User:Macaddct1984/sandbox/COIN board games

A game of Cuba Libre in progress; played using a Vassal module.

COIN (short for COunterINsurgency) is a series of multiplayer asymmetric strategy board wargames simulating historic insurgency and counter-insurgency conflicts and irregular warfares throughout the world. It is published by GMT Games.

An example of COIN games is Cuba Libre, which is set in the Cuban Revolution during 1957-1958 and has the players take the role of factions struggling for control of Cuba. Another example is Pendragon: The Fall of Roman Britain, which simulates the decline of Roman Britain in the 5th century through the power struggle between the post-Roman army, Briton lords, and invading barbarians.

The series has been noted for its innovative and dynamic gameplay, compared to more traditional hex-and-counter two-player wargames. GMT Games publishes the games and releases new titles through its P500 system, and maintains several new COIN games in development pipeline at a given time.

Most of the published titles are available for playing through Vassal Engine modules.

Game

COIN games simulate past and ongoing historical insurgencies and counter-insurgencies by pitting up to four players against each other. Each player controls a different faction with unique powers, resources, and play styles while striving to achieve different winning conditions. All games in the COIN series share the same underlying system designed by game designer Volko Ruhnke, first found in Andean Abyss, the original game of the series.

All of the games are playable solo. Non-player rules are included for players who wish to play by themselves, or for playing the game with fewer than the maximum number of players. The non-player rules enables a non-player-controlled faction to participate in the game based on a predetermined set of actions.

Components

Components of a COIN game include a board depicting the map of the region relevant to the theme of each game which serves as the main play area. The board contains divisions of the regions and specific localities such as cities, settlements, economic centers, and spaces for building fortifications. Some also features roads or lines of communications (roads, highways, oil pipelines, etc.) which players may interact with. Bordering foreign regions are also included where relevant to the gameplay, such as for the purpose of foreign aids, overseas raiding, and more.

Other components are wooden colored player pieces, a deck of Event cards, player aids, cardboard chits or tokens, a rulebook, and a playbook. The rulebook explains the rules of play in detail, while the playbook provides example plays with turn-by-turn explanation and analysis, historical contexts, game variants in form of scenarios, and notes from the designers.

Gameplay

COIN games offers several unique playable factions. Often, each has different objectives, pieces, resources, available actions, and/or starting positions. They represent their forces and holdings by placing and removing their pieces on the board, while adjusting states such as support/opposition level, victory condition progress, and amount of resources left.

All games in the series are notable for not using a hand of cards, unlike many card-driven wargames. Instead, Event cards are revealed from the deck as the game progresses, which gives bonuses or detrimental effects to players and/or break the normal rules. They also dictate the turn order of players. Some Event cards benefit or damage a specific faction, or grants effects which may become an advantage or disadvantage depending on the game state.

Players conduct their actions to further their agendas and achieve their objectives, such as having control in several regions or collecting a set amount of resources. The action selection system limits the actions a player may take depending on what the previous players did. Players may choose to execute their full actions at the risk of the next player getting the advantage of the current Event card, or vice versa. The available actions (termed in-game as Operations/Commands and Special Activities) range from marching units to a different region, terrorizing a local city, training new soldiers, attacking enemy units, and many more.

Several special cards shuffled in a prescribed way into the deck of Event cards determines the game flow while causing unpredictability. The appearance of the special cards mandates a special round (called Propaganda rounds, Coup rounds, Epoch rounds, etc. depending on the game) where victory conditions are checked and some states are changed or reverted.

Different game scenarios modifies the length of the game, starting conditions, victory conditions, and many more.

List of COIN games

Volume	Title	Published	Conflict
I	Andean Abyss	2012	Colombian conflict
II	Cuba Libre	2013	Cuban Revolution
III	A Distant Plain	2013	War in Afghanistan (2001–2021)
IV	Fire in the Lake	2014	Vietnam War
V	Liberty of Death: The American Insurrection	2016	American Revolutionary War
VI	Falling Sky: The Gallic Revolt Against Ceasar	2016	Gallic Wars
VII	Colonial Twilight: The French-Algerian War, 1954-62	2017	Algerian War
VIII	Pendragon: The Fall of Roman Britain	2017	End of Roman rule in Britain
IX	Gandhi: The Decolonization of British India, 1917-1947	2018	Indian independence movement
X	All Bridges Burning: Red Revolt and White Guard in Finland, 1917–1918	2020	Finnish Civil War
N/A	The British Way: Counterinsurgency at the End of Empire	2023	British decolonization
XI	People Power: Insurgency in the Philippines, 1981-1986	2023	People Power Revolution

References

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/apr/28/political-board-games-change-view-of-world

External links

• GMT Games - COIN Series page