Yesterday I got to play a 3-player game of Maria by Richard Sivel and Histogame, an excellent tabletop wargame based on the War of Austrian Succession, which is one of those bonkers-ass ultra-complicated Early Modern European Wars where every major world leader and military commander is related to each other by blood or marriage in some convoluted way and has some annoying title that doesn’t always correspond to their homeland. This time period has always been a bit of a blind spot to me because it usually involves hyper-complicated political intrigues between Duchies and Kingdoms that don’t exist anymore and are impossible to find on a map, and as soon as you start talking about the “Count Bruchenheim von Blenhauser, Second Grand Duke of the Duchy of Saxon-Hesse-Westphalia, second cousin by marriage to General Sir Lord Wilhelm Van der Beeks Besonders IV, Elector of Bonedenburg through the matriarchal line of Empress Josephine Therese III of Leopoldia” and all that shit is hyperlinked I just immediately think “fuck this” and bail. But the game was awesome, and while I did come one victory point short of winning I think I did a pretty admirable job of defending Austria despite being invaded from all sides at the same time. And it got me interested in the game, so I thought I’d do a little digging on the history, and, particularly on Maria Theresa of Austria. Who, it turns out, is pretty badass.