Glades Emperor

En bref · fiche BoardGameGeek traduite

« Glades Emperor » est un jeu de société historique dans lequel les joueurs incarnent un hors-la-loi évoluant dans les marais du sud de la Floride en 1910. Le but du jeu est de bâtir l’empire économique clandestin le plus solide possible sans trop nuire à sa réputation auprès des habitants locaux. Au cours de chaque partie, chaque hors-la-loi développera un réseau unique d’opérations menées par une bande d’ouvriers à son service. Ces ouvriers doivent composer avec les habitants locaux, s’adapter à l’environnement hostile de la Floride et faire face aux ambitions des hors-la-loi rivaux. Au terme d’une série de tours, le hors-la-loi disposant de l’économie la plus florissante et exerçant la plus forte emprise sur la région remporte la partie. Cependant, le hors-la-loi qui jouit de la plus mauvaise réputation auprès des habitants est éliminé du jeu, quelle que soit sa richesse. —description fournie par l’éditeur

Présentation de la campagne

Glades Emperor is a 2-4 player worker placement game that takes place in the coastal Florida swamps in the year 1910. This is an historical game based on the events and lore of outlaws that would hide in these dark swamps to avoid incarceration and yet establish economic businesses. Doing so was a challenge not only due to the harsh conditions, but also dealing with the rooted locals that were not very thrilled with their presence.

 

In Glades Emperor, each player plays an outlaw and through the resourcefulness of a band of hired hands, you try to establish the most robust secret economic empire after 4 rounds. The company with the most value wins the game. The venture requires land grabs, bribery, growing crops and strong-arm tactics. Your hired hands come and go either through betrayal or losing to fate in these primitive swamps.

 

Rushing for the economic empire is not straightforward as you will have to make some morally low decisions from time to time which builds your bad reputation among the locals. Too much bad reputation, and you will be ''removed'' by the locals at the end of the game regardless of your business stature.

 

From snakes to guns and boats to swamp, this game is a visit to a time and place that is often overlooked.

Origins

So where did this idea come from? For starters, I was born in Florida and more specifically, only a couple hours away from where this game takes place. I feel a connection to this land and when reading about these stories of old I don't have to use my imagination much to feel the heat, the bugs and the sense that there is wildlife all around you. I moved away from Florida in 2009, but because I have that tropical blood in me, I have always been drawn to that place.

Years ago, I came across a book written by Micheal Grunwald titled: The Swamp. This book was well written and covered the earliest known history of southern Florida and the efforts by ambitious and wealthy men to harness this wild place. Through the chronological history that was laid out in the book, there was one singular paragraph that stopped me. It was only a few sentences, but it described how around the turn of the 20th century, the swamps of the Everglades were a haven for outlaws and there was one famous outlaw named Edgar Watson. Watson is notorious for the deaths of a few people and when it came time to pay his hired hands, they would simply disappear. The locals of this area at a certain point had enough of this terror and in a posse fashion, gunned him down on the beach next to Smallwood's store in the only town in the area in mid October of 1910.

This story fascinated me notably for being mostly historical. The events and people surrounding Watson and the like became the obsession of author Peter Matthiessen which he penned in Killing Mister Watson. In this book he took all historical documents and witness accounts and then filled in the blanks with fictionalized tales.

So I thought, could this be a tabletop game? Historical board games have their corner in the industry and they can be wildly entertaining just by the sheer fact that the player gets to play a part in an actual event. When putting together the idea for Glades Emperor, I wanted to pull from the events of Edgar Watson as a backbone to how the game plays out. As I started inserting the subject matter of claiming land, growing crops, dealing with the elements and navigating a maze of mangrove and swamp, I found the main thread of the game. I kept coming back to Watson staring at his would be executioners on that beach wondering if perhaps a thought or two was running through his mind that maybe ambition over powered morals.

Unchecked power. This is the common theme of an empire and that is how he operated. And that challenge of balance is what I wanted this game to be all about. In Glades Emperor, you can build your economic empire in the secrets of the swamp and hide your sordid past, but will your moral compass be so low that your bad reputation precedes you? If so, and if your reputation is just too bad at the end of 4 rounds, you are out of the game and next player in line gets the victory.