"Is "bad leadership" adequately covered by the gamer himself?" Topic

As those who have not stifled me may know, I really HATE "Stupid McClellan" rules. One thing that turned me off SPI boardgames was their insane and inane "need" to quantify and have a rule for everything.
This included particularly ACW rules where you were automatically handicapped if playing the Army of the Potomac during the reign of one George B McClellan.
I always thought this was just plain WRONG. I make enough of my own mistakes. Why saddle me further with forcing me to be incompetent?
This is like forcing Custer to repeat all his mistakes at Little Big Horn.

I think that there is a huge difference between recreating a battle, and gaming it. I would rather make my own stupid mistakes than be forced to make the same ones that occurred historically. Please note that this does not incloude upgrading troop quality so that "everyone is equal, and you all get a trophy". Far from it. Just let me be stupid all on my own.

So, do scenario rules for "bad leadership" limit the gamer too much, or should the player make his own blunders?
I know that I am more than adequate to the task! (In one memorable Cold Wars, I played in 6 games, and managed to kill off 84 of the 88 "men" I commanded. )

Well, I agree that we are not recreating the battle and I would only agree to such rules if I thought they still gave me a chance to 'win' if I made accomodations. In that case they would be sand traps on the course. On the other hand, there are a few gamers I've met who require no such handicaps as they are both incompetent and incapable of learning from their mistakes. In fact, they generally spend a fair amount of time after the game 'writing their memoires', i.e., telling everyone how they actually did quite well. One of the guys who runs a Napoleonic campaign is very careful about which side he lets one person play after he single handedly threw away the cream of the British Army in Spain over the course of several battles.

I quite like rules (such as Buck Surdu's PT boat rules) where the game mechanics allow good gamers to reap the rewards and penalize "green" or bad commanders without report to any modifiers.

You can recreate the fog of misinformation that surrounded Little Mac or his like with briefings for players that lead them to mistakenly think they are outnumbered or outnumber the enemy.

I have no problem with rules like this if recreating a historic scenario. Why do them if you don't have the same handicaps? A variant could easily be provided.

Make them optional? That way if it is a once off game then dont use it and if you are fighting a historical refight with original forces and deployments and such then use it.

Why do you want to re-create a battle: don't you already know what happened? Shouldn't you want to re-do it and add the ideas and style of you, the gamer/commander, to see if the history was inevitable? The "fog" briefings can be legitimate but player should be the commander and not a channeler of a "loser".

You could ask the same question about rules that give benefits to good generals, too.

In short, Yes. I also hate being hamstrung. I want to refight famous battles, not recreate them.

if one has an interest in the history of a period, or even a single battle, then ALL of the factors that influenced the tactics and decisions of that period are more than fair to include in a design.

Should the 1806 Prussians fight with the same tactics and abilities as the the 1806 French? Should a German 88 be no better than the US 75mm for tanks? Most gamers want those differences accounted for, for history's sake.

Then why not the often far more serious limitations of command or army organization? Doctrine? Commander's personalities?

If one wants absolutely equal adversaries then Chess is a great game. If one wants to account for finer points of history, why would we not consider command issues? They were often decisive.

In any case, if the object is to just want to win an equal fight, then you are among a very rare group of commanders in history where the fight was exactly equal. That view is not historical, and better suited to fantasy games with point systems.

In fact, dealing with the structural command issues of inferior armies can be a fascinating problem for the gamer, and a well celebrated victory-if it occurs. As a matter of fact, absolute balance can be pretty damn boring.

Unlike war, historical wargaming has many rewards, and winning the game is the least of them. I'm not necessarily talking about recreating specific battles, but also doing fictional battles that are true to the period in not only armament, tactics, and uniforms, but also command and structural issues. To do less is, in my mind, fantasy gaming using figures in historical uniforms.

Historical wargames are different from fantasy gaming, and that difference should be respected. Regrettably, often it is not.

But , of course, de gustibus…

We can never recreate a historical battle accurately, precisely because it is historical. The gamer will have knowledge several orders of magnitude greater than the real commanders did -- and there's no real way to fix that.

If you want to see how a gamer can do as Lee or Meade, don't fight on a map of Gettysburg. Even with some variable arrivals, as the Talensoft game allows, we still know in broad terms when and where each major command is coming onto the map -- and we know the significance of terrain such as Culps or the Round Tops.

If instead you put together a meeting engagement in a different though similar piece of Pennsylvania -- small town with several roads crossing, lots of hills and open ground -- AND make it pretty random what arrives when -- or use a campaign map -- THEN you are beginning to get close to some of the uncertainty that Lee and Meade had to deal with.

But you'd still have the helicopter view of the battlefield, and all your troops would still be controlled by the same mind.

Should the 1806 Prussians fight with the same tactics and abilities as the the 1806 French? Should a German 88 be no better than the US 75mm for tanks? Most gamers want those differences accounted for, for history's sake.

That's not what the OFM asked. What he's asking is why have specific limitations in a scenario based on the incapacity of the historical leader?

An example "modeling" McClellan's indecision might be something like "Union troops must deploy first but may not begin movement until the second turn."

Modeling this facet of the commander does not help the ultimate fantasy of "what would you do in this situation?"

Well, if I'm hamstrung from the get go, we don't know what I'd do. I can't correct McClellan's dithering. The tactics, weapons, formations are the same otherwise.

In the end, if a rule keeps you from having fun while rolling dice and pushing figures and pretending to be Caesar or Napoleon or CPT Miller, then chuck the sucker.

If instead you put together a meeting engagement in a different though similar piece of Pennsylvania -- small town with several roads crossing, lots of hills and open ground -- AND make it pretty random what arrives when -- or use a campaign map -- THEN you are beginning to get close to some of the uncertainty that Lee and Meade had to deal with.

I quite like this method of modeling fog of war.

Very interesting!

Problem is, if you are playing the Battle of [Fill-in-the-blank] without any handicapping game mechanics you are operating with the full benefit of 20-20 hindsight. There is no chance of replicating the results if you know all the mistakes and can simply avoid them.

I agree with the way Repiqueone put it. I quit tournament chess because it largely all became so predictable.

Jay, over the years I've done a lot of wargame summer camps, mostly ACW. Eight or ten kids, older elementary and junior high, mostly. Sometimes I did Chickamauga -- it's right down the road, I'm in Chattanooga -- but if I had time, or an experienced set of gamer kids -- I had lots of repeat campers -- I'd do a random map and random arrival, but keep the Chickamauga OBs.

It WAS sometimes necessary to explain to mothers why we're doing Chickamauga on a map that isn't Chickamauga, but they mostly got it.

Otoh, it was a GREAT learning experience fpr the kids to play on a map/terrain table, and then spend one day driving around the same places at the real battlefield. All sorts of reality about visibility and keeping troops under command control become very evident.

And for me the highpoint was always to drive 80 miles to Kennessaw, to the Dead Angle where the Confederate trenches still exist, and to sit them all down and read Sam Watkins' chapter about that terrible fight.

Jay,

I understood what the OFM meant, My point was that most gamers would not think of discarding differences of hardware, or army limitations, then why say that other factors are not equally necessary to the historical representation?

In fact, the "human" factor is often the key factor in the play of history-not the gear, drill book, or "steps per minute". In a very real sense, the individuals involved are not only key, but inescapably part of the historical story. To not have to, as a gamer, deal with these factors is going to create a strange view of history, which, though personally flattering when the gamer wins, is missing many of the key reasons the "real" battle played as it did.

At the root of this is the old canard that the gamer is the commander. He isn't, he's a gamer, and probably not much of a military mind to begin with. The "game" is the interplay of ALL of the variables, and how he handles them. This can range from the weaponry his army is equipped with, the terrain he must deal with, the perceived historical quality of the troops, and , yes, the qualities of the commanders and staff, either in a general generic manner or by specific name.

In short, this is a common confusion of the role of the gamer as the ersatz commander, as opposed to being what he really is-a gamer trying to win a game based on history and acting through abstracted representations of the weaponry, tactics, terrain, and commanders of that time to achieve either a "victory" or an enjoyable historical entertainment. Board gamers have long ago made that leap, and the better current miniature wargame designers are doing the same thing.

I'm sure there were several fellow commanders in the FPW that thought Bazaine a fool, but, guess what? They were stuck with him! Lincoln knew that he had to replace McClellan, but it wasn't easy! In the meantime, he was a part of the problem in devising a way to defeat the rebels. His failings had to be dealt with.

Were they less important than the comparative differences in the Springfield and Enfield? The drill manuals used by both sides? The ground at Antietam, or Gettysburg that was fought over?

Conversely, take a Jackson or Lee out of the eastern theater's factors and you've got bupkus for a rebel campaign victory in the East.

To say that the gamer's failings are a good metaphor for the command issues
is not very credible-even in gaming terms. To say you don't want to consider these issues is just fine, but it makes for pretty tenuous historicity for a wargame.

I always say, who would play Antietam as the Rebs if there wasn't some kind of restriction on Little Mac?

Two thirds of the Union army attacks in unison and shoves the Rebs into the Potomac. Maybe they have to commit some of the other third, if the Reb player is having a good day.

We know how many guys we have, how many the other side has, where everything is, etc.

Of course, one could find the dimmest bulb in your gaming group and give him Bazaines army in 1870, or Mack's at Ulm, and give your brightest and best gamer Napoleon at Austerlitz (and find several people of low IQ and no familiarity with the rules to be the the Tsar and Mack) but as soon as they discovered your attempt at historicity-they probably would quit your group; though, if dumb enough, they might just hang around as a wargame tackling dummy.

This is an old discussion that I was first introduced to by a sore loser in the game. I hosted a game doing Shiloh. I only introduce limitation based on the terrain features of the land, meaning no matter how far you can shot by the rules, the terrain limits you to this distance. And, these troops can not move until either fired on or hear the battle begin. It was a good game, but the loser wanted more "historical" restrictions because he believed that if your doing a historical game it should go and end as it did historically.

Our answers to him were as follows;
1. Were playing a game based on history.
2. It is a "what would I do in that situation" – meaning the Confederates players are going to correct what they feel were mistakes, as well as the union players.
3. If you want it go and end as it did historically, get out a book and read it out load, and we will just push the little men around as you read.

That would depend on the gamer -- wouldn't it?

mjc

I agree with John. In my opinion, the limitations impossed by the rules should be restricted to how the troops fought and what limits their weaponry and doctrine imposed over tactics. Beyond that, the player should be allowed to plan the battle as he thinks is right. That's why I like more 'what if' scenarios instead re-creations of historical battles.

Other possible approach is to represent the battle at a lower level. For example, in the case of Antietam put the gamer not in the position of McClellan or Lee, but that of a Corps commander, that will have to implement his orders (victory conditions) as imposed from above, with the constraints in resources and time that historically the actual commander had. Besides those restrictions -time available and resources- he will plan his part of the battle as he likes.

Best regards

I agree with Mr Carroll too. I'm a bad enough general without having someone handicap me with stupid rules…

There's the statistical variation in the historical record, that goes for commanders, but as well as units.
Given 2 real-life units (or 2 commanders) of equal capabilities, put them on campaign, and by sheer luck or factors they themselves do not control, one is bound to do better than the other (cfr. how many car accidents ppl are involved to, sometimes you just have good or bad luck to have less or more than the average).

If, as a game designer, I then take these statistical differences, and model them into a fixed characteristic in the game (which for each unit still has variable outcomes), I am transforming the luck from real life into determinism into the game.

However, if there would be differences in quality due to *innate abilities* of either units or commanders (e.g. better trained, better equipment, much more experience), these should be modeled.

But the mere fact that a commander or unit 'made some bad decisions or didn't do too well on the real battlefield' should not be translated into a penalty on the gaming table.

How about we rate all troops as the same quality and allow our skills as Generals to decide whether they are any good or not. It seems really unfair to me to limit the way some of my troops fight with stupid rules. If my commanders can all be the same quality then why can't my troops? And why should some troops fight in different ways to others, or have to fight in certain ways or formations. Why can't we have fair rules that allow all our troops to fight the same way. Then we could have really fair games.

No cammand limitations your a gamer.

With command limitations your a wargamer.

War is all about command and limitations, far more so than the differences in hardware.

See 1866 for an example, Austria had much better artillery, but didn't use it to its full ability, how many gamers with rifled artillery would abide by the real restrictions on it?

Well thats like asking late war German players to not field more Tiger IIs than were even built…

It depends very much on the situation. Given a definite weakness on one side, such as the Confederates at Antietam, they do need something to help them, or hindsight will see them beaten every time. Given a more even battle (Gettysburg perhaps) then there is less reason to hamper one side over another.

Also remember that some of the friction might be trying to model command structure rather than the actual ability of the general: one general staff migth be much more efficient than another, resulting in greater speed of implementing decisions.

At the end of the day I suppose we are in the business of designing/playing enjoyable games.

Personally I'm a big fan encouraging players to think and act like their historical counterparts, this can indeed be done by rules which hamstring the dullards and reward the high flyers, or you can sometimes take other approaches e.g.

I usually give players multiple objectives in varying degrees of difficulty, and it isn't hard to give a particular commander one aim of something like 'make one major tactical blunder during the game'.

Equally, you can do the 'stupid McClellan' thing in a different way. For my Koeniggratz game, Benedeck couldn't exercise any control over the Austrians until he personally observed the situation from Chulm. So, the player who was Benedeck spent the first few turns frantically trying to negotiate the choked roads from Koeniggratz to get to Chulm, just as his historical counterpart did (and historically discovered that his entire right wing had decided to attack the Prussians on their own). Had to do a 'ride to the front' mini game, but that was easy enough to do.

I'm sure there were several fellow commanders in the FPW that thought Bazaine a fool, but, guess what? They were stuck with him! Lincoln knew that he had to replace McClellan, but it wasn't easy! In the meantime, he was a part of the problem in devising a way to defeat the rebels. His failings had to be dealt with.

But in John the OFM's example, McLellan has been replaced! The union commander in John's game is John, so why should he be forced to think and act like someone else?

If one of the subordinate commanders is a fool, or gifted in the arts of war, then replicate that, or have some rules mechanism to simulate orders being lost or misunderstood. But saying "because you're playing as this guy here, you always move last" seems wrong to me.

This is a really interesting discussion – thank you for starting it, John. A slightly different, and less personalised, approach is to get away from the personalisation of the "stupid general" rule. I think a number of players don't like these sorts of rules because they wanted to make their own mistakes, didn't want to be restricted by the personal failings (real or perceived) of the historical general in question. I have a lot of sympathy with this approach – I like to make my own mistakes also.

But I am not sure that focusing on "stupid generals" (or gifted generals) is entirely the right approach. A lot of "bad" generalship seem to me to have been caused by incorrect perceptions, bad reconnaissance, misunderstanding, poor communications and so on. In other words, deficiencies in systems, control, command – not personal stupidity. In other words, deficiencies in systems, control, command – not personal stupidity.

I'm more than happy to suffer under those disadvantages because (to me) they are an essential part of the historical aspect of the game. I'm a bit less interested in playing a half-wit (or a genius), because I'm not really convinced that on most occasions (and, yes, there are exceptions) it was personal stupidity, or some innate genius, which made the difference regarding successful command in battle.

Bad die rolls and a shattered gamer ego reflects more bad decisions and morale problems than any 'historical' rule mechanic.

I remember the SPI "Blue and Grey" games myself. There was more than one game in the series where the Union troops were allowed to move only a limited number of units, but the Confederates could move everything. I thought they were frustrating too, since I somehow often ended up playing the Yanks and usually got beat!

@Sidney

I totally concur with you.

Interesting discussion. A couple of issues emerge for me which I think are interesting.

Firstly, what happens if two sides have very different staff systems or very different structures which means that one side was historically more able to process orders and apply them more quickly. Is this not a characteristic worthy of replicating every bit as much as a difference in armament?

Secondly, accepting the premise that you the player are the commander in chief, what happens if historically one of your subdorinate commanders was particularly poor. Would you replicate that, or are you now the commander in chief AND all of the subordinates rolled into one?

So if you're doing a recreation of Waterloo, don't include minuses for leadership or command limitations to recreate Napoleons bad performance, just give overall command of the French to a gamer with a bad case of hemorrhoids.

Attempts to include command and control (of which commander quality is a part) is a very, very difficult issue.

For example, we often say Army X may use tactic/formation Y but Army 9 may not, because they did not historically do so.

So you won't let me use Ordre Mixte just because I'm Prussian? Why hamstring me that way? Let me make my own mistakes…

Of course training comes into play as well, but picking these things apart is very hard. We often just assign +1 or -1 to good/bad generals but this often ignores the main role of these officers in getting troops moved around the battle field. And this applies to subordinates as well. Why is my Corps commander rated a 2 instead of a 5? Why hamstring me just because General Puddnhead was a moron in history?

But the bottom line is, if the rule makes the game no fun for someone, chuck it out. But you may find that that results in it being no fun for someone else. Would you want to play the Rebs at Antietam?

This reminds be a bit of a similar discussion years ago I had with an organizer of LARP games. My claim was that LARPs were kind of stupid, because they acknowledged physical skills (you actually have to hit the other guy with a sword, or run the actual mile to get away from the orcs, …); but does not recognize mental skills at all ('You're a lvl 5 wizards, so these are the spells you know').

My claim was that they should give more mental abilities (like spells) to players who – in real life – have shown to be able to study more and better. Thus, a guy with 3 different Ph.D.'s should be allowed to play a level 30 wizard, while the person who barely finished elementary school should not get any abilities at all. Heck, even organize real exams in maths or literature or whatever to decide at what level you can exert mental abilities in the game. E.g., give a player an Assyrian text, and he has to translate it. If he succeeds, then he gets access to whatever powerful spell in the game. "But that's unfair!" he said.

"So, you claim that you cannot roleplay someone who is smarter than you yourself are?" he said. I answered affirmative, since they also didn't let anyone roleplay better physical skills than they had in real life. If you 'arbitrarily' assign mental skills to players, but then have physical skills depend on their actual real-life abilities, then the game lacks consistency.

He never understood the point.

I never LARPed.

"So you won't let me use Ordre Mixte just because I'm Prussian? Why hamstring me that way?"

As you say, training is fairly important here, as when you order troops into a formation or ot use tactics they've never even heard of and aren't trained to do, they tend to look at you blankly or mill about in confusion.

"Why is my Corps commander rated a 2 instead of a 5? Why hamstring me just because General Puddnhead was a moron in history?"

Because he was a moron? No different to green units being rated as green and elite veterans as EVs.

As you say, it does ideally have to produce a decent game, whcih may require some tinkering of victory conditions and objectvies, and/or a degree of role playing on the part of players. Some players like role playing.

Another thought here is victory conditions. In order to "win" a scenario, maybe you don't have to rout your opponent from the table. Maybe simply doing better than our historical counterpart can be sufficient an objective.

I also agree with Martin Rapier. Troops are trained to operate in a certain manner, to expect them to do things completely differently is fine in a pure game context, but it doesn't seem to me to be wargaming, i.e. playing a game where the abilities of the model soldiers is based on what their historical counterparts could do.

I posted this to the Toofatlardies group, where this thread's sparked a parallel discussion, so apologies to anyone that gets it twice:

The specific case of the Young Napoleon is a real problem one, as you *can't* replicate his position without special rules – everybody with even the most cursory knowledge of the civil war knows he's holding a hand full of aces, so you can make up all the dodgy intelligence briefings a la Pinkerton that you want, the wargamers' basic knowledge of the period will be enough that he'll just go "that's nonsense" and plough on. Thus any game revolving around him must necessarily be fudged:

1. Have a "stupid Mclellan" rule that annoys the union.
2. Don't have one, and watch them mince their way through woefully mis-matched rebs.
3. Beef up the rebs to the point that it's actually a fair fight.
4. Disguise the scenario enough that the union player doesn't *realise* he's Mclellan, and has no reason to suppose those scary intelligence reports aren't genuine.

In terms of authenticity, 4's the obvious winner (indeed Rich (aka Toofatlardies) has played that card well at past games days – Crete especially was lifted straight from the history books, but he'd lead all of the players to read the wrong chapter as it were….) The moment players know which battle it is, though, 20/20 hindsight kicks in, and you've either got to have rules to minimise the effect of that hindsight, or accept that you're not really fighting that battle any more, as you may have the right troops on the right bit of ground, but the players *aren't* in the same position as the generals were, simply by virtue of knowing what the hell is going on….

In general I don't like the idea of a "stupid CinC" rule (although historically stupid subordinates I'm fine with….) but it may be a necessary evil at times; if you're refighting a historical action where what the CinC knew was as important as which troops he had, then you're going to get a very dull and predictable, not to mention unhistorical, outcome if the player is just set loose in full possession of the facts….

Dom.

Yes, to pick up on what Dom has just said, it has indeed sparked an interesting discussion on the TooFatLardies Yahoo group, and I should thank John the OFM for providing the catalyst.

Is "bad leadership" adequately covered by the gamer himself?"

No – the gamer tends to avoid the stupidity, particularly if it is a matter of historical record.

It's the same problem as in RPG's – the character has wisdom of 6 and Intelligence of 5, yet still comes up with the cunning plans and the smart ideas. Anyone can role play being stronger than they are, or weaker than they are, but it's hard to be thicker than you are, and almost impossible to role play greater intelligence than you have (e.g. the guy with a character who has 18 intelligence but who can't string 5 words together into a coherent sentence).

if you want your gme to include a chain of command and you want that to reflect an historical set-up you'll need something to handicap the poor leaders, and something to assist a genius.

When looking from the point-of-view of scenario-design, it depends on what premises you accept to be the initial setup:

We are going to play a scenario based on battle such-and-so, using the same troops as were present historically.

- or -

We are going to play a scenario based on battle such-and-so, using the same troops, including their stupid general, as were present historically.

The comparison with roleplaying games is actually a good one.

In a typical roleplaying session, you (acting out your character), might persuade some NPC using some clever arguments.
The GM then decides to roll the dice vs. one of your characteristics or skills. To account for your clever argument, he'll probably give you a modifier on the diceroll.

Same applies for acting out a general in a wargame.

This is why I like using a set of rules like Piquet or Too Fat Lardies where the rules limit what you can control at any given time but have the ability in them to model an army that had a better system than the other guy. It eliminates the need for an McClellan rule because you will make a good or bad decision on your own.
When I write up the battle rosters I use either the players name as the commander or I try to find some "historical" sounding name for the piece of lead. I also try to design the scenario with enough of the same historical events that it gives a flavor of what happen and make the real person deal with them as they arrive.

In general I agree with you. I too believe that we all make enough mistakes on our own. At the same time when you combine our own mistakes with the interaction of other variables that control the outcome of a wargame (ie. dice rolls or differing deployments by different people) I don't believe you need to hamper the player with too many controls on the commander.

However, I believe there are times when you have to consider those controls when it was in the nature of that particular Army to be directly affected by poor leadership. There are armies that are so similar that the reason one may have done better than the other was because of differing command and control factors. For a straight up game, not an issue, for an understanding of history, you may want those command controls.

When I play a GAME (vs. reenactment… which I've no interest in) I want to be in control at my level… but I'm fine if any my sub-commanders are gimped… have bad Leadership ratings or whatever.
My goal is to get the flavor/feel of the setting/period… I hold no illusions that anything I'm doing relates to 'reality' or 'history'.

This is why I like using a set of rules like Piquet or Too Fat Lardies where the rules limit what you can control at any given time but have the ability in them to model an army that had a better system than the other guy. It eliminates the need for an McClellan rule because you will make a good or bad decision on your own.

No they don't. Like a lot of people above you are confusing two issues.

There are the limitations that an army had. Poor control in life should lead to poor control on the table. If an army did not use a formation (ordre mixte) it should not use that formation. The number of people who believe different armies should have the same capabilities is very small.

But the "stupid McClellan" rules lie on top of this and applies only to a particular commander. They add arbitrary constrictions to make the army worse than it actually was, because the commander on the day appears to have been a fool. The next day, commanded by someone else, the "stupid McClellan" rule disappears.

The issue then, is not whether armies should have limitations based on their historical capabilities. We pretty much all agree they should. Instead we are discussing if the army should have further restrictions placed on it depending solely on the commander. If he is deemed to be useless, suddenly the whole army becomes useless!

I say McClellan rules are ridiculous, and this is why. If McClellan had been replaced by Lincoln, would his replacement act as if a "stupid McClellan" rule was in place? Of course not! So why should we, who are also not McClellan, by hamstrung as if we are?

(That the battle is not gameable without the rule is unfortunate, but no reason to add a silly rule. There are lots more battles where good generals actually did overrun smaller forces – which we don't game. Why not add a "stupid McClellan rule to them, to make them gameable? Because that would be silly?)

I have to kind of wonder what the point of a stupid McClellan rule is. If we are trying to simulate history and we have that stupid McClellan rule in because McClellan was stupid, should we really expect to get any other result than the historical outcome? It makes the game come down to a matter of pure luck in the form of die rolls because we have simulated everything else, right down to the stupidity of the commanders. Given that, what's the point of playing the game?

On the other hand, allowing a commander to use the same army, with all other things being equal, means that we can see if the outcome could have been different if someone else were in command. If we replaced McClellan as commander, would we be Hooker or Grant?

In a "toy soldier" game, the players are all that's necessary since history is of secondary importance.

In "historical games" where the emphasis is not on artifical play balance and "equal" chances for both sides to win, "Yes!," somehow representing inferior leadership/generalship is at least reasonable, and ideally a definite factor.

TVAG

TVAG: you are aware that the "stupid McClellan" rule is invoked precisely to as a play balance mechanism? It is to make a "historical game" suitable as a "toy soldier" game.

So, if we invoke the quality of the general in one battle, why not do it in all?

Imagine a game where you agree to conditions, then roll a dice. The loser gets some command penalty, because he is deemed to be worse. That is what the McClellan rules should lead to, taken to their logical conclusion.

Actually KoenigKrieg used to do this, and it was infuriating. If you got a significantly worse general than your opponent (who was naturally of equal ability) it made the game over before it started. It was acceptable in campaign games, where you might be standing in for a poor general, but it was wildly inappropriate otherwise.