Archives for design - Page 3
Game Design Notes: World War One Strategic Battles
This was originally written as a game design session prompt for a session at Chestnut Lodge Wargames Group back in April 2004. A discussion thread on about this excellent blog post lead me to dig it out and post it here. World War One Strategic Battles Turn structure Three turns per year, March – June (Spring), July to September (Summer) and October to February (Winter). Actions Small offensives can be prepared and launched within one turn. Large offensives take a turn of preparation and then take a whole turn of offensive action. Small offensives can be carried on into large offensives. Battles are fought in phases. Preparation: divisions are allocated to the line, first wave, second wave, exploitation, training and reserve tasks Bombardment Assault Counter-attack Continuation phases if appropriate Resolution Fighting is resolved at Army level, with Divisions as the…
The Stress of Battle 5 – WW2 Heroism & Surprise
This is the fifth and final part of my extended review of The Stress of Battle by David Rowland. It is such a strong piece of operational research that I thought that it would be useful for wargame designers (and players) to understand what the research evidence is for what went on in WW2 battles. This part is on the effects of heroism and combat degradation. Combat Degradation Combat degradation is a measure of how less effective weapon systems and individual soldiers are in actual combat when compared to training exercises and range work. A score of is equivalent to not being degraded at all. Degradation to would mean that it was operating at 30% of its peacetime range effectiveness. the analysis by Rowland's team broadly matches that done by Wigram in 1943, that there are three classes of effectiveness. About 20% of those involved could…
The Stress of Battle – Part 4 – Op Research on Anti-Tank Combat
This is the fourth part of my review of The stress of battle: quantifying human performance in combat by David Rowland, which is an essential piece of Operational Research on WW2 and Cold War combat operations. Unlike small arms, the effectiveness of anti-armour weapons has changed considerably over the course of the mid-20th century. From non-specialist gunfire in WW1, to high velocity armour piercing in WW2 and then to Anti-Tank Guided Weapons in the Cold War period. This makes the operational research harder to do because the start point needs to be battles where only one kind of AT weapon is in action. Much of the analysis starts with the 'Snipe' action during the second battle of El Alamein in North Africa where data on each of the guns individually was available. 'heroic performance' plays a large factor in the effectiveness of anti-tank guns about a quarter of guns (at…
The Stress of Battle – Part 3 – Op Research on Terrain Effects
This is the third part of my extended review of The Stress of Battle by David Rowland. It is such a strong piece of operational research that I thought that it would be useful for wargame designers (and players) to understand what the research evidence is for what went on in WW2 battles. Fighting in Woods The data comes from an analysis of 120 battles that took place in woods or forests from the US Civil War to the Korean War. It also applied all the things from the previous research and tried to see how woods differed from combat in other types of terrain. Woods Open Urban Attacker casualties per defence MG (at 1:1 force ratio) Force Ratio Power Relationship Defence is less effective in woods, most likely because limited fields of view mean that the engagement ranges are…
Stress of Battle – Part 2 – Op Research on Urban Battles
This is the second part of my review of The stress of battle: quantifying human performance in combat by David Rowland, which is an essential piece of Operational Research on WW2 and Cold War combat operations. For this part I thought that I would focus on the lessons on urban battles. Rowland and his team used historical analysis on lots of WW2 urban battles and then compared this to a series of field trials using laser attachments to small arms and tank main armaments in the late 1970s and early 1980s. The approach was to find battles where single variables could be controlled, and then use them to work out what the effect of that variable was on outcomes. Here's an interesting table on how attacker casualties vary by odds and the density of defending machine guns. Interestingly, in successful assaults the…