An Empire Building Campaign System

My last post “A Campaign For The Balkans 1370 AD” has been well received and to a couple of people asking if I’d publish their campaign systems.  One such request came from Peter Barrett of Canberra Games Society.

His system is based on Roman expansion in the 1st century BC but is equally applicable to any expanding empire, including mid 4th century BC Macedonia, the Byzantine Empire of Justinian I, the early days of the Arab Caliphate, the Seljuk Empire, the Mongol Empire or the Empire of Timur.

Having read and reformatted the rules for the web I must say that I agree with Peter when he said that:

“To my knowledge this campaign system is unique in two ways. Firstly, the number of players can vary throughout without seriously affecting the campaign. Secondly, all players are nominally on the same side.”

Peter’s system is remarkably simple, easy to use and neatly solves the age old problem of player unavailability blighting the progress of a campaign:

• SPQR campaign rules (pdf).

The campaign system was designed with DBMM in mind but can also be used with other rules, and periods post 1500 AD, as long as the scoring system is adaptable.

Peter has agreed to answer any questions raised here as comments and I’d like to hear from people who know of suitable maps for Empires other than Rome.