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Holy War

Board and counter Wargame (1979). Metagaming Concepts. Designed by Lynn Willis.

Holy War's framing narrative describes the creation of a Pocket Universe by a vast alien machine entity, in which time passes at a greatly accelerated rate. After the construction is complete, this being realizes that life has appeared on one of the planets orbiting the handful of stars in its microverse. While the entity is considering the ethical implications of this development, an intelligent species evolves, discovers the creator's monitoring devices, and splits into factions which on the one hand worship the being as a nurturing God, and on the other regard it as an alien creature to whom their existence is a random accident. Soon, a microcosmic war has begun between these two groups – a war which is the subject of the game.

As in the designer's earlier Godsfire (1976), the game offers a fully three-dimensional representation of its artificial space. The unusual Physics of that space and the unlikely natures of the combatants justify a variety of exotic features, including sun-towing spacecraft, instantaneous travel along fault lines in the microversal reality, and the Psionically empowered "luckships". Despite some potential for confusion and a sense that too many good ideas have been crammed into too small a space, Holy War is undeniably one of the most novel of the many science-fictional Wargames of the 1970s. Ironically, either player's victory can result in the destruction of the combatants' entire universe, either because its architect is disrupted by suns thrown at it through its sensory apparatus in a misguided attempt to escape into the larger reality, or because the creator turns off the microverse in self defense.

"Amtik the god had a problem. The universe was internal to his 400,000km long self. He was "god" to the universe's inhabitants. Unfortunately, only the Holy Band truly believed in and worshipped Amtik. The unruly Sunthrowers believed in Amtik's existence, however, they also believed that "life was not an end, but a by-product of systems design". Amtik was in danger! The Sunthrowers were hurling stars at his universe sensor ducts. The Holy Band wanted his divine intervention. A sun in the ducts would dissipate poor Amtik and free his creations. While the Holy Band mightily struggled to believe and triumph, Amtik might even get bored and "turn-off" his universe."

This TTS port of the classic Microgame includes resources contributed by the Boardgamegeek community as well as a selection of 3D model ships to optionally replace the "classic cardboard" counters of the original game.