Brief Border Wars

There are Sundays when a game does not need to be big to do its job. With coffee, Nutella pretzels, and an impromptu BLTG session, Compass’s Brief Border Wars series finally found its way onto the table. I had bought it mostly for the theme—and the Brian Train connection certainly helped—but my first impression was that it was outrageously simple. As it turned out, the cloudy, supposedly, Sunday was exactly the excuse I needed to give it some room.

We had considered starting with the Second Lebanese War, but it seems like a more unusual scenario, perhaps better once one has a little familiarity with the system. So we began with Attila. I will not pretend the game unfolds some intricate mechanical marvel: its essence is a short, direct pocket-format military confrontation, where decisions in the scenario have to be made quickly and with a clear head.

What keeps it alive is that, within that simplicity, it leaves room for decisions and strategy, while the dice can create genuinely tense moments. Our game ran for around an hour, seventy minutes at most, and the interaction came precisely from that pressure of choices and luck—especially when the dice decided to do their own thing, as they tend to when facing the group’s habitual unlucky player.

If you regularly play proper hex-and-counter wargames, Brief Border Wars may feel so light that it gives you anaphylaxis. For me, though, it delivered the fun: a clean, quick game for the right occasion, without demanding the whole table or the whole day. And with three Greek-interest subjects in the first two sets, it is hard to call it a bad choice.