"What is 'bathtubbing'?" Topic

Hi everyone. I have been lurking about a week, and this will be my first post.

I have been a gamer for about five years, and just recently heard the term 'bathtubbing' used. I got the idea that it means scaling down a battle in some way. Any help with the definition?

While I cant help you with that term,let me be the first to say Welcome!

An extreme example of bath-tubbing would be to take a WWII game where each unit is a platoon. Say one side has three platoons and the other has two. Now declare that each platoon represents a division and play on without changing the rules. That's a bathtub game.

I often switch up or down a level, in a black powder game declaring each battalion represents a two-battalion regiment or conversely a wing of a battalion. The more levels of unit you transcend (platoon-company-battalion-regiment-division) the more distorted the result.

Imagine Patton's Third Army taking cover behind a house.

A very, very, very big house.

but it does represent Paris ;-)

my grannie used to say it had something to do with 'gin'…

Wow, I have been way off on this one for years. I thought it was when you painted figures while soaking in the tub…In fact, I was about to ask if anyone else was having troubles with strange colored rings around their toes after cleaning their brushes.

generally bathtubbing is switching down in scale from historical battles to the tabletop game. It is a convenient way to introduce historical force balances, conditions, terrain, etc. into your game of choice. Many battles are much better described at larger scales than at smaller scales, and creating a bathtub game lets you take advantage of that.

E.g. I am creating a bathtub scenario for this weeks FOW game with my local group based on the second day at Sidi Rezegh. Battalions > Companies for this conversion, so the 5th Panzer Regiment (two battalions), will hit the table as two companies of Panzers. As is often then case in bathtub games, some of the supporting elements cannot be further subdivided, so a single reconaissance platoon in the original OOB will still have to appear as a platoon if I want the capabilities available, although it can show up as understrength in the bathtub version.

Welcome and well met. If these apes give you a hard time, just let me know. I'll send Critterette round to give them Thorazine and Electro-Shock Therapy.

Some even think that about me!

Not me though.

In fact, I was about to ask if anyone else was having troubles with strange colored rings around their toes after cleaning their brushes.

Is that what you kids are calling it now?
Welcome again, we know you are going to like it here.

A lesser example of bath-tubbing are the 25mm Napoleonic games using 1:20 units. In the refights of the larger battles each battalion on the tabletop represents around 3 battalions in the real battle. A French corps has around 10-14 units on the table versus the 30-40 battalions they would field in real life.

Naval games in a more realistic setting than the tabletop.

John, Critterette is back from Aussieland you know?

Normally I'm not so dense as to not be able to figure out the origins of a word's usage. Even though I understand what it means in this context, I can't for the life of figure out why it is used in this context. What made someone say, "I'm going to field these three companies, but they are going to represent battalions and I'll call it bathtubbing?"

Something that many wargamers need to become familiar with?

Welcome. You may find this old TMP thread helpful.

TMP link

What made someone say, "I'm going to field these three companies, but they are going to represent battalions and I'll call it bathtubbing?"

The allusion is to toy boats in a bathtub. I think the first example was the whole dang Barbarossa campaign, shrunk down to about a corps of Command Decision troops on each side and played on the Fire In The East/Scorched Earth maps.

You'll notice that it does not mean bathing before a convention.

"I'm going to field these three companies, but they are going to represent battalions and I'll call it bathtubbing?"

That was pretty much my question. Maybe it's the same idea as playing with boats in a bathtub?

Is it like "sea-gulling" or "tea-bagging"?
I don't know what these terms mean either but the terms see to amuse some of my friends and to be honest I just laugh along & pretend I do ….

dude………

"sand-bagging" is my favourite….its the same as "tea-bagging" just involves larger constituent parts…. (apparently)

christot is bragging again…..

You'll notice that it does not mean bathing before a convention.

Maybe it should…

"Bathtubbing", well, that's always meant PLAYING in the tub. Of course new terms can arise. That's anyone's privilege. But I'm not going to encourage this one….

LOL Luke! Ok, just for completeness, and risking my own incarceration for profanity:

"Sea Gulling" is the practice of swooping in, making a LOT of noise, crapping all over everything, then flying away. Often times, managers do this, and the term is never used in a flattering way. It's a tiny bit like the "Helicopter Parent" effect, where parents hover around their kids all the time, waiting to swoop in and take care of every little problem they might have.

"Tea Bagging" is a vulgar spin-off from multiplayer video game "etiquette" (and I use the term loosely), where a player, after killing another player, will repeatedly crouch over the dead player's corpse, symbolically dunking their, um, "tea bags" in the other player's [redacted].

Yuck.

At least two people have answered him seriously! He should think himself lucky.

Suppose that I wanted to game the Battle of Arracourt, and found out that I needed 60 Shermans and 60 Panthers. I have 20 of each. So, I scale the battle down so that instead of playing with battalions, I am playing with companies.

Or, I have the "Command decision" scenario book "Bengazi Handicaps", but I play Flames of War.
Even though BH is at the next higher level, I can still play all the scenarios with FoW unit organization, with some very minor crunching to eliminate anomalies.

Basically, if you want to do Team Cherry or Team Desobry before Bastogne, but you do not have enough figures to Do The Real Thing™, you adjust the scenario downwards to the next level so the number of tanks, etc., requitred for the scenaro reflects what you have or your table size or the time you have for the game.

Or, as Woody Allen said, "My first wife was so immature. I was playing with my ships, and she came into the bathroom and sank them all."

"sand-bagging" is my favourite….its the same as "tea-bagging" just involves larger constituent parts…. (apparently)

That's not the meaning of sandbagging. SB is a card term (Bridge/Spades) where somebody consistently under bids the # of tricks they can take.

The age of innocence is not over :)

LOL Luke! Ok, just for completeness, and risking my own incarceration for profanity:

"Sea Gulling" is the practice of swooping in, making a LOT of noise, crapping all over everything, then flying away. Often times, managers do this, and the term is never used in a flattering way. It's a tiny bit like the "Helicopter Parent" effect, where parents hover around their kids all the time, waiting to swoop in and take care of every little problem they might have.

"Tea Bagging" is a vulgar spin-off from multiplayer video game "etiquette" (and I use the term loosely), where a player, after killing another player, will repeatedly crouch over the dead player's corpse, symbolically dunking their, um, "tea bags" in the other player's [redacted].

Almost completely incorrect. Try the Urban Dictionary. However stupid some of its definitions are, it's pretty much on the money(shot) with these two.

…and bathtubbing does rather sound like a third slightly deviant sexual practice

The problem with so-called bathtubbing is that you increase the representation (i.e. a company becomes a battalion) but do not reduce the ground scale to compensate. This gives rise to the ludicrous situation where (for example) artillery can fire from Kiev to Moscow (as Martin Rapier said in the thread linked above).

Mike, they are only prolems if you want them to be. If you want your company size battle to epresent divisions, you ar merely fighting a battle.game. Don't over-think it. If you have enough tanks to do Kursk at 1:1 nd the space, go for it. If you hate all rules at division lever, you can either bathtub or play a boardgame. Nothing wrong with boardgames.

"Mike, they are only problems if you want them to be."

Surely you jest? How can it possibly be right that artillery should be able to fire at a range of 470 miles?

"If you hate all rules at division level, you can either bathtub or play a boardgame. Nothing wrong with boardgames."

No I do not hate all rules at division level and I agree there is nothing wrong with boardgames. I do however think that weapon ranges in a game should reflect (even approximately) the real life weapon ranges.

If a player wishes to have a game based on the forces available to him within a theatre, and then condenses it to the forces available, I have no problem with that. Obviously, 470 miles is a bit if a stretch for "available". If the player wishes to ignore that, more power to them. I can do it and sleep souldly at night. YMMV.

BTW, I have never labored under the delusion that anything we do on the tabletop has any grounding in reality, except superficially.

"If a player wishes to have a game based on the forces available to him within a theatre, and then condenses it to the forces available, I have no problem with that."

Neither do I. In fact I do it all the time.

"Obviously, 470 miles is a bit if a stretch for "available"."

Not sure what you mean by "available" in this context, but I think you agree that an artillery range of 470 miles is slightly ludicrous.

"If the player wishes to ignore that, more power to them."

Far be it from me to dictate what anyone else should or shouldn't do in this wierd little hobby of ours. However, I would challenge blatant unrealities such as ridiculous weapon ranges (whether too long or too short).

"I can do it and sleep soundly at night. YMMV."

At the end of the day it is your choice whether you accept such obvious fallacies or not. I wouldn't, but as you say YMMV.

"BTW, I have never labored under the delusion that anything we do on the tabletop has any grounding in reality, except superficially."

Neither have I. However though, I do think that superficial reality extends to "realistic" weapon ranges.

We need a TMP Wargamer's Glossary! I'm still wondering what "teabagging" means…in the context of AWI wargaming.

I know of "sandbagging" in a sales context – a salesman retaining some sales he could make in one quarter into another to improve chances of making target. No idea of the origin. Same basic idea of pretending to be weaker than the actual case I guess.

Darn, I thought bathtubbing was just Hotubbing for people who could not afford a hot tub.

:(

I thought sandbagging was was just teabagging, except you dunk the teabags in sand before setting them on someone's shoulder or where ever else you want to put them…