Yeah, Risk sometimes drags a bit, but that's only a problem because you're going through the same actions again and again. This is a little long, but my friend and I found a new way of playing Risk that makes it quite a bit more strategic and deliberate, cutting down dice rolls without really increasing play time by much. Hours have passed like nothing:

NEW RISK RULES

Initial troop placement begins by selecting a capital for each army, something strategic (we went with Brazil and Yakutsk - place a nickel on each capital to avoid confusion). The territory cards are divided into three piles and one of the piles assigned to a "neutral" army, and three men of the "neutral" color (we used yellow) placed on each such country. These neutral troops won't be moved or attack, but you'll have to fight through them in order to take new territories. Troop placement for the other armies is determined not by the remaining cards but by alternating placement of individual troops on a country of each player's choice until no countries remain, then placing the rest of your allotted troops three at a time.

The order of gameplay and combat rules remain mostly unchanged, though two substantial new rules make things a little more deliberate:

• All new troops must begin at your capital. The premise here is that you are essentially an occupying colonial army, and while the resources of each country you hold will fuel your war machine, loyal troops come from your own citizenry. Additionally, victory comes only from taking the opponent's capital. Moving troops for defense becomes as crucial, deliberate and fun as offense with these rules.

• All troops may move only one space per turn. This includes armies moved following an attack, as well as fortifying armies moved within your territories. Any troops who move forward to a conquered territory following an attack are unable to move or attack any further (lay them on their side until your turn ends).

This introduces the new gameplay element of transportation through supply lines, and deemphasizes the role of massive armies in assuring victory. In Risk, you can get your foot in the door of a new continent, and then unleash dozens of new armies ex nihilo and tear through half of the continent on your next turn. Forcing each army to fan out and move more deliberately along a chain of occupied countries prevents this, as well as limiting the time you spend in combat each turn. You might expect the "one unit, one move" rule to lengthen games by a great deal, but in our experience not only was this not the case, but turns moved more quickly and strategically with these limitations.

NOTE: As part of our desire to encourage smaller, more strategic battles, we decided to remove the escalating army bonus for turning in three-card matches, instead planting it permanently at 6 armies. We also removed the "territories divided by 3" extra troops, leaving only 3 per turn and continent bonuses. This keeps battles smaller and more strategic - you can't just conquer all willy-nilly as controlling regions becomes crucial.

CARDS AS A RESOURCE

Special attack: Every turn, you have a chance to roll a die and attempt to convert enemy armies anywhere on the board. Roll a 5, convert enemies to neutral. Roll a 6, convert them to your side. If two colors of troops remain in a space they must fight out a civil war until only one color remains. The catch is that after rolling, your second roll determines how many troops you convert, and you can only convert troops up to the number of cards you currently hold. This introduces a small element of randomness and spices up turns, and introduces the decision of whether to hold onto cards for a passive bonus or spend them for troops on your current turn.