Quartermaster General WW2: Prelude
Quartermaster General WW2: Prelude Rulebook
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
What's New in Second Edition?
This second edition of Prelude completes the refresh of the original series. This edition adds two new cards and includes several clarifications to the first edition.
Components
Rules
- 1 Tension track
- 109 Prelude cards (in 6 decks)
Your Prelude cards are not commingled with your country's regular deck. Use a separate draw deck and discard pile for your Prelude cards. Most of the Prelude cards will be returned to the box before the regular game begins.
Using Prelude with the Total War Expansion
Prelude is designed to be used with either the base game alone or together with the Total War expansion. If you are not playing with the Total War expansion, ignore any game text on cards that relate to Air Forces, or French and Chinese pieces. Game text relating to the expansion will be in brackets [ ].
Example: If you're not using the Total War expansion, The Long March can only be used to recruit a Soviet Army.
Setup
When using Prelude, follow the following procedure:
- Place the tension track beside the board with a small counter of your choice (we suggest an army piece) on the "0" space.
- Shuffle your regular draw deck, and then draw cards as usual (10 cards for the base game; 12 cards when using the Total War expansion). Examine these cards but do not discard any yet; just set them aside for now. Some Prelude cards interact with your opening hand. In addition, your knowledge of your opening hand will help you during the Prelude.
- Shuffle your Prelude cards; then immediately discard the top 2 Prelude cards from your Prelude draw deck.
- Draw a hand of 2 Prelude cards.
- Play the Prelude (pre-game) as described in the next section.
- After the Prelude is concluded, any remaining Prelude cards in your Prelude Hand, Prelude Deck, or Prelude Discard Pile can be returned to the game box (to make space on the table).
Example card, Prelude card P69:
The Long March (Tension 0)
Recruit a Soviet [or Chinese] Army in China or Szechuan, but the space must be empty.
- Now take your regular hand of cards and discard cards as normal (3 cards for the base game, 5 when using the Total War expansion).
- Then begin the regular game on Round 1.
Prelude Turns
The Prelude round order proceeds like the regular game (Germany, United Kingdom, Japan, Soviet Union, Italy, and United States), with each player finishing a Prelude turn before the next starts.
Prelude Turn Sequence
- Prelude Play Step: Play a Prelude card (see below).
- Prelude Discard Step: Discard any remaining (0, 1, or 2) Prelude cards in your hand.
- Prelude Draw Step: Draw 2 Prelude cards. If your Prelude draw deck runs out of cards, you do not draw more cards during the Prelude. If the tension level is 10 or more, or all players have one or fewer cards in hand, stop the Prelude.
Each step is mandatory, if possible.
Prelude Play Step
On your Prelude Play step, you may play 1 Prelude card from hand, or you may play the top card of your Prelude draw deck. Since you can look at the top card of your draw deck at any time, you'll know what you're getting.
If you don't like the top card of your Prelude draw deck, you may discard it, and examine the new top card of your draw deck. You can repeat this procedure until you decide to play one, run out of Prelude cards, or play one from your hand after all.
Ending the Prelude
The Prelude can end in two ways:
- When the tension level reaches 10 ("At War!"). Every History card played, including those played on the table, adds its tension level modifier to the total tension level. Move the counter on the tension track to record the current tension level.
- OR, when no player has more than 1 Prelude card in hand and all of the Prelude draw decks are depleted.
The Prelude ends immediately after the current player's turn is finished, even if it is not the end of a full round. There is no need to keep track of rounds in the Prelude game. After the Prelude ends, the regular game begins with Germany on Round 1, as usual.
Example card, Prelude card P70:
Japanese-Soviet Non-aggression Pact (Tension -1)
Place on the table face-up. Discard and gain +4 Victory Points the first time Japan battles your piece if you have not battled a Japanese piece yet this game.
Who Can See What?
The same basic secrecy rules that apply to regular cards apply to Prelude cards: your cards in hand, discard pile, and face-down are secret to you, like other cards in Quartermaster General. However, there are a few small differences:
- You may always look at the top card of your Prelude draw deck.
- During your Prelude Play Step, at any time you may discard the top card of your Prelude draw deck.
As usual, you cannot share that card's information with your teammates.
Prelude Cards
There are two kinds of Prelude cards, Armament and History. References to Prelude cards will always be explicitly stated (i.e. "Prelude cards", "Prelude draw deck", etc.). When the word "cards" is alone, it refers to the regular (not Prelude) game cards.
Discarding Prelude Cards
Prelude cards are never discarded to the regular discard pile, but always to the Prelude discard pile. A regular game card that refers to discards (e.g. Flexible Resources) never refers to Prelude discards.
Running Out of Prelude Cards
If a Prelude card requires you to discard from your Prelude draw deck and you have no more Prelude cards, discard from the top of your regular draw deck instead.
History Cards
History cards are similar to Event cards in the regular game: to use, just follow the game text on the card. Most History cards are immediately discarded, but some are placed face-up on the table and then discarded (and some benefit gained) when some other game condition is met, a bit like a Response card, but not secret. History cards also have a tension level modifier (see Ending the Prelude). Some History cards will be placed face-up on the table (e.g., Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact). When discarded, these cards are placed in the Prelude discard pile, or back in the game box.
Armament Cards
Armament cards are played face-down on the table, like Response cards, and can be used during the regular game (after the Prelude), like a Response card. However, Armament cards differ from Response cards in an important way: to use an Armament card, you must discard 1 regular game card from hand, but only when the card is used from the table, not when played to the table during the Prelude.
Note that Armament cards are not Response cards. Another game card that refers to a Response card (e.g. Operation Magic) cannot act on an Armament card (and of course Armament cards are discarded to the Prelude discard pile or game box).
Example card, Prelude card P63:
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact (Tension -1)
Place on the table face-up. Discard and gain +4 Victory Points the first time Germany battles your piece if you have not battled a German piece yet this game.
Example card, Prelude card P94:
United States Army Air Corps
Use at the beginning of your Victory step. Gain +1 Victory Point [or deploy an Air Force].
No Reactions during the Prelude
Cards on the table that react to game play, including Status, Response, and Armament cards on the table, cannot be used during the Prelude. Bolster cards cannot be used either, if using Total War.
Prelude Card Breakdown by Country
| Country | History | Armament |
|---|---|---|
| Germany | 8 | 12 |
| Japan | 9 | 9 |
| Italy | 9 | 7 |
| United Kingdom | 10 | 11 |
| Soviet Union | 9 | 8 |
| United States | 10 | 7 |
Designer's Notes
Writers of history always have a bias, whether overt or implied. I wrote this Prelude with the specific belief that it would have been in the Allies' favor had they intervened earlier. Hence, it is usually, but not always, beneficial for the Allies to conclude the Prelude sooner; all things being equal, the Allies should try to add tension and the Axis remove it. But it is rarely the case that all things will be equal, and thus I can't offer a hard and fast rule of thumb.
Be careful of the hidden cost of Armament cards. You'll have to discard when you want to use one, and that discard may seem a lot easier when not looking at the cards in hand at the time!
Adding both Total War and Prelude to the base game will set you up for a wild ride as so many more unexpected combinations appear, and you may find the games diverge further from history. Of course, this is to be expected, as Prelude alters the game's trajectory at launch.
Finally, you might consider a practice round of just the Prelude before playing the entire game. Because Prelude can change the game's trajectory so substantially, it's important all of the players fully understand the new mechanics.