Maquis
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Every night you'll return home. Or perhaps not. Every completed mission is a victory. Every agent arrested will never return.
WHAT IT'S ABOUT
The French Resistance in thirty minutes of impossible choices
Occupied France, World War II. Jake Staines puts you in charge of a Resistance cell: few agents, little time, too many objectives. Born as a print & play in 2013, Maquis has become a small cult among fans of thematic solitaire games. Ilya Baranovsky and Mark Tuck have visually conveyed the tension of those dark days.
You place your agents in different parts of the city: buying weapons, printing leaflets, sabotaging convoys. But Nazi patrols are moving, and spaces are closing. Anyone who doesn't return to the safe house before curfew is arrested. Forever. Each game is a different mission, each mission is a balance between ambition and survival.
What they're saying abroad
Maquis captures the moral tension of the Resistance better than games three times its size.
— FroGames
"Every decision feels dangerous. Every agent lost feels personal."
Every choice seems dangerous. Every agent lost is personal.
— Meeple Mountain
Maquis
Designed exclusively for solitaire play. The enemy patrols move according to deterministic rules that gradually block spaces. It's not an automa: it's a spatial puzzle where you lose options every turn. The experience is complete because there is no multiplayer version — this is its definitive form.
FrogScore · FroGames editorial rating · based on rules, international reviews, and play sessionsYour resources
What you have to fight the occupation
Partisan agents
Few. Too few. You place them one by one on actions scattered across the map. Any agent you lose never comes back. Ever.
Mission objectives
Sabotage trains. Print underground newspapers. Procure medicine. Each game draws two missions to complete. Failing one means defeat.
Nazi patrols
Collaborationist Milice and Wehrmacht. They move in a fixed pattern, blocking the spaces where they are stationed. You plan around them. Or die trying.
Safe house
The base. All agents must return before curfew. Anyone left outside is arrested. Managing the return is half the strategy.
Recommended sleeves 54 cards in 2 sizes ▼
If you play often, we recommend protecting your cards with transparent sleeves to make them last longer.
| Size | Quantity |
|---|---|
| 63 × 89 mm | 50 |
| 70 × 120 mm | 4 |
| Total cards | 54 |
In thirty minutes you'll know if your cell won. Or if the agents will never return home.
Come si gioca
Video dimostrativo di gameplay.
A game in five moments
What happens at the table
Not the rules. The experience.
Mission Impossible
Draw two mission cards. Sabotaging trains requires four weapons. Printing newspapers requires three different resources. You look at the map. You look at your four agents. It already seems impossible.
First moves
You place the first agent. Collect money. Then another: you buy a weapon. The patrols move, blocking two spaces. You already have to change your plan. Always like this.
Curfew
You sent an agent too far. The patrols block his return to the safe house. You can sacrifice him to complete an objective. Or burn a turn to bring him back. You choose.
The map closes in
It's the fourth day. Half the available spaces are gone. Patrols cover almost everything. You have to fit three precise actions into two turns. One mistake and you lose an agent. Movements count too.
Last turn
You completed one mission. The other is one step away. You place the last agent. You take the last resource. You check: everyone returns. Victory by a hair's breadth. Or maybe you lost an agent along the way. Then you lost everything.
How to play
The flow of each day (round)
Each day is divided into three phases: placement, actions, patrolling. Simple on paper. Lethal in practice.
Choose a free space on the map. The agent goes there and performs the action (collect money, buy weapons, print flyers). You cannot use spaces where patrols are stationed.
After each placement, patrols advance one space according to predetermined paths. Where they stop, they block the action. You must anticipate them.
Repeat until you have placed all available agents (usually 3-4 per round). Then check: everyone must have a clear path back to the safe house.
Anyone who cannot return to base is arrested: remove the pawn from the game. Lost forever. Then start the next day with one less agent.
Why it's different from others
Six reasons why Maquis is not just another solitaire game
No luck
Zero dice. Zero random card draws. Patrols move deterministically. If you lose, it's your fault. If you win, it's thanks to you. Period.
Exactly 30 minutes
Setup in three minutes. Game in twenty. Cleanup in two. No epic solitaire downtime. Perfect for a lunch break or to immediately try a second mission.
Variable missions
Each game draws two different objectives from a deck. Sabotaging trains requires weapons. Helping the wounded requires medicine. Printing propaganda requires morale. Each combination changes the strategy.
Shrinking map
At the beginning, you have the whole city. After three days, half the spaces are blocked. You have to plan your routes not only to collect resources, but to return alive.
Permanent losses
Arrested agents never return. Losing one on the second day means playing the rest of the game with one hand tied behind your back. The weight of choices is real.
Pure spatial puzzle
It's not a disguised eurogame. It's an optimization puzzle where you have fewer options each turn. Worker placement stripped down to its core: place, act, survive.
How it ends
How to win and how to lose
You have fifteen days to complete both missions drawn at the start of the game. Failing one, or losing too many agents, means defeat.
Victory
- You complete both missions within the fifteenth day (collect the resources required for each)
- All surviving agents return to the safe house on the last turn
- You have never exceeded the loss limit (usually you can lose a maximum of one agent)
Defeat
- You fail even one of the two missions drawn
- You lose too many agents to arrests (usually more than one)
- You reach the fifteenth day without having collected all the necessary resources
Maquis is a spatial puzzle disguised as worker placement. Every turn you lose options. Every lost agent weighs heavily. Zero luck, maximum tension.
Frequently asked questions
Maquis FAQ
How difficult is it?
You'll lose your first games. Often. But Maquis has a fast learning curve: after three games you start to read the patrol movements. After ten, you're setting the pace. The game doesn't cheat: if you lose, you understand why. And you immediately want to try again.
Is it really only half an hour?
Yes. Very fast setup (draw two missions, shuffle patrols, position agents). Game 20-25 minutes. Zero downtime. Perfect for playing two or three games in a row, changing missions. It's a solitaire game that respects your time.
Does it need to be printed or is there a physical edition?
Born as a print & play in 2013, Maquis has received several physical editions (Side Room Games, Giga Mech Games, and this one by Schwerkraft). Simple but functional components: board, cards, pawns. If you have a printer and cold laminate, the original PnP works great.
Can you lose due to bad luck?
No. Zero dice, zero random draws during the game. Missions are drawn at the start of the game, then everything is deterministic. Patrols move according to fixed rules. If you lose an agent, it's because you miscalculated the movements. Brutal, but fair.
Is it available in Italian?
This is the German edition by Schwerkraft-Verlag. The game has medium language dependence: mission cards, action cards, and rulebook are in German. Translated rulebooks exist online. The mechanics are simple: once learned, just remember the icons.
Maquis is a solo board game of worker placement set in the French Resistance during World War II. Designed by Jake Staines and published by Schwerkraft-Verlag, it offers intense 30-minute games for 1 player, recommended age 14+. Each game requires completing variable missions by placing partisan agents on the map, avoiding Nazi patrols that progressively block available spaces. Zero luck, maximum tactical tension: arrested agents never return. With a weight of 2.19 on BGG and a rating of 7.45, Maquis is appreciated for its strategic depth in a compact and fast format. Available on FroGames.it.
Maquis
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