Tank Games - an Unexplored Genre?

EDIT: (a) For those who simply read the title, then comment, this post is not saying tank games do not exist, but there is areas to explore within the genre (i.e. smaller skirmishes, non-Microarmour/ battalion scale). (b) Also, if you have linked here from TMP please tell Tango to bugger off and not link my blog again, ever

We have shedloads of WW2 rules, and quite a few modern sets.  But there isn't many that specifically focus on armoured warfare.  Yes, we have tanks in those WW2 games (Bolt Action, FoW etc) but they are part of a whole.  I'd like a game specifically focussed on tanks, with infantry merely playing a supporting role.  Think Warmachine; solos and casters are detailed, whilst "grunts" are generic groups.   Given that there are so many miniatures around, and everyone loves tanks (if you don't, your man-cave privileges are permanently revoked). So why don't we have more games that focus on them?  (No, weird/expensive boardgames or stuff from the 70s doesn't count)

Tanks (and crews) are the "heroes" or "aces"
Tanks should have detail, infantry do not. Tank weapons and capabilities are quite detailed, but infantry is streamlined, simplified and generic.  Specific tank crews can "level up" perhaps with a limited range of "special abilities."  Infantry are merely rookies, experienced or veteran which applies to all infantry on a side.  So some sort of (simplified) Mordheim-esque campaign system is required.

Squadron/platoon level
There are plenty of combined arms games (like FFTW3) at a large scale (brigades, battalions).  In order to keep our game focussed on specific crews, it will need to be a manageable size.  It will use between a troop (3-5 tanks) and a squadron (~12 tanks) with between a platoon (~3 squads) and a company (~9 squads) of infantry.  Artillery is unlikely to appear at this level.  So we're sort of looking at the FoW-Bolt Action scale from a tank-centric focus.  Whilst sweeping Cold War battles involving complete divisions (and usually abstract rules where a single tank = a platoon) are beloved of gamers, a lot of tank battles in WW2 involved a dozen or less per side, not hundreds. 

The Crusader is possibly my favourite tank.  Back when tanks were in a transitional period, and designs were innovative and weird, rather than the boring copy-paste MBTs we have today.

Realistic tactics = focus
In order to win, you need to use realistic tactics. I'm not a tank expert but I presume "bounding overwatch" where some tanks fire while allies move up/flank will be heavily used, as will setting up ambushes and taking hulldown positions.

For example, a troop activation might be "bounding overwatch" 2 tanks fire and 2 move.

I also want tanks to feel and move like tanks.  In some games they simply feel like infantry and kinda freely move anywhere and face and fire any direction.  Perhaps give them a turning radius if they move over 1-2" per turn.  Maybe limit the amount of degrees they pivot in a move?   I'll need to know exact stats - from memory a Panther could pivot 360 in 30-40 seconds; but how would Russian mud etc effect this?   this could simply translate into I.e. light tanks can spin 270, mediums 180, and heavies only 90, halved in bad going....

Gun traverse may also a thing; early Panther tanks took a full minute(!) to turn 360.  While I'm not going to track turret facing in-game, it might effect "reaction" times to targets off to the side, for example, or the ability to engage multiple targets.

I'm happy to have a somewhat fluid/flexible time/ground scale as long as it mimics the correct tactics and feel.  For example, I presume the "practical" RoF of many guns would be around 15 rpm no matter what the actual RoF is - they need time to aim. 

Activation & Reaction
Reactions seem sensible as tanks might peek out over a rise or round a building then compete to get a shot off first. I'm not sure the level of co-ordination between tanks - perhaps activate by troop if equipped with radio, with units having to pass some sort of test without.

No IGOUGO of course; I'd like the initiative to swing back and forth; perhaps as tanks take hits and fail morale/skill tests, the "active" player would then become the "reactive" player. 

Simple damage
I'm thinking a few levels, that could be denoted by a marker.  There's no hitpoints, just general effects.

Shaken = crew is freaking out, from non-pen hit. Perhaps it's being scoured by 20mm fire or a deflected shot or something.  Maybe temporary -1 to rolls, perhaps tank cannot advance in the direction of the fire.

Damaged = this is where the detail comes in, but keep it simple (maybe so can mark with micro d6)
1-2. Bail out! = crew jump out beside tank; may test to get back in later
3. Crew injuries = -1 to all rolls for rest of game as crew are impaired or have to multi-task/take over from wounded comrades
4-5. Mobility damage = perhaps a radiator is hit or tracks damaged; tank can must pass a test or remain stationary that turn; if is passes it may move at half speed for rest of game; if it fails a 2nd test it is permanently immobilized (and -1 to fire if hydraulic turret)
6. Weapon damage = turret ring jammed or similar; gun cannot be used until a crew test is passed

Killed = this takes a few forms.
1-2.  Brew up! = tank explodes in spectacular fashion; it's a total write-off
3-4. Crew kill = everyone inside is dead; tank quite salvagable
5. Mobility Kill = tank immobilized for rest of game
6. Weapon kill = gun knocked out or turret jammed; may not use primary weapon for rest of game

The Grant is similarly weird and awesome. The whole design just makes me smile. 

Infantry Damage and Rally Points
Infantry damage would be simple as possible; shaken, pinned, or destroyed.
In many games infantry squads once "destroyed" are gone for good, I'd like to see them have a chance to 'respawn' at a rally point (roll based on their morale) within a certain range; representing scattered survivors re-forming and re-organising.  Rally points (or "jump off") points could be set like in Chain of Command and thus could be valuable tactical targets - i..e once rally point is overrun, you cannot respawn there.   I'd also like to look at "cohesion" ranges - most games have squads 2" apart - which be 20-30 yards in 1:300?  I'll have to look it up but I presume real life squads would be able to operate more independently than that.

Spotting
Whilst I don't want to head into 90s territory with super-detailed spotting charts, I do think this should play apart in the game as many tank fights started with an ambush.  Perhaps tanks (or tank troops moving together) could be a "blip" until spotted (quite a few WW2 accounts say tanks were heard long before they came into sight) 

They could be divided into generic small (light/turretless TD), medium (T-34) and large (Tiger, Sherman) and have a set range at which they are revealed (halved if they are behind cover, doubled if they fire).

Setting
I'm thinking anything before good gun stabilisation, ATGW and helos as I feel tank warfare changes significantly. While tanks are still the best anti-tank weapon, we don't want those infantry peasants ruining things with Saggers or Apaches/A-10s interdicting a tank column before the fight happens. 

So I'm thinking WW2-late 1960s for the technology.

As I don't want to get bogged down with official orders of battle, I'm probably going to have battles in an "ImagiNation" between mercenary tank units where I can freely mix what-if 1946 wonder tanks in with early stuff that simply looks cool (Crusader, Lee), or use an S-Tank in my 1960s battles alongside more usual T-55s and Centurions. 

EDIT: TL; DR
There is room for a 1:1 tank game that is not big battalion micro armour/Cold War.  The tank genre tends to focus on big battles rather than engagements of half a dozen tanks per side; and if it is in a ruleset such as FoW, the tank rules themselves tend to be lacking or merely part of a whole; rather than the "tank crews as stars/aces" of a game like Battletech; where mecha crew are the focus.
(a) individual crew skills which can level up like Mordhiem or Battletech
(b) campaign/experience system
(c) dynamic reactions/interactions and initiative not just IGOUGO + overwatch.
(d) more realistic movement system than microarmour rulesets
(e) minimal infantry/confine to pre-ATGW era
(f) simpler spotting than older microarmour rulesets
(g) damage system which has some detail (crew, weapon, mobility damage or kill) but can still be denoted by tokens

Think tanks-meets-Mordhiem - or Heavy Gear/Battletech with WW2 tanks instead of mecha.  This could be done by adding depth to existing micro-armour sets like FFTW3.  Finally, I have excluded ancient (read 1970s, early 80s) games and obscure/expensive boardgames.

World of Tanks - Owning Your Results, Improving Yourself

Whilst to "repetitious" to be a full-time love, World of Tanks is a game I drift back to from time to time.  Slow paced, simple controls, and requiring cunning rather than reflexes, it is a good "dad" game to play with mates when you have a spare 10min.  Imagine chess where you are one of the pieces - a piece armed with a Pak 88 and in hedgerows rather than a checkerboard.

I've already done a few articles, a review,  Getting Started, basic skills/knowledge, improving from the basics and  intermediate skills.  The latter two reflect my journey from being a "reactive" player (only concerned about myself and my tank) to a greater awareness of the battle around me.

I recently got interested in it again, due to (a) being unable to wargame due to being on holidays but having access to a laptop and (b) and article on "win rate" and how people do or don't believe they can influence a game's outcome. As I both like stats, and I like internet arguments and pointing out fallacies, here's a brief overview of the opposing sides:

Stat Deniers: These people either claim that WoT games are "rigged" so they cannot win or that they always lose due to their 14 stupid team mates.  Or they claim the outcome of games is purely random due to the random mix of tanks and differing player's skill level.  They ignore the common denominator in all their games: themselves.  They tend to play by self-imposed "rules" and claim to only play for "fun." They often point to a single one-off game to prove they are "really" a good yet unlucky player and ignore the fact they win only 47% or less of their games and invariably have below average damage and kills per game.  Basically, the stats show they are mediocre players, so they blame anything but themselves.  I can't be bad - therefore stats must be meaningless!

Stat Whores: These people also think their team mates are stupid, but have decided that they can personally win matches, and the only person to blame for a loss is themselves.  They take responsibility for their themselves and their team. They will take every advantage possible within the game mechanics; under the theory "if the game allows it, and gives me advantage, I will do it."  Interestingly, they all tend to have above average stats and win rates that range from 55% to an astronomical 65-70% in some cases.  They tend to work hard to improve themselves by watching tutorials, streams, guides and videos, and by analyzing their stats to find their weaknesses.  Sadly, they often morph into arrogant pricks.

Why stats matter:  Most WoT players have played thousands of games.   With such large sample sizes, the stats are very reliable.  The average player has a 49% win rate (allowing for draws).
If you have a win rate above 60%, you are in the top 1% of players.  A player who goes completely AFK and just lets his tank sit in base doing noting for 1000 games would get a win rate of around 42%.  (There's one guy that has played 88,000 games with a win rate of 43% - only slightly better than being AFK - talk about never learning from your mistakes).  Handily, WoT has a lot of stats measuring tools and websites, such as vBaddict, noobmeter, and 3rd party programs like XVM.   Stats are great for analysing and improving your play (but sadly many use it to enlarge their e-peen.)

As you can see, I tend to favour the "stat whore" category who take personal responsibility rather than denying my shortcomings and blaming it on everything and everyone else.

Everyone remembers the time they carried the team and won the game, killing half the team including their top heavies, and capping solo against hordes of incoming foes. But you also have to acknowledge you can also "lose" a game - not just by dying in the first minute with 0 damage, but by your in-game choices. 

Teams are balanced by tank, not by skill. So often a lot of better players end up on one side, and a team gets stomped.  Poor players highlight this, and think that they only lose because they have bad teams.  But they ignore the fact that everyone gets bad teams - over 1000+ games it evens out.  There's a commonly held opinion that 30% of WoT games are impossible to win, 30% are impossible to lose, and the remaining 40% can go either way.  Good players know they can tip the "either way" games in their favour.    Further confusing the issue is "tiers".  Poor players feel helpless when they are a bottom tier tank in a game.  A Tier 5 M4 Sherman or T-34 vs a Tier 7 Tiger, IS or Pershing will be murdered 1v1, sure.  But it's not 1v1 - it's 15v15.  Even bottom tier, you can win games by flanking and supporting your team mates - you just can't rambo in, that's all.

With the new physics, it's possible to flip your tank and end up on your back like a helpless turtle all game. I did help my team mate right himself - after posing for a screenshot, of course.

After reading the post about the stats vs stat deniers, I looked at my own overall stats: 52% win rate, slightly above average kills and damage per game.   It had been rising ever since I started to put into practice the ideas from the intermediate thread and was 55% over the last 1000 games.

However, previously I had tried to better myself by focussing on higher damage and kills.  I had seen a significant jump in damage dealt and XP earned, and my win rate had climbed simply as a nice side effect.  But what if I deliberately tried to improve my win ratio?  What if I "owned" not only my personal stats, but also the win rate of the entire team?  I decided to do an experiment.   

As the official forums are useful but can be a bit of a cesspit of whinging and negativity, I've been visiting WoTLabs forums, which is run by purple (i.e. top 1%er) players.  Here's a collection of ideas gleaned from them, which I have been trying to put into practice.

1. Play the same tank or same style of tank repeatedly to get "in the groove". (i.e. swapping between a slow, tough KV-1 heavy and a speedy Chaffee scout is too a jarring change of playstyle) That way you can concentrate on the big picture of the battle (macro), rather than trying to remember the capabilities of your tank (micro).
Don't play every random tank in your garage for your "daily double." Focus on 2-3 similar tanks and play them repeatedly to get consistency.  You'll earn more XP anyway as you'll win more. 

2. Learn from others.  WoT is easy to get into a rut.  If you blame your team or the matchmaker, there's no incentive to improve.  Quickybaby and Jingles are popular Youtubers, but I'm expanding my horizons; Zeven and Taugrim try to be more educational as they play.

3. Learn from your mistakes.  After each game I make notes about my failings or discuss it with someone.  It started out  simple "why did I die?" but it is becoming more complex "what could I have done better"  "should I have swapped to the other flank earlier" "did I support from the right position?"  It's not an elaborate thing: it only takes 20-30 seconds or so.   If you view each match as a learning experience, it takes the sting out of deaths: "Well, it was a great position - but you need 2-3 tanks to hold it, not one."

4. Analyse your stats.  I noticed my survival % is low - so I need to be more cautious.  I also noticed my capture/defence ratio favoured captures.  But good players always have a higher ratio of defence.  So I need to defend more; instead of pushing aggressively.  Also, my damage could be higher.  I need to fire more: get into better positions and simply snap off more risky shots.

5. Know your enemies/limitations.   I've dropped back to Tiers 5 and 6 where I know every tank, it's capabilities and it's weakspots, already.  Again, this helps you focus on the big picture.   I know I can play well in Tier 5-6, but I'm merely OK at Tier 7 and struggle at Tier 8.  I'm going to get my stats up here, then move up the tiers - I'll stop around Tier 7-8 as higher tiers are too expensive and the grind is too long - stock tanks aren't as much fun!

6. Be positive.  Never blame your team.  When you are bottom tier, instead of cursing matchmaker, think "How can I be most useful?"  Being low tier changes your tactics, but does not make you play badly. Learn from your bad games. 

7.  Macro, not Micro.  Whilst I once used it merely to track nearby tanks to shoot, I now try to analyse the overall "flow" of the game.   Is a flank crumbling? Do I reinforce it or retreat?  Should I push out wider to flank or compress back onto my team mates in defence?    It's thinking about the big picture. 

8. Play your good, upgraded tanks, play your good crews.  I know some friends who relentlessly "grind" a tank from stock, then once they get a good crew and good upgrades, immediately move on to the next tank.  The problem: by quickly moving on to the next stock tank, they're always playing with sub-optimal gear - i.e. handicapping themselves.  They never play and enjoy their upgraded tank.

9. Never trade damage.  The good players regard their hitpoints as 4-5x more valuable than everyone else and seldom trade damage 1 for 1 unless their is a specific need to.  Corollary: it's seldom a good idea to suicide to save a team mate who yolos off.  Sometimes you just need to let natural selection take it's course.  Corollary: When you face another tank 1v1 it's not a honour duel to the death - feel free to retreat and go elsewhere - or lure him forward into crossfire.

10.  Don't go solo. Don't defend that crumbling flank solo.  You'll just get ganged up on and wrecked.  It's better to push with the lemmings.  Likewise, pushing to a great position is pointless if you're solo: it may be great tactics, but you'll get focussed down and killed.

11. Short term patience.  I don't mean camping an empty flank all game or sitting back on base "guarding" arty.  But it's just having the patience to not take that extra shot, or wait till the enemy tank turns side on so when you track it you can pen every shot.

12. Think ahead.  I think World of Warships, with it's lumbering behemoths taught me this: plan to ahead where you'll be in 20-30 seconds. It's not an inflexible strategic plan; more a "where should I be in 30 seconds?"  I'm trying to apply this to tanks.  Corollary: Have an escape route.  I always ask myself: if I go here, can I run away if things go bad?

13. Short term goals.  If you've already played 5000 games you can't suddenly change your overall win rate from 49% to 60% overnight.   I set goals over the short term, i.e. week - and compare it to my last 1000 games.

14. Play medium tanks more.  They have the best blend of speed (necessary to move around and help influence the game), firepower and vision. They're the best for "macro" level play. I personally like tank destroyers (Jadpanthers, Su100,StuG look so awesome) but they are too passive and "reactive" so I'm playing them less and less.  Heavies have poor view range and often "must" go to particular areas of the map; limiting their flexibility; many are slow.  I find it difficult to use light tanks as most current maps now are very confined and corridor-like; so their scouting is less useful; in most cases their firepower is lacking.

15. (EDIT). Winning in normal mode is simple:  Win one flank before the enemy wins on the other.  Simple, really.  You side can then cap, or reinforce the other flank at will. This informs quite a few decisions: do you try to "hold" a weaker flank to allow your superior flank time to push through?  Do you join the lemmings to push through a flank faster, as the other flank is screwed anyway? How can you find gaps in the enemy line to "lead" your allies forward?

I'll add in more as I think of them, but these are some of the key things that come to mind that I have been consciously working on.

Sites like Noobmeter can be helpful to analyse your gameplay. 

Results: 

It's a small sample size of ~70, but since I started "owning" my play and trying to win the game, looking at the ebb and flow of the game, regardless of team or tier, my stats have climbed sharply.
I'll compare them to my last 1000 battles.

Although average damage has remained similar (it improved most back when I was working on the skills in my "intermediate"post).   Base captures and defences have both doubled.  My survival has climbed from 32% to 44% so my kills/deaths has climbed accordingly from 1.5 to 1.9.  But most tellingly, my win rate has jumped to a staggering 70% compared to my usual 55%.  It's mostly Tier 6, but that's where I mostly play anyway - I'm not claiming to be a good player, merely a much improved one.

I think I'm in the third stage of my WoT career:
Stage #1:  learn basics, like armour, vision, and camo mechanics
Stage #2: own my own results - work on improving damage/personal positioning to benefit myself
Stage #3: own the team's results - work on positioning/situational awareness to benefit my team

As my win rate has sky rocketed, so has my confidence and attitude.  I load in as a Tier 6 against Tier 8s with double my armour and firepower?  No worries - I can help somehow.   Games seem less random. If you're a 49%er, an "average" player - the game IS random - pretty much a coin flip.  But if you're consistently 60%+, you start to see meaning in the wins and losses. With consistent 5-6 game winning streaks, losses are now tending to be anomalies that can be analysed rather than random, regular occurances.  I'm not saying I'm suddenly an awesome player, but I am saying that applying the knowledge of better players has contributed to a massive improvement in my stats (at least over the small 70-game sample size). 

It's mostly generic advice above, but I think the crux is:  I'm owning not only my results, but the team's results.  It's not someone else's fault if I lose - it's mine. The second point - you can always improve, but you have to want to.  It's easy to plateau - the guy with the most WoT games (149,000!) has a precisely average 49% win rate. He shows perfectly, you don't necessarily get better through sheer experience.

Historic Guns - the Sequel

Sadly, I still haven't had any "man cave" time as my family insists on more trips and holidays.  People tell me I'll look back with nostalgia at the time I had toddlers... (but I think they're full of crap)

However, one interesting fact - while on a few days holiday at Bundaberg (a town a few hours north) I checked out some more colonial guns I remembered from my childhood...  ...which turned out to have a direct link to those in my last post.

Basically, Queensland had it's own defence force (from 1859 until it became part of Australia in 1901); it also got it's own "navy" -  for 60,000 pounds it acquired two 360-ton 3rd class gunboats: the HMQS Palumba and Gayundah.

The Nordenfelt guns are all  1" (not .45 cal as I speculated in my last post). The quad (#3348) was earmarked for Fort Lytton but served on one of the two gunboats as well as at the Naval Store at Kangaroo Point.

The twin 1" (#6673) was one of two gun mounts on the fast, small 56-ft wooden piquet boat "Midge" - coincidentally, it's the sister gun of the smaller twin gun from the Maryborough Park from my last post.

The 6" Armstrong Gun (#4194) is a 4-ton, 80-pounder.  This was the stern gun of the HMQS Palumba which was replaced by a quick-firing 4.7" in 1905.

If you click you can enlarge the pic for further information.   In the top right is the gunboat Gayundah.

Pics of both gunboats. I'm sure you could google more info on the web, but I'm tired after my latest "holiday" with kids....

Anyway, when will there be wargaming and hobby-related articles?  Soon (tm)

Holidays and Historic Guns

Hopefully hobby time will improve as I'm now on school holidays. But first, family time!  I live in a fairly "old" city by Australian standards (established 1847, Maryborough is one of the oldest in Queensland and was a major port in the 1880s).  While giving my 2 year old a ride on the local miniature steam trains, I wandered over to look at the obligatory "gun in the park."  In most Queensland towns it is a 40mm Bofors or 17pdr artillery from WW2, and whilst the Nordenfelt guns are nothing that special, the 5" BL in the middle is something I don't see often.

The Nordenfelt in the foreground (No. 6675) is interesting only in that it has a double barrel rather than the usual triple or quad barrels.   I presume only fires a heavy rifle calibre (.45 or .50 or thereabouts?)

The furthermost Nordenfelt is a single barrel. 

The second Nordenfelt (1.5") is much bigger than the twin mount.

However the 5" BL is one I've never seen elsewhere. As you can see it comes with a Vavasseur mount (?) which suggests it is a dedicated coastal defence gun.  Back in the 1880s the "Russian Peril" was a thing for us Aussies, far from the Mother Country.

It has a 16lb charge and a 50lb projectile.

Range an optimistic 4100m over open sights....

Quality worksmanship from the Royal Carriage Dept 1887, "Ex-d at RCD Woolwich"

Looking out over the Mary River....

Anyway, after repeat visits to park, pool, and various family activities hopefully I will have time to clean out my shed and resume hobby activities tomorrow....

Game Design #66: Designing with "Focus" - Lessons from The Forest vs ARK

Steam abounds with "early access" (i.e. incomplete and buggy) survival games.  Most are never completed, and stand as a testament to the stupidity of consumers.

(/Rant - in the comments of one such game, unfinished for 2 years and still in "beta" I see: "I love this game, will you sell some dlc?"  What the f***! They haven't finished a game you already paid for and you want to give them more money?!  Truly, we deserve the world we live in.)

Anyway,  I admit to owning  two such "Early Access" games.  ARK: Survival Evolved - because, well, dinosaurs.  As blog regulars may have noticed, I'm in a "dinosaur" phase at the moment.  The other, The Forest, was because I read some interesting reviews about the cannibals AI - they are attracted to activity so if you build a advanced camp, you will have "visitors" - but they can be scared off, call for help, etc. I liked the idea of "live off the land, and never get noticed" vs "build a well-fortified camp, and fight off invaders every night." 

Anyway, what were the lessons?

Well, ARK was a better, deeper game.  (Both, in fact, are remarkably well-made and complete for EA titles) It has so much to do.  So much depth.  Tame dinosaurs, ride them, craft 101 items, a deep RPGish "levelling" system to unlock survival and crafting skills.  Join clans, and fight big multiplayer battles with dinos. Build awe-inspiring structures - and destroy those of others.  "Tech up" from primitive clubs to automatic weapons.

In contrast, The Forest is more limited.  Your crafting doesn't progress further than "sticks and stones" type tech.  Multiplayer is limited to co-op with a friend.  Most of the game is spent exploring and surviving - trying not to get spotted and swarmed by cannibals or the horrors that lurk in the caves under the island.  It may even be better not to "tech up" as buildings attract cannibals. 

 But I liked The Forest more. Wait? What?

Well, in ARK the survival aspects always seemed an inconvenience.  Chugging berries every 2 seconds in order not to die of hunger gets old really fast .  The "good bit" was riding and fighting dinosaurs.  The "survival" bit is more a frustrating and inconvenient time sink. I gave up without progressing far, as I was bored and impatient to do the interesting stuff. I'm not willing to spend a real life hour taming a turtle to ride (in the meantime, foraging 1000 berries for myself to avoid dying of hunger every 5 min) when a "cool" dino remains out of the reach of my gear and "level."  Not only do you need to run around scarfing berries every 2 seconds, but your weapons and tools "degrade" after only a few whacks.  The constant, ridiculous entrophy of yourself and your tools means for too much "chores" and not enough "fun."  Imagine you get a videogame called "X-Wing" - only to discover you must spend 200 hours maintaining the X Wing for every hour you fly, by mashing buttons in repetitious tasks.  

In contrast, in The Forest, survival IS the game.  Avoiding cannibals, creating traps for them, and balancing exploration against the wish to avoid a gory death - heck, you even have to scavenge for food and water less, and your axe never breaks.  In ARK, some dinos will want to eat you - but you can usually easily avoid them unless you blunder into them.  But it seems more like random chance - an unlucky and inconvenient death.  In The Forest, the cannibals will seek you out if you dare to light a fire to warm your freezing bones. It's personal. The creepy horror vibe makes surviving each day a victory, rather than another day closer to grinding a T-Rex.  Avoiding death is not a boring chore, but a gripping adventure. I've explored more of The Forest in an hour (and had more hair-raising escapades) than five hours of ARK.  Even building a house is more fun; (or rather, booby trapping it for any midnight "guests") - a frantic affair to finish it before the sun goes down.

Okay, okay - get to the point!

The Forest knows its niche and focusses on it.  It's about making day-to-day survival scary and gripping.   ARK is a far deeper game; an awesome mish-mash of ideas that somehow is (for me) less than the sum of its parts.  Day to day survival is a bit grindy and dull and forms a barrier/timesink to the riding and hunting dinos and fighting clans which sounds so awesome. 

How does this apply to wargames? 

Well, it's about focussing on the strengths of your game and designing to them.  Do you want an awesome campaign-based skirmish game, a new Mordheim-beater?  Well, make the campaign system good.  The gameplay itself can be quite simple.  Frostgrave did this well - I wasn't a fan of the mechanics of the game itself, but the campaign was interesting (albeit unbalanced and in need of playtesting).  It focussed on its strengths, with a interesting spell and equipment list.   In contrast, there was a Mordheim-esque spin-off of LOTR called Battle Companies.  Why didn't it take off? (Well, besides GW quickly burying it because it only required $20 of minis to play).  The campaign system was TOO simple. It didn't have enough 'meat' on it.  A campaign game with only a half-dozen upgrade options isn't really a 'proper' campaign game.

2HW does this well. They focus on the solo-play/reaction aspect of their games. People overlook the general shoddiness of the rules design and layout for the ability to have semi-automated opponents.

Warmachine unabashedly cultivates a CCG vibe with its combo-chaining gameplay. There isn't many wide sweeping flanking maneuvers - it's more about who hits who first or can get off their combo at the right time.  It's not everyone's cup of tea, but its rules are tight, and each faction has combos that are so OP and unbalanced the game is actually... ...balanced.  You may not like the style, but it has a consistent focus.

Battlestations! is a relatively obscure WW2 fleet scale game, which ruthlessly adheres to its focus as a "fleet" game.  In contrast, when the age of sail fleet game Fighting Sail attempts to adapt it's rules to 1v1 duels and it just feels awkward. 

It's popular to bash 40K, but in the past it has clearly drifted away from its original "heroic skirmish" of 2-3 heroes, 2-3 squads and a vehicle or so to become massive encounters with 100s of minis and dozens of vehicles (Apocalypse) - a scale that merits a completely new rule mechanic (Epic, anyone?).

Infinity's charm was its reaction system and nail-biting decisions, and a lethality that meant even the lowliest grunt could gun down a power-armour hero if well-positioned; it was all about game play decisions trumping list building and min-maxing.   However I feel it's lost it's way - with over 150 special rules (often very complex, with rules explanations taking an entire page) the game is drifting into Warmachine territory in that "he who remembers the most special rules, wins."  And that's fine for Warmachine, because that's it's focus.  But I feel it's diluting the original Infinity experience - there's still a great game in there, but I'm increasingly unenthusiastic about playing with each rules expansion.

To recap: sometimes you need to focus on one thing and do it well.  Work out what the most important thing about your game and emphasize it.   There's a reason there's very few good "universal" rule sets - in trying to do too many things, you can fall into the ARK trap, and add in stuff which dilutes gameplay appeal.   Sometimes stripped back game with a narrower focus, like The Forest, is actually more fun to play.  I'd think this advice goes double for small, indie rules designers, with limited playtesting and designing time.  What are you trying to do with your game?
What is the 'main thing' you want to emphasize?  If someone talked about your game, what would you expect them to praise?  "It has great x"

Game Design #65: Abstraction, Tables, and "Negative Game Design"

Yeah, my train of thought is sometimes still boarding at the station.  This is inspired by my large draft folder of incomplete posts, and a dearth of time.  On the Delta Vector google group, a topic was posted that pretty much covered the same ground as a draft post, which has been sitting in the drafts box for a month. 

So I've decided to "publish and be dammned" - and if there is enough interest in the topics, I'll expand them into the full posts I originally intended.    Kinda like a trailer for the movie, if you are being generous (or a the ramblings of an incomplete thought process, if you aren't).

Abstraction - What to abstract, and when?

Basically, rules are either simple to execute, or complex.  Realistic or unrealistic (as I've written elsewhere) have nothing to do with how gluggy or fast playing a set of rules are.  A key aspect is abstraction, which streamlines things. 

When to abstract, and when?  Well, we can abstract or even outright remove anything without a major impact on the genre being simulated.  For example, a modern rifle with a 30-round, quick loading magazine might abstract the loading process, as let's say it takes 15 seconds to empty the clip, and 3 to load it.   Whereas a crossbow needs to be laboriously reloaded every round, so the loading process might be tracked/detailed or otherwise have a process within the gameplay (move or fire, reload counter, etc).  Likewise, if a trooper carries enough ammo for a typical engagement - do we need to track it?
1. The focus is on the effect, while streamlining and simpifying the process.  
2. But sometimes we can remove the process altogether. 

Trappings vs Effect:  I've seen diagrams where a d100 is rolled cross indexed to diagrams of the human body for wound results. For a 1:1 skirmish, then we might care about individual soldiers. But let's ignore the location of the wounds and focus on the effects - unimpeded (scratch, graze); minor but noticeable injury (deep bleeding, sprain); major injury that severely impacts (broken bone etc) but does not take out of action; out of action (cannot fight on) and dead.  The exact location of the wounds can be abstracted.  Like Savage Worlds highlights so well - it's not about the trappings, but the final effect.

Charts and Tables: Good riddance?

Back in the 80s and 90s charts were de rigueur; usually very complex affairs, accompanied by often dozens of modifiers.  In the inevitable backlash, the humble table has almost vanished from gaming altogether, replaced by chugging handfuls of dice, usually to beat a fixed target number, with "modifiers" being shown by simply adding or removing dice.

Tables allow you to quickly cross-index data and allows table designers to 'build in'complex math and do all the hard work for the user.  

That said, tables have value in quickly doing complex tasks simply.  The designer can 'build in' complex math in the "back end" - the player simply has to run his finger down a column.   So by abandoning tables, have we thrown the baby out with the bathwater?

So I think perhaps the question should not be "do tables have value" (they obviously do) but "how complex can the math be in wargames?"  I've recently seen DP9 do some rules which 'improve' on their old ones primarily by replacing multiplication/division with addition/subtraction.   I personally have no trouble with 2x, 3x and 4x multiplication, so I think this is a waste of effort.  But does this make the game more accessible?  Would your gaming circle really miss anyone incapable of doing Year 3 math?

Negative Skills

I dislike negative skills.  In the videogame "Warframe"  you are a cyborg space ninja, wielding swords, automatic weapons and Jedi powers.  However in about 1/3 of the missions, drones with "nullifier" bubbles render your Jedi powers useless.  These missions are simply less fun.  You have fewer options, and the game is a poorer experience.  I mean, why have cool Jedi powers if you never have a chance to use them?

Another example is Faction A has the ability to teleport short distances; Faction B can cast AoE attacks, and Faction C completely nullifies the powers of Faction A and B.  Faction A vs B might be an interesting contrast of tactics; whereas Faction C reduces everything to a boring vanilla battle.  Faction C has a negative skill.   What if, instead, Faction C has a chance to reflect or mimic the powers of Faction A and B would make Faction C more active and interesting to play or play against, as it adds in new tactics and possibilities, rather than removing an element from the game.


Linked to this is an increasing trend for "limited activation" - not all units get to activate in a given turn/phase.  This is admittedly a simple way to force difficult decisions on the player.  But it's also negative activation. 

Negative (Limited) Activation

 Example: You have 10 units, but only get 5 activations.  So 5 units have to "miss out" each turn.
Or you have to roll a 4+ on a d6 or your unit does nothing. 
Yes, it forces vital "decision points" on the player in a simple, easy way that adds no complexity.... but it's lame.  It's a GAME folks.  I didn't paint my minis for hours just to have them sit around "cheerleading" for most of the game.   Whilst it's not precisely what is happening,  there's the sensation units are "missing out" on their "go."  

But we need friction! I thought you were for 'realism?' I thought you liked resource management?  Yes, but there's other ways to do it besides make units sit around doing diddly squat for most of the game.  I don't mind things like suppression removing actions, but to have units inactive for large portions of the game isn't fun.  A unit can be limited in it's choices, but it's not so much fun when it can do nothing at all. 

I like the "everyone gets an action, +1"  
i.e. ALL units get a chance to act EVERY turn/phase, but it is EXTRA actions which are the resource to be managed, i.e:

#1. DBA (limited action): roll d6 for the number of units you can activate
 You will have units sitting around - you have to make choices as to which units act, and which units sit around boringly like dummies.

#2. DUST Tactics (resource management): roll d6 for the number of extra actions you can take (which cannot be interrupted by reaction fire etc); THEN all units get to activate (or - as in Robotech - the d6 shows extra abilities like double moves, power attacks and dodges)
You will have all units able to act - you have to make choices as to which unit get cool extra special abilities and actions.

Both have resource management and an equal amount of decisions added.   But the perception is the first example is negative (completely nullifies half your minis), the second is positive (gives extra abilities and actions to your minis). 

Because the base mechanics of #2 (DUST Tactics) is positively geared, even if we remove an action due to suppression or a game effect, the player can still activate the unit by spending one of it's 'extra actions.'   Whereas in example #1, removing an action from a unit would simply exacerbate the "I can't do nuffink" feeling.

In my experience as a sport teacher, if a kid turns up in uniform, kitted out, excited to play, sitting him out isn't fun or desirable.   I know that units missing turns shows friction and simulates initiative, the ebb and flow of combat, etc.  But the perception that your carefully painted mini sat around most of the game completely static does not promote  a sense of "fun" and "involvement" - for me at least.
There's other, better ways to do it.  

Note: Eric Farrington explores this topic from a different angle in the google group

Book Roundup #8: Fantasy

Fallen Blade  (Jon Courtney Grimwood) = 3.5 Stars
Venetian assassins and vampires, pitted against "krieghound" werewolves of the Holy Roman Empire?  It couldn't sound any more cliched - "Underworld"-in-Venice, anyone?  but is actually quite fresh and well written.  The Moorish "Atilo" and his marriage to the heiress "Desdaio" is one of more than a few sly nods to Shakespeare.

You'd read it: Vampires vs werewolves, with a touch of Shakespeare? Underworld: Venice? Quite well written - Mr Grimwood is slumming it a bit I feel.

You'd leave it: Because vampires and werewolves are almost as tired as zombies

In the Eye of Heaven (David Keck) =  3 Stars
I initially abandoned this book as being too confusing - too much "hard work" to make sense of its world and plot. The author likes. Using. Short sentences.  The writer is a "writer" rather than an amateur historian, gives a better feel for his world in a few jumbled, terse sentences than the wordy exposition of the Red Knight. It's pleasantly "different" from my usual fantasys fare.


The trilogy may never be finished - the first two books came out in 2006 and 2008, and we're still waiting for the concluding book. This makes notorious slackers GRR Martin & Patrick Rothfuss look like a bundle of feverish writing energy.

You'd read it: An interesting book, with a choppy writing style that delivers a good "feel" for the world. Like the James Enge books, an interesting change of pace for a jaded palate.

You'd leave it: A bit confusing, and likely the trilogy will never be finished

Red Knight (Miles Cameron) = 2.5 Stars
100 years war mercenary company takes on the fairie folk ("the Wild"). 
At first I thought it was lame, then it grew on me, before faltering off again to end in cliches.  The second book was an ever bigger mess of exposition (the author is more amateur historian than fiction writer) which I didn't bother to finish. I could have edited the 450-page book down to 150 pages of actual story and plot.

You'd read it: Because you like the idea of 100 Years War longbowmen vs fae and wild forest critters. Some originality and unpredictability in places.

You'd leave it: Because of the enthusiastic but painfully verbose amateur-historian exposition style could be bettered by many high school students.

Malice, Valour - John  Gwynne = 4 Stars
The first two books of the Faithful and the Fallen (Malice, Valour) have been my surprise hits of 2016.  It has a very David Gemmell flavour to it - perhaps a somewhat B-grade David Gemmell - but it mixes old school fantasy tropes with the "new gritty and grimdark" in a pleasant balance.  Even better, the writing has improved in book 2 which points to a promising finale in books 3 and 4.  Also, the conceit of having a villain who idealistically thinks he is the saviour of the world (rather than the dark lord he is gradually becoming) is a fresh one. 

You'd read it: Because you like your fantasy grim and dark, but not relentlessly grimdark.  And you like it when some heroes are occasionally actually heroes, and not always unmitigated bastards.  Heck, even the villains sometimes have some redeemable traits.

You'd leave it: Another series with 4 hefty 900-page tomes; or you haven't read all David Gemmell's books yet.   Also, it is a bit oldschool i.e. "farm boy doesn't know his destiny" with "dumb sidekick" and "hot, impetuous ninja girlfriend" as well as "mentor who is a secret Jedi" - it visits pretty much all the fantasy tropes.