: Every factory the country owns produces one combat unit
- Maneuver: Every combat unit owned by the country moves one space. If pieces move onto enemy pieces, they are both eliminated at a 1:1 ratio. If they move into a neutral area with no enemies, they gain control of the territory and will score points during the taxation action.
- Import: The country spends its own money to purchase specified units (Including ones it can’t normally produce). If a country needs boats and does not have the correct factory, this action could import boats.
- Investor: The country pays each player that has bonds in the country. The higher the bonds, the more the player receives.
- Taxation: This action is the heart of the game. When the country takes this action, its territories and factories are added up and affect the following:
- How much its bond’s VP value raises.
- How much money the country earns.
- How much bonus money the controlling player earns.
The Investor and Taxation actions are the most important actions in the game. The Investor action directly helps players – the taxation action raises the country’s VP value.
The investor action is also how players buy more bonds. It is the ONLY action that is triggered even when it is passed over. At that moment, the player holding the “Investor Tile” will buy one bond of any country and of any value they can afford. The tile is then passed clockwise. These are the moments that a country’s controller may change.
Players will combat for territories, buy bonds in any country they wish, and use the taxation action when the country is sitting pretty. The game ends when one country reaches the end of the VP track. Players calculate the value of every bond they have – most VP is the winner.
1ST CLAW - Plan or Plunder
Imperial’s 1st claw strikes during the first round – a country can begin the game on ANY space of the action roundel. One country may begin by building a factory to ensure a larger army over time. Another might say f*ck planning and immediately produce from their starting factories to strike first. Or one may use Import to craft their first army. Or, if a player wishes to steal control of another player’s country, they can choose Investor and rob the country blind. It happens more often than you think.
The 1st claw highlights human nature’s mercurial drive and shows why dice and cards are not needed to create unpredictability. Ambition and bluffing do enough. Once each country’s action piece anchors to an action, their following turn becomes limited to one of the three next spaces on the roundel. This helps players calculate what each country’s controller might do next, but there is another factor that helps you gauge more accurately – the loyalties of each player.
All bonds are public. If the controlling player of Germany also has bonds in Britain and France, the player is less likely to strike those countries – those bonds will be worth more VP if the country does well. If the Russian controller has bonds in Britain and Russia, Germany may be the meat of their upcoming sandwich. The limitations of the roundel, the bonds a player controls, and the wealth that has been divided out by the Investor action allows you to make estimated guesses about each country. But leave it to human nature to throw it all into the grinder and leave you drop jawed as one player makes one wildly greedy move.
2ND CLAW - Combat and Upheavals
Since combat in Imperial is simply death at a 1:1 ratio, battles are quick and never slows the game. Such speedy combat can create reactionary moments that make your friends look like they’ve gone braindead. If Britain strikes Germany and wipes out their boats (Which can begin and end in 5 seconds), Germany will go next in the turn order and, well, may build more boats as a show of strength . . . instead of striking France like everyone thought. This, of course, surprises France and allows that player to act with impunity. A bewildered player is never in their right mind. Chain reaction after chain reaction of quick turns can mutate the landscape in only a few minutes.
The 2nd claw also puts a spotlight on the leaders. If a player has pulled off a dominating move, like controlling all of northern Africa, then almost assuredly two kinds of enemies will coalesce against them. One enemy is the alliance of every player who has no bonds (or very little bonds) in the powerhouse country. These players WILL inadvertently team up to strike. The other new enemy are the players who DO have bonds in the empowered country. Cause if they ever have a chance to buy enough bonds to steal control, you d*mn well know they will.
The rise and fall of leading countries is the beating heart of the 2nd claw. Sudden alliances and usurpers form and disappear in the span of only a few minutes. It truly is a joy to watch the drama undulate between players, with each crashing wave capped off by a unique concept in Imperial – A country may suddenly have a new controller, and every decision made earlier has no value. A new sheriff can appear in town at any minute, and suddenly France’s enemies become their friends while Britain will be hellbent on destroying them next turn.
THE BITE - Roundel Race
With so many wild moments, it can be hard to know who truly is winning. But those who THINK they have the win will undoubtably initiate the finale. The bite of Imperial is usually a lone power move carried out by a player who thinks their war machine is big enough. Each country has been rising along the power tack (which dictates how much VP a country’s bonds are worth). This amount is raised whenever a country takes the taxation action. And anyone who has ever played a point salad game knows how these things end – a spamming of VP actions.
The bite chomps down when a player dishes out the cash needed to move their action piece further around the roundel, hunting that taxation action as much as possible. An almost unavoidable flaw in this rush to win is that you attack, and produce units, less. Their territories become blood in the water and others will strike in the hope of slowing them down.
This is also when some players, who have bonds in the powerhouse country, will also actively slow them down. The controlling player always has the most bonds (And therefore the most VP), and so the other investors may need some time to let their other assets rise. Suddenly, a three player team becomes two against one.
The end becomes a multifaceted race: a race to taxation, a race to take territories, a race to becoming the richest using the investor action. Combat becomes more sacrificial, money becomes more valuable (As left over money is VP), and risks become more viable. Like many games I cover in this blog, Imperial’s fast paced action and tension never slows down.