Overview
At a glance
Is this game right for my group?
ABG editorial scores on a 1–5 scale.
Harder to teach
High replayability
Highly interactive
Scales well
Deep strategy
How it plays
How does it play?
No Motherland Without is a card-driven strategy game for two players. The game depicts the struggles of the Kim Regime from 1953 to present day North Korea against the West.
Core mechanisms
Key systems that shape the decisions players make.
Campaign Card Play
Play cards to command conflicts and carry consequences through a campaign.
Dice Rolling
Roll dice to introduce uncertainty into actions, production, movement, or resolution.
Hand Management
Time and sequence a limited hand of cards to preserve future options.
Network and Route Building
Create connected routes that improve reach, delivery, control, or scoring.
Simulation
Model a real or imagined system through detailed cause-and-effect rules.
Read the full game description
No Motherland Without is a card-driven strategy game for two players. The game depicts the struggles of the Kim Regime from 1953 to present day North Korea against the West. In the aftermath of the Korean Armistice Agreement, the Korean peninsula divided in two. While its signature marked a cessation of armed conflict, the war was not over. In over six decades since the armistice was signed, three generations of the Kim regime resisted Chinese and Soviet influence, endured floods, famine, isolation and economic sanctions while defiantly pursuing nuclear weapons. One player will be the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea), seeking a nuclear deterrent to invasion, improving living standards to prevent uprising, and purging elites to prevent a coup. Another player will be the West, aiding defectors to obtain intel, stymieing the missile program to secure the region, implementing sanctions to impede the North Korean economy and further isolating the DPRK from the global community to intensify pressure on the regime. —description from the designer