How the deck was one

[Arnauld]

DESIGNING THE COMBAT SYSTEM AND DECK

Inspiration for wargames can come from unusual sources.

Back in 1996-97 I was a radio announcer for an Indianapolis radio station. As such, I met lots of local musicians, some of whom became good friends. DJ was one of these musicians (synthesizer). I introduced him to the wonderful world of games. He introduced me to his girlfriend KM — She was a little crazy, but hot!

Other than roleplaying, DJ enjoyed playtesting new games most. I started playtesting my new deck idea for THE GREAT WAR with him. At first this was more or less an off-shoot of Eon's Cosmic Encounter War-like deck, mutated to represent WW1 battles. We kept track of all army movements on a piece of paper. Army strength was represented by stacks of (hidden) pennies.

This was TGW version 3.0 — a game engine in search of a game.

The three of us became good friends, but DJ and KM were having problems and were going to break up. I could see that. I just waited for the inevitable break up.

In the meantime, while waiting, I played innumerable games of TGW 3.0 with DJ. We were struggling for the fate of Europe while also struggling for... I know it sounds ridiculous, but these were the optimum conditions in which to forge a combat resolution deck for a military simulation — the struggle existed on so many levels: in the game, honing the deck, and man-to-man.

As DJ and I played many games of the paper and pencil version of TGW 3.0, we fine-tuned the deck -- in between DJ's and KM's fights, of course. And then, eventually DJ left.

In the end, I was successful, not only with the deck, but also with KM.

And then I moved on.

She was crazier than I had initially realized.

And the paper and pencil version of this game was disappointing as well. The deck worked great, but it just didn't seem like a wargame. I basically had the engine but no voiture -- in both cases. So I moved on.

I knew the deck was rock-solid, though. So I designed the game around it! I looked through old combat records to find casualty rates, battlefield losses, manpower figures, numbers of heavy artillery, etc. for each battle of WW1! The McEntee text was invaluable here.

Then I reverse-engineered the combat system from those casualty figures. I devised a d6 system which very nearly modeled the historical loss ratios vs. combat power. I quickly realized I had to abandon the Corps level of simulation -- the system needed to be based on groups of corps in order to function properly with a d6. But once I was finished, I had a combat system that reflected historical casualty rates based on infantry units composed of groups of corps -- that also fit in perfectly with my deck. That was about two years of work. Once that was done, the fun part began.

I started playing out the war using all my research tools (especially the McEntee and Banks books). Step-by-step I went through the whole war using the average or Historical Combat System. That's how I was able to devise such elaborate scenarios. Using the historical army movements and the historical combat resolution produced absolutely astonishing agreement with the historical record!

And now here we are!

TT 10 février 2009