The Other Side of the Hill, an unique design about the cooperation and competition in the German High Command during WWII, is just running its Kickstarter Campaign. Today we have pleasure to talk with Carlos Márquez, designer of this intriguing title. If you would like to learn more, please follow both links:

Michal: Please tell us a little about yourself Carlos. What do you do for a living, what games do you play? Also, what is your role in the design and publication of the game?

Carlos: First of all, thank you very much for all your help and support with “The Other Side of the Hill”. I am a lecturer at the University of Granada, working in the English Department. I am happily married and have two wonderful sons. I play all sorts of games, provided that they tell me a story. Games where you just move resources around and try to optimize your play are not really my cup of tea. Historical simulation games and more specifically wargames allow me to combine two of my passions: history and boardgaming. Within wargames, I prefer the grand strategic and operational games. I do not usually play tactical games. My favourite game is Axis Empires, by decision Games, and the Hex bond series by Mark Simonitch also hits my sweet spot in complexity, simulation and playing time.

Michal: Now, as for the game, what inspired “The Other Side of the Hill”?

Carlos: I have always been interested in WW2, ever since I was a boy, and I have been reading intensively about it for most of my life. When I read about history, I am drawn to individual people, how they experienced historical events and how they influenced history. I know that it is economic and material factors that move history, but I cannot help but be attracted to the individual. Another intriguing topic for me is loyalty: the limits of loyalty, conflicts of loyalty and the corruption of loyalty. Well, the “Other Side of the Hill” addresses those topics, which are usually overlooked in wargames: how the development of the war was affected by individual factors in the German military leadership, such as ambitions, political convictions, jealousy and courage, on the one hand, and how loyalty was manipulated or used as an excuse to appease or betray the Generals’ consciences, on the other.

Michal: What are the key components of the game?

Carlos: The game will include one 22″x 34″ mounted board, four A4 Player Boards, four A3 player aids, one Setup Aid, two different Rulebooks and one Playbook. Armies are represented by wooden cubes of various colours and the game will include over twenty custom dice to resolve combat and other game situations. Finally, there will be over 200 cards, which are the heart of the system, from cards representing Generals to others representing Directives, Events, the AI for the Allied actions… There are even cards to recreate the July 20 1944 plot. All these components will be up to the high standard that NAC Wargames is known for.

Michal: Can you elaborate a little about the game mechanics?

Carlos: The players take the place of the German High Command. Each player takes on one section of the High Command: the OKW, who directs and oversees the conduct of the war, the Head of Operations, who distributes replacements and handles the movement of Armies, the Head of Production, who manages Germany’s war economy and is responsible for strategic warfare, and the Head of personnel, who has certain advantages when appointing Generals to Command positions on the map. Each game turn is a season of the war, and it consists of an Administrative phase and an Operational phase.

In the Administrative phase, players apply the effects of the bombing of Germany, distribute replacements, and play Directive cards, which will affect the political, the economic and the military aspects of the war. Military directives, for example, determine the offensives that can be attempted for the turn. During the Operational phase, players resolve the strategic war, move armies around the map, appoint new commanders if necessary, and then conduct the Axis offensives. After this, the game’s AI takes over and determines where the Allies will attack and how powerful each attack will be. The result of combat will depend on the forces in the Area, the Generals in command of the troops, air and naval control in the front, terrain and even some random events.

Apart from a section of the High Command, each player controls a set of Generals that they can use to take over Command positions on the map or as leaders in battles. Defeated Generals are questioned and may be dismissed. Successful Generals will be awarded Prestige.

Michal: Recently, solitaire games are getting a lot of traction. Are you planning a solo mode to the game?

Carlos: The box effectively includes two different games that can be played with the same components and the same core mechanics; you can play a solitaire or cooperative game, on the one hand, or a competitive game, on the other. In the cooperative/solitaire mode, the player(s) will lead the Axis and try to do better than they did historically, but bear in mind that Germany will always lose the war, because you will be recreating the historical war, where the Axis had to fight both the USA and the USSR. Even though the basic procedures are the same, the differing victory conditions clearly create two completely different playing experiences. Competitive play focuses on friction and negotiation when taking decisions, whereas the solitaire/cooperative game is fundamentally a simulation of WW2 at the strategic level.

Still, solo and cooperative players will have to decide where to use their Generals and the game includes certain limitations as to which Generals may be chosen at a given moment, to simulate the conflicts and flaws inherent to the military leadership of a state at war, which are more serious in the case of totalitarian states. In the solitaire and cooperative play, the player(s) always lose if Germany collapses before the historical date, spring 1945. If they manage to survive by that point, they check how many Victory points they have achieved. These VPs depend mainly on the control of German borders, the Fanaticism level in the army and the number of successfully completed technological projects.

Michal: How do players determine victory?

Carlos: In competitive play there is always one winner, even if Germany collapses. The winner is the player with the most Prestige Points by the end of the game. Prestige comes from three sources: Section cards, the actions of the Generals and Agenda cards. As stated above, each players is responsible for a Section of the High Command, which are rotated among players at the beginning of the year. Each Section of the High Command awards Prestige Points to the players according to specific parameters. At the beginning of each year, the OKW player is awarded Prestige Points depending on the Fanaticism level, the Head of production is awarded prestige for completed technological projects and the Head of Personnel is awarded Prestige for each of his Generals in a Command position. During the game, the OKW and the Head of Operations are granted Prestige Points for successful Military Directives and the OKW is also awarded Prestige for adding countries to the Axis. The Head of Production increases his prestige for each advance in technological projects and for each success in strategic warfare.

The second source of Prestige Points for the players is the Generals they control. At the beginning of the scenario, the initial generals are distributed among the players. Each year new Generals are added to the game and also distributed among the players. A player will be awarded Prestige Points at the beginning of each year if his generals occupy the position of Army Group Commander or Front (OB) Commander and for each of his Generals that participated in combat. In addition, generals will also be awarded Prestige Points based on their achievements in combat. On the other hand, casualties and retreats reduce the players’ prestige and may cause the Generals to be dismissed.

Finally, players will be awarded Prestige points for their Agenda cards. In every game there will come a point when the High Command will be restructured to increase OKW control in the conduct of the war. When the High Command is restructured, Agenda cards will be distributed among the players. The Head of the OKW at that moment will keep that Section card until the end of the game and will receive the OKW Agenda card, which is public. The remaining players will receive one of the four remaining Agenda cards at random. These other Agenda cards must be kept secret. Depending on the number of players, at least one Agenda card will not be assigned to a player and will be removed from the game without looking at it, so players will not know what the other players’ secret Agenda cards are, nor will they know for certain that a particular Agenda card is in play. These Agenda cards award Prestige Points at the end of the game that depend on the interests of the different factions within the German High Command.

  • The OKW Agenda card awards Prestige Points at the end of the game if Germany has not collapsed and according to the level of Fanaticism. This card is public.
  • The Old Guard is a secret Agenda card that awards Prestige Points at the end of the game if the Old Guard has the highest Influence value, for the Command Posts occupied by the Old Guard Generals and for the Festung sectors on the Eastern Front that have not been captured by the Allies.
  • The Professionals is a secret Objective card that awards Prestige Points at the end of the game for the Command Posts held by the Professional Generals and for the surviving German Armies on the map.
  • The Sympathizers is a secret Agenda card that awards Prestige Points at the end of the game if the Sympathizers have the highest Influence value, for the Command Posts occupied by the Sympathizer Generals and for the Festung sectors on any Front that have not been captured by the Allies.
  • Finally, the Dissidents represent the potential presence of a conspirator in the game, a mechanic that adds depth and tension to the decisions the players will make. The Dissidents secret Agenda card awards Prestige Points at the end of the game for the Influence the Dissidents have accumulated and if the Fanaticism is not at its maximum value. Most importantly, the Opponents get a decisive boost in Prestige Points if the end of the game is triggered by the Collapse of Germany

It must be emphasized that all Agendas except the OKW are kept secret, so the Prestige recorded in the General track may vary greatly if player achieve or fail to achieve the goals set by their Agenda cards. A player with a clear lead may be surpassed by another player who met all the requirements in his Agenda card.

Michal: Now, as for “The Other Side of the Hill” itself, what makes this game unique?

Carlos: This is the first game where you can recreate World War II in Europe from the Axis side. However, it is not an Axis wet dream, far from it. Germany is always going to lose the war in the end, although you can try to resist as long as the German High Command managed to do. Also, this game is unique because it explores the influence of the conflicts and inefficiency inherent to command decisions during a war, especially in a totalitarian state.

Additionally, it is innovative because, although it is fundamentally a wargame that recreates historical and plausible events in World War II, its mechanics are drawn from other strategy games, especially of the Eurogame kind. “The Other Side of the Hill” endeavors to bring together the narrative power of wargames and the elegant, refined mechanics of Eurogames. Finally, I think it is interesting that your are getting two different games for the price of one: a highly competitive game of negotiation and backstabbing, and a deep, complex simulation of World War II at the strategic level hat takes into account the influence of command and which you can play alone or cooperatively with your friends.

Michal: Who will publish the game and where can the players interested in the project get the more information?

Carlos: The game will be published by the Spanish company NAC Wargames, which has already released high-quality games from the point of view both of components and gameplay. I am very grateful for this opportunity and the confidence they have placed in me and in this game. You can get all the information and subscribe to news on the project at https://edicionesmasqueoca.com/juegos/the-other-side-of-the-hill/

Michal: What are the future plans for you? Any new designs / games in preparation?

Carlos: Yes, I currently have a project in the P500 page of GMT Games, titled “Imperial Fever”. It is a deckbuilding game for three to four players that recreates great power competition in the period between 1881 and 1915. In Imperial Fever” up to four players will vie for world dominance as they take on the roles of the United Kingdom, France, the Central Empires (Germany and Austria-Hungary), and the Emergent Powers (the USA and Japan).

The mechanics are loosely inspired in the very successful system of GMT’s “Time of Crisis”, but it includes many new, distinguishing elements. The whole focus on the game is on competition rather than confrontation, since military tensions among players will trigger World War I, but there is still plenty of conflict between the main Powers and wars to wage with Minor Powers and military action in the colonies. I like to think that “Imperial Fever” is “PaxBritannica” playable in under for hours. You can get more information and pledge to the game at https://www.gmtgames.com/p-1050-imperial-fever-great-power-competition-in-the-late-19th-century.aspx

Michal: Thank you very much for interview Carlos, and good luck in your campaign!