Stripped Down for Parts: Purgatorio: Battles of the Guelfs and Ghibellines, 1176-1325

  

 

I’ve come late to Purgatorio: Battles of the Guelfs and Ghibellines, 1076-1325 (GMT Games, 2026), the sixth game in the Men of Iron series and designer Ralph Shelton’s second contribution. There is a long story involving missing order components that meant my delivery – along with a handful of other folks’ P500 orders – had been put on ice until the missing bits arrived. Lucky for me, I live in the same city that the distribution centre is based, and so I was able to negotiate getting the rest of the order released while the missing part will be sent along with whichever order they come in with (I’ve got two more orders on the way, so hopefully they’ll show up with one of those).

I also came late to the Men of Iron system. I stumbled across a copy of Arquebus: the Battles for Northern Italy 1495-1544 (GMT Games, 2017) when it had been out of print for a couple of years (a reprint is available for pre-order on GMT's P500 page), and caught up when the Men of Iron Tri-Pack (GMT Games, 2020) was first released.

This will be a brief look at Purgatorio; to be honest, there isn’t that much to the game. That’s not a criticism – the relative simplicity of the Men of Iron system is one of the game’s strengths. I was able to introduce my brother-in-law to the game in a single session of play, and he beat me in our second match.

 

The cover art is striking. Daringly dark, it captures the intimacy of near-fraternal violence of the age. The illustration was commissioned from Kurt Miller, a digital artist who GMT has been leaning on for some of their most striking covers of late, including Pendragon: the Fall of Roman Britain (GMT Games, 2017), A Time for Trumpets (GMT Games, 2020), Norman Conquests: MoIVol. V (GMT Games, 2023), and even rail games like 1846: Race for the Midwest (GMT Games, 2016) and 1848: Australia (GMT Games, 2021). Mr Millers work is dynamic and thematically rich, and – to my mind – really sets the tone of the game.

My only criticism of the box-front would be that the red title gets a little lost in the twilight aspect of the cover illustration, but it something like that would put a punter off buying it, they probably wouldn’t be in the market for this kind of game in the first place. The edge faces all feature a bold white “Purgatorio” against a vermillion background, which is how most people would likely come to the game initially, slipped into a gap in a bookshelf. The title alone might be enough to elicit some initial interest.

Box back.

The box back offers a brief introduction to the Men of Iron system, how it plays and its two-handed solitaire suitability, and a paragraph outlining the historical background against which the battles featured in the game are set, including the origins of the terms Guelf and Ghibelline, referring to supporters of the Pope or the Holy Roman Empire respectively. No map images are featured, but a selection of unit counters and markers  are presented at their regular 5/8” size, along with a list of the game’s contents, the personnel responsible for its coming being brought to market, and some details about the scale of the game (unit sizes, map and time scales). We also learn Purgatorio is recommended for two players, aged 14 and up, that the difficulty rating is suggested to be Four out of Nine, and solitaire suitability Seven out Nine.

The MoI System Rules-set.

The Men of Iron Series Rules have benefitted from years of in-the-field playtesting over several versions of the game. As mentioned, Purgatorio is the sixth game using the system first featured in Men of Iron: Warfare in the Middle Ages (GMT Games, 2005). As mentioned earlier, the system is relatively simple and easy to assimilate, but it’s proven robust enough to handle (with only minor modifications on a case by case basis) to handle tactical warfare from the late 1000s to the late 1400s – four centuries of radical transformation in war-making.

The rules are clearly presented, but being a series rules-set, there are large swarths
of material that are irrelevant to the game to hand (still interesting reading, though).

The rulebook itself is printed on the familiar medium weight matt paper, and is well laid out and easy to read and navigate. Being a series rulebook, some of the material presented is of no consequence to Purgatorio. Of the twenty-five pages of standard rules, the content necessary to this game comes to about sixteen pages (and this count includes the space given to the components and unit descriptions). Another two pages present Optional Rules, and the twenty-eight page book is rounded out with a Cover page, Index and Credits (also a page), and an Extended Sequence of Play on the back cover.

The Battle Book, covering the scenarios and other details for this set.

The Battle Book is the heart of the game. This also comes to twenty-eight pages. These are comprised of a cover page and preface at the beginning, and at the back, a two-page Example of Play and another Extended Sequence of Play more specifically tuned to Purgatorio. The middle twenty-three pages cover the game’s seven scenarios.

Sample scenario (Battle of Cortenuova). Each scenario starts with a historical brief and
an estimated game length, then gets into the meat of the game, with set-up instructions
for each of the two armies, and a map placement map to hurry things along.

After the army set-up instructions come any special rules or scenario instructions (e.g., in
this scenario, the Guelfs may adopt a shield wall defence, the Ghibellines may not),
a note on game balance, and the Flight Levels for the two sides,

Each scenario is presented over three to four pages. Each has a historical introduction, a rough playing time and who sets up first. The two armies are listed by deployment. These are colour-coded by their Leader (another thing I really appreciate about the Men of Iron system), Then Who Goes First and any quirky scenario specific rules or chrome in play for the scenario, and lastly The Flight Levels for each army (in case you’re new to the Men of Iron system, I’ll swing back to the significance of the Flight Levels a bit later – bear with me).

In among all of this is a map, presented on a full age, indicating where each (colour-coded Battle (the term used throughout the age to describe all the troops under a particular leader) begin the action on the field. A lot of the time, this will be a rigid placement (hex numbers are offered in the Army deployment notes), but sometimes there will be the chance for free placement within certain confines, as illustrated on the set-up map.

Everything in the scenarios is really clearly presented and easy to comprehend and apply to the play map. The historical background pieces are very helpful for setting the context of the situation your about to play out. One could argue that successive designers have had two decades to get it right, except the presentation hasn’t changed much at all since the original set was released. All in all, it’s a lovely bit of information transfer design in a hobby not always known for effective user interfacing.

The three map sheets. All 22" by 34" in size, two are back printed to offer the three
full-sized battle maps and four 22" by 17" maps (two to a sheet).

Purgatorio comes with three standard sized map-sheets, two of them double-sided. These present the seven scenario battlefields that we’ve been introduced to in miniature in the Battle Book. Three of the battles – Montaperti, Benevento, and Zappolino – are played out on full sized 22” by 34” maps (unsurprisingly, these tend to play out over three hours and up), while the remaining four scenarios are played on half-sized maps. In these cases, two maps are presented on each side of one of the back-printed maps.

I took over a dozen photos of a couple of the maps and this was the best shot out of
the lot. I'm not going to embarrass myself by posting any of the others, but this, the
map for the Battle of Tagliacozzo, is a good representation of what you can
expect to find with all of the scenarios.

The maps are printed on heavy, low-gloss paper, and lean more into functionality than prettiness, but this is as much a product of the doctrines of warfare as any thoughts of production practicality. Battles throughout the middle-ages tended to be fought on clear, open spaces to facilitate manoeuvre and wide rank formations. My only criticism is that the opportunity was there to put the smaller maps on the obvers of the centre fold on two separate maps instead of printing them all on a single sheet. This would have allowed the map to be presented folded in half for all four smaller scenarios without having to back-fold the sheets centre fold (I complained about this in the Norman Conquests unboxing as well). That said, I’m looking forward to setting up and pushing some counters around on these maps.

Counter sheet 1: the Ghibelline battles and leaders.

Counter sheet 2: the Guelf battles and leaders.

Counter sheet 3:markers various and divers.

 The counters are presented on three card sheets, two full-sized sheets and one quarter sized. These are printed on a good weight of brown-core cardstock that seems to be the standard these days for GMT games, and are die-cut, but can be removed quite cleanly. The counters themselves are 5/8” (which is a nice upgrade from the half-inch counters offered in the Tri-Pack). The units look very nice and should prove to be quite readable on the table.

Player Aid Card (PAC), Back panel (left) and Front panel. The Front panel features the
Weapons Matrix, one of my favourite features of the MoI system.

The inside spread of the PAC offers a set of terrain modifier tables for each of the
included scenarios. You shouldn't need to refer to this too often during play, so you
can treat your 11" by 17" PAC like an 11" by 8,5" card for most of the game.   .

The game includes two bi-fold Player Aid Cards (PACs) which present pretty much everything you will need to refer to during a game, arranged sensibly into combat-related charts and tables on the front and back of the PAC, and a list of short Terrain Effects Charts for each scenario map inside the fold. A key feature of the system is the ability of some units to perform Shock or Charge attacks. The front of the PAC features a Shock/Charge Matrix, an illustrated table that defines which units are capable of the tactic in this particular game, cross-referencing the modifier applicable to each kind of potential target unit. Combat is relatively simple but takes a few steps. A lot can happen in in melee including the loss of a leader. The tables for Defenders attempting a retreat before a Shock attack ae also located here. Combat results tables covering close combat and missile attacks (in the case of Purgatorio, exclusively archers and crossbowmen) are located on the reverse side of the folded card, along with tables covering Charge Reluctance, Counter-Charge vs. Charge, and Counter-Charge vs. Shock/Fire, as well as a handy list of modifiers that may influence a roll for Charge or Shock attacks.

The Flight Track (top) with the starting points for both sides, each battle, prefilled for
your convenience, and the General Track.

Medieval battles were usually attritional. The Men of Iron system reflects this through each side accruing Flight Points for units and leaders lost in battle. As mentioned, each scenario lists a number of Flight Points for each side. These threshold numbers are marked on the Flight Track (see above) for each side and each scenario. During the course of each round the position of each player’s Flight Marker is adjusted to reflect the accrual of Flight Points. At the end of each Free Activation (the first activation for the opposing player when the current player has lost the initiative), both players roll a die and add the result to their current Flight level. If one (or both) player’s resulting total exceeds their Flight threshold, the game is over with a loss to that player. If both players exceed their threshold in the same check, the battle is considered a draw (in this instance, for us at least, a rematch of the same scenario will be scheduled for the next available date).

The card also includes a General Track. this is used for the special Timed Battle rule, that sets a limit on how long the attacking side can galivant around looking for openings or advantages. Each battle has a declared Time Limit, The Defending player has the option to pass on their free activation, and that will shift the Time marker down one space. Then the Time marker reaches Zero, the attacking side immediately loses the game. This is a special rule, not an optional rule, but the way the introduction to the rule is phrased, it seems like it was initially intended as an optional rule. But don’t quote me on this – I’m probably wrong.

Box, dice and baggies (in situ).

It should come as no surprise that Purgatorio comes with ten-sided dice – one purple and one yellow for the two factions) and baggies. Actually, a big roll of baggies (I didn’t count them, but probably enough to separate out all the individual Battles). A cardstock insert is also included to create a trough for the dice and baggies, and to keep everything nice and flat during shipping.

I saw on one of the Facebook groups a fellow mentioning how he inverted the inserts of many of his games to better accommodate counters and other components. This was a lightbulb moment for me, and since then I’ve done this to quite a few games.

"Oh, strange new world; oh, inverted insert."

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The animosity between the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire that stretched from the end of the twelfth century to the beginning of the fourteenth is a slice of history of which I am particularly ignorant, so I‘m quite looking forward to getting some of these battles to the table. Realistically though, I don’t think this is likely in the short term, at least across the table from another opponent.

I’m on a bit of a project/mission at the moment with the various Army expansions for Commands and Colors: Napoleonics, so I may not get to Purgatorio very soon. I may be able to do an AAR or two now T has a copy of the Men of Iron Tri-Pack that came in the same delivery as this one (although we’ll have to wait for the Patch Kit* before we can play all of the scenarios from that set. This will arrive with Coast Watchers (GMT Games, 2026) which, by all reports should be charging soon and shipping by the end of June.

When I do get to Purgatorio, be assured I will report back on the experience. There will be AARs with the same insightful critique and poor-quality, under-lit phone-camera photos you have come to expect from A Fast Game.

 

* When the files for the Second Printing of the MoI Tri-Pack were sent to the printer, some older files for maps and scenario booklets were forwarded in error. To their credit, GMT notified customers through their following newsletter, but had already put the production of a replacement component package (Patch Kit) in motion.