MERC

Table of Contents

• What is it?
• How To Play
• Provenance
• Components
• Jagged Alliance Expansion
• New Game Modes

MERC is an all against 1 area control game where each player hires and controls a team of mercenaries. One player takes the role of the evil Dictator, the rest work together to defeat the dictator.

Tenagra is a wealthy country full of industries. Taking control of those industries will finance your efforts. Along the way you'll pick up equipment and hire MERCs. You'll need to train militia to fortify and hold territory after you've taken it.

There are 47 unique MERCs for you to hire, each with their own personalities, special abilities, skills, and weaknesses. The right combination of MERCs will lead you to victory, but you'll have to compete to hire them against the other players who are also drawing from the same talent pool, including the Dictator!

MERCs would be nothing without their equipment. The game offers more than 40 different types of equipment. There are various types of weapons; everything from a simple 9mm handgun, all the way up to a shoulder mounted assault weapon (SMAW). There are various types of armor and accessories.

Every game of MERC is unique, because the map deck allows you to reconfigure the island of Tenagra so many ways. Plus, sometimes the best MERCs are killed in the first couple days on the island, so you have to fight your way to victory with their lesser counterparts. All of these variables ensure that you'll have endless amounts of fun playing MERC.

Perhaps best of all, MERC is a complex strategy game you can play in about an hour. It's not like other military-themed games that can take several hours or days to play.

Feel free to jump right into the rules. Or here's a brief overview of the game play:

Play happens over 5 rounds. Each Rebel forms a squad of MERCs who will do a combination of exploration, training militia to hold territory, and fight to gain new territory on their turn. All the Rebels work together to ultimately overthrow the Dictator by killing him or taking control of his territories.

You can overthrow the Dictator by controlling more territory than him at the end of 5 days, killing the Dictator, or capturing his secret base.

Meanwhile the Dictator will often hire MERCs, and has lots of his own milita. Plus he's got a deck of dirty underhanded tactics like threatening families, poisoning the water, and hitting you from a distance with artilary barrage.

MERC is based upon an old DOS game from the 1990's called Jagged Alliance. It was the first game I was ever truly a fan of, and I've always found it unfortunate that there hasn't been a good successor since Jagged Alliance 2 in the early 2000s.

I started working on MERC in 2007 and started playing it with friends and co-workers in 2008. MERC is actually the reason that The Game Crafter exists. Back then it had over 400 cards, and I was sick of manually printing and cutting them out. When I found no one to do it for me, I convinced my business partners that we should do it, and The Game Crafter was born.

In fact, we are all in the game!

• A Dictator AI to make the game a full Co-op. This also enables solo play!
• 4 new game modes which create entirely new ways to play.
• 9 new Dictators to overthrow
• 4 new Dictator tactics
• 5 new MERCs
• 14 new map sectors
• 58 more pieces of equipment
• 3 more player mats

Assassination Mode eliminates the area control victory, and instead you have to assassinate the Dictator to win. However, the Dictator starts in one corner of the map, and all the Rebels start in the other and have to gather equipment along the way.

Vehicles mode adds 5 new ridiculously overpowered vehicles including a Sherman Tank. If you're in for over the top mayhem, then vehicles are for you.

Versus mode eliminates the Dictator and allows for 1v1, 2v2, 1v1v1, 2v2v2, and 3v3 tournament style game play.

I, Dictator mode sets a new battlefield condition: Whomever can get the components to build a dirty bomb first becomes the new Dictator!

Also, the Dictator AI is kind of like a new game mode as it allows the game to be played with an automatic Dictator, so that you and your friends can all work together if you like.

Why buy this?

I found the game to be very interesting. I loved equipping and managing my MERCs to make them the ultimate fighting force.

• All against one co-operative battle!
• Each mercenary has their own personality and skills.
• Complex strategy in about an hour.

Requirements

Components

Component	Quantity	Photo
Skinny Mat Set	1 set of 4 skinny mats
Medium Circle Chit Set	1 set of 150 medium circle chits
Large Retail Box	1
Poker Deck	1 deck of 16 cards
Poker Deck	1 deck of 69 cards
Poker Deck	1 deck of 47 cards
Poker Deck	1 deck of 10 cards
Poker Deck	1 deck of 2 cards
Jumbo Booklet	1
Bowling Pin, Large, Black	1
Bowling Pin, Large, Blue	1
Bowling Pin, Large, Red	1
Bowling Pin, Large, Yellow	1
Bowling Pin, Small, Black	1
Bowling Pin, Small, Blue	1
Bowling Pin, Small, Red	1
Bowling Pin, Small, Yellow	1
Brochure, Jumbo	1
D6, 16mm, Black	10
Hotel, Black	1

Possible Discounts