Summit (game)

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Summit
no image Players use military and economic threats to win world domination.
Players	2 to 6
Age range	adult
Setup time	> 5 minutes
Playing time	> 1 hour
Random chance	Med
Skills required	Strategy, Making Allies and Enemies, Planning for the future
Similar to Risk's theme, but with its own set of rules.

Summit was introduced in 1961 by Milton Bradley as "The Top Level Game of Global Strategy", and had done well enough to issue an updated model in 1971. Each player choose one of the major powers from the 1950s/1960s era and controlled their economic and military build up during each turn, much like Risk.

The game is obviously made during the Cold War era.

Contents 1 Board 2 Pieces 3 Strategy 4 Other 5 Further reading

[edit] Board

The board is an Azimuthal projected map of the Earth looking down at the North Pole. Each of the six playable "countries" are different bright colors while unplayable regions are various shades of brown depending on their economic and military "value". The six counties and their colors are:

United States (Blue), Soviet Union (Red), China (Yellow), India (Green), Western Europe (Purple), and South America (Orange),

Each of the player countries are worth 10 points, while the brown regions vary from 2, 4, 6, and 8.

[edit] Pieces

For the board is a small circlet holder with colored flags to remind players which countries are in play. This piece is largely viewed as a gimmick, though various house rules may have different uses for these pieces.

Each player may build, in their captured regions, a balance of Factories, Mills, and military Bases.

Each player is awarded every turn a number of I-Beams, red Military Threat chips, white Popular Support chips, and black Economic Pressure chips. The I-Beams are produced by a player's Mills and are used to build more Factories, Bases, and Mills. Economic Pressure chips come from the amount of Mills a player owns. Popular Support chips come from the number of Factories one owns. Military Threat chips come from the number of Bases one has.

There is also a set of cards with various situations that players must respond to. They can be as simple as gaining two I-Beams, to losing three red chips. The cards are similar to the community chest and chance cards of Monopoly.

[edit] Strategy

Allies are welcomed and may help struggling players get out of trouble, or create an unbeatable force that will crush the remaining weak players. Eventually though everyone must defeat their opponents to win the game. The game calls for a balance of social skills, economic knowledge, and military tactics.

[edit] Other

One of the most often pointed out quotes from the Rules Book is: "Compare some of the plays you are making with the international news of the day. Quite often it will coincide with the play of the game." This is usually followed by the display of the card that describes your trip to Mars. Though this would have been hilarious during the 1980s and 1990s the effect of this very odd passage is slowly being lost with the recent trips to the red planet this century.

[edit] Further reading

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