"Skirmish gaming by texts" Topic

What interest might there be in skirmish rules (any period) with players getting and receiving texts, and a third party game master? I have done a dozen or so such (AW) with some success, but no formal rules. I'm thinking Simultaaneous moves (as each player would be guessing what the other might do) and the GM sends a photo by text after every turn.

Or maybe others already do this? Any existing rules?

Sounds interesting.

Yep, sounds interesting to me as well.

My original reaction was thinking this was skirmish gaming by reading texts, and selecting options, as has been done in some books with brief narrative statements, and where you choose your options.

Seems like a more interactive version of that.

Might be fun for a WWII, Cold War, or Ultra-Modern What a Tanker-like game too.

Intriguing. How many players, and how many figures do they control?

Traditionally, texts have been associated with games at the general level: you receive a text from Colonel Smith saying his hussars have encountered enemy troops, so you know the enemy are in the vicinity. In a skirmish game, you know the enemy are in the vicinity because you've ducked behind a fallen log and enemy bullets are smacking into the other side of it.

I think there might be some possibilities here, if you can capture the sense of immediacy and the command level.

Thinking about Marcus Reno down in the Little Bighorn Valley (no particularly good reason for this as an example). He would have had initial orders (verbal, I think), input from enemy activity (hostiles swarming out of the south end of the village), the one sighting of Custer (?) on the hills east of the river, after the retreat to Reno Hill there was the sound of heavy firing to the north, and then the last message ("Benteen, Come on. Big village. Bring packs. P. S. Bring Packs.") Some of these would be more appropriate for text messages in a skirmish game than others.

I think some sort of mixed media thing has real possibilities for a skirmish level game. In the one case, I want to see lots of mounted Indians, not get a message, "Dear Marcus, My guys are sweeping out of the village and are going to take out your left flank. Yours truly, Crazy Horse

Let us know how things work out.

Grelber

I'm thinking that each turn each leader will issue orders to his command, which the GM then resolves. That means die rolling by GM. But leaders will have ratings for COOL and command limitations etc.

We did a naval version of the text/email & photo game and it went well. We are contemplating land versions. I recommend simple rules that all participants grasp easily so they focus on gameplay.

Here are the videos of the game. This one is the intro:

youtu.be/TIB2wcDbI1U

and this one is the AAR:

youtu.be/vxkMFumQHjI

Kind of a modern version of a play by mail game?

Kind of but lots faster.

I think the idea has potential. A friend of mine did something similar with a zombie campaign he was running. Each player controlled small group of survivors. We messaged what our group was doing (Jim, Bob and the dog are going to recon north 2 hexes along the road. Jill, Sally and Billy are going to fortify the post office and prepare supplies for a hasn't departure.) He would tell us what happened, and we would resolve interesting scenarios on the table top as a miniatures game.

Digging through some old Courier mags. There as a 'periscope' game where commnaders only got to see what their 'general' could see. Now we could use photos or video clips in chat. GM sets up and runs the game based on player feedback.

I have… as I'm interested in games that are either hard to play by conventional methods or ones that conventional methods don't scratch the itch for me.
In lockdown 1 I did a Nam LRRP game. 3 mates led a LRRP team each in a patrol area. They told me what they were doing in message form in a WhatsApp group. I fed them back info etc in written form. I tracked them on a map… they had their own maps that they tracked their movements on.
I found a text to voice app and voice filters so could do radio "actual" transmissions.
I also found some sound effects or mortars etc
Players said it was intense as they were moving through bunkers or a NDP was bekng probed…
Even it turned out that it was a troop of monkeys that was moving through the pos.
I kept all in game stuff in the same chat room. So players could know what was going on.
The plan was to them switch to company commanders and do a BN sized op based on which AO they thought best but looked down 1 ended.
Next time and with the BN game I'd run live so times would be able to turn over quicker.

I think camera phones would be good for a gable top game but have players only see they PoV.. and in Games where command might be in a helo etc the camera could do a pass in video etc.
I like terrain and figures. But I'd like to be in the position not of a 200 foot genral but the person on the ground seeing what they would.

Its ironic that computers wargames that could do this as well as other things like take care of dispatching orders tend to just end up replicating the 200 for general.
I know there are exceptions… but not many..or the ones there are.. radio commander or radio general the player fights against the computer.

I think again an app on a phone that that could track movement for an umpire or deal with the logistics that an jmpire gets bogged down with would be great.
If done a fair bit or pb email etc. With maps etc.. but what takes the time is tracking stuff. Positions strength etc. Which one would think a program or app now should able to handle.