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Lion of the North: The Dawn of Modern Warfare, 1631-1632

#3581BGG ↗

1993 · 2-4 players · 180min · weight 3.64 · 167 ratings

v2 v3 v4 wide v4 deep

BGG raw

ID
3581
Name
Lion of the North: The Dawn of Modern Warfare, 1631-1632
Year
1993
Rank
12315
Min players
2
Max players
4
Playing time
180
Min playtime
180
Max playtime
180
Avg weight
3.6364
Num weights
22
Bayes avg
5.5583
Average
6.45689
Users rated
167
Num owned
677
Wanting
15
Wishing
55
Num comments
79
Fetched at
Wed Apr 29 2026 05:34:57 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time)
Mechanisms (3)
Dice RollingHexagon GridSimulation
Categories (2)
Pike and ShotWargame
Description (1755 chars)

(From the publisher) The war for minds and souls had been raging for ten destructive years when the vaunted, virtually undefeated Catholic army of the Hapsburg emperor and his allied German states looked across the gentle valley of Breitenfeld directly into the blinding rays of the dawn of modern warfare. By the end of the day, Tilly's lumbering army lay smashed beyond redemption, the victim of rapid-firing artillery, fast-moving infantry and hard-charging cavalry. The prediction had come true: Breitenfeld signaled the ascendancy of Gustavus II Adolphus, King of Sweden, the Lion of the North. Lion of the North is the third volume in GMT's heralded Great Battles of History (GBoH) Series. The Thirty Years' War signaled the dawn of modern warfare ... a return to the supremacy of linear tactics, drill and discipline, to what some historians call "the return of the legion." Lion of the North represents two of the most famous battles of that period: Breitenfeld, 1631 Lutzen, 1632 Scale: Time = 30 minutes per turn Map = 100 yards per hex Unit = 100 men per strength point This is in the line of GBOH games which include Alexander, SPQR, Caesar: The Civil Wars, Caesar: Conquest of Gaul, and Cataphract. It won the Best Wargame Graphics in 1993. Components: 480 full-color two-sided counters, featuring - 17 full-color two-sided 1x1/2" counters representing heavy infantry (pikemen) - 24 full-color two-sided 5/8" counters representing tercios One full-color 22x34" mapsheet and one full-color 17x22" mapsheet One 6-sided die, one 10-sided die 32-page Rule Book 16-page Scenario Book Optional Rules Sheet -- including Frenzied Units, Exploding Guns, and the Death of Gustavus Three different 8.5x11" Player Aid Cards

LLM v2 (wide)

Not yet enriched at v2 (wide pass).

LLM v3 (deep)

Not yet enriched at v3 (deep pass).

LLM v4 wide (controlled-vocab primitives)

Not yet enriched at v4 (wide pass).

LLM v4 deep (archetype fit)

Not in the v4 deep-pass top-20% slice.