Problems with using historical movement rates?

[Bandit]

OK, fresh start at a conversation started weeks ago:

I’m interested in the movement rates used in wargames. My presumptions are simple:

1) Many games do not allow for historical movement speeds, rather they have movement rates that per their own time scale are at 1/2 or 1/4 speed that troops often moved. There is probably a reason for this, it could be convenience, it could be they are more accurate than I think they are, who the heck knows but I don’t.

2) I’m focusing on games with large formations of troops, not skirmish games, not small tactical actions but whole divisions moving from point X to point Y in Z period of time.

3) I’m not trying to account for lots of detail, I’m looking at averages and holistic events: i.e. can Augereau’s whole corps close from ~1,400 yards out to contact in something similar to a half an hour?

4) Historical movement rates appear to have averaged about 75 yards a minute, this is an *average* and not a strict amount.

I’m not looking to “fix everything”, rather I’m looking to identify the problems with using faster “historical” movement rates and determine on a per problem basis if those issues are: a) phantoms to be ignored, b) real but can be ignored, c) real but can be solved somehow, d) real and can’t likely be resolved.

Again, for categories’C’ and ‘D’ I’m not looking to discuss specific solutions, just to determine if solutions are plausible.

For some perspective on what this looks like on the tabletop:

1″ = 75 yards * 20 minute turns = 20″ of movement
1″ = 100 yards * 20 minute turns = 15″ of movement
1″ = 150 yards * 20 minute turns = 10″ of movement
1″ = 200 yards * 20 minutes turns = 7.5″ of movement

Table size will obviously vary but we can presume no one is going to wargame on a table bigger than 6′ wide or smaller than 4′ wide.

If ya think this is a fool’s errand, no worries, it might be, and please participate by telling me *why* you found it doesn’t work (not that it doesn’t work), and yes, I’ll have questions and challenges – that is how I come to understand things.

[Phil Dutré]

1. I think you make the classic mistake of computing movement rates bottom-up (“I can run 100m in 10 seconds, so in 10 minutes I can run 6 km”). Especially for large-scale formations, movement is only partially determined by how fast a man can walk.

2. Movement rates in wargames cannot be seen independent from other aspects of the gaming rules, esp. fire resolution. If a turn is 20 minutes, are all 20 minutes spend continuously on marching without firing, and is the fire phase only firing without moving? In the rules, all action in those 20 minutes is discretized in those 2 clean seperate phases, but if you assume that firing is happening throughout those 20 minutes, as well as moving, the aggregrate of all those actions should be averaged out in those two distinct phases. Hence, movement rates are often slower that what would get by a simple bottom-up calculations, because not all the time during those 20 minutes is spend on moving.

3. In the end, it doesn’t matter that much, since an accurate ground scale relative to troop density is an illusion in most wargame scenarios anyway. After spending too much time thinking about this issue, I have taken the stance that “if it feels right on the table, that’s ok with me”.

[Bandit]

Phil Dutré wrote:

1. I think you make the classic mistake of computing movement rates bottom-up (“I can run 100m in 10 seconds, so in 10 minutes I can run 6 km”). Especially for large-scale formations, movement is only partially determined by how fast a man can walk.

Actually I didn’t do this at all. Rather than start with drill rates and scale up, I am working from examples of troop movements that occurred in 15-30 minutes under a variety of conditions. Thus, I am not extrapolating.*

It would be perfectly fair to say that extrapolation is necessary if one was going to apply my working average to time increments smaller than 15 minutes or longer than 30 minutes.

Phil Dutré wrote:

2. Movement rates in wargames cannot be seen independent from other aspects of the gaming rules, esp. fire resolution. If a turn is 20 minutes, are all 20 minutes spend continuously on marching without firing, and is the fire phase only firing without moving?

I’m aware, however, the examples I’m using include troops under artillery fire, troops under small arms fire, troops crossing a variety of terrain and obstacles, troops changing formation to repel cavalry and then reforming against to continue their movement, troops that halted to conduct fire and then press on. So it is safe to say that either my “average rate” will still be slower than a unit moved over 20 minutes or none of those things had a material impact on the distance covered in 20 minutes historically. I’m not sure if it matters which as I’m not looking for “perfect” just “far closer to history than is common”.

Phil Dutré wrote:

3. In the end, it doesn’t matter that much, since an accurate ground scale relative to troop density is an illusion in most wargame scenarios anyway.

That is true if you start with something broken, i.e. troop density that is not *similar* to history. And the issue of troop density which is a complex problem involving basing, intervals, weapon ranges and ground scale. But I’m not trying to examine movement sitting on top of something I already know is broken, I’m examining movement based on something that is presumed as reasonably close to history.

[Patrice]

Bandit wrote:

games do not allow for historical movement speeds (…) 20 minute turns

This is the point that made me uneasy in the other  thread although I couldn’t explain myself why. But, yes:

“20 minute turns”. How do you know that a turn represents 20 minutes? Because the author of the rules wrote it somewhere in the rulebook. But it’s not really a part of the gaming rules; in fact it’s “designer’s notes” or whatever you call it, it has no effect on the game system itself.

Gamers are looking for:

-an acceptable simulation (or feeling of simulation) of the relation between moves/fire/etc; which does not depends on the exact time scale, but are relative to each other;

and

– an acceptable simulation (or feeling of simulation) of what the general sees and decides on the battlefield. As you wrote earlier, the generals took into account the true speed of their units (in reality)  …as the players take into account the true speed of their units but on a gaming table it’s in cm (or inches) per turn and nothing else. It works even if the exact scale does not match.

(- and fun!)

IMO what you are looking for is an absolute modelization. It’s something different of a game system. If you take one of the rulesets that have been metioned, and take a pen and write “one turn = 10 minutes not 20” across the first page, you could be happy with the units absolute speeds without changing anything else in the game rules. It’s different things.

http://www.argad-bzh.fr/argad/en.html
https://www.anargader.net/

[Don Glewwe]

“…movement rates that per their own time scale are at 1/2 or 1/4 speed that troops often moved. There is probably a reason for this, it could be convenience, it could be they are more accurate than I think they are, who the heck knows but I don’t”

A possible reason = to impose on players some uncertainty in their well-laid plans?  Dunno…I’m thinking of situations where troops get to move “more than their fair share” as the result of combat and/or reactions to enemy activities – these allowances may reflect (in the designer’s eyes) situations of “quickened” action that lie beyond the purview of a commander/player?

 

dunno…I’ve no experience in the genre, but see the same difficulties/objections raised in the skirmish level games that were (theoretically) excluded from the discussion.

 

 

Dunno…

 

[Bandit]

Patrice wrote:

“20 minute turns”. How do you know that a turn represents 20 minutes? Because the author of the rules wrote it somewhere in the rulebook. But it’s not really a part of the gaming rules; in fact it’s “designer’s notes” or whatever you call it, it has no effect on the game system itself.

Sorry, I didn’t follow this, can you rephrase or clarify what you said here?

Patrice wrote:

If you take one of the rulesets that have been metioned, and take a pen and write “one turn = 10 minutes not 20″ across the first page, you could be happy with the units absolute speeds without changing anything else in the game rules.

Person certainly could, though I *presume* as Sam and others have pointed out that games are largely designed with integrated mechanics meaning that changing the time increment of a turn to “make movement rates more correct” *should* alter the relative accuracy of other mechanics. Obviously whether or not it does depends on a bunch of specifics and the level of mechanic integration.

Don Glewwe wrote:

A possible reason = to impose on players some uncertainty in their well-laid plans?  Dunno…I’m thinking of situations where troops get to move “more than their fair share” as the result of combat and/or reactions to enemy activities – these allowances may reflect (in the designer’s eyes) situations of “quickened” action that lie beyond the purview of a commander/player?

I hear ya there. I think this matters more or less based on the scale & scope of the game and the level of precision being attempted. Since I’m preoccupied with systems that are nominally using 15-30 minute turns I am working in a realm where accounting for every minute isn’t workable. Several people have either perceived or suggested that I’m looking to do just that but I’m not.

With that focus, and using an average that is absolutely on the slow side of “maximum” it means that if I applied these “fast” rates to a system they might still be slower than some historical movements, they’d just be closer to the examples I’m using. It also means that there remains a bit of slop which I agree is unavoidable. To me this means that unless the “more than their fair share” of activity is radically greater than the slop amount, it may prove OK.

[McLaddie]

As I see it, the real tension in a battle was the army’s efforts to train troops to predictability, so that commanders could actually plan, estimate and determine what could be done.  Obviously,  fortune, personalities of subordinates and the enemy worked against that predictability.  This is why training was so important.  Napoleonic general knew this, worked to mitigate the elements of chance and have methods for countering events caused by chance.

And just as obviously, they were successful sometimes and sometimes not.  In designing a Napoleonic game there has to be that tension between predictability and chance, even in movement.  Different games handle that differently, from rolling for activation to rolling for movement distances.  Any game attempting to model battle would have that predictability/chance there.

The first question to ask when games are built on the probability of something happening is to ask  ‘in general’ / on average / usually how far did troops move?  Only then can you see what a ‘realistic’ variable would be in determining the chance that a unit would do better or worse.

[McLaddie]

1. I think you make the classic mistake of computing movement rates bottom-up (“I can run 100m in 10 seconds, so in 10 minutes I can run 6 km”). Especially for large-scale formations, movement is only partially determined by how fast a man can walk.

 

Hi Phil:

I also think computing movement rates from the bottom up is a mistake…  So we ask, how fast did large formations move? [Brigades, Divisions, Corps]  What did those sized units accomplish moving during a battle? What did Napoleonic generals estimate was the average speed under fire/not under fire? What did troops train to accomplish in large formations?  I’ve found that generals, training and battle performance all come to ‘in general’  75 yards per minute.

2. Movement rates in wargames cannot be seen independent from other aspects of the gaming rules, esp. fire resolution. If a turn is 20 minutes, are all 20 minutes spend continuously on marching without firing, and is the fire phase only firing without moving? In the rules, all action in those 20 minutes is discretized in those 2 clean seperate phases, but if you assume that firing is happening throughout those 20 minutes, as well as moving, the aggregate of all those actions should be averaged out in those two distinct phases. Hence, movement rates are often slower that what would get by a simple bottom-up calculations, because not all the time during those 20 minutes is spend on moving.

Agreed. Movement will be in relation to a whole legion of other aspects.  However, that average movement rate was accomplished in the midst of all those other aspects, often very different from one another, marching up hill, against heavy artillery fire, across obstacles and with the need to dress lines more than once.   What does that tell us? “In aggregate”, the movement rate was 75 yards per minute.  That isn’t a bottom-up estimate, but one done at the level of our concern: Brigade and Division movement.

Part of the issue is those separate phases.  The whole turn is one time factor and all activity must be within that scale time frame.  Why not have separate time frames for each phase?  Another approach is to have the time scale so small that each action, movement and combat, can be discrete.  There other ways to treat the time structure.  An interesting question is how military men themselves divided up the issues of time, movement and combat.

Part of the issue is how much time could firing and close combat take?  They are similar questions to movement: what’s the average? To model history, we have to have some historical evidence to model, whether crude estimations or exact numbers. If none can be found, then of course, we can’t model it and are free to do whatever we want.

3. In the end, it doesn’t matter that much, since an accurate ground scale relative to troop density is an illusion in most wargame scenarios anyway. After spending too much time thinking about this issue, I have taken the stance that “if it feels right on the table, that’s ok with me”.

Well, I am not sure about the first statement because it all depends on the scale and stand size in the end.  I will agree that ground scale is an illusion in most wargame scenarios… for a wide variety of reasons.   If I want to design a wargame that would be acceptable, what constitutes  ‘feels right?’   I would assume that has something to do with history and how well you see the game matching your understanding.  If that ‘feels right’ is different for every gamer, then we have at best a moving target based on who knows what…

McLaddie

 

[Don Glewwe]

“The whole turn is one time factor and all activity must be within that scale time frame.  Why not have separate time frames for each phase?”

Ramblings of a fly on the wall…

 

A turn is a measure of reaction time of the player (isn’t it?) – ie: a break in the game when input is allowed.  Too far…not far enough…objections seem to rely on a fixed time instead of a turn.

 

dunno…

[Bandit]

Don Glewwe wrote:

A turn is a measure of reaction time of the player (isn’t it?) – ie: a break in the game when input is allowed.

I would agree with this.

BattleTech (sci-fi Mecha game) is very much this way. Each turn is something like 30 seconds. The execution of a turn is essentially looking at a video capture of the last 30 seconds and determining what occurred. Analysis of events past.

[McLaddie]

The whole turn is one time factor and all activity must be within that scale time frame.  Why not have separate time frames for each phase?”

Don:

Yeah, why not?  The backbone of any game, any simulation is how time is handled. How activity is divided up: what happens first, second and third etc…  Many games have a turn represent a certain amount of time and each phase is a different activity, movement, combat, command allotment etc. within that time frame.  It could just as easily be different phases, each with variable time and at the end of the turn, you add up how much time has passed.  Or with cards and/or command point representing a player choice of activities, one card or point at a time for a turn, with a set number of cards representing what could be done in that time frame. Lots of games do that, starting with games as old as Flames of War and On To Richmond.  Then there are games that divide the table up into areas with different activities possible within each during the same time frame.

My group once took Volley & Bayonet phases, Combat, movement, fire, morale tests and exhaustion calculations and put each on a card, one movement card for each player etc. all in a deck, which was then shuffled and drawn, so that each phase came up randomly. Made for a wildly different game.  We even went so far as to double the number of cards and include a reinforcement card for the side who had them coming on, so that a run through the entire deck was a two hour turn.

Basically, time in a game can be divided up by time [a 30 minute turn, or 4 minutes etc.] and/or activities [ combat or movement phases for example, or cards or command points] or events [end of a turn triggered by die rolls, player actions both sides pass on movement or some such] and then player decisions. [Both sides chose not to move anymore for example]  Board games have been doing all these things for quite a while.  The options and combinations of time, activities, events, and player decisions dividing up a ‘turn’ are endless. It is all a matter of what you want to represent.

An interesting question is how military men perceived the decision cycle and time.  How did they divide up the battlefield and time conceptually?  How did that direct their thinking.  The current military spends a great deal of time on those questions.  So did 19th Century officers.

A turn is a measure of reaction time of the player (isn’t it?) – ie: a break in the game when input is allowed.  Too far…not far enough…objections seem to rely on a fixed time instead of a turn.

It can be, if that is your purpose for the segmenting of a turn.  A game that divides a turn into movement and combat movement phases in a IGO/UGO system has a number of places where players can made decisions, but the measure of reaction time is really gross compared to same alternate card play or phasing player action/non-player reaction options during a turn.  That fixed time is simply an answer to a question of rate of average speed in twenty minutes.  It would be the same rate regardless of how you divided up time/reaction time/decisions in a turn.

A ‘turn’ in a wargame is segmenting a set of game actions that are supposedly representing actual time and event progressions so as a designer, you have two issues with that one question:  Does it work as a game and does it represent what could be done in the scale time chosen for that ‘turn’?   Some game designers have said you can’t do both and have settled on the one question: What works as a fun game?  Others have chosen to emphasize the representation aspects over a smooth game structure.  I still think that both can be accomplished with one game mechanic/turn sequence.  And I am certainly not alone in that belief when reading wargame designer’s statements such as those found in Regimental Fire & Fury, Black Powder or Shako.   

McLaddie

 

[Angel Barracks]

Napoleonic Gaming is not my forte.
So please consider that before replying!
And excuse incorrect terminology, but you should be able to get my jist.

Could you not use a movement system along these lines:

Road = 10 units of movement
Good = 7 units of movement
Poor = 4 units of movement

Veteran troops +2 units of movement
Regular troops +0 units of movement
Green troops -2 units of movement

So we have basic movement dependant on the terrain.
Then modified by the troops experience and ability to dress the lines.

You could then add a commander value to further modify the rate and unit wellness.

So:

Veteran commander +1 unit movement
Regular +0 unit movement
Green -1 unit movement

Then:

Unit is fresh (no losses, good morale) +1 unit movement
Unit is tired (no more than X% in losses) -1 unit movement
Unit is broken (more than X% in losses) -2 unit movement

No idea if this appeals, but seems like it would work to me.

You would have to fill in the blanks, so once you have established a turns/phases time period you could then plug in what you feel to be the correct movement rate, maybe taken from a drill manual?
You could even say the drill speed is the same as the road speed?

Just a thought anyway.
may not even be what you were asking…



[repiqueone]

Part of the issue is a chicken or egg sort of issue, does game play trump historicity?  I can think of a lot of games where all sorts of history driven considerations swamped playability, and damn few where game mechanics eliminated the illusion of historicity.

The time in a game turn is an approximation, in almost every game it actually varies, and in no rule set I know of does it have any relation to the real duration of a battle, or reflect anything other than a designer’s arbitrary selection of some time interval.

There is an argument to be made as to the relative speeds within a designer’s universe of various arms or unit types.  Those must be believable.

There is an argument to be made as to the relationship of general movement to the available table playing surface ( which varies).  Too slow and the game is quickly tedious.  Too fast and there’s little maneuver and an unsatisfyingly rapid game conclusion.

There is a very strong argument to be made as to the relationship of movement to the “beaten zone” of firepower weapons.  i.e., How many times is a unit exposed to fire if directly crossing a musketry or artillery fire zone when closing with the enemy, given the movement and weapon ranges stated in the game?  Too few and the unit is “bulletproof”, too many,and the unit is ripped to shreds and the game becomes as static as a WWI trench line.

There are also issues of preference.  I vastly prefer variable opportunities for movement, and variable movement distances, as this adds drama, removes command from complete robotic control of the units, and seems to, in aggregate, argue against fixed move distances when compared to most historical accounts.  The “average” move distance is provided by the math of dice probability not a fixed calculation, rather like firepower in most games.

An historical miniature wargame must be, first, a good game to which history is added to the degree necessary to make the players feel they are experiencing the salient points of battle in a given period, and that the game is true to their understandings.  The degree of historicity needed varies widely among gamers and groups.  Designers generally try to hit a golden point where the button counters and the dice rollers are both happy. It’s a delicate mix.

The greatest error of would-be designers is to get caught up in the history and forget the game.  A rule too far is the general outcome.  There is also the tendency to become a tad too precious about the history and their knowledge of it.  History makes for wonderful reads and can be very engrossing, but much of it does not make a good fit with a game, and is better left in the book, than piled unto the table. You want just enough history and not a jot more.  Culling the meaningful facts that fit a game design thesis in a rule set is the first level of editing, and generally illustrates a far better understandingof history on the part of the designer, than those that just generally try to slather it on.

I’m reminded of the first grade teacher whose class won the the elementary school’s coloring contest every year.  When asked why her kids unfailingly won, she replied, ” You’ve got to know when to take the paper and crayons away.”  A lot of Napoleonic wargame rulesmith’s need someone to take their paper and crayons away more quickly.

[McLaddie]

Angel Barracks:

Those mechanics might work very well.   If we are just talking about game mechanics, then they look interesting.  Of course, we’d have to see how they integrate within the entire game system.  If we are talking about those rules representing command and movement issues faced by actual Napoleonic generals, then we have to have some historical evidence to represent.  The question would be what relationship if any do they have to Napoleonic generalship, movement and such.

Historical wargames are representational art.  Such game systems and mechanics have an explicit relationship to real battle and command or they aren’t ‘historical’.  The questions are simply where and how that representation is accomplished in game play.

McLaddie

 

[repiqueone]

Wow, McLaddie!  I actually find we are in complete agreement!  It must be the magic of The Wargames Website at work!  I love this place!

[Mike]

repiqueone wrote:

It must be the magic of The Wargames Website at work!  I love this place!

Feel free to encourage others to join up!

[McLaddie]

 I can think of a lot of games where all sorts of history driven considerations swamped playability, and damn few where game mechanics eliminated the illusion of historicity.

Bob:

We often agree. You just haven’t noticed.  The above is certainly true.  I chalk that up to bad game design rather than some inherent problem with historically driven considerations.  And it isn’t surprising game mechanics rarely eliminate the ‘illusion of historicity’, depending on what is meant by ‘illusion’.

 Illusion:

A thing that is or is likely to be wrongly perceived or interpreted by the senses; mirage, hallucination, apparition; a deceptive appearance or impression; a false idea or belief; delusion, misconception.

A game mechanic by itself can be imagined to represent anything the player [or designer] wants it to, so it isn’t surprising that game mechanics by themselves don’t dispel any illusions the players want to wrap around them in their pretending. Only when you state what those game mechanics represent visa vie history do you have the illusions challenged.

It is easy to add a few period words, a concept like ‘melee’ to the game processes, neat playing pieces, lots of pretty pictures to encourage those illusions.  Risk and Battle Cry do this very well.  However, that isn’t what all wargame designers attempt to do.  For instance, Rich Hasenauer stated that his games F&F and Regimental F&F achieved both ‘Historical accuracy’ and ‘playability’—providing both the chicken and egg.

Historical accuracy would appear to be diametrically opposed to the ‘illusion of historicity.’  Whether the chicken or the egg came first or one is more important than the other, both are being sold together in a Historical Wargame.  That history is being represented in Historical Wargames is explicit–the illusions aren’t.

It is just questions of where and how the history is included.  It belies the name Historical Wargame if any history is considered impossible to represent or worse, a deception, all just ‘illusion.’

The issue of too fast or too slow movement, table size, fire effects and all the rest are very real issues.  Again, we agree. No one is arguing that they aren’t.  However, IF the idea is to present players with challenges similar to those faced by the actual military men, their estimates of movement ‘in general’ coupled with actual battlefield performances should be what movement is based on—you know, the history.  We all have our preferred game mechanics, but if unit movement rates, whether wildly variable or fixed, card-driven or within a single movement phase, don’t allow units to move and maneuver as far as they did in the actual battles, what is being represented?

 An historical miniature wargame must be, first, a good game to which history is added to the degree necessary to make the players feel they are experiencing the salient points of battle in a given period, and that the game is true to their understandings.  The degree of historicity needed varies widely among gamers and groups.  Designers generally try to hit a golden point where the button counters and the dice rollers are both happy. It’s a delicate mix.

Yes, that golden mean. We are in agreement here too.  It is a very difficult point to hit when the degree of historicity needed varies ‘widely’ between gamers and groups.  A real danger is aiming for the lowest common denominator, supposedly the largest group of buyers, and thus perpetuating illusions and bad history.  Some designers specifically promote their games as ‘Hollywood’ history, and that is not only okay, but being upfront about the quality of the historical content.  There are a number of games like that I enjoy.

Other designers target particular groups and degrees of historicity–even going as far as to insist all gamers are in one group with one preference.

Then there are the designers who have hit on a far less demanding solution.  They simply claim to have achieved historical accuracy and playability, both the chicken and egg, without any real explanation of where and how. This allows [or should I say abandons] the players to inject their own ideas into what is being represented by the game mechanics… creating their own free-form illusions of historicity, regardless of what the rules were designed to represent.  It works far better because it can potentially satisfy a larger number of customers, more groups, each believing their understanding of history has been portrayed.  After all, the gamers are pretending, and they are really good at it.  They wouldn’t be in the hobby if they didn’t enjoy pretending.

Dr. Francis Crick, one of the discoverers of the double helix structure of DNA, once said of his work, “It’s much more fun to guess. Finding the real answer takes work.”

For wargamers, that has become an enjoyable pastime: guessing what the game mechanics represent of history.  That’s fine, particularly if they haven’t been given a clue in the first place.  For them, it often doesn’t matter if they guessed right or not. I have a lot of examples of the gamers guessing wrong about what different games were designed to represent.

With this type of marketing strategy, illusions are the mainstay, and work far better than actual history.  Here, actual history is the bane of this approach.

However, that guessing can’t be true for the designer if they are providing both the chicken and egg.  Otherwise, the whole design process becomes a hall of mirrors where anything goes, rather than actually representing something historical.  If the designer doesn’t have any historical evidence, how could he represent it?  At that point, he is free to do what he wants.  Again, that isn’t what we are talking about here.

However, there are a variety of ‘less illusionary’ ways to make players “feel they are experiencing the salient points of battle in a given period”.  For simulation games, one of the basics is called guided pretending. In participatory simulation games, this is created by being specific and clear with players about those ‘salient points’ the designer has chosen to represent—providing examples from history to establish the links in the players’ mind.  Players know explicitly what the simulation was and was not designed to represent and where.  Then there is no question about what they are pretending to do and how that matches historical experience.

 The greatest error of would-be designers is to get caught up in the history and forget the game.  A rule too far is the general outcome.  There is also the tendency to become a tad too precious about the history and their knowledge of it.  History makes for wonderful reads and can be very engrossing, but much of it does not make a good fit with a game, and is better left in the book, than piled unto the table.

 

I agree that is certainly a critical error for any designer, would-be or experienced. when offering both the egg and chicken.  So, here too, I agree to some extent.  However, the greatest single error a wargame designer can make is to fail to do what he set out to do.  If he sets out to provide both the Chicken and the Egg, but ends up only provides one of them  [An unplayable simulation or an unhistorical game], then the designer has failed whether the design is only excellent history or a fun game.  That is the ultimate error: failing to accomplish the intended and promoted goals for the design.

The idea that much of history can’t ‘fit’ into a game system may or may not be true, depending on what we are talking about.  To claim that some history is included in the game obviously suggests it is possible, but stating that it is impossible to represent with a game system? —both claims require evidence to that effect.  The second is far harder to prove.

 You want just enough history and not a jot more.  Culling the meaningful facts that fit a game design thesis in a rule set is the first level of editing, and generally illustrates a far better understanding of history on the part of the designer, than those that just generally try to slather it on.

All true. Just enough game rules, and not a rule too far.  No more history than necessary to portray what the designer has chosen. And creating an administrative nightmare of die rolls and charts certainly can wreck any illustration of history as easily as ahistorical play, regardless of how much evidence they are based on.

So exactly where is anyone here attempting to ‘slathering it on’?  A rule too far is certainly a game AND simulation killer, but that isn’t what is being discussed here, is it?  Unless you are saying that establishing a general movement rate is in-and-of-itself a ‘rule’ too far.

 

[repiqueone]

My argument with the present discussion of movement rate, is precisely what you claim to be demanding.  What pupose does worrying about an ostensibly “accurate” move rate that is somehow linked to historical data (however questionable in battle application) serve to illustrating either history or creating a good game? Is is, in practice, even farther from historical “truth” than other movement systems?

Now, if Bandit, or you, were writing a game whose purpose is to illustrate movement rates, proper drill, and make some point about getting to the Pratzen Plateau that would illuminate our readings of Chandler, then I’ll listen.  What you have failed to do is state what is your pupose in terms of creating a good wargame, a playable wargame, and whether anything related to scale movement serves those purposes better than what designers have done to date-or even as well?  Bandit started by asking whether the historical movement taken literally and in scaled terms to the table top was possible and/or a good thing?  I think the disvcussion has just jumped to “Yes!” on bothpoints with little proof, but a lot of extraneous data.

Is scale movement and time, in any way, not only possible, but is it even helpful?  I’m reminded by model railroaders use of “Scale” clocks that moved at accelerated rates in order for a train order list to be achieved in a train running session.

Not many model railroaders got into operations on this level, but preferred looser, less narrow considerations.  They loved doing what trains do, in an historically correct manner, with well modeled trains, on very detailed and terrained layouts, but they simply found the time tables, and the spinning fast-time clocks not adding much to their enjoyment.

Y0u really should look up fast-time clocks, and the use of the term “Smiles” by model railroaders. I’ve often thought that operation intensive model railroaders were the Napoleonic gamers of their hobby.

Im far more interested in the decision matrix for gamers and posing decisions that mimic in some broad and interesting way, the nature of command decisions, than I am in making sure the trains run on time!

[Bandit]

repiqueone wrote:

My argument with the present discussion of movement rate, is precisely what you claim to be demanding.  What pupose does worrying about an ostensibly “accurate” move rate that is somehow linked to historical data (however questionable in battle application) serve to illustrating either history or creating a good game? Is is, in practice, even farther from historical “truth” than other movement systems?

I don’t think anyone needs to justify their chosen topic of discussion in order to have a conversation about it. I’d like to talk about the topic of this thread, if you have material things to add, I’m interested in hearing them.

repiqueone wrote:

What you have failed to do is state what is your pupose in terms of creating a good wargame, a playable wargame, and whether anything related to scale movement serves those purposes better than what designers have done to date-or even as well?

I don’t know why you think I need to do this. I want to talk about movement. If you want to talk about movement, join in. If you prefer to talk about other things – as you say at the end of your post – OK, go talk about those, start a thread on it.

repiqueone wrote:

Im far more interested in the decision matrix for gamers and posing decisions that mimic in some broad and interesting way, the nature of command decisions, than I am in making sure the trains run on time!

I think that knowing when the train is likely to arrive has a heck of a lot to do with directly influencing the player’s command decisions.

If it will take 6 hours to arrive at the train station and 15 minutes for me to reach the train station and buy a ticket… I’m probably not going to leave my home until shortly before that 6 hour mark. If it takes the train only 1 hour, I’m going to leave a lot sooner. A clear expectation of what is possible and what is likely is key when making decisions.

Had it taken Soult 60 or 120 minutes to reach the Pratzen instead of 20 minutes, I suspect Napoleon would have chosen a different time in the course of events to send him forward. Battlefield decisions by senior commanders are time sensitive. Not in terms so much of a clock but in terms of knowing how long X will take in compared to Y. As Nappy said [paraphrased], “space I can recover… time, never.”

[McLaddie]

Im far more interested in the decision matrix for gamers and posing decisions that mimic in some broad and interesting way, the nature of command decisions, than I am in making sure the trains run on time!

Bob:

So am I, and I imagine Bandit and others as well.  We are all interested in that decision matrix, the nature–and basis–of command decisions.  That is what games offer, “A series of interesting decisions” as Sid Meiers says.  In this case, we want those interesting game decisions to mimic the decisions faced by actual commanders.  To do that, we have to know what constitutes that decision matrix.

Matrix:  Something (such as a situation or a set of conditions) in which something else develops or forms

If you are suggesting that having a basic understanding of how fast units usually moved, could move in battles are not issues within that decision matrix, I’d love to hear your thoughts on it.  If we are going to mimic the nature of Napoleonic command decisions, then the thoughts of actual commanders on that subject are certainly the ones I want to listen to.  What do they think are the important considerations?  What generalizations do they rely on in making decisions?  Clausewitz, for instance, often speaks of time and space, speed and rapidity of movement in both his strategic and tactical works. Jomini too.

At this point you seem to think we are far more fixated on just time and movement than we actually are.  Movement is only one of many aspects of that decision matrix, just one question, one piece of the puzzle, but a basic consideration non-the-less.

Best Regards,  McLaddie

 

 

[repiqueone]

No, Bill, what I am saying is that we DO have a general sense of the AVERAGE rate of most arms over broad periods of time in the Horse and Musket era, and that almost all games already incorporate such factors.  There is no “secret code” to be found in anecdotal history, nor a reliable way to extend drill book rates, which were often very similar, from the drill ground to the battlefield that suddenly causes us to revise and change our general sense of what was possible.   Men move on foot, while bearing packs and weapons, a rate that varies from 3 mph to 4 MPH with bursts to maybe 6 MPH for a few hundred feet.  This is amended greatly by ground or enemy resistance. Horse were somewhat faster, especially in short bursts, and artillery was slower, sometimes a LOT slower. Combat, above all, changes everything to a highly variable pattern.  Averages still apply, but exceptions grow more frequent.

You guys are fussing over some pretty anecdotal BS in order to find the equivalent of alchemist’s gold.  I am reminded of a quote from Omar Khayam’s XXVIIth verse from the Rubiyat,

” Myself when young did eagerly frequent

Doctor and Saint, and heard great argument

About it and about: but evermore

Came out by the same door by in I went.”

 

[McLaddie]

No, Bill, what I am saying is that we DO have a general sense of the AVERAGE rate of most arms over broad periods of time in the Horse and Musket era, and that almost all games already incorporate such factors.  There is no “secret code” to be found in anecdotal history, nor a reliable way to extend drill book rates, which were often very similar, from the drill ground to the battlefield that suddenly causes us to revise and change our general sense of what was possible.

Bob:

Who is this ‘we’ and what is being averaged if not ‘anecdotal history’?  You need at least two data points to create an average, a lot more to create a meaningful average.  What secret code?  It is simply looking at the averages moved by brigades and divisions according to historical accounts,  what military men said they saw as the average and then what movement speeds were practiced. Military men were neither shy about discussing such things nor writing in a secret code. They often did record battle times and paces and such as though they were important to them.   The three points we were discussing, actual battles, officer estimates and drill rates of movement all match,  AVERAGING from 60 to 75 yards per minute from 1792 to 1870…  From what I can tell so far.  And I don’t see most games already incorporating this… and a number of designers acknowledge that units could move faster but give game reasons, from table size to artillery attrition mechanics among the reasons for slower movement rates rather than historical justifications.

Men move on foot, while bearing packs and weapons, a rate that varies from 3 mph to 4 MPH with bursts to maybe 6 MPH for a few hundred feet.

What? Is that your average rate?  That is about 1.5 to 2 times faster than what we’ve been talking about for a ‘general sense’ of an AVERAGE–

And 3 to 4 times faster than the average infantry movement in both Die Fighting and Zouave II.    It is also 3 to 4 times as fast as most all other 19th Century games around.

Combat, above all, changes everything to a highly variable pattern.  Averages still apply, but exceptions grow more frequent.

Never questioned that.  Finding those patterns, that range of variability, those exceptions to the averages can only be discovered in reference to a solid average in the first place.

[Bandit]

Bob,

repiqueone wrote:

what I am saying is that we DO have a general sense of the AVERAGE rate of most arms over broad periods of time in the Horse and Musket era, and that almost all games already incorporate such factors.

repiqueone wrote:

Men move on foot, while bearing packs and weapons, a rate that varies from 3 mph to 4 MPH with bursts to maybe 6 MPH for a few hundred feet.  This is amended greatly by ground or enemy resistance. Horse were somewhat faster, especially in short bursts, and artillery was slower, sometimes a LOT slower.

I’m at a loss here. Almost none of the rules I took off my bookshelf and used as examples in my first thread demonstrate this.

None of them were greater than 2MPH except for “Napoleon’s Eagles” which was 3.1MPH. Half of my sample was less than 1MPH and the other half was between 1MPH and 2MPH.

I also don’t know where you get 3-4MPH with bursts up to 6MPH from, those are really high rates, higher than anything that anyone has mentioned in either thread.

repiqueone wrote:

You guys are fussing over some pretty anecdotal BS in order to find the equivalent of alchemist’s gold.

And this? I’ve got no clue what you’re even talking about here. You keep saying things like this to us but saying it over and over doesn’t make it true. I’m also really confused how you lambast us using “pretty anecdotal BS” but then claim that there is an ‘average’ already in use that is historical. So is that ‘average’ you say that exists in “almost all games” based on better “anecdotal BS” or what?

I’ve gotten pretty sick of this. I started a thread looking to discuss movement on the Napoleonic board and you join the conversation to say I’m wasting my time, tell me it is worthless and actively discourage the discussion. I start a new thread in Game Design at the prompting of Editor Sam to discuss it without all the disparaging remarks and you come here and are doing the same thing.

You want to talk about movement – talk about it here with us. Offer up something material. DO NOT come into a thread to dissuade people from discussing the topic on the basis that you don’t care about it or do not feel it is important. This song, it isn’t about you.

[Mike]

People can talk about any gaming related thing they like on here as long as it does not break forum rules.
If anyone thinks someone is wasting their time, tough, deal with it.
Let them waste their time.

If anyone tries to dissuade people from talking about a subject they will have their forum privileges restricted.
I won’t have people bullied into being quiet about something they care about just because others think it a waste of time.
The rules are clear and warnings have been issued in the past.

Final Warning.

[John D Salt]

A thought that occurred to me a couple of weeks ago, but I was too disorganised to post at the time, is that I think the factors that modulate movement rates are different before and after the advent of mechanical transport. When an army has to walk, the likely pace of movement is sufficiently low that the ability of a commander and staff to make a plan and dish out movement orders is probably not a major constraint on the time it takes a unit to move from a to b. Once the internal combustion engine lets people zoom around at giddy speeds like 15, maybe 20 miles an hour, this is not longer true; and I suspect that the added complication of headquarters organisation and signals sections mean that very little time is saved in the distribution of orders, so the main limit on unopposed movement becomes the speed of tactical decision-making. As a pal of mine put it, “an army advances as fast as it thinks”. I have said “unopposed movement”, but there is also the point that for the last hundred years air and indirect fire have meant that moving elements can encounter opposition, and have their movement rates slowed miles behind the forward line of own troops.

All the best,

John.

[grizzlymc]

John

 

I think you make a good point.  Perhaps the empty battlefield plays a big part.  Advancing a battallion in line is much harder when no one can see an entire company than when the entire Bn is laid out for everyone to see and every soldier just has to step forward to the beat of a drum.

I think with time we go from duelling Kriegspiel blocks to a sort of push of rubber bands.

[Author]

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