War and Peace, subtitled Game of the Napoleonic Wars: 1805–1815, is a board wargame published by Avalon Hill in 1980 that simulates ten years of Napoleonic wars.

Description

War and Peace is a multi-player strategic war game that simulates the Napoleonic Wars from 1805 to 1815 through ten separate scenarios.

Components

Scenarios

The game is divided into nine scenarios: Several more scenarios were published in various issues of The General.

Gameplay

Supply

A unit must trace supply to a major city through a chain of friendly strength points up to 3 hexes long.

Naval Rules

They are used only in the campaign game and consist of blockades of ports and skirmishes per sea zone (Baltic, North Sea, Atlantic and Mediterranean). There is a separate chart to see what happens when fleets come together.

Publication history

War and Peace was designed by Mark McLaughlin and published by Avalon Hill in 1980 in a boxed set with cover art by Denis Dighton. After the demise of Avalon Hill, the rights to the game were acquired by One Small Step Games, which reprinted it in 2020, with a redrawn map and counters, and new scenarios of the Italian Campaign of 1796–7, the Egyptian Campaign of 1798 and the Marengo Campaign of 1800.

Reception

In Issue 26 of Phoenix, David Mylie notes "If you prefer strategic games or are interested in the Napoleonic period, War and Peace is well worth investigation." War and Peace was chosen for inclusion in the 2007 book Hobby Games: The 100 Best. Fantasy author R. A. Salvatore commented, "I've played them all and that's the one that had me lying in bed for hours and hours, working up multi-turn strategies for blasting my enemy's supply lines, or creating a back-alley run to Paris. That's the game, with its simple elegance yet multitude of tactics, that offered to me exactly the right amount of information to juggle. Neither overwhelming nor underwhelming, too hot nor too cold, too big nor too small, too soft nor too hard, War and Peace fit this duck's bill."

Awards

At the 1981 Charles S. Roberts Awards, War and Peace was a finalist for "Best Pre-Twentieth Century Game of 1980."

Other reviews