"Miniature Wargaming - Why does it bring you enjoyment?" Topic

Just purused some of the recent posts on toy soldiers vs military minaitures.

How about action figures vs dolls? Now THERE'S a debate!

:-)

Firstly, some wargamers are also football fans, so I'm afraid that arguement falls flat on its head, although I do get the impression, rightly or wrongly, that you are not a fan of football?
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i think you have misunderstood the point which, and it applies in England too, is that who are (in the UK case) soccer fans to look down on people playing with toy/model soldiers when they pay a fortune to watch 22 overpaid dilettantes run about a pitch – if people stopped going then the situation where some players earn more a week than many earn in 5 years would stop. Its not anything to do with liking football/soccer or not and neither does the fact that some wargamers are also sports fans undermine the point made by OSchmidt. I think we do btw have the right to point out that some TV etc is just plain mush and is part of a 1984 pap for the masses "i'm dumb but sexy" line esp when its made by people with university degrees

GRNREP8

But why pick on football or sports fans? Are they the only ones who look down on wargamers? I doubt it? And when you look at his rant against the sports fans it suggests he might be a mite jealous or just can't understand how they can get enjoyment from a sport like football.

As for what people, wargamers or not, want to watch on TV and what they prefer concerning anything else for that matter, it is their choice – not ours – we have to accept that, otherwise we are all hypocrites. The same with accepting people calling Military Miniatures Toy Soldiers. I have to accept that some wargamers see themselves, or don't mind others seeing themselves as playing with toys. I don't agree with it but I accept it. It is their choice. And I certainly do not see myself as any way elitist because of what I prefer to call them. I'm a wargamer like any other wargamer, whatever term they use.

But I think perhaps we should now be concentrating more on why we enjoy Military Wargaming, while others fail to see anything in it, or, dare I say it, see it as only playing with toys. If we could discover what makes us love and enjoy the hobby/pastime, and go to the extremes and cost that we often do, as I think the original post intended, then perhaps we can help persuade non-wargamers to have a go or at least understand why we get so much enjoyment from it.

Then again, perhaps it is just a case of either you like wargaming or don't, in the same way that you either like football or you don't.

I like and play football.

I love model soldiers and war gaming, but it's not my only interest, football both watching, playing and fantasy team management. I also enjoy watching rugby. I don't see why sports and hobbies are meant to be exclusive. Some people might look down on it. But others just don't care, and others who know me I think deep down, have a little respect that I have some knowledge about things that they don't. I was always useful on pub quiz machines aswell.

I agree with Gazzola. A wargame with a lot of outcome dependent decision-making can be a scholarly exercise. Hence, military miniatures, not toys. Also, hence all the hub-bub about how much FUN it can be too :)

I also agree with Edwulf, I watch a lot of American football. They aren't mutually exclusive. But we are trying to figure out why people don't get why we think what we are doing is so fascinating and so much fun.

BD before I came back into this hobby I visited craft tents at country shows & seen displays of plastic models & thought what is the point………I guess the people who put on these displays didn`t care what I thought…..what I am saying why do we care what others think?
Being a wargamer/modeller is only part of my spare time hobbies. I think war gaming, like a lot of male hobbies, can be seen by many as passive. Where many team sports/hobbies can be seen as active

GRNREP8

But why pick on football or sports fans? Are they the only ones who look down on wargamers? I doubt it? And when you look at his rant against the sports fans it suggests he might be a mite jealous or just can't understand how they can get enjoyment from a sport like football.

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I love soccer – I don't though agree with the way it is going in terms of salaries and the hard core fans who pay out thousands for season tickets have to recognise that by doing so they contribute to the ridiculous money culture that surrounds it – and the point is not that they (gaming and sports) are mutually exclusive but that as a mass activity soccer and football (in the US) have passed by the level whereby they can be ridiculed – whereas our hobby will always be seen as geeky whatever we say

As for what people, wargamers or not, want to watch on TV and what they prefer concerning anything else for that matter, it is their choice – not ours – we have to accept that, otherwise we are all hypocrites
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Hypocrites – not really – we have every right to complain say if TV programs are made glamourising criminal lifestyles or causes even if some people might want to watch them because they agree with them etc (though maybe the UK is more strict on such issues than the US)

GNREP8

Good posts. However, as for not paying the costs of present day Football etc, I agree with you but do you think if we stopped buying Military Miniatures the manufacturers would put down their prices? I doubt it.

And we do have to accept that people have different tastes in all aspects of life. I'd much prefer to see the TV and film world offering more military/history programmes/films etc, both factual and fictional. But the world is what it is and we can only embrace what we enjoy, while others embrace what they enjoy. At the moment, wargamrs and military history buffs are probably in the miniority, but who knows what the future may bring.

Happy wargaming to you anyway.

HH, because the thinking precedes the saying and often times the doing.

Happy wargaming to you anyway.
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and you too

Surely the main aspect of being a soldier in war is that someone is trying to kill you. I'm not of course proposing that people do any of the things on my list but then I don't think that in wargaming I am really simulating military operations – I am wargaming. Otherwise we risk sounding like the Lt. in Aliens 2

GNREP8:
Surely if that was the main/primary aspect of being any soldier in a war, then that is probably what all soldiers would train for--even with simulations.

However, some soldiers are officers, from sargeants, captains to generals, and that isn't necessarily their primary concern on the battlefield, or if it is, it is about someone trying to kill their men. A number of challenges experienced by commanders can be simulated. That's what military men do, and to a lesser extent that is what wargame designers do.

We may differ about what is important to simulate, or how much. However, few military men find it beneficial to simulate the aspects of the combat experience you've mentioned, for a variety of reasons--OR they do find doing it in different ways is more beneficial. No point in teaching hand-to-hand combat with miniatures. When they do simulate it, it is physical contact, but neither opponent is trying to kill the other, so even that 'combat' is simulated in some very real ways.

And for some of those same reasons, wargamer designers choose to focus on other, command aspects of battle to simulate. And some folks learn Karate… by simulating combat.

Best Regards,

Bill

swipe me just seen `beast of war`full 15mins video war game /modelling site on UK tv

Bill
Maybe its a difference between the US and UK – I don't often hear British gamers using the word 'simulatation'. Also is simulation in the military training context, a different thing to the games we play with our models/toys/miniatures. I guess what I dislike is the implication sometimes by some wargamers and re-enactors that they have something more than really a very small understanding of what being in the ACW or whatever was all about because they have played a wargame or dressed up – maybe thats due to working in too many organisations where having been on training courses and read stuff made you an expert (per my quote from Aliens). Its rather like the relationship of playing Subuteo (well known table soccer game) to playing the real game – yes it may teach you some management and tactical points but as to the essential experience its a million miles away. Most wargames are anyway so abstract really unless one plays at 2mm or has a massive table – the non violent aspects that interest me would be the difficulties of moving say a 600 man unit across rough terrain etc – but you are never going to really appreciate that with a 20 or 30 figure btn that can move through the gap in a scale hedge or cross a scale bridge in 2 turns. So its a game (i play a lot of SAGA where forces starting at 30 or so figures commonly end up reduced to 2 or 3 figures as there are no morale rules – so a 90% loss rate – in 'reality' one side or the other would have packed in and fled long before that – but it makes for a good game)

Maybe its a difference between the US and UK – I don't often hear British gamers using the word 'simulation'. Also is simulation in the military training context, a different thing to the games we play with our models/toys/miniatures.

GNREP8:

Could be. I've heard the word 'simulation' used in a wide variety of contexts, from entertainment, to training to education and research, let alone wargames. I've designed simulations for a wide variety of reasons, but mostly training and education, yet they had to be fun games or folks didn't train and learn.

The point being, no simulation can even approach the mass of detail and wide breath of issues that are found in reality. They can only focus on some of them, like your example of Subuteo. All simulations, computer, or paper and pencil share that some kind of limitations. They can't begin to capture all of reality, so like a scientist, or historian or a stamp collector, there is too much reality to handle all at once, so they select a very small portion to study, to illuminate, to understand.

The only real value of a simulation, or wargame for that matter, are those few aspects of reality present. Otherwise it's just a game that has nothing to do with history or military operations. That's fine, and can be fun of coures, but most all wargame designers in our hobby--English or American, French or French Canadian, they all claim their designs have some kind of connection between real war and the game mechanics--which is why they call them Historical war-games.

Where? and how much or how little? are the questions.

I'll give you an example of what I mean in the next post. But I want to say that in describing all that, it doesn't make wargames more important or serious. It just a question of whether they do what they were designed to do. I have given the example of Black Powder where the designers say they wanted to design a "Tolerable representation of real battle."

Okay, so how is that done and how do we know they succeeded? Knowing of course, that whatever they've done, it won't come close to representing ALL of the factors and experiences of real battle… just a few.

Bill H.

An example of a simulation issue:

I enjoy computer flight simulators and have played them often. Are they games or simulations? They're designed as both. I now fly real sailplanes and am working on my license. The first time I flew a sailplane, my instructor was sure I'd had some kind of previous experience because I did better than expected. I hadn't--I'd only flown simulators on my computer.

Now, I'll be the first one to admit that a flight simulator has nothing on the Real Experience of flying a sailplane at 5,000 feet. The simulators I played were for powered craft, not gliders. Even so, while the computer model was far removed from the real experience, it HAD simulated what the game designer had attempted to recreate for fun--some of the flight characteristics of airplanes in relation to gravity, speed, aerodynamics and the ground. And the simulation did it with enough validity that I demonstrated a number of skills when I piloted a real plane for the first time.

If I'd had fans blowing air past my computer room window at 60 MPH and been seat-belted to my chair while playing the flight simulator, that would not have been a 'better' simulation of flying or 'closer to the real thing'--nor would I have flown the sail plane better because of it. Of course, those little touches might have ‘felt' more realistic, but that totally subjective conclusion wouldn't have meant a thing in regards to the effectiveness of the flight simulation. In fact the added complexity could have interfered with what was being simulated—and the skills I was learning.

The computer program ‘worked' as a simulation because of what reality it focused on, not how much or the vast amount it didn't even address. It also worked as a game not only because I could ‘win', but the focus kept the complexity manageable---That, and the fact a good deal of reality can be challenging and fun, particularly when you don't have to worry about crashing your plane. Game mechanisms can co-exist with the simulation processes without any problems, because as design issues with game mechanics, they are very similar, if not identical.

The same thing is true of all simulations and of wargames… is it just where and how they do it.

Bill H.

Well then, the question becomes what of the reality of historical war gaming simulation?

Toys = based upon the assumption of fictionalized reality or that a non-fictionalized historical reality is impossible to know.

Or

Military Miniatures = non-fictionalized historical reality, e.g. the past, is possible to know.

Tim somebody called our hobby intellectual….its nothing of the sort…its a passive hobby where we can feel uncomfortable trying to defend what we do. I just enjoy what I do buy what I like

I figure when it comes to my spare time and money; I can spend it 'foolishly' any way I want.

Hammerhead

I don't know who called our hobby/passion/pastime intellectual, but surely there is a fair level of intellect require to play them? That is not suggesting that you have be considered intelligent or elitist to be a wargamer.

But we don't just hold two figures in our hands, point them at each other and go 'bang bang', do we?

No, for some crazy reason, we do research, paint up our miniatures to match those from history, work out musket and artillery ranges, terrain problems, movement speeds etc. etc. And we try to make sure that buildings and trees etc, are to scale. We obviously enjoy doing it otherwise we wouldn't wargame at all. (Not sure we enjoy the costs involved, though)

So you could say that playing wargames is indeed, a form of intellectual activity. But it is still a game. And, as long as we enjoy playing our games, and the extensive preparations involved preparing them, then that's all that matters, no matter what non-wargamers think.

I've had non-wargamers say Why go to such lengths, why not just play with them? and You spend more time researching and preparing than you do actually playing? and of course, Why can't those cavalry attack that lot over there or why can't those guns just blast everyone off the table. I think only wargamers would laugh at these questions.

Happy wargaming to all.

I haven't looked up the dictionary definition, but Bill seems to also be suggesting that part of the definition of simulating something, in part or in whole, is that it is in preparation for performing a reality. Therefore, historical war gaming isn't simulatory b/c its efficacy can't be tested.

I don't get the intellectual hang-up. Are military operations intellectual ? Is chess intellectual ? Can war games be intellectual ? Yes to all three. I don't see the big deal. What's wrong with saying it's the use of higher order thinking ? It's an intellectual pursuit, now get over it. Everyone can do it, but not everyone does. That's not elitist or "nerdy" and the only "people who are lost" are the one's who choose not to. Or one might dare say or the "peoples" that don't exist anymore.

Tim wrote:

So that's why I personally think it's better to classify a wargame as a game and not a super serious simulation. When someone starts to insist their game is a serious simulation, I think it's kind of pompous.

Tim:
You have captured what I said. I agree. It is kind of pompous to call design a simulation if it isn't, and the designer has little idea of what such a system requires.

On the other hand, I don't think the only two choices here are wargames on one hand and serious or super serious simulations on the other. There is no comparison between military computer simulations and our miniatures on a table… in purpose or detail.

There are many kinds of simulations, and computer sims are just one kind. Any game system that attempts to mimic some aspect of miliatary operations from the past, even if on a wargame table, is attempting to simulate something.

A wargame can simulate a few things well… but not as many as a computer. They can both be simulations.

And wargames are designed as entertainment, and a designer is only 'serious' about being successful in supplying that. However, if part of that entertainment is providing some aspects of history or the military arts, I think they should be serious enough to actually succeed.

For instance, here is the statement of intent for

CdePK A Tactical Toolkit' the Piquet variant of Chef de Battalion: "….have you ever been curious about the view from the brigade or regimental commander's saddle rather than the corps commander's? CdePk will let you find out what it is like to maneuver companies, command a battalion or squadron, and to wheel artillery sections into position ."

I would imagine that the designer would be, should be serious enough to actually attempt to provide that, and the gamer would be serious enough to expect that from the game.

I designed training simulation games without the benefit of computers. Most were fairly simple role play with scenarios, table games, group games and such. But they had to effectively simulate what was being trained in relation to real world situations or there was no transfer of skills and understanding to the real world.

So my experience of simulation design is probably far simpler than yours, but I know from designing sims and talking to simulation designers from a wide variety of disciplines that the simulations issues, creating a procedural system, whether with a computer program or a role play game, are the same, just expressed with different mediums and to different depths.

Bill H.

BD wrote:

I haven't looked up the dictionary definition, but Bill seems to also be suggesting that part of the definition of simulating something, in part or in whole, is that it is in preparation for performing a reality. Therefore, historical war gaming isn't simulatory b/c its efficacy can't be tested.

BD:
I am not sure what you mean by the 'preparation for performing a reality.'

I don't think that, if I understand your statement. There are ways to test the efficacy of a simulation, any simulation… even wargames or the kinds of simulation games I designed.

I am saying that wargames could be simulations. That they can be tested to see if they do what they are designed to do visa vie the historical evidence.

Wargames aren't simulations at the moment because 1. none of us know enough about what history they were designed to represent, and thus can't 'test' them to see if they work as simulations, 2. Most designers haven't tested them either, and 3. Most designers and wargamers don't have a clear idea of what a simulation game is in practical, mechanical terms, at least from the many comments I've read, so getting to #1 and #2 is hard.

Bill H.

To rephrase my previous post, it seems that part of what defines a "simulation" as a "simulation" seems to be that it is intended to prepare or train a person to perform a task. Therefore, a historical war game isn't a simulation per se b/c its efficacy--how well it trains or prepares--can't be tested or surmised.. But that's not to say that historical war games and designers don't seek to accurately simulate and/or represent various aspects of military history, but strictly speaking they're NOT simulations, nor can they be.

Kriegspiel, in its time, was or could have been a simulation in that its efficacy in training and preparing a person for military operations could have been tested or surmised.

Bill wrote:

I am saying that wargames could be simulations. That they can be tested to see if they do what they are designed to do visa vie the historical evidence.

Strictly speaking I don't think they can be "simulations", but perhaps "simulatory" per their testing by the historical evidence, not the designer.

BD

"To rephrase my previous post, it seems that part of what defines a "simulation" as a "simulation" seems to be that it is intended to prepare or train a person to perform a task."

I find it very hard to agree with that; simulations can be used for much more that preparing or training someone to perform a task. For example, they can be used to check systems and processes without actually building the real thing. The "simulation" debate was done to death and beyond a while ago.

Colinjallen:

Then what about all those simulation games sold? And of course, all those companies that take training and military simulations and turn them into commerical games, like GameSpot?

A wargame or simulation game is a procedural system that does very concrete things, asks of players very specific behaviors. Somewhere in there, something is supposed to represent very specific history.

There are ways to test the system to see if it 'works' as designed.

That's all. What defines a simulation is what the system is designed to DO: represent something else in a dynamic, rather than static way, like a plastic model. What a particular simulation is then used for doesn't define it, anymore than using a hammer to drive wood screws defines the purpose of the hammer. Simulations are just tools, for fun, training, research, and education. They are an artifical system designed to represent, 'act like', or 'match' something else. In our case, some military history and/or real world operations.

Bill H.

Bill,

You appear to be arguing with something that I have not said.

I do understand that you have a bit of a thing about simulations and can post about them repeatedly and endlessly for days so I am not going to encourage you further.

Enjoy your wargaming.

Colin

To me the fun of wargameing is to set up a scenario which is an over simplificaton of the real world using a set of over simplified rules and then be able to say "Wow! even with this crude set of assumptions I begin to understand a little more about how and why commanders at all levels made some decisions". In our latest games, trying to simulate (very crudely) a full depth assult covering the Forward Edge of Battle to the first real Engagement Area has:-
1) shown how little we understand. 2) Showed how much of the stuff in the manuals that never seemed to fit into a wargame, becomes relevant. 3) Last but not least proved a fun challenging experience.

Would it make me a General? No Way! It does help me understand slightly better some of the accounts of battle I read about.

Wheather you game, simulate, model figures, make scenary it does not matter as long as you let the other guy have his form of fun.

Is the game interlectual? It is if you want it to be. For some folk they want a simple beat em up scenario not a detailed and complex scenario demmanding maximum attention for 3 solid hours. I do both and enjoy both.

Brian Handley

Good post. What Wargamers want and get from a game is often different, but they all enjoy the fun of gaming.

And it is often a learning experience, especially if you come up with a brilliant plan of action (or rather what you think is a brilliant plan), which suddenly falls apart almost right from the start.

But thankfully, mistakes mean no blood is shed in our battles.

Colindale wrote: "…they can be used to check systems and processes without actually building the real thing. "

How can that be a simulation ? That sounds more like a calculated projection or hope. If I were looking to buy a product from a company, and they said "Well, listen we haven't built the thing yet and we don't know how it will perform, but we can provide you with a simulation to show you how it will perform and our price is based on our product's performance as shown in our simulation" I'd say, WHAT ?

I bet a lot of companies throw that word into their sales pitch. And I also bet a lot of governments waste billions on buying simulated things before there is a thing to simulated. Don't' get me wrong, I see what you're saying, but I don't think those are simulations per se, rather they are projections or plans. Similar to an architects plans or scale model prior to building, but not a "simulation".

But OK solely to train to prepare is too narrow. But there needs to be a verification process or procedure… a test… or an ability to surmise the simulations efficacy in relationship to the real thing. Very difficult for historical war games to do that at least at the tactical level which is the most fun in my opinion. The best I've seen it done was SL/ASL and from what I understand they were able to do that b/c of all the information available through AAR's. And even there it sought to represent only a specific thing which was the tactical decision-making environment of WWII. As stated does SL/ASL simulate that well? I would say yes. My verification process for that has been when I see interviews of WWII combat veterans when they talk about specific combat situations, I often find myself saying "Wow, I learned about that in SL/ASL". Can other historical war games do that for different eras ? Probably. I would like to see two created for military miniature war gaming. One that recreates/simulates the tactical decision-making environment of the Napoleonic Wars and the other that recreates/simulates it for the American Civil War.

As I said, we're talking PIECES not Toys :)

Colin:

I was responding to this. I probably should have placed it in the post.

…;simulations can be used for much more that preparing or training someone to perform a task. For example, they can be used to check systems and processes without actually building the real thing.

Enjoy your wargaming too.

Bill

While not stealing the finances of unsuspecting "muppets", I rather enjoy an afternoon mercilessly destroying an opponent on the game table.

Thoroughly thrashing his (or her) knowledge of historical minutiae while laughing haughtily and spewing partially masticated potato chips atop my well nursed corpulence rounds out what I would consider the 'perfect gaming experience'.

*sigh*

Oh, and I like forcing small men to do my bidding at their peril wearing proto leisure suits.

That aside, I guess it's the comraderie around the gaming table I most enjoy… and hearing myself talk.

Yeah, mostly that.

BD,
It is a simulation because we can simulate the behaviour of a system or process, based on extensive modelling of a wide range of parameters. It is neither a projection nor a hope.

Can one use it to prepare or train someone? Of course, but that is only one use.

In reading all the above, i'd of course agree that there are of course some things that games simulate and where we as gamers can see how they match to real life war as documented – ie don't stand in front of a battery of artillery, HMGs can kill from a long way off etc. My own interests are very much around low level tactics and the whole motivation thing (maybe because I have never been a professional and "seen the elephant"). I do know in a very small way from my own job, how no amount of training/simulation can ever prepare one for the physiological aspects that threat and other stressors put upon one (and thats whether that is life threatening or just peer pressure/expectations etc). So if we play a WW2 skirmish and think that we are simulating anything much more than the surface parts of it, then we are mistaken. Of course maybe in the language we use (copied from the military etc) we are perhaps anyway sub-consciously copying too the whole thing of make it more approachable/manageable (thats not the right word but trying to think of it) – 'pinned down' actually means that someone has probably just messed their pants (and no wargames rules I've seen have ever gone more down the latter path), collateral damage is just a nice way of saying a lot of mums, uncles, grandparents and kids just got turned into offal. Of course as a gamer myself, I like virtually everyone I'm sure recognises that on the one hand it is only a game but on the other that, unlike sports games, its based around a real life activity involving death and detsruction (but like Cluedo players that doesn't mean we agree with murder!) – probably its Wellington's quote that is most apposite in terms of the fascination of war for man (at both the real and table top level) "It is well that war is so terrible, or we should grow too fond of it".

Its often the case too that as ever with hobbies ,one section looks down upon the others – eg some re-enactors who are not gamers would be inclined to make fun of wargaming, as only they as re-enactors know what the ECW battlefield etc was really like (when really all they are doing is re-enacting a slightly more exaggerated verion of a Trained Band pre-war muster/exercise)

Could you furnish the source for the Wellington quote. On this side of the pond it is attributed to Lee at Fredericksburg. Wellington of course pre-dates Lee, so I may have to retire one of my favorite tee-shirts which has Lee's picture with that quote.

Wartopia wrote…

21 Mar 2012 3:09 p.m. PST
What is best in wargamimg?

To crush your enemies, to see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentations of their women.

:-D

_____________________

Their women? Wait, isn't the post about wargamers?

;)

I do it because I have always loved small things (that's what she said) and dioramas. Plus, I love the mechanics of games. To top if off I am interested in military history. Hence, I enjoy wargaming!

apols – false memory syndrome – you are right – i had it my mind that was said in the Waterloo film and googled it but only looked at the headline result which gave the words but also had mentions of Lee and Wellington – the Wellington one of course is
"Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won."

GNREP8

You are correct that it would be difficult to model the effects of the phycology on real folk. Even the technical manuals do't try to model that and we (MG) definitely pay but lip service too it. Were that to be the focus of your game it would not look like a conventional wargame, the parameters would be wholey different and not being a phycologist I would have no clue what they would be. I can manage the tactics etc based on simple engineering. MG was almost called Rule of Thumb as it takes the very basic rules of thumb.

1) Only infantry can take ground.
2) You have to win the the firefight before you can assult.
3) Observation over preservation (for AFV's perticularly).

Validation for us is that you set up a scenario a bit like somthing you read about and you get somthing that either looks the same or you have an inkling of why your result was different. On our armour values there is the odd bit of data around an we get a plausible result. If in a test the armour was penetrated by a round at a range. We would be happy if in our rules gave a good chance (better than 50%).

The fun is if the game flows a bit like engagements you have read and used tactics a bit like the "book" win or lose its a great game. As far as enjoyment goes we rarly play to the bitter end. A game finishes for us when the fun has gone. If we both think one has lost but there will be lots of non challengeing play to "finish" we abandon and conceed defeat. Nothing for us is worse that a boring game even if you are winning.

In other words what do we get out of a wargame is playing it. Win or lose is nothing its the playing that is the fun. In the more complex games we know so little we could not set victory conditions anway! However if we are haing fun playing and learning who cares who wins!

Brian wrote:

Validation for us is that you set up a scenario a bit like somthing you read about and you get somthing that either looks the same or you have an inkling of why your result was different. On our armour values there is the odd bit of data around an we get a plausible result. If in a test the armour was penetrated by a round at a range. We would be happy if in our rules gave a good chance (better than 50%).

That player experience and the game dynamics 'matching' what is understood of the particular combat period is what wargames are designed for. The question is how and where in the game system to get the optimum from it.

The fun is if the game flows a bit like engagements you have read and used tactics a bit like the "book" win or lose its a great game. As far as enjoyment goes we rarly play to the bitter end. A game finishes for us when the fun has gone.

There is a great book out written by a well-known game and wargame designer [both board and computer] Ralph Koster: A Theory of Fun for Game Design.

He discusses not only what makes games 'fun', but how to design for that fun. Its a big issue for the Multi-billion dollar computer game industry.

However if we are haing fun playing and learning who cares who wins!

I enjoy that aspect too, but there are those who would say you can't learn anything from wargames. And play a game not to win? ;-7

Bill H.

Bill H.
You always play to win the scenario. But its playng that counts. If winning is all that it is about then Wargames is the wrong hobby. Winning at any price is a pyric victory that no one can afford. You learn by failure (assumong you know what failure is). Many battles "lost" may not have been "lost" in reality. Arnem "failed" but they never retreated and forced yet another retreat. Villers bocarge was a bad incident but the overall campaighn was a win. In our scenarios the winner is who did best. A long delay by a platoon holding up a colum so the EA can be prepaired is a "win".

I believe most would say that the Alamo was a win despite being a "failure".

In modelling an aero engine some desighns were hoped to be wins but fail. However they add to the pool of knowledge. Such is a wargame. A simulation from which both parties hopefully learn win or lose. Plus you get to be an armchair general and have to read loads more books ;-). An ultimate win!

Brian:
I was being ironic… I agree with all that you wrote. I certainly enjoy those aspects of gaming.

Bill

Gazzola, we play board games when we are kids then people grow out of it. most wargamers played with Airfix soldiers & like me i haven`t grown out of fighting battles with model solders.Being Intellectual dose not sit with me at all well I just am interested in the hobby research, painting all of it.
I would not spend hundreds of pounds on stuff I can`t share with other like minded people.
I get the impression you are a regular type of bloke, its the personalities of the group you play in that can make the
enjoyment in what we do. one last, do you display your figures in your home?

HammerHead

I don't for one minute think that you have to be intelectual or that wargaming is a direct intelectual activity, but I do believe that a fair amount of intelect is required to play. Otherwise, we would all be holding our plain, one coloured figures and going bang, bang!

In contrast to yourself, I guess I might still spend hundreds of pounds, even if no one else wanted to play wargames with me. I'd become a solo wargamer. Come to think of it, I might win more wargames that way!

No, I do not have them on display. They are not intended as showpieces or for historical dioramas. Apart from that, I don't think my painting skills are anything to boast about. Do you display yours?

HammerHead wrote: "Being Intellectual dose not sit with me at all.."

HammerHead, what you don't like being a Homo sapien sapien ? You know Homo neanderthalis probably wished he had our intellect cause he might still be around if he did as I don't think he waged war very well, nor probably did any of the others in our genus who were around when we hit the scene. I'd say we made a big Splash with our intellects and all that …:)

GAZZOLA I take your point. Yes I do have them on display I am proud of my painting skills NOW. Tough learning curve. I started as a collector & was getting nowhere with the bags of figures in my collection, invited to a big demo game painted about 160 figs motivated to get stuff done.
joined a club nearby, wargamed a small skirmish ww1 great fun sunday then did sport relief mile. As the t-shirt says "enjoy yourself its later than you think"
people picked my figures up to have a look…I don`t care what people think I like the way I paint my figs.
BD
If men were so intelligent why in all history did we kill other men with such enthuiasum no other spices takes such
delight in killing for no reason we don`t seem to learn any lessons from one generation to another, do we?

I call them 'Military Miniatures' because my mummy would call me 'Mummy's Little Soldier' in front of my mates and all the big boys would tease me for playing with my toy soldiers. I never served in the Armed Forces because I had asthma and a note from my mum, so I have a desperate need to demonstrate my masculine, military prowess and intellectual credentials by commanding 'Military Miniatures' in 'War Simulations'. And to never, ever play with toy soldiers. Any similarity between Military Miniatures and toy soldiers is entirely coincidental.

I'm consequently so insecure and sad that I need to mock others who are comfortable enough with their own maturity and masculinity to publicly declare that they play with toy soldiers. Being an internet hard-man makes me feel so manly. I also like to capitalise TOY SOLDIERS to emphasise my superior maturity and masculinity over these child-men (who I am ever so slightly jealous of, as they served in the country's Armed Forces and aren't afraid to admit that they play with toy soldiers).

God I'm so lonely.

I consequently feel Gazzola's pain. I'm here for you, brother!