Norad, originally published in 1973, has been republished in a third edition
Dana Lombardy's game Norad is a representation of a hypothetical nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union in 1962. Originally published in 1973 in CONFLICT magazine, it was republished in 1977 by the Mishler Company, and then again in 2024 by Bonzai Games in Japan. And now you can own the latest edition:
Dana Lombardy looks at his game NORAD 50+ years later
In 1973, I needed a wargame for Conflict #4 – the magazine I started the previous year. Several new designs were under development and would be published with future issues of Conflict. But I needed a new game design – and it had to be finished in 60 days.
It wasn’t the first time I published a game that wasn’t a typical wargame. Conflict #3 included a time travel science fiction paper-and-pencil design called Assassin! It was too different for many of the readers whose feedback was: “Give us a real wargame!”
This meant that the game had to be a military battle or campaign and include conventional die-cut unit counters and a game map. But I wanted to create something that was not completely traditional.
NORAD was my first modern era design: a hypothetical nuclear war caused by the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis between the USA and USSR. The readers’ reactions were extreme: they either loved it or hated it. NORAD used a polar projection map where the movement spaces were smaller at the North Pole and became wider as they moved South. To the best of my knowledge, this was the first wargame to use this type of map instead of a traditional hexagon or square pattern.
Combat did not have standard combat factors on each counter that was resolved using a customary Combat Results Table (CRT). Instead, if a Russian bomber or submarine missile reached a Canadian or United States city it was immediately flipped over to show a nuclear mushroom cloud. This designated that the city was destroyed and the Soviet player received victory points for that city. If the Canadian or U.S. fighter aircraft could reach the Russian bomber before it could nuke the city, both counters were removed. There were also anti-aircraft missile counters placed on some cities that were last-ditch defenses. Both sides had a few decoy (blank) counters representing electronic countermeasures (ECM) to confuse an enemy’s radar and weapons.
To start, the U.S. player set up his fighters, decoys, and anti-aircraft missiles on any city square. These faster moving units were moved to the incoming Russian bombers to eliminate them before they could move onto a space with a Canadian or U.S. city.
Game play consisted of the Soviet player moving his bombers (including decoys) onto the northern edge of the map. At least four (or more) bombers of his fleet of 30 counters had to move onto the map every turn. Only one bomber could be in a square. Every bomber on the map moved every Turn until it was destroyed by a Canadian or U.S. fighter or reached a target city.
Each city was worth from 5 to 9 points. Soviet victory was achieved by accumulating at least 100 victory points. The U.S. player “won” if the Soviet total was less than 100 points. But America was still destroyed.
NORAD was easy to learn and fast-playing. One reader called the game “nuclear checkers.”
In 1977 a friend reprinted the game for his Mishler Company using the same artwork and a few rule edits. NORAD 2 was planned by Victory Point Games adding cards, chits, and major rules changes but it was never published. Banzai magazine’s NORAD 3 is a greatly expanded version based on the original design that adds the USA attack on the USSR.
I am honored and flattered to have one of my first game designs republished by Yasushi Nakaguro in a version that includes much improved graphics and the expansion of the American attack on the USSR.
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