VASSAL Module: Advanced Civilization

This help file describes how to play with the Advanced Civilization VASSAL module. You can find other information here:

• Module user's Guide (Note: You need to set up the game before you can play.)
• Reference Guide

Module Setup

Before you play, you need to prepare the module in a few easy steps. Afterwards you will save the configuration and send it to the players. Before setting up the game, you should have some basic information:

• How many players will participate?
  This determines which nations are in the game, the number of population tokens per nation and which board overlays should be used. See the rulebook section 16. for details.
• You can choose beforehand who will play which side, or you can decide this in an introductory session.
• You should agree upon any rules variants you want to use (see pages 41 ff. of the rulebook): Western and/or Eastern expansion map, Atlntis, Imperial, Trade and other opional rules (page 46/47).

Setting up the the Game Board and Trade Card Decks

• Open the module and log in as the side "Setup".
• Choose the board configuration (main map plus optional western and/or eastern map).
• When the module has opened, go to the Trade Cards Admin window:

All trade cards start the game on this panel; the Trade panel is empty.

• Click the leftmost button to shuffle the card stacks in the (green) "temporary" section.
• Then click the rightmost button. It sends all 9 trade card stacks to the Trade panel.

Note: The normal player sides cannot make changes on this panel, it restricted to the Setup, Master and Solitaire sides. You will use this panel again after the "buy Civilization Advances" phase when discarded (used) cards will go to the brown section, into their respective discard piles.

Setting the Number of Players and Board Details

Open the Setup window:

Click the player number to change it. The window will show how many population tokens ech player should get (rules, 16.). The player mats are pre-loaded with 47 tokens each; if players get 55 tokens, you can send the missing 8 tokens to their mats by clicking the button "Send 8 population to player mats".

Below, you find buttons to limit the game map (rules, 16.). Choose the appropriate configuration. Note that the leftmost blocks are not available when the western map is in play, and the rightmost blocks are not available when the eastern map is in play.
Note that with a player number of "2" the module auoatically places an overlay that hides the city sites on islands (rules, 16.8).

Other than the effects described above the player count does not impose any limitations on the game.

The map is pre-set to show the names of the map regions as given in the conference map (rules, page 24/25). If these labels annoy you you can switch them off with the "Show region labels" button.

If you play with the trade variant you can switch on the display of trade cities. They use the same symbols as the trade cards and automatically consider whether the western map is in use or not (rules page 45, "Silver" commodity).

Choosing Player Sides

If theplayers want to choose the sides in an initial game session, you can use the side chooser window for the purpose. It is best if all players log in as "<observer>" for this initial session.

Players draw chits from the stack, one each. By the rules (15.3) the numbers can be used to determine who chooses his side first. Alternatively you can just use the side drawn (ignore and re-draw if you draw a nation not in play).

Alternatively you can roll the Sides Die. Again, ignore and re-roll die rolls for nations not in play or already taken.

Finally, there is a 100-sided die available to roll for general random decisions. Normally you won't need it.

All chit draws and die rolls are logged in the chat window of the module.

Setting up the AST (Archeological Succession Track)

Once you know which sides will be in play you can set up the AST. You have 3 stacks of tokens available when you open the "virgin" module: For each nation there is one track for the AST, one AST Marker to travel along that track, and one census marker. Double-click each stack to expand it and draw the required track or tokes to the AST, or draw them one by one from the top of the stacks. Note that a simple click on the stack selects the complete stack.

Note: Africa has 2 slightly different AST tracks. The one marked "(w)" must be used if you play with the Western Extension map.

Delete tracks and tokens not needed for the game by right-clicking and deleting them (you may also use the keyboard shortcut "CTRL D"). Be careful not to delete the complete stack! If something went wrong: There is an "Undo" button (red arrow) at the top left of the menu bar. Then

• sort the AST tracks by their order of preference (= the numbers on the census markers),
• place the AST markers on the "Start" spaces of each track,
• place all census markers on the blank "zero" space of the census track,
• and finally click the "reset movement markers" button (crossed-out blue flag) to clear the traces of your setup (like most windows, the AST keeps track of who moves which pieces).

Note: If all goes wrong you can retrieve missing tokens from the game master's piece palette. It is not visible in the menu bar, but you can open it with the keyboard shortcut "ALT CTRL SHIFT C". It is only available to the sides called Setup, Master and Solitaire.

You are now ready to play! Save the game (the file extension should be .vsav) and send it to all players.

Begin to Play

Each player can now log into the module as the side he or she wants to play. Make sure that all players have read the module's manual. Maybe you will want to have an initial session to explain how the module works if the users do not know VASSAL well.

Back to the User Guide

VASSAL is an open source project. Advanced Civilization is a boardgame by The Avalon Hill Game Company (1991). The Advanced Civilization module was created by Lutz Pietschker (PunTheHun at boardgamegeek.com).