Tactics - game

Tactics II (1958)
Other name(s)	Tactics II
Manufacturer(s)	Monarch Services J.E. Smith & Co.
Publication date	1954 II: 1958
Years active	1954-1958 II: 1958-1972, 1973-1998
Genre(s)	war
Language(s)	en
Players	2
Age range	12 and up
Playing time	120 minutes

Tactics is generally credited as being the first commercially successful board wargame.

History

It was designed by Charles S. Roberts in 1953, and self-published in 1954 under the company name of The Avalon Game Company (later changed to Avalon Hill in 1958). Tactics II, a revised version published by Avalon Hill in 1958, then re-released again in 1961 and 1973. In 1972, the game was discontinued due to rising costs, but was redesign in 1973 with less costly components and used as a loss leader as it was an introductory wargame. In 1983 Avalon Hill released a "25th anniversary" edition of the original Tactics, which did (for the first time) include the second map.

Play

Tactics pioneered many game mechanics which became standard in the board wargame industry, including the odds-ratio combat results table and variable movement costs for entering squares (later hexes) containing different types of terrain. It also evolved the use of cardboard counters which had been previously introduced with the game War Tactics or Can Great Britain Be Invaded?. Unlike later board wargames which used a hexagonal grid superimposed on the game map, Tactics used a square grid.