I'm intrigued by the premise of Fortress America, and I am definitely planning on picking this one up. But one thing puzzles me, and perhaps fans of the original game can enlighten me. What on earth happened to Canada? I can see that the border between Canada and the USA still exists, so we're not supposed to assume Canada was annexed by the USA or anything. Yet we're supposed to believe that in the scenario depicted in the game, the three invading superpowers have no interest in first invading Canada as a staging ground to invading the USA? They all choose to simply ignore Canada?

I suppose the simple answer is "The makers of the game didn't want to bother with detailing a fourth invasion area" or something along those lines. But I find it hurts the game's verisimilitude somewhat to simply ignore Canada as if it wasn't even there. Unless you assume Canada is simply neutral or something, but even then it's hard to believe the invaders wouldn't pull a "Germany-through-Belgium" strategy to plow into the northern USA.

Thoughts?

Yeah! And what about Quebec TABARNAK!!!!!!!!!!! LOL!

Just kidding!

The gameplay look really cool and semi-unique. 1 player against 3 super forces trying to survive and repel the invaders.

This game is on my radar even though i'm canadian pwahahahah!

Well since this is a reprint of the MB version of the game from 1986, Fantasy Flight is just treating Canada just like MB did in the 1986 version. In that version, which I haven''t gotten to play since about 1992, I remember Canada was neutral. It was actually explained in the rulebook, and I don''t remember why Canada was neutral. That''s all I remember. Since this was a game a friend of mine had who I lost contact with, I''m looking forward to playing it again. It was a great game.

You really think it is OK for world powers to invade an "innocent" country as a stepping stone to invade a "problem" country?

And, you really think the world powers would actually allow something like that to happen?

So … you think it's OK for the UN to invade the USSR or Pakistan if they wanted to put troops into Afghanistan (as a hypothetical example), and that everyone would be alright with that? Because France or some other country decides to refuse troops to move through/base in their country, that is enough reason to invade them?

Obviously the answer is "No" to the world doing such a thing. If Canada couldn't be pressured diplomatically to allow troops into their country, from which to launch an invasion of the US, the other world powers would NOT invade Canada just to be able to do that.

On another note… this is based on the original game, which is founded on Cold War concepts. Theoretically, in the original, all the invading forces are communists. The East were the Soviets, the South were (essentially) Castroites, while the West were the Chinese. As Canada did not lean Communist, nor was a member of the Warsaw Pact, and was a staunch ally of the US… obviously there was no reason for a threat to come from the north.

While having Canada represented in Fortress America would be very nice as it would additional flavour I can see the challenges in doing so.

An option is to have a mini-expansion that adds Canadian forces or effects such as supply interdiction. Canada's participation could be automatic as part of initial set up with some force balancing required (could be on either side) or be triggered by actions on the board such as a special card in the Partisan or Invader deck that grants access to the Canadian forces.

This approach could also serve as a way of balancing the game when played by expereinced and novice players.

dvang said:

You do remeber that the invasion of Afghanistan wasn't about 30 milion Afghans or even the Taliban. It was to attack Asama bin Landen & Al'quida.

Perhaps the UN is not listening to you… And no, I don't think it's OK, so their clearly not listening to me either.

Since Canada is where the US player sits, I think it would be difficult to add it to the game.

Unless maybe the Canadian player is the US players significant other.

Go find a copy of SPI's Invasion America. It is a lot more complicated, but it is the exact same scenario and includes Canada as a US ally since this was before the time when being a modern flaming liberal was politically viable. You know, the days when saying "Merry Christmas" to a non Christian didn't result in a lawsuit.

How about a variant where one invader comes from Canada rather than from East, West or South? You could easily add invasion zones border 6 area's in the north. Say the area east of Seattle to the area west of Minneapolis (the Great Lakes have been mined extensively to prevent Canada from launching an attack directly over the water). Lets call this the Northern Alliance where in the fluff Canada conquered/acquired Alaska. With the Alaskan Oil reserves Canda deems itself a Super Power!

The game would be quite different from the current one; suppose that the Canadians came in place of the Eastern invader (the economy of Europe having collapsed years ago they cannot afford to have a standing army). Canada is within easy reach of several cities that were deemed "safe" by the US (Minneapolis, Milwaukee, Chicago) but it makes cities such as Miami, Tampa, New York, Washington etc much more secure. You can play quite a few variants with this one (4 variants in total including the original game).

Other alternative is to add the same invasion zones and add Canada as an extra player (you would need a set of miniatures in a different colour as well as markers but this can be done). Some suggested rules changes for this variant:

- Increase the number of victory cities to 24. The US does NOT surrender that easily.

- US starts with 90 rather than 60 units on the board (definitely need a second F:A game then). Alternative is to place ALL 24 partisans on the board but these can only be placed in Resource area's, one partisan per resource area.

- US draws three Partisan Cards every turn rather than two.

- US can fire two shots with each laser but will stop receiving more laser after US turn 5. Alternative would be that the US already starts with some lasers in play. However because there are much less "safe" cities I'd preferr the Two Shots Per Laser variant.

Ummm... When has Canada ever had an effect on ANYTHING? Screw Canada. Not even worth discussing.

Ummm... When has Canada ever had an effect on ANYTHING? Screw Canada. Not even worth discussing.

Useful and resourceful post, thanks man.

If the game ever had an expansion I think Canada would make the best 5th player. Also you could add secret Invader Agendas which can even the 4 vs 1 odds. Euro-Socialist Pact could have the Agenda requiring them to have more cities than the Central American Federation, The Asian Peoples Alliance could secretly be allies with the US making it the classic 3v2 scenario.