"Same ruleset, very different wars, very different games" Topic

McLaddie, OK, so now you are changing your argument. Up until your last post you said nothing about the rules being "unplayable". You only said that when covering a certain amount of different warfare interactions (too many years of combat) that you can't put it in rules.

I'm glad that you now acknowledge that what you said was wrong.

I couldn't respond to the context you kept in your head and didn't put in your posts.

I still can't respond to unplayable, since it is a subjective opinion (still something inside your head). I can say that something like WH40K, with way to many rules IMHO, is "playable" because people play it. Of course, you may disagree.

No universal rules is what I have been saying the whole thread.

The historical content limit is irrelevant to the discussion. You were saying given known behaviours (from whatever source) can't be combined. What isn't known is irrelevant to that argument.

Does that have to be? No. But it is what I see in all the rules sets I have read

Again, changing the argument. This is the first time you brought up your experience with rules instead of stating what can or can't be done as an absolute. And, again, I can't make an argument with respect to the rules you have seen.

If you had just started with "I don't like the rules I have seen that do this" instead of "this is not possible", it would have eliminated a lot of back and forth.

Etotheipi:

No, I wasn't changing my argument. The only thing I didn't understand was your use of the term 'universal.' Got that sorted out. My point has been and still is:

What I have been saying is that when a design covers a large swath of history, the danger is the system painting everything vanilla, so every era is painted as a shade of vanilla to fit, regardless of the 'parameters' that can be added or not. No, actually the 'parameters' themselves can easily be part of that vanilla construct, where every period is just a version of the earlier or later era with a parameter tweak. Doing that lends itself to burying all the spices that make an era unique.

I only rifted on your erroneous conclusion that I saw some 'magic' limit. So, I listed the design limits I saw. That's all.

You also added the "unplayable" criterion as an alternative in your previous post. You said such a ruleset would be "vanilla" or "unplayable".

Prior to your previous post you were saying "can't" not "runs the risk". I didn't feel like pointing that change out, but since you quoted it again …

The part that you cherry picked above without the rest of the context of your previous post by itself says you see some limit on the ability to put "non-vanilla" rules together to cover a large period, which is what you have been saying all along.

You also added the "unplayable" criterion as an alternative in your previous post. You said such a ruleset would be "vanilla" or "unplayable".

etotheipi:
I was giving my thoughts on game design 'limits.'
The sentence about unplayable was:

There is the content limit to play. At some point the amount of content/detail makes the game unplayable. One type of limit.

You know five books of rules, a nine map Pacific War Games that are so big or rules heavy they become unplayable. All simulation designers recognize this content limit… too much and it doesn't work.

My concern about rules that span hundreds to thousands of years of warfare isn't that there is some content limit making them unplayable, though add enough parameters and that can be the case.

No, my point is this: To create a set of rules that span hundreds to thousands of years, must assume that there are common components between all the periods of warfare, components that are so central to warfare in all of them that a common set of rules can be historically viable--given some added or subtracted 'parameters.'

The risk, one I see realized in all the rules I have played or read, is that meaningful history is lost and a vanilla substitute is created. Meaningful being vital aspects of particular periods not found or dealt with in earlier or later history.

There is the Age of Eagles system taken from F&F, covering 1700 to 1918 with Age of Kings and Age of Valor. Lots of parameters.

Chris's Bloody Battles rule are now applied to the Napoleonic wars and WWI.

Ancient rules are often said to cover 2000 BC to 1300 AD

Would it be reasonable to suggest that one core rules set could cover WWI to the Ukraine War with some different parameters in just communication and Decision Cycle differences--not counting all the other distinct command challenges?

To insist it is possible is to assume there is some common core to warfare during this hundred and twenty years that allows the different types of warfare to be modeled.

I simply disagree: It isn't reasonable if one wants to be true to historical warfare…certainly not in the rule sets I have seen. That folks enjoy them is great, but what are they saying/teaching about history?

It is no accident that the less history there is to glean, such as ancients, the more willing designers are to ignore the history that is there.