Armchair Dragoons Reviews The Vietnam War from Dark City Games

Michael Eckenfels, 30 June 2025

Good Morning, Mekong! A Wargamer’s Dispatch
or
Agent Orange You Glad It’s Just a Game?

INTRODUCTION

I had a bit of an adventure, finding out about Dark City Games. I’d never heard of them before, but that itself means nothing; it’s not like I know every game company ever. I assumed, wrongly, that Vietnam War was one of but a handful of games this company had made, and it made wargames if it was delving into a subject like a sim of the Southeast Asian conflict it is named after.

A bit of searching and with the help of BoardGameGeek, and I learned that this company was founded in 2005 to revive the spirit of Metagaming’s classic “MicroQuest” series. If you’ve not heard of that, then you’re not alone, either, as I have not – but if you peruse their list, you’ll see no doubt recognizable names such as OGRE. I mean, that’s a rather well-known pedigree. And Dark City’s repertoire of games is rather significant itself; there are no less than (as of this writing, anyway) 35 titles on its BoardGameGeek page. A large number of its games seem to be of the programmed solo adventure variety, which are narrative-driven games in which players make choices that lead to different outcomes, similar to choose-your-own-adventure books. These games are built around their own free rules system called the Legends series, which supports both solo and cooperative play.

With that kind of history, you’d think their wargame collection is minimal, but that is not the case either. Vietnam War is but one of several you can find, several of which look very intriguing to me. At $15 (USD) each, like this particular game (Vietnam War), they’re all pretty affordable and if they’re at all similar to this wargame I’m reviewing for you, they’ll pack quite a bit of punch for your gaming dollar. But let’s examine this particular title together and see exactly where that leads us, shall we?

COMPONENTS

The game arrives in a Ziplock bag, and contains a rule book (20 pages long, black and white printing, with a color cover), one sheet of counters (which is an actual sheet of hardy cardstock), and two maps. No dice are included, but what wargamer or gamer has no spare d6 dice lying about? You’ll probably need a lot of d6s to play properly as the larger scenarios may have you rolling upwards of nine or so at a time, depending on your tactics and my interpretation of the combat rules. You do NOT need to have that many d6s and can make do with just one, if needed, but me being a completionist I have so many d6s of so many different colors that I had dice just for the US side and dice just for the North Vietnamese side.

The counter sheet has 60 counters, and as mentioned are made from one sheet of hardy cardstock. There are a couple of things to note, here – one is that you have to cut the counters out yourself. At first this bothered me, as I have zero PnP skills, but decided it would be a positive as it’s sometimes fun to just sleeve cards or do organization of a board game – so why not. It should be mentioned here though, just so you’re prepared. Understand too that more ‘normal’ wargame counters such as die-cut cardboard pieces would have significantly amped up the price of these games, no doubt. For a $15 price tag, I’m happy to cut a few counters out of a sheet.

click images to enlarge

The other thing to mention is the color choices made. I admit it’s a little odd as US forces are a light green color with black unit silhouettes and numbers/info, while the NVA forces are dark green in color with white silhouettes and numbers/info. Now, during play, this isn’t that big of a deal as counters are easy to tell apart. However, making NVA units dark green just felt…odd. I know historically that the NVA started with tan/khaki but moved to a more reed green color, which if they’d used this would have been less discernable from the US forces. So the dark green color for the NVA counters works for me, but you might wonder why the choice was made. In any case, as long as you can distinguish at a glance between the two sides, there’s no issues.

The iconography on the counters works well enough; there’s not a lot of unit variety so that you’re overwhelmed with remembering a bunch of different unit types, but there’s certainly enough to keep it interesting – infantry, MGs, vehicles, and a few others.

There are two maps; one is about 11” x 17” and the other is about 8.5” x 11” or so. The larger map has two Boards – One and Two, on each half of the map. One displays a landing zone and a few other terrain features, while Two is a hill with trenches and emplacements. Board Three, the smaller second map, is made up of rectangles with an urban top-down view underneath. At a glance, you can already tell there’s going to be a variety of missions to go up against. The two Boards on the one map are divided into hexes, which each measure in at 50 meters across, making for a rather intimate battle space.

GAMEPLAY

Speaking of missions…let’s talk a bit about how this game works. It is labeled as a “solitaire squad-level tactical war game,” so one would think that means there’s significant solo rules to it, right? If this thought occurred to you, you would not be correct. The solo rules are in fact only a handful of paragraphs, which seems odd, but the way the game is laid out and played, it makes much more sense. I will get to that; let me talk a bit more about how the game plays out.

As with any wargame, the units are rated according to different abilities, and as you’d imagine some units are better at certain things than others. All are rated for Range (a number of hexes to which they can shoot), Movement (number of hexes they can move), Armament/Firepower, and Survivability. I like the latter two as this is what drives combat, and these numbers represent the number of d6s one rolls when firing as an attacker (Firepower) and when defending (Survivability). For example, a standard US infantry squad has a 2 Firepower, so they roll 2d6. If they’re fired upon, they have a Survivability of 2, and this means they likewise would roll 2d6.

The only difference in Firepower is the Armament rating, which is a letter. This is where there’s a bit of a learning curve, but it’s not that steep. Infantry, for example, has an “r” which means…wait for it…Rifle. This means it can attack soft targets once per turn. Other ratings include Anti-Tank, Anti-Aircraft, High Explosive, Machineguns, Napalm, and a few others. Each Armament type governs the number of attacks it can make and what types of targets it can attack.

Since I’m on it, I’ll say combat is kind of fun.

Since I’m on it, I’ll say combat is kind of fun. Being able to see at a glance how many d6s you roll for both attacker and defender – I like to do it all at once, rolling different-colored dice for attacker and defender of course – gives me immediate results without having to refer to a CRT or some other complicated combat chart. Here, the results are simple – if the attacker’s two highest dice are more than the target’s highest Survivability die roll, the target is destroyed and removed. If, instead, only one die of the attacker’s is higher than the defender’s Survivability roll, the target is Disrupted and flipped over.

Let me give an example, straight out of the book. If an infantry squad decides to attack another infantry squad, and the attacker is rates for 2 Firepower and the defender is rated for 2 Survivability, both sides roll 2d6. Let’s say the attacker gets a 5 and a 6, and the defender gets a 4 and a 5. The attacker has one die that’s higher than either of the defender’s rolls, so the defender is Disrupted. If the defender instead rolled a 3 and a 1, then the attacker’s rolls of 5 and 6 both surpass the highest defender’s roll of 3, and therefore the target is destroyed. It sounds complicated when I’m trying to explain it, but it’s really not, and I really enjoy this part of it. The only part that I had to keep in mind is the Armament rating to ensure I was applying all the proper rules for attacking.

In a turn, a unit can either move or fire; it cannot do both. This actually, in a way, makes your tactical decisions a little easier. Couple this with the strategy that your ‘bot’ opponent takes at the start of the scenario (each one is a bit different), and your approach will differ. For example, if you’re on the defense then there’s no reason to move unless you need to cover an important hex (such as the HQ hex in the Ia Drang Valley scenario), or are otherwise on the defensive (like in the Khe Sanh scenario). Likewise, in the Hue scenario, you are on the offensive, so you do need to move. Your movements can trigger enemy activation either adjacent to you or in your space/hex, which almost always triggers combat.
The difference lies in if they get to shoot immediately via Opportunity Fire, like in an ambush, or if you spotted them and therefore are able to deny them that initial attack. I really enjoyed this aspect of it and this is where the solo play comes out even more so. Even though the solo rules section is small, like I mentioned, the rules overall pertain to solo play, making things come alive for that solo play and makes the game engaging in that regard.

There are eight scenarios included in the game. One is a simple, straightforward beginner battle (aptly named that, exactly), intended to get one used to the process of the game. The remaining seven scenarios are historical representations, with five of them being representative of an actual battle (Ia Drang Valley, Khe Sanh, Super Gaggle, Hue, and Hamburger Hill), and the last two being part of a historical battle but somewhat generalized within said battle (Search and Destroy, and Rolling Thunder/Bolo). Each provide a mix of units so the player can explore different combat unit capabilities and have different end goals. The player will also face different set-ups in some of the scenarios, making them vary a bit from play to play. While there are not many scenarios, they offer enough flavor and different set-ups, maps, and unit mixes to make it feel like the game itself is much larger than it actually is (physically speaking, anyway).

The interesting thing about this system – at least, I assume this – is that the rule book is labeled “Combat Boots.” The first paragraph of the rules states that this is a system, so I would think if one learns this system, one could play any of their Combat Boots-related games out there. Some of the games they have for sale on their site show very similar counters, such as for Operation Battleaxe and Operation Barbarossa, among others. I would think learning one of these systems means one would have the basics down well enough to be able to jump into any of these other games, too.¹

DOES IT CLICK, OR IS IT A BOOBY TRAP?

Does the game work well? I actually enjoyed it, and I am not one for much patience these days when it comes to wargames, to be honest. Don’t get me wrong; I love them to death and still play them, though my tastes have gone to other games such as large, narrative adventure ones. I think my tastes in wargames, which started in the law-like tomes of 70s and 80s-era Avalon Hill type games, have gravitated to more simple and easy-to-understand games – and this is definitely it.

The rules are not verbose nor lengthy and get to the point easily, and they flow well, too. That, and the combat dice rolling was something that really appealed to me. I think I’m past the ol’ CRT odds generator thing and love being able to just pit straight up die rolls against each other. The units’ different Armament ratings really help make things differ in combat so it’s not just ‘roll X dice versus Y dice, and that’s that.’ Armament ratings change things up and add the variety that will make you think of what you should commit to combat, before you make a move.

IS THERE A ‘FUN’ BUTTON IN THIS HUEY?

I enjoyed this enough to keep it on my table for several days, and even brought it back. I mean, the fact that I had to put it through its paces for a full review is one thing, but like I said, my patience for games these days is somewhat limited. If a game does not click with me, I will be brutally honest and likely won’t get it back to my table anytime soon. However, I played through all the scenarios within and can see myself playing them again soon, just because of the variety in them. The fact that the game is simple, clean, fast to set up and put away, and is actually quite fun in rolling dice…plus, the fact that it’s solo, which is my thing…really makes this an excellent game overall. I have seen a lot of solo games in the last few years, from excellent to Godawful, and this one is on the excellent side of things.

The fact that it packs so much potential and wargaming enjoyment in such a simple, small package, really makes it shine for me, and I would imagine it would be a great addition to any wargamer’s library.

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