Breakthrough: Cambrai

About this board game

Breakthrough: Cambrai is a two-player World War I area-movement game with an approximately 180-minute playing time, depicting the British assault against the Hindenburg Line near Cambrai from November 20 to December 3, 1917.

One player commands the British forces, while the other controls the German forces. The British seek to control a required number of map areas or exit units through designated perimeter zones; the German player works to prevent that breakthrough.

The game recreates the offensive’s combined-arms character, in which 324 British tanks advanced with eight infantry divisions across a 10,000-yard front. New artillery techniques initially smashed the German trench line, producing gains of three to four miles in some places before the British lost 47% of their tanks on the first day.

Each game turn represents one day and is divided into four phases and impulses. Players alternate these short mini-turns, creating a steady flow of movement and combat with little downtime while the opposing player completes a move or attack. The system is similar in impulse structure to Breakout: Normandy and Monty’s Gamble: Market Garden.

• Scale: areas represent 1/6 mile, or 268 meters, per inch; units range from battalions to brigades.
• Components: a 22 x 34-inch full-color map, 240 counters, a rulebook, a playbook, six player aid cards, and four six-sided dice.
• Game profile: medium complexity and medium solitaire playability.

With its alternating impulses and competing territorial and exit objectives, Breakthrough: Cambrai focuses on the challenge of turning an initial breach into a decisive advance toward the “green fields beyond.”