Game of the Week, April 29th - May 5th

A new week brings us a new title in our Game of the Week promotion. This round we stay in Europe but go back in time about 250 years with Great Northern War from the Musket & Pike series. This title is on sale for 25% off now through Sunday, May 5th. This is the first time we have offered this game at a discounted price, as we just crossed its one year anniversary earlier this month.

At the start of the 18th Century, Sweden was the undisputed power in the Baltic region and a dominant force in Northern Europe. However, the Swedish empire was in the way of the regional ambitions of Russia, Saxony and Denmark - who had several scores to settle with the Swedes.

With the accession of the boy King Charles XII to the Swedish throne in 1700, Russia, Denmark and Saxony saw an opportunity. They formed an alliance and struck at Swedish territories hoping for a swift and decisive victory. However, they had seriously miscalculated the strength of the Swedish military and the resolve of their new monarch and by 1701 they had all been defeated. Their attack launched a grueling 21-year war which would drag other countries into the conflict.

The Great Northern War highlighted the military genius of Charles XII and the resilience of the Swedish military, who held off defeat for 21 years. It also saw the rise of Tsar Peter I, who reformed the Russian military and adapted tactics and strategy to play to Russian strengths - which would ultimately defeat an exhausted Sweden.

You can read the full 43-page Design Notes document here.

Additionally, back in March we released a free expansion package for this title which is now part of the base game. The package added in 20 more scenarios, some from the existing core game content - but many that were part of the Scanian War package covering that conflict from 1675 to 1679. You can read those additional notes here.

Another document we'll specifically call out today is one to help players transition from the Napoleonic series over to the Musket & Pike series. This doc was written for Seven Years War, but many of the points it makes apply here as well. While the two series are somewhat close in relation to dates, there are many aspects of play that are very different. You can view that document here.

This title brings you 44 unique engagements in 89 different scenarios from these two conflicts. These fights range from small skirmishes to large battles with tens of thousands of troops per side.

We built this title with both play against the AI and PBEM in mind, testing for both formats. Each scenario has a recommended method of play at the bottom of the description window. But note, you can play the side opposite to the one we suggest, if you wish.

Additionally this game offers 5 campaigns which bring an additional 132 scenarios to the mix with some variants, but also some hypothetical battles to cover campaign unique situations. All in all, Great Northern War has a load of replayability to offer.

The Musket & Pike engine has seen an immense amount of development time applied to it since WDS took over the product line. Some was done to get the series ready for publication of this title, but further development continued in the Thirty Years War cycle and then the Vienna 1683 cycle - with all those changes being applied here. To give you an idea of the scope of that you can see the changelog here. Further development continues, as we have many more games in the works. We won't plan to release another update though until the next game in the series releases - hopefully in the late Fall '24.

Ok, moving on to book recommendations, we have a few:

On to video content - The Mack has 8 videos up covering this title. You can see that playlist here.

SmartWargames also has a video review of this title posted here.

We'll wrap up today's overview with several more screen shots from the game. As you will see this title has battles fought in the summer & winter, so a variety of terrain to choose from.

And finally, here's the Musket & Pike specific section on the Official WDS forums if you wish to discuss the game, or any games within that series.

Ok, that concludes our preview of the game. You can head on over to the product page for Great Northern War and pick up a copy for yourself when ready!

Enjoy!