Morschauser’s Wargame Rules

 “It’s not what you look at that matters, it’s what you see.”

— Henry David Thoreau

I’ve enjoyed many of John Curry’s volumes in his History of Wargames Project, from republication of early wargame rules and historical wargames used for training and analysis to treatises on matrix games and other serious wargaming. I recently acquired one that had previously eluded me, Joseph Morschauser’s How to Play War Games in Miniature: A Forgotten Wargaming Pioneer: Early Wargames Vol. 3. I was initially lured to it by the claim it included an introduction of a gridded play surface into miniature wargaming, but I pleasantly found it filled with intuitive, concise rules, options for basing, and overall solid advice for miniature wargaming newcomers just as relevant and inspiring as when it was first published more than 50 years ago. It was a refreshing affirmation of many miniature wargaming elements I’ve come to enjoy over the years: concise simplicity; based units; flexibility between open battlefield and gridded surface; flexibility between eliminating units or keeping a roster for a multiple hit system; and an overall informative and welcoming approach to hobby.

Rules as Written, Game as Played

 “The essence of a role-playing game is that it is a group, cooperative experience.”

— Gary Gygax

Chevy Chase's character from
Community prepares to run D&D....

After last week’s missive about “rigid” and “free” rules I started thinking about the flexibility roleplaying games have always offered and the variable experience they provide when mixing a rules system with a setting, a particular gamemaster, and a certain group of individual players. Sure, all games provide some variability with different participants within the more rigid structure rules impose. But roleplaying games offer a lot of room for interpretation to suit different play styles: which rules a gamemaster relies on and which they use infrequently or even ignore completely; to what degree the participants focus on rules, character roles, or setting; where an adventure moves and how it involves players and their characters. Roleplaying games give us lots of freedom between the rules as written and how we run them, subject to interpretation and collaboration between everyone at the table. All these variables sometimes lead to inconsistent quality. Sometimes game sessions can be terrible; but with the right combinations, the experience can seem magical. Each person at the table and their interpretation of a game (internally as a mindset and externally through play) represents a wide-ranging variable...all of which can affect the course of the game and the satisfaction each person finds in it.

Tower of the Faceless Clock

Or Challenges Extracting Rules Text from Solo Adventures

My discussion of the difficulties extracting system from setting in roleplaying game supplements reminded me of an abandoned project. It was an experiment to design a programmed solitaire adventure (with numbered paragraphs, like the Choose Your Own Adventure books) to present a specific setting without reference to a specific rules system. Having written plenty of solitaire tutorial adventures intended to teach game mechanics along the way, designing one without considerations for typical rules – how to run combat, procedures for skill checks, how to make saving throws, etc. – proved challenging.

Extracting System & Setting

 “If you obey all the rules you miss all the fun.”

– Katharine Hepburn

For most roleplaying games the mechanics and setting remain bound together. Extracting one from the other often proves challenging from a game design standpoint and dubious from a marketing perspective. Few game systems exist entirely apart from any given setting, though they claim (with different levels of efficacy) to operate with any genre. Over the years various games have released as standalone rules sets – Steve Jackson Games’ GURPS, Chaosium’s Basic Roleplaying (BRP), Hero Games’ Hero System, S. John Ross’ RISUS: The Anything RPG, even West End Games’ popular D6 System – with varying degrees of success. Some emerged from existing games, like D6 from the Star Wars Roleplaying Game and BRP from favorites like Call of Cthulhu. These find some success among pockets of gamers willing to do the legwork to adapt them to their original settings (though some, like RISUS, make this quite easy). Yet few products have made their mark as settings extracted from or produced without rules systems. Such oddities require a delicate touch, a very generic approach to anything smacking of rules, and finesse in inspiring gamers to undertake the work adapting them to a favorite game system.

Customizing the OSR Experience

Resources like Brent Newhall’s Old School Renaissance Handbook and Taxidermic Owlbear’s overview of retro-clone systems remind me of the OSR’s amazing diversity in mechanics. Each new OSR game provides the author’s own interpretation of the classic Dungeons & Dragons game system based on a beloved early edition, an amalgam of preferred mechanics, new innovations on those systems, or other inventive derivations. (And I’m not even mentioning setting interpretations incorporating those mechanics....) Although I like a single unifying “core mechanic” in my games – such as the dice-pool roll against a difficulty number in the D6 System – I grew up with the amalgam of different mechanics in the Basic/Expert D&D and Advanced D&D games. “Core mechanic” systems allow for a some degree of interpretation in fine tuning within the scope of the basic rules, yet so does D&D with its numerous individual rulings for resolving the host of situations that arise in the course of a game. D&D established the foundation for fantasy roleplaying game mechanics; the OSR demonstrates just how variations and innovations can vary to produce games with different play styles.

The process adjusts individual mechanics within the game to find the right balance of game play. Take a look at individual systems and notice how gamers can alter nearly every one for a particular play style or rules preference. Since roleplaying games focus on characters, many of these elements appear on the character sheet; many trickle down to other systems, particularly in handling monsters .Designers have adjusted existing rules to their liking, but for some they’ve devised original ways of handling mechanics while still evoking the spirit of early roleplaying games:

Shields in OSR Games

Frequent readers know of my recent explorations in Old School Renaissance gaming (OSR) through my solitaire B/X Dungeons & Dragons exploits (my preferred old-school system). These activities help me examine what I like about various elements and how to improve those that don’t work for me. So I come to the shield conundrum: they seem underpowered. In looking at alternative shield mechanics I found myself questioning the very core rationale behind armor and shields in D&D combat.

(Throughout this post I refer to various bonuses to armor class as +1, etc., as I’m using ascending armor class; for the traditional descending armor class read that as -1. Either way, “bonus” means a benefit to armor class in the context of whatever system you’re using.)

I prefer a more heroic style of play rather than the deadly “grinder” style (as I’ve discussed before), so I look to provide my characters with every possible advantage within the bounds of the rules...and then house-rule some mechanics to offer some minor benefits. Of the three characters I’m running through various solitaire scenarios, two have shields and one has eschewed a shield in favor of two-handed weapons (the underpowered battle axe...a topic Jonathan Becker has discussed before at his B/X Blackrazor blog). While one of the shield-bearers has no ranged weapon, the other must set aside her shield if she chooses to use her long bow, temporarily shedding its armor class bonus. I’m examining the shield rules with an eye to making my low-level characters less monster-fodder and slightly more heroic.

Revisiting the Random Dungeon with Themes

Several weeks ago I explored issues in random dungeons based on my own experience with the original Gygaxian method from the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide and John Yorio’s No Budget No Frills Pencil and Paper Dungeon Generator, Ver. 3.0 over at the Tabletop Diversions blog. After my admittedly limited initial experiences I set off to devise a slightly more focused “random” dungeon experience incorporating an overarching theme for the delve and table results skewed to allow for some escalation from basic encounters to more challenging ones.

I wanted to structure a blank form outline with tables for determining corridors and chambers, traps, treasures, and encounters, with most of the die types and ranges left blank for users to fill in with their own preferences. For instance, choosing a 1D6 roll for determining corridors or chambers might allow one on a roll of 1-2 and the other on 3-6, skewing the results to favor a preferred structure. They could populate a trap table with theme-appropriate devices. Treasures could reflect the theme as well. But the most integral of all is the encounters table, where users “seed” the delve with themed encounters rather than relying on random monster tables by dungeon level. An escalation mechanic -- in the form of a bonus to the table roll equal to the number of previous encounters -- skews results to the higher and more challenging encounters, culminating in a showdown with an appropriately powerful “boss” monster.

The result is a PDF document with forms to fill out and then “save as” or print to create a one-page set of tables for a “themed dungeon” with randomized elements skewed toward a particular experience.

Here’s a look at the rationale I followed:

Intent: Since this serves as a side-project for me -- a quick jaunt exploring an interesting idea and game-design exercise -- I imposed a few restrictions on development. I wanted to keep the tables to one page with adequate room for users to customize the material with their own ideas. My urge to keep things relatively straightforward influenced me to leave out several traditional elements and interesting concepts; in some cases I’ve marginalized them from their more prominent places in previous random dungeon generators.

Secret Doors: Most random dungeon generators include some means of noting secret doors in passages and chambers. I overlooked this element in the interest of simplicity, though also partly to make sure the tables had more space for encounters, special treasures, and traps. I’m considering (and may have already implemented) a section on the “Chamber” table to account for the possibility of secret doors.

No Exits: A keen playtester noted the current “1D4-1” roll to determine the number of exits from a chamber could result in a complete dead-end in the very first chamber. I’ll alter the wording to eliminate that “-1” modifier until after explorers have visited four or six rooms.

Special Corridors & Chambers: I’d originally hoped to include results and additional tables for creating special corridor elements (stairs up and down, exits and entrances) and chambers (pillared halls, chasms with bridges) users could customize to the theme. At this point I’m considering including a “special” result on the corridor table with parenthetical suggestions for such remarkable features beyond the basic passageways.

Empty Room Table: The gamer community occasionally vents on the subject of empty rooms in dungeons, a result of random tables I personally found frustrating in my own solitaire delves. Unfortunately space considerations forced me to omit a table on which users could roll to generate some themed setting descriptions for trappings within empty rooms: abandoned shrines, barracks, common areas, or even caves with partially collapsed ceilings.

Take a look at Schweig’s Themed Dungeon Generatorand see how the system flows. I’ve included the blank, fillable form on one page and a sample dungeon on the second page to demonstrate how it might work. The document is still in flux, though I intend to revise it with an eye toward publishing it through my e-storefront at DriveThruRPG.com as a free/pay what you want product. For now it remains accessible from this blog post, though in the future the link will migrate to the e-storefront.

As always, I encourage constructive feedback and civilized discussion. Share a link to this blog entry on Google+ and tag me (+Peter Schweighofer) to comment.

Thoughts on the Random Dungeon

I’m returning to my Oracle System-driven roleplaying game design for Basic Fantasy Heroes as an occasional break from work on the miniature wargame rules for Panzer Kids. The rules went through several rounds of playtesting earlier this year, with solid input and good insights on fine-tuning the system and improving the presentation. But aside from running a few test encounters myself to see how combat worked out within the overall Oracle System, I’d not have a chance to run a small band of heroes through a scenario. So I turned to a solitaire alternative using a random dungeon system to generate an adventure in which I, as player, truly could not anticipate what the characters would face from one room to the next. Beyond offering a taste of the Basic Fantasy Heroes game system mechanics in an actual play setting (albeit solitaire), the experience helped me come to some conclusions about what I expect in random dungeon solo play.

Rationale

I wanted to adhere to certain conditions in undertaking this foray into solitaire random dungeon adventuring, primarily to provide a realistic experience using the character and combat rules I’d developed in a fully unexpected setting. To this end I created three beginning characters using my Basic Fantasy Heroes rules: a priest, elf, and dwarf, each with their own specialties that would affect gameplay (primarily combat).

My main concern was generating a dungeon layout with interesting results for solo gameplay. I’m no expert on the various options available today for solitaire dungeon generation. Giving in to my nostalgia, I initially turned to the original material created on this subject, the Gygaxian system in “Appendix A. Random Dungeon Generation” of the Advanced Dungeons & Dragons Dungeon Masters Guide.

To vary my approach I also polled some folks on Google+. Several offered good suggestions on alternate, more recently developed random dungeon generation systems available. Thanks to John Fiore, host extraordinaire of the Solo Nexus blog, I picked up the No Budget No Frills Pencil and Paper Dungeon Generator, Ver. 3.0 by John Yorio over at the Tabletop Diversions blog. (Though I’m also interested in eventually picking up the geomorph Dungeon Dice Clayton Rider suggested.) The discussion also covered TSR’s Cardmaster Adventure Design Deck, which I own but declined to use in this particular exercise.

In both cases I decided to create my own first-level dungeon monster encounter table based on the low-level creatures I’d devised for Basic Fantasy Heroes -- not all the creatures I’ve developed have corollaries in the AD&D Dungeon Masters Guide monster tables, and I didn’t want to outright translate that game directly to mine -- but they still ran the range from bandits and goblins to giant centipedes and slime. The presence of traps in both dungeon generation rules revealed to me that I’d not considered rules for traps in Basic Fantasy Heroes; so I quickly drafted some functional notes on how certain iconic traps worked within the Oracle System framework with an eye to developing them more fully later.

I intended to try two strategies in recording my solo dungeon-delving experience: creating an annotated map (somewhat of a necessity in these exercises) and writing an in-character chronicle describing events, encounters, and reactions (an idea John Fiore has featured over at Solo Nexus, though he recommends not writing in a player character’s voice). Experience with both random dungeon generating systems showed the map an obvious requirement and the primary focus of the game. In the course of rolling, mapping, and handling combat encounters, however, I regret the adventure diary chronicle fell by the wayside; I liked the character narrator, but it seemed a strain to catalog encounters in an engaging style, even in the most general sense (though I was quite happy with my introduction).

The Gygaxian Labyrinth

At first glance the byzantine tables in the Dungeon Masters Guide appendix seemed to lead one down the path to revealing a dungeon with all the complexities one expects: traps, monsters, treasure, secret doors. Slightly weighted tables favored some results over others, but not by much. The system seemed more attuned to taking into account every possibility within the dungeon layout and offering an unbiased result, giving almost every option the same chance of occurrence.

Amid all the twisting corridors and intersections my intrepid heroes came upon seven rooms, four empty ones and three containing monsters. For the solitaire play -- and in chronicling the adventure writing as one of the heroes -- empty rooms proved extremely boring. I found myself wishing I had some means of determining any descriptive features about the chambers just to liven things up and give some clue about their past use and the dungeon’s origins. Despite the tables for traps and treasure, the heroes didn’t encounter any. The random monsters they confronted had no theme to them other than “Level 1” and, typical for this kind of exercise, there seemed no rationale for them being there other than excuses I created for the adventure diary chronicle: obviously bandits were probably looting the dungeon like the heroes and the cave mantids made a nest in one of the chambers, but why kobolds were hiding behind an illusionary wall in one room is beyond me.

What also occurred to me as I tired of this exercise was the lack of any meaningful conclusion. My heroes simply reached a point where they’d had enough and back-tracked their way to the dungeon entrance. Assuming they returned to the nearest town to tend their wounds and cash in their treasure, they had little compelling reason to return to their subterranean explorations other than the promise of haphazard carnage and loot.

No-Frills Simplicity

The no-frills dungeon generator promised a far more simplified method than the Gygaxian model: roll 1d12 and consult the table. The 12 possible results included an even distribution for various corridor types and three kinds of rooms, those with monsters, traps, and the infamous ones with nothing at all. Asterisked notes included intuitive methods for determining corridor length, chamber size, and the number of doors in a room (though I modified these from 1d10 rolls to 1d6 rolls). .

My heroes began their delve and started exploring the catacombs with far more ease than navigating the numerous Gygaxian dungeon-generation tables. The results seemed more interesting, too; of four rooms they discovered, two held monsters and two traps…no empty rooms in this dungeon. That’s as far as they got because the presence of more traps wore down the party. Traps appear in locations (rooms or corridors) one time in six, with monsters appearing one time in twelve. The dungeon also remained void of any kind of thematic rationale aside from the fact that the bandits were probably looting the place, too, and the giant centipedes had nested in another chamber.

Between the two random dungeon generation systems, though, I liked the no-frills one over the more complex and time-consuming Gygaxian method. The no-frills system benefitted from both brevity and a better presentation, with each result illustrated by a mini-map geomorph depicting the dungeon feature. But it highlighted the need for separate tables for corridors and rooms as well as the variability of having even slightly weighted tables. Both systems -- one possibly the first in the adventure gaming hobby, the other a recent refinement -- left me feeling somewhat unsatisfied. Yes, they both certainly challenged me as a player to use character resources and specialties to overcome adversaries and survive traps, but they lacked even the most basic contextual story elements.

Themed & Skewed

Although I actually achieved my original mission of playtesting the rules and characters in the context of a solitaire random dungeon crawl, I can’t help but consider how to craft a more fulfilling solitaire play experience in a relatively random dungeon. I think adding both a basic theme and some skewed (or escalating) results might help add more intriguing narrative elements to elevate the experience beyond a completely random hack-and-slash delve. I’m envisioning a quick setting paragraph to put the dungeon entrance and its theme in context, followed by tables to generate corridors and chambers (favoring some results over others). I’d include a monster encounter table customized to the theme (vermin, goblins, magical creatures, etc.) incorporating an escalating mechanic to push future rolls up the spectrum toward a “boss” monster. It’s something I’ll think about as a possible solitaire random dungeon generation system when I next feel the need to explore some new game design territory.

My ultimate lesson learned concerns the nature of random dungeon generation as discovered by the necessity of gradually revealed solo play. Dungeon delves -- while the primal form of adventuring in the hobby -- remain a limited form, more so in the random dungeon generation style used for solitaire play. More involved campaign play, balancing wilderness, town, and dungeon encounters, offers more possibilities for a richer solitaire experience and hence more interesting narrative possibilities for chronicles recording adventures.

Next time I need a break and feel the need to test my Basic Fantasy Heroes rules in a more varied narrative setting, I’ll grab my sets of Rory’s Story Cubes (regular and Voyages) and send my characters through the paces of John Fiore’s The 9Qs Solo RPG Engine.

As always, I encourage constructive feedback and civilized discussion. Share a link to this blog entry on Google+ and tag me (+Peter Schweighofer) to comment.

Cutting Down to the Essentials

In adapting Fantasy Flight Games’ Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game for play with a three-and-a-half year-old preschooler I’ve learned some lessons about cutting down a game system to the essential rules, a task applicable to the kid-friendly tank skirmish game I’m developing.

Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game

My preschooler son has reached a point where he’s voraciously absorbing everything Star Wars we allow (i.e., only original trilogy material), primarily inspired by the numerous Star Wars toys, games, and other images in my office. Over the past few months we’ve read him the pop-up book, listened to the soundtrack in the car ad nauseum, got out some old Playskool figures (and the Millennium Falcon) he plays with, and finally watched Star Wars: A New Hope together (the pre-special edition version).

We spent a day at Historicon this past July where he inevitably noticed and intently watched the last half of a Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game playing out, including such ships as Han Solo’s Millennium Falcon and Darth Vader’s advanced TIE fighter. Between that and actually watching Star Wars he was hooked. Luckily I found a nicely discounted copy of the X-Wing Miniatures Game in the Historicon dealers hall; after adding a few more starfighters acquired in numerous quests to gaming stores near and far we were ready to play.

The game itself offers several levels of play, from the extremely basic quick-start rules to the main game and several more involved “additional rules.” The system includes some innovations on a style of miniature wargame “lite” popularized several years ago by the World War I aviation-themed Wings of War (an Italian game Fantasy Flight Games distributed in America). They’ve added several layers of complexity beyond the basic move-and-shoot system, including pilot actions (barrel rolls, focusing, evasion), pilot cards for each spacecraft to vary the pilot skill and actions, upgrade cards to enhance individual ships, and special eight-sided dice for attack and defense rolls.

Stripping this all down to the level of a three year-old seemed daunting at first, until I focused only on the quick-start rules, designed to get people playing right out of the box. These rules use the main ship stats, maneuver dial, movement templates, and dice in a very bare-bones game even young players can comprehend with a little adult gamer guidance. Gameplay focuses on the essential basics of movement and attack; no fancy actions, no dealing with pilot skill, no starship upgrades or special weapons. Granted, we play with lots of parental assistance using these extremely basic yet functional rules. From a parent’s perspective, it offers a chance to teach numbers using the movement and turn templates (“How far do you want your ship to move?”), counting dice to roll and their results, and direction (straight, left, or right; gradual turn or sharp turn). We also let the preschooler fly the Millennium Falcon, which, thanks to guns mounted on turrets, has a full 360-degree field of fire, so he doesn’t have to worry about lining up his target in a limited forward-facing fire arc. (It also gives him plenty of shields and hull strength so his ship has only rarely been eliminated during a game.)

We’ve played it several times, usually with Mommy flying Luke Skywalker’s X-wing fighter and Daddy fielding a pair of TIE fighters or the newly acquired TIE interceptors. With our help the preschooler has quickly mastered the basic game concepts (though his moves on the starfield don’t always make sense); so he’s recently asked for (and his parents desperately sought) some new additions to enhance his game experience. Although I thought he might appreciate the range rules -- allowing an extra attack die when firing on close targets or giving an extra defense die for those at long range -- my son saw the cardboard punch-out asteroid pieces used in some of the game’s missions and wanted to use those. Of course, they made the game harder for Daddy’s TIE fighters….

Panzer Kids Basic

My approach to a kid-friendly tank skirmish game takes a similar strategy as the X-Wing Miniatures Game’s incrementally more involved rules. I intend to release Panzer Kids in two stages, the free/pay-what-you-want PDF basic edition containing the barebones rules, several tank stat cards, rulers, and print-and-play top-down tank pieces (in lieu of miniatures kids can find or purchase from other sources). The for-pay Deluxe Edition would include all the basic rules plus tons of optional rules players can learn piecemeal and include in their game when they feel ready to add greater depth of play.

I’m in the process of drafting the core rules based on pages of notes and disparate paragraphs hastily written as inspiration came in the design process. As I write I’m finding a number of things to toss out of the basic edition. I knew I’d relegate many rules essential to complex miniature wargames to the more advanced deluxe edition -- hull down vehicle cover, static anti-tank guns, shots at close range, traversing difficult terrain, mine fields, and mission objectives -- but I’m still finding concepts I thought might work in the basic edition to move to the deluxe edition or even eliminate altogether. Here are a few I’d thought to include in the basic game that, in the course of developing a rules set for a younger audience, I ultimately decided to cut to stick more closely to the absolute essentials:

Variable Scale: I’d originally intended to include information (primarily speed and range, both measured in inches) for both 15mm and 6mm “micro-scale” tanks. I personally like wargaming with both, and have a small collection of tanks from the North African theater in both scales. But in considering what kids might have available to them, or what they might find in hobby, toy, and game stores, I decided to cut references to the 6mm scale. I’ll include some top-down pieces kids can print and play with in lieu of actual miniatures, but will relegate the 6mm information as an optional appendix in the deluxe version of the game.

Deployment Options: In determining how players set up games, I’d devised a few alternatives to the basic “put your tanks along your edge of the battlefield” strategy reflecting the terrain set-up and any slight disparity in the total unit point costs between Axis and Allied player forces. For instance, with cover terrain set up along the middle of the play area, the side with the slightly lower total point cost might deploy tanks up to 12 inches from their edge of the board. In writing these conditions out, however, I realized it might be too much for kids to comprehend amidst all the other nuances of miniature wargame rule. These options might go into a sidebar in the deluxe rules’ movement section, but they don’t belong in the basic game.

Unit Point Cost: The gamer in me insisted on rating each tank type with a “cost” to field it, a value reflecting its firepower, armor, and speed. Theoretically this helps each side build a force of relatively equal strength to make sure each has a fair chance of winning. But when I took a closer look comparing Axis and Allied tanks, I realized they had fairly close values. Rather than spend an entire section explaining the concept of unit point costs and balancing forces, I cut it and instead offered some suggestions for Axis and Allied tank face-offs (mostly from the North African theater). Most represent equivalent numbers of tanks (3 German Pkw IIIs against 3 British Crusader IIs), though the one exception proved the Pkw VI Tiger tank, which I paired against two M3 Stuart tanks.

Two miniature wargaming concepts remain essential to playing the game beyond simply moving and shooting in the open: line of sight and cover. Both might seem too complex to include in the basic edition, but through playtesting I realized they really form the core of tactical decisions for a small skirmish. Players need to maneuver their tanks around the available cover (mostly hills and oases in my desert games) to hide from enemy tanks and gain some small advantage from cover.

I also realize these rules remain bound to other constraints I’ve placed on myself, notably some foundation in the tanks’ historical performance (demonstrated in the tank stats themselves) and a desire to introduce young gamers to wargaming concepts one degree beyond simply moving and shooting. I have also, rather foolishly I might argue, taken on the challenge of trying to draft a set of miniature wargame rules intended for kids 10 and older to pick up on their own, learn, and play without adult supervision. Old Dominion GameWorks’ Mein Panzer Junior offers a set of basic move-and-shoot tank rules with some slightly more complex stages; but it presumes involvement and supervision from a miniature wargames-informed adult. (Downloading these free rules requires registration at the ODGW website.)

  

We’ll see how my continued development and writing for the Panzer Kids rules challenges my ability to hone rules down to their bare minimum while still clearly and concisely explaining game concepts to a younger audience.

As always, I encourage construction feedback and civilized discussion. Share a link to this blog entry on Google+ and tag me (+Peter Schweighofer) to comment.

Simultaneous Action Resolution

Many non-gamers assume players take turns in games, each one resolving their actions fully before moving on to the next player. Gamers obviously have a bit more experience with different player sequences and resolution, whether using an innovative initiative system in a roleplaying game, flipping playing cards to see which side’s units move and shoot in miniature wargames, participating in a shifting player order in a European-style board game, or, my favorite, resolving actions simultaneously so nobody’s knocked out of the game before they get a chance to take a parting shot.

Even in traditional turn-taking games I prefer every piece to have a chance to take action even if enemy fire that turn would normally destroy it; the Axis & Allies Miniatures Game and it’s War at Sea naval version do a good job of simultaneously resolving hits by noting how much damage units take and removing destroyed units at turn’s end after every piece has had a chance to move and shoot. In Panzer Kids, the beginner-friendly tank miniatures game I’m developing, I make sure to allow every tank within range and line of sight to a target a shot before accrued hits take effect and knock some tanks out of the skirmish.

While player sequencing helps maintain order at the game table, resolving actions simultaneously not only provides a better sense of fairness but forces players to remain involved and focused on the game throughout their and others’ turns. It’s a rules element I prefer, when available, in whatever games I’m playing; I try incorporating simultaneous action resolution into game designs when the mechanic seems suitable to the game’s style, overall mechanics, and theme. I’ve enjoyed some experience in other games with simultaneous action resolution:

Wings of War/Glory: One of the elements I like about Wings of War/Wings of Glory remains the simultaneous attack resolution. After all units have moved, everyone determines which enemy planes are in range and which ones they’re attacking, with target aircraft taking damage cards (or chits in the WWII version) with different damage values (including zero); aircraft with hits reaching their damage resistance value are destroyed. This procedure, however, allows the target plane to get off a shot even if, when taking hits itself, it would be eliminated at the end of the turn. In the Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game -- a direct derivative of the Wings of War/Glory game with some original innovations -- ships move and shoot according to their pilot skill value (higher being better); less experienced pilots move first and shoot last in those respective phases, while veteran pilots naturally maneuver last and attack first. Although movement might seem like a simultaneous action -- with maneuvers revealed on a previously set dial, much as flyers in Wings of War/Gloryreveal cards for maneuvers -- the addition of actions like barrel-rolling, targeting, evading, and focusing all reveal the intentions of players moving first. Since combat is fully resolved in turn beginning with the better pilots, they can knock less experienced pilots out of the game before everyone’s had a chance to shoot that turn. I enjoy Wings of War/Glory that much more because I know, even if my plane’s going down in flames this round, I have a chance to take a parting shot at an enemy aircraft.

D6 System Roleplaying Game: When I run roleplaying games with built-in initiative systems I generally resolve actions simultaneously in my head, with an eye toward fairness to player characters and unexpected plot developments from actions with results that often clash. I frequently discard built-in initiatives systems -- intended to impose structure on player and gamemaster actions -- in favor of an improvised yet simultaneous task resolution method. Typically I’ll announce the characters’ adversaries intentions then go around the table to each player (usually varying my start point each round) asking for their characters’ actions and letting them know what relevant skills to roll. I roll the gamemaster character skills, noting how well they did in terms of success/failure and degree of success (for opposed rolls). As players reveal their skill roll results I figure out what’s going on in relation to opponent actions, then narrate the outcome. This certainly makes a bit more work for the gamemaster to mentally keep track of what all the characters and their adversaries are doing, but makes for some interesting moments as simultaneous action resolution brings about some unexpected results. I also find the technique -- or the simple omission of an intrusive initiative game mechanic -- far more cinematic.

Oracle System: I’m building the Oracle System -- the basis for a retro-clone-style fantasy roleplaying system I’m developing -- on the concept of simultaneously resolving combat between two opposing parties, including chances to hit and defend in one roll. A hero rolls her dice while the gamemaster rolls dice for her opponent; each counts up defend results (2s and 3s), a number of which (equal to the character’s armor value) can cancel out the opponent’s hits (4s, 5s, and 6s), with any hits getting through armor lowering the defender’s overall dice (both an indication of ability and health). In this fashion two opponents can conceivably knock each other out of a skirmish; even someone about to be vanquished still has a chance to inflict damage with a parting shot. (You can read more about the Oracle System and its simultaneous combat resolution mechanic in an earlier blog entry.)

Simultaneous action resolution isn’t right for every game. They often becomes a choice over other game concerns. For instance, I’m sure the Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Game designers felt using a pilot skill value was far more important to the overall game strategy than simultaneous attack resolution; in fact, offering different pilot expertise levels helps players build diverse squadrons essential for both varied skirmish scenarios and organized play (a cornerstone of the game’s appeal and marketing approach to the gaming community). Mechanics remain the primary consideration; if simultaneous resolution doesn’t work with the core game system -- or needs additional fiddling to fit it in -- it doesn’t belong. It’s a convention I enjoy in many games, but not at the expense of fluid and engaging gameplay.

As always, I encourage construction feedback and civilized discussion. Share a link to this blog entry on Google+ and tag me (+Peter Schweighofer) to comment.

Summertime Odds & Ends

Summertime has distracted me from my numerous game projects with several family visits, excursions, Historicon, and a few friendly gatherings at the house. Nonetheless I managed to find game-related inspiration in a number of occurrences I hope can fuel my enthusiasm in the coming weeks.

Tank Game Playtesting

Frequent GaDeJo readers might recall I’m developing a kid-friendly tank battle miniatures wargame. Last year my young 10 year-old nephew stayed with us for a week, during which time we played a few sessions of the tank rules, which he remembered and wanted to play during this subsequent visit. While running rules through my head -- and even playing games against myself on the basement wargames table to test rules firsthand -- helps solidify game concepts and rationales, nothing tops playing the game with a member of the intended audience: in this case, a young kid with little experience with miniature wargames but an enthusiasm for games in general. During a family visit this summer we once again set up tanks and terrain on the wargaming table and blasted away at each other’s units, consulting rules, rolling dice, and racking up “hit” markers.

In an open-minded view of the experience I realized through playtesting I needed to develop a few additional game elements. Defense values need a one-point boost; I’d initially added 3 to the armor-based value for a static defense number attackers had to exceed to score a hit, but this resulted in lesser-armored tanks taking too many hits too quickly (an issue when pitting slow German tanks with strong firepower and armor against faster but lesser-well-armed/armored British tanks). I should work out rules for capturing an objective in a scenario. I need to sort out the particulars when an attacker rolls critical failure (1) when shooting a target near an explosive objective (fuel or ammunition dump). And, in my modeling endeavors, I need a massive explosion terrain piece to mark the detonated fuel/ammunition dump.

Overall these playtest sessions reinforced decisions and revisions made after last year’s games and opened up new areas to consider and develop. This experience might just fuel my enthusiasm to push the project to the forefront of my limited development time; the potential to feature the game at distant wargaming conventions in early 2014 might also serve as incentive to fast-track development.

Reiner Knizia’s Palazzo

During my nephew’s visit we pulled out Reiner Knizia’s Palazzo as a rainy afternoon activity; my older nephew, now in his teens, seems interested in real estate, architecture, and the process of building structures, so this game seemed to offer at least some thematically appealing elements. The game reminded me how, while seemingly complex at first, the game’s subtle mechanics at several different levels drive gameplay, increase tension in the final rounds, and leave everyone guessing who will come out on top of Knizia’s elegantly intricate scoring structure

Inspirational Soundtracks

Lately my toddler son has been getting into everything Star Wars, inspired not only by Daddy’s “toys” but his observation of a Star Wars: X-Wing Miniatures Gameat Historicon, as well as other Star Wars bits evident in our household (such as my vintage 1980 mug featuring the faces of Darth Vader and “Bobo” Fett…). Now he’s demanded to have Star Warsmusic played in the car (giving us a much-needed break from listening incessantly to the B-52s’ “Love Shack” whenever we’re in the car). So I dug out a mix CD I made featuring Star Warsmusic for use in different stock scenes when running the roleplaying game. He’s three and a half, so we haven’t show the Little Guy any Star Wars films yet (though I intend to start with Episode IV…it’s just good parenting), though I have read him my Star Wars Pop-Up Book once or twice. So the Little Guy naturally started asking what’s going on during each musical track.

Listening to the tracks from the original three Star Wars films rekindled the excitement I felt as a kid. In the days before Netflix, DVDs, streaming video over the internet, or…shudder…video tape players, listening to the soundtrack (on vinyl records, no less) remained one of the few ways fans could relive the action in the films at the time of the original movie releases. I need to prep an all-Episode-IV CD just for him, condensing the tracks in order so we can listen to the movie scenes in sequence. The experience also reminded me how much music contributes to my creative process (both focus and ideas); whether I’m listening to a Mozart violin concerto, Basil Poledouris’ Conan the Barbarian soundtrack, or other thematically appropriate tracks, music helps blot out real-world distractions and allows me to concentrate on the project at hand.

X-Wing Miniatures Game

Continuing my Star Wars theme, I finally found some time to break open the Star Wars X-Wing Miniatures Game produced by Fantasy Flight Games I bought from a friendly dealer at Historicon. The components have the high production value one expects from a high-end game from FFG: cards, thick cardboard turn templates and tokens, and, of course, extremely well-detailed, painted TIE fighter and X-wing miniatures (far better than the fine Galoob MicroMachines available 15 years ago we used as props in the roleplaying game). (Unlike Reiner Knizia’s Palazzo, however, only some of the numerous components -- the starship minis and stands -- actually fit into custom forms in the box.) A quick read-through of the rules brought a few interesting elements to mind, particularly when compared to the Wings of War/Wings of Glory game which broke ground in this field of casual miniature wargaming:

Graduated Rules: Several rules levels gradually draw players into subsequently more complex stages of gameplay. The “Quick-Start Rules” -- a four-page flyer separate from and situated on top of the “Rules of Play” booklet -- introduce the most basic elements to playing the game, most of which translate in some form to the general rules. Beyond the main rules readers also find “Additional Rules” and “Advanced Rules” expanding on earlier game concepts to increase the complexity level and cover specific conditions during gameplay.

Dice: The game comes with six eight-sided dice, three red “attack” dice and three green “defense” dice, each type with different symbols on them. They add an extra step (from the method used in Wings of War/Wings of Glory), determining whether an attacking craft hits a target ship within its field of fire and range. I’m not sure how I feel about this; it seems an obvious ploy to sell more separate sets of dice to gamers and capitalize on gamers’ natural predilection for nifty new dice; but the mechanic also allows for increased complexities in other stages, usually alterations to the number of attack and defense dice used or the conditions under which they’re re-rolled.

Ordered Actions: One element that often lends itself to confusion in Wings of War/Wings of Glory games is the simultaneous hit mechanic; target aircraft take damages in no particular order, with hits (and kills) simultaneously resolved. The X-wing miniatures game relies on the pilot skill value for establishing an order for revealing and executing maneuvers (lowest skill to highest) and in resolving hits (highest to lowest), resulting in situations where two craft might have each other in field of fire and range, but one shoots and scores a kill before the other gets a chance to attack. While I like that it resolves the order in which movement and hits are carried out among numerous players on a large playing area, I’m not so sure I like the non-simultaneous hit resolution system. I do understand, however, that variable pilot skill adds to the game, especially in its organized play format relying on different factors when calculating point costs for squadrons.

Expandability: The game offers several opportunities to expand the action, from addition ships from the classic Rebellion era to “upgrades” one can buy (for additional points in game set-up) to increase a ship’s capabilities.

The game seems easy enough to learn and teach to gaming newcomers, especially with the basic “Quick-Start Rules” and the essential concepts in the main rules. I’ve not yet had a chance to play the game (we came close with my nephews in the house), but the Little Guy’s been pestering me to play it, so we might try out the “Quick-Start Rules” to give him a chance to play with the starship minis and see how things work.

As always, I encourage construction feedback and civilized discussion. Share a link to this blog entry on Google+ and tag me (+Peter Schweighofer) to comment.