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A Force More Powerful™
Players’ Guide
Version 1.0
System Requirements
Platform: PC, with the following minimum specifications:
•
Pentium® III CPU, 600 MHz (1.2 GHz recommended)
•
Windows® 98/2000/ME/XP
•
128 MB RAM (256 MB recommended)
•
Video card with 32 MB of RAM and Hardware TnL (GeForce® 2 or equivalent)
•
PC-compatible Mouse
•
800 MB of free disk space
•
DirectX® 9.0c or newer
Installation
1.
2.
Insert the A Force More Powerful CD-ROM into your CD-ROM drive. Follow the
onscreen instructions to install the game to your hard drive.
If for some reason the installation screen does not appear, double-click on “My
Computer,” then locate and double-click on the icon for your CD-ROM drive.
Double-click on “Setup.exe” to begin the installation process.
Performance Issues
•
•
•
The two most important factors in determining how smoothly A Force More
Powerful plays are your CPU speed and RAM. A Force More Powerful is playable
with the minimum specifications listed above, but plays more smoothly the faster
your machine is. If the city maps slow down your machine unacceptably, try turning
off some of the graphics details in the game’s Options screen (see 4.10.1 below).
Also make sure you are using the latest video drivers for your machine.
If the screen flickers when you move the mouse, go into Options and click on
Graphics; then select “Use Windows Mouse”. Save your game, then close and reopen A Force More Powerful.
It’s recommended that you turn off any secondary programs such as screensavers,
periodic email downloading, virus software, etc., as these may conflict with running
the game. In general, the fewer applications running with A Force More Powerful
the better, especially if your machine is older.
Technical Support
•
•
For technical assistance with A Force More Powerful, please go to the technical
support forum at www.afmpgame.com.
To install/update DirectX® or Adobe® Reader® on your machine, click the “start”
button, select “Programs” and “A Force More Powerful”, then click on the
appropriate shortcut label.
IMPORTANT UNINSTALL NOTE!
When you uninstall the game, you will lose all files and folders except:
•
The “Save” folder if it contains any saved-game files;
•
Any new folder under the current “Scenarios” folder;
•
Any new folder under the current “CityTiles” folder;
•
All files in these (only) folders.
Files saved in any folder created when the game was installed will be lost.
PRODUCERS’ NOTE
We didn’t set out to create a game. Some years ago, after we produced a
series of documentary films on nonviolent conflict, activists all over the
world began using them as training tools. This was surprising; the films
were intended to demonstrate factually that nonviolent strategies frequently
succeed. And we knew our stories would be inspiring. But we hadn’t
designed the films to be used for training.
When we saw the demand for an educational tool, we immediately
considered whether an interactive game might be the answer. We knew that
strategy games were popular, and experts who use games for serious
purposes such as ours encouraged us to go forward.
Three years later, you hold the results in your hand. It carries the same title
as the original documentary films and the book which accompanied them:
“A Force More Powerful.” The game contains no secrets, no sure-fire
recipes for winning. But through active immersion in simulated conflicts—
in fictionalized but realistic settings—the game allows you to learn the
principles and techniques of nonviolent strategy.
We are grateful to the designers, programmers, artists, and others whose
great efforts and considerable talent have gone into this first version of the
game. We do not consider it a finished product. Rather, we see it as the
first step towards creating a worldwide community of users whom we
invite to become our partners—suggesting and contributing refinements,
revisions, and improvements for new versions and versions in other
languages.
We dedicate this first version of the game to the courageous people who
have taken up nonviolent strategies to fight for their rights and freedom,
whose experiences and achievements inspired and informed this project.
Peter Ackerman
Steve York
To learn more about A Force More Powerful™, go to
www.afmpgame.com
Table of Contents
1.
2.
INTRODUCTION .............................................................................4
GETTING STARTED.......................................................................6
2.1 Fundamental Concepts .......................................................................6
2.2 Screen Flowchart................................................................................9
2.3 Example of Play—“Corruption is Stealing” Scenario......................10
3.
INTERFACE OVERVIEW ............................................................27
3.1 Main Menu Screen ...........................................................................27
3.2 Scenario Selection Screen ................................................................28
3.3 Strategic Estimate Screen.................................................................28
3.4 The Game Screen .............................................................................29
3.4.1 The Status Bar ..........................................................................29
3.4.2 The View Screen ......................................................................30
3.4.3 The Jump Map (National Map) ................................................31
3.4.4 Tactics Control Panel................................................................31
3.4.5 Navigation Area........................................................................32
3.4.6 Tactic Coordinator Display.......................................................33
3.4.7 Tactics Selection Display .........................................................36
3.4.8 Target Selection Display...........................................................37
3.4.9 Information Screen ...................................................................38
3.4.10 Organization Screen................................................................40
3.4.11 National Map ..........................................................................42
3.4.12 Tactics Queue .........................................................................45
3.4.13 Information Panes...................................................................46
3.5 Evaluation Screen.............................................................................55
4.
PLAYING THE GAME..................................................................56
4.1 Managing Game Information ...........................................................56
4.1.1 Choosing a Scenario .................................................................56
4.1.2 Managing Game Play ...............................................................59
4.2 Using the Strategic Estimate ............................................................70
4.3 Building and Strengthening the Movement......................................70
4.3.1 The Player’s Role as the Movement Planner ............................70
4.3.2 Characters .................................................................................70
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
4.3.3 Groups ......................................................................................76
4.3.4 Alliances ...................................................................................79
4.4 Weakening the Regime ....................................................................82
4.4.1 Pillars of Support ......................................................................82
4.5 Avoiding Violence and the Consequences of Violence ...................83
4.5.1 Violent and Nonviolent Tactics ................................................84
4.5.2 The Occurrence of Violence .....................................................85
4.5.3 The Resolution of Violence ......................................................85
4.5.4 Results of Regime Violence .....................................................85
4.5.5 Violence as a Result of Movement Actions..............................86
4.5.6 The Ripple Effects of Violence ................................................86
4.6 Confronting and Disrupting the Regime ..........................................87
4.7 Managing Messages .........................................................................87
4.8 Understanding the Local and National Economy.............................90
4.9 Winning the Game (Victory Conditions) .........................................91
4.10 Game Options and Shortcut Keys ..................................................92
4.10.1 Game Options .........................................................................92
4.10.2 Keyboard Shortcuts ................................................................94
4.11 Vignette Tactics .............................................................................94
4.12 Tips on Play....................................................................................96
5.
STRATEGIC ESTIMATE..............................................................99
5.1 Strategic Estimate Screens and Tabs—An Overview ......................99
5.2 Building a Strategic Estimate ......................................................... 101
5.2.1 Review the Situation............................................................... 101
5.2.2 Assess the Mission.................................................................. 105
5.2.3 Choose Victory Conditions..................................................... 113
5.2.4 Create Phases & Objectives.................................................... 114
6. Appendix.............................................................................................. 119
6.1 Tactics & Competencies................................................................. 119
6.2 Tactics & Training (& Potential for Violence)............................... 122
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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1. INTRODUCTION
“Never doubt that a small Group of committed citizens can change the world. Indeed,
it's the only thing that has.”
— Margaret Mead
A Force More Powerful is a game; it is also a tool for you to learn the value of, and
enhance your capacity for, strategic thinking in nonviolent conflict. Hence it
emphasizes assessing the overall political, social, economic, and military situation in
detail, selecting and prioritizing objectives, planning the appropriate strategy and
tactics to achieve those objectives, and reacting appropriately to the actions of one’s
adversary. The better your planning is, the more successful your strategy will be.
You assume the role of senior strategist within a nonviolent resistance or opposition
movement. You will take charge of the organization’s material and human
resources, and decide how best to allocate them to conduct a variety of Tactics
(actions) to support the larger strategy that you employ. Regardless of whatever
individual, organization or group of organizations you represent, your side is
always termed the Movement in the game.
As the Movement strategist, you play against the Regime, which is the game’s term
for your opponent. “Regime” is the word that best encompasses the variety of
adversaries represented in the game’s 10 scenarios, and describes a system or mode
of rule—not just the ruler. Regardless of whether an individual, government or other
entity is your opponent in a scenario (e.g., a dictator, an oligarchy, a military junta,
a foreign occupying power, or a city council), the functional term in the game is
Regime. The Regime is created by the scenario designer, and is controlled by the
game’s artificial intelligence.
The purpose of the Movement is to pursue the goals you have chosen, which may or
may not lead to a change of leadership in the Regime. Just as often your goals may
be achieved by inducing the Regime to change its policies or behavior (e.g., securing
fair elections or winning the right to form a free labor union).
Many game-play decisions involve choosing which Characters (see 4.3.2) and
Groups (see 4.3.3) to involve in your strategy and tactics, and evaluating the benefits
of such actions relative to the resources they will cost. Characters represent specific
named individuals who may lead Groups. Groups are the central political unit in the
game; they represent the diverse interests and agendas present in any complicated
struggle. One special Group—the General Public—is present in every scenario.
Influencing the General Public, and getting its support, is an important objective for
both the Movement and the Regime.
You must also consider the actions of the Regime, which will have its own array of
actions to consider and its own resources to budget. Therefore, you are often
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
required to choose between offensive and defensive Tactics. A successful offense
will reduce the material and human resources available to the Regime, and may shift
the Support Levels (see 4.3.2) of Characters, Groups, neighborhoods, regions, or the
General Public. Successful defensive Tactics will conserve or build resources for the
long term, but allow the Regime to conserve its resources as well.
Both the Movement and the Regime influence the game by planning and executing
Tactics, which are the “things you can do” in the game. Tactics for the Movement
are drawn largely, but not exclusively, from Gene Sharp’s book Methods of
Nonviolent Action. Regime Tactics are inspired by the conduct of real-world
government repression. Tactics usually, but not always, involve a specific target
Group or Character.
IMPORTANT!
Although A Force More Powerful aims to impart the values and techniques of
strategic thinking for individuals participating in (or leading) nonviolent
movements against oppressive opponents, it does not guarantee real-world
results. Life is very complicated and circumstances in the real world are
difficult (even in the best of times) to anticipate and can change rapidly.
Thus, no training tool can simulate these circumstances fully. Please keep this
in mind when playing A Force More Powerful, and know that the results you
receive during play may not be the same results you receive if (and when)
you apply these methods to a real movement.
CITATIONS
The following two publications are referenced in this manual:
•
Helvey, Robert L,, 2004, On Strategic Nonviolent Conflict: Thinking
About the Fundamentals, (Boston, Massachusetts: The Albert Einstein
Institution)
•
Sharp, Gene, 1973, The Politics of Nonviolent Action, Vol. 2, The
Methods of Nonviolent Action, (Boston, Massachusetts: Porter Sargent
Publishers)
For information on how to obtain copies of these books, go to
www.afmpgame.com.
© 2005-2006 BreakAway Ltd., International Center on Nonviolent
Conflict, and York Zimmerman Inc. All Rights Reserved.
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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2. GETTING STARTED
If this is your first time playing A Force More Powerful, we recommend that you
read through this chapter, and follow the steps in Section 2.3 to launch and play the
game.
2.1 Fundamental Concepts
At its heart, A Force More Powerful is a political game; it is about putting pressure
on interest groups and people so that they will do what you want them to do and
help you further your goals instead of the Regime’s. To do this, though, you must
master both risk and timing: the risks involved in taking public action against a
repressive Regime can be considerable, and the timing required by such a campaign
can be unforgiving. Though the information below is discussed in more detail
throughout the Players’ Guide, the key elements in the game are:
•
Alliances: Your Movement and the Regime you are trying to reform or
change are both Alliances.
•
Groups: A Group is a political constituency or presence with influence or
other political significance in a given scenario. Alliances get their power
from Groups and from the Characters who belong to those Groups.
•
Characters: A Character is a named personality who can perform Tactics
to further the goals of the Alliance he or she belongs to.
Groups and Characters have the following qualities which play important roles in
the game:
•
Support Levels. Each Group and Character has an Overall Support Level
for the Regime and for the Movement. The Overall Support Level is the
highest of the three individual Support Levels: Legitimacy, Ideology, and
Financial Gain. Different Tactics affect different Support Levels. Some
Tactics, such as Recruit Character and Meet With, are for influencing
Characters. Others, such as Fraternize and Organize Social Event, are for
influencing Groups.
•
Fear, which reflects unwillingness to take risks, lack of hope, and
pessimism about the future and the possibility of change. Fear affects
many political variables in the game, but especially willingness to face
physical risks for a cause.
•
Enthusiasm, a measure of the willingness to engage in activism and to
agitate for change. Enthusiasm affects many variables as well, but
especially the willingness to show up and publicly oppose the Regime.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
•
Public Influence, which measures how likely the General Public and local
populations are to pay attention to the political moves of a Character or
Group.
•
Policy Preferences, which represent ideology. Two Characters who have
nearly identical Policy Preferences are ideologically similar. Characters
who strongly disagree about Policies may nonetheless take the same side,
though. Alliances have Manifestoes (see 4.3.4) which are like Policy
Preferences but are set by the Alliance’s leadership (or by you, in the
Movement’s case).
When playing a scenario, you represent the behind-the-scenes strategic planner for
your Alliance. You are not its leader, nor are you directly represented in the game.
Instead, think of yourself as engaged in a game of chess with your opponent the
Regime, with your Movement’s Groups and Characters as your chess pieces. To
make your moves, consider the following:
•
The Goal of a scenario is the most important thing to consider. In the
Strategic Estimate (see below), you will choose Objectives and Victory
Conditions which are like stepping stones towards the Goal. Political
benefits will flow from successfully carrying out a plan that you
formulated beforehand.
•
Tactics are how you, as a strategic planner, implement the strategy you
have developed. They range widely in cost, risk, and effect. Before
attempting a Tactic, you should read its description in the Tactics
Notebook (see 3.4.7), and its expanded description in the Resistopedia.
Tactics for the Movement are drawn largely, but not exclusively, from
Gene Sharp’s book Methods of Nonviolent Action. Regime tactics are
inspired by the conduct of real-world government repression. Tactics
usually, but not always, involve a specific target Group or Character.
•
The Strategic Estimate is both a planning tool and an information
repository. It contains all the information about Alliances, Groups, and
Characters that can be seen in the game, as well as Notes that will relate
important details about them. You can use this to study your opponent and
take note of its weaknesses and internal divisions, and figure out how best
to exploit them.
You will get more help by the detailed coverage in the manual as well as the Hints
& Tips sprinkled throughout, but this is a basic outline of some things you might
want to pay special attention to:
•
Neighborhood Support. Like Characters and Groups, geographic areas like
neighborhoods and regions can support one side or the other. (They don’t
have the individual Support Levels, though.) Their support will greatly
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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affect the chances of success with Tactics that depend on crowds of
sympathizers showing up, such as Mass Protests and Concerts.
•
Alliance Membership. In general, a Character or Group belongs to the
Alliance for which it has the highest overall support, plus meets the
minimum support requirement of High. (Neighborhoods and Regions
never belong to an Alliance.) A Character can belong to a different
Alliance than his/her Group. A Character who is a leader of a Group can
guide that Group’s Support Levels—if a Group changes Alliance
membership, it can “snap back” because its leader doesn’t want it to
change. If the leader is weak, though, with low Will and poor political
skills, the Group can simply get a new leader.
•
Fear and Enthusiasm. The most important effect of these two values is
that a Character or Group whose Fear exceeds its Enthusiasm will not
change Alliances. Enthusiasm also particularly affects Tactics and their
success.
•
Ideology and Policies. Ideology support is determined by the level of
agreement in Policy Preferences between a Group or Character and an
Alliance’s Manifesto (except for the Regime—there, it is the Status Quo
that matters).
•
Public Profile. The lower a Character’s Public Profile, the less the Regime
can do directly to interfere with him… but beware of “free arrest” attempts
by the Regime, which it gets whenever a Character attempts a Tactic that
brings him into the open (such as Distribute Literature or Publish
Website).
•
Regime Collapse. In each scenario, the Regime has a “collapse threshold”
that it must maintain in order to stay in power. Everything it does is aimed
at keeping enough Groups in its Alliance to stay above this threshold.
Different Groups contribute different amounts to the Regime’s “base”;
you can usually figure out which ones are the most important by looking
at the Strategic Estimate. But if you cause the Regime to collapse, be
careful! Unless you have taken steps to ensure the military, police, and
other influential elements do not oppose your program, the ensuing chaos
could yield an outcome worse than the original Regime.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
2.2 Screen Flowchart
After launching A Force More Powerful, you are first prompted with the Main Menu
Screen. From here, you begin play by making choices that will take you further into
the interface, and eventually into the Game Screen where A Force More Powerful is
played. Below is a flowchart indicating the order in which these screens are
accessed. For step-by-step play instructions, see Section 2.3.
Main Menu Screen
Select “Start Conflict” to begin a new scenario.
Scenario Selection Screen
Select the scenario you wish to play,
then select “Start Conflict.”
Strategic Estimate Screen
Set up your Movement’s Strategic Estimate,
select Victory Conditions and set each
condition’s priority. Select “Back to Game” to
begin. For full details about the Strategic
Estimate, see Chapter 5.
The Game Screen
A Force More Powerful is played on this
screen, and all other vital in-game screens are
accessed from here.
Evaluation Screen
When the scenario ends, the Evaluation
Screen appears and provides details about
how successful you were in achieving your
goals.
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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2.3 Example of Play—“Corruption is Stealing” Scenario
Below is a step-by-step example on how to launch A Force More Powerful and play
through a small part of one particular scenario. The scenario we have chosen for this
sample is called “Corruption is Stealing,” and it’s a relatively simple scenario that
allows you to get acquainted with the mechanics of play. Follow the steps below to
begin.
STEP #1—Launch the Game
Find the A Force More Powerful executable file on your computer’s desktop or in
the directory structure of your computer, and double-click on it. This launches the
game.
STEP #2—Select “New Conflict” on the Main Menu Screen
After A Force More Powerful launches, you are taken to the
Main Menu Screen. There are a number of different options
from which to choose, but since this is your first time to play,
select “New Conflict.” This takes you to the Scenario Selection Screen.
STEP #3—Select “Corruption is Stealing” on the Scenario Selection Screen
On the Scenario Selection screen, you’ll see a
list of the scenarios available in A Force More
Powerful. Find the scenario called “Corruption
is Stealing” and click on it. A brief description of the selected scenario appears
below.
Read this description carefully as it
gives you a quick overview of the
political situation covered in the
scenario. In short, this scenario is about
a Regime whose leaders are intent on
maintaining the “status quo” of
corruption, and your Movement has
come into conflict with that purpose. One of your leaders has been arrested on
trumped up misdemeanor charges, but you know that it’s an attempt by the power
structure to curtail dissent.
Below the description is a difficulty bar which you can adjust left and right to either
decrease or increase the difficulty level of the scenario. Moving it left decreases the
difficulty level; moving it right increases the difficulty level of the scenario. Since
this is your first game, go ahead and adjust the setting to “Very Easy,” as shown
below.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Once you have fully read the scenario description, select
“Start Conflict” to continue on the Strategic Estimate. The
scenario may take a few minutes to load.
STEP #4—Read Scenario Background
After the Scenario Selection Screen, you are taken to the
Strategic Estimate Screen, where an even more detailed
description about the scenario is found. The description
here not only contains what you’ve already read on the previous screen, but also
provides details about the country in which the scenario is placed, its economic and
unemployment status, the general welfare of the public at large, further details about
the Regime and its
members, etc. At the
bottom of the description
(as shown to the right), you
are given information
about what your role is in
the scenario (as the
Movement planner). Read
that information carefully
as well, because, as with many situations in life, the more information you have
about the circumstances you are in, the better your decisions and strategic
calculations will be.
There are a lot of other things you could do on
the Strategic Estimate Screen, and once you
get familiar with how to play A Force More Powerful, we highly recommend that
you read Chapter 5 and learn more about how to use the Strategic Estimate to plan
(in detail) your Movement’s strategy (in fact, Chapter 5 uses this scenario as the
basis for explaining how to manipulate the Strategic Estimate).
STEP #5—Choose and Prioritize Victory Conditions
Select “Victory Conditions” located in the middle of
the right-hand page. This takes you to the Operational
Plan tab and the list of victory conditions. The Victory
Conditions tab is part of the Strategic Estimate. Here, you will select victory
conditions (or goals) that you will try to achieve in the scenario. First, review your
primary goal and objectives. They are listed on the left side of the screen. Then,
move to the right-hand page to view and select the list of Victory Conditions. For
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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now, disregard the “Vision of Tomorrow” section in the bottom left-hand corner;
more information about that can be found in Chapter 5.
Your primary “goal” in this scenario is to reduce Grbac corruption to well below its
current level. You do this by trying to achieve up to 4 main Victory Conditions.
They are:
1. Free imprisoned student Slobodan Popovic.
2. Force the city to launch a corruption investigation.
3. Force a policy change wherein corruption is deemed unacceptable.
4. Force Mayor Gavrilovic to resign.
The designer of this scenario has picked these four objectives for you to try to
obtain; some or all may be achievable, and others may not be achievable within the
given timeframe. But as the Movement planner, you have to decide which are the
best for your cause, based on your assessment of your Movement’s capabilities, and
how realistic and achievable you feel the objectives are. After reading the scenario
description, you may decide that it’s feasible only to try to free the imprisoned
student, or perhaps you’d prefer to work towards the mayor’s resignation. These
decisions are yours entirely, and what you choose and how you go about achieving
these objectives will determine your success or failure. This is where strategic
planning begins: defining objectives that are achievable with the resources available,
and then planning a strategy to achieve them. The Strategic Estimate is important in
this process, for you can use it to completely define your Movement’s Manifesto
(see 4.3.4) and its goals. For our purposes here, however, we will choose to add all
four of the conditions listed, so that you can see how the process works.
(1) Select a Victory
Condition in this
list.
(2) Select Add
button to move VC
down to
“prioritize” field.
To do this, select a Victory Condition in the list and then click the Add button in the
center. The selected condition moves down to the “Prioritize Victory Conditions”
field. Repeat this with all the conditions. Once they are in the bottom field, you can
prioritize them.
So, why is it necessary to prioritize your Victory Conditions? Aren’t they all equally
important? Yes, and no. As the Movement planner, you must be practical, and must
improve your strategic thinking by looking at your objectives and deciding which
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
are the most important and achievable at a given time. Many real-world Movements
fail because their leadership tries to accomplish too much too soon. Again, be
practical and take time to consider your most important goals, and then plan to
achieve them based on your analysis of the information about the scenario.
To reorganize the conditions in this field, select a
condition and then click the Up or Down buttons to
move it accordingly. After moving them, your list should be prioritized in the
following manner:
Conditions #3 and 4 should be
swapped such that the list looks like
this in the end.
Once your conditions list matches the above, select the
Back to Game button in the bottom center to start the
game. Again, loading time may take several minutes.
For full details about the Strategic Estimate and how to use it properly to determine your
Movement’s Manifesto, see Chapter 5.
STEP #6—Begin the Struggle
Selecting Back to Game on the Strategic Estimate Screen takes you to the Game
Screen. This is where you will play the scenario. By default, the City View Screen
appears. This is a 3-dimensional (3D) representation of the city (usually the capital)
of the country in which the scenario is based. The Game Screen has a lot of parts.
Below is a brief description of all of them. For full details, see Chapter 3.
3D View
Screen
Status
Bar
City
Map
Filters
Jump
Map
Navigation
Area
Tactics Control Panel
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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Status Bar: The Status Bar shows pertinent information about the scenario: The
current date, the name of the city, the unemployment and inflation rates of the
country, and the amount of money and people available in your Movement.
City Map Filters: These filters allow you to highlight the City View with various
color-coded data. They also allow you to display the names of important buildings,
and allow you to zoom in and out.
3D View Screen: This is the center of the screen and by default, the City View
appears. You may change the screen which appears here by using the Navigation
buttons in the bottom right-hand corner (see below).
Jump-Map (National Map): This map shows the country in which the scenario
takes place. You may click here to jump back and forth between the City map and
the National map. This scenario does not have a National map, and thus the A Force
More Powerful game logo appears here instead.
Tactics Control Panel: This is where you will select Tactics. More on this can be
found in Section 3.4.4.
Navigation Area: The Navigation Area is where you can access various data
screens that can be displayed in the View Screen area. We will describe some of
these screens as we proceed below.
Before we continue, let’s review some definitions, as these represent the core
elements that comprise A Force More Powerful.
The Struggle: Every scenario in A Force More Powerful is constructed such that you
have two opposing Alliances: The Movement versus the Regime. Each Alliance is
composed of like-minded Characters and Groups.
The Character: A Character is a person who belongs to a particular Group, and
may also belong to a particular Alliance. Some Characters are independent and
thus do not belong to an Alliance.
The Group: A Group is a collection of Characters that are brought
together by common interests, aspirations, emotional bonds, or economic
or political necessity. A police force, such as the City Police of Grbac in
this scenario, is considered a Group.
The Alliance: An Alliance is a collection of Groups with a like-minded purpose. The
“Freedom from Corruption” Movement in this scenario is considered an Alliance.
The Regime: The Regime is an Alliance of Characters and
Groups supporting the ruling body, and is (in essence) your
opponent. In this scenario, the Regime is called The Government of Grbac.
The Movement: In this scenario, your Movement is called
Freedom From Corruption. The Movement is an Alliance of
Characters and Groups that support your goals objectives. You are the behind-the-scenes
planner of the Movement. Members of the Movement are at your disposal to perform
Tactics.
A Tactic: A Tactic is an action taken by a Character to support the
larger strategic goals and objectives of his/her Group and Alliance.
For example, Mass Protest is a Tactic in the game.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Now let’s begin…
STEP #7—Review the Assets of the Movement and the Regime
Before you begin assigning Tactics to your Movement leaders,
however, let’s review the assets of both the Movement and the Regime.
This is a common step in real life strategic planning in nonviolent
struggle. To do this, select the Organization button in the Navigation
Area of the Game screen. This refreshes the View Screen area to show the
Organization Screen.
Screen Heading: Select to color-code
Groups and review game data
Movement: The Freedom from
Corruption has 2 Groups to start
Regime: The
Government of
Grbac has 5
Groups
Unaligned
Group
Color-Code (dark green to red) indicates
Group’s and Character’s standing and support
on various issues
The General Public: Always
listed outside an Alliance
The Organization Screen shows you all the Characters, Groups and Alliances in the
scenario. All Characters and Groups with a common Alliance appear in their
respective gray box. All unaligned Characters/Groups and the General Public (GP)
are displayed independently. So, let’s assess the situation in this scenario:
•
•
•
•
•
There are two Alliances, one comprising the Regime and the other
comprising the Movement.
The Regime has the support of five different Groups: Grbac Municipal
Court (CRT), City Council Office (CNCL), City Police (POL), WBRK
Radio (DJs), and the Retailers Association (RTL).
The Movement is currently smaller with only two Groups: The University
Student Association (UNIV), and the Web Design Group (WEB).
Also shown are the General Public (GP) and an unaligned Group, the
Motorcycle Manufacturers (MOT).
At your disposal are six Characters: three in the
University Student Association (Nikoleta Pantic,
Slobodan Popovic, and Ivan Varomic), one at the Web
Design Group, and two stand-alone Characters whose Groups are
currently aligned with the Regime. These Characters comprise the
“leadership” (or the generals) in your Movement. Other persons involved
in your Movement are displayed in the upper right-hand corner of the
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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•
•
•
screen (in the Status Bar), and represent the unnamed “captains” and
“lieutenants” in your Alliance who assist in the preparation and execution
of Tactics. Only the leadership can conduct Tactics, though all members
are involved in the implementation of those Tactics. More on this in
Section 3.4.6.
A Group’s leading member (or leader) is the Character left-most
displayed. Thus, Nikoleta Pantic is the leader of the University Student
Association and is, for all intents and purposes, the key member of your
Movement. She is the so-called “go to” person in terms of conducting
many of your Movement’s main Tactics.
Notice that all Characters and
Groups are color-coded. The color code runs from dark green to red. For
full details about what these colors mean and how to adjust them to learn
important game-play data, see Chapter 3. For our purposes, however,
simply know that dark green means that the Character/Group heavily
supports the topic that is displayed in the screen’s heading, and red means
that the Character/Group has low support for the topic displayed in the
screen’s heading. By default, the support levels for your Movement, which
is called Freedom from Corruption, are displayed. And of course, there
are various gradations of color in between to reflect different levels of
support. In this corruption scenario, notice that the Student University
Association (light green) supports the Freedom from Corruption Alliance,
and indeed two of its membership strongly support it. In contrast, the
Grbac Police Group is predominantly orange, indicating low support for
the Movement (they support the Regime).
And one final point. As alluded to above, some Characters can be either
“unaligned” or they can support an Alliance in opposition to the Group in
which they belong. These Characters’ silhouettes are white, and if you
move the mouse arrow over them, their normal black silhouettes will
highlight as well, showing you exactly where their support lies.
Now that we’ve assessed the situation and know where all Characters and Groups
stand, we can begin to assign Tactics.
STEP #8—Choose a Tactic Coordinator
As the Movement leader, your responsibility is to achieve the strategic goals (or
victory conditions) of the Movement. You do this through the use of “Tactics.” (For
a full list and descriptions of all Tactics, see the Resistopedia, which is an option
within the game that gives you detailed information about how the game works and
the different Tactics in the game). But in short, a Tactic is a tool used in an attempt
to strengthen your Movement and/or weaken your opponent. Quite literally, Tactics
are nonviolent weapons used against the Regime, either directly or indirectly. A
Tactic used directly against the Regime would be, for example, holding a Mass
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Protest or Harassing a Regime official. A Tactic used indirectly against the Regime
would be raising money for your Movement, which opposes the Regime, or training
your Movement’s members in Nonviolent Intervention (which are high-risk Tactics
in nonviolent action that disrupt the opponent directly. Training in this allows
members of your Movement to carry out disciplined nonviolent action with less
likelihood of it devolving into chaos or violence). Regardless, the purpose of any
Tactic that you initiate is to strengthen the Movement and to weaken the Regime.
In the bottom center of the screen rests the Tactics Control Panel.
This is where you will assign a Tactic Coordinator, a Tactic and a
Target for the Tactic. Although you can select these options in any
order you wish, the best policy is to first select a Coordinator. The
Characters available to make these assignments are your
Movement leaders.
To pick a coordinator, select the “Click
here to Choose the Tactic Coordinator”
button. This opens a notebook listing your
Movement leaders. The current “head” of
your Movement, Nikoleta Pantic, is listed
second under Municipal Court member John Duval. Go ahead and select her by
clicking on her portrait. The selection circle should appear over her portrait. Her
attributes are then listed on the right-hand side. Let’s take a minute to review her
characteristics.
All Characters have a set of attributes that define
who they are and what their “qualities” are. For
Nikoleta, her “Public Profile” is marked in orange,
meaning that she isn’t very well known. But she’s
capable of having influence over the public (light
green), and her “Enthusiasm” for the Movement
itself is very high (dark green). The color-codes
here are the same as they are across the entire A
Force More Powerful interface; for full details, see
Chapter 3. Nikoleta also has a number of
“Competencies” that make her an excellent leader:
Writing, Charisma, Vision, Empathy, Creativity
and Street Smarts. These Competencies play a very
important role in how successful a Character is
when conducting Tactics (see 4.3.2 and the
Appendix for more information about
competencies). Nikoleta is also skilled in
Nonviolent Intervention and Support & Logistics Training, so she’s a good
candidate for Training Tactics. Clicking the “More Information” button will open up
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an even greater list of attributes and data on Ms. Pantic, but we won’t worry about
that now. More information on that can be found in both Chapters 3 and 4.
Let’s give Nikoleta her first assignment. To do this, double-click on her
portrait or select the OK button in the bottom right-hand corner. Doing
so closes the leadership display and places Nikoleta’s portrait in the
coordinator spot on the Tactics Control Panel.
STEP #9—Choose a Tactic
Now that you have a coordinator, you must choose a Tactic. There
are a lot of different Tactics to choose from. Which Tactic to pick
and when to apply it is the big challenge in A
Force More Powerful, and the more you play
and understand how things work, the more
proficient you will become. For now, let’s start slow and have Nikoleta raise some
money through the Tactic of Fundraising. Your Movement has some money to start
(as shown in the upper right-hand display on the Status Bar), but you can always use
more. Nikoleta has the Competency of “Charisma” and so she’s a good candidate to
raise money.
To do this, select the “Click here to Choose a Tactic”
button on the Tactics Control Panel. This opens a list of
Tactics. There are five different categories of Tactics:
Attack, Deny, Build Strength, Defend, and Communicate.
Beneath each of these categories is a series of individual
Tactics that you can assign to your Movement leaders.
The Tactic we require is located under the Build Strength category.
•
•
Select the “+” sign next to this category to open a list of Tactics.
Then select the Fundraise Tactic
(it should be the first Tactic
listed). It highlights and the right
side of the page refreshes to reveal
details about the Tactic.
A Tactic’s description page is divided into three sections: Description, Resource
Expenditure, and Duration.
Description: This gives a description of the Tactic you’ve selected. Since you’ve
selected the Tactic of Fundraise, a description of it appears here.
Resource Expenditure: This section indicates the cost in both money and in
personnel needed to conduct this Tactic. Fundraising does not require any
significant amount of money (thankfully), but it does require at least two other
Movement people to participate. Looking at your current money and people
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
numbers in the upper right-hand corner of the Status Bar, you have more than
enough personnel to conduct this Tactic.
Duration: This section is interactive, in that you can
adjust the values that appear in the bottom three listings.
The “duration” of a Tactic is important to consider
carefully, and a full explanation of this can be found in
Chapters 3 and 4. In short, using the up and down
carets, you can indicate the number of days (or turns)
that a Character should “wait” before beginning the
Tactic; the number of days to “prepare” for the Tactic;
and how many days the Tactic will “last” before it
completes.
The default settings for the Fundraiser is 3 days for
“prep” and 14 days for “duration,” which means that Ms.
Pantic would be tied up for 17 day preparing and
conducting the event. But we want her to be available for further operations sooner,
so lets’ reset these numbers. For our Fundraiser, we will set the preparation time to
5 days, and decrease the number of days the Tactic will last to 3 days, which means
that Nikoleta Pantic will be tied up for only 8 days planning and implementing the
fundraiser (completion date of 9 January 05). Note: While Nikoleta works on the
fundraiser, she can be given other Tactics, but she will not be able to begin them
until she finishes her duties on the fundraiser; see Chapter 4 on assigning multiple
Tactics.
When you have finished reviewing the information about Fundraising,
select the OK button in the bottom right-hand corner and the Tactic
appears on the Tactics Control Panel.
STEP #10—Choose a Target
The next step is to pick a Target for the
Tactic. Not all Tactics require Targets,
but Fundraising does. To choose a
Target, select the “Click here to choose
a target for this tactic” button on the
Tactics Control Panel (as shown above). This opens a list
of Targets. There are three Groups from which to raise
money: The University
Student Association, the Web
Design Group, and the
“unaligned” Motorcycle
Manufacturers. Since Ms. Pantic is a member of the
student Group, let’s choose it as the Target of our
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Fundraiser. As with selecting a Tactic, select the Target in the list on the left-hand
side of the page. Details of the Target appear on the right-hand page.
The details for our Target, the University Student Association, are formatted much
like Nikoleta Pantic’s information. The name of the Target (a “Group” in this
example) is listed at the top, followed by what kind of Group it is, its leader (luckily
for us, it’s Nikoleta herself), where it is located (if available), and a series of other
details indicating its support for the Regime, the Movement, etc. As always, the
color-code is the same here as in other displays (dark green to red). Finally, you may
select the More Information button to access further details about this Group (see
Chapters 3 and 4).
Select the OK button in the bottom right-hand corner and the Target
appears on the Tactics Control Panel.
After completing steps 8, 9 and 10 above, the Tactics Control Panel should look
like this:
STEP #11—Review Your Decision with Movement Leaders
Once all three areas of the Tactics Control Panel are filled, the small sidebar
next to the Target area highlights with a green arrow (submit Tactic), a red
chalkboard eraser (clear Tactic), and either a green dot, a yellow triangle, or a
red stop sign (survey Tactic). This area gives you the opportunity to submit
your Tactic for implementation (green arrow), delete the Tactic that you’ve
selected (eraser), and/or survey the viability of the Tactic with your Movement
leaders (colored survey symbol). Let’s take
a survey first. To get the opinions of your
leaders, select the green Survey button. This
opens the Survey dialog and shows what
your leaders think of the Tactic you’ve
selected.
Fundraising is a very popular Tactic in your
Movement, so it’s full speed ahead with this
one. If the Survey button had been a yellow
triangle, then some of your leaders would
not have been sure about the feasibility of your decision. If it had been a red stopPage 20
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
sign, the majority of your leaders would not have liked your decision at all. The
opinions of your leaders are important to consider before submitting a Tactic,
because if the majority of them do not like the Tactic you’ve selected, there’s
probably a good reason why. You do not have to take the advice of your leaders, but
it’s a good idea to at least listen to their concerns.
Note: Hovering the mouse arrow over the text of a
Character’s assessment will access a tip with a
further explanation of their opinion.
But Fundraising is a very useful Tactic, so let’s go ahead and “submit” it.
To do this, select the green arrow (or the Submit button on the Survey
Screen itself). This tells the game that you intend to put her Tactic into
play, and a brief message appears on the screen declaring so.
STEP #12—Set the Timer for the Tactic
Once you’ve submitted the Tactic, it’s time to put it into action and
then see the results. You do this by setting a number of days that
you wish the scenario to progress in the Turn Indicator above the
Navigation Area in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen.
In Step #9, if you recall, we set the number of days that we wanted to prepare for the
fundraiser to 5. Also recall that the event itself would take 3 days. Thus, it will take
a total of 8 days to prepare and run the event. This number is automatically recorded
by the game and placed in the Turn Indicator field. You may adjust this number if
you wish in order to stop on the day you want. But the game will, if necessary, reset
the number here each time a Tactic is submitted in order to ensure that the game
pauses on the day that the shortest Tactic completes. But let’s go ahead and accept
the 8 day setting.
STEP #13—Advance the Turns
Now it’s time to advance the turns and see the results
of your fundraising Tactic. To do this, select the
Advance Time button. The screen goes black momentarily to reveal the
number of days that have gone past. When the screen refreshes, notice that the date
in the upper left-hand corner has advanced as well. This means that 8 days have
passed in the scenario. At the end of these 8 days, you should learn the results of the
Fundraiser.
Message Interruption: At this point, you may be interrupted by a message prior to
reaching the full number of days indicated above. This means that some kind of
important event, which may require your attention, has occurred in between the current
turn and the turn listed in the Turn Indicator field. If such a message appears, read it,
then close the message and continue by clicking the Advance Time button again.
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STEP #14—Review Results (Messages)
IMPORTANT: Note that the results indicated below versus the results that you see in
your game may be different. Results of Tactics and certain events in A Force More
Powerful are randomized somewhat in order to give you a wide variety of real-world
conclusions. So if your Fundraiser is not as successful as the above, that’s okay. The
important thing is to learn how to assign Tactics and then review results (whatever they
may be) in the messaging system.
To the left of the Turn Indicator is a flashing Message button. Select it
to review the results of your Fundraiser.
Messages are very important in A
Force
primary
More Powerful, for they are the
way to know if Tactics succeed or
fail. There
are three types of messages: memos
(listed
alongside a letter icon), advisor
balloons
(ones that you receive privately from your Movement advisors), and public news
messages indicating events occurring in the country that are “in the news” (listed
alongside a newspaper).
The result of our Fundraiser should be listed at
the top of the messages list. Select the icon to
the left of the message to open it. A green
check mark appears over the icon of any
message that you’ve selected, and the content
of said message appears to the right.
Good news for us! Nikoleta Pantic was
successful in raising money from the
University Student Association. This money will help us expand our message and
fight for the release of our prisoner. This money immediately goes into our treasury
in the upper right-hand corner of the screen. Notice,
however, that your Movement has gained more money than
acquired through the Fundraiser. This is because your
affiliated Groups automatically earn you monies each week. So, you’ve earned
money through your Fundraiser and through your Groups. You’re off to a good
start.
STEP #15—Select Two More Tactics
Now that your Fundraising Tactic has been resolved with positive success, let’s
assign a couple more Tactics. It is possible to select and submit multiple Tactics
before progressing the turns in the scenario. We will do this below.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
First Tactic (Display Symbol): Follow steps 8,
9, and 10 to assign Ivan Varomic the
Communicate Tactic of having your members
Display Symbols in the downtown region of the city of Grbac. Follow the steps
carefully as indicated to select the Display Symbol Tactic from the Tactics list.
When you’re finished, the Tactics Control Panel should look like this:
Notice that the Survey button is now a red stop sign. Your members are not
confident at all in the success of this Tactic. But that’s okay; go ahead and
submit it anyway and see what happens. Press the green Submit arrow to verify
your decision. Notice that the Turn Indicator jumps from 1 day to 4.
WAIT!! Do not “Advance” the turns yet! We will submit another Tactic
before advancing game turns.
Second Tactic (Hunger Strike): Before
advancing the turns, let’s select another Tactic.
Slobodan Popovic is sitting in jail but wishes
to contribute to the cause. It’s unlikely to succeed but he will conduct a Hunger
Strike. Follow steps 8, 9, and 10 to assign Popovic the Communicate Tactic of
Hunger Strike. Follow the steps carefully as indicated. When you’re finished, the
Tactics Control Panel should look like this:
Notice that no Target is required for this Tactic. The Target is Popovic
himself, and thus you do not need to fill out this part of the panel. Notice too
that your leadership thinks this is a pretty poor Tactic, but again, that’s okay. Go
ahead and submit it by clicking the green Submit arrow. Notice that the Turn
Indicator does not change this time (it remains at 4). This is because the Hunger
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Page 23
Strike Tactic is scheduled to take longer than the Display Symbol Tactic, and thus
there’s no need for the game to change the time. Once the Display Symbol Tactic is
completed, the time will be reset to indicate the number of days remaining before
the Hunger Strike Tactic is complete.
NOTE: The ability to assign and submit multiple Tactics before advancing turns is
important to keep in mind, for you can go through all of your members and give them
assignments immediately. This saves time and uses your resources to best effect.
Government Rally: At this point, the game may be halted by a government rally. If
this happens, the screen goes blank momentarily, tells you what’s about to occur,
and then jumps back to the 3D View to show the rally taking place. This kind of 3Dvisual Tactic is called a “vignette” Tactic. For more details, see Section 4.11.
STEP #16—Review All Tactics on the Tactics Queue
Now that you have chosen and submitted three different Tactics
(Fundraiser, Wear Symbol, and Hunger Strike), click the Tactics Queue
button to open the Tactics Queue.
Character
Portraits:
Circled Portraits
indicate which
Tactics appear
below
Filters
Tactics Queue:
Indicates which
Tactics have
finished (marked
with red check)
and which are “in
progress” (no
marks).
Monies and
Manpower
Expenditures
The Tactics Queue is a very important screen in A Force More Powerful. It shows
you all the Tactics currently “in progress” and those that have completed. Various
filters on the screen allow you to sort the data as you desire, and you may also use
the buttons near the bottom (postpone, rush, delete, etc.) to manage and adjust when
Tactics are resolved. For our scenario, we have assigned three Tactics, one to each
of our student leaders. Two of the Tactics have resolved: Fundraiser and Display
Symbol. Slobodan Popovic’s Hunger Strike, however, is still in progress.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Step #17—Continue the Struggle
Now that we have walked you through assigning and submitting three Tactics, you
may continue on your own. This corruption scenario spans the course of one year
(beginning on January 1 and ending on December 31). Continue assigning Tactics as
explained above and experiment with different things. As you progress, other
Characters (and perhaps even Groups) will join your cause, thereby increasing the
resources at your Movement’s disposal. Some Tactics will succeed; others will fail.
Some Tactics may fail so terribly that members are imprisoned or killed. Those are
real risks when using nonviolent action to fight very oppressive opponents. As the
strategic planner of a nonviolent Movement, then, your challenge is to create a
message that resonates with people and groups and attracts them to your cause,
mobilize those people and Groups to participate in Tactics, build up the strength of
the society to resist oppression, and use the Movement’s strengths to Target the
weaknesses of your opponent. It’s a difficult task indeed. But success can be
achieved. Be smart, be practical, be resourceful, and most importantly… be patient.
Change never happens overnight. If you wish to continue playing this scenario, here
are some things to keep in mind:
•
•
•
•
•
Improve Your
Movement’s
Message. The Craft
Message Tactic is an
essential early
Tactic. Select a
Coordinator with, if
possible, a combination of these Competencies: Charisma, Creativity, Empathy,
Intelligence, Vision, and Writing. Repeat this Tactic until the Movement has a
high-quality message, and then repeat it periodically to keep your message
sharp.
Conduct other Build Strength Tactics. Recruiting Characters and Organizing
Social Events like Meetings and Parties are always good Tactics. Social events
help to improve Character Enthusiasm and can increase your membership,
which is vitally important for more aggressive Mass Protest Tactics later in the
game.
Fraternize, Fraternize, Fraternize. Find Characters whose “support” for the
Regime is soft and Fraternize. This Tactic is essentially the “warm up” to the
more forceful Recruit Character Tactic, and is very helpful in the early stages.
Assign Tactics to all of Your Leaders. The steps above were simple and
included only three of your leaders. Now go back and assign Tactics to all of
your leaders. And as long as you have money to spend, keep assigning Tactics
to everyone. Do not leave anyone idle; keep up the pressure!
Watch Your Funds. Continue conducting Fundraisers. Although you will get
monies from affiliated Groups, Fundraisers are the best way to keep your
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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•
•
•
Movement financially secure. As time goes on, you’ll want to try more
aggressive, more costly Tactics. You’ll need money to conduct these Tactics.
Continue with Hunger Strikes. Your first Hunger Strike may fail. If so, try it
again, and again, and again, until it succeeds. It’s an important Tactic in this
scenario.
Watch Your Messages. You will get scores of messages during play. Watch
and read them carefully. Pay particular attention to any messages that indicate
that a certain Character is interested in your Movement. And then, make
immediate Fraternize or Recruit Character attempts to sway him/her to your
cause. These may fail and they may take a long time, but they are worth it.
More Characters mean more support.
Read More Tips-On-Play. Read Section 4.12 for a more detailed and
comprehensive set of tips on how to play A Force More Powerful.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
3. INTERFACE OVERVIEW
This chapter describes all of the interface features available in A Force More
Powerful. After reviewing this chapter you should have a good understanding on
how all the various buttons, tabs, text fields, etc. function. For full details about how
these features work in context to game play, please refer to Chapter 4.
3.1 Main Menu Screen
New Conflict: Select to begin a nonviolent conflict. You’re taken immediately to
the Scenario Selection Screen (see 3.2).
Resume Conflict: Select to continue playing a conflict which you’ve recently
saved. There can be multiple saved game files available.
Review Results: Select to open a list of savedgame files where the game state is “complete”
(that is, the game has been finished); when one is
selected, the game displays the results of the
Victory Conditions for that scenario. Red listings
indicate failed results; green listings indicate
successful results. See Section 3.5 for a sample.
Options: Select this to set up various game play
options. There are four categories of options:
General, Alerts, Graphics, and Sound. See
Section 4.10 for details.
Resistopedia: Select to access the Resistopedia.
The Resistopedia is a full, online reference tool formatted as a “Help” file, and gives
you information about all the various Tactics and their accompanying historical
examples. It’s recommended that you study the Resistopedia often.
Quit: Select to exit A Force More Powerful.
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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3.2 Scenario Selection Screen
Scenario
List
Picture
Symbolizing
Scenario
Scenario
Description
Return to
Main Menu
Difficulty
Level
Start Conflict
Scenario Picture: A real-world picture appears in the upper left-hand corner of the
screen, which gives a clue on the kind of scenario you’ve selected. This picture has
no bearing on game play.
Scenario List: This field lists the scenarios available for play. To select a scenario,
click on its name. You may also double-click on the scenario name to start the game.
Scenario Description: This field provides a description of the scenario you’ve
selected from the scenario list.
Difficulty Level: Use this difficulty indicator to either decrease or increase (from a
range of “very easy” to “brutal”) how the Artificial Intelligence (AI) of the game
will behave against your Movement. The AI in the game is, in effect, the Regime.
Return to Main Menu: Select to return to the Main Menu Screen.
Start Conflict: Once you’ve chosen a scenario, select this option to continue on to
the Strategic Estimate Screen.
3.3 Strategic Estimate Screen
A Strategic Estimate, in general, is a document that helps a Movement organize,
analyze, and plan a course of action that can withstand the costs, uncertainties, and
even chaos that such actions can bring. The one in A Force More Powerful is an
adaptation of the Strategic Estimate found in Robert L. Helvey's book, On Strategic
Nonviolent Conflict. It is the place in the game where the volume of information
available is organized in a systematic manner, so that you can assess the information
quickly and plan your course of action in a strategic—rather than haphazard—way.
The Strategic Estimate is divided into four different pages, which are accessed
through a series of tabs at the top of the screen. By default, The Situation Screen
appears. To access a different screen, click on its tab.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
The Situation: The Situation Screen displays the information and data you need to
know before starting the scenario.
Mission Assessment: The Mission Assessment Screen provides tools that you can
use to begin planning your Movement's actions.
Victory Conditions: The Victory Conditions Screen comprises four areas which
enable you to review goals and your Vision of Tomorrow, select Victory Conditions,
and prioritize Victory Conditions. This page must be accessed and Victory
Conditions must be selected and prioritized before you can begin any scenario.
Phases and Objectives: The Phases and Objectives Screen allows you set your
phases and determine your objectives for those phases.
An entire chapter has been devoted to the Strategic Estimate. For more details about
this screen and all of its capabilities, see Chapter 5.
3.4 The Game Screen
The Game Screen is where A Force More Powerful is played. Upon entering this
screen, the City View Map is displayed, although you can refresh this screen to view
the National Map and other displays that give you valuable information during play.
3D View
Screen
Status Bar
City Map
Filters
Building
Names
Neighborhood
Name
Jump Map
Tactics Control Panel
Navigation Area
3.4.1 The Status Bar
The Status Bar shows up-to-date information about the scenario being played.
Running left to right…
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
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Date—Shows the current day, month, and year in the scenario. This
information changes as play progresses.
Name—Shows the name of the map or the informational data currently
displayed in the center of the screen. By default, the City Map View
Screen is displayed, but this can be changed by using various display tools
in the Navigation Area (see below).
Unemployment—Shows the unemployment level of the map area
currently displayed in the center of the screen. There are five levels: Very
Low, Low, Medium, High, and Very High. Unemployment rates can
change during play.
Inflation—Shows the current inflation level of the entire country. There
are five levels: Very Low, Low, Medium, High, and Very High. Inflation
rates can change during play.
Money and People—Shows the total amount of money and personnel
your Movement currently has available. This rate fluctuates up and down
as you play. For money, the left number is the amount of money your
Movement currently has; the number in parenthesis is the amount you’ve
currently allotted to conducting Tactics. If the amount is red, then you
need more money before you can conduct further Tactics. For personnel,
the number represents a symbolic representation of the total people
resources of your Movement.
3.4.2 The View Screen
The center of the screen shows (initially) the City View, which is usually the capital
of the nation in which the scenario is played.
The city displayed here may not be the only
city in the nation, and you may jump from city
to city by using the Jump Map (see below).
You may zoom in and out of this screen by
rolling forward and backward the wheel on
your mouse, and you may scroll around the
map by pushing the cursor all the way to the
left and right, or top to bottom of the screen. In
addition, the districts of the city (West Side,
East Side, etc.) are displayed throughout the map, and you may move the
mouse arrows over these names to highlight the entire district/area in
question. In addition, using the top two filter buttons on the left-hand side
allows you to highlight the map with various color-coded displays that give
you information about political and social standing within these districts.
Using the third button down allows you to turn on and off building names.
Using the bottom slider allows you to zoom the 3D view in and out. For a
list of shortcut keys, see Section 4.10.2.
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3.4.3 The Jump Map (National Map)
The Jump Map allows you to change the display in the
middle of the screen to the National Map. Clicking
anywhere inside the Jump Map will automatically
change the view screen from whatever is displayed
there to the National View. Not only do the Map
Controls show all the main cities of the nation (the
large squares), but they also show outer-lying resource areas, such as oil wells, radio
stations, coal mines, etc. that can be selected and targeted with Tactics (see 3.4.8).
To jump from the National View back to the City View, click on the icon of the
desired city and the view screen will change again to display that city.
The buttons appearing in the upper left-hand corner of the National Map
allow you to color-code the various regions of the map to glean valuable
information about the status of the country on various issues. The top button
allows you to cycle through various Support Levels; the bottom button allows
you to cycle through demographic information. Repeatedly clicking a button
changes the information displayed.
3.4.4 Tactics Control Panel
This area of the screen allows you to pick Tactics, Tactic Coordinators, and Targets
for Tactics.
Tactic Coordinator
Tactics Selection
Target Selection
Tactic Coordinator—This area is where the coordinator of a Tactic is selected and
displayed. See Section 3.4.6 for more details.
Tactics Selection—This area is where a Tactic is selected and displayed. See
Section 3.4.7 for more details.
Target Selection—This area is where the target of a Tactic is selected and
displayed. See Section 3.4.8 for more details.
Submit Tactic—This arrow highlights in green when you have picked a Tactic
Coordinator, a Tactic, and a Target. As soon as these three areas are filled, click this
arrow to confirm that this is the Tactic you wish to put into action.
Clear Tactic—Use the eraser to remove (or delete)
the Tactic you’ve just selected. This allows you to
start over from scratch.
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Survey Tactic—Select to review the opinions of Movement members towards the
Tactic currently planned. If a green circle is displayed, the majority of your
members like the Tactic; if a yellow triangle, your members are split on their
opinions; if a red stop sign, then the majority if your members do not like the Tactic.
Moving the mouse arrow over the opinion of a member gives you a further
explanation of why that member does or does not like the Tactic.
3.4.5 Navigation Area
The Navigation Area allows you to change the display in the
middle of the screen.
Messages—Messages are very
important in A Force More
Powerful, for they are often the only way to
know if Tactics succeed or fail. There are
three types of messages: memos (listed
alongside a letter icon), advisor balloons
(ones that you receive privately from your
Movement advisors), and public news messages indicating events occurring in the
country that are “in the news” (listed alongside a newspaper).
Since receiving and managing the flow of messages is such an important part of A
Force More Powerful, a special section has been set aside to explain the messaging
system. See Section 4.7 for details.
Turn Length—This area allows you to adjust up and down the number
of turns that are advanced at one time. One turn represents one day in
the scenario. The number that you place here is linked to the amount of
duration time (see 4.1.2) that you specify for each Tactic. The game automatically
sets the turn length to the end of the next scheduled Tactic. For example, if you have
set two Tactics, one that will take 5 days and one that will take 7 days, the game will
automatically set the turn length to 5. Once that Tactic is complete, the turn length
will be reset to 2 days to reflect the completion date of the next Tactic.
Advance Turn—Once you’ve determined the number of turns to elapse in
the “Turn Length” area, click here to advance the game that number of
turns/days. The “Tactics Control” area will update to indicate whether
there are any messages available to read pertaining to any Tactics that were resolved
in the elapsed time.
End Game—This button appears when the scenario ends, and
replaces the Turn Length and Indicator buttons. When it appears,
select it to advance to the Evaluation Screen (see 3.5).
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Information Screen—Select to display the Information Screen. See
Section 3.4.9 for details.
Strategic Estimate—Select to display the Strategic Estimate. See
Chapter 5 for details.
Organization Screen—Select to display the Organization Screen. See
Section 3.4.10 for details.
National Map—Select to display the National View Map. See Section
3.4.11 for details.
Tactics Queue—Select to display the Tactics Queue. See Section 3.4.12
for details.
City Map—Select to display the City View Map.
Game Options—Select to display various game options.
Help—Select to access the Resistopedia.
3.4.6 Tactic Coordinator Display
The Tactic Coordinator Display represents a spiral-bounded notebook opened to
reveal information about Characters within the Movement. On the left are shown
portraits of each Character (except those that have been killed) and a few pertinent
facts, such as a Character’s name, his/her position within the Movement, current
location, etc. On the right-hand side are more details about the Character currently
selected.
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Character
Description
Page: Shows
details of the
Character
selected on the
left-hand page.
Tactic
Coordinators:
Members of your
Movement. The
“leader” of your
Movement has
the Movement
symbol in the
corner.
Choose Character Page: Character portraits are displayed top to
bottom, with the Movement and/or Group's leader often listed at the top.
The leader also has a symbol displayed in the upper right-hand corner of
the picture (Movement symbol). Each portrait’s background is colorcoded to indicate the Character’s current support for the Movement.
These colors are universal throughout the interface to show gradations
of support, and they go from dark green (high support) down through
light green, yellow, orange, and finally red (very low support). These colors can
change during play.
Another symbol shown on a Character’s portrait is the selection circle (shown in the
Character portrait above). This appears when you
left-click on the portrait. When this is done, that
Character’s “Description” information is displayed
on the right-hand side of the dialog (see below).
Clicking OK at this point picks that Character to
coordinate (or lead) the Tactic being planned, and
displays the portrait in the Tactics Control Panel.
Clicking CANCEL closes the display.
Also, a number can appear on a
Character’s portrait. This number appears
when a Character is currently assigned to
a Tactic that’s still in progress. The number
indicates the number of turns (or days) until that
Character is available to lead another Tactic. For
more details about selecting the proper Character
and Tactic, see Chapter 4.
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Other important symbols that can appear on a Character’s portrait are as follows. For
more details abut these statuses, see the Resistopedia.
Dead
Missing
In Prison
House Arrest
Left Country
The amount and kinds of Tactics available for Characters to perform can be limited
by their status and the kind of symbol appearing over the portrait. For example, a
Character “In Prison” can only conduct a Hunger Strike or Send Letter. For more
information on Character status and its effects on game play, see the Resistopedia.
When a Character is selected, the Description Page shows his/her details. These
details show a Character’s relevant strengths and weaknesses that affect how well
they will perform various Tactics. There are four sections. The top-most section
(Public Profile, Influence and Enthusiasm) indicates by color a Character’s strength
in each category. The color system here is the same system for Movement support.
The second section (Competencies) indicates what the Character is good at (see
4.3.2 and the Appendix). The third section (Group Training Levels) indicates the
training level of the Group that the selected Character belongs to. This section is not
connected to the selected Character’s personal training, and it only changes when
the Group’s training in those categories change. Again, the color scheme is dark
green (good) to red (poor). The fourth section is the More Information button.
Clicking this button opens the Information Pane of the selected Character. See
Section 3.4.13 for more details. For more information on the effects that a
Character’s Public Profile, Public Influence, Enthusiasm, various Competencies,
and Group Training Levels have on Tactics, see Section 4.3.2 and the Resistopedia.
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3.4.7 Tactics Selection Display
The Tactics Selection Display lists the Tactics that you can choose to assign to
Characters within the Movement.
Tactic
Description
Tactics: There are
5 categories:
Attack, Deny,
Build Strength,
Defend,
Communicate
Resource
Expenditure
(cost and
people)
Tactic
Duration
Choose Tactic Page: On the left-hand side is the scrollable list of Tactics, formatted
in a tree-view structure. Tactics are first sorted by general category: Attack, Deny,
Build Strength, Defend, and Communicate. Beneath these, specific Tactics can be
accessed by clicking on the small +/– signs on the far left of the tree-view. Doubleclicking on the category/tactic name itself will also expand/collapse that part of the
list. Left-clicking on a Tactic selects it and displays its description on the right-hand
side of the page. Clicking OK at this point picks that Tactic to use and displays its
name in the Tactics Control Panel. Clicking CANCEL closes the display.
NOTE: The number and types of Tactics displayed here depends upon which order
you’ve chosen items in the Tactics Control Panel. For example, if you’ve chosen the
Target of the Tactic before picking the actual Tactic, then only the Tactics usable
against that Target are displayed.
Description Page: When a Category or Tactic is selected, a description of it appears
on the right-hand side of the page.
Resource Expenditure: This section indicates how
much money and how many people are necessary to
conduct this Tactic.
Duration: When a Tactic is selected, five items of
information appear in the lower right of the dialog:
# of Days: This line indicates the number of days
the Movement needs to agree to this Tactic. Riskier
tactics require more “convincing” time. See Section
4.1.2 for more information.
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Travel Time: This line indicates the number of days it will take the Coordinator to
reach the site of the Tactic.
Wait: This line indicates the number of days the Movement will wait before it
begins preparing for the Tactic.
Preparation: This line indicates the number of days the Movement will spend
preparing for the Tactic.
Execute Tactic: This line indicates the number of days the Tactic will run.
Using the “up” and “down” carets in lines 3 through 5 allows you to reset the
number of turns (days) for each item. Knowing how to adjust these settings is an
important part of the strategy for properly selecting and implementing Tactics. For
details, see Chapter 4.
Special Tactics Symbols: There are two special symbols which appear next to
certain Tactics, as described below:
Illegal Tactics: If a Tactic is classified as “illegal,” this symbol appears
on the Tactic’s description page. For more details about illegal Tactics, see
Section 4.5.1.
Potentially Violent Tactics: If a Tactic is classified as potentially
“violent,” this symbol appears on the Tactic’s description page. For more
details about violent Tactics, see Section 4.5.1.
3.4.8 Target Selection Display
In the Choose Target Screen the Player chooses a specific Target for a Tactic.
Target
Description: Shows
details of the target
selected on the lefthand page
Targets: There
are two main
categories:
Geographic and
Societal
Choose Target Page: On the left-hand side is a scrollable list of targets currently
available, sorted by category (Geographic, Societal, etc.). These Categories can be
expanded/collapsed by clicking on the small +/– signs on the far left of the treeview. Double-clicking on the Category name itself will also expand/collapse that
part of the list. Left-clicking on a Target selects it. Doing so displays its descriptive
information in the right-hand side of the dialog (see below). Clicking OK at this
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point confirms the Target to use in the Tactic being planned, and displays its name
in the Tactics Control Panel. Clicking Cancel closes the display.
Description Page: When a Target is selected, a
description of it appears on the right-hand side of
the page. The Target’s name, what category it
belongs to, its Leader’s name (if a Group or
building), etc. are displayed. Below this are levels
of support for the Regime, the Movement, etc.
color-coded as per all other displays on these
kinds of pages. Below these indicators is the More
Information button. Clicking this button opens
the Information Pane for the selected Target. See
Section 3.4.13 for more details.
3.4.9 Information Screen
The Information Screen displays a graph showing changes in Fear,
Enthusiasm and Support Levels over time for a particular Group. This is a
useful tool for allowing you to analyze how various Groups reacted to
your Movement’s actions, and to your opponents’ actions, over time. You can also
look for relationships over time between various groups’ Fear, Enthusiasm, and
Support Levels. There may be positive correlations or inverse relationships in these
attributes between two or more different groups. You can also look for short or long
term trends on these graphs.
Message
History: Shows
the messages
received within
the selected time
slice.
Group
Being
Reviewed
Group and
Time
Filters
Graph: Each slice represents one unit of selected time.
Message history refreshes when a new slice is selected.
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The Graph: The left-hand side of the screen contains the graph. The colored lines
indicate the Fear, Enthusiasm, and Support Levels of the Group being reviewed. The
Fear line is red, the Enthusiasm line is green, and the Support Levels for the
Alliances are purple and light blue. Also shown to the right of each Alliance is its
symbol.
The graph is vertically divided into slices, with each slice representing a
fraction of the total time measured on the graph. The number of slices
depends on the number of days being measured, as follows:
•
If 1 month (30 days) is being measured, each set of 7 days gets
its own slice.
•
If 6 months (180 days) are being measured, each set of 30 days
gets its own slice.
•
If 1 year (365 days) is being measured, each set of 90 days gets
its own slice.
•
If 5 years (1825 days) are being measured, each set of 365 days
gets its own slice.
Selecting a different slice refreshes the
message history (see below).
Pull-Down Menus: Below the graph are two
pull-down menus that allow you to select different Groups and time-scales to view..
Choose Select a Group to View to sort Groups by category (Bureaucracy, Business,
Labor, etc.). Once a category is selected, you may choose a Group on the right-hand
side. Choose Set Time Scale to set a different time-scale.
Graph Measurements: By default, all measurement lines on
the graph appear. If you move the mouse cursor over a single
measurement category to the right of the graph, only its line
appears. So if you highlight Fear, only the red line appears.
Message History: Along the right-hand side of the
screen is a list of messages that were generated
within the time-scale selected on the graph. Select
one to read the full message. These messages do not
go away as per the normal rules for message
deletion (see 4.7). All messages generated in the
selected time-scale (slice) appear here.
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3.4.10 Organization Screen
The Organization Screen displays the scenario’s political Groups and
Alliances. You can view all the units in the game, or any category-defined
subsets, using the drop-down menu controls near the top of the screen.
Screen Heading: Select to
color-code Groups and
review game data.
Movement: The Freedom from
Corruption has only one Group.
Regime: The City
Government of
Grbac has 7
Groups aligned
with it.
The General
Public:
Always listed
outside an
Alliance
Color-Code (dark
green to red)
indicates Group’s
standing on
various issues.
Unaligned
Characters
White Silhouettes: Indicates Character is not
in the same Alliance as his/her Group.
The Groups and Alliances appearing on this screen are organized and colored in the
following manner:
Shapes: Characters are silhouettes within squares on transparent or colored
backgrounds, attached to Groups. Groups are rectangles, and Alliances are square
bounded areas of gray.
Names: Each Group’s name appears at the top of its rectangle. Each
Alliance’s name appears at the top of its shaded area. Groups use
their acronyms; Alliances use the longest possible name allowed as space provides.
Colors: Colors reflect the units’ value for the attribute selected in one of many filter
categories in the filter dialog.
•
•
•
•
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For Characters, the background of the silhouette in the square takes on the
color connected to the value for the attribute/support status being filtered.
For Groups, the background color of the rectangle changes.
For Alliances, the color of the bounded area changes.
If an attribute is selected that does not apply to a particular Group, that
Group becomes white. If an attribute is selected that does not apply to a
particular Character, that Character becomes white. If an attribute is
selected that does not apply to a particular Alliance, its area becomes gray.
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Size: The size of an Alliance’s bounded area is adjusted as needed to accommodate
its contents.
Group Placement in or out of Alliance area: Characters and Groups not inside an
Alliance’s boundaries are “unaligned.”
Character Placement in a Group: This indicates the Character’s membership (or
status) within the Group. The leftmost Character is always the Group’s Leader.
There is an exception to this rule, however. A Character can be a member of a
different Alliance than his/her Group’s. In that case, the Character appears in two
places: in the normal state (a black head on a colored background) in his/her
Alliance’s bounded area (or Unaligned) and attached to his/her Group, as an empty
(transparent) silhouette.
Tooltips: When a Character or Group is passed over with the mouse cursor, the
following information appears as a tooltip.
•
Full name of Character or Group.
•
The second line shows the name of
the Alliance that the Group or
Character is a member of; if
unaligned, then “Unaligned”
appears.
•
The third line shows the standing of the Group/Character as per the filter
that you have selected in the screen heading (see below).
Title and Filters: Above all listed
Groups and Alliances appears the
title of the Organization Screen. It
has two parts: the category of Groups being displayed (for example Labor, or Police
or Agricultural, or “All Categories” if you want to see all kinds of Groups displayed)
and the name of the field being viewed for each (example: “Police: Corruption”
would show Corruption policy preferences for each Police Group).
The controls for filtering the Organization Screen view are accessed through
clicking on the Organization Screen’s title. To change the category of Groups being
displayed, click the first part (before the colon), and a dialog displaying a list of
categories appears. When a category is picked, all Groups not belonging to that
category fade into the background.
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When the part of the title after the colon is clicked, a dialog with several types of
entries appears. Only one entry can be picked at any time, and the dialog closes as
soon as you make a choice (or click Cancel). The entries, organized by type, are as
follows:
3.4.11 National Map
The National Map is the highest-level map normally available in a scenario (unless
the scenario is a city-wide scenario, in which case there is no National Map and the
City Map is instead the highest-level map normally available). A limited amount of
national- and regional-level information is available in this view. This will be wellknown information about the structure of a nation that anyone could get from an
atlas or the Internet, and therefore it is available to you, the player, as a means in
help you plan your Tactics.
Specific
Locations (or
nodes): Main
capital of the
country is
represented by
a star within a
square.
Regions: Are
color-coded to
indicate
different
political/
demographic
entities.
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The basic function of the National Map is to depict and simulate activity outside
urban areas. The map is not scrollable. All game functionality on the National Map
resides in the icon network overlaying the background. Cities and Interactive Map
Features (listed below) are square or circular icons; the transportation network of the
country is represented by connections between the icons. City names show up near
the city icons. A second part of the functionality is in the division of the country into
different colored Regions, which exist as separate political/demographic entities.
National-Map Features/Key: Features shown on the National Map are listed
below. The shape of each National/Regional Map icon helps distinguish between
cities and other types of map features.
The buttons appearing in the upper left-hand corner of the National Map
allow you to color-code the various regions of the map to glean valuable
information about the status of the country on various issues. The top button
allows you to cycle through various support levels; the bottom button allows
you to cycle through demographic information. Clicking multiple times on a button
changes the information displayed.
City icons are square.
Road Junctions, Road/Rail Junctions, Airports, Mountain Passes, and
Bridges are diamond-shaped.
All other clickable features are circles.
The entire set of National Map icons is as follows:
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Secondary Road
Oil Refinery
Primary Road
Oil Well
Capital
Labor Camp
Large Non-Capital City
Insurgent Camp
Medium Non-Capital City
Prison
Ranch
Nuclear Facility
Orchard Farm
Non-Nuclear Facility
Rice Farm
Rural Clinic
Corn Farm
Mountain Pass
Villages
Road-Railroad Junction
Refugee Camp
Road Junction
Logging
Airport
Military Base
Border Crossing
Mine
Bridge
Railroad
River/Sea Lane
Regions: Regions are the areas that a nation is divided into. They
may be political, economic and/or ethnic/religious. When clicking
on a Region’s name, an Info Pane (see 3.4.13) for that Region
appears. Regions can contain cities or other Interactive Map Features. However,
Regional demographics do not include city demographics; this is because part of the
point of including Regions and non-urban areas is to highlight the differences at
work therein. Clicking a city icon generates its Info Pane; double-clicking it sends
the user to that city’s 3D view.
Disruption: Some Interactive Map Features can be Disrupted. The nature
and effects of this Disruption vary by the type of Interactive Map Feature,
so that a Disrupted Road Junction means that travel is not possible through
that node, whereas a Disrupted Mine is not contributing to the economy.
Disruption can have many causes: nonviolent barricading of a road junction, a strike
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
or protest at a mine or village, or something more violent, like an airstrike or
insurgent attack. Both Regime and Movement personnel can be affected by
Disruption; even those conducting the Disruption can be affected.
3.4.12 Tactics Queue
The Tactics Queue is divided into two parts: a row of (potentially) six portraits at the
top, depicting members of the Movement; and a list of Tactics beneath, displaying
the current and future scheduled Tactics, or Tactics that have already been
completed. Next to the portrait row (which is vertically scrollable) appear Character
filters, All On (showing selection circles over portraits) and All Off (no selection
circles).
Character Portraits: Circled Characters
have their Tactics displayed below.
Character
Filters
Tactics Filters
Tactics List:
Those listed with
a red check
mark have been
completed.
Resource
Expenditure
Tactics
Management
Buttons
Tactics List: The main feature of the queue is a list of all Tactics assigned to
Movement Characters. This shows Tactic names and Coordinators, starting dates,
end dates, costs, and the number of people needed to conduct each Tactic. A “status”
icon appears on the far left as either an empty circle (denoting a current tactic) or
one with a red check mark (denoting a completed Tactic). The absence of a symbol
indicates a future Tactic. By default, all “completed” Tactics are turned off.
Character Portraits: At the top of the Queue are a set of up to six Character
portraits, which can be scrolled up or down to reveal more. (These portraits are
color-coded dark-green to red to represent their current support for the Movement.)
These portraits act as filters to the list of Tactics below them. For example, to view a
particular Tactic that you have assigned to a particular Character, click on the
Character’s portrait and his/her Tactic(s) appear in the list.
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Character Filters: Clicking the filter buttons at the far right of the Characters
selects all or de-selects them accordingly. The Tactics list will refresh to show the
proper set of Tactics.
Resource Expenditure: These displays indicate the amount of money and people
needed to conduct the Tactic. When it’s time to conduct the Tactic, the game looks
to see if it has the money necessary; if not, the Tactic is delayed until such a time as
monies are available.
View Completed/Current/Future: These buttons can be activated (clicked on) at
the same time. When Completed is active, all completed tactics (subject to the
Character filter) are displayed. When Current/Future is active, all current and future
Tactics (subject to the Character filter) are displayed.
Tactics Management Buttons
•
Postpone: Any future Tactic can be postponed, if the Tactic has not yet
occurred (or is in the process of completing). To postpone a Tactic, select the
Tactic and then select the Postpone button. This shifts the selected Tactic down
one slot in the list.
•
Rush: Rushing a Tactic is the opposite of postponement. To do so, select the
Tactic and then select the Rush button. This shifts the selected Tactic up one
slot in the list.
•
Delete Tactic: Any future Tactic can be deleted. Do this by clicking the tactic
to be deleted, then the Delete button.
•
Discontinue: If a Tactic is currently in the middle of execution, you can
discontinue it. To do so, select the Tactic and then select the Discontinue
button. Tactics can be automatically discontinued if certain conditions are met;
for example, if the Target of a Recruit Character Tactic changes Alliances, the
Tactic will automatically discontinue.
•
Copy Tactic: You can also click a Tactic and then the Copy button. This
copies the Tactic and its parameters entirely into the Control Panel, altering
only the start date. The Tactic must still be submitted normally. A Character
cannot be “copied” a Tactic that he or she is currently conducting (i.e., a
Character cannot conduct two Hunger Strikes at the same time).
NOTE: There are certain times in which the Tactics Management buttons are not all
available at the same time. If an option is not available, then the button will be grayed
out (deactivated).
3.4.13 Information Panes
Information Panes are widely used and available in
the A Force More Powerful interface. They can be
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
accessed through nearly every major screen in-game. Information Panes list all the
information relevant to whatever has been selected. For example, if a building has
been selected (for possible targeting of a Tactic), then an Information Pane for that
building appears, listing its name, affiliated Groups, any Characters physically
present there, and its Economic Significance, plus perhaps one more buildingspecific piece of information (such as a foreign power’s attitude towards the nation,
if the selected building is an embassy).
Information Panes are accessed through a variety of different buttons, links, and
menu options. Below are some of the places through which an Information Pane can
be accessed.
(1) When a CHARACTER is selected via the portrait area of the Control Panel
or the Organization Screen, or via the “More Information” button in the
Character Display…
•
Name: The Character’s name is
listed on top.
•
Leader of: Indicates what Group
the Character leads. When this is
clicked, the Information Pane
switches to display details about
this Group (see entry #2). It’s
possible that two or more “leader
of” displays appear; the Character
may be the leader of more than one
Group/Alliance.
•
Member of: Indicates what
Alliance the Character belongs to.
When this is clicked, the
Information Pane switches to
display details about this Alliance
(see #3 below).
•
Location: Indicates the current
physical location of the Character, whether it be a neighborhood, a
building, an indication that the Character is “Traveling to” a specific
location, or is “Exiled” and living in a different country.
•
Regime Support: Indicates the support the Character has for the Regime.
When this is clicked, a pop-up appears showing Financial Gain, Ideology,
and Legitimacy support and their levels.
•
Movement Support: Indicates the support the Character has for the
Movement. When this is clicked a pop-up appears showing Financial
Gain, Ideology, and Legitimacy support and their levels.
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•
Other Alliance Support: Indicates the Character’s support for other
Alliances. If no such support exists, this display is faded to the
background.
•
Enthusiasm: Indicates the willingness of the Character to carry out
Tactics for his/her Alliance. A high value here is important to the success
or failure of a Character’s actions.
•
Fear: Indicates the Character’s fear of oppression and/or retaliation from
the Regime. A high fear factor reduces the chance that the Character will
change Alliances.
•
Competencies: This is a list of skills that the Character possesses. For
details, see the Appendix.
•
Notes Button: Select Notes to type in a brief note/comment about the
Character you are reviewing.
•
Close and Target Buttons: Select Close to remove the pane from view.
Select the Target symbol to indicate that this Character is the Target for a
Tactic.
•
Forward and Back Carets: Use these to scroll through previously
opened panes.
•
Policy Preferences: If selected, this
opens up the Character’s Policy
Preferences display. This dialog is
formatted by tabs, which can be
selected to reveal the Character’s
standing on various policy issues.
To access a preference category,
click on its tab.
Key Policy Preferences—The first page
displayed indicates the policies that
the Character cares about the most.
The color-coded system here works
similarly to all other colored status
displays: Dark green means the Character cares a great deal about the
policy; red indicates the Character doesn’t care at all, or has great disdain
for the policy.
Military—This lists the Character’s attitude towards military policy.
Law Enforcement—This lists the Character’s attitude towards law enforcement
policy.
Labor—This lists the Character’s attitude towards labor policy.
General Welfare—This lists the Character’s attitude towards the general
welfare of the nation.
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Civil/Religious—This lists the Character’s attitude towards civil and religious
policy.
Economics—This lists the Character’s attitude towards economic policy.
Freedoms—This lists the Character’s attitude toward individual freedoms in
the nation.
Close and Key Buttons—Select the Close button to close the preferences
display. Select Key to return to the Key Policy Preferences page.
•
Cultural Attributes: If selected this opens the Character’s Cultural
Attributes, as shown below:
Ethnicity—This lists the Character’s ethnicity.
Religion—This lists the Character’s religion.
Age Group—This shows which demographic
the Character belongs to.
Gender—Shows the gender of the Character.
Misc—If other details are needed which do not
fit within the above categories, they are
listed here.
(2) When a Group is selected through an affiliated Building…
•
Name: The Group’s Name is listed at the top.
•
Category: Indicates the category in which the Group resides.
•
Leader: Indicates the leader of the Group. Click the name to access the
Character Information Pane (see entry #1).
•
Resources Provided: Indicates the monies and people available in that
Group.
•
Economic Well-Being: Indicates the material wealth in the Group.
•
Public Influence: Indicates how much credibility the general public
places in the views and actions of this Group.
•
Member of: Indicates the Alliance the Group belongs to (if any).
•
Regime Support: Indicates the Group’s overall support for the Regime.
•
Movement Support: Indicates the Group’s overall support for the
Movement.
•
Enthusiasm: Indicates the willingness of the Group to carry out Tactics
for the Alliance. A high value here is important to the success or failure of
a Group’s actions.
•
Fear: Indicates the Group’s fear of oppression and/or retaliation from the
Regime. A high fear factor reduces the chance that the Group will change
Alliances.
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•
•
•
Policy Preferences: If selected, this
opens the Group’s Policy
Preferences display. This display is
similar to the Character Policy
Display (see entry #1).
Cultural Attributes: If selected,
this opens the Group’s Cultural
Attributes.
Pillar Symbol: If a pillar symbol
appears on a Group’s pane, then
that Group is a “Pillar of Support”
for its Alliance (see 4.3.4 and
5.2.2).
•
Notes Button: Select Notes to type
in a brief note/comment about the
Group you are reviewing.
•
Close and Target Buttons: Select
Close to remove the pane from
view. Select the Target symbol to indicate that this Group is the Target
for a Tactic.
•
Forward and Back Carets: Use these to scroll through previously
opened panes.
NOTE: A special type of Group is the General Public. This Group is never aligned
with a particular Alliance (see below), and its Information Pane is similar to any other
Group Info Pane. However, only the details relevant to the General Public are listed on
the pane.
(3) When an Alliance is selected via Character or Group Information Pane
entries or the Alliance Selector…
•
Name: The Alliance's name is listed at the top.
•
Alliance Type: Indicates whether the Alliance is affiliated with the
Regime or with the Movement.
•
Leader: Indicates the leader of the Alliance. Selecting this name opens the
Character’s Information Pane (see entry #1).
•
Members: This lists the members of the Alliance. Selecting a name opens
that Character’s Information Pane (see entry #1).
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
•
Manifesto and Status Quo: Select
these to access either the Alliance’s
Manifesto (what they stand for), or
their Status Quo policies. These
displays are structured similarly to
the Policy Preferences display (see
entry #1).
•
Notes Button: Select Notes to type
in a brief note/comment about the
Alliance you are reviewing.
•
Close and Target Buttons: Select
Close to remove the pane from
view. Select the Target symbol to
indicate that this Alliance is the
Target for a Tactic.
•
Forward and Back Carets: Use
these to scroll through previously
opened panes.
(4) When a National Map Feature is selected…
•
Name: The name of the feature is
listed at the top.
•
Location: Indicates the feature’s
location.
•
Economic Status: Indicates
whether the feature’s economic
value is OK or has been Disrupted
(see 3.4.11).
•
Economic Significance: Indicates
how much this building contributes
to the health of the local and
national economies.
•
Affiliated Group(s): Indicates the
Groups associated with the feature.
•
Close and Target Buttons: Select
Close to remove the pane from
view. Select the Target symbol to
indicate that this map feature is the Target for a Tactic.
•
Notes Button: Select Notes to type in a brief note/comment about the
Map Feature you are reviewing.
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•
Forward and Back Carets: Use these to scroll through previously
opened panes.
(5) When a Region is selected by clicking its name on the national map…
•
Name: The name of the region is listed at the top.
•
Cities and Features: Indicates the
names of significant cities and
features in the region. Select an
item listed here to view its
Information Pane.
•
Regime Support: Indicates the
region’s overall support for the
Regime.
•
Movement Support: Indicates the
region’s overall support for the
Movement.
•
Economic Well-Being: Indicates
the material wealth in the region.
Cultural Attributes: If selected,
this opens the region’s Cultural
Attributes.
•
•
Percentage of Pop: Indicates the
percentage of the national
population living in the region.
•
Fear: Indicates the region’s fear of oppression and/or retaliation from the
Regime. A high fear factor reduces the chance that the region will change
allegiances.
•
Enthusiasm: Indicates the willingness of the region to carry out Tactics
for the Alliance. A high value here is important to the success or failure of
actions that take place in that region.
•
Notes Button: Select Notes to type in a brief note/comment about the
region you are reviewing.
•
Close and Target Buttons: Select Close to remove the pane from view.
Select the Target symbol to indicate that this region is the Target for a
Tactic.
•
Forward and Back Carets: Use these to scroll through previously
opened panes.
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(6) When a City is selected in the national map by clicking its name…
•
•
Name: The name of the city is
listed at the top.
Neighborhoods: Indicates the
names of the neighborhoods in
the city.
•
Regime Support: Indicates the
city’s overall support for the
Regime.
•
Movement Support: Indicates
the city’s overall support for the
Movement.
•
Literacy: Indicates the level of
literacy in the city.
•
Economic Well-Being: Indicates
the material wealth in the city.
Cultural Attributes: If selected,
this opens the city’s Cultural
Attributes.
•
•
Percentage of Pop: Indicates the percentage of the national population
living in the city.
•
Fear: Indicates the city’s fear of oppression and/or retaliation from the
Regime. A high fear factor reduces the chance that the city will change
allegiances.
•
Enthusiasm: Indicates the willingness of the city to carry out Tactics for
the Alliance. A high value here is important to the success or failure of
actions that take place in that city.
•
Close and Target Buttons: Select Close to remove the pane from view.
Select the Target symbol to indicate that this city is the target for a Tactic.
•
Notes Button: Select Notes to type in a brief note/comment about the city
you are reviewing.
•
Forward and Back Carets: Use these to scroll through previously
opened panes.
(7) When a Neighborhood is selected by clicking its name on the city map…
•
Name: The name of the neighborhood is listed at the top.
•
Buildings: Indicates the buildings located in the neighborhood. Clicking
in a name will open the building’s Information Pane.
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•
Regime Support: Indicates the neighborhood’s overall support for the
Regime.
•
Movement Support: Indicates the neighborhood’s overall support for the
Movement.
•
•
Economic Well-Being: Indicates the material wealth in the neighborhood.
Cultural Attributes: If selected, this opens the neighborhood’s Cultural
Attributes.
•
Percentage of Pop: Indicates the
percentage of the national population
living in the neighborhood.
•
Fear: Indicates the neighborhood’s
fear of oppression and/or retaliation
from the Regime. A high fear factor
reduces the chance that the
neighborhood will change
allegiances.
•
Enthusiasm: Indicates the
willingness of the neighborhood to
carry out Tactics for the Alliance. A
high value here is important to the
success or failure of actions that take
place in that neighborhood.
•
Notes Button: Select Notes to type
in a brief note/comment about the
neighborhood you are reviewing.
•
Close and Target Buttons: Select Close to remove the pane from view.
Select the Target symbol to indicate that this neighborhood is the target
for a Tactic.
•
Forward and Back Carets: Use these to scroll through previously
opened panes.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
3.5 Evaluation Screen
Each scenario has a set amount of time in which the player has to effectively fulfill
the victory conditions. At the end of a scenario, the Evaluation Screen appears and
gives you an assessment of your play.
Outcome:
Indicates
“success” or
“failure” for
each victory
condition
selected.
Shows the
reason(s) why
the scenario
ended.
Victory
Conditions:
Those you
have selected
are listed first.
The top of the screen will show (in blue) a statement of why the scenario ended. The
left side of the screen lists the Victory Conditions that you selected in the Strategic
Estimate (see 3.3), in priority order. The right side shows the success or failure of
your Movement to accomplish these goals. The right side also indicates how
important the scenario designer considered each goal. Selecting the More button
lists the other Goals that you did not select, and indicates what priority (or
importance) the scenario designer placed on those Goals.
Review Results Screen Sample: After completing a scenario, the result can be
accessed later by selecting the Review Results button on the Main Menu Screen. A
sample of the screen appears below:
Completed scenarios
listed here. (The sixdigit number after the
date is a time stamp to
help differentiate
between identical file
names.)
Scenario Evaluation:
The Victory Conditions
for the selected scenario
are listed here. Green
results indicate success;
red results indicate
failure.
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4. PLAYING THE GAME
Chapters 2 and 3 walked you through the procedures on how to actually play A
Force More Powerful, and also provided a graphical layout of how the screens look
and function. This chapter explains in more detail key areas in which to focus your
attention while playing. It’s highly recommended that you read through this chapter
carefully, especially if this is your first time playing. We also recommend that
experienced players review this chapter from time to time as well to help refresh
their memory.
4.1 Managing Game Information
You will be more successful in A Force More Powerful if you are able to manage
information effectively. During play, you select Tactics Coordinators and the Tactics
they will conduct. The results of those Tactics are presented to you through various
displays, and it’s vital for effective play to understand these displays and be able to
glean the proper information from them. As in real life, some information is more
relevant than other information in choosing your course(s) of action, and it is
important to discern what the most crucial pieces of information are when making
your decisions. Also, as in real life, the more you know, the better you will be able
to plan the most realistic and appropriate course for your Movement.
Let’s begin by walking through the process of selecting a scenario and choosing
Victory Conditions.
4.1.1 Choosing a Scenario
The first thing to consider when beginning A Force More Powerful is which
scenario to select. There are quite a few to choose from, with goals ranging
anywhere from bringing down a dictator to forcing the ruling government to cease
its corruptive behavior. If this is your first time playing A Force More Powerful, we
suggest that you select the scenario featured in Chapter 2 (Corruption is Stealing),
as this one has Victory Conditions which are easier to achieve than those in many of
the other scenarios. But if you’ve played a few times and want to delve further, we
recommend that you select a scenario that best fits your particular situation. As
mentioned in the Introduction, A Force More Powerful does not guarantee realworld results, but it does provide a
wide variety of options that mimic realworld situations. And through the play
of these scenarios, you can (hopefully)
gain a better understanding of how to
best promote your nonviolent
Movement’s agenda through effective
strategic planning.
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So, the first thing you will do is select a scenario. You do this on the Scenario
Selection Screen. Your choices on this screen are simple: Select a scenario and read
its Description. The Description provides a quick summary of the problems and
goals in a scenario, as well as its length and relative complexity.
After selecting the scenario you wish to play, click on
Start Conflict to load it. Once the scenario loads, you
will see the Strategic Estimate Screen.
The Strategic Estimate Screen is where the full details about the scenario you’ve
chosen are displayed. You should spend some time here reading carefully. See
Chapter 5 for more details.
Background Information: This area of the
screen provides full details about the country
and its political situation. It also provides the
names of many of the key Characters in the
scenario. It’s important to remember these
names and keep them in mind when you
start, as some of these people will be vital to
your success (or failure).
Goals: The goals section of the screen is a description of the kinds of things that
your Movement should
consider when planning
your strategy. It is usually
the last paragraph in the
background field. This is a
very important section,
because it explains the key
goals that your Movement
should be striving to obtain.
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IMPORTANT!!
It’s important to note at this point the difference between so-called “goals” and
“Victory Conditions.” A scenario’s goals are oftentimes a broad range of ultimate
objectives, such as bringing down the dictator of a ruthless Regime. A scenario’s
Victory Conditions (or objectives) are a bullet-pointed list of items that you strive to
achieve in the scenario to reach your ultimate goals (see below). Sometimes they are
the same, such as in the “Corruption is Stealing” scenario detailed in Chapter 2. A
“goal” in that scenario is to secure the release of your imprisoned Movement leader;
doing so is also a “victory condition” which you can select as an objective for your
Movement to strive for. However, there is still a fundamental difference and that is: A
Movement’s goals are broad; victory conditions are specific objectives that you choose
to achieve during play to ultimately secure your Movement’s success. Keep this in
mind when playing A Force More Powerful.
Select Victory Conditions: The right side of the
Strategic Estimate Screen has a button called
Victory Conditions. Selecting this button takes you to the Victory Conditions tab of
the Strategic Estimate (see Chapter 5). The
purpose of this page is to give you the option of
selecting a set of Victory Conditions (objectives)
that your Movement will strive towards achieving during play. The objectives are
listed in this fashion so that the computer’s artificial intelligence knows exactly what
your Movement is trying to accomplish, so that it can determine at the end of play
just how successful you were.
Your first step here is to select a number of
Victory Conditions that you think your
Movement can accomplish in the amount of
time allotted in the scenario. The number of
conditions displayed here are variable and have
been selected by the scenario designer in
advance. It’s quite possible that some of these
conditions are not even achievable within the
time allotted in the scenario (the designer
selected them to throw you off course).
Therefore, as the Movement planner, your first
responsibility is to decide which of these
conditions are realistic and within your Movement’s capabilities to achieve. Once
you’ve decided (having first analyzed all the background information provided),
select a condition in the list, then click the Add button. This moves the condition
down to the “Set Priority…” field.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Set Priority of Victory
Conditions: Selecting the Add
button moves a condition down
into this portion of the screen.
But it’s not enough to simply
select your goals; you must set
the priority of those goals once
they are here. Why? Because
that’s part of effective strategic
planning. Though it may seem feasible to apply the same level of importance (or
value) to each condition, in reality, it’s very difficult to do so. Simply put: Some
objectives are far more important to achieve than others; the measure of a good
Movement planner is to decide which objectives can be achieved and the priority of
those objectives. The scenario designer has already decided which conditions are
achievable and has already set a priority for the list. Your goal, then, is to try to
figure out and prioritize which conditions are obtainable for victory in the scenario
you’ve chosen.
To prioritize conditions, select one, and then use
the Up or Down button to shift the condition
accordingly. Once you’ve set the priority for each condition, you may then select
Start to proceed to the Game Screen.
Once you’ve set priorities, select Close to “close” the Strategic Estimate to begin.
NOTE: It is important to know that the priority you set is not necessarily the order in
which you need to achieve the goals. For example, you may have set Priority #1 on the
goal of achieving a referendum allowing women the right to vote, but you may have to
first pressure the government to agree to conduct the referendum (which may have been
set to Priority #2). In this case, you could not possibly have a vote until you’ve
pressured the government to agree to hold one. You should look at setting priorities in
terms of “ultimate objectives.” The ultimate objective in the example above is to give
women the right to vote, and therefore it should be set at the highest priority, even if
you wind up not achieving it. The purpose of making you set priorities is for you to
improve your strategic thinking.
4.1.2 Managing Game Play
You have selected a scenario and have determined your goals and Victory
Conditions. Now it’s time to play the game. To understand the technical aspects of A
Force More Powerful (i.e., moving from screen to screen, selecting buttons, etc.),
refer to Chapters 2 and 3. The information below details the main functions and
purpose of each game screen. Fully understanding this information will give your
Movement the best chance for success.
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The Game Screen: Once you’ve chosen a
scenario and set priorities, you’re ready to start.
The game takes you to the Game Screen. By
default, the City Map View is displayed, but you
can change that display to suit your own needs
and style of play.
Much of A Force More Powerful involves
picking Characters within your Movement to
conduct various Tactics with which to apply pressure to the Regime. For details
about Tactics, see the Resistopedia. But in short, a Tactic is an action taken by a
Character to support the larger strategic goals of his/her Alliance. An Alliance can
belong to either the Movement or the Regime. As the Movement leader, you can
only assign Tactics to Characters within the Movement’s Alliance. Assigning
Tactics is handled through the Tactics Control Panel at the bottom of the screen.
Choosing a Tactic Coordinator: The first thing you should do is
select a Tactic Coordinator. Only a coordinator can conduct a Tactic.
Which one should you choose? Based upon the scenario you are
playing, you may have a large Group of Characters from which to
choose. Some of these Characters will be better suited to conduct
certain Tactics, while others will not. Picking the right Coordinator for the right
Tactic is one of your main challenges as the planner of the Movement. For full
details about Characters, see Section 4.3.2 and the Appendix. But in short, a good
rule of thumb is to review a Character’s Competencies to see what the Character is
good at doing.
For example, a Character with charisma
and organizational skills would be an
excellent choice for organizing a
Fundraising event. On the other hand, a
Character with no Competencies at all can
still attempt any Tactic available, but will not have the same chance of success as a
Character with Competencies that help him/her complete that Tactic. Unfortunately,
there will be times where you have to assign a Tactic to someone that may not be
qualified to perform that Tactic; you go with what you have. But generally speaking,
you should review a Character’s Competencies first and then apply a Tactic
accordingly.
Choosing a Tactic: Picking a Tactic largely
depends upon your Coordinator. But there are
also other factors to consider as well. The current
time in the scenario, the effects of previous Tactics, the amount of time it will take
to conduct the Tactic, the amount of money and personnel available, your overall
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
goals and objectives, etc., all play a part. For full details about the Tactics available,
see the Resistopedia. But here’s a summary of how to best pick a Tactic.
There are five categories of Tactics: Attack,
Deny, Build Strength, Defend, and
Communicate. Beneath each of these
categories is a list of various Tactics. As the
planner of the Movement, you’ll want to select
a Tactic that fits the qualifications of each
Coordinator, and ones that ultimately achieve
the goals of the Movement. Which Tactic that
will be varies throughout the game, but let’s
look at an example of a Tactic selection below.
In the example below, Milena Aleksic, leader of The Women
Student’s Association and a key member of your Movement, seeks
to secure the vote for women in her country. Her government is
very opposed to this idea, and if the Movement strikes too
aggressively early in the campaign, the Regime may take
countermeasures that seriously damage the Movement. So as the
Movement planner, you decide that the best thing for Milena to do first is to “Build
Strength” within the Movement itself by conducting training sessions (using the
Train – Movement Tactic) in Nonviolent Intervention (which are high-risk Tactics in
nonviolent action that disrupt the opponent directly. Training in this allows members
of your movement to
carry out disciplined
nonviolent action with
less likelihood of it
devolving into chaos or violence) for the Business
Women’s Association… a supporter of your
Movement.
The Tactic description is displayed on the right
hand side of the page. Before confirming that this
is indeed the Tactic you wish for Milena to
conduct, you should review this information to
decide if it’s even feasible for your Movement to
perform this Tactic. Let’s look at the details.
•
•
The cost of the training
will be 5 monies and 2 Movement personnel.
You certainly have enough of both.
Now let’s look at the amount of time (or Duration) it will take to conduct this
Tactic. The Movement needs 6 days to agree to this Tactic. They do not require
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•
•
time to travel to the training (everyone is located in the capital). If necessary,
you could wait a certain number of additional days before beginning the
training by using the carets to adjust the time up.
Finally, you will have to spend 5 additional days to prepare for the training, and
the training itself will last 5 days.
All of these days are added up to tell you the exact amount of time it will take
for this Tactic to begin and end. Do you have that much time? You decide that
you do, and click OK to approve the Tactic.
Have you selected the right Tactic? Sometimes it’s hard to judge. However, A Force
More Powerful gives you tools with which to see if your decision is feasible or (at
the least) popular within the Movement. Selecting the Tactics Survey button can
help you decide if your decision was the right one (see below).
A NOTE ON TIMING: Before we proceed to choosing a Target for a Tactic, it’s
important to spend a little more time on the “duration” of a Tactic. The numbers under
the Duration section can be adjusted if you choose to do so, or you may simply ignore
this section and proceed. However, it’s important to know that simply accepting the
defaults given to you by the AI can dramatically affect the success or failure of a
Tactic. Any listing that gives you Up and Down carets allows you to adjust the number
of days that that listing will take. For example, you could adjust the “Prepare for…”
area to increase (or decrease) the number of days it will take to prepare for the Tactic.
Now, why would you do this? You would do this to ensure that you’ve given your
Coordinator enough time to effectively plan for this Tactic. Perhaps you’ve picked an
Attack Tactic such as Mass Protest. You need a lot of time to plan this kind of event
effectively, and so you add an additional 10 days to the prep time. Doing so may be the
difference between success and failure. A longer duration time generally makes the
Tactic more effective, but also garners more expense.
Another very important thing to consider is how long your coordinator should wait
before beginning the preparation of a Tactic. You may wish to adjust this number in
order to ensure that certain Tactics “complete” on the same day. This isn’t such an
issue early in a campaign, because your goal at that point is to build your
Movement’s strength and conduct lower-risk actions. However, near the end of a
successful campaign, when the Regime is feeling pressure from the Movement and
you think one dramatic push could break their back, you may wish to have a number
of Tactics complete on the same day in order to apply real, powerful, and longlasting results. For example, you’ve decided to have both a Mass Protest and a
Building Occupation (see the Resistopedia) occur on the same day, but the Mass
Protest will take 15 days to prepare, while the Building Occupation may only take
one. When setting up these Tactics, you would adjust the “Wait” and “Prepare” days
listings to ensure that both Tactics occur on the same day. To help you see when a
Tactic begins and ends, use the Tactics Queue (see 3.4.12).
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A NOTE ON PERSUASION TIME: Most
Tactics involve Persuasion Time—the time
needed to achieve the required level of consensus amongst the members of the Alliance
regarding the action to be taken. The more hierarchical the Alliance's Decision-Making
Style (see 4.3.4), the smaller the Persuasion Time will be (all else being equal); i.e., each
Tactic will have a base value for Persuasion Time, and will be modified by the tasked
Character's Alliance's decision-making style as well as the Alliance leader's political
skills. Persuasion time can be "paid off" during a waiting period before a Tactic (e.g., if a
Tactic is scheduled for a week in advance, and the Persuasion Time is less than a week,
there will be no additional delay for the Tactic; hence it is to your advantage to schedule
Tactics in advance, so the Persuasion Time hurdle can be taken care of in advance).
Finally, the number of days you choose will be reflected on the
Character’s portrait as a large number directly below his/her face. This
indicates the number of days that that Character will be “tied up” in
planning and orchestrating the Tactic. It’s important to keep this number in mind
when assigning new Tactics to a coordinator already conducting a Tactic, since that
Character won’t be able to begin a new Tactic until the current one is finished.
Choosing a Target: Now that you’ve chosen a Coordinator
and a Tactic, it’s time to choose a Target. Whom (or what)
should you choose? That depends upon your first two choices,
plus the goals you wish to ultimately achieve. The best
method for choosing a Target is to understand the nature of
the Tactic that you’ve chosen. For example, if you’ve chosen
a Mass Protest Tactic, you may target the protest toward an entity or in a part of the
country where you think it will do the most good, which in the pictured example is a
monastery. When choosing a Target, keep these things in mind:
•
•
•
For an Attack Tactic (like Mass Protest), pick a Target, such as a
Character (or organization/alliance/building), fully aligned with the
Regime. This target may not be swayed under any other condition and will
likely only respond to direct pressure.
For a Deny Tactic (like Boycott), pick a Target whose economic or
political power rests in their ability to perform duties or services for the
public. If you “deny” their access to the public, you will be denying them
their ability to maintain their strength.
For a Build Strength Tactic (like Fraternize), you generally want to pick
a Character who is either sympathetic to your Movement or is a person
inside the Regime whom you’d like to sway to your side of the fence, such
as a Chief of Police. This kind of Tactic is also directed to Alliances or
organizations within the Movement itself, such as Training Tactics
wherein you try to bolster the skills of persons within your Movement.
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•
•
Build Strength Tactics are good Tactics to use throughout your struggle,
but they can be especially crucial in the early phases of your Movement.
For a Defend Tactic (like Hide), pick a Target that requires protection,
such as a Movement leader who may get imprisoned or killed unless he or
she stays out of the public eye for a while. Other Targets possible for
Tactics in the “Defend” category include locations in the country (such as
a particular district in the capital) where you are not sure of your public
support, and you wish to first visit and “test the waters” of your message
and goals.
For a Communicate Tactic (like Publish Newspaper), it’s generally a
good idea to Target a Group or segment of the population that “may” be
sympathetic to your cause, but who may not have enough information
before them to make a conscientious choice, such as distributing literature
on the Upper West Side of the capital in order to get your message out.
Surveying Tactics: After selecting a coordinator, a Tactic and a Target, a
good thing to do is to take the “pulse” of the Characters in your Movement
towards your decision. To do this, select the Survey Tactics button to
open the Survey Screen.
Hover the mouse arrow over a
Character’s hand-written opinion to
get an even further explanation (as
shown here) of why the Movement
member does not like your decision.
Your Movement leaders are displayed along with their opinions about the Tactic that
you’ve chosen. Sometimes, they agree with your decision, and sometimes they
don’t. A good way to tell at a glance (even before opening the screen) is to check the
color of the Survey Tactics button itself. If it is green, the majority of Characters like
your decision; if yellow, they’re unsure; if red, they’re against it. It’s up to you
whether or not to take their advice. Going against the opinions of your Characters
does not adversely affect the success or failure of a particular Tactic. However, you
should pay attention to the reasons why they don’t like it. To review their objections,
hover the mouse arrow over their opinions to read a tip explaining why they do not
like the decision.
Confirming the Tactic and Advancing Game Turns: Once you’ve
decided upon a Tactic and are ready to put it into action, select the green
Confirm Tactic arrow. This places the Tactic onto the Tactics Queue
screen (see 3.4.12) and makes it ready for execution. The Tactic does not begin,
however, until you’ve advanced the game turns. Each turn represents one day. The
first thing you should do is set the number of turns you wish to advance the game.
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By default, the game automatically sets the number of turns for you, taking into
consideration the Tactic that you’ve just submitted. For
example, if you’ve submitted a Tactic that will take 7 days
to complete, the Turn Indicator will refresh to show a
number of turns equal to the submitted Tactic. It will only
do this if the Tactic just submitted is shorter than a Tactic currently “in progress”;
meaning, if a 4 day Tactic is pending completion, submitting a 7 turn Tactic will not
change the Turn Indicator (because the shorter Tactic will complete sooner). See
Section 4.10.1 to adjust this function.
However, you may overrule the game’s default settings by clicking the forward and
backward arrows alongside the Turn Indicator. Each click progresses the turns up or
down accordingly (one turn in A Force More Powerful equals one day in the
scenario). Once you’ve settled on the exact number of turns/days you wish to
advance the game, select the Advance Turns button. The game moves forward the
specified number of turns. When it reappears, you may (or may not) have results of
ongoing Tactics shown in the Message display (see 4.7).
How many turns should you advance the game? It’s totally up to you. You may wish
to advance the game only one day each time, or you may wish to increase the turns
to 10, which means that the game will jump ahead 10 days. Whatever you wish is
fine.
A word of warning: Pay close attention to when the scenario ends, because if you’ve
selected a Tactic that takes 10 days to complete and the scenario lasts for only 5 more
days, the Tactic will not resolve before time runs out.
Reviewing Important Game Play Data: During A Force More Powerful, there are
a number of screens that provide important game play data which you should use to
best effect. These are the in-game screens accessed from the Game Screen. The
information below explains why you, as the Movement planner, should access and
use these screens to achieve your Movement’s goals.
The Organization Screen: The Organization Screen allows you to
view all of the political Groups in play, and compare those Groups to
one another.
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Group: The
Women’s Student
Association
Alliance Name
It currently has two
prominent members;
the left-most member
is the Leader of the
Group
For full details about Groups, see Section 4.3.3. For purposes of general game play,
however, it’s important to know that all Groups belong to either the Regime, the
Movement, or are Independent. As the Movement planner, one of your goals is to
sway some of these Groups over to your side. At a minimum, you should attempt to
find the so-called sympathetic characters within these Groups and try to Recruit
them (oftentimes, getting the Leader of a group to change Alliances is a big
achievement). The Organization Screen can help you with this goal.
All Groups on this screen are lumped together with their Alliance named above
them. For full details about Alliances, see Section 4.3.4. In short, an Alliance is a
coalition of one or more Groups. Your Movement is, in essence, an Alliance. As
stated above, your goal is to try to sway Group members to your cause; or, at least,
to force them to break from their Alliance. Characters are displayed in two different
ways, either as a fully black silhouette, or as a transparent silhouette. Characters who
are fully black are members of their Group and also members of their Alliance;
transparent Characters are members of their Group, but not affiliated with any
particular Alliance. Another way to know if a Character is not a member of an
Alliance is to see if that person’s silhouette is sitting “outside” the boundaries of any
particular Alliance. If so, that Character does not belong to an Alliance. Why is this
important? Because Characters with no Alliance affiliation are the most likely to be
swayed to your cause, you should target these Characters first with Tactics (such as
Recruit Character) that will help bring them towards your Movement. Of course it
will sometimes be necessary to target aligned Characters as well (those with very
high support for their Alliance). But as a general rule, it’s best to begin with
unaligned Characters and work your way up.
Filters: As a way to help aid in your Group
comparison, there are a number of filters
that you can turn on to know where Groups stand on the pertinent issues in the
scenario. The filtering options rest at the top of the screen. Select the title to the left
of the colon to filter Groups by category. Groups not belonging to that category are
grayed out. Select the title to the right of the colon to filter Groups first by issue
category (such as Cultural Attitudes), and then by a specific item within that
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category. For example, if you wanted to know the opinions of bureaucratic Groups
towards women, you would select “Bureaucracy: Female.” All non-bureaucratic
Groups would gray out, leaving bureaucratic Groups color-coded to indicate their
like (or dislike) towards women. The color-coding reflects a Group’s level of
support for the subject being explored, and it follows the same pattern as all colorcoded displays in A Force More Powerful: Dark green indicates high support for the
issue in question and dark red indicates low support.
Tooltips: Hover the mouse arrow over a Group or a Character to get further details
about that item. This is useful to help further clarify and reinforce your
understanding of where these Groups/Characters stand on issues.
The Information Screen: The Information Screen allows you to view
the Fear, Enthusiasm, and Support Levels of Groups over a particular
amount of time. Displayed on this screen is a graph (left-hand side) and
a listing of messages (right-hand side) associated with the selected
measure of time on the graph.
So how, as the Movement planner, should you use this
screen? The information displayed on this screen is
best reviewed after a month or more has elapsed. As
Tactics are assigned and implemented, the graphic
updates to show support changes within Groups. Like the Organization Screen, you
can filter the information displayed on the graph to suit your needs. To filter the
information on the graph to see a Group’s current Support Levels, choose Select a
Group to View. This gives you a list of categories in which Groups are listed, as
shown below:
Groups: Only
Groups
associated with
the selected
category appear
here.
Group
Categories:
Select a
category to
access
Groups of
that category.
Once you’ve selected a Group, select a time-scale in which you wish to see the
progress of the Group.
Picking a time-scale changes the number of so-called time “slices” on the graph.
You may view Group data as far back as 5 years, so as you can see, using the
Information Screen allows you to chart the history of a Group. This can be very
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important, especially in a long scenario where trends are
important to document and react upon. When using this
screen, pay close attention to the kinds of “Tactic” messages
appearing at specific times. This can give you clues as to
which Tactics are working best when targeted at certain
Groups. For example, if you are looking at a radio station
Group and you noticed that near the end of a six month period
(the time-scale you are reviewing) that that Group’s
Enthusiasm for the Movement shot up considerably, you can see which Tactics you
conducted during that period that may have been the cause of that sharp spike. You
can also look for relationships over time between various groups’ Fear, Enthusiasm,
and Support Levels. There may be positive correlations or inverse relationships in
these attributes between two or more different groups.
The Tactics Queue: The Tactics Queue shows Tactics currently
scheduled and those that have been completed. This is a very important
screen to access during play, because it helps to keep all Tactics nicely
organized for your benefit. In fact, it’s recommended that you spend as
much time on this screen as you do in the Organization Screen. It is especially
important later in the scenario when many Tactics are planned and many have
already been implemented. You can go into this screen and review them all in total,
and also sort them by Character.
At the top of the screen are shown the leaders of your Movement (those Characters
whom you can assign Tactics). Below them is the list of Tactics. If the Character
portrait is circled, that Character’s Tactics will be displayed below (assuming that
person has conducted any Tactics at all). Use the filters to the right of the portraits to
select or de-select all Characters. These are useful tools to use when you have a lot
of Characters and wish to have only one Character’s Tactics appear. You can turn
off all Characters and then select the individual Character by clicking on his/her
portrait.
Use View Completed and View Current/Future to sort the list accordingly. These
filters work together with the Character filters, so you can select only one Character
whose Tactics you wish to view, and then sort those Tactics by Complete and
Current/Future.
You may also sort the list by clicking on any column headings.
Finally, as described in Chapter 3, the buttons at the bottom of the screen are used
to manage the Tactics list.
•
Use Postpone to shift the selected in-progress Tactic down the list so that
it occurs later.
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•
•
•
•
Use Rush to shift the selected in-progress Tactic up the list so that it
occurs earlier.
Use Delete to remove the selected Tactic from the list.
Use Discontinue to end and wrap up the selected in-progress Tactic.
Use Copy to have a Character repeat the selected Tactic.
The Strategic Estimate: During play, you may access the Strategic
Estimate and make changes as conditions change in the scenario. For
details about the Strategic Estimate, see Chapter 5.
The City Map: The City Map is the default screen that appears when
you enter the Game Screen. The City Map is the graphical compliment
to the Organization Screen, because it shows you (by building) where
the Groups in the scenario are located. This is important to know
because if you, for example, Target the “Upper West Side” neighborhood of a city
with Tactics, you’ll know which Groups may be affected by that Tactic. You can
also use the City Map to select various Groups for Tactics. To do this, click on the
building where the Group is located (like the Police Station), and its Information
Pane (see 3.4.13) appears. You can then Target that building for a Tactic.
In addition to the above, the City Map also reflects activities (and possible changes)
occurring in the city. For example, if you were to conduct a Mass Protest outside
City Hall, protesters waving signs and banners will appear (see 4.11). If a building is
disrupted for a long period of time, or destroyed, that will also show on the map.
Zooming the map in and out changes the amount of detail you will see.
The National Map: The National Map shows the country in which the
scenario is being played. It shows the country’s travel network and also
the outlying political or economic sites scattered throughout the
countryside. For details about all the various Interactive Map Features
that can be displayed on the National Map, see Section 3.4.11. But the most
important thing for you to know about the National Map is that it gives you the tools
with which to go outside a nation’s capital and conduct Tactics.
Choke Points: Key sites on the National Map are called “chokepoints.” These are
places where, if they are Targeted with Tactics that disrupt them, can have a
significant impact on the Regime and the Movement. For full details about
disruption, see the Resistopedia. But in short, disrupting these places can put a great
amount of pressure on the Regime.
On the other hand, targeting the Regime in this way could also produce setbacks for
your Movement, if the Regime’s reaction to such Tactics ends with your leaders in
jail or dead. But that’s the risk you take when trying to lead people to affect political
and social change under a repressive government. Oftentimes, it’s best to wait until
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a later phase of the campaign before conducting such aggressive Tactics. At that
point, you may have greater support from the public and from influential
government officials, which can be important if such a Tactic is to work.
Receiving Messages: See Section 4.7 for details about A Force More
Powerful’s messaging system.
4.2 Using the Strategic Estimate
During play, you may access the Strategic Estimate to periodically
review data about the scenario being played. Some information can be
modified once play begins, some cannot (the Movement Manifesto,
Objectives and Victory Conditions). For full details about the Strategic Estimate, see
Chapter 5.
4.3 Building and Strengthening the Movement
An important part of play is to build and strengthen your Movement. To do that, you
must first understand the fundamentals that comprise a Movement: your role as the
Movement Leader, your Characters, the Groups within your Movement, and the
Alliances that Groups form.
4.3.1 The Player’s Role as the Movement Planner
While playing A Force More Powerful, you represent the Character who is the
strategic thinker in charge of planning your Movement’s campaign for nonviolent
change. Note that this person is not always the public “leader” of the resistance
Movement, who in some cases is a charismatic figurehead but not the actual
decision maker.
You are not directly represented in the game, but your role is significant, because
you assign Tactics and plan the Movement’s strategy. You cannot be targeted
directly by the Regime, but your Characters and Groups can, so it’s dependent upon
you to make the choices that will not only keep your Movement going forward with
its strategic goals, but will also bring the least amount of danger to your
Movement’s supporters.
4.3.2 Characters
Characters are very important to the Movement. They comprise the
backbone of your Movement, and are absolutely essential in carrying
out the strategic goals of the Movement. Without Characters, the
Movement cannot survive.
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A Character has several attributes and qualities which are displayed when you select
a Character’s name (or the More Information button on Character displays) inside
the game. All Characters are rated in the following ways:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
The Character’s name.
A Character is either “male” or “female” (which should be obvious from
the portrait).
A Character has a “title” if
one is applicable, such as
“Governor of Ulmar.”
Characters can be leaders of
more than one
Group/Alliance.
A Character is placed within a
specific Group category, such
as “Judicial” or “Labor.” For
details, see the Resistopedia.
A Character’s location.
A Character has both a public
profile and public influence
rating, which is indicated by
color-code.
A Character has a listing of
Support Levels for the
different Alliances in the
scenario (including the
Regime), again indicated by
color-code. They can be
clicked on to reveal separate Support Levels.
A Character’s support for “Other Alliances” is indicated (assuming the
scenario has more than two Alliances in play).
The Character’s current Fear level. For details, see below and the
Resistopedia.
The Character’s current Enthusiasm. For details, see below and the
Resistopedia.
A Character has a set of “Policy Preferences” which indicate a set of the
Character’s ideology on the issues present in the game (see 3.4.13). These
policies can change during game play, so pay close attention to them.
A Character has a set of “Cultural Attributes” which indicate his/her
cultural traits.
A Character is defined by a set of “competencies” that reflect particular
aptitudes and proficiency at different kinds of Tactics. For details, see
below and the Resistopedia.
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For all items listed above, refer to the Resistopedia for details.
At first glance, you may be intimidated by the amount of detail included for
Characters in A Force More Powerful. Don’t be alarmed. Many of these elements
are obvious and easily understandable within the context of play. For example,
knowing a Character’s gender (male or female) is as simple as looking at their
portrait. There are, however, some key elements that all Characters possess, and it’s
important that you understand them fully. They are below.
A Character’s Policies
A Character (or Group’s) policy preferences can be altered via Tactics—particularly
those in the “Communicate” category—during play. This is important because
Ideology support (see below) depends directly on the level of agreement between a
Character or Group and an Alliance’s Manifesto: The closer the two mirror one
another, the higher Ideology support will be, especially when Key Policies match
closely. Persuading Characters and Groups to change their views on important
policy issues is a key element of strategy in A Force More Powerful. For
descriptions of all Character (and Group) policies, see the Resistopedia.
A Character’s Support Levels
Characters and Groups (see 4.3.3) have three Support Levels for each Alliance in the
scenario: Financial Gain, Ideology, and Legitimacy. The “Overall Support Level” is
the highest of these values, meaning that a Character with multiple reasons to
support an Alliance can be very hard to sway. You can access this information by
clicking on the Support Level listed (such as “maximum”) and a small dialog
appears showing the following categories.
•
•
•
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Financial Gain Support reflects the
degree to which a Character (or Group)
feels obliged to support an Alliance
because of monetary gain or perks. This
support level captures the phenomenon of
people supporting a patently unjust
Regime because their jobs depend on it,
or supporting a resistance Movement
because the Movement provides essential
services and benefits.
Ideology Support represents the support a Character (or Group) gives
based on how much of its beliefs coincide with that of an Alliance (see
4.3.4).
Legitimacy is perhaps the most important Support Level; it reflects the
degree to which a Character (or Group) supports an Alliance because it
believes that the Alliance is entitled to authority. When elections occur,
Legitimacy is the most important factor in determining how a particular
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Group will vote. Legitimacy is generally the second hardest Support Level
to dramatically change (Ideology is harder).
A Character’s Enthusiasm
Enthusiasm is a measure of the Character’s willingness to carry out Tactics or
otherwise engage in activism on behalf of his/her Alliance (see 4.3.4). Characters
with low Enthusiasm may refuse Tactics or do them poorly. Enthusiasm is
independent from Support Levels (see above) because a Character may be a strong
supporter of an Alliance, yet be unwilling to do anything involving personal
inconvenience or risk. However, if a Character has low Enthusiasm which persists at
that low level for an extended time, then Support Levels may be affected. Several
game factors can influence Enthusiasm:
•
•
•
•
Specific Tactics: Both success and failure of Tactics can positively or
negatively affect Enthusiasm levels of the tasked Character, the Target of
the Tactic, and affiliated Characters, Groups, Alliances, neighborhoods,
and regions.
Decision-Making Style: Alliances using a more hierarchical DecisionMaking Style will cause Characters to lose Enthusiasm (since those
Characters will feel that their views and concerns are not being addressed
by the decision-making process).
Personality Differences: An Alliance full of strong-willed, ambitious
Characters can lead to low Enthusiasm for some of them, to reflect bruised
egos and leadership struggles.
Repression: Strong repression or intimidating Tactics carried out
successfully by the Regime (see 4.4) or another violent non-Player
Alliance may cause Characters to lose Enthusiasm; they still support their
cause, but are unwilling to take risks on for it.
A Character’s Fear Level
All Characters, Groups, neighborhoods, and regions, no matter what their Alliance
affiliations are, can experience Fear. In game terms, this value represents many
things: fear of repression, fear of physical harm, fear of change, fear of chaos, and
fear of losing power. Fear can paralyze people into inaction, and this can only be
overcome when Enthusiasm is greater than Fear. As such, Characters can actively
pursue Tactics that increase Fear for their opponent, or decrease Fear for their
Alliance, as they see fit. Factors that can change Fear levels include:
•
Repression: Strong repression or intimidating Tactics carried out by the
Regime or other violent non-player Alliances may cause members or
supporters of the repressed Alliance to gain Fear; they still support their
chosen cause, but are unwilling to take risks for it. This Fear can also
ripple out to unrelated Characters, Groups, neighborhoods, and regions.
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•
Specific Tactics: Both success and failure of Tactics can positively or
negatively affect Fear levels of the tasked Character, the target of the
Tactic, and affiliated Characters, Groups, neighborhoods, and regions.
A Character’s Competencies
Competencies reflect a Character’s particular set of proficiencies that may assist him
in carrying out different kinds of Tactics. For example, a Character with the
Competency of “Writing” would likely be a good choice for the Craft Message
Tactic. Also, a Character with multiple Competencies that affect one particular
Tactic is much more likely to succeed at that Tactic. For example, if a Character has
Charisma, Creativity, and Empathy, he or she would be three times more likely to
succeed at the Craft Message Tactic. Competencies represent not just training or
acquired learning, but also exceptional personal qualities and aptitudes.
In the Appendix is a chart listing Character Competencies and their associated
Tactics.
Acquiring Competencies Through Training: Characters can acquire new
Competencies through Training Tactics. This is especially good for those Characters
in your Movement that do not have any Competencies at all. Whenever you conduct
a Training Tactic, the following can occur:
•
•
If the training session was anything other than Repression, all Characters
who are members of the target Group have a 10% chance of getting one of
the following Competencies (randomly determined): Writing,
Organization, Public Speaking, Training, Fundraising, and Vision.
If the training session was Repression, the possible Competencies gained
are: Interrogation, Weapons, and Crisis Management.
A Character’s Public Profile
A Character's Public Profile is basically a measure of how well-known he or she is
to the public. The Public Profile ratings from most to least visible are Famous,
Prominent, Visible, Low, and Anonymous. The value is set for each Character in the
beginning of the scenario, but will increase when the Character performs certain
Tactics (e.g., giving speeches and other “visible” activities). It will also degrade over
periods of inactivity or low-visibility.
Public Profile affects a variety of game-play elements. Characters with sufficiently
low Public Profile ratings cannot be targeted by the Regime; therefore, it makes
sense for you to manage risks to the Movement's Characters with this in mind. For
example, a Character with a low Profile might be useful in carrying out Tactics that
have a high probability of arrest, because the Regime is less likely to “see” them.
Alternately, a Character with a high Public Profile that has been attracting negative
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Regime attention might do well to Hide for a few days (which lowers his/her Public
Profile).
Characters with high Public Profile are generally more likely to succeed with Tactics
that require public recognition, such as making speeches, or leading mass protests.
Conversely, these Characters will lose Enthusiasm if tasked with mundane, low
visibility Tactics such as Distributing Literature.
Public Profile also comes into play when replacing Group leaders. If the current
leader of a Group is removed, and there is another Character with equal or greater
Public Profile in the Group, that Character becomes the leader.
A Character’s Public Influence
Public Influence measures how much credibility the General Public places in the
views and actions of the Character (or Group). Public Influence can represent that
their individual opinions are well-respected, or that their memberships or affiliations
are widespread throughout the public. Characters with high Public Influence are
more likely to “pull” the General Public along with them when they alter their
Support Levels or Policy Preferences.
Recruiting Characters: Recruiting Characters to participate in your Movement is
an important strategy in A Force More
Powerful, and is essential to strengthen
and improve the Movement. To that
end, here are some things you should keep in mind:
•
Do not try to recruit hardcore Regime supporters, those individuals whose
Regime Support Levels are very high. It’s unlikely that they will ever
change Alliances, and making the attempt may cause more trouble than
it’s worth. Putting your Characters in front of such high level Regime
personnel brings a lot of attention to your cause; attention that you may
not desire at the moment.
•
A good Character to recruit is one that is not affiliated with any particular
Alliance (i.e., those Characters whose silhouette on the Organization
Screen (see 3.4.10) is transparent). These Characters tend to be soft or (at
least) uncommitted to the Regime, and may very well share many of your
philosophies.
•
Another factor to consider when recruiting is if the Character in question
has the same Policy Agreements as you do. This information can be found
on the Organization Screen or on the Character’s own Information Pane
(see 3.4.13).
•
Pay close attention to your Character’s Competencies (see above). If a
Character has Empathy or Vision or even Charisma, he or she is the best
person to choose to make recruitment attempts.
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•
Finally, it’s important to not try to recruit a Character too often. Roughly
once a week is about the right number of attempts. Any more than that and
you run the risk of annoying the Character and turning him/her completely
away from your cause.
4.3.3 Groups
A Group is the basic political element in the game. A Group
represents an organization, institution or constituency that can
potentially play an important role in the scenario. Groups
comprise one or more Characters, whose interests, aspirations,
or livelihood rely on or are manifest through the activities (or responsibilities) of the
Group. For example, all of the employees of a television station can comprise a
Group.
Groups are gathered either under an Alliance (see 4.3.4) or are Independent. This is
easily seen by accessing the Organization Screen (see 3.4.10). Groups connected
with the Regime have thrown their support behind the Regime’s goals; Groups
connected with your Movement have thrown their support behind your Goals. But
Group affiliations are not static in A Force More Powerful, and Groups can shift
their support back and forth between the Movement and Regime many times during
play. Power is expressed in both the game and in real life though Groups. By
providing their cooperation, or withdrawing it, Groups (especially key Groups that
are Pillars of Support) have a major influence over how powerful and effective the
Regime and the Movement will be in carrying out their actions. The trick for you, as
the Movement planner, is to sway as many Groups as you can over to supporting
your goals, or at the least expressing some sympathy with your cause.
For the most part, Groups are affected by the same things that affect Characters (see
4.3.2), and they also share many of the same attributes (such as Fear and Enthusiasm
levels). A Group’s attributes and Support Levels, however, are independent of its
membership; meaning, a Group’s Fear level may be very different from an
individual member’s Fear Level (i.e., a Group’s Fear level is not a composite of its
Characters’ levels). But it’s still important to note that what affects Characters can
also affect Groups. Also, Characters who change their Support Levels, Fear, and
Enthusiasm can have ripple effects on the Groups they’re members of. Keep all this
in mind when playing the game.
The Leader: All Groups have a leader, who is the Character displayed in the leftmost box. The leader of a Group is often a good Character to Recruit because he or
she carries great weight within the Group. If the Group leader changes his/her
Alliances or expresses interest in your cause, there is a good chance that the Group
will also change its position as well.
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Alliance: Membership of a Group in an Alliance is determined automatically
by the Group’s Support Levels (see 4.3.3). A Group may be a member of an
Alliance, or be Unaligned. A Group can be a member of an Alliance even if
some members of the Group are not (and visa versa). For Characters, Alliance
affiliation is reflected by hollow or transparent silhouettes (see sample to the left).
However, if a Group’s leader belongs to a different Alliance than the Group, then he
or she is at risk of being replaced with someone else if he or she doesn’t pull the
Group over.
Affiliated Structures: A Group can be affiliated with one or more National Map
Features (see 3.4.11). Unlike Characters, Groups do not have specific physical
locations; they are considered to be present in part at each of their affiliated
buildings or features.
Infiltration Status: Groups can be infiltrated by
either Alliance, but specific Characters cannot be
infiltrators, or moles. A Group is infiltrated using
the Infiltrate Tactic, or as the result of other peripheral Tactics (see the
Resistopedia). When a Group has a mole, the opposing Alliance is aware of the
Group’s plans, and as such, the Group isn’t as effective at carrying out Tactics. To
get rid of a mole, the Group leader can run the Accuse Infiltrator Tactic. If the
Group has a mole, this will get rid of him, but if the Group doesn't have a mole, the
Group will lose Enthusiasm for being falsely accused.
Training: Groups can be trained in the use of
Tactics. Well-trained Groups will not lapse
into violence when undertaking potentially
violent Tactics; well-trained Regime security
forces will be more effective when repressing
dissident elements of the public. A Group’s
training level is invoked when its leader is tasked with a Tactic (since Groups
generally do not perform Tactics of their own accord). There are four kinds of
training:
•
Nonviolent Intervention—a high training level in this means that the
Group is more likely to maintain nonviolent discipline in the face of
repression, and to successfully execute nonviolent Tactics.
•
Support & Logistics—a high training level here means that the Group is
more effective at carrying out large-scale, complicated Tactics.
•
Political Activity—this training type refers to skill at electioneering,
media relations, communications, propaganda, and so forth.
•
Repression—a high training level here means that the Group is more
effective at police-style raids, arrests, and crowd control. This type of
training is available only to Police, Military, and Paramilitary Groups.
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Training Chart & Tactics: Below is a chart that indicates which Tactics are best
served with Training.
Training and Player-Only Tactics
Nonviolent
Intervention
Political
Support and
Logistics
Repression
Blockade City; Funeral; Lockout;
Mass Protest — rally, vigil, march; Noncooperation
Campaign — money, information, people; Overload
Facilities; Picket; Strike — slowdown, limited,
establishment; Train — nonviolent intervention
Boycott; Craft Message; Distribute Literature;
Fraternize; Fundraise; Meet With…; Organize Social
Event —meeting; Poll; Petition; Press Conference; Train
— political
Blockade City; Community Work
Distribute Literature; Dramatize; Fundraise; Funeral;
Lockout; Occupy Building; Organize Concert
Organize Social Event — party; Mass Protest — rally,
vigil, march; Noncooperation Campaign — money,
information, people; Overload Facilities; Picket; Publish
Newspaper; Strike — limited, establishment; Train —
support & logistics; Upgrade Communications —
efficiency, security; Wear Symbol
none
Training and Non-Player Tactics
Nonviolent
Intervention
Political
Support and
Logistics
Repression
Destroy Property; Regime Assembly — government rally
Change Policy — bill; Regime Assembly — government
rally
Attack Insurgents; Confiscate Property; Destroy
Property; Ethnic Cleansing; Regime Assembly —
government rally; Repair; Restrict Movement —
checkpoints, patrol, curfew
Arrest; Assassinate; Attack Insurgents; Confiscate
Property; Destroy Property; Detain; Ethnic Cleansing;
House Arrest; Interrogate; Intimidate; Kidnap; Mass
Arrest; Protect Building — surveillance, post guards,
blockade; Raid Building; Regime Assembly — military
parade; Restrict Movement — checkpoints, patrol, curfew
Train –repression
Recruiting Groups
One of your responsibilities as the Movement planner is to try and sway Groups
over to your Alliance, or, at a minimum, to force or persuade a Group to un-align
itself with the Regime. For details about how to weaken the Regime’s Pillars of
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Support (which are key Groups that support it), see Section 4.4.1. But in short, you
should try to get as many Groups as you can to support your Movement.
The best way to do that is to target a Group’s Characters with Tactics. Any of the
“Build Strength” Tactics (see 4.1.2) are excellent choices, but the best of these are
Fraternize, Organize Social Events, Fundraise, and Recruit Characters. These
Tactics are specifically designed to influence the members of a Group. If these
Tactics are applied effectively throughout play, you should see Groups change
Alliances from time to time. And once a Group begins to support you, the members
of that Group become available to conduct Tactics, and all the financial and
structural support that that Group has is now at your disposal.
When does a Group Join an Alliance? In general, Groups will join a new Alliance
when their support for the new Alliance is higher than their support for any other
Alliance, and their Enthusiasm is higher than their Fear.
4.3.4 Alliances
Alliances are political
associations of Groups and
Characters. Alliances are used
in the game to model different sorts of political associations: broad-based coalitions,
resistance Movements, guerrilla bands, and political parties. An Alliance differs
from a Group in that an Alliance may consist of more than one Group; i.e., it may be
a coalition of disparate interests that share a common goal, just like a real-life
opposition Movement or parliamentary coalition.
Membership in an Alliance: Both Groups and individual Characters can be
members of an Alliance. A Character can be a member of an Alliance even if his/her
Group is not (and vice-versa). An Alliance full of strong-willed, ambitious
Characters can lead to low Enthusiasm (see 4.3.3) for some of them, to reflect
bruised egos and leadership struggles.
Alliance Leader: Alliance leaders can carry out Tactics like any other Character.
Additionally, some of their attributes affect the persuasion time (see 4.1.2) required
for any Tactic carried out by any member of their Alliance. Alliance Leaders with
the Competencies of Vision, Charisma, Organization, Empathy, Negotiation, and/or
a high Will value need less persuasion time with a Tactic, while those with a low
value for Will require more time. The cultural identity of an Alliance leader also can
affect their vote share should there be an election. If an Alliance leader is detested or
disliked by a neighborhood/region, his/her vote share in that area will be reduced.
Conversely, respected and admired Alliance leaders receive more of the vote share.
You may also be able to predict what kinds of actions the Regime might take by
studying the attributes of its Alliance leader. For instance, if the Regime Alliance
leader has a low “Violence Unwillingness” (and thus is violent; see 4.5.1), the
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Regime is more likely to choose violent tactics when responding to the Movement’s
actions.
It’s important to note again that an Alliance leader is not necessarily the public
“leader” of your resistance Movement, who in some cases is a charismatic
figurehead but not the actual decision-maker. In fact, many of the scenarios in A
Force More Powerful challenge you to strategically pick the most effective
figurehead to lead the Movement, based on the specifics of the political situation
represented by that scenario.
The Movement is an Alliance: Though it should be obvious, it’s important to stress
that your resistance Movement is an Alliance, whose goal is to carry out Tactics
intended to achieve the Victory Conditions you have selected within the scenario.
The Regime: The Regime is the Alliance of your adversary, and it is played by the
computer’s artificial intelligence. The Regime starts each scenario as the
government. A Force More Powerful allows for a wide range of possible Regimes,
from almost-benign to pervasively evil, from unified under a dictator’s iron fist to
“ready to crack.” The Regime is created by the scenario designer. Regimes may
collapse due to overwhelming political pressure caused by noncooperation of a
city’s or country’s people. The threat of collapse is ever-present, although it may be
very difficult to achieve in some scenarios. Regimes depend on their pillars of
support (key groups that support them) to retain power. If enough groups withdraw
their support from a Regime, it will collapse. For more details about how to place
pressure on the Regime, see Section 4.4.
Alliance Decision-Making Styles: An Alliance’s decision-making style represents
the process by which the Alliance makes decisions. There are five settings that range
from rigid and hierarchical to consensus-based. An Alliance with a more rigid
decision-making style gets things done faster, but rapidly depletes the Enthusiasm of
its members. Coming to a consensus takes longer, but the members are more
enthusiastic because they are involved in the process. The decision-making styles
are listed below.
•
•
•
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Autocratic: One person within the Alliance makes all decisions with
minimal outside influence. Real-world examples include Tsarist Russia
and North Korea.
Oligarchic: The Alliance leader and a close cabal of influential advisors
make decisions that are carried out by the rest of the Alliance. Real-world
examples include the former Soviet Union, Communist China, and Iran.
Majority Rule: The Alliance leader must persuade a majority of the Group
leaders within the Alliance to go along with plans and Tactics. Note that
this is not literally enforced within the game; rather, it is abstractly
enforced through the reduced Enthusiasm cost (and greater time cost,
A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
•
•
assumed to be invested in persuading a majority to do what the player
wants). Real-world examples include Western parliaments with strong
party discipline (e.g. the United Kingdom).
Compromise: Identical to Majority Rule except that the minority members
always receive some extra considerations in exchange for their support of
the Alliance’s plan. Real-world examples include Western legislatures
with weak traditions of party discipline (e.g., the United States).
Consensus: For the Alliance to go ahead with any plan or Tactic,
unanimity must be obtained.
Alliance Policies: There are 27 different standard
Policies that an Alliance can endorse. For full
details about these policies, see the Resistopedia. But there are some policies that
are classified as “key” policies and these can be obtained through the Alliance’s
Information Pane.
As shown to the right, Alliances consider some
policies to be absolutely critical to their
worldview or to the nation's future. Whether or
not a policy is a “key policy” has substantial
impact in the game. Agreement on key policies
translates much more strongly into Ideology
support than agreement on non-key policies.
Agreement always exists when two
Characters/Groups have the same color
showing for their preference on a policy. If the
two colors are close to one another
(red/orange, orange/yellow, etc.) then
agreement may exist. If the two colors are far
from one another, then there is disagreement. In addition to affecting Ideology
support, policy disagreements affect how the General Public votes, and affect how
likely Build Strength tactics are to succeed (it is more difficult to recruit new
members and strengthen your coalition if the people you are trying to recruit
disagree with you on fundamental issues).
The “Status Quo”: The “Status Quo” set of policies represents “the way things
currently are” in the scenario, or the “nation’s policy set.” This set of policies will
likely differ from the preferences of any particular Group, Character or Alliance,
including those of members of the Regime. This means, for example, that just
because the Regime leader wants a particular policy to have a certain value, that
preference might not be reflected in the Status Quo. That said, the Regime is the
only means by which the Status Quo policies in the game can change. A Force More
Powerful takes many factors into account when deciding whether to change Status
Quo policies, including the dictator’s preferences, his/her strength of will, and
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his/her leadership type (e.g., Ideologues are less likely to change the Status Quo
away from their preferences, even if doing so would help them politically).
The interaction between Policy Preferences of Groups, Characters, and Alliances,
and the actual Status Quo is very important. For example, a Regime may decide to
set Status Quo policies in ways its current supporters don’t like, in order to solidify
its support outside its inner circle. Additionally, sometimes a Tactic will refer to a
particular Status Quo policy setting as part of its resolution. For instance, the status
quo policy on “Freedom of Expression” will affect the difficulty of distributing
literature, and the Status Quo policy on “Use of Torture” will affect the likelihood of
a Character surviving arrest and interrogation.
The Alliance’s Manifesto: The policy preferences of an Alliance are its Manifesto.
Each Alliance’s Manifesto is set by the scenario designer. You may change any part
of the Manifesto at the very beginning of the game before time has passed.
Afterwards, you may not change the Manifesto.
4.4 Weakening the Regime
The Regime is the adversary in A Force More Powerful. It
is an Alliance, and starts each scenario as the government.
The nature of the Regime in each scenario will be a major
determinant of scenario difficulty. The easiest scenarios
will have lenient, careless or politically vulnerable
Regimes. The hardest ones will have well-trained, wellfunded, ruthless and politically strong Regimes. It’s recommended that you start
with easy scenarios and work your way up.
4.4.1 Pillars of Support
Both your Movement and the Regime have Pillars of Support… those
Groups provide you with crucial legitimacy, services, and/or human or
materials resources. Of course, as you strengthen and protect your Pillars
of Support, you should try to weaken the Regime’s. Weakening a
Regime’s Pillars of Support can be very difficult, as the Regime tries very hard to
keep its core supporters on its side because these Groups are vital to its survival. So,
how should you go after these seemingly unmovable supporters? The first step is to
recognize which Group (or Groups) in the Regime represent the Pillars of Support.
This is best found through the Strategic Estimate (see Chapter 5), which can be
accessed in-game through the Strategic Estimate button in the bottom right-hand
corner of the screen.
Once you’ve identified the Pillars of Support for the Regime, the next step is to
figure out what kind of support they provide to the Regime. In the game, there are
three kinds of support:
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Legitimacy Support—Pillars of Support that believe that the Regime is the
“legitimate” government of the country can be swayed through Tactics that attempt
to reveal the “illegitimacy” of the government. For example, if one of a Regime’s
Pillars of Support is a military Group, then you would want to find commanders
within that Group whose support for the Regime is soft. Conduct Tactics that Target
them, such as Recruit Character, to try and sway them to your cause. Even if they
do not change Alliances, then perhaps they can be softened enough such that, when
and if the Regime orders them to conduct violent Tactics against your Movement,
they are less likely to act. If you can sway the General Public against the Regime
through Tactics such as Distributing Literature or if the Regime orders a violent
crackdown on a Mass Protest and the public does not like it, then members of the
Pillars of Support may begin to realize that their first duty is to the people, and not
the illegitimate government, of their country.
Financial Support—Pillars of Support that support the Regime because of financial
gain (often because they sell the Regime goods or services) can often be swayed
through Tactics such as Strikes, Building Occupation, Boycotts, etc. Any Tactics
which weaken a Regime’s hold on the financial resources of the country are useful
against these kinds of Pillars of Support.
Ideological Support—This kind of support is the most difficult to change because it
involves changing people’s deeply held preferences. If the members of a Pillar of
Support strongly believe in the Regime’s ideology, and share the same goals and
outlook on life, then they are much harder to sway. The best way to target these
kinds of Pillars of Support is to make sure that your Movement’s Manifesto can
appeal to at least some of the belief system as the members of these Pillars. For
more details about Manifestos, see Section 4.3.4.
4.5 Avoiding Violence and the Consequences of Violence
In a nonviolent struggle, one goal of any Movement is to avoid violence. Violence
engages Regimes where they are strongest; regimes are well-prepared for, and know
how to handle, violent opposition. Often, Regimes will even try to instigate violence
among opposition Groups so that they will have an excuse to arrest, kill or otherwise
repress opposition members. Also, violence among the opposition tends to solidify
the support of a Regime’s troops and political supporters, whereas nonviolent action
creates an asymmetric conflict that tends to create division in the regime’s troops
and political supporters.
Historically, it has been difficult for some nonviolent movements to avoid violence
altogether: people involved get impatient, lose their cool, react to violence or other
provocative behavior perpetrated by the Regime, etc. Therein lays the challenge for
any movement planner: Do you have the patience and forbearance to see your
struggle through without resorting to violence? In the game, you must take special
care to prevent your Characters and Groups from slipping into violence, so that your
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message is not lost in the polarization and media coverage that it causes. One of the
best ways to do this is not to put the members of your Movement in potential harm’s
way if they cannot handle it, and to make sure that any members that could be in
harm’s way have adequate skills and training (such as in Nonviolent Intervention) to
ensure that they maintain nonviolent discipline. Occasionally, you may want to
consider conducting Tactics such that the violent tendencies of the Regime are
exposed. The hope here is that the Regime’s violence will backfire and cause
revulsion among the General Public and other Groups.
4.5.1 Violent and Nonviolent Tactics
There are four classifications for Tactics with respect to violence. They are:
•
•
•
•
Illegal Tactics: An illegal Tactic is any Tactic marked with the
“illegal” symbol as shown here. An illegal Tactic is a Tactic which allows
the Regime to arrest the Coordinator of the Tactic without using its Arrest
Tactic. The determination of whether a Tactic is or is not illegal is based
on the Status Quo settings (see Chapter 5) of Due Process, Freedom of
Expression, Rights to Privacy, Border Controls and Immigration.
Totally Nonviolent Tactics: Even if these Tactics go very badly, they
cannot “get out of control” in a violent way (e.g., Fundraising).
Potentially Violent Tactics: A potentially violent Tactic is any
Tactic marked with the “violent” symbol as shown here. When attempting
one of these Tactics, and if it fails, there is a chance that the Regime may
react violently and/or the protesters may get out of control. Protesters may
also be arrested if violence breaks out. Examples of such Tactics are Mass
Protest, Strike, Funeral, and Occupy Building.
Inherently Violent Tactics: These kinds of Tactics are only available to
the Regime. An example of this kind of Tactic is “Assassinate.” Groups
and Characters in the Regime with high “Violence Unwillingness” (see
4.5) may refuse to perform Tactics in this category (such refusal will be
reflected by the unlikeness of the Tactic’s success, or by an up-front
warning—at the moment of tasking—that the Group will refuse to conduct
the Tactic or possibly leave the Alliance).
For a full explanation of all Tactics, refer to the Resistopedia.
When an Inherently Violent Tactic is executed, or if a Potentially Violent Tactic is
poorly executed, other Groups may reduce their support for the Alliance responsible,
depending on their Violence Intolerance value (which Groups do so may be
determined by location or by media coverage). Hence a Regime or Movement that
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adopts the use of violence (intentionally or not) may have to plan for this
“revulsion” effect.
4.5.2 The Occurrence of Violence
The occurrence of violence depends on the Regime’s attempt to disperse activists
and whether or not that attempt succeeds. If it succeeds, the Regime has successfully
dispersed activists with no notable violence. If it fails, however, then violence may
result and political fallout may occur. The Movement can react poorly to a failed
response by the Regime, and if they do, property damage (with the accompanying
political damage), injury, or even death can result. The Movement has some control
over these possibilities in that you can recommend low or high levels of
aggressiveness when confronting security forces. Low levels mean that violence is
unlikely but that the Regime will have an easier time of dispersing activists (and
thus neutralizing the Movement’s Tactic); high levels mean the opposite.
4.5.3 The Resolution of Violence
Once a Tactic is determined and put into play, the game’s artificial intelligence
decides what the Regime’s response will be. The Regime’s Tactics can be inherently
violent, or can become violent, depending on how prepared the Movement is. Only
the Regime can use inherently violent Tactics. The violence that results from
Movement-initiated Tactics is caused by a loss of nonviolent discipline. The
Movement Tactics that can become violent are: Mass Protest, Funeral, Strike,
Organize Concert, Occupy Building, Overload Facilities, Picket, and Blockade City.
When one of the above Tactics is tried, one of five outcomes is possible:
•
•
•
•
•
Tactic is resolved normally with no violence.
Tactic is cancelled with no violence.
Tactic is cancelled with violence by the Regime only.
Tactic is cancelled with violence by both sides.
Tactic is cancelled with violence by the Movement only.
4.5.4 Results of Regime Violence
Regime violence results in Movement casualties, which negatively affects
manpower, reduces Enthusiasm, increases Fear, and reduces Regime legitimacy
support of the Movement's group, and may also affect the population in the
surrounding areas. It can also negatively affect the Regime Legitimacy Support and
Enthusiasm of the violent Group, particularly if the Group has a Violence
Intolerance. However, as the Movement leader, you often don't want to count on a
backlash against the Regime: Without public sympathy and wide reporting of the
violence, the Regime can get away with repression.
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4.5.5 Violence as a Result of Movement Actions
Movement violence is the result of the tasked Group losing nonviolent discipline.
This is less likely to happen if…
a) no casualties are suffered, or
b) if the Tactic Coordinator, Group, Alliance, and General Public have a high
violence unwillingness, or
c) if the Tactic Coordinator has Crisis Management or Organization skills, or
d) if the Tactic requires few people, and if the cultural attitudes in the
neighborhood are favorable.
Movement violence can directly cause property damage, but not Movement
casualties (although Movement casualties may result if the Regime initiates counterviolence in response to the Movement).
If a building is destroyed as a result of Movement violence, it affects the Economic
Well-Being of the associated Groups, which can also affect their Support levels,
Enthusiasm, and Fear.
As a practical matter, mixing nonviolent resistance with violence is a poor idea. It
gives Regimes an excuse to violently crack down and arrest members of the
opposition. It tends to alienate members or the General Public and third parties
(including international actors) from the opposition. It also tends to increase the
reliability of a Regime's troops.
For example, in Russia 1905, in the face of massive strikes and nonviolent action,
Russian troops were on the verge of defecting from the Tsar's army. However, once
strikers and other opposition members became violent, soldiers felt threatened and
immediately began following orders again. They then reliably obeyed the Tsars
commands to violently put down the opposition Movement. The Movement was
then defeated.
4.5.6 The Ripple Effects of Violence
In the game, violence generates its own ripple effects that affect not just the General
Public but also Groups… particularly Groups tied to buildings local to the violence.
The ripple effects of violence are also connected to the amount of media coverage
the violence receives. So, when a Tactic gets violent, there are two ripple effects
generated: one for the Tactic itself and one for the violence associated with it. These
effects may offset or reinforce one another.
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4.6 Confronting and Disrupting the Regime
Some Interactive Map Features (see 3.4.11), such as an oil well or a
railroad station, can be Disrupted. The nature and effects of this
Disruption vary by the type of Interactive Map Feature, so that a Disrupted
road junction means that travel is not possible through that Interactive
Map Features, whereas a Disrupted mine is not contributing to the economy.
Disruption can have many causes: nonviolent barricading of a road junction, a strike
or protest at a mine or village, or something more permanent, like an airstrike or
insurgent attack. Disruption powerfully affects the Groups affiliated with the
disrupted Interactive Map Features or building, and can cripple the Regime (or the
Movement). It reduces their ability to execute Tactics and the resources they
provide, and also causes them to question their loyalties if those loyalties are based
on money. As a result, the Regime will be quick and forceful in its response when its
crucial power centers are Disrupted. Make sure that once you have the capability to
Disrupt targets, you don’t do it carelessly. A Regime that is fighting for its political
life may attempt extreme measures. Finally, it is possible to indirectly Disrupt
targets by cutting them off from cities. If an Interactive Map Feature on the National
Map cannot trace any travel path to a city because all available routes are cut off by
disrupted Interactive Map Features, then it too is Disrupted. This means it is possible
to take advantage of choke points on the National Map and Disrupt multiple
Interactive Map Features with a single Tactic.
Other, more subtle ways of attacking the Regime include undermining the reliability
of its pillars of support, or reducing the Regime’s support in areas that contain many
of those pillars, infiltrating the security forces so you can anticipate their activities,
and engaging in boycotts and non-cooperation campaigns to reduce the Regime’s
supporters’ ability to contribute money and people to the Regime’s cause of staying
in power.
4.7 Managing Messages
The message system in A Force More Powerful keeps you
informed about what is happening in the game—it lets you know
the results of your Tactics, activities of the Regime, and gives you
advice about situations you should consider acting on. It is
controlled by the dual newspaper/envelope button next to the Advance Time button.
When opened, it displays a list of messages.
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Scroll Bar:
Messages remain
on the list for 7,
30 or 90 days, as
specified by you
on the Game
Options Screen
(see Section
4.10.1). The
“default” setting
is 30 days.
Message Icons
and Brief
Description
Message Date
Message Read: Messages you’ve already read are checked off in green.
Urgent Messages: Messages that are urgent (denoting very important effects
such as the death or arrest of one of your Characters, or a major Tactic coming
to resolution) have red exclamation points. Sometimes you will receive an
urgent message before the number of turns that you set to elapse in the Advance
Time controls has fully gone by. This means that the event described in the message
is important enough to stop the game and let you react to it. These kinds of messages
can be either good or bad.
Messages are retained for thirty days after they arrive; this length of time can be
adjusted in the Game Options (see 4.10).
As stated in earlier chapters, there are three types of message:
“In the News” Messages: These messages appear alongside a newspaper
icon. They represent messages widely dispersed throughout the country.
They often denote important events, such as Government Rallies.
Message Title
Date and
Sub-Title
Story Details
Memos: These messages appear alongside an envelope icon. They represent
messages that aren’t high profile enough to make the news, but that you
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would find out about anyway, such as low visibility Tactics by either side, or
Characters switching Alliances, or new Characters becoming available.
Movement Icon
Message Title
Message Details: This
explains the reasons for
why the message was
triggered. Pay close
attention to these details,
as they can give you clues
about future Tactics.
Advisor Messages: These messages appear alongside a speech balloon.
They represent advice about the game situation from people in your
Movement. These messages will appear as soon as the event causing them occurs.
Message Title
Character
Portrait
Message Details
Character Delivering
the Message
Below are lists of items or “situations” that may trigger messages.
Situations Triggering Advisor Messages
•
A Character would switch Alliances but Fears the repercussions.
•
A Character would increase his/her Ideology Support (see 4.3.2) for your
Movement if the Movement could change (or improve) its position on a
specific issue.
•
A neighborhood or a region is ripe for a mass action (such as Mass
Protest).
•
The Regime is facing imminent or potential collapse, and any Group taken
away from it would hasten the collapse.
•
The Regime is no longer facing collapse.
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•
•
•
•
Money allocated to a Tactic exceeds the available money in the
Movement.
People allocated to a Tactic exceed the available personnel.
A Victory Condition has been met.
A new phase, according to the Strategic Estimate (see Chapter 5), has
begun.
Situations Triggering Messages In General
•
Groups or Characters changing Alliance membership.
•
New Characters becoming available.
•
A Group replacing its Leader.
•
Violence occurring as the result of a Tactic.
•
A victory condition has been satisfied.
•
The Regime has successfully dispersed participants in a Tactic.
•
Random Events.
•
Changes in Regime focus on the Movement.
When receiving messages, it’s a good idea to take some notes. In fact, it’s
recommended that you use the Notes feature listed on various Information Panes
(see 3.4.13). Since game messages only remain active for 30 days, you may forget a
vital piece of information, such as a Regime Character willing to join your
Movement if his/her Fear level is brought down. By adding this note to the
interested Character’s “Notes” dialog, you have a better chance of remembering it if
the message disappears before you are able to convince the Character to join your
cause.
4.8 Understanding the Local and National Economy
The two most important
economic variables in A Force
More Powerful are Inflation and Unemployment. Inflation exists only for the nation
as a whole; Unemployment exists for each Neighborhood and Region, and the
national value is computed as a population-weighted average of these. The game
does not literally express the inflation and unemployment rates. Instead, each of
these indicators has five possible settings:
Inflation
Very Low
Low
Moderate
High
Very High
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Unemployment
Very Low
Low
Moderate
High
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High Inflation is bad for the Regime. It means they are unable to pay their security
forces and other Pillars of Support with money that has value. As a result, when
Inflation is high, Regime Tactics are more difficult to bring off.
Unemployment is also bad for the Regime, in that difficult economic times make it
easier for opposition Movements to get traction with their criticisms of the
government. It also means that in general more people have free time on their hands
with which to organize. However, people don’t like to see opposition Movements
“make the situation worse,” so not all Tactics are made easier by high
Unemployment—any Tactic perceived as targeting the economy will be made more
difficult if Unemployment is high. Moreover, certain Movement Tactics are more
effective if targeted at economically depressed areas.
Corruption also has a strong effect on the Regime. Widespread corruption (a red or
orange setting) hurts the Regime greatly, as it takes away their Money resources and
makes their Tactics more difficult to implement. A Regime with little Corruption (a
green setting) will be much tougher for the Movement to deal with since its security
forces will be more dedicated to duty.
4.9 Winning the Game (Victory Conditions)
To “win” a game of A Force More
Powerful you must achieve the
Victory Conditions you set out for
yourself in the Strategic Estimate
(see Chapter 5). A Force More
Powerful, unlike most games, allows
the player some considerable leeway
in determining what counts as
winning. In the Strategic Estimate,
you can select and prioritize one,
some, or all of the Victory
Conditions suggested in the scenario;
when the scenario ends, the Evaluation Screen will describe your success with all
the Victory Conditions you have chosen.
Victory Conditions can be almost anything. Forcing the Regime to hold an election
might be one; winning it might be another; getting international monitors to verify
the results might be a third. Victory Conditions can range from human-rights trials,
to building support for your Movement, to avoiding the inadvertent use of violence.
Just because you haven’t selected a Victory Condition doesn’t mean it isn’t worth
achieving; you may want to keep your plan simple and modest, and if you exceed
your chosen objectives, all the better.
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You can also assign Victory Conditions to your plan using the Phase Display in the
Strategic Estimate. You get no special rewards for achieving them in this case,
though, as you would if they were mere objectives.
Some Victory Conditions are game ending—achieving them automatically ends the
game and takes you to the Evaluation Screen. Other ways for the game to end
include the scenario’s time expiring and the Regime’s collapse (when the Regime
loses enough Pillars of Support, it will abruptly collapse). Regime collapse is not
always to your benefit! In many scenarios, Regime collapse can trigger a military
coup, civil disorder, civil war, or even foreign invasion. To avoid these
consequences, make sure that part of your strategy includes planning for the
transition of power. Try to get the Regime’s security forces on board with your
Movement, or at least willing to stand aside and preserve order during a transition.
Violent insurgencies or separatists have been similarly persuaded to keep their
peace, and worried foreign powers with large armies have been reassured that you
will not act completely against their interests.
4.10 Game Options and Shortcut Keys
A Force More Powerful has a number of Game Options and shortcut keys which
allow you to customize game play to suit your own preferences.
4.10.1 Game Options
From the Main Menu Screen (see 3.1), select Options to access the Game Options
tabs.
Select the General Options tab to view a list of general options.
Message Retention: By default, A Force
More Powerful retains 30 days of messages
in the message page. You may reduce or
increase this amount by changing the
message retention to 7 days or 90 days).
Auto Save: Select this option to “auto save”
the game you are currently playing between
the indicated turns. You may set the autosave for every 7 turns up to 365 turns.
Remember, one turn in A Force More Powerful equals one day.
Tactics Queue Retention: Select this option to set (in months) the number of
Tactics saved in the Tactics Queue for future reference.
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Turn Length Reset: The Turn Length Reset option is associated with the Turn
Indicator that you set during play (see 3.4.5). If you have the turn length reset On
then whatever number you previously placed in the Turn Indicator will reset itself to
that number after receiving urgent messages. If you have the turn length reset Off,
after urgent messages, the reset does not work and instead, the difference between
the time you set and the time remaining appears. For example, if you have the Turn
Length Reset set to Off and have set the Turn Indicator set to 10, if an urgent
message appears on the 5th day (and play stops), then the number 5 appears in the
Turn Indicator when play resumes (since there are but 5 days remaining). If the reset
was set to On, then the number 10 would remain in the Turn
Indicator.
Credits: Select the Credits button to view the list of persons
involved in the creation of A Force More Powerful.
Select the Alerts tab to view a list of game alerts.
Low Resources Alert: Set this to On if you want to be
alerted when the amount of money and/or people in the
Movement gets low.
Unsubmitted Tactic Alert: Set this to On if you want a warning message about any
unsubmitted Tactic before “advancing” the Turn Indicator.
Select the Sound tab to view a list of sound options.
Volume Level: You may use this slider bar to
increase/decrease the volume level of the game.
There are a total of 10 settings.
Sound Effects: Select this option to turn sound
effects On or Off. Sound effects in A Force More
Powerful are those you hear throughout the
interface (button clicks, pedestrian sounds on the 3D View Map, etc.). Sound effects
excluded from this option are those associated with Vignette Tactics (see 4.11).
Music: Select this option to turn music On or Off.
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Select the Graphics tab to view a list of graphics options. This allows you to
adjust the graphics display on your computer if it is running too slow.
Building: Select this option to set building graphics
to High or Low resolution in the 3D View.
Utilities: Select this option to set utilities (i.e.,
lampposts) graphics to High (on) or Low (off) in
the 3D View.
Vegetation: Select this option to set vegetation
graphics to High (on) or Low (off) in the 3D View.
Vignette Display: Select this option to set 3D images of vignettes to High (on) or
Low (off) (see 4.11).
Use Windows Cursor: Select this option to use the standard Windows cursor in the
game. For this option to take affect, you must select it (highlight the box with an
“x”) and then restart the game.
4.10.2 Keyboard Shortcuts
Below is a list of shortcut keys that you can use to facilitate play.
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Press the Esc key to display a dialog that will allow you to Load a game,
Save the current game, access the Options Screen, or Quit the game.
Press F2 to toggle Windows mode on/off. The default is Off.
Press Alt-F4 to display the Quit dialog.
Press Ctrl-N to toggle Neighborhood color overlays on/off.
Press PageUp or PageDown to zoom 3D view in or out.
Use the Arrow Keys to pan the 3D camera left, right, up and down.
Click the left mouse button to escape from a vignette Tactic (see 4.11).
Press Ctrl-Z (before doing any other action) to undo a text edit in a
Strategic Estimate (see Chapter 5) field.
Press F8 to end the game and view the Evaluation Screen (see 3.5)
4.11 Vignette Tactics
Vignette Tactics are those that have a brief 3D
animation associated with them. For example, if
your Movement organizes a concert, the 3D View Screen appears momentarily and
shows you a visual representation of the event and its result (as shown below).
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Concert Sample
An Organize Concert Tactic was
attempted in the Roca Town
Square as shown in this example.
But few people attended the event,
unfortunately.
After the Vignette Tactic occurs, you will receive messages indicating success or
failure of the event, in addition to other animations supporting those messages.
Using the example above, the Movement held an unsuccessful concert, and the
results were documented in the messaging system:
The failed concert event shown above
generated three messages. The first
indicates that the Movement wasn’t
able to maintain their nonviolent
discipline; the second is to the
Movement personnel specifically,
indicating the reasons why the
concert failed; the third message
indicates what physical damage
occurred during the concert….
Not a good day for the Movement!
It’s important to note that Vignette Tactics work the same way as any other Tactic
(they simply have a 3D animation associated with them). The Vignette Tactics in A
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Force More Powerful are: Funeral, Mass Execution, Mass Protest (March, Rally
and Vigil), Organize Concert, Raid Building, and Regime Assembly (Rally and
Military Parade). It’s also important to note that the 3D animation associated with a
Vignette Tactic is seen only if the Tactic is conducted “in” a city and, for the Tactics
listed below, only at certain location types:
Tactic with Restricted Vignette
Location Options
Mass Protest—Rally
Courthouse, University, Embassy
Mass Protest—Vigil
Prison
Mass Execution
Stadium, Town Square
Organize Concert
Town Square
4.12 Tips on Play
Here are some additional tips that will help improve your play.
Fear and Enthusiasm
•
Fear and Enthusiasm are among the most important elements in the game.
Groups and Characters whose Fear is higher than their Enthusiasm won’t
change sides, regardless of who they support.
•
Fear and Enthusiasm also play a role in national elections. Elections are based
on two factors: turnout and vote share. Turnout is how many people show up to
vote; vote share is who they vote for. High Fear and low Enthusiasm will
reduce turnout. Vote share is affected by Policy agreements or disagreements
with the Regime and the other Alliances, and by the existence of independent
political Groups. So, if you want to prevent independent political Groups from
siphoning off your votes, it may make sense to persuade them to join you
before the election.
•
To lower Fear, it can be effective to defy the Regime and show that they cannot
impose their will. The Display Symbol, Wear Symbol, and Dramatize Tactics
are good for this. Mass actions, such as Organize Concert and Mass Protest,
will also lower the Fear of the General Public.
•
To raise Enthusiasm, Tactics such as Organize Social Event, Charity,
Community Work, Train, and Publish Website will serve to encourage people to
act on their beliefs.
General Public
•
A Character’s Public Profile has a large effect on how easy it is for the Regime
to arrest him. Characters with a high Public Profile are often better at certain
Tactics (such as Press Conferences, Meetings, etc.), that are seen by or involve
the general population, but are also more visible and therefore more likely to be
targeted by the Regime.
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•
Sometimes the General Public will mimic a political shift, such as a change in
Support Levels, Enthusiasm, or Fear, undergone by a Character or Group. The
chance of this happening is directly linked with the Character or Group’s Public
Influence. Therefore, the more influential Characters and Groups you persuade
to support you, or to agree with you about Policies, the greater the chance the
General Public will do so as well. This matters a lot in elections.
Joining Alliances
•
It’s easier for a Character or Group to join the Regime than any other Alliance
(including the Movement). If Regime support is yellow, and the Character or
Group has no higher support for someone else, then that’s enough for that
Character or Group to join the Regime. For anyone else, the support must be
light or dark green.
Regime
•
Remember that the Regime’s goal is not to “beat” you; it’s to stay in power.
This means that unless your goal is to get rid of the Regime entirely, the
Regime may actually help you achieve your goals if you put enough pressure
on it. The Regime will not always engage in repression. Depending on the
characteristics of the Regime leader and the amount of pressure you are putting
on the Regime and its Pillars of Support, the Regime may opt to grant
concessions or otherwise try to give you some of what you want.
•
The Regime can’t assign Tactics to Characters unless they strongly support the
Regime or belong to the Police, Military, or Bureaucracy categories. So, to
prevent the Regime from doing too many Tactics, it may be possible simply to
erode a Character’s support, even if you don’t get him/her to leave the Regime
outright.
Support Levels
•
Remember that a Character or Group’s Overall Support is the highest of the
three different Support Levels (Legitimacy, Ideology, and Financial Gain). This
means that a Group with high Support Levels for the Regime in all three types
will be very hard to sway, since reducing just one will have no effect on
Overall Support.
Support Changes
•
Changes in Support, Fear, and Enthusiasm are gradual; even a very successful
Tactic won’t completely change them overnight.
Tactics
•
It’s best to try small, strength-building Tactics early in a scenario, before you
try anything more public or ambitious. The Regime will notice you and start to
do something about you, and you don’t want this to happen before you are
ready.
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•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Many Tactics, particularly public Tactics that require the participation of local
people who are not part of the Groups in your Alliance (such as Mass Protest,
Strike, Occupy Building, Funeral, etc.), will require the support of the
neighborhood or region in which the target is located. Attempting these Tactics
without high support in those areas will not turn out well, regardless of how
strong or influential the Groups in your Movement are.
Many Tactics are helped if the Tactic Coordinator has certain Competencies.
See the Appendix for a list of Competencies and which Tactics they support.
Also refer to the Resistopedia for additional information.
The Craft Message Tactic is very important, particularly in the early phase of
the game. You will want to attempt it early in the scenario, for some time (at
least a couple of weeks). Your message quality will decline over time, too
(whenever this happens you will get a message). So you will need to have one
of your Characters do the Craft Message Tactic again from time to time.
Having a good message will do you little good unless you use it! Most Tactics
are helped by a good message, but those in the Communicate, Build Strength,
and Deny categories are especially effective when your message resonates with
the public.
When you adopt Tactics designed to change a target’s mind about a Policy, you
should always have a Policy Focus for the current Phase in your operational
plan. If you have no Policy Focus, then your coordinator will decide which
Policy to emphasize in the Tactic, which may not be the same one you want to
work on!
Preparation time is crucial to the success of most Tactics. More preparation
time will never hurt you, but if all your Tactics take a long time, you may run
out of time in the scenario before achieving your goals, or fall behind the
schedule you laid out in your operational plan.
The Groups who are aligned with your Movement will generate a steady trickle
of money each week, but the Fundraise Tactic can be used to increase your
money reserves even more. If successful, it will generate daily income based on
the Economic Well-Being of the Target—but it will not work if repeatedly
targeted at the same Group.
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5. STRATEGIC ESTIMATE
Good planning is the cornerstone of a successful Movement; without a plan, the
resistance effort may squander its human and material resources, mismanage its
time, make poor choices that result in setbacks of public support, and without a plan
the Movement may even fall apart in moments of crisis. The Strategic Estimate is
the most important planning tool provided to an organizer of a nonviolent
movement. A Strategic Estimate, in general, is a document that helps you to
organize, analyze and plan a course of action that can withstand the costs,
uncertainties, and even chaos that a nonviolent struggle can bring. The one in A
Force More Powerful is an adaptation of the Strategic Estimate found in Robert L.
Helvey's book, On Strategic Nonviolent Conflict It is the place in the game where
the volume of information available is organized in a systematic manner, so that you
can assess the information available, and plan your course of action in a strategic—
rather than haphazard—way.
To fully utilize the benefits of planning via the Strategic Estimate, you may want to:
1. Evaluate the scenario situation;
2. Create a plan;
3. Test the plan by playing the scenario;
4. Evaluate your success (or lack thereof);
5. Evaluate where/why your plan failed to identify or consider dangers and
opportunities;
6. Create a new and better plan;
7. Test this plan by playing the scenario again.
This process should enable you to hone your strategic planning skills.
5.1 Strategic Estimate Screens and Tabs—An Overview
The Strategic Estimate is the first screen you see after choosing a scenario (see 3.2).
It contains four sections:
I.
II.
III.
IV.
The Situation
Mission Assessment
Victory Conditions
Phases & Objectives
Each of these sections is described in more detail in the following pages. By default,
The Situation Screen appears first, and it’s recommended that you start with the
options offered on this screen to devise your plan. Below is a brief description of the
screen layout.
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Sub-Sections: Select these blue
buttons to access sub-pages.
The Tabs/Pages: Each tab/page provides
options that you can set to develop your own
Strategic Estimate.
Situation
Options: Select
Planning, Victory
Conditions, or
Movement
Manifesto to
access these
options.
Background
Information: Gives
details about the
scenario selected.
Backward/Forward Buttons: Use these to
page through the Strategic Estimate.
Select Go to
Game to begin
play.
You have four options on this page:
1.
2.
3.
4.
Read the Background. This is an indispensable source of information
about the scenario, and you should always review it before starting play.
Start Planning. Clicking on the Planning link takes you to the Mission
Assessment section, where you can start building your strategic plan. This
can be a lengthy process, and is not required in order to play the
scenario—but completing it will provide valuable insights into how best to
play it. See Section 5.2 for building a Strategic Estimate.
Choose Victory Conditions. You choose your own Victory Conditions in
A Force More Powerful; in fact it is a required step prior to starting the
scenario. If you choose the Planning option above, you don’t need to click
on the Victory Conditions link here; you’ll be taken to that section as part
of the Planning process. However, if you wish to proceed straight into the
scenario, click this link to go to that section and choose your Victory
Conditions first. See Section 5.2.3 for more details.
View/Revise your Movement Manifesto. The Movement’s various
policy beliefs form its Manifesto, which is what Groups and Characters
look at when deciding whether or not to join with you. If you choose the
Planning option above, you don’t need to click on the Movement
Manifesto link here; you’ll be taken to it as part of the Planning process.
However, if you wish to proceed straight into the scenario, you might want
to click this link to look at it and possibly make some adjustments. See
Section 5.2.2 for more details.
Advanced players, and those interested in real-world applications and training, will
want to complete the entire Strategic Estimate before beginning the scenario. Note
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that the Strategic Estimate can (and indeed should) be updated during play to keep it
current with the actual situation in the scenario. Only the Movement Manifesto,
Objectives and Victory Conditions cannot be changed once gameplay starts.
Navigation through the Strategic Estimate: You can navigate within the Strategic
Estimate in several ways:
•
You can click on one of the four yellow tabs (labeled I.-IV.) to go to that
section;
•
You can click on one of the blue links (variously labeled A-F) to go to that
sub-page;
(Forward) arrow to advance sequentially to the
•
You can click on the
next page;
•
You can click on the
(Back) arrow to return to the preceding sequential
(not the previously viewed) page.
5.2 Building a Strategic Estimate
In this section we will walk you through the development of an entire Strategic
Estimate. We’ll use the Corruption is Stealing scenario to build this estimate.
Launch this scenario (see 2.3), and like this section in Chapter 2, follow the steps
below in order.
As part of reviewing the scenario information, you can always click on Go to Game to
view maps, the Organization Screen or whatever else you wish, and then return to the
Strategic Estimate.
5.2.1 Review the Situation
The Situation Screen displays the information and data you
need to know before making your plan. The following
“pages” (accessed by the links at the top left of each “page”)
are included:
A. Background
This contains the
background text
description of the overall situation in the
scenario. It is the first step to understanding
what you need to plan for in any scenario,
and what constraints you face.
In this scenario, as shown to the right, the
Background tells us that corruption is a
massive problem in the city of Grbac.
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Consulting the Resistopedia about Corruption will reveal that high corruption makes
it harder for the Regime to attempt certain kinds of Tactics. That’s an advantage for
you, but the Background also states that the Regime has cracked down somewhat on
Freedom of Expression. You will want to look at the “Status Quo” value for
Freedom of Expression later in the Strategic Estimate, so as to get a clearer picture
of what Tactics you may or may not be able to execute successfully when you begin
your campaign of resistance.
The Background also tells us that a student, Slobodan Popovic, has been arrested,
and his freedom might serve to galvanize the public into further action. Furthermore,
an important political figure, the judge who approved his imprisonment, is having
second thoughts about his role in this. It may be a good strategy to try to convince
the judge early on that he should no longer support the regime.
There are other important clues in the Background. Continue to read it on your own,
and take note of anything else of interest that you find. Remember that you can
always come back to review it during play, should you wish to.
B. Demographics
These pages contain data relating to the population, such as
literacy, ethnic groups, religions, etc. This information is
available at the Geographic (Neighborhood, City, Regional
and National) level, and also at the Societal (Groups and Characters) level. These
screens also include support levels and policy settings. They serve as a reference
only and, aside from the Notes textboxes, cannot be manipulated or changed in any
way. Both the Geographic and the Societal screens are formatted in much the same
way as the Tactics pages in the game (see 3.4.7).
The Notes boxes, as well as any other text boxes that have a gray
shading, are editable. In addition to providing information put there by
the scenario designer, you can add/remove text in such boxes as you see
fit, both before and during play. If you edit text but change your mind and decide
you want to retain the original, you can restore it by pressing Ctrl-Z before doing
any other action.
Geographic: In this section, you can get information about the
important places in the scenario. For an explanation of the color
coding, see Section 3.4.6.
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Select an item
here and here to
reveal details on
right side.
Details display
here of the
selections
made on the
left side.
Click the “Star Square” entry on the tree view and look at the Notes; note that it is a
site of some historical interest, with some political consequences. This may play a
role in how you run your campaign. In particular, when you write your Course of
Action later in this process, you might want to make special mention of Star
Square’s unique status.
You can find the Status Quo policy settings by clicking on the name of the city or
country that the scenario takes place in.
Societal: In this section, you learn more about all the Characters and
Groups in the scenario. Click on the name “Alex Grant” in the tree
view and review the Notes associated with him; you will see that he is a major
political rival to the mayor. Along with what you learned about the judge in the
Background, this continues to paint a picture about what political pressures the
mayor is under. You can use these pressures to your advantage. But you may not be
able to take advantage of them all. Part of creating a Course of Action is choosing
which political figures and Groups you can afford to pursue, what risks each
approach entails, and whether you can deal with those risks.
Select an item
here and here to
reveal details on
right side.
Details display
here of the
selections
made on the
left side.
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In addition to the Notes, you can also see a large amount of game information about
each Group and Character. One important element is their Policy Preferences. Click
Policies when you have “Alex Grant” highlighted:
Select an item
here and here to
reveal details on
right side.
Details display
here of the
selections
made on the
left side.
The right side changes to display his/her policy views; scroll down to view them all.
One way of boosting your support is to tailor the Movement Manifesto to more
closely match the views of people you want to join your Movement. However, doing
this too much can greatly undermine the support you get from groups you may take
for granted. Since Corruption is the most important issue in this scenario, you’ll
want to pay special attention to it. Look at a few other people and note what their
preferences on Corruption are. Note that few people prefer that the “occurrence [of
corruption] is shocking”—many people prefer a less radical view. You may want to
moderate your Movement’s position on this issue when it comes time to create the
Manifesto. However, if you go too far, you may fail to distinguish yourself
sufficiently from the Regime!
Other things to take note of in this section: you should look at the police group, the
City Police, and note their Violence Unwillingness. If it is red or orange (it is orange
in this case—indicating low violence unwillingness), that indicates the police may
be quick to use violence against you. This has both benefits and costs—your
movement may arouse great sympathy, but your members may lose their courage.
Which outcome prevails will depend on your training and preparation for a possible
confrontation with the police.
You’ll also want to take note of the Competencies (see the Appendix) that
Characters in the scenario have. Characters with many Competencies are usually
good to recruit, since they add to your Movement’s capabilities—but of course they
may not want to join. You’ll have to assess how easy or hard it will be to convince
talented Characters to join you. If a Character is implacably set against you, it may
not be worth trying to recruit him/her, no matter how many Competencies appear in
his/her list.
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Many other useful bits of information appear in the Societal section. You’ll want to
pay attention to what you see there when formulating your plan.
5.2.2 Assess the Mission
The Mission Assessment provides tools that you can use to
begin planning your Movement’s actions. This section
includes the following “pages”:
A. Your Goals & Vision of Tomorrow
On the left-hand page, the scenario designer has provided the
goal(s) for the scenario. Beneath that is an explanation (in game
terms) of what needs to be done to achieve each of the scenario’s possible Victory
Conditions.
Select blue buttons
to access sub-pages.
You may draft your
“Vision of
Tomorrow”
statement here. This
statement is
displayed on other
Strategic Estimate
screens as reference.
Victory Conditions
details
The writable text box for the “Vision of Tomorrow” is where you can write down
what you envision as the desired end-state for the situation, and how it should be
reached. The “Vision of Tomorrow” is very important in strategic planning; without
a clear vision of where you want to go, it is difficult to get there and difficult for
people to know what your movement stands for. The more detailed and concrete the
vision, the more likely it is to spawn ideas for usable goals.
The theme of this scenario is corruption, so your Vision of Tomorrow should focus
on that. In real life, purely negative political messages, such as “We envision a
nation without corruption!” do not resonate as much as positive ones, such as “We
envision a nation where public service is truly service to the people!”
B. Pillars of Support
The Pillars of Support page is where you identify the
Groups that are crucial to the survival of each Alliance.
These are Groups that their Alliance depends on greatly—Groups provide an
Alliance with crucial legitimacy, services, and/or human or materials resources.
Identifying a Group as a Pillar of Support serves as a reminder to you, the
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Movement planner, to watch the activities of this Group. The reminder will be both
in the Strategic Estimate and on the Info Pane for that Group (see 3.4.13). For
Groups that have been identified as the Regime’s Pillars of Support, you will want
to pull them away from the Regime, such that the Regime eventually topples. For
Groups that are Movement Pillars of Support, you will want to keep them happy.
Select blue buttons
to access sub-pages.
Support
Levels are
color-coded
dark green to
red.
Alliance dropdown
menu.
Groups and their
Support Levels.
Select to
return to the
game.
To select a Pillar of Support, pick the pertinent Alliance in the dropdown menu, then
simply click on the name of a Group. (Note that when you place the mouse cursor
over the name, the Group’s “category” appears.)
Remember to set the pertinent Alliance in the dropdown menu before you begin
assigning support levels!
Here, the Regime’s pillars of support are twofold. It is usually appropriate to
designate at least one Group from the Security category as a Pillar of Support, since
without these Groups many of the regime’s tactics are ineffective or unavailable.
However, the WBRK Radio group has a Substantial Public Influence rating,
meaning that its ability to influence the general public is greater than most other
Groups’. It might therefore be considered a Pillar of Support as well. Similarly, the
Grbac Municipal Court may also be designated as a Pillar of Support, as it is both
wealthy (High Economic Well-Being) and somewhat influential (Moderate Public
Influence).
C. Strengths and Weaknesses
Here you list and examine each Alliance’s strengths and
weaknesses. These are your perceptions at this stage, based
on the information provided by the scenario and the policy values of the various
Groups. There is also a place to list what you don’t know—but would like to find
out—about each Alliance; this provides you with a list of important “unknowns”
you should try to find out about. Lastly, there is a text box for noting who gives each
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Alliance its legitimacy; this will inevitably include some, but maybe not all, of the
Pillars of Support (a Group can be a Pillar of Support without believing the Alliance
is legitimate or vice-versa), but it is always important to reduce the perceived
legitimacy of the Regime.
Select blue
buttons to access
sub-pages.
Select Alliance
here.
Write in
Alliance’s
“unknowns”
here.
Write in
Alliance’s
apparent
strengths here.
Write in
Alliance’s
legitimacy
sources here.
Write in
Alliance’s
apparent
weaknesses here.
Remember to set the pertinent Alliance in the dropdown menu before you begin typing!
What you fill in here should reflect the analysis you have done thus far, particularly
in the Demographics section. For example, one obvious weakness of the Regime
matches the theme of the scenario: it’s corrupt. Corrupt Regimes lose a portion of
their money every week to inefficiency and bribery, and their Tactics are harder to
execute (police officers look the other way at crimes they’d otherwise stop or make
arrests for; etc.). So you should definitely include that among the Regime’s
weaknesses. Another possible weakness, revealed by looking at the “Alex Grant”
Character, is that the corrupt mayor has a political rival who may be induced to turn
on him. Fissures in a regime’s political structure are very important, and it’s rare that
you’ll be clearly presented with one right at the start of the scenario.
The Sources of Legitimacy section invites you to think about why the regime is in
power and how it stays there. This, in turn, may lead you to ideas that you can
specify in the Alliance’s Apparent Strengths box for the Regime. In this scenario,
the Background reveals that the government was democratically elected, which is
often a source of legitimacy for corrupt or “backsliding” states or localities.
For your Movement, your current strengths include the leadership of Nikoleta
Pantic, whose list of Competencies is long indeed, and, once he is released,
Slobodan Popovic, who is very capable although not as strong as Nikoleta. Two of
your weaknesses are that you have few material and human resources (money and
Characters) and one of them is in prison to start the scenario.
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For Unknowns, consider what you can’t get from analyzing the at-start situation.
You don’t know, for example, how long Popovic will be in prison, or how much
pressure will be needed to induce the government to release him. Other Unknowns
will depend on how sure you feel about the information you have collected.
D. Assumptions and Constraints
You may have to base some of your decisions on
assumptions. It is important to distinguish between
assumptions and facts, because assumptions may prove to be false. Additionally,
you may be working within constraints that are completely outside of your control.
Here is where you can list and examine the impact of these for each Alliance. That
way, if conditions that led to an assumption or constraint change during game play,
you will be all the wiser, and will be able to take advantage of that opportunity for
action.
This scenario’s simplicity doesn’t lend itself to a lot of assumptions, but some
examples of assumptions might be the fact that since the Regime is not a longstanding dictatorship, but just a local government flexing its muscles, the repressive
measures it is willing to take against you may not be extensive, or that the police are
not brutalized by years of terrorizing the government’s enemies and therefore may
not be willing to adopt violent measures. (A little examination of the background
and the statistics of the groups in the scenario will show that the first assumption is
probably accurate whereas the second may be dangerously off.)
In terms of constraints, you are constrained by the Status Quo Policies, so check
those out. In particular you will want to look at the Freedom of Expression, Right to
Privacy, Border Controls, and Strike Rights policies, as these directly affect your
Tactics and whether or not they are illegal.
Select blue
buttons to access
sub-pages.
Select Alliance
here.
Write in
Alliance’s
constraints
here.
Write in your
assumptions
about the
Alliance here.
Remember to set the pertinent Alliance in the dropdown menu before you begin typing!
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
E. Movement Manifesto
Although each scenario provides policy settings as a matter
of course for each Alliance, this screen gives you the
opportunity to adjust the Movement’s settings before gameplay. You can use your
“Vision of Tomorrow” as a guideline for how you would like things to be (or, as you
adjust policies, you may be compelled to add to your Vision). You can also set the
Movement’s Key Policies—that is, the policies you wish to put particular emphasis
on during your campaign (see 3.4.13) here.
You will want to review the Pillars of Support that you set for yourself and the
Regime, and ensure that your Manifesto strikes a good balance between keeping
your natural supporters in your Movement, and reaching out to the General Public,
unaligned Groups and Characters, and supporters of other Alliances (such as the
Regime). In particular, note the Corruption preferences for each of the Regime’s
Pillars of Support, and see which ones you can try to attract. Also consider the
Victory Conditions; at this point you can be thinking of which Victory Conditions
and Objectives will be part of your overall plan, and you can then set your Manifesto
in such a way that you can attract specific people that these Objectives will require
you to recruit.
For example, clicking on Movement Manifesto in the Corruption is Stealing
scenario reveals that the only Key policy is Corruption:
Select policy category here.
Currently, Corruption is the only Key
Policy for your Movement.
You can now do several things:
•
You can add one or more other Key policies by selecting a new policy
category in the dropdown menu, and clicking in the desired selection box
to add a red “x”:
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Select policy category here.
Add new policies by placing red “x” in
box.
•
You can adjust the setting of policy preferences to better match your
intentions (and hopefully attract the support of other Groups and
Characters who have similar preferences), by clicking on the slider handle
beneath the policy name and dragging it to the right or left. (The little “v”
above the handle shows the original setting.) Changing “Border Controls
& Immigration” to a somewhat more liberal setting would make it look
like this:
Select policy category here.
Click on the slider handle beneath
name to adjust policy settings.
•
You can remove Corruption from being a Key Policy by clicking in the
selection box to remove the red “x,” and then refresh the display by picking
“Key” again in the dropdown menu).
Once you have started play by advancing time, you can no longer adjust your Manifesto,
so be sure it is set in accordance with your plan beforehand.
Note that the scenario designer determines the policies that will be in effect in a given
scenario, so don’t be confused if a particular policy appears in one scenario but not
another.
F. Courses of Action
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Here you create and analyze the Possible Courses of Action on
which you can base your strategy; and from these you select the
best Course of Action for the Movement. For the Movement, the possible Courses of
Action are a brainstormed list of different “paths” it can follow to achieve the
Goal(s) given in the Mission Assessment.
Step 1a: Create
Courses of Action
here.
Step 3: Cost,
benefit and risk of
Courses of Actions.
Step 1b: Select Add/
Delete to add/remove
Courses of Action
from list.
Step 4: Regime
response to Courses
of Action.
List of Movement
Courses of Actions.
Step 5: Final
Course of Action.
Step 2: Regime Courses of Action.
Once the Possible Courses of Action are outlined, you can conduct a step-by-step
analysis of potential Regime responses to each of them. The analysis can pull from
the Regime’s “worst-case scenario” lists, or there might be additional responses
from the Regime that aren’t worst case scenario responses. Generally speaking, you
want to base your analysis of Possible Courses of Action on an assessment of what
your opponent is capable of doing in response to your actions, not just what you
think (or hope) your opponent will do in response to your actions. In this way, you
will be prepared because your analysis will be based on your opponent’s
capabilities. In essence, you prepare for the worst. The idea here is to understand
what the costs of each action may be, determine which losses are acceptable, and
which actions are likely to have the most impact toward reaching the Movement’s
goals.
Step 1—Create the Movement’s Possible Courses of Action
•
Type in a Possible Course of Action (note that there is a character limit in this
text box), then click on Add to move it to the “Movement’s Possible Courses
of Action” box. Repeat this as many times as you wish.
•
For the Corruption is Stealing scenario, one possible Course of Action is to get
Popovic out of prison as soon as possible by attempting a hunger strike, despite
low public support at first. Another is to delay a hunger strike and not risk
Popovic’s life. That only pertains to one Victory Condition, of course; a Course
of Action should deal with how you are going to achieve the scenario’s overall
goal as well as any intermediate goals.
Step 2—Determine the Regime’s Possible Courses of Action
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•
List the Possible Courses of Action that the Regime may pursue, based on an
analysis of its leaders, capabilities, and policies. This should be a worst-case
scenario list of what the Regime is capable of doing to the people, independent
of the Movement’s possible Courses of Action. This option is provided as a
way to analyze the Regime’s actions before the final selection of the
Movement’s Course of Action.
In the Corruption is Stealing scenario, the Regime’s possible courses of action
are, like yours, constrained by the Status Quo. But how likely is the Regime to
engage in repression as opposed to appeasement? To do this analysis, take a
look not just at the Status Quo but also at the scenario background and at the
Regime leader’s characteristics. If he or she is an Ideologue, you can predict
that the Regime will not be as willing to change the Status Quo away from the
Regime leader’s preferences. Similarly, if the Regime leader is a Bureaucrat,
you can predict that Regime responses will be slower and more deliberate.
Step 3—Determine Costs, Benefits, etc., for the Movement’s Possible Courses of
Action
•
Select one of your “Possible Courses of Action” by clicking on it in the
“Movement’s Possible Courses of Action” box. Then analyze and list the
potential costs, benefits and risks you think may be associated with this
approach.
•
Select each other “Possible Course of Action” and analyze it in the same
manner.
Step 4—Determine the Regime’s Responses to Your Possible Courses of Action
•
Select one of your “Possible Courses of Action” by clicking on it in the
“Movement’s Possible Courses of Action” box. Then analyze and list the
Regime’s potential responses to this Course of Action based on what you
entered in Step 2 above.
•
Select each other “Possible Course of Action,” and analyze and list the
Regime’s potential responses to it in the same manner.
When finished, you should be able to click on each “Possible Course of Action” in
turn and see your analyses of both its costs/benefits and the Regime’s potential
responses to it at the same time.
Step 5—Select a Final Course of Action
Select one of your “Possible Courses of Action”
by clicking on it in the “Movement’s Possible
Courses of Action” box. Then Click on Choose This Course of Action; this will
pick the one you’ve chosen as the one you will base your operational plan on.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
5.2.3 Choose Victory Conditions
Here, using your chosen Course of Action as a guide, you begin
building the plan that will help you attain your Goal and Vision of
Tomorrow. Begin by selecting the Victory Condition(s) your Movement will pursue
in the scenario, and prioritizing them in order of how important they are to your
overall success.
The program allows you to select your own Victory Conditions (from a list supplied
by the scenario) to give you the freedom to create your own strategy. (Since there
may be multiple ways of meeting the scenario Goal, having the scenario
automatically predetermine the Victory Conditions would force you to follow
whatever strategy the designer envisioned, thus diminishing the game’s
effectiveness as a tool for teaching strategic thinking.)
Step 3: Select
Victory Conditions.
Step 1 & 2:
Review your
Goal and Vision
of Tomorrow.
Step 4: Prioritize
Victory Conditions.
Steps 1 & 2—First review your Goal and Vision of Tomorrow. It’s important to
keep these in mind as you plan your operation.
Step 3—Based on your analysis of the situation, select a Victory Condition that you
wish to pursue in the scenario, and click the Add button to move it down into the
“Prioritize” box. Repeat this as many times as you wish until all desired Victory
Conditions have been moved. Here, you will have to ask yourself whether a Policy
Change on corruption is enough, or whether you won’t be satisfied unless the mayor
himself resigns. Pick either Victory Condition (or both). You can also add freeing
Popovic to your list, although you’ll want to do that regardless.
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Victory Conditions are the same as Objectives in game terms, except that some Victory
Conditions cause the game to end when achieved. Usually these will be obvious, as they
are closely related to the Goals of the scenario, but it will be spelled out in the Goals text.
Some Victory Conditions may be unreasonable for the given situation. Nothing prevents
the designer from including a ‘red herring’ or two (i.e., Victory Conditions unobtainable
within the time allotted) to test your analytical abilities.
Step 4—Prioritize the Victory Conditions that you’ve chosen, by selecting one in
the “Prioritize” box and clicking the Up or Down button to change the number at the
beginning of its line. “1” is the top priority, “2” is the next highest, etc. Repeat this
as many times as you wish until you’re satisfied with the prioritization.
Prioritize your Victory Conditions according to their importance in achieving your Vision
of Tomorrow, not by the order in which you should attain them.
Once you have started play by advancing time, you can no longer adjust your Victory
Conditions in any way, so be sure they are in accordance with your desires beforehand.
5.2.4 Create Phases & Objectives
The next part of building your plan comprises determining which
Objective(s) you will seek to achieve, and creating the Phases of
your operation and assigning Objectives and Victory Conditions to them. A good
plan should include objectives and an expectation of when they will be attained. On
these “pages” you’re given the opportunity to:
•
•
•
•
Divide your plan into Phases;
Give each Phase a “Policy Focus” and a text description of what you hope to
achieve in it;
Choose the Objectives that you think will aid your progress, and;
Assign those Objectives (including Victory Conditions) to the Phases.
This process allows you to document your strategy in a step-by-step manner, and
determine what you hope to achieve by certain dates.
Some Objectives may be unreasonable for the given situation. Nothing prevents the
designer from including a “red herring” or two to test your analytical abilities!
When you meet an Objective within the designated Phase, the members of your
Movement gain confidence, which may manifest as a boost in Enthusiasm for your
Movement’s Groups and Characters, or amongst unaligned people. Regime figures may
also lose support or Enthusiasm.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Phase Selection
Objectives List
Policy Focus
Add/Remove
Objectives
Phase
Accomplishment
Objectives by Phase
Select Course of
Action
Add/Delete Phase
To assign Phases and Objectives, use this page to:
•
•
•
•
Select a “Policy Focus” for a Phase of your campaign (note that the
Phase dropdown menu defaults to Phase 1); Tactics that require a
Policy will default to the one you choose here when they’re executed
in this Phase. If you don’t pick one, your Characters will pick one for
you on a Tactic-by-Tactic basis… and they may choose to emphasize
their personal agendas rather than your plan!
Enter a text description of what you hope to achieve in this Phase
(Will you try to build your strength, confront the Regime, etc.?). It
should fit with the Objectives you have chosen.
Select an Objective in the “Objective List” and click on Add to move
it down into the “Phase # Objectives” box (repeat this step as many
times as you wish). In this scenario, good early Objectives include
“Raise 50 money” and “Gain support of WBRK Radio.” Good lateterm objectives include “Raise 100 money” and “Hold a successful
Mass Protest.” You will get a better sense of which Objectives are
feasible at various stages of a scenario through experience.
Click on Add New Phase to create another Phase in your plan, and
set its Start Date by clicking on the blue date to the right of the Phase
selector. The End Date of the preceding Phase will then automatically
adjust to fit with the new Phase; your Operational Plan will always
cover the entire length of the scenario.
Once you understand how the interface works, you may find that you’d rather create
all the Phases first, then select the Policy Focus and enter the description, etc. for
each. Whichever sequence you prefer is fine; just don’t forget to complete all the
steps for each Phase, because once you start play by advancing time, you cannot
come back and change any of this.
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Page 115
Note that some Objectives are also Victory Conditions. You can think of Victory
Conditions as “primary” objectives.
When you’ve finished to your satisfaction, your plan should be complete, and you
should be ready to begin play. Click on Go to Game and start conducting the
Tactics that will help you achieve your Objectives. You can always refer back to
what you have done, although your Manifesto and operational plan are frozen once
any game time has passed.
Once you have started play by advancing time, you can no longer change your Phases
and Objectives, so be sure they’re set to your satisfaction beforehand.
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A Force More Powerful™ Players’ Guide
Tactics Available to The Movement
Tactic
Option
Tactic
Accuse
Infiltrator
Occupy Building
Blockade City
Organize Concert
Boycott
Organize Social
Event
Canvass
Change Alliance
Leader
Overload Facilities
Charity
Petition
Community
Work
Picket
Craft Message
Poll
Display Symbol
Press Conference
Distribute
Literature
Publish
Newspaper
Dramatize
Publish Website
Fraternize
Recruit Character
Fundraise
Reorganize
Alliance
Funeral
Send Letter
Harass Official
Option
Party
Meeting
Slowdown
Strike
Hide
Limited
Hunger Strike
Establishment
Infiltrate
Political
Leave Country
Train
Lockout
Mass Protest
Rally
Travel
Vigil
Upgrade
Communications
March
Meet With
Wear Symbol
Money
Noncooperation
Information
Campaign
People
Support And
Logistics
Nonviolent
Intervention
Security
Efficiency
Keyboard Shortcuts
•
Press the Esc key to display a dialog that will allow you to
Load a game, Save the current game, access the Options
Screen, or Quit the game.
•
Press F2 to toggle windowed mode on/off. The default is Off.
•
Press F8 to end the game and view the Evaluation Screen
(see 3.5)
•
Press Alt-F4 to display the Quit dialog.
•
Press Ctrl-N to toggle Neighborhood color overlays on/off.
•
Press PageUp or PageDown to zoom the 3D view in or out.
•
Use the Arrow Keys to pan the 3D camera left, right, up and
down.
•
Click the left mouse button to escape from a vignette Tactic
(see 4.11).
•
Press Ctrl-Z (before doing any other action) to undo a text
edit in a Strategic Estimate (see Chapter 5) text box.
To learn more about A Force More Powerful, go to
www.afmpgame.com
6. Appendix
6.1 Tactics & Competencies
Accuse Infiltrator
Arrest
Assassinate
Attack Insurgents
Blockade City
Boycott
Canvass
Change Alliance Leader*
Change Policy
Charity
Community Work
Confiscate Property
Craft Message
Destroy Property
Detain
Display Symbol
Distribute Literature
Dramatize
Ethnic Cleansing
Execute
Fraternize
Fundraise
Funeral
Harass Official
Hide
†
Decree
Bill
†
†
†
WRITING
WEAPONS
VISION
TECHNOLOGY
TRAINING
STREET
SMARTS
PUBLIC
SPEAKING
ORGANIZATION
NEGOTIATION
INTERROGATION
INTELLIGENCE
FUNDRAISING
FINANCE
SECURITY
EMPATHY
CRISIS
MANAGEMENT
CREATIVITY
OPTION
CONSTRUCTION
TACTIC
CHARISMA
Below is a chart showing which Competencies are helpful when conducting each Tactic.
House Arrest
Hunger Strike
Infiltrate
Interrogate
Intimidate
Kidnap
Leave Country
Lift House Arrest
Lockout
Mass Arrest
Mass Execution
Mass Protest
Money
Information
People
Party
Meeting
Overload Facilities
Petition
Picket
Poll
Press Conference
Protect Building
Publish Newspaper
Surveillance
Post Guards
Blockade
WRITING
WEAPONS
VISION
TECHNOLOGY
TRAINING
STREET
SMARTS
PUBLIC
SPEAKING
ORGANIZATION
NEGOTIATION
INTERROGATION
INTELLIGENCE
FUNDRAISING
FINANCE
SECURITY
EMPATHY
CRISIS
MANAGEMENT
‡
Rally
Vigil
March
Occupy Building
Organize Concert
Organize Social Event
CREATIVITY
†
†
Mass Release
Meet With
Noncooperation Campaign
CONSTRUCTION
OPTION
CHARISMA
TACTIC
Publish Website
Purge
Raid Building
Recruit Character
Regime Assembly
Military Parade
Government Rally
Release Prisoner
Reorganize Alliance
Repair
Restrict Movement
Checkpoints
Patrol
Curfew
Send Letter
Slowdown
Limited
Establishment
Political
Strike
Support & Logistics
Train
Nonviolent Intervention
Repression
Travel
Upgrade Communications
Security
Efficiency
Waste Money
Wear Symbol
Tactics available to the Movement are shown in blue.
*The new leader must have 5 Enthusiasm in order for this tactic to be successful.
† A Character with Empathy is less likely to succeed when attempting this Tactic. A Character’s Enthusiasm is also severely reduced when assigned this Tactic.
‡ A Character with Empathy can never coordinate a “Mass Execution” Tactic.
WRITING
WEAPONS
VISION
TECHNOLOGY
TRAINING
STREET
SMARTS
PUBLIC
SPEAKING
ORGANIZATION
NEGOTIATION
INTERROGATION
INTELLIGENCE
FUNDRAISING
FINANCE
SECURITY
EMPATHY
CRISIS
MANAGEMENT
CREATIVITY
CONSTRUCTION
OPTION
CHARISMA
TACTIC
6.2 Tactics & Training (& Potential for Violence)
Accuse Infiltrator
Arrest
Assassinate
Attack Insurgents
Blockade City
Boycott
Canvass
Change Alliance Leader
Change Policy
VIOLENT*
REPRESSION
P
I
I
P
Decree
Bill
Charity
Community Work
Confiscate Property
Craft Message
Destroy Property
Detain
Display Symbol
Distribute Literature
Dramatize
Ethnic Cleansing
Execute
Fraternize
Fundraise
Funeral
Harass Official
Hide
House Arrest
Hunger Strike
Infiltrate
Interrogate
Intimidate
Kidnap
Leave Country
Lift House Arrest
Lockout
Mass Arrest
Mass Execution
Mass Protest
SUPPORT &
LOGISTICS
OPTION
POLITICAL
TACTIC
NONVIOLENT
INTERVENTION
Below is a table showing which types of Training are beneficial to each Tactic, with an extra column to indicate
which tactics are potentially or inherently violent.
P
P
P
I
I
P
P
P
I
Vigil
March
Rally
P
I
P
P
P
VIOLENT*
REPRESSION
SUPPORT &
LOGISTICS
POLITICAL
OPTION
NONVIOLENT
INTERVENTION
TACTIC
Mass Release
Meet With
Noncooperation Campaign
Money
Information
People
Occupy Building
Organize Concert
Organize Social Event
P
P
Party
Meeting
Overload Facilities
Petition
Picket
Poll
Press Conference
Protect Building
Publish Newspaper
Publish Website
Purge
Raid Building
Recruit Character
Regime Assembly
P
P
Surveillance
Post Guards
Blockade
Newspaper
P
Military Parade
Government Rally
Release Prisoner
Reorganize Alliance
Repair
Restrict Movement
Checkpoints
Patrol
Curfew
Send Letter
Slowdown
Limited
Establishment
Political
Support & Logistics
Nonviolent Intervention
Repression
Strike
Train
Travel
Upgrade Communications
Security
Efficiency
Waste Money
Wear Symbol
Tactics available to the Movement are shown in blue.
* P = Potentially; I = Inherently.
§ Potentially violent if Regime’s Strike Rights policy setting is “Unsatisfactory”.
P§
P§
P§