Raise an empire around Mare Nostrum, the Roman term for the Mediterranean Sea, in Mare Nostrum Empires, a rather unique waro featuring a range of historical empires from different time periods battling in a world where the impact of heroes and gods can be felt.
The most interesting part of this empire building wargame, is that there are four ways to win. You can be the first to build The Great Pyramids, build a fifth wonder or hero, control four capital or legendary cities, or be the leader in trade, culture and military at the same time.
Disclosure: Thanks to Academy Games for giving us a review copy of this civ building game. Some links in this post are affiliate links, using them costs you nothing extra and helps support this website. As an Amazon associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
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What is Mare Nostrum Empires?
Mare Nostrum is the name the Romans gave the Mediterranean sea, which meant “our sea.” Mare Nostrum Empires is an empire building game featuring that sea and various historic empires that existed on its borders in an anachronistic battle for dominance.
This semi-historical wargame was designed by Serge Laget and features artwork from Jean-Marie Minguez. While this one is new to us, it was originally published in 2016 by Academy Games who we have to thank for hooking us up with a review copy. The game is still in print, well supported, and can be found at most online game stores and your FLGS.
Mare Nostrum Empires is actually a reintroduction to Mare Nostrum, which was originally published in 2003. The new Empires version expands on Mare Nostrum in a number of ways, including updated rules, better components, and a new map. It also introduces two new win conditions. While we haven’t played the original, Board Game Geek users prefer the new version by a significant amount (it’s currently rated 0.8 points above the original).
This unique, empire building, folk on a map, game scales very well with three to five players. Games run from an hour and a half to over two hours. This improves once you have a group that all know how to play. As for weight, this mashup of euro-style board game and wargame is medium to a bit heavy. I would say it’s medium-heavy as a board game while at the same time being significantly lighter than most heavier wargames.
In Mare Nostrum Empires, players will be extending their civilizations’ influences into new provinces, establishing trade caravans and markets, founding new cities, building temples, recruitings heroes and erecting wonders, all with the goal of meeting one of four victory conditions. Win by building the pyramids, by having a mix of five heroes and/or wonders, by controlling four capitals and/or legendary cities, or being the top in Trade, Culture, and Military. All of this is driven by a unique economy where you pay for everything by trading in sets of different commodities or a set of coins.
Physically, Mare Nostrum Empires comes in a standard square board game box, fits great in a Kallax, and features a ton of cardboard and plastic components. There’s a large main board and two side boards. You place these smaller boards on top of the main board to shrink the map for lower player counts, which is really clever.
The game comes with cardboard tokens for thirteen different commodities, plastic military units in five player colours, cardboard city, temple, caravan and market tokens, two different sets of custom dice (one set for land battles and one for sea battles), tiles for the various wonders and heroes, player screens and boards for each player, and more. The rulebook is very concise and clear, being good for both learning the game and for reference during play.
All of this is stored in an included plastic box insert, which has done a surprisingly good job of keeping things sorted, especially the different units and commodity tokens. This insert even has room for expansion content, of which there is quite a bit, but none that we own or have tried.
One design highlight that I really appreciate in Mare Nostrum Empires, is that the different materials used and the shape of the components all means something in game.
Cities and temples are square, military units are triangles, markets and caravans are round, all of this coincides with the markings on the Trade, Culture and Military tracks on the board. Along with this, all military units are plastic, the commodities and coins are round cardboard tokens, stuff that’s placed on the map are flat cardboard, etc. All of this enhances the gameplay and makes the game flow quicker. It also makes it easier to teach, and allows everyone to see what is what at a glance and to easily keep track of everyone’s progress.
As a bonus, the plastic units actually look unique for each of the game’s factions. This part doesn’t actually help with play at all, but it’s a cool addition to the game.
We originally reviewed Mare Nostrum Empires on The Tabletop Bellhop Gaming Podcast Episode 250: Happy Birthday Bellhop, and I invite you to also check that episode out, especially for Deanna and Sean’s thoughts on the game. Nothing has really changed since that original review. We all still dig this game a lot.
A high level overview of play in Mare Nostrum Empires
Mare Nostrum Empires is an empire building wargame from a company known for their historical wargames. There is a lot going on in this game so I’m going to keep this overview pretty high level. Please know that there are quite a few details and many exceptions that I’m going to skip over. I hope to give you just enough information to know if this game sounds right for your and your group.
At the start of the game, each empire controls three provinces. Each of these will come with some markets, cities, temples, caravans, and military units already built. This is all very asymmetric and the empires available each game is based on the player count.
The first thing you do each round of Mare Nostrum Empires is to collect resources and coins. What you collect is based on the buildings you have in play. Coins come from Cities and resource come from Caravans, with Markets, and Temples doubling this production for the province they are in. Any player who controls a Legendary City gets a bonus random legendary goods token. There is one legendary good for each of the different resource types.
Once everyone has collected their stuff, it’s time to put some of it up for trade with the other players. The active trade leader decides how many commodities players will trade. Players then place that number of tokens in front of their player screens where everyone can see them. For each trade, the active player takes one token on display from one other player. Then the player whose token was taken gets to choose one from another player, and so on, until all trades are complete.
During this phase players will want to focus on collecting coins or sets of different resources. This is a very important part of Mare Nostrum Empires, as the next phase is the Build Phase. The order of building is determined by the player who is at the top of the Trade track, with one player building everything they want before the next player starts.
Anything you build in this game costs a set number of coins or a set of different resource tokens tokens of the same number. That number is three for cities, caravans, all military units, and provincial control markers. Temples and Markets cost six, and heroes and wonders cost a variable amount, with the price going up based on how many you already own.
Heroes and Wonders, are represented by tiles and each gives the owning player some form of powerful special ability and may also advance them up one or more of the game’s three tracks. One of the ways to win the game is to hire/build your fifth Hero or Wonder tile.
As you are building remember to adjust your position on the game’s three tracks, as they will impact the remainder of the round by adjusting who sets the turn order.
After building, comes the move and battle phase. There are three unit types in Mare Nostrum Empires, Triremes, Legions and Fortresses. The Military leader decides the player order, with the active player moving any triremes and fighting any naval battles before moving any legions and fighting land battles. Fortresses are defensive and cannot be moved.
Battles in Mare Nostrum Empires are straightforward and quick to play out, but do feature an older hex and counter wargame mechanic. You roll one custom die for each unit in a battle, add up the total on all of the dice, and then divide that by five, rounded down. That number is the amount of opposing units that are defeated. Rolls are simultaneous on both sides of the battle. As units are removed, remember to update the military track.
After a battle, if there are still units from more than one side left, that province remains at war. If the defenders win, nothing changes, they keep their territory. If the attacker wins they have a number of options.
They can pillage one building (gaining production for that building immediately and removing it from play), they can occupy a building (gaining control of it for the next production phase), or they can try to take provincial control (which requires continuing to own that province until the end of their next turn).
When a player manages to occupy provinces containing a total of four capitals or legendary cities, they win the game.
At the end of each round there is a Claim Leadership phase. Here you double check everyone’s positions on the three tracks: Culture, Trade and Military.
Culture is based on the cities you control, Trade is based on your caravans, and Military is based on your military units. These are meant to be updated in real time during the other phases of the game but it’s easy to forget something so we always double check the math during this phase, which is easy to tally up thanks to the colour coding and component shapes.
Once you’ve verified everyone levels, if a single player is at the top of all three tracks, they win the game.
At this point, assuming no one has won, you start another round. Everyone generates resources, trades, builds, and battles, until one of the four victory conditions is met.
As a reminder, the four victory conditions in Mare Nostrum Empire are to build The Great Pyramid, collect five wonders and/or heroes, control four capital or legendary cities, or to be the top of all three tracks at the end of the round. All of these happen instantaneously, which makes player order very important. Note also that there’s no timer or set number of rounds, the game just keeps going until someone claims one of thefour victory conditions.
Mare Nostrum Empires is a great mash up of euro-style board game and wargame.
As you may or may not know, Deanna is a huge classical civ fan, and even has a classics degree. She’s the one that who convinced us to check out Mare Nostrum Empires. At the time we both expected it was going to be more historical than it is. A big thing you should know going in is that is not a historical wargame. Maybe you could call it an anachronistic wargame, as it features empires from different time periods fighting together as well as having fantasy elements by including gods and heroes that you can recruit.
While playing the first time Deanna pointed out that Hammurabi didn’t live in the same time period as Cleopatra (there’s several hundred years between them). Castor and Pollux aren’t historical characters, etc. This is not a game that is going to teach anyone history. Mare Nostrum Empires takes all of the classical civ. stuff, from over a 2000 year period, and puts it into a blender, with a bit of myth and a pinch of Homer’s epics, and adds in the The Seven Wonders of the Ancient World for some additional flavour.
The next thing that is important to know about Mare Nostrum Empires is that while it is generally considered a wargame, and is currently ranked in the top 100 wargames of all time, it’s not the kind of wargame most people expect when they hear that term. This game has a very strong euro-style board game feel due to the fact that everything you buy in this game is paid for in sets of resources or coins. Trading is as important as conquest, and you won’t be moving around stacks of chits across hexes, or referencing combat results tables.
This is also not any form of simulation, everything presented in Mare Nostrum Empires is high level and abstract. The use of only three military unit types is a good indication of this. You either have boats, ground troops, or defence, that’s it. Now there are differences between the empires, representing their strengths and weaknesses but this comes out from their starting heroes not the units himself. For example, for the Romans, Caesar’s legions add one to all of their die rolls when attacking. The Greeks on the other hand, get a bonus on defence. You also aren’t worrying about provisions, feeding your people, supply lines, etc.
What heroes and wonders you purchase makes a big impact on games of Mare Nostrum Empires. When learning the game, it’s suggested you only start with so many out at once and reveal new ones tiles whenever one is bought. Once you know the game well enough the rules suggest that you put all of the heroes and wonders out at the start of the game. Having all of those options on your first play or two is overwhelming but having everything up from the start is fantastic with experienced players, and really lets you start working on a strategy early in the game.
Do watch out for competition for wonders and heroes though, as their abilities really are powerful and the boost they give on the tracks can sometime lead to a surprise victory. There’s also some nice thematic tie in with these tiles as they abilities fit the mythology behind them.
The most brilliant thing in Mare Nostrum Empires, is the resource system and the way the map is designed so that different regions have access to different commodities. There is no way for a single player to be able to generate all of the resources, it’s just not possible. You are forced to expand, building caravans, and are forced to trade. This gives the game a high level of player interaction, and unlike many wargames, that interaction isn’t just battles for territory control. While players can’t trade except during the trade phase, negotiations, deals, promises, allegiances, and betrayals can all be part of Mare Nostrum Empires. Be wary when negotiating, as nothing is binding, except for the trades made during the trade phase.
The other thing that I love in Mare Nostrum Empires is the fact there are four, very different, victory conditions. I also dig that only one of these is a military victory. My last few plays included three different victory conditions being met and so far there hasn’t been a single strategy that seems to dominate. Also I’ve noticed that different groups and players tend to gravitate towards different things. While one game may have a lot of battles, another may only have a conflict or two. Some players like to keep the trades to a minimum while others like to see lots of tokens passing around. This helps to keep the game feeling fresh.
The combination of the commodity rules and the four victory conditions combine to mean that you really need to watch what your opponents are doing in Mare Nostrum Empires, and often, it’s the player you least expect who is suddenly only one action away from winning. With experienced players we’ve noticed the end game often shifts to denying other players a win, while trying to surprise everyone with your own, instead of everyone just working on their own thing.
Personally, I didn’t really have any interest in Mare Nostrum Empires and didn’t know what to expect from it at all until I cracked it open for the first time and played. At that point I was totally sold. This is my kind of wargame.
I love the way the game flows, and how simple the three phases are while still offering many decision points. There’s no one right way to play and the various victory conditions present many equally valid strategies. The game is both strategic and tactical as you need to adjust your play based on what the other players are doing. The end game is a fascinating mix of trying to complete a victory condition yourself while also trying to deny the other players from achieving what they are aiming for.
For the historical wargame fans remember that Mare Nostrum Empires is not a historical wargame or simulation in any way. It’s a fanciful take on multiple empires over different time periods in the same geographical location that also takes liberties with its heroes and gods. If you are looking for a meaty hex and counter game or a true historical wargame, you are going to have to look elsewhere.
On the other hand, if one of the things you don’t like to do is recreate actual battles and sometimes problematic periods of history, Mare Nostrum Empires lets you play around in history’s sandbox without having to re-enact anything actually historic. It’s a great abstract look at battles around the Mediterranean Sea.
Now here’s the fun one to me, if you dig economic euro-style board games about collecting sets of resources and using those to build something, you should check this game out. Don’t be scared by the fact that it’s considered by many to be a wargame. I’ve played this with people who claim “I don’t like wargames” who were totally won over by Mare Nostrum Empires.
Mare Nostrum Empires is a fantastic Waro, a mashup of Wargame and Euro game that blends the two perfectly and keeps me wanting to come back for more.
FAQs
Is Mare Nostrum Empires a Wargame?
While it is classified as a Wargame, Mare Nostrum Empires is more of an engine building board game, where combat and area control are part of the game but not the only focus. The collecting of a variety of resources and effective trade are as important as expansion and conflict.
Is Mare Nostrum Empires Historic, and what period does it cover?
Despite featuring many real life empires that did fight for control of the Mediterranean, Mare Nostrum Empires cannot be considered a Historic Wargame. The empires included cover a two-thousand or so year period. In addition, the game includes characters from myth and legend and gives them special powers that are based on mythology and not history.
Who will enjoy Mare Nostrum Empires
A wide range of hobby gamers are going to find something to like in Mare Nostrum Empires. This game really does bridge the wargame/boardgame gap. There is a lot of depth here and a large variety of options but the flow of the game is quick to learn and easy to remember.
I strongly encourage everyone who can check this game out and give it a shot. That includes fans of games like CATAN and Wargamers who are used to hexs and counters.
In this review I used terms like Euro, Eurogame, Euro-Style, Wargame and Waro, and as time goes on and board games continue to change and evolve I start to wonder just how useful these terms are anymore? We are seeing more and more overlap between styles of games and it’s not just the old Euro vs Ameritrash thing either. Genre mashing is just part of good game design now. and I’m all there for it. However, I know people do like to put things into buckets, so I guess maybe it’s just time for some new buckets!
What bucket do you consider games like Mare Nostrum Empires to fall into?
I would also love to know what your favourite Waros are. What’s another game like Mare Nostrum Empires that we should check out, where the elements of traditional board games and wargames have mashed together to make something wonderful?
- Mare Nostrum – Empires allows players to play the way they want. The game is exciting and fun for both deep strategists and casual gamers
- Mare Nostrum – Empires contains the highest quality components including heavy mounted game board, large and thick 2.5 mm counters, and beautiful plastic figures for Legion, Fortress, and Trireme pieces
- Game turns follow a logical flow that is easy to understand and teach
- Ages: 14 and up, Players: 3-5
