Twilight Struggle (Deluxe Edition)

“Now the trumpet summons us again, not as a call to bear arms, thougharms we need; not as a call to battle, though embattled we are – but a callto bear the burden of a long twilight struggle…”

• John F. Kennedy

In 1945, unlikely allies toppled Hitler's war machine, whilehumanity's most devastating weapons forced the Japanese Empire to its knees ina storm of fire. Where once there stood many great powers, there then stood onlytwo. The world had scant months to sigh its collective relief before a newconflict threatened. Unlike the titanic struggles of the preceding decades, thisconflict would be waged not primarily by soldiers and tanks, but by spies andpoliticians, scientists and intellectuals, artists and traitors. TwilightStruggle is a two-player game simulating the forty-five year dance of intrigue,prestige, and occasional flares of warfare between the Soviet Union and theUnited States. The entire world is the stage on which these two titans fight tomake the world safe for their own ideologies and ways of life. The game beginsamidst the ruins of Europe as the two new “superpowers” scramble over thewreckage of the Second World War and ends in 1989 when only the United Statesremained standing.

Twilight Struggle inherits its fundamental systems from the card-drivenclassics We the People and Hannibal: Rome vs. Carthage. It is a quick-playing,low-complexity game in that tradition. The game map is a world map of theperiod, whereon players move units and exert influence in attempts to gainallies and control for their superpower. As with GMT's other card-driven games,decision-making is a challenge; how to best use one's cards and units givenconsistently limited resources?

Twilight Struggle's Event cards add detail and flavour to the game. Theycover a vast array of historical happenings, from the Arab-Israeli conflicts of1948 and 1967, to Vietnam and the U.S. peace movement, to the Cuban MissileCrisis and other such incidents that brought the world to the brink of nuclearannihilation. Subsystems capture the prestige-laden Space Race as well asnuclear tensions, with the possibility of game-ending nuclear war.

This deluxe edition, first published in 2009, includes the followingchanges from the basic game:
Mounted map with revised graphics
Two double-thick counter sheets with 260 counters
Deck of 110 event cards (increased from 103)
Revised rules and player aid cards
Revised at start setup and text change for card #98 Aldrich Ames

Components:

• 260 full-colour counters
• 22"x34" mounted map with revised graphics
• 110 event cards
• 2 six-sided dice
• 1 24-page rulebook
• 2 full colour player aid cards

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