Richard III

When you start a new game, you must choose a side or "Solo" if you wish to play solitaire. There is more solitaire information below.
Before doing anything else, set Preferences under the File menu item. The following items (except password) are under the General sub-menu.
1. Choose a password if you have not already. Do not change it once you start a game.
2. If you trust your opponent and are playing by email, you might enable "opponents can unmask my pieces." This lets your opponent reveal your blocks in case you forget.
3. Enable "Mark Moved Pieces" if you want to track which units you or your opponent moved.
4. I like to enable "Moving stacks should pick up non-moving pieces." It means when you put units on a stack, they automatically create a new stack.

[2-player only] All blocks are laying face-up on the board. Press the "hide" button on the toolbar to flip upright your blocks. Each block will have "upright" printed in its lower left corner. These buttons do not work in solo mode.
Every card or piece in a Vassal module has its own command menu. You see it if you hold the cursor over the object and click your right-mouse button.
Open your pool window (toolbar). The hide button here will flip these blocks upright. When you send blocks to your pool (right click command on block), they will stack in the lower left square. Spread them out if you wish.
The heirs who are not yet in the game are stacked on the right edge of the map.
The card deck and discard piles are on the map. Open your hand window and draw 7 cards to it. You don't need to shuffle the deck because Vassal automatically shuffles it. You will see a "card back" icon on the drawn card. This means it is face down and hidden from your opponent. You will need to either drop it on the discard or turn it face up (right-click command) so he can see it. When you play a card, place it on the map over your colored dot, which is located beneath the draw and discard piles. When the hand is done, you can send the discards to the draw pile with a right-click command on the discard pile. (Both decks have right-click menus.)
When you kill a block, it will either go to the pool or to the graveyard. The graveyard is an unmarked area in the lower left corner of the map. If the Rebel is killed, it goes to a spot in the Irish Sea.
Killed mercenaries do not go to their homes. If they did, you would not be able to distinguished between killed and live mercenaries. They instead go to the pool. You must remember to send them home during the intermissions. They have right-click commands to do that.
In the real game, there are pairs of red and white blocks for all the Traitors. It is not necessary here. Use a right-click command to change a block's side.
The Rebel block has a change sides command. When killed, it will not go to the red or white pool. Instead it will go to a spot in the Irish Sea. You must move it to a pool manually if you choose to do that.
There is a battleboard on the toolbar that you may choose to use. Move your blocks here, and don't forget to flip your blocks so they are revealed. The hide button here (unlike on the main map) both reveals and hides blocks.
1. Use the target markers to point to blocks. It saves typing. For example, instead of typing, "Stanley fires at the King", simply put the target markers next to Stanley and the King.
2. Use the 1-4 markers to designate hits (especially in PBEM). You can duplicate and delete them. The Markers window on the toolbar has more of them.
3. When you move blocks here, put the battle marker in the map area to remember where they came from. The battle marker has a right-click command to return it to the battleboard.

Solo Play: The colored buttons with the "S" are for Solo play. They do not work unless you choose "Solo" as your side. Likewise, when doing Solo, the hide buttons only work in 2-player mode. If you press either S button, the blocks of that color will turn over to their solid colored side. That should be enough to get you going.