The Final Conflict was a game commissioned by Personal Computer Games, a magazine from the early to mid 1980s. It was originally played by some of the magazine readership as a voting game, each reader was issued with a rulebook and had a unique code number and represented one of the four superpowers (I was union member CJ-0236). Every player sent in the turns that they wanted their superpower to perform and then the magazine would collate all of these votes and implement the most common orders as that superpowers turn. That possibly seems potentially unfulfilling, as your moves may never influence your superpower, however, each turn the computer used to run every turn that was received and the best turns received recognition in the magazine and got extra authority for the next turn by receiving extra votes.
I will run the game as a standard pbem (play by email) wargame with a single player taking on the role of a superpower. Further information about the running of each game will be included in the house rules.
The continent that the game is set on is divided into 32 countries. Each country is a self-sufficient economic and military unit and has four different types of resource, which can be built or destroyed. These are armies, missiles, shelters and factories. At the start of the game, different countries will have various numbers of each of these resources. As the game continues each country can use its productive capacity to build more of these items but, when conflicts occur, some or all may be destroyed. Productive capacity depends on the number of factories in a country. The 4 superpowers each control a group of countries, not necessarily in one block. In addition some countries will be neutral. In order to conquer the continent, and win the game, a superpower must gain control of 17 countries.
Each turn, players will submit their orders by email. They must enter one, and only one, order for each country they control. The possible orders for each country are as follows: Launch Missiles against another country Attack a neighbouring country with your armies Reinforce a neighbouring country you control Supply a neighbouring country you control Build armies Build missiles Build shelters Build factories
The precise way of sending your orders will be included in the house rules for each game. In each of the first four orders above, the player must specify which country is to be attacked, reinforced, etc. If a player omits to give an order for a country or gives an invalid order then the default order of build armies will be used instead. If a player does not submit a turn twice in succession then it will be assumed that the player no longer wishes to remain in the game and so all of his/her countries will become neutral.
This occurs in the following sequence:
1. The productive capacity of each country is calculated by totalling the number of factories and executing supply orders.
2. The country's new resources are calculated by executing build and reinforce orders, except for build shelters. Any automatic builds as a result of launch missiles or attack orders are included in this phase.
3. Launch missile orders are executed and resources removed from target countries as appropriate.
4. Attack orders are executed and armies removed or advanced as appropriate.
5. Build shelter orders are executed.
Each factory has a productive capacity of one megadollar per turn. The productive capacity of a country has two components: The megadollars from its factories and the productive capacity of any neighbouring country ordered to supply it.
If country A is ordered to supply country B, all of country A's productive capacity is added to country B's productive capacity for that turn. Country A, of course, then has no productive capacity for that turn.
It is possible to shift a country's productive capacity further than an adjacent country. If country A is ordered to supply country B, and country B is ordered to supply country C, then both A and B's productive capacity is added to that of C.
Thus is all of a superpower's countries are in a single block, it would be possible to concentrate all of the block's productive capacity in a single country.
There is, however, one necessary restriction on supply orders to prevent them being given in such a manner that an endless loop occurs: for example country A is ordered to supply B, B to supply C and C to supply A. If a combination of orders such as this results, then the actual orders for each of the countries involved will default to build armies.
In the above example if country D had been ordered to supply country A the loop would still have occurred and country D's orders would have also defaulted to build armies even though D wasn't part of the endless loop.
The productive capacity of each country is spent during the build phase. Items that can be built have differing costs as follows:
Army = 1 megadollar
Missile = 2 megadollars
Shelter = 2 megadollars
Factory = 5 megadollars
These costs must be met by that turns productive capacity - you can't go into the red! Sometimes, the productive capacity will not match exactly the cost of the items to be built. For example, with a capacity of 17 megadollars, 3 factories could be built, but a surplus of 2 megadollars would be left. Wherever a build leaves a surplus of megadollars, the surplus is spent in building armies. In the example given, 17 megadollars would produce 3 factories and 2 armies.
Any new armies built during the production phase cannot take part in an attack until the following turn. They can, however, take part in defence of the country immediately. Any new missiles built during the production phase cannot take part in a launch until the following turn. They are, however, still liable to explode if they themselves become the target of a missile launch.
Reinforce orders are also executed in the production phase. If country A is ordered to reinforce country B, all the armies in A are transferred to B. Like any other new armies these can only take part in the defence of country B until the next turn. Meanwhile country A's productive capacity is automatically devoted to building fresh armies which remain in country A and are available for defending the country.
An order to Launch Missiles will launch all the missiles in the country against the target country, with the exception of any new missiles built during the production phase. In a missile attack on a country the following will happen:
1. Shelters are hit first. It takes 2 missiles to destroy 1 shelter. If any shelters remain after all the missiles have been used, the attack is over and any odd missile has no effect.
2. If all the shelters have been destroyed, any surplus missiles cause enemy missiles still on the ground to explode. In effect, this means their destructive capacity is added to that of the surplus attacking missiles, creating a greater surplus.
3. These surplus missiles then attack armies. 1 missile destroys 3 armies.
4. If all of the armies have been destroyed, any remaining missiles attack factories. 1 missile destroys 1 factory.
5. Any missiles left after all this explode with no further effect.
If a country is left with no resources of any kind after a missile attack, it is said to be devastated and immediately becomes neutral.
A country ordered to launch missiles automatically devotes its productive capacity to building new missiles, but these missiles cannot be used in the launch. They will, however, explode if they become targets of enemy missiles.
An order to attack a neighbouring enemy country causes all the armies in the attacking country to attack the enemy country with the sole exception of newly built armies, which stand by to defend the country from attack. A country ordered to attack automatically devotes its productive capacity to building new armies which are immediately earmarked for defence. To these may be added reinforcements built by neighbouring countries.
A country under attack uses all its armies in its own defence unless it itself is making an attack.
Battles are decided according to simple rules (not stated here) but in practice if the number of armies on each side are equal, the attacker will suffer double the losses of the defender. The more armies the attacker has, the more serious the defender's losses will be and the less serious the attacker's. If the attacker has double the defender's armies it will wipe out the defender completely.
If the defender is completely wiped out, the attacker's remaining armies move into the country, and the attacker takes possession of it. This means all of the country's factories, shelters and missiles are captured intact. If the defeated country was itself making an attack on another country, but failed, any surviving armies are also captured.
It may occur that a country is attacked by more than one neighbouring country. When this happens, all the attacking armies are added together for the battle calculation. Losses are then calculated as normal. Each attacking country suffers a proportionate share of the total attacker's losses. The more armies it contributed, the greater it's share of losses.
For example if country A attacked country C with 80 armies and on the same turn country B attacked country C with 20 armies then the losses would be calculated as if 100 armies had attacked country C. If the losses suffered by the attacking armies was determined as 10 then country A would lose 8 armies and country B would lose 2 since A contributed a greater proportion of armies.
If the defender has lost possession of his country then the attacking country with the most armies left moves its armies in and takes possession of the country. If no attacking country has a clear majority of surviving armies, then no one moves in and the country becomes neutral.
It may occur that two countries attack each other on the same turn. This is a special circumstance in which neither country is said be defending and so the losses are calculated differently. If both attackers have the same number of armies then the losses will be equal. The more armies one side has the greater the number of losses on the other side.
If neither country has lost all of its attacking armies then the battle is over with both attacking sides withdrawing to their own countries (providing it hasn't lost possession to another country).
If both countries have lost all of their attacking armies, the battle is over.
If one country has attacking armies left and the other has none, then the surviving attacking armies take part in a straightforward attack on the other country and engage its defending armies.
These behave exactly as any other country, except that since no one is giving them orders, their productive capacity is devoted each turn to build armies.
These countries will never attack a neighbour, but if attacked their armies will be used in defence in the ordinary way. You capture a neutral country just as any other country, by wiping out its armies.
This is for you to work out, but here are a few guidelines.
Early on, each superpower will have two main aims: to capture neutral countries, and to try to form a single block, which will be much less vulnerable. This means some decisive early attacks may be called for.
As the game wears on, the emphasis will shift to increasing productive capacity by building factories, as this is the way to gain overall strength in other resources.
Beware building missiles without missile shelters. A country containing unprotected missiles is wide open to a missile strike, in which case its own missiles will add to the destruction.
Remember, it's usually pointless attacking another country unless you have significantly more armies than it does. You can, however, attack a country from two of your countries at once to increase your superiority.
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