Last issue I addressed the of accuracy in design and came to conclusions about the intrinsic limitations on the type of tactical and strategic games to simulate the historical decisions of a situation. This discussion prompted the following responses.--FC

The invitation in your Two Cent's Worth of the last Grenadier is too much to resist. Your statements about OOBs, product and process accuracy, and operational level games are controversial and gave rise to several thoughts which I would like to share with you.

I do not agree with your comments regarding OOBs as being a good barometer of the accuracy of a game. First, you are singling out an item which is only a part of the overall accuracy of the game. There are several other areas (supply, terrain, movement factors) which may be just as easy to research and which have just as great an effect on the accuracy of the game. For example, it should be relatively easy to develop an accurate map for any World War II or modern period game. But, this is not often the case as illustrated in the review of Next War in Grenadier No.5.

And the same arguments you give for using OOBs as an indicator of accuracy can be used here. Second, how much a part of the integral design is a historical OOB? Current state of the art requires that units be given a historical designation regardless of whether or not any specific game function is associated with the historical designation, such as divisional integrity or supply.

In many cases the historical designation is just "chrome" provided by the designer to give more "history" into the game. I do not feel an entire design should be criticised because the historical numbers on designations are incorrect. Third, if the OOB is incorrect, how much does this affect the end product?

I'm sure you have read countless reviews in which the reviewer takes great delight in listing the most minute OOB error when, if you compare the mistake with the end product, the OOB error does not enhance or detract from the game. Lastly, is it possible to obtain entirely accurate 00Bs? For example, will there ever be a consensus on the exact OOB for the Battle of the Bulge? If one looks long and hard enough, one will find a source to dispute any given 00B. In summary, I feel there are more reasons for not considering 00Bs as a measure of the accuracy of a game then there are for it.

Your distinction between product accuracy and process accuracy in game design is an excellent concept. I believe a game cannot be designed without an element of either type in the design. As gamers become more sophisticated an acceptable accurate will have to have liberal amounts of both product and process accuracy.

I have been a wargamer long enough to remember the phrase "now you too can refight . . ." and the positive effect it had on my game buying habits. This type of seduction continues to this day on every boxed wargame on your suppliers' shelves. However, this concept should be recognized for the generality that it is. Wargamers and wargames have progressed beyond singular role playing as the focal point of a game. Most games present much more than the view from a certain participant's point of view.

For example, Avalanche supposedly puts us in General Clark's place as commander of the Salerno invasion forces. But, was Clark responsible for the tactical decisions regarding immediate objectives and unit deployment as the game player is? Nor do I feel that role-playing adequately covers the extensive amount of information found in such games as Air War, Submarine, Up Scope, Air ForcelDauntless, or Cross of Iron. Granted, role-playing is a fine generalization to describe wargames to a beginner but it does not nearly define the things I expect to get out of any wargame I purchase.

Since you have raised the issue I feel it is necessary to ask, "Do you design your games to involve the players in a specific role?" Judging from your previous efforts I would have to say not. Nor do I feel your associates at GDW do. Otherwise, how would it come to pass that GDW products have more chrome than other publishers'. Looking at most of your designs (GDW's) from a strictly role-playing point of view would probably result in a lower quality game than I normally expect from you because how much of the color, charts, markers, etc. are needed in a roleplaying game? Would Crusader be very popular presenting the battle on just one level? Part of the attraction of that game is all the hard data provided by the counters alone. I seriously doubt that you consider wargames as roleplaying.

Unfortunately, your article abandons this role-playing and game designing discussion at this point. The paragraph with which you end page 28 and begin page 29 does not describe any game which has ever been published by GDW. Perhaps designing for role situations is a solid theory but does it really sell many games? The job of the designer remains to present an accurate simulation but the method used (product accuracy vs. process accuracy) is still the discretion of the designer.

There are far too many variables in any historical conflict to be presented in a mere wargame. The designer must choose those which he feels interacted to present to the wargamer in the form of an entertaining and/or educational game.

Just as I am dissatisfied with your role-playing generalization, so am I dissatisfied with your conclusion that operational level games are the only possible accurate gaming situation. You are not giving us, the consumers of your games, much credit in thinking that we are only interested in accurate presentation of role-situations. If we can base an entire hobby industry on military conflict, which is just a small part of History, cannot we also explore those elements of military conflict which are just a small part of operational level role-situations? Strategic and tactical level games do just that. They are a valid part of the overall wargaming environment. They do not necessarily have to place the gamer in a role to be either enjoyable or informative.

Lastly, your essay was not entirely clear on some important concepts. You did not fully clarify role- playing. If you intended to include all levels of role-playing present in a game then some of my comments are too strong. However, the examples given led me to believe that you allowed only one rolesituation per game. I also feel you should have given your definition of strategic, operational, and tactical level games. These concepts usually mean different things to each gamer and manufacturer. Those who may also write you may have different ideas of each class of game and have different thoughts about the games.

In reading Frank Chadwick's column in the last issue of The Grenadier, I was intrigued by his thoughts on intrinsic limitations to the validity of a player's decisions. I certainly agree for grand strategic games. A player, in the role of a head of state, deals with military and economic factors but never with political factors, simply because hard and fast rules can be written for nebulous political influences only by painful simplification. For tactical games, though, requiring the player (in the role of company commander) to judge the character of his subordinates would require him to guess the numerical factors on his playing pieces. Only for a completely green outfit would the player lack the benefit of prior experience for a reliable judgement, The true limitation of a tactical game has been pointed out countless times: too much information is available to the player.

In addition, there seems to be two intrinsic limitations to operational games as well.

First, hindsight bestows on the player (in the role of division or corps commander) a tremendous advantage over his historical counterpart. Try to imagine General Lucas of the U.S. VI Corps saying, "The next time I invade Anzio I'm ordering a full, immediate advance to the Alban Hills." Whereas a company commander could participate in a number of delaying actions or meeting engagements, and a head of state could battle his neighbors time after time, only exceptional circumstances could present Rommel with two chances to capture Tobruk.

Second, the player enjoys too exact a knowledge of the victory conditions. The player on the attack knows he needs to bag two more divisions and then he can send all his boys back to Berlin on leave. The player on the defense knows he needs to counter attack just long enough to gain five victory points and then he can keep on running. Both sides know that the world ends in three turns, so they can sacrifice their entire command as long as they capture or hold that one city.

The conclusion to be drawn from this discussion is that the historical insights derived from a wargame should be tempered by the recognitions inherent to the level of the design.

John Alsen's letter begins with a discussion of the merits (or lack thereof) of 00Bs as a gauge of the accuracy of a design. As to the charge that I have assigned too much weight to them, I plead not guilty. Actually, I agree with just about everything John argues in this paragraph, and feel it serves more as an elaboration on my original statement than as a refutation.

Perhaps my original argument was poorly phrased, but by war of recap/ clarification, my position is that the OOB of a game does, in fact, receive the lion's share of attention in critiques simply because it is the most visible, easily checked, and objective measure of the research that goes into a game. However, I also stated that 0013s are not the only element contributing to the accuracy of the design, that I don't feel they are even remotely the most important single element, and thus the amount of attention they receive is indeed disproportionate to their importance. John goes somewhat further than this, but essentially I think we are in agreement on this point.

John does disagree sharply with me as to my role-playing model of decision-making in a design. This disagreement, I feel, is due more to an overly simplistic definition of the position in my original article than to an actual philosophical difference of opinion. All of the games John lists stand out from their run-of-the-mill contemporaries by the very inclusion of strong role-playing elements, and to the extent that great detail is included it is so done to enhance the role-playing aspects of the game. Dauntless and Air War provide very good examples. Both provide a very detailed system that enables the player to come very close to flying the aircraft. he role model is clear: pilot.

Squad Leader, despite criticism from a number of quarters as to accuracy, is nevertheless a quantum leap forward in tactical gaming conceptually in that the player no longer represents the collective consciousness of all of his men but instead is limited, by the rules covering leader units and their effects, to the role of a commander. Crusader certainly fits this mold. Most of the rules do not broaden a player's options to the point where he makes every decision at every level, but instead limit his ability to directly influence events outside of his specific role, that of division commander. The movement rules, to name only one example, impose navigational limitations, limited intelligence, and delayed reactions to changing situations.

Finally, both John and David take me to task over the issue of the intrinsic inability of conventional games to accurately deal with strategic and tactical decision-making. Here I'm forced to stand by my original statement. John notes that the long example of strategic decision-making does not describe any game we've published. The fact that I have not yet solved these problems to my satisfaction accounts for the fact that ETO is no longer on our immediate production schedule.

This whole issue is obviously one which deserves more thought and attention, and will probably form the main subject of discussion next issue.