The following is a series of email messages concerning an upcoming play be email game. John Cash is going to run it. I hope it will be interesting to see a work in progress.
Dear Chris,
I'd like your comments on this draft of the game. I am especially concerned with how to use matrix game rules of arguments in ten-player groups when a large number of events occur in a small amount of real time (such as hand-to-hand combat), and how to maintain player interest when the scope of their arguments covers their immediate circumstances but not grand battle strategy.
PBEM game, first draft.
THE BELLS OF HELL: PASSCHENDAELE 1917
You thought you'd be fighting for king and country. Now you know your real fight is to stay alive. You and your mates must survive the intermittent shelling, gas alarms, disease, trench raids, pouring rain and hip-deep mud, and the ambitions of your officers. In twelve weeks, you'll be relieved and sent home for Christmas -- if you make it.
This is not your standard war game. The battle of Passchendaele will happen pretty much as it did. All participants are privates (field promotion is possible but no higher than sergeant). Basically, your participation WILL NOT change the battle; but it will affect whether you and your mates SURVIVE IT.
Play will unfold along two lines. First, there will be EVENTS over which players have little to no control. These include the _weather_ (which will arrive as it did in history); the _location_ of the players' battalion (two weeks at the front followed by six weeks in the rear followed by two weeks at the front); _casualties_ caused by figthing the war (including shelling, sniping, disease, and accidents in the trench or in the field), whose effects will be determined by dice roll; and _orders_ from above (again as they were given in history).
Second, there will be DEVELOPMENTS which proceed from the players' arguments concerning the way events are reacted to. Each player will be allowed one argument about the player himself, and one argument about the battalion. It is likely a player will "die" during the game; he may opt to rejoin as new recruits (and forfeit the argument about the battalion), or they may join the company of those who have "gone West" (and forfeit the argument about the player himself).
An example:
Turn 8 August 18 the battle for Langemarck, on the ridge north-east of Ypres
EVENTS
Weather: rainy; mud 3 feet deep (on average)
Location: front line trenches
Casualties (by dice-roll) : shelling -- nearby -- 5% casualties to
brigade, no players affected
Orders: assault on Langemarck
ARGUMENTS
Rain holds off all day.
Germans: Shelling of front line causes severe casualties, one
battalion pulls out. British assault fails.
British: Supplies destroyed as shells fall short, holding our
battalion back from main assault.
Pvt. Jones skulks in the trench after "over the top".
Pvt. Atkins, unusually well-informed about the May mutinies in the
French army, organizes a Socialist reading circle for the evening.
RESULTS
Rain holds off during morning assault.
Germans: Shelling of front line causes Germans to retreat to second
line of defense, Brits must be wary when they take the first line.
British: Supplies are partly destroyed and are inaccessible due to
mud; however, the effect won't be felt till next turn.
Pvt. Jones skulks in the trench after "over the top" and is summarily
executed by patrolling military police (everyone hated those guys).
Players' battalions each sustain 10% casualties in assault (result of dice roll), because of hand-to-hand fighting when the Germans try to surprise the Brits. One player affected: Pvt. Smith is wounded (result of dice roll for battle) and is sent to the rear early (result of next dice roll for survival) and loses a hand after gangrene sets in; he's invalided out before Christmas. (WE HAVE A WINNER!)
Having taken Langemarck (a point not at issue), the brigade is relieved of front-line duty and sent to the rear (but without those supplies).
Pvt. Atkins gets a lot of fellows interested in Socialism at his meeting.
Three rules for success:
- 1) Good arguments are those that keep casualties to your brigade at a
minimum.
2) Good arguments are those that keep you alive -- but not necessarily at the expense of your mates!
3) Address your arguments to local conditions, at the battalion level, and do not try to win the war.
YOUR MATES:
1st Battalion, 14th Lancashire Fusilliers (British)
Raised originally in and around Birmingham; now conscripted from that area. Mix
of urban and rural working class, urban middle class, some intellectuals.
Originally contained companies of "Pals;" some of these fellows are still in
the unit.
2nd Battalion, 28th Hanover Infantry (German)
Conscripted from in and around Hanover. mix of rural and urban working class,
urban middle class, some intellectuals. Though nominally a Prussian unit, many
remember when Hanover had a British prince as its titular sovereign.
GAME PLAN
Twelve weeks real time; twenty-four turns, including two tours of the front. Two arguments per player per turn (each supported by three reasons). Time frame: July 24 to October 16. During which time the British sustained 200,000 casualties (2500 per day, one in five men); average daily gain in territory was 68 yards.
Dear John
Let's get together and talk about how to do Paaschendale. I think you are right about having turns separate from the regular turn sequence. I'm thinking that the experience of battle in WWI was a series of very disjointed, very personal encounters with death. This means it can be independent of s rigid turn sequence since the experience itself was disjointed.
Dear Paul,
I'm flattered. Yes, I'd be glad to run "Bells of Hell" after the Korean game -- it will have to be after the middle of August, though, I'm taking a week's vacation and that would interrupt the flow (though if the timing were right it might not matter). And if someone wants to be Corporal Hitler, fine -- provided that person remember, in 1917 he was just a (decorated) 25-year-old message runner trying to do his job and stay alive.
PS. Just a note for comment: while I had planned two turns per week, I had thought that in close combat it would lose a lot of impetus and detail if it was solved in a single argument, "close combat results: side A wins." Perhaps a set of quick turns independent of the twice-weekly turn cycle, say three turns over three days, would handle it better. Consider that these three turns cover perhaps five minutes in game-time; that's the sort of detail I mean. But it seems awful complicated. Is there a better way to do that?
Hi John,
I'm beginner in MG, but... (lowly)
Many turns with different actions (and time actions) mixed seems little complicated. Many dedication for the players that they living in different time zones.
The concept seems good, and the detail can be very high... but I think first what is important to have a game calendar with a kind of arguments, similar to the Hwa Rang Do, but more detailed if this is the way.
An idea can be divide the turn in hours and the player can will select any for make an assault attack or whatever action. Hmm... I don't know....
Other idea for realism is attach players to others players like command line. The troops are tired and demoralized but the commander order a new attack. What do the platoon commanders?
One players take the role of Commanders, making your strategies and decisions (include political and others) and other players take the role of Platoon Commander in the trench, receiving orders from HQ. Many times the platoon commanders know the awful result of these, but orders are orders, no?
Thoughts?
Dear Josep,
I'm happy to read your comments. Welcome to the beginners' circle!
Many turns with differents actions (and time actions) mixed seems a little complicated. Many dedication for the players that they are living in different time zones.
Real good point; I'll bear that in mind.
An idea can be divide the turn in hours and the player can will select any for make an assault attack or whatever action.
That's a good idea, too.
Another idea for realism is to attach players to others players like a chain of command. The troops are tired and demoralized but the commander orders a new attack. What do the platoon commanders do? One player takes the role of Commander, making your strategies and decisions (include political and others) and other players take the roles of Platoon Commanders in the trench, receiving orders from HQ. Many times the platoon commanders know the awful result of these, but orders are orders, no?
I surely hope players get "attached," but as members of a unit, not as actors within a hierarchy. Players exercising high-level command is exactly what I _don't_ want, for these reasons:
1) The focus would be on tactics and how to win, rather than on survival.
2) If commanders were offered as roles, as in the Korean game, who would want to be the privates?
3) Those commanders were often real idiots, and insensitive idiots as well. Better for the players to react to them, instead of being them. I imagine a set of "orders for the day" accompanying each turn, in which insensitive idiot commanders pass along orders from HQ, to which the players must react.
So 4) the focus is not on tactics, but on how much control of the situation does the average guy have? I think a private doesn't care about taking the high ground; he cares about keeping his socks dry, helping his mates, and staying alive.
Dear Chris,
I think you are right about having turns separate from the regular turn sequence. I'm thinking that the experience of battle in WWI was a series of very disjointed, very personal encounters with death. This means it can be independent of a rigid turn sequence since the experience itself was disjointed.
I'm thinking the experience was of long stretches of boredom punctuated by random deaths, and interrupted by short stretches of intense fighting for one's life. How to manage this with mere dice and turn sequences?
A difficult task no doubt but doable!
I'm thinking the experience was of long stretches of boredom punctuated by random deaths, and interrupted by short stretches of intense fighting for one's life. How to manage this with mere dice and turn sequences?
I would suggest you roll the dice veeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrrrrrrry sloooooooowly. Couldn't help that. You could make people do very boring repetitive tasks for an hour or so before they could make an argument. Sounds like work, eh? I think that dramatic distortion is okay in this game. You jump in media res over top, bombs whistling overhead, the deathly stoccatto of the unsilenced machineguns, whizzz and the earth shakes as a shell strikes... I think you original design would work better, than the argument by argument encounter.
This method may not work in PBEM, who knows prove me wrong, please. I'd like to play the Germans because their cause was glorious and just, and they didn't didn't lose so many folks, and I'm a demon on the counterattack.
I was thinking about the Pasche.. game and several ideas came to me. First this hand to hand type combat is similar to any sports contest, as in football. An attack usually has three phases
- 1. Preparation,
2. Movement
3. Engagement with the enemy.
The preparation phase would be sending out scouts, moving forces into position, softening bombardments, setting machine guns, barbed wire or defensive patrols. This would involve searching for weaknesses, taking prisoners, spotting troop movements and other fun stuff.
The movement phase would involve obviously involve moving ones troops across obstacles, through enemy fire, breaching barriers etc.
The attack phase is where the two sides come face to face, mano a mano and duke it out, with pistol, bayonet, shovel etc..
So nothing new here in my taxonomy. However what I would suggest is that players make two arguments the preparation phase and the movement phase. A defensive player would strengthen defenses, or shelter troops from bombardment, bring up another machine gun, where as the Offensive player would probably want to bomb out the concertina wire or send sappers to blow up obstructions.
Then each side would make a movement argument. I would guess that the defender would probably make arguments to hinder the movement, mud, bad directions, etc.
The actual engagement would be resolved in the conflict round depending on the success or failure of the movement phase and preparation phase.
While I am not an authority on WWI trench warfare, I read Alister Horne's book on the battle of the Marne and few other works, I think this is how WW I trench warfare was fought. It provides a nice matrix of different offensive and defensive moves. If the preparatory barrage failed, the movement phase would probably not work, a failed argument would leave the attacker exposed in no man's land.
I welcome people's comments. A soccer or rugby match would probably have a similar phasing. Although unlike Rugby I don't think anyone in the trenches ate their dead.
Dear Dylan,
I really appreciate your comments. I have been working with Chris on conceptualizing the game and on writing the rules that would allow for the best experience. I believe I will adapt your three-fold description into a four-fold one: Preparation, Movement, Engagement, and Relief. That fits with my original concept, and allows for a break to the rear between front-line duty. It also reminds me that mere experience of the front isn't enough, even the soldiers wanted to be _doing_ stuff.
Two aspects still trouble me, and they're connected. The first aspect concerns arguments. I'm no expert on the War either, but conditions at the front seem to have involved a good deal of random death or injury, quite apart from battle. I want players to have to deal with that, but not necessarily to suffer from it. My idea was to give each player two arguments per turn, for one's character and for one's mates. Each argument would allow a player a way to protect himself and his mates from random death or injury. I am now thinking this leaves little scope for development. So I am now thinking that the first argument could address Events, such as shelling, and can be best used to protect one's character -- while Chris might describe this as part of a "You Are There" game, I'd describe this as "Why I Am Not There (in the shelling)" -- while the second argument would address Development, and can be used to argue for or against preparations, movement, and engagement, and so move the game along. I'd appreciate comments on this from all.
The second aspect concerns time. Originally I thought that all action would happen in real time -- if Turn 8 was August 18 1917, and Turn 9 was August 21, players would cope with what happened on August 18 and 21. But that would mean each turn dealt with a complex three-day period, and would compress too much into each turn. Chris has said that soldiers in combat experience time differently, such that some moments seem to last forever. So I am thinking of a more open-ended approach to time. If two turns are allowed for preparation, those turns may represent just 24 hours; if two turns follow it with movement, they may represent 30 minutes; if four turns follow that for engagement, they may represent only ten minutes total. Eight turns over 4 weeks, then, provide for sixteen arguments per player and accompanying conflicts, but might represent just over 24 hours in the field. However, they would cover the action much better, and in the right amount of detail. It would mean that players who get separated from the company, say as runners or as assault teams, would experience time differently than the other players, until they rejoined the company. I think the advantage of this approach is, players get to control the density of the experience through their arguments. They could spend eight turns taking a pillbox at the front, or eight turns flirting with a barmaid while on leave. I'd appreciate comments on this from all too.
I have a suggestion about time and the compression of events. Don't. The players will create a narrative and a time structure. I know this sounds odd, especially if you come for a Cardboard Monsters of Death environment, or miniatures, we think of turns and time references of 1 turn = 24 hours, or 6 minutes etc. I hex is 500 yards, or a unit marches 100 paces. Drop it. Trust the players to tell the referee how long an action takes. Really, an assault might take days or continuous fighting, or it may be over the top boys, Rupppppppppppppppp from a machinegun and an eternal lacunae.
The time period is not time driven but event driven. Or to use Chris' term narrative driven. Play this out yourself with two sides and you'll see what I mean. Okay the events like shelling, trenchfoot, the clap and other afflictions of trench life, you can introduce these randomly or you'll get a feel from the players when they need some random malicious event to liven things up. Chris is really good at creating random conflicts when the game seems to be lagging. Then when an event occurs you create a conflict and everyone gets to make a saving argument.
I know the temptation to structure the game but really look at the hook and the major events from a narrative and I think you can get a feel what you should include in a scenario. When I did the mad forest game I tried to make all kinds of structure and really the players didn't need it and they only grabbed what they could mentally map on to their experience. You'll see what I mean when you run the game. Recommendations simple, get a map, units and characters and lay out the results that each and characters want. Obviously survival unless your playing with some quirky Mahdist type. Give everyone, two or three arguments and let er rip. Enrich the background and people will bring all sorts of imagination to the game, especially this lot. Just be wary of all the Reds lurking in the group.
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