"Realism and Accuracy Dead in Historical Miniature Wargaming?" Topic

There's wargaming…and there's Games Workshop

I sold my soul for my other hobby, so GW are out of luck :0)

Games are about decisions.

Good game designs isolate the important decisions and have the players work within their constraints, and then try to use the fewest rules possible to support the desired decision loop.

I publish an intricate minis game about spaceship combat that, in many ways, is the "historical high fidelity" title of its niche.

It gets the physics right. I did a lot of math to get the physics right. I did even more studying to make sure that math remained in sidebars in the rulebook and players had very simple binary decision points to make.

Good play aid design can significantly reduce high complexity games to something more manageable. Great play aid design even more so.

However, good or great play aid design doesn't get you the same pay off in a simpler game. Think of you play aid designs as giving a "10% reduction in cumbersome". That can be important when you're reducing a complexity 10 game down to complexity 7 or 6, but it probably only drops a complexity 6 game down to complexity 5.

Back on topic – I've seen scenes very much like the original poster described. I've also seen people use Command and Colors; Ancients as a minis rules set, and it works beautifully for them – you're making the right decisions for the right reasons, you have some issues with command and control to keep things interesting, and the games are done in an hour or two, tops.

Indeed, one of the more amusing spaceship games I've ever seen was using DBM as the rule set for formations of ships. Stands were battle groups of ships, and the stats were, I believe Parthians versus Romans. The fellow running it was getting horrified looks from the other DBM GMs – but he also had a full table of people pushing spaceships around and learning the rules. :)

I have always been interested in history, as well as uniforms and models, since I was old enough to read.

I have a library full of books on just Napoleonics alone. I am familiar with the column/ line debate, developments in artillery, and what have you. Heck, though ashamed to admit it I even sometimes follow the arguments on who wrote various dispatches at the Battle of Waterloo, when they were sent and whether or not they were received.

But my gaming experience has always been about something different. It was about rolling dice and enjoying the company of good friends, of what has been so rightly pointed out earlier here as "telling a good story". The narrative is to me more important than achieving any kind of simulation. Of course the game has to allow for some degree of representation of the tactics/maneuvres of the time relevant to the scale of the game being played, and to a level I am happy with, but personally I am much less interested in using the tabletop to "learn" about what took place on the field of battle. I do enjoy learning, but I get that from my reading instead.

As with some other here, I am not a soldier and honestly I've never had any desire to be one. This is a hobby for me and I am in warGAMING for the fun.

I think it is also fair to say that while one gamer may be really interested in, say, WW2, and want a detailed set of rules that covers aspects of combat he or she feels is important to see reflected on the tabletop, the same gamer may not feel the same about ancients or the Seven Years War in which case a fun romp with loads 'o dice may be the thing.

We are not necessarily consistent in our approaches to what is a far-ranging hobby, and nor is it desirable to be so. Room enough for all.

One thing I've noticed in designing an historical wargame is that there isn't a 'creativity hook' like there is with fantasy/scifi/pulp. My German Grenadier is defined by history, not by my imagination. I think that is a quandry Historicals will always deal with compared to phantasmagorical games.

I'm trying to keep dynamic tension in my game, with enough realistic feel to pull it off. When an Austrian Hussar charges down a Prussian Fusilier in Strike Force Commander I want both players to feel the period, the tension, and make a lot of noise at the outcome.

Realism and Historical Accuracy? Not if you play in DBX tournaments. those are as much pure fantasy as any GW game.

Hot Lead DBA Open final featured such historically accurate and realistic opponents as Later Hoplite Greek, Pictish and Medieval German. Syracuse US DBM Open: Ottoman 1471AD, Skthians 700BC, New Kingdom Egyptian 1450BC.

Need I say more about the lack of historical realism in Ancients?

The answer to the original question is actually to be found in the two areas of concentration…history and computers. For all the criticism, most of it undeserved, of computer moderated systems, they provide the greatest opportunity for players to avoid the kind of overbearing detail that led to the flight from the "historically" accurate rules towards the simplier versions, while still playing in a game that provides as good if a better simulation of the historical period than most traditional rules.

db

I'm sorry to see half of us are fighting over whatever can be found to argue over. I'm not surprised to see ing contests but even without surprise it is disappointing.

This is a topic I have very vested personal interests in. I don't think the original post intended any quality statements as to one method "easy / simple" games being bad or lesser but rather asked if "simulations / overly complex" games were dying and if that was resulting in a lack of historical accuracy.

Some people have made some very good points that should be discussed further. I lean towards simulation games but dislike most simulation rules sets. In contrast most of the people I know who play Napoleonics go for the "beer and pretzel games." Their requirements are:

I don't have to read any rules.
Someone can explain the game to me in 3-5 minutes.
There are 2 pages or less of charts (one side is one page, two sides equal two pages).
I can be done in 3 hours.

The history of it comes after that. Their historical requirements are along the lines of result rather than method as Ambush Alley brought up. Now this is not bad in concept, nor is it always bad on the table top. But just as "simulation" games can add more complexity than makes sense, "simple" games that base their historical representation solely on the result can go bad in implementation as well.

For example, a local rules set is very easy, very playable, very novel in its concepts, and leads to a completely historical result. However, players don't do *anything*. Everything is mathematical. You can do the math, arrange your troops, enter "combat" and win. I have seen many rules sets where period tactics result in losses each and every time, yet if you play the rules rather than the history, you win like clockwork.

This is the dark tunnel one must be sure to stay away from when it comes to simple games.

With simulations, there are numerous areas to fail, however, most rules I have seen that are poor or frustrating simulations fail because they do not restrict enough. Empire – great game, many people love it. But why is a corps commander making decisions about battalion formations and deployment or recall of skirmisher companies?

All things to all people = fail.

In both respects the issue is that if a player ends up playing the rules to the greatest advantage (because that is what the rules encourage) rather than doing likely historical things and using the rules as a tool to accomplish those, then simple or complex, the rules have stopped being historical.

Cheers,

The Bandit

My two cents.
Everyone learns by example.
The GM and the experienced players set the tone for the newcomers. I was blessed early on that I learned how to play, and argue from the best. Rules lawyers can take a simple game and argue every point. A complex game can be worse, because there's more to argue about. The Spartan's first retra was that none of the retras were to be written down. The fewer charts, the better the game. It's OK to have tons of material to explain the rules or set up armies, but when it's time to play all the necessary carts should fit on one page printed both sides. A new player needs to be encouraged by the people around him and told that, "It will be OK, you'll get the hang of it." Arguing with a newbie to pad ones ego is just plain mean.
Over the years I have modified other people's rules and found out that in most cases they could be simplified without changing the results in the least. That's because people who design games get criticized for accuracy more than playability. There is no set of rules that I have ever found that covers every eventuality and therefore it is important to have ladies and gentlemen who can banter and reach equitable agreement.
Does Historical gaming teach us History?
Yes. We used to play the Europa game Drang Nach Osten at the University of Wisconsin – Parkside. The Wargame club set it up and the German History Class played against the Soviet History class. I would argue that those students learned far more about Operation Barbarosa than they could have ever learned from a book (Chronology, Geography, Forces employed, Strategy, etc.). It may not have been as much fun as playing fantasy at a convention, but it sure beat writing a seminar paper on the second Five Year Plan. Everything is relative.
As a reenactor, I would also argue that standing on Little Roundtop gives you a higher level of understanding than reading a book or looking at a 2d photo of Gettysburg. Battle reenactments are horribly flawed, but they reveal a lot, even though I would never argue that they come close to understanding what it means to be shot at with real ammo.
We use house rules at our club and I leave some things deliberately open ended so the players can debate. The more they learn the more they contribute. It's all good.
Playability
I know one wargame designer who worked for the Pentagon designing simulations. He always said game design was a tradeoff between accuracy and playability. If a game is so complex that it can't be played in "real time" then it's not accurate. That's why skirmish games and first person games are losing to computers. Miniatures also suffer from scale problems when things get abstracted too much. If you have a 1-60 figure ratio why not play fantasy?

Connard:

Sorry about your "name." Actually your last post was scrolled way up the list and I went from memory and was too lazy to scroll up and back down.

Se la jeu de guerre.

I can read some French (military-related) and know many of the "bad words," but you are correct that I have no working knowledge of it. But I do have a good friend born on Madagascar who speaks it fluently so I can always bug him to translate.

I served also (overseas in many places). Wargaming can be an excellent learning tool for students to learn more about history. Actually reenactments are "wargames" of a sort and many reenactors learn a lot about history.

Adieu.

I am told that experience in marching bands can provide considerable insight as well.

Allen

"We've tried hidden deployment, limited visibility, counters to represent units, etc to try and recreate the "fog of war", but it only lasts a few turns."

When the "baby" of your gaming group is admitted to be 55, you are already dealing with "limited visibility" without doing a danged thing: counters can be confusing: "fog of war" ditto, as the game begins in a fog and proceeds in a fog, it's called senility: and no game can last more than a few turns tops because of physical distractions. My older gaming buddies have gotten really sad to watch. But as long as we are having fun, that's the main thing, right?

I also believe you simply saw a good game and a bad game, yes more complicated systems lend themselves to more arguing and tension but the players have a lot to do with that as individuals.

It is easy to get an argumentitive nut case into a simulation game and go off as it would be in a more simpler system. He will find something to argue about no matter what he plays…

The system we play is fairly complex and in-depth and yes, we have had our own fair share of arguments but I have also seen much simpler systems at gaming conventions and clubs where players go off like school kids at each other.

Rules interpretations have a great deal to do with arguments but also one's own personal idea or opinion on an outcome that should happen in a given circumstance that they feel a rules system does not portray too accurately and especially if the outcome is unfavourable to that player….

Perception of what outcome should happen in a given situation does cause a great deal of friction between players if they do not agree with the rules system so to those players I would say, find a different system that you might like. To those that whine and whinge if the player opposite moves his troops 1 or 2 inches more than he should should stipulate before the game begins that he is perdantic about it so that everyone is aware and might be more accurate about movement allowances etc.

But if that same guy continues to whinge then take him out the back and thrush him before kicking him out of the game…

Guys that argue all the time should not play war gaming, they create bad air.

Regards,
Shane

sorry, *thrash him*

I love JR II and JR III. But, when I host a game at a con I use FnF. Why? Because it's so much easier and I get the gamers doing their own admin work much sooner.

The only problem I've had in these many years was once some gamer complained about a decision I made – "I've played with the guy who wrote the rules and that's not how he did it." I wanted to say, "Who hasn't?," but I bit my tongue and ignored his aside.

When I do FIW, I use a slightly modified TSATF. Why? Because it's so much easier and TSATF attracts gamers who are there for fun and expect to have fun. Those are the gamers I want at my table.

I'm too old and long married to fight about rules. I've read too much history to give a crap about the minor errors or inconsistencies in gaming rules. I can easily ignore them and press on with the mechanics at hand. I do not need to win, and I don't care about losing. My sense of self-worth is not defined by the performance of toy soldiers on a table top. I just want to have fun, laughs, and a few cheers. I save the serious simulations when playing with friends, that way when we find an error we can usually work out a very amicable solution. I like simple at conventions. All I want to know is the objective, how far can I move, and when can I shoot. That's a pretty shallow attitude, but all I want to do is push lead at a convention.

On gaming being useless as a teaching exercise: not in my experience. Laying out a battle on the scale terrain gives the history buff an entirely different and clearer picture of what went down. Where wargaming does not reflect war is in the actual experiencing of battle. There is no reason to denigrate a historical outcome as something worthless, when the players took historical steps during the wargame and achieved historical results. That teaches the gamers about how tactics worked.

I love this topic. These "Realism vs. Playability" debates are wonderful. Please note the following comments are from an amateur historian and lifelong civilian wargamer. As such you may take as many grains of salt as necessary to digest the following.

As has been said, a lot of designers who are attempting to simulate reality make some mistakes in their fundamental thought processes. One of them is the belief that in depth modeling of the process will generate historical results. The problem with this is that it adds a level of complexity that is unnecessary most of the time for the application at hand. Who needs to roll for load, aim, fire sequence of musketeers to see who hits when you could just as easily have them roll a to hit number and look up a value on a single simple chart?

Then there is the need to cram as much "detail" as possible into a rules set. Detail does look authoritative and impressive but it isn't always what we are looking for. Most of the time what we are looking for is an end result that isn't precise but reasonably so. For many of us how precise the final outcome is isn't as important as how long it takes for the outcome. As stated above one of the best tests for the accuracy of a game his how long it takes to play through a turn. IF it takes longer to play through a turn than the real time interval the turn represents then there is something wrong with the design.

Also there is the issue of, for lack of a better term "signal to noise ratio" or the cancellation effect. Many times the little fiddlybits added in by designers to improve the "accuracy" of their rules only succeed in making them more complex and they wind up canceling themselves out and become "noise". What we want is "signal" or real data coming back for us to process and use in our decision making process.

Another big bugaboo of mine is loss of command perspective. Some rules claim one level but force you to consider (i.e. work in) another perspective level entirely. This is a disaster waiting to happen in my opinion. If I'm playing a company level WWII game I really don't care what Von Rundstedt or Eisenhower are thinking about, nor do I care all that much about how PFC Simmons is doing other than if he's in the fight yet or not. I do a lot of naval gaming and its a big problem here as there are rules that like to focus on how much damage took place in such and such a compartment when what you are really interested in maneuvering and fighting your task force or squadron.

I suppose one of the most enlightening things I'd ever read on wargaming was in a handgun magazine. Author Massad Ayoob had written a piece on the great .45 vs. 9mm controversy and described the relative strengths and weaknesses of both calibers as well as some historical background and philosophy as to which were better for what. In the end he conceded that the .45 has considerably better stopping power without the need for fancy ammunition. He also stated the 9mm is a much easier weapon for a non shooter, or one who practices infrequently to come to terms with more quickly than a .45. Ultimately however he said the important thing in either case was shot placement, not just caliber in determining the kill potential of the weapon.

What does that mean for us? Don't get tied up in the details too deeply. Determine what the important factors at the end of the battle are THEN start designing. What that means for us is to look for games and GMs that can provide the OUTCOME we seek in a simple a fashion as possible. It also means that you CAN have a good simulation without having to deal with tons of poorly structured, complex charts and tables if you don't want to and still have fun.

>>Games are about decisions.

>>Good game designs isolate the important decisions and have the players work within their constraints, and then try to use the fewest rules possible to support the desired decision loop.

This is an almost perfect statement of a game design philosophy. I venture to modify it by quoting Sid Meier, "A game is a series of *interesting* decisions."

>>I suppose one of the most enlightening things I'd ever read on wargaming was in a handgun magazine. Author Massad Ayoob had written a piece on the great .45 vs. 9mm controversy

He might have added that armies don't fight with pistols anyway, so that the whole controversy was fairly meaningless. But of course, it was more about national feeling than ballistics or logistics, and this illustrates the point that psychology plays a major part in any human activities.

Whether it is a board game or miniaures game the tendency has been for the rules to become more complex and less fun. Recently games like Flames of War, Victory at Sea, and GASLIGHT have put some fun back into historical miniatures. Everyone decries the ongoing shift to Fantasy games but I can see why the younger set have little interest in historical miniatures. The rules are abysmal, the figures drab compared to their Space Marines, and as you noted the rules lawyers abound. Outside of a few games like Flames of War I dont think you are going to get the younger people back and a lot of us older guys have given up too.

No offence meant to Allen57, but that is pure poppycock!
The quality of historical rules are generally far better than sci-fi/fantasy ones, and any comment about rules lawyers in a post also referencing Space Marines is very funny to say the least!

Of the historical rules examples given most complaints about them are that they are too simple and don't reflect tactical/doctrinal/historical 'reality', and that you can't actually use the rules to produce historical engagements without fudging (calling Derek H!).

I think where there is a valid point is that it is easier when you have open-ended outcomes available (i.e. with historical games and rules there is a consensus at least that one side won and the another lost, which is not the case with sci-fi/fantasy as there's nothing to base anything on) and that by not having to toe a strict line of 'this is what happened' the background/marketing fluff to a game can be more easily dynamically produced. This is not the same however as saying the fluff is bound to be more interesting in a sci-fi/fantasy background.

Phew!

Cheers,

Martin

"Of the historical rules examples given most complaints about them are that they are too simple and don't reflect tactical/doctrinal/historical 'reality', and that you can't actually use the rules to produce historical engagements without fudging (calling Derek H!)."

Might as well ring up Cato the Elder and ask him his thoughts regarding Carthage, while you're at it.

Allen

Might as well ring up Cato the Elder and ask him his thoughts regarding Carthage, while you're at it.

I was thinking more of scaling issues actually.

Do you have a number for Cato? I've heard his mobile's generally best to get hold of him.

Cheers,

Martin

I am told that experience in marching bands can provide considerable insight as well.

Allen

What I remember is that faux bearskins suck (too heavy and hot-wish we'd had shako's) and that keeping the white piping and striping on the uniform clean was a real pain.

I expect there are youngsters playing fantasy, who will take up historical games too when their horizons broaden.

While I did start out with fantasy (Warhammer, specifically) and eventually switched to historicals, I would not lay this at the feet of broadened horizons. It was rather a combination of what people around me play – in particular, I began with Warhammer because that was what the people who got me into miniatures games played -, specific rules-sets (DBA just suits my tastes better than Warhammer does), and the realization that the, in my eyes, weakest parts of fantasy rule-sets tends to be the magic, flyers, and heroic characters, all of which are conveniently lacking in pre-modern historicals (well, some have heroes, but rarely of warhammerian stature).

I strangely went from historicals (ACW & Napoleonics) to sci-fi (BattleTech) to fantasy (D&D), though I never stopped historicals and have done the others only for short periods (couple years here couple years there).

AdAstraGames – Very good point about games and decision making.

Tom Bryant – Your statement about command perspective is dead-on.

As someone who likes "simulation" level games, I detest most rules because they "simulate" every level. If it is a game where a player commands a corps, then I need to know what is happening with divisions, battalions should be on the field, perhaps some route and some hold within a given division, but the time I spend determining their status should be incredibly small if any. I should never be deciding if 1st battalion of the 85th ligne should recall its skirmishers before the enemy cavalry make contact. I should be *restricted* by the rules to remain in my role as a corps commander. At the lease there should be penalties to my command and control if I choose to interfere with the lower levels of command – just as Ney did not maintain command of the VI Corps at Jena when he took a couple battalions and squadrons up to the main line. He was not able to simply call in the bulk of his divisions by radio to support him because he was too busy being in the middle of the fight.

Restrictions on players to keep them within the scope of the rules is good, it may mean that players would choose different favorite rules sets based on a narrower definition of their desired scale, but that is not bad.

Cheers,

The Bandit

The search for a historical game is prone to frustration.

Finding others who are like minded to the history of something is hard: how often do you find yourself playing with someone who is really into the rules and just doesn't care at all about the history behind them. "The rules allow me to change from line to square and back to line facing in a different direction and firing at full effect in a turn, so what?" but "General Wellington, who is that?"

Finding someone who is like minded about period and scale is hard: how often do you find yourself in a situation where you find someone who is really into what you're into and both willing and able to do figs in the same scale and kind of quality? "I like WSS and think that if we spray paint these 6mm figs red or white depending on the side we're good to go" but "No, haven't you seen these Front Rank napoleonics Kevin Dallimore painted? And by the way do you have the latest histoire and collections volume on the french hussars?"

And what about what level of game you want? "Oooh, this peninsula skirmish game looks cool?" But "Wouldn't it be nice to do the battle of Blenheim with every battalion represented?"

Now that you've narrowed it down to someone who is like minded and into the same period and scale, where do we find a table we can play on that doesn't have edge of the world issues?

And this would be a lot more realistic if you couldn't charge with everything on the last turn in a desperate bid to take that town and win a marginal victory. Perhaps you can find a campaign system that would take that away, except on the last turn of the campaign game of course……

I'm still searching for historical nirvana but am under no pretenses about finding it. I've learned to avoid playing with people who game for gaming sake but deal with having to be really flexible about a lot of other things.

[If someone watched a wargame where people were shooting rubber bands at army men and next to it was a Napoleonic wargame with painted miniatures what would they think? If we have painted, historically attired miniatures, and more detailed terrain--is the only difference the delusion that we are doing something more "mature" or historical (to fool ourselves into thinking that we are not playing with army men)?]

On one level, it wouldn't matter at all. If your game design had you resolving artillery fire by shooting rubber bands… (Canister range, shoot from 4" away; Roundshot, shoot the rubber band from 12" away – long range or muddy ground, shoot the rubber band from 20" away)… would that really be so different from rolling a die and letting whatever random number comes up on the die determine your outcome?? Both are pretty silly when you think about it. (At least the rubber-band will let your fire have "penetration" in a single action, because it might knock down some figures behind the one you're aiming at!)

As Last Hussar and some others have said, a really well-designed and well-thought-out *simple* game is a wonderful thing. Many, many hours of thinking and testing go into a good game, even though the finished product might seem "simplistic."

I always used to think of the super-complex games as basically just bad or lazy game-design. When you need to check four different tables and then roll a d20, and then take that result over here to get modified again, and then roll percentiles against another table, and then take that result over here to the loss chart and cross-index it with a d6…..

…that's not "attention to detail." That's just bad game design. A good game would have found a way to consider all those factors, either by wrapping them into other mechanisms, simplifying the math and the number of steps, changing the randomizers, etc, etc… And done it in a fraction of the time without all the charts and calculations.

Yet there will be some old grognard who still believes that the old way is "historically accurate," because Look! I'm Using a load of Charts and Tables! And your way is "Fantasy Gaming."

The quality of historical rules are generally far better than sci-fi/fantasy ones, and any comment about rules lawyers in a post also referencing Space Marines is very funny to say the least!

OK, you're going to have to a) back up your first statement and b) explain the logic behind the second. Somehow if your game is in a fictional setting* you can't nitpick the rules? Nonsense. We managed to derail the Paranoia card game with a rules argument on Sunday.

*as opposed to simply being a fictional game. As soon as you roll a die for a combnat resolution, your game is a fantasy.

As for learning history, I can safely say I learned no history playing wargames. I learned a bit from reading up on the subject, but that's not wargaming; that's research, and I can do that without gaming. Probably moreso, since I'm not having my thinking distorted by the game rules.

What do you mean by "historically accurate", anyway? Plenty of battles involve unique factors – the Prussians turning up on time at Waterloo, the Light Brigade misunderstanding their vague orders, etc. Should the game force these decisions/events on the players, or should they be allowed to not make the choice that lost/won the battle?

I'm fairly certain that meant that the comment about rules lawyers is funny precisely because there's a lot of rules lawyery in WH40k.

I tend to agree with charles as I enjoy it as a game. don't get me wrong i love my history and the study of it. love my austrians that get their tushes handed to them 75% of the time but its ok. even fight like an austrian general i am afraid..more a schwarzenberg than a charles. how ever truth be told we do have a lot of prima donas about who should relax a bit. especially in the need of recruitment of younger players. who wants to be around a bunch of witchy old buzzards? take a drink or whatever and relax and enjoy. i am afraid nothing will restore the old dynasties so just find a suitable set of rules, paint, and revel in the fact that i win 2 out of 10 games against the french or am i exaggerating..yeah i am lol.

In responding only to the original post, I must wonder if it's not the rules but the people who are attracted to those rules. Are "historically accurate" rules attracting a bunch of fussy grognards with poor social skills who only want to show off their mastery of the subject matter? Are the other rules attracting people who are participating in a game and are there to have fun?

All in all, though, I think that the REAL difference in the types of gamers can be found lurking in the definition of the term "historically accurate." I strongly suspect you mean "simulation," as opposed to a "game." Games are for fun and simulations are for teaching history. I suspect they attract different types of people that inherently influence the type of gameplay you'll find at the table.

By the way, as anyone who has read Gutshot (or visited our Website) can attest, I am firmly in the "let's have fun" camp. Murphy also likes to have fun, but he's much more entrenched in the "historically accurate" camp. That being said, I've seen him run some very nice historically accurate games, and everyone at his table seemed to be having fun. So maybe it has more to do wtih the players than the rules being played.

>>What do you mean by "historically accurate", anyway?

Good question. To me, it's a game that lets players use historical tactics to tackle historical problems and achieve realistic historical results. By which I mean that Napoleonics focuses on the handling of the three arms, and doesn't make the French win every time by giving them a +3 for Imperial Guard or whatever.

mitchel, exactly my point about the socially inept gamers who make a fun situation akin to skin disorder. something you avoid and when it happens what an agony. being a gentleman is not too difficult and considering others feelings and not having to bombast others as needing to have ones way all the time. one can only achieve so much in historical accuracy after all. consider the other people playing over the ability of a landwehr battalion to form a clump in given time or whatever. be a gentleman and maybe other gamers would not rum from our games. not to difficult.

The other aspect of game design I like point out is that rules sets should be evaluated as reward mechanisms rather than constraint systems.

Don't look at your wargame as a set of rules to keep people from doing ahistorical or undesired tactics.

Look at them as a set of linked reward mechanisms instead. People are doing this for fun; carrots are more fun than sticks and much more effective to boot.

Whenever possible, use the result of the die roll as the final modifier rather than a driver in a table lookup.

If your choice is "table lookup" and "player does math more complex than addition, subtraction or counting", use the table lookup. Use a die roll plus one math step to drive which column or row you look up on a table if you must.

Make your modifiers have the same sign – either have all positive modifiers (best) or all negative modifiers (second best) if players are doing math at the table. Every math step a player has to do is another barrier to entry.

Study statistics and probability curves and distributions; these are your tools of the trade.

And focus on the interesting and important decisions above all else.

Hi

The above, to paraphrase, do historical gamers in this also do fantasy like pirates and the like. I know Ross and I have, I am not sure I know about most of the others.

Back in the 70s for the first trek movie, Michael Scott(Kurtic) and I were given a task of producing in two weeks a game to be released with the movie.

What we had DONE was a monster sytem with modules for "science fiction" role play. Each module was done to relflect a specific work as a RPG. With no time, we just chopped down "the monster" to just the stuff related to trek.

But the core of the approach was to produce a game that allowed the players to simulate the source work. In this case, you could "play" out your own plausable Star Trek episode (pre-B&B boredom).

Jerry Pournelle had had us do a module for him to let him game his "Falkenberg" mercs universe and so on.

In these cases the sim was the fiction or fantasy.

Did a module, for fun, to allow the George Pal version of Jason and the Argonauts. My group and I have seriously discussed the various ways animated skeletons perform in various works.

In my gaming, I am not really interested in some gaming universe, but I do love gaming in a published fictional universe. And I have figs.

Scotty and I had a raft of never released trek related figs that were supposed to go with the first movie!

So, ya, real or fiction.

Rocky

Everyone likes pirates!

Come to think of it, pirates are historical, except for the ninja zombie type.

Wargaming should be as close to No limit Texas Hold em as possible. An incredibly easy set of mechanics to learn easily and quickly, coupled with a plethora of decisions to make using these simple mechanics. Not what rule to use or misuse, or interpret one way or the other! Just decision making (informed or guesswork) and a simple way to come to a conclusion. TSATF comes closest. Simple rule basics and organizations matched with well painted figures, lots of terrain, and WELL THOUGHT OUT SCENARIOS!! equals fun times for me. The quality of the wargame is mostly in the hands of the players when all is said and done. kinda like all games are really!

Man, this is the thread for great analogies! Doc Dennis, you've absolutely nailed it, as far as I'm concerned. I may print that up and hang it on the wall as a reminder of what a game designer should be shooting for in a finished product.

Docdennis

I wholeheatedly agree with Ambush Alley and intend to have it engraved on a plaque over my hobby desk. Maybe the next time I find myself worked up into a lather over the differences in ballistics between a Springfield and an Enfield rifle and how that should be incorporated into an ACW miniature rules firing table – and I'm ashamed to say I've done just that – it will bring be back to my senses.

Docdennis

I wholeheartedly agree with Ambush Alley and intend to hang it over my hobby desk. Maybe next time I work up a lather over the differences in ballistics between a civil war Springfield and Enfield rifle and how that can be incorporated into a firing table – and I'm ashamed to admit I've done just that – it will bring me back to my senses.

Well I have been Wargaming since the late 60's and early 70's since that was when I was in the shooting rubber bands at Army Men stage. Boy did we have some great battles also (I had quite a few Army Men way back then).

But the one thing I really prefer is that if you are going to fight Waterloo then outside of setting up the table the game should be able to be completed during one day of gaming (the real battle was done is less than a day). Now we all have played games where the rulesets being used would require upwards to a week or more to fight the battle of Waterloo.

So like Doc as stated you really want rules that can be able to allow you to fight Borodino in a day. But many rules out there just cannot do this.

I just want realism in how the battle should happen and it does not need to be Historically accurate. I once fought a Gettysburg battle were as an Union Corps Commander I crushed Longstreet and was in the process of rolling up the Rebel flank. Though down at the other end battlefield the Rebels were overrunning the Union forces on Culp's Hill.

Enjoying the game should be the most important thing and I quit playing 40K and WFB just because I stop enjoying the game due to decisions made be GW.

Little Wars was played using Britains' toy cannons that shot matchsticks.

An excellent thread – I'll return to read it again. But for me the point is whether complicated or simple, the game is played with some gamesmanship and since you play against a mate, most of the antagonism is taken out of it, right? It's simple for me- I roll forward , the advnace is checked, I am forced back, my opponent commiserates and I see my therapist.

An enthralling thread – can't but be carried away, so…
@ Lest We Forget: "It's not merely a game, otherwise we would be getting some unpainted plastic army men out and shoot rubber bands across the table?"
Visual appeal Of couse such a game would attract fewer onlookers, and make fewer converts, than a diorama-like table with masses of attractively painted minis. Were visual appeal not an essential ingredient of wargaming, we would be boardgaming.
But it has nothing to do with 'historicity', even less 'accuracy'. My Ancient army gained a lot of attention, and it was totally un-historical. OK, it was made of scantily clad Amazons and the onlookers were young males titillated by their rising testosterone, so this example may be not *that* conclusive. But another group member had a 'Zamorian' army of Ral Partha Elves that was as eye-candy as the (marvelous) Achaemenid Persian army of a 3rd player.
Some of us take pride from the historical accuracy of their painting – the reward for reading and research. Other prefer to let their creativity design original uniforms, flag and countries. Both have their own source of enjoyment, self-gratification, in addition to the eventual tabletop games. I emphatically decline to 'rank' them, to judge 'seriousness / adulthood' against 'creativity / originality'.
And this is totally independent from the 'accuracy / realism' of the rules. C. Grant put a lot of thought and work in his 'Wargame' Lace Wars rules, used them successfully to refight Mollwitz and Fontenoy, but choose to campaign at the head of the fictitious Vereinigte Freie Staedte.

Btw, between the "200% historical" games and the "weird" Fantasy / Sci-Fi ones lay those using Imagi-Nations – games in a fictitious, but not 'fantasy', setting. The practice is a venerable tradition among Ancient-Medieval (since Tony Bath's famous 'Hyboria' campaign) and Lace Wars (since "The Wargame" and "Charge!" books of the early "70) gamers, but is largely ignored in other wargaming circles. Btw, I just noticed this thread was Xposted neither on the Ancients nor on the 18th C. boards: maybe ły humble post will provide a discovery to a few fellows gaming in other eras?.

@ Lest We Forget: "I think that the "playing with toy soldiers" analogy is overgeneralized. One can learn from a game (which is not the same thing as claiming that it accurately simulates warfare)."
All we can learn from from the actual gaming is to become better players – and yes, that's the very point of 'professional' military simulations. Within the hobby, unfortunately, some translate it to 'To find and exploit the loopholes in the rules', but it's quite another topic.
We learn History in our readings.
Even what we could learn from a boardgame campaign is trivial, obvious – generalities. And, in the detail, History never repeats itself.

@ several posters: relationships between complication and accurate simulation: all has already be said along this thread. I may add a comment from my RPG experience (and there is a part of RPG in wargaming, in that we are acting the part of a 'commander'). Overcomplicated rules not only are boring, but they actually *hinder* realistic play. With rules (Rolemaster comes to mind) that expect you to have as many arms as an Indi deity, to manage two pocket computers, several handfuls of dice, written records and aspirin at the same time, you don't have a chance not even to 'play', but -being overloaded- to merely 'play your role'.

@ PK Inc: "Is enthusiasm for historical miniatures gaming dead?"
Obviously not. But, if I may, 'mainstream' players in some historical era work very hard to kill it.
Besides, as mentioned above, one can use historical minis in non-historical games. re. the whole merry 'Emperor vs Elector' web bunch TMP link .

@ Stavka: wholeheartedly seconded!

@ Dave Crowell: "Hot Lead DBA Open final featured such historically accurate and realistic opponents as Later Hoplite Greek, Pictish and Medieval German. Syracuse US DBM Open: Ottoman 1471AD, Skthians 700BC, New Kingdom Egyptian 1450BC. Need I say more about the lack of historical realism in Ancients?"
Here you are denying yourself one of the most enjoyable features of AncMed gaming, a feature that was dearly cultivated in the early days of the SOA and 'Slingshot': *diversity*. In later times most of the wars 'wargamed' now were between countries belonging to the same civilisation, to the very same culture. At some points battles opposed armies that were almost mirror images colored differently. On the opposite Ancient wars were often between different civilisations, and more than 2 or 3 were interacting at a given time. The same same Roman
legionary could, along his career, meet hairy barbarians in the North, then the equivalent of medieval knights in the East. Thus, 'verbatim' History notwithstanding, there is nothing 'logically blaphemous' to see all armies, worldwide, from 3500 BC to 1500 AD as potential opponents (Hyboria, again). Indeed, even from more recent times if from some 'exotic' area: Victorian Zulus fielded, 'technically', an Ancient army.

@ Knight Templar: excellent! Thanks, this thread is *so* serious….

a Martin Penneck – but also all those of the opposite opinion: sorry, the 'quality' of rules has nothing to do with their 'Historical' or 'Fantasy / Sci-Fi' nature. Remove flyers and magicians from a *good* (however you define it) fantasy set and you have a good AncMed one. Add a few sound rules for Mongolfieres and steampowered warwagons to a *good* Lace Wars set and you get a good Lacepunk one. link

@ Andrew Paul: "As soon as you roll a die for a combat resolution, your game is a fantasy." You are dead on the point. Actually every battle*game* IS a Fantasy /Sci-Fi game. To remain strictly historical, one can only move his troops and remove casualties in strict accordance to the successsive stages of an historical battle. An animated historical display, that can be both instructive and an eye-candy, but not a *game* at all. As soon as you *play*, allow some freedom to the players, introduce random /chance factors of any kind, you fall through a Warp Portal in some 'Alternate History' universe where Frederick can be taken prisoner or killed during the 1st Silesian War, the Prince Pretender win at Culloden, Wolfe or Washington be killed early in the FIW…

@ mmitchell: "I must wonder if it's not the rules but the people who are attracted to those rules. Are "historically accurate" rules attracting a bunch of fussy grognards with poor social skills who only want to show off their mastery of the subject matter? Are the other rules attracting people who are participating in a game and are there to have fun?" A very good point, but which raises an interesting subsidiary question: Why do some eras seemingly attract preferentially one of the two types of players? (Dodges for cover…)

Again, get carried away!
Cheers to all,
Jean-Louis

Abdul

You're right. I should hace xposted to Ancients and the 18th century. But to be honest I never expected this level of interest across what appears to be the entire world of miniature gaming. We've got fantasy and science fiction players corresponding with hard-core historical grognards – and very civilly, I might add.

@ abdul666lw:

"All we can learn from from the actual gaming is to become better players – and yes, that's the very point of 'professional' military simulations."
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This I disagree with strongly. Stating a limitation of what can be learned from a given experience generally results in an untrue statement and is narrow minded. If the rules represent anything accurately then we can learn something of what was from that representation. For instance, charging a formed infantry line head-on with cavalry in the ACW is suicide. Infantry formed square to avoid their flanks being turned and allow for mutual fire support between battalions during the Napoleonic Wars. These things are bore out in war games, yes it makes you a better player, but it also tells you information about why troops did what they did back then. You are learning something historical in many instances. I think – from the second part of your statement – that you realize this.

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"Within the hobby, unfortunately, some translate it to 'To find and exploit the loopholes in the rules', but it's quite another topic."
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Agreed, that is something I touched on in an earlier post and I my opinion on it is that some rules lend themselves more to this than others. I do think it is a related topic though, what Mosby's first post mentioned was that the simple gamers did not argue over every rule but the historical / complex gamers were bickering constantly. My experience has been that people bicker in both settings over whether the rules are appropriate and if they encourage historical behavior / tactics by players.

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"We learn History in our readings."
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We learn history a lot of places. I learned a lot walking the fields of Gettysburg when I was 12. Not all history is in books. For instance, here is a blog of a gentlemen from this message board who used a miniatures diorama to demonstrate the fragility of a line of battle to his HS students because books and documentaries could not make it clear:

link

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"Even what we could learn from a boardgame campaign is trivial, obvious – generalities. And, in the detail, History never repeats itself."
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In the details it is often different – true, but I don't think that makes any of this trivial. Certainly it *can be trivial* perhaps it *should be trivial* but that is up to the people involved, not the subject at point of discussion. We generally find things trivial, obvious, generalities when either we ourselves have mastered them or we personally see no importance in them, but to make a sweeping statement that there is nothing of value there for anyone is sorta silly because it is never accurate.

Cheers,

The Bandit

Hi

I have run a lot of FIW games, love the period. So, some years ago, one of the players travelled to PA for various reasons and had an excuse for a couple days off. Hit Great meadows and braddok's and so on. Called me at the end of the day. I was greated with "NOW I understand the WHY of forest rules!"

so, ya, well written historical rules can teach.

Rocky

I'm fairly certain that meant that the comment about rules lawyers is funny precisely because there's a lot of rules lawyery in WH40k

Bang on! :)

Cheers,

Martin

OK, you're going to have to a) back up your first statement

What I meant with rule quality is that stuff like 'I Ain't Been Shot Mum', the Polemos series of rules, Piquet, 'Grande Armee', 'Fire and Fury' and 'Crossfire' are all far more innovative in viewing the battle as an event and as a game, both in terms of the forces, command and control, rule mechanisms and player interaction than lots of sci-fi/fantasy rules.

Cheers,

Martin

I HOPE they can teach. We've got a couple of honest to gosh military units using our rules as a training tool!