Kriegsspiel Brainstorming

[patterson.jason]

What if there was a Kriegsspiel that was played at the operational/strategic level that would result in battles played through using something like age of eagles or snappy nappy to resolve the combat?  Only the players at that battlefield would be invited to that table.   

You would need more than one umpire/steam account if using TTS.  One for the Kriegsspiel and one for the battles.

[bayonetbrant]

I think you end up with a lot of 'dead time' around the virtual table while the non-battle-participants are waiting for the current slugfest to finish




not a bad idea, but I wonder about the practical application

[panzerde]

Check the "Future Kriegspiels" thread for ideas about where to go next. We have talked about this, but Brant is right about the downtime.

[bayonetbrant]

Check the "Future Kriegspiels" thread for ideas about where to go next. We have talked about this, but Brant is right about the downtime.

I imagine it might be a little different if there were multiple GMs running multiple simultaneous battle tables, which in turn would be reporting back to the operational commander who is on the "big map" but that's a LOT of moving parts too coordinate and might need a test run or two of just 2 simultaneous fights + the big ops map to see how it works

[panzerde]

That's kind of the point where it makes sense to be using computers.

[mirth]

My group has done big multi-table games, but not with the op/strat level at the same time. We've done games with an op/strat level, but we've done that stuff in separate sessions. So you do your moves on the strat map and if a battle develops you take it to the table in the next session. These weren't KS though. We've done it with a couple different rule systems. There was one for the NW Frontier that worked out nicely for both levels of the game.

[Cyrano]

This is entirely the point of the "Snappy Nappy" game, the glory of which is that the 10 tables are both the operational and the tactical level.

I can see no way way, however, of moving it particularly quickly.  Likely no more than an hour or two of movement per turn...

In my experience, though, and it is extensive, the more elaborate the tactical level is the more matters get buggered up as people smoke cigarettes and get into the cheese dip while waiting for battles to resolve.  The is why I've never given serious thought to using "The Eagle Fights" to resolve "Flight of the Eagle" battles.  And, as I think has been discussed here before, there's a good argument that the KS really is about moving to contact rather than what happens once contact is achieved.  Often, the fight is over by the time the two sides see one another clearly.

[James Sterrett]

Another problem is that except in an XCOM-style setup, the operational layer usually overwhelms the tactical fight - unless both sides screw up equally, the tactical fights are lopsided.

Then you get to the downtime problem, which I've never found a way around.


Good to hear from you again, Jason!