Scenario
World War I - June 1914
Europe's great empires stand at the brink. The German, Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman and Russian empires sprawl across the map - one assassination from catastrophe.
A map that no longer exists, on the last morning it did.
A map you cannot play anywhere else
This is the scenario's whole reason to exist. Twenty-eight modern countries do not exist in 1914 - they are absorbed back into the empires that actually held them.
- -Austria-Hungary holds Czechia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia as one increasingly nervous state.
- -The Russian Empire runs from Poland and the Baltics through Ukraine and Belarus to the Caucasus and Central Asia.
- -The Ottoman Empire still holds the Middle East - the borders drawn after this war have not been drawn yet.
- -Serbia is an independent kingdom and the fuse. Belgium is neutral and directly in the way.
The two blocs
Central Powers
Germany
The best army in Europe and the worst strategic position - enemies east and west, and a plan that only works if one of them collapses fast. The two-front problem is the entire campaign.
Central Powers
Austria-Hungary
A great power on paper, a nationalities problem in practice. Strong enough to start the war, not strong enough to finish it alone.
Central Powers
Ottoman Empire
Enters later, and when it does it closes the Straits and cuts Russia off from its allies. Geography as a weapon.
Triple Entente
France
Fighting on its own soil from the opening weeks. Manpower, fortresses, and a doctrine that has to survive contact with modern artillery.
Triple Entente
United Kingdom
The Royal Navy, a global empire, and a small professional army. Wins by blockade and endurance more than by breakthrough.
Triple Entente
Russia
Limitless manpower attached to a supply system that cannot feed it. The revolution is a scripted possibility, not a certainty - keep the state together and the map changes.
Triple Entente
Serbia
Small, tough, and the reason the war starts. Survival is a victory condition all its own.
Neutral at start
Italy · USA · Bulgaria · Greece · Romania
The swing seats. Italy joins the Entente on a script that you can change; America's entry is the single largest lever on the board.
The turning points
Ten scripted historical events carry the war's shape. They fire when their conditions hold - and go differently when they don't.
The July Crisis
Austria declares war on Serbia and the alliance chains pull everyone in.
Germany declares war on France · Britain enters
The Belgian question turns a continental war into a world war.
The Ottomans join · Italy joins the Entente
Two fronts open that did not exist in August 1914.
The United States enters
Fresh industrial weight arrives at the point the belligerents are exhausted.
The Russian Revolution
An entire great power leaves the war from the inside.
The collapse of Austria-Hungary · the collapse of the Ottoman Empire
Two empires come apart, and the map of the next century starts to appear.
War before the tank
Era-locked technology matters more here than in any other scenario, because the defining fact of 1914 is what does not exist yet.
From turn one
- +Mass infantry and heavy artillery - the two arms that decide 1914-16
- +Dreadnoughts, cruisers, destroyers
- +Submarines - new, and about to be decisive
Arrives later, or never
- ×Armor - not until 1916
- ×Fast attack craft - 1916
- ×Carriers - 1920, i.e. after the war
- ×Everything modern: missiles, jets, drones, integrated air defence
The consequence is the war you expect. Without mobile armor to break a defended front, artillery and manpower grind against each other and the front moves in kilometres. Rivers, bridges and mountain passes become the whole map. When armor does unlock in 1916, it lands in a war already shaped by its absence - and that is the moment the campaign can turn.
How you win
Victory is by faction, not by conquest of a single capital. The Central Powers fall when Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottomans are all neutralised - annexed, puppeted, knocked inactive, or ground down past 80% army loss. The Entente falls the same way. It is a coalition war, and coalitions lose by coming apart.
Try the WW1 scenario
Free browser demo. Pick WW1 1914 from the start menu. Take an empire, or the small country that starts it all.
Play Free DemoOr read more: the WW2 scenario · terrain and rivers · all scenarios