There was a lot of discussion about Illusion of Glory and it required errata, but GMT lived up to its reputation so now we have a fully playable, deep and interesting game thanks to this errata. So, if you liked Paths of Glory – and you might already familiarize yourself with it thanks to some of my articles like Video session report from full 20-turns game and 1917 scenario variant – then today I encourage you to focus on its sequel – the Illusion of Glory,  showing in great detail the Eastern Front. We will only slightly touch on that position in the  below article as we are just getting familiar with the game, but I am sure more will come.

I had a pleasure to play again with Kuba, my long-time co-player on all wargames. I was leading the Allies while Kuba was in charge of Central Powers. We managed to play initial 2 turns and what follows is the short session report from that meeting:

Initial set-up (click to enlarge the image in the new window)

Our session was very fast and exciting – we knew we play short game so we did not focused on long-term events (like Bolshevik revolution or US entry) but on operational level attacks.

Situation at the end of the game (click to enlarge the image in the new window)
  • 1. In the first turn I attacked Eastern Prussia and even gained there some terrain . However, I was repelled in the second turn by German reinforcements – and what is ironic, the front-line was exactly the same as before the war!
  • 2. Kuba focused with Austra-Hungary forces on Serbia (quite historically) and despite slow beginning (again, historically!) he crushed Serbian armies. However, he did not managed to take the Belgrade as he had huge problems elsewhere.
  • 3.1 So you may ask, what and where was so problematic for the Central Power? Of course, Galicia! My first move in the game – just like Russians did in 1914 – crushed and destroyed two Austrian corps and allowed me to take all the plains in front of Carpathian mountains.
  • 3.2 Second offensive was even more successful for Tsar forces – they managed to get footholds in the mountains!
  • 3.3 On top of it, some reserve corpses managed to take advantage of the situation and Russian forces flooded the Hungarian Plains!
  • 4. In the meantime, Central Powers executed powerful counter-attack through Vistula River which blooded both sides.

And we had to finish at this moment in time- it was a mid-week game and it was getting late. Still, situation on the front was rather one-sided and it was only matter of time before Russians would stand in front of Vienna 🙂

Summary

The game was interesting and brought a lot of fun. I am very glad that the errata changed the game into playable position and that GMT made the effort to correct whatever needed correction. We will for sure devote more time to that game, so you may count on further session reports!