One of the things that I have learned about game design is that you cannot leave an open ended mechanic without a finite end. The impetus for the thought is that some players seem only interested in ignoring the fact that they are playing an historical game and spend undue effort trying to find ways to distort the rules and frustrate their opponent. To what purpose is beyond me.

 A good example of what I am talking about is in my old Pacific War design where I put in a mechanic for penalty time, so players could recover forces when they had made slight miscalculations in logistic planning. I tried to ensure that this couldn't be used to ones advantage by removing the offensive players ability to conduct combat in penalty time. This way if the player messed around, the reaction player could launch a short range attack and start killing things until the pain of losses forced the player to shut things down.

 In works not only in theory, but in practice as I was once able to make an opponent (someone I did not know well at a convention) cry uncle when they tried to get cute with this tactic. What I would like to write is a rule that is called, sit down, play the game, and stop screwing around. As this is not enforceable, I have learned the lesson that all mechanics must have a enforced end even if there is a viable way around it, such as my solution in Pacific War. The reason being when there is no limit, its clear abuse frustrates most players spoiling a good time.

 Mark

Posted by markherman at 10:37 PM EST

Updated: Sunday, 27 January 2008 10:48 PM EST

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 As I never received any physical keepsake this is the only record of the award, posted so I wouldn't forget.

Walter Luc Haas-Award

The Walter Luc Haas-Award, given by the GHS members in Germany to the best board wargame of 2005, was won by 2 games this time:

Wellington

and

Empire of the Sun

Congratulations to the designers and to GMT!

Uli

Posted by markherman at 7:41 PM EST

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What Was I Trying To Simulate?

There are many things that can be simulated in a game and no game that I am aware of handles all of the details of conflict at the same level of detail in a user entertaining manner. A good simulation is one that picks out the key variables with easy to implement systems that let the player(s) manipulate them within an historical context. Additionally, the historical outcome and decisions should in some manner be within the set of game outcomes. In the end all simulations are wrong, but some are useful and hopefully entertaining.

But first a story, way back in the late seventies when I was designing what became RDF I got a chance to play the game with Jim Dunnigan. At the conclusion of the game Jim said it was interesting, but it felt it played like panzer chess. The comment referred to the fact that each maneuver he made was matched by a similar maneuver on my part resulting in two armored firing lines. I redesigned the game, but the point of the story is most games allow for near perfect information with lots of detail on a variety of force and spatial factors ala chess.

My continuing study of warfare both for game design purposes and professionally have convinced me that real combat is chaos because senior decision makers lack perfect knowledge. This has been the case for all wars including recent ones where people got killed because the real information was absent or not believed. The more successful commanders were those who were able to succeed in this constant environment of imperfect information. Consequently I have come to the view that the most important variable to simulate in a wargame is uncertainty.

I have tackled this problem in a variety of systems. In Pacific War I used hidden die rolls that integrated uncertainty as to the enemy reaction based on the intelligence condition. My most successful system has been my card driven design as embodied in We The People and For The People and copied by POG, 30YW, WW to name a few. What the cards accomplish is to create enourmous uncertainty about what the enemy can accomplish and how one's decisions might be impacted by the range of enemy reactions. By incorporating this imperfect information overlay into the more traditional force, space, and time factors interesting things happen. In addtion the cards allowed me to bring a range of soft factors (e.g., politics) into the simulation, which has ever been the original purpose of most wars. More importantly it appears that the entertainment value and replayability of the games have also been enhanced.

What is a good simulation of conflict? Is it one that develops systems for tactical trees, but misses the strategic forest. I submit that my card driven system is my attempt to simulate decision maker uncertainty in an imperfect information environment. From where I stand a game that ignores this set of variables has a harder time proving its simulation bona fides. This last point is definately a minority view in our hobby.

It is interesting that there is a perception that there is a flood of WTP/FTP derivative wargames out there, but there are less than 10 by my last count in ten years. During this same period of time there have been at least several hundred traditional wargames published. I am hard pressed to understand how this niche set of games is causing such a furor.

Just one man's view,

Mark

Posted by markherman at 7:40 PM EST

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Change of Fortune

Dan, The idea for this mechanic comes out of Clausewitz and a graph in an Archer Jones book. The point of the mechanic is to show the added effect that occurs when a sides fortune rises and falls over time.

To understand the strategies behind this mechanic you need to graph the relative SW over the course of a game. What you will see is a sawtooth type of activity, like a stock market graph, where there will be general trend over time in an upward or downward vector as a general expression of how one side is performing over time.

What is being simulated is you as the player are the President (Lincoln or Davis) and one of the political levers you have at your disposal is the ability to time events. So, if you know that you need to do something unpleasant politically or if something unpleasant happens involuntarily, you have the ability to manipulate public opinion by having some 'good' news in your back pocket to reduce the impact of 'bad' news on the electorate. If you have paid any attention to the current presidential campaign you will see multiple examples of this on an almost weekly basis, witness the recent release of the jobs report and how both sides reacted to it.

The strategies associated with this mechanic are to time political or military events to occur in a sequence that maximizes their effect on the electorate (SW). The basic strategies depend on whether the marker is on the negative or positive side. When you are in a negative condition, you want to arrange your affairs so that you take bad news before good news. So for instance if you were the Union and you wanted to fire your Army commander and conduct an amphibious invasion to capture a CSA coastal fort, it would be best to fire the general and then capture the fort. From a Civil War perspective just as Lincoln's opponents are attacking him for 'firing' their guy, positive military news comes out that dampens its impact (overall +2 SW for good timing: no additional effect for bad and +2 for change of fortune). However, if you were to do it in the opposite sequence you would whipsaw public opinion and feel it in the polls (-1 SW for bad timing: +2 for change of fortune then a -3 for the rapid change in the other direction).

When your marker is on the positive side you have to be circumspect about voluntarily doing something that will cause a change in public opinion. A common one in the game is the circumstances by which Davis forms the AoNVa. If you form the army under anyone but ASJ, you will take a political penalty due to the turmoil that ASJ proponents will cause you for passing over their favored son. However, this may be a military necessity and if you were holding an SW event card you might want to first build the AoNVa and then deliver the good news (-1 SW). If you did it in the opposite sequence you would suffer for bad political timing (-3 SW).

Over the course of the game, failure to pay attention to change of fortune could cost you 10 or more SW points. When the South wins the long game (gt 13 victory), they usually have less than this many SW remaining, so failure to handle change of fortune could be the margin of defeat. In a close game Lincoln could lose an election by this many points.

As the old saying goes, "timing is everything."

Mark

Posted by markherman at 7:39 PM EST

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Over almost a decade the results from tournament play have had a more or less 50-50 win-loss ratio for each side. Here is an example of some responses to that continuing debate loved by gamers, play balance.

Baron, I think the fact that you state that the CSA has a measurable advantage and the post above it states the North is advantaged speaks volumes to me. There is no doubt in my mind that you are one of the better FTP players out there. As you know I speak from personal experience here.

The CSA can win early, but the Union has to win late and if it is not played precisely the Union can blow the win. My view is the CSA position is more forgiving of mistakes than the Union. I will note that in our second game, I made an avoidable mistake that gave you the game on the last card, which otherwise would have been a Union victory, but such is life (but a very enjoyable game).

My take on your CSA strategy is you put Lee in the West, dominate Kentucky and repeatedly raid the North. You support this with a strong fort position in West KY/TN. If you do not win by mid-1863, you use your interior lines to keep the Union out of the deep south as long as possible. The other important dimension is you try to keep close to sp parity by forgoing every offensive opportunity to spread out your sps to avoid attrition. All in all a very sound strategy.

I believe that there is strong Union counter play, and as always it depends on what cards you draw, but I believe that a prepared Union player has several strong counter play options. An aggressive Union amphibious strategy is key to create counterplay. The Union must create an sp advantage by reducing the CSA reinforcement rate. The maximum CSA sp production rate without cards is 15. If the South can maintain this rate for the majority of the game, barring unusual circumstances, they will win. The Union must conduct a game of economic warfare in order to reduce this rate. The best way is to take out the Transmississippi states and Florida, close down at least two blockade zones, and hopefully keep the South down to only KY until mid-1863. A reduction of 5-6 CSA sps gives the Union a 2-1 sp production advantage. If the Union plays an offensive game from mid-1863 through 1864, the South eventually runs out of soldiers. Its easier to state than it is to do, but that is the key to Union victory.

Also, I believe that wherever Lee is, is where McClellan has to be located. A McClellan/Pleasanton army on a fort is tough for even Lee with the dream team to beat in a large battle. All in all, I think personal play style determines which side someone is better with.

As far as you playing James in a long series, have at it. I do not think that it will prove what you think it will. Across the spectrum of games and players, the statistics are what they are. I take it from your statement that you think the CSA is a lock, you may get a chance to prove this in the next round. Good luck,

Mark

This is the kind of debate that I love to see. Thanks all...

I believe that Baron has put his finger on the key point. The sp ratio is a good metric on how the war is going. I agree that when the Union achieves a 3:2 or better ratio, then they are in the hunt for victory. This is why I advocate a strong Union naval game. Take a simplistic calculation, if the Union stops two blockade sps (combination of amphib and blockade drs), capture one CSA state (e.g., FL), and keep the CSA out of one border state, the South recieves 11sp versus the Union 18, which is one sp, Union favor, short of the 3:2 ratio. The CSA can expect on average 1sp per turn from cards over the course of the game. See below for why that is the case.

There are 12 CSA reinforcement cards of which they will on average get one every other turn, for an approximate average of 1sp per game turn over the course of the game. This gets the CSA to 12 (given the assumptions above) and the 3:2 ratio mentioned. The list of CSA cards is (Card#:No. of sps; ?=SW penalty for sps). #17:3, #21:3, #22:3, #23:2, #33:1, #37:3, #38:2, #41:2, #47:2, #79:1, #80:3?, #106:3

The Union gets 5 cards or two per game for an approximate total of 1sp every other turn.

The list of Union cards is (Card#:No. of sps). #9:3, #10:3, #30:3, #40:5, #43:1

Of course every game is unique and is strongly effected by the cards you actually get, how those cards are played, losses due to combat, and how the two sides respectively handle attrition, which on average benefits the CSA. CSA players who use the last card play to launch a raid every turn are usually gambling that they can win the game before the Union reinforcement rate buries them. An alternate tactic is to spread some forces out to make better use of local supply and reduce attrition, which the South often did historically.

These are the reasons why I continue to point out the importance of the Union naval game and offensive actions against small CSA states (e.g., TX, AR, FL and LA). If the Union can create a long term 3:2 ratio or better on the board, then the Union chances for victory are good, less than that and barring significant SW advantage, the Union is probably losing.

Hopefully this analysis will help explain my earlier posts.

Mark

Posted by markherman at 7:37 PM EST

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This was in response to a thread around Campaign Card distribution…

Great thread unfortunately based on one of our brothers experiencing campaign distribution syndrome (CDS).

What I would like to contribute to this debate is how I believe multiple CCs give an advantage, but are not a show stopper in it of themselves. I have had to think deeply on the issue of multiple campaign cards and over the course of time I have come full circle back to where I began in the AH version of this game, no CC limits.

It is important to note that there is a basic assumption that a skewed distribution of CCs is a decisive advantage. There was also a good point made that the Southern railnet and logistic conditions would have prevented this during the real war.

FTPs military model runs off of two key factors: maneuver and logistics. The Union won the war by prosecuting a persisting logistic strategy. The CSA was trying to win by prosecuting a raiding combat strategy. FTP is built around this set of assumptions and concepts as interpreted by me from a generic model articulated by Archer Jones.

The maneuver rules are expressed through the play of cards in combination with general ratings and board position. How much maneuver a side can sustain is based on its logistic position over the course of the game.

One of my goals when I did this game was to design logistics into the core of the system, so the players would abstractly deal with it without any mechanics. I focused on SPs as the integrated logistic system for the game.

The relative reinforcement rates of the two sides is the basic logistic production model for the game. The Union has a large and relatively steady rate of SP production and the ability of the CSA to impact this rate reflects a successful application of their raiding combat strategy. The CSA SP production rate is represented at a more granular level. If the Union applies its historic persisting logistic strategy, the South will reflect the historical collapse. If the Union fails to steadily take the Southern logistic system apart (blockade, ports, state bureacracy and manpower), then the South does not collapse. This is not the historical outcome, but neither is the CSA player achieving a more than historical level of logistic cohesion.

The attrition rules reflect operational logistics by causing players to disperse their forces at the end of a turn if they do not have a good offensive option. This is exactly what Lee did several times during the war for logistic purposes. If you spread out attrition goes down (broader access to local logistics). You stay concentrated, disease and logistic considerations wears your force down faster. Since the CSA usually goes last, the Union has to remain concentrated more of the time, simulating, without overhead many of the war's logistic dynamics.

What should and does happen is the ability to score on your opponent with multiple CCs requires that you have sufficient SPs to expend in combat and maneuvers. Without sufficient SPs having multiple CCs will not yield decisive results, just a maneuver advantage. Having a 10-1 advantage in CCs is possible, but without considering the context of relative SPs and board position, it is very hard to evaluate how much of an advantage this really is. The fact that Dirion has not yet put the Union away by this point indicates that he hasn't been able to fully capitalize on Taylor's CDS problem.

As far as the point that the South couldn't accomplish this during the real war, the answer is the game supports this under certain circumstances. FTP is a model of the war, but players effect the model. If the South is allowed to have a surplus of SPs, this is due to the Union failing to reduce the CSA logistic infrastructure. In this case the historical result is no longer valid for that particular play through, because one of the key historical factors has been altered.

It is true that the Southern rail network was inefficient and poorly laid out for military operations, but somehow the South was always able to pull off concentrations when they wanted to during the war. The game only has two strategic concentration cards (Shiloh, Chickamauga), so statistically in a standard game, the CSA should get two of these per game matching the historical record. However this is a simulation (game) not an emulation (book) of the war, so variation is both intended and desirable.

The bottom line is if you pay attention to SP management, multiple CCs can be very useful, especially to the CSA raiding combat strategy. If the Union works to first gain logistic superiority via a persisting logistic strategy as happened in the historical model, it will not matter much how many CCs the South gets late in the war, because they will have insufficient SPs (as they did historically) to do much with them. This inability to do anything useful with the extra CCs simulates late war logistic problems (Richmond calls for action, but not much happens).

The opposite also applies, in the late war when the Union can do alot with multiple CCs, since their reinforcement rate (logistics) is large and steady under most circumstances.

I hope that helps. I am going to look over the game in question just to be empathetic, but FTP isn't chess and chance plays a role in the outcome. However, unlike chess where no matter how many times you play Kasparov you are guarranteed to lose, in FTP hope can spring eternal; at least once and a while. James, one of these days...

Mark

Posted by markherman at 7:36 PM EST

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