"GAME DESIGN CATEGORIES: Benefits and examples" Topic

GAME DESIGN CATEGORIES: Benefits

I was asked to start a thread about this, so here goes. Our hobby has scale categories—sort of. Certainly there are different historical periods or imagi-nations or fictional histories like the 1930's English Civil War, but when we look at what a particular set of rules offers, it gets real fuzzy. We can talk about ‘brigade level' games, but the meaning ranges from the highest level of command to what a single stand represents. We speak of game types of like ‘Old School', but actually identifying a particular set of rules as ‘Old School' all depends on the person and identifying traits vary widely. So will ideas like ‘complicated' or ‘playable'.
We are talking about what particular wargames are designed to provide. We can admit that a game can't be all things to all people, so what specifically was this game designed to do? All wargame rules seem to offer all the same things regardless of how they are designed: "Playability and Historical Accuracy." The miniature wargame hobby is missing with a primary product, wargame rules, what most hobbies and markets provide: Categories of products.
Categories are groupings of things, ideas or purposes around shared characteristics.
This can be the categories of restaurant food—Menus: Appetizers, Salads, Entrees and Dessert etc., living organisms: species, genus and family etc, or cars: as economy, mid-size and luxury etc. or Offensive football plays, option, run and pass etc.

Benefits:

1. Categories make complexities manageable. Wargames are complicated, more so that most commercial games with a wide variety of rules. Categorizing is takes all the possible recipes and foods and puts them into menus for restaurants, types of cooking like BBQ and Cajun.

2. It makes finding what is desired easier, a more efficient effort. One doesn't have to sort through every single item on a menu or in a grocery store every time to find one item. If you have ever gone to a grocery store while they are ‘reorganizing', you know what I am talking about in the way of efficiency.

3. Most importantly, it makes finding the beginner's rules or the ‘hard core' or *somewhere* in between far easier. The lack of categories is one reason gamers ‘hunt' for the perfect rules, buying far more than they will ever play and why it is hard for beginners to ‘know where to start.' Other hobbies address those issues with categories.

4. It provides more objective information about a model's design. As it is now, it is often difficult to separate the hype from the concrete game mechanics, opinion from what the wargame design actually is designed to provide. This would go a long way to avoiding discussions were someone is advocating that every game should have the same, "best" game mechanics, or worse, dividing gamers up into types instead of the game rules. Categories are neutral. Menus don't tell you that Salads are ‘better' than appetizers, or steaks ‘better' than tacos

5. The objective descriptions allow for constructive discussions on specific methods that apply to only one kind of design, or differently between the various categories.. Designing a successful generic wargame that is simple, allowing for players to ‘roll and kill' is much different than designing a game to simulate divisional combat during the Napoleonic Wars. Each has design requirements in common, but many that are specific to just those design goals.

6.It gives a structure to both critical analysis and design innovation. Understanding and creativity are both based on the ability to effectively contrast and compare—to communicate effectively. Without a structure, the community of wargamers can't do that collectively. They don't now. The depth of game design conversation is all ‘what I like vs what you like.' If I am designing an economy car, I don't have to research every car made—or even know about every vehicle ever made, but only those designs that benefit that type/category of car, where ‘what I like' doesn't solve that problem.

7.It provides a marketing structure for publishers and product manufacturers. If there is one thing that controls the innovation of the ‘next generation' of games, it is the market and the products it offers. Agreed on Categories help the seller know what gamers want and in turn this provides more specific products, which in turn generates more innovation. This is quite evident in RC Modeling and Model RR, for instance.

These categories are not something that the customer makes up, they are something the market provides because they are a tremendous help to the market, customer and provider alike. Such categories are arbitrary, agreed on because they work to provide the 7 benefits above, not because they are ‘the truth.' There is no logical reason that can vegetables couldn't be stocked next to fresh vegetables. Any reasons for doing it are ‘practical' and simply agreed on… just as are the differences between Napoleonic and 19th Century games or economy and compact rental cars.

Some in our hobby have attempted pieces of this with such things as standardized scales, but unlike RC Models where the craft and performance is all directly physical, a significant portion of wargaming is not: the game design and play. (The play is physical, but actually represents another kind of physical activity altogether.) Yet game ‘performance' is what categories address and what most game discussions are about.

I'll provide an example…and only an example of what I mean by wargame categories.

In the end, who decides what categories ‘work' and where a particular game fits?: The designers and publishers. At this point, they haven't done their job collectively like so many other hobbies.

Some in our hobby have attempted pieces of this with such things as standardized scales

Standardized scales? You must be joking. No such thing in this hobby.

Such categories are arbitrary, agreed on because they work to provide the 7 benefits above, not because they are ‘the truth.'

Who cares?

First of all I appreciate the effort you have gone through to detail your thoughts. As a librarian I make my living dealing with classification and cataloging. However in a hobby our size I think what you propose is a solution in search of a problem. There just aren't that many rules sets published to cause the confusion you describe. I doubt many gamers would buy Force on Force and then complain because it does not simulate the actions of brigade on brigade action.

I would probably most compare our hobby with board wargamers. There are probably more games created to cover a single battle such as Gettysburg than there are miniatuares rulesets covering the entire Civil War. Likewise the consumer base for those games is probably larger than ours. Even then the game publisher is probably going to use the same type of descriptions a rules publisehr will resort to. "Easy to learn" equals beginner's level. "Highly detailed" appeals to the grognard. there are some game designers to publish a scale of sort on their games indicating complexity and solo play ability, but even those categories are self created by the designer and may or may not reflect the experience of the user.

Falling back on my librarian background again, when seeking out miniature rules I am much more concerned about recall than precision. I believe the designers are too. Labeling something a "division level game" and then turning off someone looking for "brigade level" just unncessarily limits an already small target demographic. Give me a list of all the games and a decent description of the mechanics involved, which most publishers do, and I can pretty well come to a conclusion without excessive categories.

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@ottoathome

Not very constructive comment.

Rather than staying at home shouldn't you be out and about?

OK, just to everyone has something to throw rocks at:
For me--after broad period--the big categories are level, casualty representation and complexity.
When I say "brigade level game" I'm referring to a game in which the miniature wargamer commands a brigade. If I'm talking about the representation, I'll say "stand=platoon" or some such.
Casualty removal can only be individual, stand or roster. I suppose theoretically it could be "mixed" but then the rules automatically fail my complexity test.
I'd love to have a system for categorizing games by complexity, but I've never seen one. Page count or required volumes is the best surrogate I have. (With the rules in front of me, it's always quite easy: pick some common activity and try to read through how it's done. Mostly, this is the stage at which the rules go back on the rack. But if you can't break the shrink wrap, they all tell you they're simple and quick to learn.)
Special categories:
For me, "hex based"--i.e., "board game derived" is one. The other is what I call "constant frontage" and applies to the DBX series, V&B and a few others. Constant frontage games base all units on just that, or some fraction thereof, and are almost always stand removal and--except for a couple of Phil's latest--are usually relatively simple games. At least, they're readily adapted to any army which also has a constant frontage.
As far as "Old School" goes, I think the confusion stems from confusing wargame rules of a type written in a certain period with rules written when the wargamer was a certain age. And I'd call any rules "Old School" which involved individually-mounted figures, removed individual figures as casualties and were relatively simple and straight-forward in their mechanisms. "Charge!" is probably the set most often encountered in conventions, but I would accept Aelred Glidden's "Landing Party" series as an excellent example of the type, even though written decades later.

Other than that, I think we're down to families based on core mechanisms.

So a category would be something like "This is a horse and musket period game, set at the brigade level, roster based at medium complexity (32 pages.)" I'd still love to find an objective standard of complexity--possibly number of steps in the firing sequence?--but it's the best I can do for now.

When I say "brigade level game" I'm referring to a game in which the miniature wargamer commands a brigade.

A lot of gamers would disagree with that definition.

Yes MajorB, that was mentioned above. But until we agree on a definition, words don't have a lot of use. What would you call a game in which the wargamer commands a brigade?

A lot of gamers would disagree with that definition.

. . . and thus we come directly back around to the problem which the original post was intended to address . . . the inability of any significant number of wargamers to agree upon anything.

The more professional branches of wargaming are gradually building a consensus on a catalog of concepts and a common vocabulary with which to discuss them (listen to some of the talks from this year's Connections UK conference to see this in action) but hobby wargamers will likely never be able to benefit from any of it, out of sheer obtuseness.

I've tried to read the OP three times and each time it makes less sense. It's like random sentences spliced together. Is there a Rosetta stone for this literary hieroglyph?

Wachaza, I can give you a summary of the translation:

"If we can get some agreed-upon vocabulary for describing rules, it will be easier for wargamers to find the rules they need, and for publishers and stores to sell the rules they have."

And I think it's a point. I find it much easier in a car lot or a bookstore to describe the kind of thing I want than it is in a game shop or vendor's hall looking for rules. I have as clear an idea of what I want, but there's no shared vocabulary, even to the extent there is one in, say, wargame figures. We have words to describe scale, but as MajorB points out, we don't even have an accepted set of terms to describe what level of command a set of rules is intended for. Surely we can improve on this.

I think we are over-thinking this just a tad. We play games with toy…er…model soldiers. Everyone has their own tastes, vernacular, favorite period/size/scale/companies/rules etc. Our hobby has always been about creativity and free choice, craftsmanship and so forth. Why on earth would you try to codify that?

Joker, So we can communicate with each other? If I tell a building supply place that I need a 30/66 RH solid-core door, pre-hung, with a 4" throat, and he understands what I mean, it doesn't impede anyone's creativity or free choice: it just means I get the door I'm looking for. Same thing if I tell the clerk in the bookstore that I'm looking for a Heyer-style Regency, or a Doc Smith style space opera.

But if I ask OMM for a simple brigade-level set of Napoleonics rules, meaning one about four or five pages in which I command a brigade, and OMM send me one I might get the hang of in a week and in which the maneuver units are brigades--that's not free choice and craftsmanship: that's just confusion and inconvenience. We might as well not have agreed-upon words for doors and windows.

We need an agreed-upon set of words to describe rules which will at least let us sort for the ones which might work for us. Being able to say in a few words that I need a set of Napoleonics rules in which I will command a brigade or equivalent, which remove castings to keep track of losses and which are learnable in an evening and have everyone know what this means impedes no one's creativity: it just reduces the frustration level.

It ain't going to happen. Wargamers are far too much free spirits for that. What's more, would any of us ever ask OMM for a "simple set of Napoleonic rules"? I think not. We almost all read about a new set of rules here, or in the hobby press, and order that specific set of rules after doing a small amount of reading reports to make sure it's the right level game for us. All this desire to regiment a fun hobby seems a bit pointless.

Could be. But I'd about pay money to get these jokers to stop putting fluff on the back of the rule books and give me a few hard facts on the contents. ("Easy to learn but hard to master" is an ambition, not a characteristic.) Even the reviews are not always very specific about core things like basing, or even complexity. (Standing offer to the magazines: could we not trade off one photo of the practice game for a step by step through the movement and firing phases? The reviewer's "quick" and "simple" are often very far removed from my own.)

Lots of rulebooks going into a crate for Lancaster and the flea market. Clearer vocabulary might have saved me a ton of money.

Joker, So we can communicate with each other? If I tell a building supply place that I need a 30/66 RH solid-core door, pre-hung, with a 4" throat, and he understands what I mean, it doesn't impede anyone's creativity or free choice: it just means I get the door I'm looking for. Same thing if I tell the clerk in the bookstore that I'm looking for a Heyer-style Regency, or a Doc Smith style space opera.

Huh…

So you asked for a "brigade sized" rules set and didn't get what you were looking for because he had different ideas on what "brigade level" meant? Maybe you should have said, "I am looking for a set of rules where each unit is a battalion and a player is expected to command about 4 units." wouldn't do it? Or perhaps you just don't want to put forth the effort and communicate exactly what you want.

An Example of Wargame Categories
Some points here:

1. These categories are an example, nothing more.
2. Designers and publishers would create the categories and they would decide where their wargames fit. Here I have placed games in this example based on what the designers themselves have said about their games.
3. There is no good, bad, right or wrong issues here. The categories are value neutral in that all equally valid and valuable.
4. Any of the categories could be simulations, depending on what they are simulating.
5. While complexity goes up as we go down the categories, it isn't an inherent need or quality. Various games in all categories could have the same level of complexity.
6. Here it is obvious what games can act as an introduction to historical wargames.

Wargames:
All wargames are games, designed to represent war in some fashion. From there, they go off in many different directions. We a looking at Historical Wargames.

Generic Wargames:
[e.g Stratego, Risk or Battleship, variants of Settlers of Catan and Chess. ] The wargame provides some of the elements of armed conflict and some of the dynamics surrounding the principles of war, but does not represent any real war.

From here, wargames become genres, representing particular wars and/or battles during particular period historical, SF/F or RPG and any combinations thereof. However, we are interested in Historical wargame rules and what they provide, so here is an example of what historical wargame categories might look like:

HISTORICAL WARGAME CATEGORIES

Evocative Historical Wargames: [e.g Battle Cry, Axis and Allies, H.G. Wells' Little Wars, TSTF, Square Bashing, DBA and many ‘Universal rules Systems' fit here.] This is any game that includes some elements of war, including weapons, combat, types of units, military terms, representative playing pieces and terrain. The actual game process doesn't portray actual scale terrain or actual units. Much about the history is ‘generic' rather than specific, implied rather than overt in representation. Borg called his BC game "stylized history" and the designer of Axis and Allies said that it wasn't an attempt to portray WWII as much as show "some of the strategic decisions of the war." Scale and actual unit sizes, organization etc. isn't portrayed or abstracted away. The game is what counts and the history is minimal. Particular battles may or may not be portrayed, but rather period-type warfare. The rules don't portray actual unit relationships or battle other than some general dynamics and principles of war. It is evocative because the period is identified with period figures and armies named, while history ‘colors' game play. For instance, in Battle Cry and TSTF, artillery fires farther than rifle fire, but the range relationships and actual damage involved are not historically representative. Nor are the units. BC has generic units that may or may not represent brigades and divisions. In TSTF, Larry Brom had two infantry companies represent an entire battalion. The intent of the rules is important here. Larry writes:

"Throughout this booklet, you find deviations from and simplifications of historical facts and figures. Remember, what we are trying to create is a playable, fun-filled, entertaining game that will capture the flavor, to a reasonable degree, of those stirring ‘Days of the Empire' on the tabletop."

[Italics his, from the first page intro to TSTF] In other words, the history is included to be Evocative, Decorative, provide ‘Historical Flavor', not provide a factual representation of real British Colonial battles during the 19th Century.

Representational, Historical Wargames: [ e.g. Black Powder, Flames of War, Regimental Fire and Fury, Grand Armee, Sharp Practice, Piquet and Principles of War. ] This game design is meant to recreate historical battles based on actual terrain, units and combat outcomes. Recreation is a major design goal. As the designers of Black Powder wrote, their design was meant to be a "convincing representation of real combat." Regimental Fire and Fury is said to be "Historically Accurate" Time, historical terrain, military units, and combat may or may not have actual scales, but the purpose of the design is to represent specific history. This is the ‘black box' kind of game that generates historical decision options and results, but doesn't necessarily do so in a dimensional way, with actual times, terrain and actual scale units. There are many reasons why a designer would do this, but all representational designers would have one reason in common: The history they wanted to represent didn't require those things.

Scale Historical Wargames: [ e.g. Napoleon's Battles, From Valmy to Waterloo, Chain of Command, Age of Eagles, Johnny Reb, Across a Deadly Field, Empire and Age of Reason and Day of Battle] The three indicators of this type of game are scale time, terrain, and combat units. They are to some particular scale, usually the design focusing on representing very specific times and tactics. AND the designer explains how his design uses them to recreate history. The game mechanics incorporate these ‘three scale dimensions.' The intent is to recreate battle as closely as possible. Even innovative designs like the variable length bound (VLB) can fall under this category. Both simultaneous and alternating turn games can be ‘scale' games.

Some designers for both Representational and Scale Historical Wargames given as examples above state they have designed ‘simulations' while others in both groups have not. These designers feel being as true to scale as possible is important.

We can talk about whether each design succeeds, but categories provide some basis for what kind of success was attempted.

Our hobby has always been about creativity and free choice, craftsmanship and so forth. Why on earth would you try to codify that?

Joker:
That isn't what is being 'codified' anymore than a menu 'codifies' restaurant food, let alone hampers creativity, free choice or craftsmanship… it gives creativity focus, free choice tools for those choices and describes craftmanship.

"I am looking for a set of rules where each unit is a battalion and a player is expected to command about 4 units." wouldn't do it? Or perhaps you just don't want to put forth the effort and communicate exactly what you want.

Is that one stand per battalion or four? This isn't about what the customer is communicating, it is about what the designer is communicating, the publisher is communicating, so the player can make a choice without having to go to each designer asking for a game "where each unit is a battalion and a player is expected to command about 4 units" and getting a questions back: What scale, four battalions or a single battalion with four units, etc. etc. etc.

I was asked to put this up as a OP, so I have to generate a discussion.

So you asked for a "brigade sized" rules set and didn't get what you were looking for because he had different ideas on what "brigade level" meant? Maybe you should have said, "I am looking for a set of rules where each unit is a battalion and a player is expected to command about 4 units." wouldn't do it? Or perhaps you just don't want to put forth the effort and communicate exactly what you want.

That is the whole point of standardizing a vocabulary. "Brigade sized" means something different to different people. Without standardization, you could spend ten pages describing your game and not cover the things that I am looking for in an explanation. I could spend ten pages writing a query and you could not know if your game fit that bill or not.

"Deck Building Game", "Living Card Game", "Collectable Card Game", and "Fixed Deck Game" all mean something specific to card gamers. In a Venn diagram, those things overlap. The power of taxonomization is not that you can draw a Venn diagram, but rather that given a hundred card gamers, 99 of them would put a specific game in the same part of that diagram (there's always an outlier). And, more importantly 9 of 10 players with experience would be able to do it without being given the categories.

You know what is amazing to me McLaddie? Its how Featherstone, Moreschauser, Bath, Scruby, Young, Dowdall & Gleason, and Grant managed to make their games without all this contrived, convoluted claptrap.

You know what is amazing to me McLaddie? Its how Featherstone, Moreschauser, Bath, Scruby, Young, Dowdall & Gleason, and Grant managed to make their games without all this contrived, convoluted claptrap.

Otto:
I'm not surprised. The next time you go to a restaurant and peruse the menu, be amazed how they ever created meals before menus and other claptrap while you order from it.

All the miniature wargames mentioned fall into the category of dice games.
As gamer, it is for me irrelevant if you have to individually roll for cohesion, orders, communication, charge, home in, morale, fight, ammo, casualties and humidity (good old style rules) or just roll once to solve the same event.
As irrelevant as the claims for more or less accuracy by publishers.
What may be remotely relevant are things like bookeeping requirements, and REAL game speed.
Ultimatey these games make me yawn.
It is indeed fortunate that most of us spend more time collecting and painting that just playing that.

Otto, don't you have a battle report to write up? There's a good chap.

McLaddie, thanks for posting this. I don't have much time to respond today, but I think any system, such as the one found at boardgamegeek (where the categories and mechanics themselves are explained), would have to come from users rather than manufacturers. I'm sure they would fear being pigeon-holed or that people would write a game off purely because it used a certain mechanic. In addition I think wargamers tinker and houserule more than most boardgamers and you only have to look at threads where people ask for a game that features 'x' and people respond with 'try my favourite game but treat 'y' as 'x' and it'll be fine. This may well encourage designers to try to reach as broad a base as possible.

Whilst it would be helpful to have an expanding database which you could search by ticking boxes such as card-driven, battalion-level (which has a definition in the system), etc. I can't see really what benefit there would be for what are often one or two people producing rules in their spare time to give up more time and try and coordinate with the thousands of others in the same situation. If one of the bigger companies (Battlefront, Warlord) decided to set something up, I'm sure lots of people would view it with suspicion and refuse to adopt it from contrariness.

The only way I can see it happening would be for a committed group of users to:

a) agree on what would be useful categories to help players
b) target the most popular rulesets out there and tick the boxes in the database
c) allow people to upload houserules, reviews and other information. Add a marketplace. Seem familiar? This would encourage people to see your website as a resource rather than a sterile database
d) open up the system to allow people who collate rules and have too much time on their hands to complete the majority of entries (see Wikipedia for how that would come about over time)
e) invite game designers to post and encourage game design discussions
e) fund your site with news items and adverts from manufacturers

I do find boardgamegeek extremely useful – the ability to mine it for games and ideas by themes and mechanic is simple but took time to collate. Something similar for wargaming as part of the same family would be of use.

That is the whole point of standardizing a vocabulary. "Brigade sized" means something different to different people. Without standardization, you could spend ten pages describing your game and not cover the things that I am looking for in an explanation. I could spend ten pages writing a query and you could not know if your game fit that bill or not.

I guess it is a miniature gamer thing…at least for some. I am amazed that some folks can;t simply articulate what they want without the use of buzz words. That is what this boils down to. Making a menu of buzz words and agree as a community on what each one means. Good luck with that.

I find myself agreeing with Otto. Now, take your meds like a good lad, Otto. It doesn't happen often, and that feeling will go away.

Did you ever read academic papers defining "humor"? About as dry and boring as it is possible to be. Not a joke or smile to be found.
This is remarkably similar.

I guess it goes with the territory. Wargamers have this insane urge to define things, often if not usually, wrongly.
And like many academics, their definitions are self serving. Does the proper usage of "begging the question" strike a familiar note? The OP is full of question begging.
They are not axioms, at least as how I learned the definition of "axiom" in high school geometry. But modern research has shown…..

You don't ask the whole community to agree joker – you go ahead as a group and people will either buy in over time (as has happened in other hobbies) or they don't.

There are only tweo ways that standardization happens: From an authority because it is really important to have a standardisized vocabulary (all firemen need to know exactly what a description means) or from a private agency that becaoms so useful, that everyone uses their vocabulary. BGG has the category "card driven" boardgame. Now it is defined and everyone interested knows what it means.

If miniature wargaming had a clear vocabulary first of all, we would notice how non innovative wargaming is. Isnt one of the innovation of Bolt action 2 the use of templates for burst weapons?

you go ahead as a group and people will either buy in over time (as has happened in other hobbies) or they don't.

These are who exactly? Elected officials to the great Miniature Wargaming Collective? This seems so…serious. It's wargaming with toys.

Who said anything about electing people? I'm sure those behind boardgamegeek and rpg.net weren't elected, but they took a lead in developing something which grows because of the community.

Boardgame geek has most mini wargames already classified.

Example:

Category
Collectible Components
Miniatures
Vietnam War
Wargame
World War II

Mechanisms
Dice Rolling
Modular Board
Point to Point Movement
Simulation
Variable Player Powers

Family
Flames of War
Solitaire Wargames

'Mechanisms' are the key part for game design discussion.

I'm sure they would fear being pigeon-holed or that people would write a game off purely because it used a certain mechanic.

Hi Ben:
Well, that is a danger now, but I have been surprised by how many designers fight the idea of 'categories', even with all the market benefits for just that reason. As long as 'my game' can be all things to all people, then I can sell to the largest audience.

In addition I think wargamers tinker and houserule more than most boardgamers and you only have to look at threads where people ask for a game that features 'x' and people respond with 'try my favourite game but treat 'y' as 'x' and it'll be fine. This may well encourage designers to try to reach as broad a base as possible.

Designers always want to reach as broad a base as possible, particularly when the lack of information about the product has gamers buying lots more rules sets than they can ever play to find what they want…or avoid that route by changing the ones they have or making their own rules.

I can't see really what benefit there would be for what are often one or two people producing rules in their spare time to give up more time and try and coordinate with the thousands of others in the same situation. If one of the bigger companies (Battlefront, Warlord) decided to set something up, I'm sure lots of people would view it with suspicion and refuse to adopt it from contrariness.

Well, that is part of the problem. Lots of weekend publishers so the market never matures… and remains fairly amateurish apart from some powerhouses like Warlord.

The only way I can see it happening would be for a committed group of users to:

a) agree on what would be useful categories to help players
b) target the most popular rulesets out there and tick the boxes in the database
c) allow people to upload house rules, reviews and other information. Add a marketplace. Seem familiar? This would encourage people to see your website as a resource rather than a sterile database
d) open up the system to allow people who collate rules and have too much time on their hands to complete the majority of entries (see Wikipedia for how that would come about over time)
e) invite game designers to post and encourage game design discussions
e) fund your site with news items and adverts from manufacturers

Actually, that isn't the way categories are built. First of all, the customer doesn't do much of anything. How did car rental companies all start using the same compact, economy, mid-size and luxury categories with all sharing the same traits? Because it was useful.

Joker calls the categories 'buzz words', but is that what menu categories are--buzz words, or terms that help the customer quickly and efficiently find what they want?

Wargamers have this insane urge to define things, often if not usually, wrongly. And like many academics, their definitions are self serving.

Winston: Yes, I've noticed that, an insane urge you don't find rampant other hobbies.

Ever wonder why?

And this has nothing to do with academics, unless you believe organizing a grocery store, selling effectively in the market place or identifying a dish as a salad is an academic exercise.

And in agreeing with Otto about this, remember that he is one of the most active TMP posters in asking [and determining] what is important in a game, what players really want from a game, what is the right kinds of games, the right kind of fun, etc. etc. etc.

Mechanisms' are the key part for game design discussion.

Jerboa:

Agreed. That is the focus of the categories: Game design.

And was that set of categories you posted 'voted' on? Was some committee elected to create it? And most importantly, are the game designers using the list to identify their games?

Wargaming is a complex hobby. Categories help in navigating the marketplace for both customer and publisher.

Apparently there's an eclipse today because I find myself agreeing with Otto and the OFM.

The next time you go to a restaurant and peruse the menu, be amazed how they ever created meals before menus and other claptrap while you order from it.

The only organizational frameworks I've ever seen on restaurant menus are for simple obvious things like: "Beverages," "Pasta," "Seafood Dishes," and "Desserts."

Nicer restaurants don't even do that since they have smaller selections; they just assume that you're bright enough to know that something called "Roast Oysters Garnished with Radish" is, er, Oysters and Radishes, and probably not a dessert?

Unless you want it to be; why not? The customer is king, right? Maybe I like eating oysters and radishes for dessert; who cares that the category doesn't label it a dessert?

If we can get some agreed-upon vocabulary for describing rules, it will be easier… for publishers and stores to sell the rules they have…. Agreed on Categories help the seller know what gamers want and in turn this provides more specific products, which in turn generates more innovation.

There are so many unproven assumptions in those sentences I don't even know where to begin.

Do you have any data showing that the handful of remaining retailers who still carry historical miniatures rules would derive more sales as a result of attaching category labels to these products?

Do you have any data showing that attaching labels to old* historical miniatures games would "generate more innovation" for new games?

* I use the word "old" here because most of the examples you cite above are of games that were published 10-20+ years ago and haven't been on anybody store shelf in ages. Do you honestly believe that putting category labels on them would suddenly result in a surge of new purchases?

We already have categories. They are called the rules. Any game is defined by its rules, and the rules are the game (although not the game experience). Anything else is just an attempt to make a summary. It reminds to an old debate in software coding: do you have to provide comments in the code, or should code be self-explanatory?

As for the categories proposed, one has to make a distinction between vocabulary used by a publisher (usually marketing language, also on the back of boardgames boxes …), and the vocabulary on review sites such as BGG (what players say the game does). These are not the same thing, and serve different purposes.

As for standardized language, it is not something you can enforce, it has to grow organically. Game reviewers – if they're interested in participating – are the best course of action.

And btw, I do think we have a lot of common terminology already that is useful in describing games. When someone tells me "This ruleset uses army lists, a buckets of dice method to resolve combat, an igo ugo turn sequence, and puts orcs against elves", my answer will be "I'll think I'll pass."

By the way, a lot of online retailers and service providers have been doing things like this for several years now. Amazon, for example, or Netflix. They attach labels to the books you order or the movies you watch, and then try to offer you: "More Like This…"

Maybe it works for some people, but I find that the recommendations normally don't make sense because the categories can't possibly capture all the reasons why somebody might like something.

If I watch a cowboy comedy horror movie starring Brad Pitt and George Clooney, and I give it "5 Stars" because I loved the interaction between two of the minor characters, and because the dialog was so clever… then I'm going to get tons of recommendations for cowboy movies, for comedies, for horror movies, and for anything starring Brad Pitt or George Clooney. But none of them probably come close to being like my experience watching this particular film. Because there's no category for: "Really great dialog that appeals to Garth."

What I want is another movie that appeals to me at this unique and personal level.

Or not. Maybe that movie was unique for me in that way, and I don't "need" or want another. Now I'm ready to move on to watching a Polish detective movie about vampires in World War One. Good luck categorizing that.

I do find it rather pathetic that this sensible approach on a Wargemeds Design board, not a general board is treated by some, almost with ridicule.

As to the idea I think it has great merit. I am a part time rule writer and I do find it hard to quickly get an undertanding even remotely of new rule sets.

For instance a game designed for a group at a typical wargames club is DEFINITELY not for me. To much has to be glossed over as the participant may have little or no working knowledge of the period or its tactics.

So suitable for club Muliplayer may be a relevant catogory if honestly applied.

The in our game detail is modest. Tanks with turrets have to use them and most wepon systems are modelled i.e , main gun, Smoke dischargers, smoke generators, Battle Management, FLIR, Gun Launched missiles and various natures of gun ammunition. We do not in general account for individual ammunition use hence modest detail not High detail.

Low detail would be where for instance a 1 stand equals a platoon did not reflect its posture. i. Battalions in dence or skirmish formations in early time and for say tanks in line Optimum fire to front), echalon left (optimum fire to the front or left side only).
In my scale low detail would be where not all tank weapon systems were not modelled.

Clearly some sescriptions would be of great benefit to most. The buyer always has the option to ignore the categories and should not be scored or apluded for his personal preferences.

What would you call a game in which the wargamer commands a brigade?

A brigade level game.

Although few here will agree on classification, I do appreciate the efforts of McLaddie in getting it started.

Jerboa – that list is rather random and vague. I don't think it's particularly helpful in itself, nor are miniature wargamers the core audience for that site.

McLaddie – 'Actually, that isn't the way categories are built. First of all, the customer doesn't do much of anything. How did car rental companies all start using the same compact, economy, mid-size and luxury categories with all sharing the same traits? Because it was useful.'

That isn't the way *some* categories are built. What about the Dewey Decimal system? Melvil wasn't a publisher, nor was the system put in place to make their lives easier or shift more books, I'm sure.

In your car hire example, it might well have been the case for a number of similarly organised large companies who are targeting the same audience in each category. Good luck with expecting a mixture of companies who range from enthusiastic amateurs publishing one game in their life, to those with perhaps a few dozen employees, to take time out and try to agree what would be the most suitable categories. We are not talking about one word to describe up to 4 all-encompassing categories, but something far more complicated.

Let's add in the fact that the big companies who *could* take a lead (GW, Battlefront, Warlord) probably don't see the need as people already know their games and why should they highlight the competition. All the while, your manufacturers know that their audience will often happily fork out for product they don't really need anyway. Do people rent cars for joy-riding?

I would concur with Phil in that game reviewers are the group who could do something about use of *useful* language, but they would need a suitable place to engage in the process and I don't think TMP is it.

Brian, I do find somewhat surprising the number of people who jump into threads to say (in effect) 'This aspect of wargames discussion is unimportant…' without adding the important qualifier 'to me'.

There are people for whom historical research is unimportant. Similarly painting. Or fantasy. The list goes on. For other people it can lead to years of discussion or indulging in an activity. That does seem rather 'serious' joker, doesn't it?

Isn't it fantastic that we can be interested in different aspects of the same hobby or are some people too keen to try and tell others they're playing with or talking about toy solders wrong?

Dr. Dutre hit the nail on the head:

As for standardized language, it is not something you can enforce, it has to grow organically. Game reviewers – if they're interested in participating – are the best course of action.

A useful "standard" of language might also arise from some kind of community or group voluntarily publishing rules reviews and analysis. Bill, if you want to start a web community dedicated to this pursuit, I'll sign up, but… well, good luck with that. There aren't a lot of wargames analysts in the world. :-\

Either way, a standardized jargon will only arise if the wider audience of wargamers finds such analysis useful enough to simply adopt its language as the baseline for rules discussion in the wider wargaming world.

A "design by committee" approach to creating a jargon is clearly going to founder on TMP. This place has less intellectual coherence than a stampede of cats.

- Ix

The only organizational frameworks I've ever seen on restaurant menus are for simple obvious things like: "Beverages," "Pasta," "Seafood Dishes," and "Desserts."

They are only obvious because they have been accepted for a long time. And yes, they are simple…and if they provide categories for such simple items, imagine the need for complex products.

Unless you want it to be; why not? The customer is king, right? Maybe I like eating oysters and radishes for dessert; who cares that the category doesn't label it a dessert?

Maybe you do…terrific. Where will you find them on the menu and how do you know you are eating them for dessert?
Categories, which are only agreed-upon conventions…because it makes things simpler.

What I want is another movie that appeals to me at this unique and personal level.

Great… so how do you find it? And knowing it is a cowboy, comedy, horror film [I am assuming you identified it as such] doesn't narrow down the search at all, is that it? Then you better check out the mysteries, romances, war and documentaries also. No wait, you know that won't get you what you want because of those categories. How many thousands of films don't you have to go through to find what you want because of that?

Or not. Maybe that movie was unique for me in that way, and I don't "need" or want another. Now I'm ready to move on to watching a Polish detective movie about vampires in World War One. Good luck categorizing that.

Do you realize how many categories you just threw around to describe that movie? Just think how hard it would be to describe that movie without the categories Polish, Detective, Movie, Vampires, World War One, and how much easier it is with them.

Our wargames are easily as complex because as that movie. They include things like Polish, World War One let alone all the military terms, scale, periods, tactics, terrain, abstract rules etc. etc. If there are enough Polish detective moves with vampires in WWI, they will create a category for it.

As for the categories proposed, one has to make a distinction between vocabulary used by a publisher (usually marketing language, also on the back of boardgames boxes …), and the vocabulary on review sites such as BGG (what players say the game does). These are not the same thing, and serve different purposes.

They do serve different purposes in the historical miniatures hobby at the moment. In most hobbies they are not different to any great extent.

We already have categories. They are called the rules. Any game is defined by its rules, and the rules are the game (although not the game experience). Anything else is just an attempt to make a summary. It reminds to an old debate in software coding: do you have to provide comments in the code, or should code be self-explanatory?

How many games to you buy because they are 'self-explanatory?' This isn't the Dewey Decimal System, but a very common market tool for buying and selling.

As for standardized language, it is not something you can enforce, it has to grow organically. Game reviewers – if they're interested in participating – are the best course of action.

Of course it isn't something you can enforce. People create them and use them because they are useful…make things easier. That's why hobbies develop those categories and use them, not because they are 'enforced.'

Those are common terminology… but does it really tell you how the game plays other than lots of dice? What constitutes a 'bucket of dice?' Lots of very different games use 'lots of dice'. As for IGO UGO games. I Just played three games, one board and two miniatures that could be described as IGO UGO, but the turn sequence was very different, with lots of possible interruptions of a turn in two of them.

We already have categories. They are called the rules. Any game is defined by its rules, and the rules are the game (although not the game experience). Anything else is just an attempt to make a summary. It reminds to an old debate in software coding: do you have to provide comments in the code, or should code be self-explanatory?

"The Rules" don't have categories that the hobby uses with any success… just like saying it is a IGO UGO system tell you very little about how the play can or does go. Chess and Chain of Command are both IGO UGO games… Right? Useful category? I don't think so.

The original idea seems commendable: to help players find the game that best suit their needs.

Mechanics of current wargames are all the same, dice rolling or card drawing, that can be used as near equivalents. This is objective and so the core classification as we see on BGG is of no use.

So we are left with something like:
- Core randomizer: d6; d10; percentage; mix; generic cards; dedicated deck, etc
- Play length. The problem here is that anything compared to Empire is ‘fast play' and there is no way to get an independent grading on how fast games are.
- Bookeeping resources: requires the use of on table markers; off table markers; turn counting; generic notes; template notes; no bookeeping.
- Engine: simple rolls; roll to hit and roll to save; opposed rolls for score's different; doubling systems; plus variants of all of those using cards.
- Action layers: can be objectively quantified by the number of steps needed to perform a certain action. For example combat, is it a simple dice roll (1); opposed dice rolls (1/2); roll to hit and then to save (2); roll for sight and then fire and save (3); check morale; test to charge; test to hit then save (4) etc.
- Chart consulting: how many charts are needed to perform a certain action.

And we could go on, but the work to do this would hardly pay. Wargamers seem to waver between the last hype and established classics. Industry produces the hype and classics are known to us all, so there is no rational method to teach each of us what the best game would be for our highly subjective demands.

Plus there is the essential problem that most are not ready to accept: there is no satisfying wargame in the market today. As a new game – or the latest edition – is released there is a chance it will be popular, that is proportional to the advertising and industry support driving it. ‘Big' industry produces rules to sell more minis not to produce a great game, let's not forget that is part of the business, no drama.
As the new shinny and true popular set comes out it gets praised by the usual crowd and gain momentum. For a time it will seem skill matters and the game is enjoyable. This is just because some people will master the rules faster than others and they will win more often. But as the time passes and more players dominate the basics the game results will just reflect the true core engine randomness (dice) and interest will fade, even if most are not truly aware about why. That's the time to go back to ‘classics' until the new hype arrives.

This is the hobby today. A few of us love it well enough to try harder: to give back to those that have provided us the inspiration, the dream, a new game that could open the door to something intellectually more satisfying than this.
My plead to all designers is: let's dare break this cycle or be cursed failing.
Those of us that have already been cursed have indeed nothing to lose.

OK, I know that even questioning this noble crusade is considered thoughtless and maybe even evil, but I do – honestly (!) – have four serious questions:

1. When? I've been on TMP for eight years and this is the fourth or fifth time that I've seen McLaddie post this suggestion. A decade has come and gone. What has been keeping him from just doing it? What is he waiting for?

2. How?
You're not proposing a simple counting of beans. Most of these criteria are totally subjective. For example: even a simple question like: how long does it take to play each of the following ten games? How do you answer something like that, when playing time depends upon the number of guys, their personalities, the size of the scenario they take on, their familiarity with the rules, and many many other things. How on earth would you get reliable apples-to-apples data for something like that? *

3. What?
I've got something like 20 card-driven games in my closet. Between them, there are at least 15 distinctly different kinds of card play involved. It's very rare that two games, even if they use similar mechanics, use the same mechanics. Are you going to come up with 15 separate categories of card-driven game mechanics in order to label them all precisely and correctly? Otherwise, if you simply call them all "card-driven" that tells me pretty much nothing about how the game works. If your purpose is to inform the customer, then just saying they're "card-driven" is about as useful as saying, "they contain dice."

And no matter what you call it, if I've never played that particular mechanic before, then how am I supposed to know whether or not I like it? Just knowing that something has a name, doesn't mean I can understand or evaluate it.

4. Where?
Even if you could somehow collate all of this data, where does it go?

You can't make publishers put it on the back cover. You can't make retailers devote space to it on their websites or store shelves. Time and space are precious and expensive. I assume you'd have to create a website devoted to this endeavor, to which people can come and look-up their interests?

Which takes me back to #1. You've been talking about this for years. What's stopping you?

- – -

* I note that McLaddie didn't answer either of my questions about whether or not he had any reliable data to back any of his assumptions about the relationship between providing this information and the imagined benefits. I assume that means "No."

OK, I know that even questioning this noble crusade is considered thoughtless and maybe even evil, but I do – honestly (!) – have four serious questions:

Garth: It isn't any crusade, it's just when I see the same damn questions/discussions come up over and over 'Is it a brigade game'? that's not my idea of a brigade game. Publisher X says their design is, but doesn't have brigade stands, yadda yadda yadda. So much wasted time is spent everyone starting over and over again at ground zero in describing what games do. So, I suggest it as something I experience all the time in other hobbies and markets.

1. When? I've been on TMP for eight years and this is the fourth or fifth time that I've seen McLaddie post this suggestion. A decade has come and gone. What has been keeping him from just doing it? What is he waiting for?

Uh, a little exaggeration? It may be the fourth time I have posted about it in the last two-three years, but a decade? 2006, Really? I've only been on the TMP for a little over eight years.

I'm waiting for the publishers and hobby organizations to do it… that is who does it in all the other markets. The best I can do is suggest as I have above by request.

2. How?

You're not proposing a simple counting of beans. Most of these criteria are totally subjective.

Yes, and arbitrary too. What is the difference between a salad and an appetizer? Who made up that distinction? What is the difference between semi-scale, scale and true scale RC airplanes? Totally subjective lines are drawn between them, but the whole hobby recognizes the differences which have traits that aren't subjective. Again, it isn't because it is THE WAY to do it, but that the distinctions work to clarify efforts for both designers and customers.

For example: even a simple question like: how long does it take to play each of the following ten games? How do you answer something like that, when playing time depends upon the number of guys, their personalities, the size of the scenario they take on, their familiarity with the rules, and many many other things. How on earth would you get reliable apples-to-apples data for something like that?

And yet a number of game designers state 2-4 hours for their designs leaving the players to ask the very same questions you are. And the designers have play-tested the games, supposedly extensively. So IF that is an important question for the customer, how could the publishers provide meaningful descriptors [which lead to categories] of play time? That isn't something I personally can do for the whole hobby.

3. What?
I've got something like 20 card-driven games in my closet. Between them, there are at least 15 distinctly different kinds of card play involved. It's very rare that two games, even if they use similar mechanics, use the same mechanics. Are you going to come up with 15 separate categories of card-driven game mechanics in order to label them all precisely and correctly?

Well, I find it interesting that you have had to rely on a category [created by board wargame designers] to describe the games as 'card-driven'. Why has that come up as a meaningful term, even though as you say there are so many kinds? Just like there are so many kinds of True Scale Planes or salads for that matter.

4. Where?
Even if you could somehow collate all of this data, where does it go?

Where did it go with the list that Boardgame geek came up with, why? That's where it starts. More people use the terms. It goes on the products the categories are describing, it goes on those who describe games, it is used by the entire hobby to talk about games. It isn't something to collate, it is something to be used.

When was the last time you saw someone collate the distinctive characteristics between economy, compact, mid-sized, and luxury cars? Yet, most people that use rentals have a pretty uniform idea of those distinctions…

* I note that McLaddie didn't answer either of my questions about whether or not he had any reliable data to back any of his assumptions about the relationship between providing this information and the imagined benefits. I assume that means "No."

Well, I missed that, but I'd be glad to provide it, but I would think it is really, really obvious.

Dangit, McLaddie, you missed a /q again. How am I supposed to tell who's yelling at whom? Edit, man, edit!

(I really wish we could edit our posts for 24 hours instead of 1. I hate it when I miss a formatting mistake like that and it's too late to fix it.)

- Ix

It reminds to an old debate in software coding: do you have to provide comments in the code, or should code be self-explanatory?

Quit whining and comment your code. If I have to draw a flowchart to understand your work, I'll just delete it and redo it myself. With comments.

Sorry, that's no help with the discussion. You just stepped right into my professional mindfield. :-)

We already have categories. They are called the rules. Any game is defined by its rules, and the rules are the game (although not the game experience). Anything else is just an attempt to make a summary.

Sort of.

The specific example in this thread about the meaning of "brigade level" et al bothers me personally. There are at least two completely different interpretations of such a descriptor, making it useless. It would improve communication to define it and be able to correct misuses.

I would also like more widely agreed definitions of very analytical concepts like "process oriented" and "results oriented".

- Ix

There are two issues here:
1. The definition or agreement on useful categories.
2. How can you make people use them?

These are interlinked, because people will only start to use terminology if it useful for them. Otherwise, it is only an empty exercise.

As for terminology and categories, as I said before, there is already a wide array of terms and concepts we use.
I gave the example before of IGO UGO. Some might say this doesn't cover all possible variants, but for most people it is very clear what type of turn structure is meant. Of course, it's always possible to make subdivisions, but in the end, you would have given every possible variant , i.e. every individual game, its own individual label. So any categorization is in some sense a generalization.
Same for other terms we use often: buckets of dice, opposed die rolling, point-based army lists, opportunity fire, overwatch, to-hit-numbers, stand removal, written orders, skirmish game, line of sight, die modifiers, … These are all established terms to describe how a game functions.

What these do not describe is how players experience a game, or how all these ingredients are put together to build a complete set of rules. But that's very similar to listing ingredients vs tasting a dish. These are not the same, and actually, very different. Have two people prepare exactly the same recipe, and you end up with two different dishes. So that's why a restaurant critic describes much more than only the ingredients, or why a review of a book or movie describes much more that individual words or the plot. Reviews often describes how people feel or experience, and rarely give a mechanical recipe.

And this is exactly why games, also miniature rules, need GOOD reviews, much more than any mechanical categorization. A review tells a potential buyer what other people thought of the game, which has much more value than saying "this is a game that has turn structure variant A1, combat resolution system B, subvariant 3, and morale system Alpha-4".
In some boardgame discussions, where many mechanics are also shared, this is a recurring joke. Instead of giving rules, one just says "This is game variant A1,B3,Alpha4.

But anyway, a categorization might do more than just listing rule mechanics. It might say something about the intended design of the designer. But that becomes very difficult to categorize, unless you go back to describing things. There is standardization in many fields, but standardization usually describes things, the size of things, or the stuff things are made of – not the intended use of things.

Some have given BGG as an example. But to be frank, many of the categories there are also very bland, and describe things, or machanics. Two different games might both be card-driven, resource management, multiplayer, and historically themed. But both games might play very differently, and one might be crap, and the other might be excellent. And how do you know the difference? By buying the game, reading the rules, and play the game!