Maurice: War in an Age of Gentlemen and Philosophers – 1690-1790

About this board game

Maurice: War in an Age of Gentlemen and Philosophers – 1690-1790 is a tabletop miniatures game for 2-4 players, with games lasting about 180 minutes. It combines rules for historical and fictional battles with a limitless campaign system and role-playing elements for officers, units, and armies.

Across wars and decades, you create the personalities of your forces and manage their fates from battle to battle. The campaign system requires virtually no math or paperwork, making it possible to connect individual engagements into a broader military story.

Gameplay is driven by action cards. Each card can potentially serve more than one purpose, but it may be used for only one purpose at a time. During alternating rounds, the active player first decides whether volleys will be fired by both sides, then chooses an action.

• Play a card for its event.
• Activate a group of units to march, rally, charge, or bombard.
• Pass and draw more cards.

Activating a force requires discarding cards according to its span number, based on the distance between the commander and the force. The chosen action also determines how many new cards may be drawn: more vigorous actions allow fewer cards. Groups of units are defined by physical proximity, type, and formation, while an additional card can modify an action.

The passive player may hold interrupt cards that inject complications into the active player’s action. The battle continues until one army’s morale breaks. If neither army reaches that point before the cards run out, night falls without a decisive victory. In Maurice, every battle can become part of an ongoing military narrative shaped by cards, commanders, units, and morale.