What can Wargaming Learn from Board Gaming? Part 2

In the previous post we looked at what modern board gaming can teach us wargamers in mixing up our games a little. Playing co-operative games works very well for wargaming and works well for playing differently. However, there are plenty of other ideas we can use that are lifted directly from modern boardgaming. In recent years there have been a recent spate of games that use unknown locations to drive the narrative as the players move through the map. Arkham Horror the Card Game does this very effectively, each location card is placed on the table face down, only being flipped when a character moves on to it and any events are then triggered by the reveal. Other games take the 'choose your own adventure' style of play and use this in a similar fashion, 7th Continent allows players to explore the map board by placing numbered tiles in connecting locations as they move around. 

Can we emulate these kinds of mechanics in our tabletop wargames? yes, is the short answer. If the game is played as a cooperative game similar to the one I described in the previous post about this subject, or even as a solo game we can create a fog of war as a player explores their table top. To take a specific example, although this can be transported to any time period, location or war, we'll take a platoon patrol from the Second World War. I will assume you are playing on a 6ft by 4ft table and have plenty of scenery and the enemy forces. Don't forget, anything you don't have can easily be made from coloured card pieces, so a brown square is a ploughed field, a green sheet cut into random shapes can be a wood, etc. 

For the game, we are intending to simulate a unit moving through an area that they have not yet scouted for whatever reason, maps have not arrived, there is a rush to advance, or simply the area is foggy. The unit might even be the scout unit themselves, pressing ahead of the main force. What ever the story behind the game the outcomes will be the same. The game itself will control the unfolding tabletop scenery and the defending enemy forces that you may bump into. 

As before a small amount of pre-game preparation will be required. The table needs to be roughly split into 12" squares, meaning four along the short axis with six along the long axis.  These can be roughly guessed or marked specifically on the table. The exploring unit(s) will be deployed in one of the squares on the edge of the table, decide which one, but don't place the units just yet. First we need to create the scenery. The following outline will the same procedure anytime the unit leaves the square they are in into an new and as yet unrevealed square. 

What is also required for creating the scenery is a deck of pre-made cards (or a table for rolling a dice against) with different types of scenery noted on each. For example, this could be woods (thick), woods (light), road, river, hill, houses, etc. The card you draw (or result you roll on a table) will tell you what type of scenery to place in that square. How you do this will be up to you (or you could break the square down into further smaller squares and roll a dice to decide exactly whereabouts the scenery piece is placed. 

So the above grid shows a 12" square broken down into 3" squares, that in turn are numbered. To find out where the scenery piece will go just roll a D20, rerolling any score of 17-20. Increase or decrease the size of the squares depending on the scenery, a woodland may be larger than 3", for example. For roads and rivers, roll the dice twice to find out where the feature enters the 12" square and where it leaves it (reroll 6, 7, 10 or 11). Below, when placing the river the player rolled a 9 and a 4 for the entry and exit points of the river (numbering the edge squares from 1-12 and rolling a D12 will make this particular example easier):

With linear features such as the roads, river, railways you then will have the entry point into the joining square, so all you will need to do is roll for the point where the feature leaves the square when you set up your scenery in the next square uncovered. Use some common sense for this, if the feature loops back to the square that already has had its scenery deployed then reroll until you get a result that makes sense. For features such as buildings and the like, you can roll a dice to determine how many there are, from a single farmhouse to a small village. The dice you roll is entirely your choice. if you want a rural board, roll a D3 or D6, if you want a larger conurbation, roll a D10 or even a D20. I would also suggest adding roads as well, along with gardens, or the usual features you would find near a group of buildings. Alternatively, this could be specified on the card itself, including the number of buildings, ie: 'a farm including main house, outhouse, barn, chicken coup, fences and hedges, also roll 1D6: 1-3 = no change 4-5 = one extra building of player's choice, 6 = two buildings of player's choice.'

How many cards you draw for the revealed square is entirely up to you, but it also could be dictated by the card that is drawn. So if you draw a small woodland card, it could also state on the card 'draw two further cards, if there is no space in the square for the extra scenery, just use the first extra card drawn.' This means if you draw a woodland and it takes up half of the square's space and the second and third cards are another wood and a marsh, respectively, just ignore the marsh and place the second wood as before. 

Use your preferred set of rules to move your units, but when they reach the edge f the square they are and move into a new one, simply repeat the steps for creating the scenery they encounter. It may seem a bit strict to limit the squares to 12", but you can set this size to whatever you like and whatever suits your board. Also, squares are not very natural, but you can get around this by placing hedges, fences or other scenery on the edge of the square that blocks line of sight into the adjoining square. Alternatively, you can have irregularly shaped areas in which you place the scenery, again, blocking the edges and line of sight with scenery that you draw from the deck, it is entirely up to you and the ideas here are just a guide for playing your games slightly differently. 

As with the scenery added as the unit advances into new uncovered squares, we also have to determine if there are enemy units in the vicinity. A further deck of cards will be required for this, each marked with a particular enemy unit type. This will be period specific, and only include units you actually own! Simply draw a card when the player controlled unit moves into a new square to check if there are enemy units close by. For friction it is recommended to add blank cards to the deck, so that the player is not sure about what faces them as they advance. As with scenery, how many cards you draw is entirely up to the player, or it could be controlled by the card text, ie: 'One section of Panzergrenadiers, plus Panzerschreck team. Draw one more card'. As for deploying the enemy units, you could use the grid system above or simply put the defenders in the best and most obvious place for a defence force. For example, they are unlikely to be stood in the middle of an open field if there is a hedge to hide behind. If using the grid system, an alternative way of placing the defenders would be to place them in scenery closest to the grid square that you roll for if they end up in the open, for example. When it come to firing, just use your common sense and allow the defenders to fire at the best target for them, for example, rifle armed soldiers wouldn't fire at tanks... 

The player(s) will spend their game advancing across the board, uncovering new squares of scenery with enemy forces possibly emplaced and having to deal with the threats as they unfold. The victory conditions are entirely up to the player(s), it could be as simple as clearing a line of advance for the main force behind this vanguard, or exiting off the opposite table edge with as many survivors as possible. This is a very simple and basic way of creating a 'choose your own' adventure type of game on the tabletop. Creating a deck of cards is not difficult with Microsoft Word, or any other word processing software, simply print them and laminate the cards for durability. Alternatively, just create a series of tables that you can roll dice against to gain a result. the latter method is not as modifiable as a deck of cards, but can still work well and is a quick solution if you don't have access to the means to make cards.  

The above is a quick and easy way of creating a different gaming experience that a lot of board games use and that are reasonably easy to transfer to the wargaming table. Games like this will work very well as a cooperative game or even as solo.