Europa Universalis: The Price of Power

Every time I think of Europa Universalis: The Price of Power, Aerosmith's Hangman Jury gets stuck in my head. Maybe because my group's silent agreement to take on this monster feels suspiciously like a conspiracy: somewhere, I fear they will lynch me for the harm I did by suggesting it. Thankfully, I have a group that can handle this sort of thing. This is the troubled Kickstarter, based mainly on the rather deranged computer game rather than the old 100+ hour board game. It was delayed not because of the pandemic, aliens, or shipping, but because its creator was unhappy with the initial version of the rules and pulled it back for a serious redesign.

The result genuinely impressed me. In a game with this scope—let's just say Here I Stand would count as one of its medium-sized scenarios—there is no way it can avoid having rules for economics, religion, exploration, and complex diplomacy among 15-20 states. The rulebook is dense and hefty: 48 pages of pure rules, of which you need to know 20-30 well in order to play. It is a notch more difficult and heavier than Here I Stand and Virgin Queen, but everything you read makes sense and, rarer still in this genre, often feels like a very sound design choice. You simply will not get it on the first read—probably not even on the second.

It needs reconnaissance runs, not only to absorb the rules, but also to understand how each country works and how diplomacy around the neutral states is constructed. That diplomacy is not decorative; it is essential if you want to get ahead. We have only played a two-round test scenario, but we already saw plenty: fighting from the opening, colonies, and the foundation for a much larger political game. Now we are looking for the right Sunday to return with clear heads and genuine enthusiasm.

Having seen many games of this kind, from GMT and elsewhere, I think Europa Universalis deservedly takes a place on the podium. It delivers a very good taste of a monster game in roughly one tenth of the time the genre usually demands. And as if that were not enough, its solo mode looks impressive, with multiple bot decks. Simply deranged—in the best possible way.