Whereas a commercial wargame might have thousands or even millions of players, military wargames tend to have small player bases, which makes it harder for the designers to acquire feedback. Secrecy makes it harder to disseminate corrections if the wargame has already been delivered to the clients.
Military organisations are typically secretive about their current wargames, and this makes designing a military wargame a challenge.
Recreational wargames may take some creative liberties with reality, such as simplifying models to make them more enjoyable, or adding fictional armaments and units such as orcs and wizards, making them of little use to officers who must fight in the real world. Historical wargames are wargames set in the distant past, such as World War II or the Napoleonic Wars – simulating these wars realistically may be of interest to historians, but are of little use to the military. Having simple, loose rules also keeps the learning curve small, which is convenient since most officers have little or no wargaming experience.Īs military wargames are used to prepare officers for actual warfare, there is naturally a strong emphasis on realism and current events. In a recreational wargame, such looseness would lead to concerns over fairness, but the point of a military wargame is education, not competition. If the umpire is highly knowledgeable about warfare (perhaps he is a veteran), then such wargames can achieve a higher degree of realism than wargames with rigid rulesets. Military wargames tend to have looser rules and simpler models than recreational wargames, with an umpire arbitrating situations based on personal knowledge. Military Wargames versus Commercial Wargames At the US Naval War College, some preferred the terms “chart manoeuvres” (when simulating campaigns) and “board manoeuvres” (when simulating battles), although the term “war game” was never officially proscribed. In the US Army, many preferred the term “map manoeuvres” (in contrast to “field manoeuvres”). One of these was Georg von Reisswitz, the creator of Kriegsspiel and the father of military wargaming, but he stuck with the word “game” because he could not think of a better term.
Wargaming strategic war professional#
Some military wargamers feel that the term “game” trivializes what they see as a serious, professional tool.
A game that exercises only the player’s technical skills, such as a combat flight simulator, is not a wargame. A wargame is about tactical or strategic decision-making.Some writers use the term “live wargames” to refer to games that use actual troops in the field, but this article shall instead refer to these as field exercises. This definition is used by the US Naval War College. A wargame does not involve the use of actual troops and armaments.A wargame must have at least one human player.There must be two opposing sides whose players react intelligently to each other’s decisions. “Business wargames” do not simulate armed conflict and are therefore outside the scope of this article. A wargame simulates an armed conflict, be it a battle, a campaign, or an entire war.To prevent confusion, this section will establish the general definition employed by this article. The exact definition of “wargame” varies from one writer to the next and one organisation to the next. A wargame at the US Marine Corps War College (April 2019).
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