Maquis

“We are solitary. We can delude ourselves about this and act as if it were not true. That is all.” 

- Rilke

I probably should have entitled this post 'Boardgames for One 3' because I have acquired another solo boardgame. As an indication of how often I play these, none at all have hit the table since I last posted on the subject. Still, when does noes not playing with things ever stop a wargamer buying more of them?

Maquis has, as the name would suggest, a WWII French resistance theme wherein the player tries to complete two missions in the face of random Milice patrols. These require a mix of scarce resources plus control of a path back to the safe house. Recruiting and deploying more resistance fighters will bring an increase in patrols, but you might need to because arrests are inevitable; or at least they have been while I have been running the show. You have fifteen days to complete both the missions, unless either all your fighters get captured first or your morale breaks.

"Listen very carefully, for I shall play this only once!"

It's one of those irritating games that gets under one's skin, because it seems that only one more go and you'll have it cracked, but the next pair of missions are always just too difficult (or, to be specific, the combination of the next two missions; I've just had one mission to shoot all the Milice coupled with one that says I can't shoot any of them until I've poisoned their dogs first). Whether it ever gets taken out and played again once I've put it away I don't know, but I'm certainly getting my money's worth for now.