Models

The enduring fascination of war games must be the use of a model of a complex interaction to examine the myriad ways the process can play itself out.  This WaPo article describes the modern incarnation of a coffee-table war-gaming tradition that flowered in the early 80s, dropped off a bit, and has experienced a resurgence with the ability of widely dispersed enthusiasts to connect via the Internet.

My own dear husband has designed a Civil War game (Cedar Mountain) that is now in the pre-sale period, where it must attain a certain number of orders before it will be officially launched--and it's getting there slowly.  He plays games by email with co-enthusiasts all over the world.  The games employ physical maps and counters, but the players can execute them long-distance, just as chessplayers might do.  It's a wonderful aspect of worldwide instantaneous connection.  It's also, as it turns out, a good way to become a whizz at graphics software.  Whatever did we do without PCs?

We once spent a vacation driving up and down the Shenandoah Valley, locating battlefields that were never turned into parks.  My husband can be annoyed by hamfisted cinematic portrayals of battles the same way I am whenever they attempt to portray any aspect of life in a law firm.

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

LOL. You think board games are geeky? You have not plumbed the depths of geekitude until you get to the historical table-top miniature wargamers.

I know your husband's pain. I know it very well.

Eric Blair said...

LOL. You think board games are geeky? You have not plumbed the depths of geekitude until you get to the historical table-top miniature wargamers.

I know your husband's pain. I know it very well.

E Hines said...

When I was in jr high, some friends and I modified a game then in vogue, Diplomacy. We built a map that needed two conference tables side by each to hold it, and altered some of the combat rules to allow for a broader range of diplomatic overtures.

It took us all summer to work through just one game.

Now, with the advantage of a PC, I purge my pea brain of the day's stresses playing Civilization. I've been known to pull all-nighters on that one, though.

My wife knows your husband's pain, too.

Eric Hines

Texan99 said...

His pain . . . ? He's having a great time.

DL Sly said...

" My husband can be annoyed by hamfisted cinematic portrayals of battles the same way I am whenever they attempt to portray any aspect of life in a law firm."

I hear ya. I'm the same way with firefighting. (Don't get me started with "Backdraft".) MH as well with police or military stuff. Which is one reason why we don't watch them much anymore.

Texan99 said...

No kidding. I have yet to see a movie about firefighting in which anyone wore a mask going into an engulfed structure. Makes it too hard to tell one character from another. Also, there's almost always perfect visibility in there, with some smokeless flames on the other side of the room.

Texan99 said...

Oh! --that's what you guys meant about his "pain."

DL Sly said...

LOL LOL LOL
God love ya, Tex. And this Dark Lord, too.
0>:~}

Assistant Village Idiot said...

I have a friend who had an elaborate WWII game published fairly recently

http://assistantvillageidiot.blogspot.com/2012/12/wargaming.html

Anonymous said...

A group of us airplane drivers did an MST3K on some "aviation" movies. Yes, there's a reason our friends and/or spouses do not take us to see airplane movies.

"Wait, those are Mustangs. They didn't appear in the ETO until two years later!" "A B-model King Air at 40,000 feet? What'd they do, fly it up in a Learjet and drop it?" Yeah. :)

LittleRed1

DL Sly said...

MST3k! Oh man, I miss that show.
I don't need a personal nitpicking show to go MST3K on something. And the VES has been well-versed in the art of observation wrt movie and show mistakes or incongruities.
heh
Damn my mortal hide for teaching her to observe and think critically!
0>;~}

Tom said...

MST3K? WTH(eck)?

I should probably get into this; I was in the war games club in high school & loved it. If I could play-by-email, that would be cool.

But, do you have to leave the game set up in the house for weeks or months at a time? Or is it all digital now?

Oh, and yeah, they made us change the club name from 'War Games Club' to 'Chess Club,' even though we almost never played chess.

Texan99 said...

You never watched Mystery Science Theater 3000? Great stuff: a running commentary on bad old science fiction movies.

As for the games, there is software called Cyberboard that translates the analog paper/cardboard game onto the screen and allows you to plot and transmit moves. Here is a forest of links from my husband:

Cyberboard: http://cyberboard.brainiac.com/download.html

Cyberboard manuals: http://privatewars.kyth.org/index.htm

Vassal: http://www.vassalengine.org

Here are two websites for wargamers:

Board Game Geek: http://www.boardgamegeek.com/wargames

Consim World: http://www.consimworld.com the game designers and game companies usually post here. It is an old-school website with hundreds of forums, each essentially an endless thread. The trick is to subscribe to the forums that you want to follow and all of the new posts to those forums are collected for you in a message center.

To request a game (opponents wanted):

http://talk.consimworld.com/WebX/.ee6ca39/1794

BoardGameGeek is a wiki with a page for each game. Requests for opponents are usually posted on the forum for the individual game.

Tom said...

Cool! Thanks!