"Some Thoughts about Naval Wargaming" Topic

"For some time now, I've been working on a set of American Civil War naval wargaming rules (more and that some other time). This naturally led me to thinking about naval wargaming in general and what I like or dislike about it specifically. Which, in turn, led me to think about games and game design in general. The result was a bit of a muddle, but prodded by David Manley, I decided to write it down, in the hope that it might serve as a basis for discussion…"

THE RAFT

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Armand

Naval and air warfare were different from land warfare because they used small numbers of large machines rather than huge numbers of men with smaller machines.
An army colonel with his own regiment may command up to 4,000 men, while a navy cruiser captain a quarter of that. But, the navy captain has 10,000 tons of steel while the army guy significantly less.
Also, because they don't have to look the enemy in the eye Naval and Air warfare is focused more on training than leadership. Sailors and airmen had jobs to do in combat, and the enemy was another machine, not another person. So, all a sailor had to do to succeed in combat was fulfill his assigned task.
When weighing the human aspects of naval warfare the single biggest question is how well the crew is trained. Even the best hardware is useless if the crew can't operate it. Training makes the process faster, the ship more effective and improves morale and teamwork.
In land warfare the important factor is the willingness of the individual to put themselves in harm's way. It doesn't matter how well trained, organized or equipped they are if they won't peek over the rim of the trench.
When you dive down into modelling the various types of warfare you have to abstract those human factors further in land warfare than naval warfare. If you are commanding a ship the will of your captain to keep the ship in combat is the only morale factor you have to consider, training is built into the ship capabilities before the game is started (though this is often ignored because it is such a game changer).
If you are playing a land battle your playing pieces have a morale separate from the commander you are simulating and (for example) their choice to close assault or face a close assault has to be abstracted into a die roll or you are playing chess.
To look at it another way, if you were to play the equivalent of a squad-level game in naval terms you'd be playing a single AA gun tub on a battleship. Really, one ship is the smallest command a player can take in a naval wargame.

I generally agree with Murvihill's response.

I, too, agree with Murvihill's conclusions. My concern in our games is that the question of competence never comes up and morale is only barely touched after considerable damage.

The guy's brown water for the Big Muddy is on spot!

Thanks

Armand

Same same with my home grown spaceship game. The mechanics are quite simple. Draw a card the color says what side can act. The value on the card tells how many actions that side can take. The actions are move, fire, and/or repair.

Draw a red 3 and one ship can take all three actions or 3 ships could each take one action.

Limit the cards in the deck to give one side a disadvantage in tech or crew quality.

Thanks also…

Armand

Interesting stuff, enjoyed the article.

Happy for that…

Armand