Random Friday Wargaming: Strike Force Hunter

Why am I pimping Strike Force: Hunter when it's my own game?







Because I might actually finally get back to doing the other two games I was planning 6 years ago, and I'd love the feedback on this one to take forward with me into the design of the other two.

There's no CSW forum for it, but you could discuss it on the BayonetGames thread here.

It's a print-and-play game (PDF here), but it's only 4 sheets of paper: map, counters, 2 pages of rules. And counters are stand-ups (fog of war, baby!) so there's no mounting needed.
Check out the publisher's page for the Strike Force series here.

Master links/images from Boardgamegeek.com; message boards linked to Consimworld. Other links to the actual game pages...


By: Brant

A New BayonetGames Project

It's not truly a wargame, but it's an idea that's come together very quickly. Look for a full beta version within the next week or so, which we'll probably release here for some public comment.

By: Brant

Thoughts on Recon in Wargaming

Originally written by moi in response to a discussion of recon in the Battles Magazine folder at CSW...

There are a lot of games with good spotting rules (I happen to like LnL), but once you spot, you have perfect intel. There's no spotting with "a squad in the woods" and no idea of the capabilities. You see it perfectly or you don't see it at all. It's rare in a boardgame to have the reaction of "Holy crap! I knew there was something over there, but I thought it was just a couple of lost guys, not 3 machine guns!"

It's also rare that you even have a maintenance collection point on the map, much less some overeager scout call back on the radio in a panic hollering "there's 11 tanks over this hill!" when only 3 of them will actually move under their own power.

And that's just the tactical level. At the operational level, as soon as anyone in your force sees the enemy, everyone sees the enemy. There's no time lag in reporting, or any radio retrans issues that might keep someone from accurately reporting the location of an enemy unit from 50km away.

Finally, and really most importantly, because so many of the real-world "unknowns" are "known" on the tabletop, it's hard to even develop a solid recon plan that would be designed to inform you of things you need at decision points. With hindsight, everyone charges into Gettysburg like it's Ragnarok. Was that was really happened on the ground? Wasn't there a lot more bumbling and misinformation floating around than we allow for in the game?

Recon is designed to not just find bad guys, but find the right kind of information about the bad guy in a timely fashion for you to make key decisions as you execute your plan. For those specific purposes, recon units are designed, organized, equipped, and employed.

Given that so many of their objectives are completed as soon as you cut the shrinkwrap, it's a challenge to find an appropriate use of them in battle, without simultaneously putting them into play where they could sway some other part of the battle where they never would've been present (this is especially true when light cav isn't used for recon in games between 1740-1870 or so). If you take them out of their recon role, but instead use them elsewhere as just another fighting force (many WW3/Germany games are bad about this) then you've dramatically altered the shape of the battle in a way that would never happen.

What we tried to do with the Warfighter games was to give recon units something to do other than just be another set of guns on the battlefield. They are given specific tasks that emulate - but can't ever truly replicate - their actual employment on the battlefield. This keeps you from just adding extra guns to the fight while still keeping them in the battle. It also makes the counter-recon fight more important because you deny the opponent victory points if you can defeat the recon.

By: Brant

The Wargame Lab over at BayonetGames

Here's all the different game projects I currently have on my plate, in varying stages of development. What I wouldn't give for sufficient full-time funding to just get these bastards finished!

• Warfighter: Asian Thunder (scenario testing and need to fund it to go to press)
  
• Next Wars I: Orange Crush (scenario testing and tweaking some basic rules, need to fund it to go to press)
  
• "Designing Out Loud" project on here on GrogNews (next episode this week!), a Euro-flavored card wargame
  
• Next Wars II: The Project That Shall Not Be Named, in initial draft stage with early orbats/maps, built off same ruleset
  
• The Modern Quick & Dirty games (working title: Meeting Engagements), inspired by the old SPI ModQuads, designed to be built off same rules but with varying particulars, currently looking at 6 (yes, 6!) titles: England's Emergencies, Invasion '83, Blood Red Borders, War In The Clouds, Brushfires, Holy Wars... right now the early drafts of maps/counters being put together and some early rules notes sketched out
  
• Bandits! Been lingering for a while, but a basic idea built around a Euro/Ameritrash game not unlike Runebound for the gaslight & flintlock era
  
• Castles & Kings: started out as using chess pieces on a Risk map, but now modified to include some card actions that allow for kingdom building as well. Starting to incorporate ideas from Dominion and 7 Wonders (two games I really like) to build on the older civ-flavored mechanics. High hopes for this one, but a LOT of moving parts to balance. Draft of card mechanics and combat being kicked around right now and may get table-tested soon.
  
• The Investigation Engine: started out as using a dominoes-style mechanic to "connect the dots" in either an intel scenario or law enforcement, as you try to unravel a conspiracy of people by figuring out who's connected to who; been lingering forever, and will have to revisit it sometime
  

Wow... that's a shitload of stuff I wish I could just spend all day working on. If only I had a real job to afford the luxury, eh? By: Brant

Tuesday Q&A: Jim Snyder

A true wargaming double-threat, Jim Snyder has worked on both computer-based games and on the tabletop. He is a rocket scientist by day (no, really!) and a game designer by, well, any other time

If my plaque was to go in the Wargaming Hall of Fame next week, the 2-sentence bio on it would say this about me:
“Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.” I guess a one sentence bio.

You would know me from my work in this corner of the wargaming world:
From working with Mark Walker on modules for his awesome World at War series and testing/reviewing/suggesting on other systems like White Star Rising. I’m also working with Rob Crandall on a Matrix Games follow up to Flashpoint Germany.

I'm currently working on:
Flashpoint Middle-East for Matrix Games. It is slow moving beast but we see a speck of light at the end of the tunnel. I’m also helping on the latest WaW module “The Untold Stories” and also scribbling notes on a few other game ideas of my own. I’m also looking over this game called “Orange Crush” for another very handsome, manly, high profile game designer.
(ed note: I did not pay him to say any of those things.... yet.)

What was the first wargame you taught to someone else?
I would have to go with teaching my brother how to play a Star Wars trench battle game I designed on the back of some PanzerBlitz counters back in 76-77 time frame. Basically the first game I put together.

Favorite gaming website(s)?
Wargamer, Matrix Games, Lock n’Load, GrogNews, CSW sites related to the games I support, and The Escapist for Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw reviews.
OK, OK... you're sucking up now. But that doesn't mean we want you to stop!

When I mock up a game for playtesting, my general process is…
Simple steps. Maps. Units and OOBs. Counters. Rules. Test. Then rinse and repeat.

What's one wargame rule you've given up on as hopelessly broken?
I think is more a general wargaming theory that more detail and granular resolution provides a more accurate result. Wargame design, whether it is board or computer, requires a level of abstraction to make the system playable without dragging a truckload of super-computers around to analyze every minute and quasi-insignificant factor of a particular action. Some games I feel get lost in trying to account for everything to get to a result just as good from an abstracted system. Plus more rules and tables and time can really take away from having a good game experience.

What are your three favorite types/genres of wargames?
I’m definitely a tactical/grand tactical modern themed wargamer. Any thing 1939 plus with tanks, planes and/or ships works for me. That’s not to say I haven’t hit other eras or genres. A touch of Sci-fi/Horror/Fantasy works too.

What is one historical outcome you'd change to make a compelling alt-history game/scenario?
I’d say having a NATO and Warsaw Pact throw down in the late 80s. At least we would be able to answer all of the questions of whose toys where better. Assuming we just wouldn’t nuke the world back to the Stone Age.

What was the first wargame you designed your own scenario for?
Mark Walkers “Death of the 1st Panzer”. I got started working with him after Origins a few years back doing the scenarios for that expansion.

Coolest thing you've ever done on a computer?
I have to go with being part of the development team for “Full Canvas Jacket” about 8 years or so ago. It was an add-on for Red Baron 3d, made good reviews in several game mags and was runner up for Flight sim of the year to boot. We lost to MS flight sim. Their game had NO guns and was bank-rolled by a giant. I sensed shenanigans, but there was no way to prove it.

If you could be the filmographer at any one battle in history, which one would you view?
There are a ton of good selections, but I think the Battle of Midway. Such a pivotal point in the war and just a series of right place right time moments for the USN.

What actor would you like to see play you in a movie?
I would like to say Brad Pitt or possibly Robert Downey Jr, but the reality is more along the line of Kevin Smith. We both have the same build, beard, quiet genius, and mad Batman/Jedi/Ninja skills.

Ginger or Mary Ann?
No contest. Mary Ann.

People would describe my fashion sense as…
just short of tragic…
I think we can all agree on that one...

By: Brant

Ukraine's Seams Fraying

Hey, the Ukraine is coming apart in a disputed election.

A Ukrainian court has suspended the result of the recent presidential election, following a challenge by losing candidate Yulia Tymoshenko.
Mrs Tymoshenko, the Prime Minister, went to the supreme administrative court in person on Tuesday claiming the result was rigged.
The court says the result should be suspended while it considers the evidence she has submitted.
It also says the inauguration of winner Viktor Yanukovych should be delayed.
Ukraine's parliament had agreed on Tuesday that Mr Yanukovych should be inaugurated on 25 February.
The new court ruling concerns the Ukrainian Central Electoral Commission's declaration on Sunday that Mr Yanukovych had won the vote.
The results showed him to have beaten Mrs Tymoshenko by a margin of 3.48%.
Mrs Tymoshenko has so far rejected Mr Yanukovych's appeals for her to accept defeat.
She has claimed that the election was marred by "systemic, fundamental and general falsifications".
But international election monitors have said there were no significant flaws in the vote.

Who could've seen that coming?!

Ah well... maybe there won't be a factual basis for what started as a hypothetical game after all.

Ukraine's embattled premier Yulia Tymoshenko says she has withdrawn her legal challenge to the results of the country's presidential election.
Tymoshenko said Saturday she "sees no sense" in continuing her appeal since Ukraine's Administrative Court has refused to consider the documents she claims show the falsification of some election results.
Tymoshenko lost the Feb. 7 presidential runoff to pro-Russian opposition leader Viktor Yanukovych by just 3.5 percentage points. She has refused to concede and has urged a full re-count.

By: Brant

Is the Ukraine Fraying?

Looks like the election in the Ukraine is still being disputed by at least one party.

Ukraine's embattled Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko appeared in public for the first time in days Thursday but still ignored calls to concede defeat in the presidential election and resign her post.
Tymoshenko, looking tense but determined, appeared before the media for the first time since Sunday's election to chair a government meeting. She did not comment on the elections directly but took a swipe at the pro-Russian opposition leader Viktor Yanukovych, who defeated her by a margin of 3.5 percentage points, according to the final preliminary vote count.
Her refusal to admit defeat signals that Tymoshenko is digging in for a long power struggle with Yanukovych. Analysts say her strategy now appears aimed at undermining Yanukovych's attempts to consolidate power and enact legislation.
"It is already obvious today that nobody from Yanukovych's team has any intention of raising social standards," Tymoshenko told the government meeting. "Already, after the election, we are starting to discover huge pre-election deceptions and people should factor that into their future political calculations."

Think this might make a good wargame?
You can discuss it and track the progress of the design/development at ConSimWorld.

By: Brant

Counterattack at Salyan - Liveblogging today's Warfighter game over at ConsimWorld

Follow today's live blog of the Warfighter game over at social.consimworld.com




By: Brant

Actual Game Discussion!

This is the start of a discussion over at The Next Wars discussion forum on ConSimWorld:

So I've been fiddling around with the info I could find on the Georgia/South Ossetia War from this past summer. I was trying to piece together a scenario or two for Next Wars series using the existing Orange Crush counters, and a few slight mods... Basically, I was trying to set the game up so you could re-create the war and be able to play a 1-sitting game, in which each side was trying to do better than they actually did in the historical game.

Here's the problem, though. For either side to exceed their historical stopping points, you have to really "break" the game. For the Georgians to stem the red tide would require blowing up the Roki Tunnel - in which case, darn near nothing gets into the oountry, based on limited mobility elsewhere, and it becomes a Kosovo-ish air campaign on the part of the Russians (which Next Wars really isn't the best at).
The other option for the Georgians is to fight a total guerilla fight - again, not the best use of the Next Wars system.

If the Russians were to seize any more of Georgia than they did, you're likely running into more of a 4-headed diplomatic game. Additionally, to properly account for the Ossetian / Chechen / Abkhazian 'rebels' you've got to increase the partisan counters by a LOT in the countermix.

So, even though it seems like it'd be a TON of fun, I can't figure out a way to make the Next Wars rules work in a Georgia - Russia shootout.

If anyone's got any suggestions, I'm happy to hear them. Please share!

By: Brant

Russia Threatens the Ukraine. War(game) Imminent?

Vlad the Invader may be picking out his next target. Following the rather clumsy and brutal attempt to bring Georgia back into the fold, Putin has ramped up the rhetoric targeting the Ukraine:

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of Russia on Thursday accused Ukraine of having sent weapons and military personnel to assist Georgia during its war with Russia.
The accusation came as Russia announced a memorandum of understanding for handling natural gas sales to Ukraine after Putin met with the Ukrainian prime minister, Yulia Tymoshenko.
The timing of the Russian prime minister's statements underscores a drive in Moscow to increase its leverage in Ukraine, a former Soviet republic.
Without referring to the Ukrainian president by name, Putin suggested that President Viktor Yushchenko had authorized weapons supplies to Georgia before and during Russia's war there in August. He also said that Ukrainian military personnel had fought on Georgia's side during the conflict.
'When people and military systems are used to kill Russian soldiers, it's a crime,' Putin told reporters after meeting with Tymoshenko at his residence outside Moscow.

Boy, sure would be nice if someone would get around to publishing their game on this topic, eh*?

By: Widow 6-7


* for those not in-the-know, GrogNews editor Brant is the head wargame designer at BayonetGames.