"Wargames Accurately Simulating War" Topic

There is at least one other "consideration" that is all important and for all simulations makes the simulation validity less: the audience. The expectations of the audience are always a problem, and especially with amateurs, and not a few professionals. The miniature issues, the figures, the traditions of game play, as an example the practice of examining the opposing figures, the "too much information" problem, which is a little less in boardgames, as done now or in the past, make the simulation value less. The market, which makes possible the production and use of simulatiins of lesser or no value is the issue, and these other considerations are more important than any designers desire to get it right. The Book of Sandhurst Wargames or any professional map game dont sell. Games like CD or TY do because they appeal to the wargame publics idea of war. CD has a history of "appeasing the masses" and Chadwick admits to this. Yet is he a bad designer to appeal to the gamers prejudices or not so bad as his designs hope to have a residual of simulation. Indeed, was Jack Radeys input a good thing(the gamer brougght up on Manstein and Carrel aka Schmidt think not) or bad as it upset the old PanzerBlitz tradition. Is the worth of a simulation based on sales? no, and yet thats what is being played.

The expectations of the audience are always a problem, and especially with amateurs, and not a few professionals.

Rick:
Yep. But who feeds those expectations? If a simulation is being incorrectly used because of false expectations, that is either the fault of the designer for not be clear on what expectations there are for a design--or the gamers are 1. ignoring that designer information or 2. were never interested in the first place. You see both behaviors in large numbers of gamers.

The raising of false expectations or failing to be clear about what the simulation does, is a designer problem. After that, what gamers do or don't do with the simulation is not in the control of the designer. That is a condition found in both professional and commercial wargame and simulation creation. It is a common issue and frustrating for designers, but not something related only to simulations. Lots of games are treated the same way.

The miniature issues, the figures, the traditions of game play, as an example the practice of examining the opposing figures, the "too much information" problem, which is a little less in boardgames, as done now or in the past, make the simulation value less.

You are assuming that designers haven't dealt with that issue successfully. At times they have. The question is whether gamers want that or designers have actually attacked the issue in a simulation fashion. In either case, that has nothing to do with the value of simulation design or its potential for the hobby, only what has or hasn't been done by designers or desired by gamers.

The market, which makes possible the production and use of simulations of lesser or no value is the issue, and these other considerations are more important than any designers desire to get it right.

Agreed. However, that assumes that functional simulations have actually been produced. They are often called simulations without any of the hallmarks of such a product. On TMP pages, several designers have claimed their designs are simulations in adverts and designer's notes, simulating historical battles while arguing vehemently that wargames can't be simulations.

On the pages of TMP, Designer Bob Coggins insisted that he and Craig Taylor didn't design Napoleon's Battles to be a simulation. When I quoted the designer's notes for NB where it stated categorically that NB WAS a simulation, Bob admitted that the publishers [Avalon Hill] stuck in the word 'simulation' because they thought NB would sell better as a simulation.

The Book of Sandhurst Wargames or any professional map game dont sell. Games like CD or TY do because they appeal to the wargame publics idea of war.

Okay, so someone designs a game to sell, and simulations don't sell. That should tell you something about why wargames could have such a low simulation quotient. It is more than a failure of ethics or ignorance, but purposeful.

CD has a history of "appeasing the masses" and Chadwick admits to this. Yet is he a bad designer to appeal to the gamers prejudices or not so bad as his designs hope to have a residual of simulation.

Do they. Has Frank said or written that he 'hoped to design' a simulation such as CD? There is nothing wrong with attempting to 'appease the masses', wanting to play to their prejudices. If you want to sell games in large numbers, that is one approach.

Personally, I haven't seen enough competent simulations created in the last fifty years to say that they do or don't appeal to the masses. Age of Eagles and the 1870 family of rules come close and they are very popular with Napoleonic and 19th Century gamers respectively.

I can say that bad simulation attempts haven't appealed to the masses.

Is the worth of a simulation based on sales? no, and yet that's what is being played.

No, that is how sales, not simulations are being valued. There are a far, far more 'ready-to-fly Radio Controlled planes sold each year than kits for True Scale models. Does that mean that 'ready-to-fly kits are 'worth more?' As modes of entertainment, no, of course not. As a product that sells in larger numbers, yes.

If the primary motivator is sales, then everything will be valued in relationship to that. It often leads to really poor analysis of the product. It is simply sales--does or doesn't it sell?

If a designer attempts to design a simulation, advertises it as a simulation, and it doesn't sell, then the assumption is that simulations don't sell. The quality of the simulation, or even if it actually IS a simulation is not considered.

Of course, at one point in wargame history, 1970-1990, the word 'simulations' DID sell games, hence AH sticking the word on NB. Simulations Publications, Inc. proved that and I see them as one reason simulations have such a bad reputation now.

Why? Because most all of those wargames during that time weren't successful simulations, if they were simulations at all.

McLaddie,
You make some good points, however, I think the marketing departments at the major game publishing companies are the ones to tell you about what sells.

Here is my take: We are all visual creatures. Miniatures players even more so. I find that when I look through a 40K or Bolt Action book I am visually drawn to the images. While way beyond my skill level, I still picture myself recreating something like that on a table using their rules or someone else's. That's the only reason I can think that they pack about 30% of the pages with eye candy. Marketing people know the "sizzle" sells.

Since the entire idea is to sell as many copies as possible I see nothing wrong with it. If people don't like it they won't buy it. Maybe, in the end, it is the consumers who drive the market, not the companies.

Regarding "Simulations": I think they have gotten a bad rap because in the last few decades detail = unplayable. Unfortunately, too many rules are dumbed down to gamey dice duels with pretty toys. I hope I did not offend anyone. If people want a simple set of rules as a means to push their pretty toys around the table to take pictures and blow things up so be it.

I would not even know how to define or quantify the difference between a game and a simulation and I doubt if you could get a majority to agree with you. Personally, I don't even think it is worth discussing.

Wolfhag

You make some good points, however, I think the marketing departments at the major game publishing companies are the ones to tell you about what sells.

Wolfhag:
That is why I mentioned 'major WARgame companies' who specifically stated they were designing 'simulations.'

Here is my take: We are all visual creatures. Miniatures players even more so. I find that when I look through a 40K or Bolt Action book I am visually drawn to the images. While way beyond my skill level, I still picture myself recreating something like that on a table using their rules or someone else's. That's the only reason I can think that they pack about 30% of the pages with eye candy. Marketing people know the "sizzle" sells.

I would think that is obvious. I wasn't saying anything about that being wrong--I said that is fine. The problem arises when they claim their product does something--like simulate--when in actuality it doesn't and in most cases was never created to be a simulation. THAT is the problem and one of the major reasons that gamers have such a negative reaction to the word "simulation."

Since the entire idea is to sell as many copies as possible I see nothing wrong with it. If people don't like it they won't buy it. Maybe, in the end, it is the consumers who drive the market, not the companies.

Again, I never said there is anything wrong with that approach, and yes consumers drive the market, but in most cases that means that companies supply what is already a perceived need. Providing a 'New' need successfully is what most companies would like because it creates big sales that only they supply--until other companies jump on the bandwagon. However, that is a much bigger gamble than glitzing up the same-old, same-old and calling it by a new name.

I would not even know how to define or quantify the difference between a game and a simulation and I doubt if you could get a majority to agree with you. Personally, I don't even think it is worth discussing.

Well, there is the problem. Can you imagine having that problem with most all hobbies' major products?

"I doubt if you could get a majority to agree which are RC airplanes and which are "U" controlled." Or "No one agrees on the difference between a card game and a board game."

A functioning simulation isn't someone's opinion. It is a technical description of a physical design and specific play processes and mechanisms, both in purpose and function.

No one fusses over the definition of 'a game' because the technical definition is fairly simple and the purposes well-defined for commercial designs. They are either successful or not. The ONLY qualification is that they have to be entertaining. Not so with a simulation game. That design has TWO objectives.

As long as the our wargame hobby talks about and claims to be recreating historical battles without being able to agree on how that is done…if at all, it will suffer problems that others hobbies don't. And that is a technical issue, not someone's opinion or determined by what does or doesn't sell.

McLaddie wrote –
"Not so with a simulation game. That design has TWO objectives."

True words ….. and all the more difficult to achieve since attitudes, opinions, approaches and even simple historical understanding vary so widely across the hobby.

B

True words ….. and all the more difficult to achieve since attitudes, opinions, approaches and even simple historical understanding vary so widely across the hobby.

Blutarski:

It isn't all that difficult to achieve--if designers want to. For instance, Military artists like Don Troiani,James Dietz or Graham Turner [to name a few] all work in similar communities that have widely varying, "different attitudes, opinions, approaches and even simple historical understanding." The artists all have different styles of painting, different mediums and subjects. Yet they all claim to create 'historically accurate' artwork, that is 'representative art.'

And no one among military artists and enthusiasts says anything close to what our hobby says about such claims or the impossibility that those artists have achieved historical accuracy. Why?

Because the artists:

1. State what THEY MEAN by "historically accurate." That is,
they provide the customer with what specific history they relied on and chose to portray in producing their paintings.

2. They state or demonstrate where in their paintings that history is illustrated.

3. They provide that information to those who buy their paintings.

Now, folks may not like the artist's style or the subject matter. Fine, but that doesn't have anything to do with historical accuracy.

Folks may disagree with the historical data the artists used, and if such data is shown to be better information than the artists used, that is a real criticism of the historical accuracy of that painting. That is a risk anyone takes when claiming to have achieved historical accuracy, whether a historian, painter--or wargame designer.

However, NO ONE, particularly the artists in question, have ever said that because "attitudes, opinions, approaches and even simple historical understanding" vary so widely, that historical accuracy is unattainable or undefinable.

The same is true of what constitutes a simulation among the wide variety of simulation designers, from research to training to entertainment [in other industries like computer games]. But they are looking at the definition as a technical question, not one of agreements among personal attitudes or opinions.

So, historical accuracy with a simulation game may be hard or easy, but technically, it isn't some mystery or a matter of opinion any more than Don Troiani saying that his paintings are "historically accurate." That is a technical statement about the content that can be verified or disproved and Don has determined the parameters / target for that claim--no one else. Designers are free to chose the goals of their design and determine how to reach them just as Don does. THEY are the ones who circumscribe what is 'simulation accuracy' by the targets they chose to hit.

Only our designers insist on making the issue a matter of feelings and entirely subjective opinions with no technical meaning or reality.

No one is saying that gamers HAVE TO want simulation games. No one is saying that wargames HAVE TO be simulations.

But if the designer claims he has created a simulation or that his game does what only simulations technically can do: recreate, illustrate, mimic, represent etc. history and combat, then there are technical ways to establish those claims apart from opinion and feelings. That doesn't require anyone to like the simulation game or care if it is one.

The designer is the one who establishes what his design does and what it is based on.

or he deliberately went off the reservation in direct opposition to the stated objectives… something he was never accused of. Kernan simple suggested that Van Riper was mistaken in how he 'viewed' the exercise/experiment, seeing only one and not the other.

Because (1) there is no room to bring a storm of external hate and discontent with an internal matter, and (2) he probably didn't want to get sued , and (3) the JAG that helps prep him would have told him not to say that.

So, the umpires/white cell running the game didn't immediately correct his actions, and his actions occurred over several engagements, not one and only in one did he use 'unvalidated' units

You should really find out what one of the exercises is like before you draw conclusions about them. There are hundreds of people doing things in dozens of rooms. They manage thousands of engagements in the sims (in order to generate the realistic stimulus to the C2 systems). There is not a white cell person monitoring every interaction of every unit.

Nobody had the option to fire him during the event. They did have someone follow him more closely after the second time (giving him the benefit of the doubt for the first) this was also part of him being "overconstrained".

"Not in his OOB?" Meaning not in the sims that were given PK ratings, rather than the entities in his 'country' that he had access to.

No. They were entities that were not part of the OPFOR OOB he was given to use.

People use other human beings as a "meat shield". It's realistic. But if that isn't part of the intended scenario, it's not part of the OOB. I can't believe that you, of all people here, are justifying someone going outside the intended design of the game.

McLaddie –
Perhaps I misunderstood the thrust of your comment –
"Not so with a simulation game. That design has TWO objectives".
I took it to refer to the challenge confronting the designer of a simulation-oriented wargame to not only provide an enjoyable and playable game, but to also model the "mechanics of war" for the chosen period in a reasonably accurate way. Based upon that interpretation, I would respectfully argue that the task of the sim designer is an order of magnitude more complex and difficult than that faced by an artist; it can be viewed as akin to the difference between modeling a chess piece and mastering the game. The scope of the artist's research burden is IMO much narrower, isolated and specific when dealing with a specific event at a specific location involving specific individuals at a specific moment in time. Modelling the conduct and mechanics of warfare (of any period) is a far greater challenge because it demands a much wider scope of research and understanding and all of that vast scope of material is open to dispute and disagreement
Three quick cases (for the sake of brevity) come to mind that illustrate that point –
> About two terabytes of storage (OK, forgive the minor hyperbole) have been consumed on TMP alone by the debate over the battlefield effectiveness of the smoothbore musket versus the rifled musket.
> You and I once had a spirited go-around regarding the march rate of Pickett's divisional attack at Gettysburg. I'm pretty sure we still disagree.
> Another forum (which shall remain unnamed) features a gentleman who is positively certain that concentration fire in the Grand Fleet of WW1was haphazard, not controlled or organized in any meaningful way and largely a waste of time. Nothing whatsoever sways him from his opinion.
I do not by any means argue that all games must be simulations. But I do suggest that all simulations must, at the end of the day, serve two masters. If sim authors expect anyone to actually play their rules, t hey must deliver a broadly accurate and acceptable of the "mechanics of warfare" for the chosen period while simultaneously providing an enjoyment gaming experience. Consequently, I see simulations as being a great deal more difficult to craft.
B

"Not so with a simulation game. That design has TWO objectives".

I took it to refer to the challenge confronting the designer of a simulation-oriented wargame to not only provide an enjoyable and playable game, but to also model the "mechanics of war" for the chosen period in a reasonably accurate way.

Blutarski:
You didn't misunderstand. You got it in one. That is what I meant.

The scope of the artist's research burden is IMO much narrower, isolated and specific when dealing with a specific event at a specific location involving specific individuals at a specific moment in time. Modelling the conduct and mechanics of warfare (of any period) is a far greater challenge because it demands a much wider scope of research and understanding and all of that vast scope of material is open to dispute and disagreement
Three quick cases (for the sake of brevity) come to mind that illustrate that point –

You give great examples and make a good point. I definitely could be far more challenging depending on what was being chosen--and how much to be simulated.

You and I once had a spirited go-around regarding the march rate of Pickett's divisional attack at Gettysburg. I'm pretty sure we still disagree.

Sure, so if I design a simulation, I will simulate what I believe is the march rate and will give Pickett's charge as one of the examples I used as the basis for march rates in my simulation.

The simulation will be accurate IF it mimics the march rate I chose. That would require some testing against real events. If it succeeds, it is an accurate simulation,[ i.e. it did what it was designed to do] just as Don Troiani's painting will be historically accurate based on the history he used to develop his painting.

If you disagree with me, that doesn't negate the accuracy of the simulation. For you, it negates the information it was based on. If you have better information than I do, then it could well be that my simulation failed at that point… and isn't historically accurate.

That is the double jeopardy that any simulation faces:

1. It has to pass any tests to show it does mimic the history it is designed to simulate, and
2. It is vulnerable in that the historical evidence it was based on can at anything be shown to be wrong.

The important issues here are:
1. You know, as a gamer, what the evidential basis for the game content and dynamics are, and
2. What the game was attempting to do…and not do.

As a consumer, those are vital pieces of information into what you are buying.

they must deliver a broadly accurate and acceptable of the "mechanics of warfare" for the chosen period while simultaneously providing an enjoyment gaming experience. Consequently, I see simulations as being a great deal more difficult to craft.

Depending on what is being simulated, absolutely. That might be one reason so few miniature wargame designers don't attempt it and others dismiss the effort as impossible.

If sim authors expect anyone to actually play their rules, t hey must deliver a broadly accurate and acceptable of the "mechanics of warfare" for the chosen period while simultaneously providing an enjoyment gaming experience. Consequently, I see simulations as being a great deal more difficult to craft.

Blutarski:

Addressing you point about the serving two masters, accurate simulation and enjoyable game, it is twice as difficult, but not necessarily as difficult as you might think.
bobm1959 mentioned Phil Sabin's book and included gamesSimulating War. Those games were very simple.

There are good examples of simple, but accurate simulations, but here is one:

Block Busting: It is an infantry combat simulation game of Urban combat. You can see it here:

link

The wargame is played on a 6 x 9 square board with maybe twenty counters and 4 pages of rules with examples. At one military training/game day, several teams played 18 turn games with six players in two hours. The coordinator of the DCDC study day was a Brigadier Andrew Sharpe, a veteran of fighting in Basra, Misrata and elsewhere. Sabin writes:

There could be no better illustration of the merits of simplicity in wargame design. Brigadier Andrew Sharpe, who masterminded the study day, was deeply impressed with the tactical realism of Block Busting,despite its relative simplicity, and he emphasised during the closing discussion session how well it captured the key dynamics of fighting in built-up areas.

Note that he didn't say it was an accurate simulation of weapons or logistics or command. The simulation was designed to capture the key dynamics of Urban fighting and a veteran of real urban fighting recognized the 'realism' in what the simple game did, not about what what he thought was more important and not about what it wasn't designed to do.

It could well be an accurate simulation with one type of test passed: People experienced in actual combat of that kind giving it a thumbs up.

Simulation game design is much simpler IF the designers know what simulations can and can't do and how they work and are tested as systems so we know they work as simulations.

McLaddie -
I agree that the degree of difficulty in creating a proper simulation will vary in accordance with the degree to which the subject matter is bounded, i.e. if the sim focuses upon urban "Block Busting" tactics, then the research (and game mechanics development) demands are likely to be far less onerous than if the goal is to write an all-encompassing simulation to cover 21st century land combat in its entirety – something I believe you alluded to in an earlier post: defining the scope of the rules does matter.

I also agree that "end user" validation of the game system is a key indicator of the success of the effort. If you happen to know any individuals who happen to have served as naval officers in the 18th century, please do refer them to me; I have a set of AoS rules I love to have them play-test.

Speaking of my AoS rules project, my experience in developing them exposed me to the phenomenon of "mission creep". What started as a set of rules to model deep water naval engagements inevitably led me to inshore waters, gunboats, coastal batteries, etc, etc, which immensely complicated the development program until I instituted some self-discipline.

Lovely and informative discussion.

B

One of the issuse is also pride. I have been taken to task on a number of ocattions for pointing out obvious flawsin certain modern games which goes against the basic tenents of warfare. besicaly there are gamers who want to pretend their game is a simulation and dislike folk bursting their bubble.

The issue here is that folk want to think they are playing a simulation despite very obvious flaws. This makes, as has been stated, a cleaner nore tehcnical analysis of simulation much more difficult in this hobby.

Even simple simultions require a number of games to get to grips with and an understanding of the period. We did encounter a gentlemwn with superb painted tanks who was not aware that tanks were orgaised into platoons. But he had been happily playeing a well known game without need ing any understanding and thought it acceptable.

Simulation or the real need for it puts us in a very small minority and I guess we just have to live with that.

Simulation= A magical word of power conferred on any old rules set by people who believe (despite all evidence to the contrary) that they are nascent Napoleons, a military genius in the rough, a brilliant leader of men. Note this is a very temporary spell and does not usually survive their first defeat, at which time a new set is required to cure the "inadequacies" and "historical errors" (other words of power to dispel the negative mojo of the defeat) of the previous rules which had the MWP of Simulation invoked on them.

That is as daft a statement as those in rules pretending to make some high level commanders, like generals better than others, a player is as good a general as he is. You cannot make a good general or bad general good. In most of our simulations it is the game that counts. If at the first failure you are looking for a new set of rules you were never serious about the simulation anyway. Many Games, rather than simulations have high random levels so players can blame die not play. If you are a simulator you expect to demonstrate your lack of ability, it teaches you to get better. I am still a poor general but I am better than I was and have loved every minute of my incompetence.

Simulation= A magical word of power conferred on any old rules set by people who believe (despite all evidence to the contrary) that they are nascent Napoleons, a military genius in the rough, a brilliant leader of men. Note this is a very temporary spell and does not usually survive their first defeat, at which time a new set is required to cure the "inadequacies" and "historical errors" (other words of power to dispel the negative mojo of the defeat) of the previous rules which had the MWP of Simulation invoked on them.

It's a shame that that is the response in the hobby to what is simply a term describing a particular kind of game system.

That misappropriation of what is a a technical term can be laid at the doorstep of hobby designers who used it as hype to sell games, didn't understand how simulations work and as noted wanted a grander label, a more 'serious' description for their wargame rules.

A simulation game designed for entertainment is no more 'serious' than any other game. A functional simulation game can offer more in the way of historically valid challenges than just a game. A Prius is no more 'serious' than a Dodge Ram pickup. They are designed to offer different things to the customer. Any emotional attachments or meanings associated with those designs don't change that fact, only how the owners see the differences.

I also agree that "end user" validation of the game system is a key indicator of the success of the effort. If you happen to know any individuals who happen to have served as naval officers in the 18th century, please do refer them to me; I have a set of AoS rules I love to have them play-test.

Blutarski:

No, I don't happen to know any. That issue concerning folks who have actually experienced what is being simulated is a common problem for simulators in a variety of arenas. [I'm designing a factory production process costing $30,000,000 USD that has never been created before--how can I simulate it to see whether it will work and the pitfalls I might run into?]

Because of this and other issues, simulation designers have come up with eight basic tests for a simulation, to establish whether it works. It is interesting how these were developed. They began as basic systems tests usually applied to computers, but as any simulation or game for that matter is a system of processes, they found they could test the validity of a simulation visa vie reality when they didn't have direct access to reality to test it against.

The way these tests were validated over many years was to create simulations of realities that DID exist, test them with these 8 methods with a yes/no result of whether it would work and THEN test the simulation against the real thing. What they were able to establish was that IF a simulation passed 4 or more of these tests, then the simulation could be considered simulating realities that were untested directly.

Over half a century, they have been been proven to work, with few exceptions. Again, it is choosing a target, developing a system to hit it, and then testing to see how close to the target the designer got. No magic and nothing that can't be done with any simulation game.

I read about wargame designers 'sort of' trying some of these methods, but nothing like four of them in any methodical way.

One of the issuse is also pride. I have been taken to task on a number of ocattions for pointing out obvious flawsin certain modern games which goes against the basic tenents of warfare. besicaly there are gamers who want to pretend their game is a simulation and dislike folk bursting their bubble.

UshCha:

That 'bubble' is one reason why folks play games, experiencing the pretending 'as if' something were real, as if it mattered. [Damn, I lost my Queen!] Game designers call it the "Magic Circle" or "The Flow" and all good games produce it. The draw of simulations is the promise of MORE of that 'as if' pretending, because it is something 'real' in the first place, something found in history books, and not a dragon or a romp through Middle Earth. Obviously, that is a personal preference as to which one a gamer wants to engage in.

So, having you pop them out of their 'magic circle' isn't ever going to be appreciated any more than questionable rules results 'pop' a gamer out of the 'flow.'

One stumbling block is that most gamers have several decades of training in 'fillng in the gaps' with missing information. In fact gamers can really enjoy imagining what that rule or game result actually represents, when in reality they don't know what the designer actually created it to represent… mostly because the designer didn't know.

For example, I had a discussion with Charles Vasey about James Dunnigan's old SPI Korea game. He is an experienced game designer and insisted that he didn't care what designers did with a game and could tell what the game was designed to do. He gave the example of the Chinese armies represented in the game as 10-2 counters. Obviously, he said, the Chinese armies were very poor organizations, which is why they where given such poor ratings. However, Dunnigan, in his designer's notes, part of the rules Vasey said he never read, Dunnigan said he gave the Chinese the ratings he did because HE considered the Chinese armies the finest infantry army in the world at the time.

Gamers, like Vasey, don't want to be told that what they thought was X was really Y. And of course, it takes away the pleasure of 'making up' what a game result represents. On the old Grande Armee list I watched a four day debate over what damage from counter battery fire represented. Lots of ideas were put forward and the debate got heated. I simply asked the designer, who hadn't said a thing up to this point, what the counter battery damage was supposed to represent, and he gave an answer that none of the posters had put forward: Simple loss of guns. That ended the discussion, of course. And I am sure some of the posters didn't appreciate being told anymore than those gamers you spoke to.

It isn't about who was right or should have been right. It was about what the game was designed to represent.

The issue here is that folk want to think they are playing a simulation despite very obvious flaws. This makes, as has been stated, a cleaner nore tehcnical analysis of simulation much more difficult in this hobby.

Very difficult, and one of the emotional resistances to actually talking about simulation game design as an art or/and technical endeavor. As long as no one knows what a simulation is, then everyone is free to 'pretend' they are simulating regardless of the game content or dynamics.

Gamers in our historical wargame hobby all have become very good at that kind of 'pretending'. And because it has no limits--where it would with functional simulation games, it leads to the grandiose flights of fancy that Otto sees attached to the concept of 'simulations.'

Permit me to point out a few examples how and why a simulation can provide a richer and more interesting gaming experience.

I once ran a full-tilt PQ17 Arctic Ocean campaign game, wherein the commands held by the individual participating players were kept secret. No player knew who was an ally and who was an opponent. On the German side, the surface units, the U-boats and the Luftwaffe resources were totally independent of one another. As an intended consequence, If a U-boat sighted the convoy and the player controlling the U-boats failed to instruct the umpire to pass along the sighting information to the surface fleet, the mighty Tirpitz just remained sitting in its little fjord. The Allies had a similar problem routing information. After a while, when the size of the operational area became more evident, the separate commands all started asking each other that any useful sighting reports be relayed to them. Lo and behold, reconnaissance became better understood and MUCH more appreciated.

Another little feature involved the umpire tracking endurance/range of all the ships at sea (not as complicated as might be imagined). Fuel consumption varied approximately according to the square of the average speed over a 4hr time period. For example, if a DD at 15kts cost one point of endurance, 20kts cost two points, 25kts cost 3 points, 30kts cost four points; 35kts cost 6 points. When that sank into the minds of the players (typically after their first destroyer reached 50pct fuel state and was required by the umpire to turn back to refuel) it was amazing how carefully all participants began to monito and manage their fuel reserves, protect their tankers at sea, etc. Totally changed their approach to the campaign. Hehe, as the umpire, I had a blast with that.

Random weather (and player psychology) also conspired to play delicious havoc at times. On one occasion an encounter took place between the convoy close escort of two British light and two heavy cruisers and a German force consisting of Admiral Scheer, a couple of light cruisers and four or five escorting destroyers. Contact occurred on a moonless night in a snowstorm. The British cruisers were in an extended scouting line when they detected the Germans ahead by radar. One British cruiser would appear on one bow of the German force; a few minutes two British cruisers appeared on the other bow; a few turns later a fourth British cruiser appeared entirely on the German flank. The German admiral in command totally lost his nerve at that point, turned his entire command about and fled the scene.

That is what a good simulation can bring to the gaming experience that a ho-hum fake set of gamey rules can probably never do.

Strictly my opinion, of course.

Sometime I think I should run this campaign again. It was a great time.

B

Bultarski you are talking to a convert, even as a two player game on a big virtual board the game becomes vastly more representative. In a bigger battle space the uncertainty increases, you are no longer in a position to say the enemy is within the narrow band of a kilometre or so. Speed becomes an issue. Take too long on one section and you find you have to go back to refuel. This gives the enemy more time to prepare and bring up additional resources. Unfortunately this takes a game out of a single evening in many cases as both players have homework before the game and between games to plan and update the plan. It also requires player with that sort of dedication and knowledge to know what to plan. This is not achieved in a couple of games.

Hi UshCha – my apologies if I was unclear. The PQ17 event was run as a campaign spanning several weeks. And, yes, I was most fortunate to have a group of good committed wargame friends available to carry the campaign through to a conclusion.

BTW – We used GQ1&2 to adjudicate surface and a/c actions; the Avalon Hill board game "Submarine" to adjudicate submarine contacts.

B