Games with a real-life strategy feeling

Are you impressed by Napoléon’s strategy at Austerlitz? Well, you should be! It is one of the most decisive victory on a battlefield against an overwhelmingly superior enemy. Fighting at 1 vs 2, with no major technological, the French “Grand Army” shattered its counterparts with very limited losses.

What are we looking at? A thin flank to bait the enemy followed by a strong push in the center to split the opponent forces and cut the retreat lines.

That’s it. We can go into the details, but basically there is not much more to it. Real life strategy, from Cannae to Desert Storm revolves around simple ideas. The issue is that there are really few games that can simulate this. No IA will likely be defeated by Napoleon’s plan. What you will often have to do too, is micro managing your units, performing series of mini encirclements, basically achieve victory through a series of tactical decisions where you exploit the flaws of the computer. There is no perfect answer, human or IA, but some games did cover some aspect of warfare pretty well.

Coordination and asymmetry of information: Artemis Space Ship Bridge Simulator

In this independent video game that I strongly recommend, each player assumes one position in a spaceship. The 6 roles are Captain, Navigation, Weapons, Engineer, Communication and Science. The players do not see the same thing on their screen. For example the engineer does not see what is happening outside the ship. He has to rely on information from his colleagues to know when to divert the energy to shields and weapons, when he has to focus on speed to escape and where he should send the damage control party in priority. The navigator and the weapon specialist do both see outside the ship, but the navigator does not see if torpedoes are ready, which enemy ship is currently targeted. He has to get the information from the weapon specialist who in turn must know which maneuver is planned to prepare his strike. Hit and run with a nuke or surprise attack for the back with shield disrupting torpedoes? All the while the captain try to coordinates the team, the science officer monitor the star system for new threats and give intelligence on enemy shields, and finally the communication officer try to coordinate ally ships and space stations. The game shines because communicate is not an option; it is plain and simple mandatory.

Artemis is chaotic with real tension. You see limitation in the ability of people to absorb information or to communicate efficiently. You also see the usefulness of a leader. If there is a game that can prove that bad leadership is better than no leadership, it is Artemis. It is also a good illustration of the chaos that will be provoked by the first blasts in an untrained unit.

For those that are interested, it is not a difficult game in term of mouse clicking and rules. Artemis can be taught in 15 minutes to complete beginners. You need to buy 1 copy of the game for the group, and then you are authorized to install it on your friends PC to play together. Note, it does not need to be as dramatic as on the video!

Fog of War and Uncertainty: Le Vol de l’Aigle

The Vol the l’Aigle is a traditional wargame with referees that plays very well by email. The campaigns have an historical setup (Napolenic Wars) and can be played by very large group of players with each one incarnating a general and its troops. The only thing that you know is where you are, and what your troops see and do. Each turn the referee gives you an update on what happened to your troops, which communications you did get from other generals etc…

So you are marching your troops across Belgium with only one day old updates on the position of your fellow allies when you encounter enemy troops. Are they a vanguard? The main force? Should you engage and send for help or can you deal with this yourself?

Because there is a referee to run the game, the player has a lot of liberty in his action. He can send patrol, divide his forces, give precise orders all out attack or just testing the enemy resolve? How to use his reserve forces? Resting, fortifying a village etc… What is great is that you do not have to know all the rules by heart. Most of the mechanics are handled by the referees so that you can focus on the strategy. The biggest uncertainty is the situation, not the roll of a dice (but there are many dice behind the scene).

Incomplete control: Heart of Iron III

Let’s start by saying that I am not a big fan of Heart of Iron III. But here is the interesting part; I did not like it precisely because HoI 3 features the best AI control of your troops that I have seen. You organize your army in theater-army-corps-divisions and from there can delegate actual movements of any part of it to the AI.

Let us say you are Germany in 1940. Here is an example of what you can do to invade France:

• Tell the HQ West to attack towards Paris and watch the show as on the History Channel.
• Tell one army group to Attack Amsterdam, another to push towards Brussels, another to defend along the Maginot line, and the rest to carry an all out attack in the Ardennes. After 2 week of attack, you update orders to complete a major encirclement of the Allied troops.
• Give real time orders to 100+ divisions and their support brigades and attached aircraft units

I could not resolve myself to delegate control to the IA and there were too many units to control myself, so I gave it up despite being a huge fan of HoI2 and its numerous mods. But if you can delegate, HoI3 is definitively a great experience, which gives you a feeling of real-life strategy, with broad troop movements emerging from the chaos. You are the general forging the tool and leading the way, but that’s it, you cannot micro manage your way to victory.

Links to awesome strategy games:

Artmemis

Vol de l'Aigle

Heart of Iron

 

Update: Other recommendations from BoardGameGeek: 

Kriegspiel One of the first wargame ever. Developed for the Prussian army. Need a Referee.
Scourge of War  PC game, apparently fun: Quote from BGG poster Eker "Ride up to the higher ground and use your binoculars. Send a courier with your orders (He can be shot). If you are lucky a courier may show up with reports that are many hours old."
Solomon Sea A lot of modern naval games have been mentioned. It seems that a good naval simulation has to include fog of war mechanisms. For exemple on Solomon Sea, quote fron BGG poster Lancer4321 "Based on my experience as an officer on group and fleet level staffs, I've found that Solomon Sea provides a very realistic feel for how naval operations are conducted at that level. You don't deal with minutae, instead you focus on the key decisions that an actual staff would be concerned with, and all the details are handled abstractly by the system."

I have never been in a combat zone, nor intend to, so if you think I missed a major aspect of what warfare really, let me know. And more importantly, let me know which game covers it. 

EuroExark

My 3 favorite Board Games - Strategy and Diplomacy

Streamlined with difficult choices, this how I would describe my favorite games. Here is why:

Twilight Struggle, Board Game Geek #1 game, 2 players’ game

The game simulates the entire cold war on a world map. The 2 players take control of the US and the USSR in what is a beautifully balanced asymmetrical game. The tempo of the game is determined by cards which always give you a choice between action points and an event. The cards are unique, for example the NATO card does not have similar effect to the Warsaw Pact card. The early war is to the advantage of the Russian who will try to invade Korea, put pressure on Berlin and Europe. The Americans will wait for a better late game while trying to use their initial positioning to contain the communist out of America and South East Asia. One key element is that when you have one of your opponent cards in hand, you will be forced to activate his event in order to get the action points for yourself. Some beginners will hate this, but really you want to have your opponent’s event to choose the timing of the crisis. For example, the US will be happy to prepare strong bases in Mexico and Panama before playing the Fidel Castro card that establishes a threat in their backyard.

Games can be very tight until the end, but it is also a game that you can lose badly, being completely crushed before mid game. This comes from a very high level balance. Russian will win 50% of the time (okay, I admit, 51% in competitive games), but it is not an Eurogame where you wait for the final scoring to lose by 1 point. The game can be harsh, so I would not recommend it for players who like to build their little farm on their own with no interaction. No points for second place in the cold war!

Pro

• Steep learning curve
• Replayability
• Balance
• Theme is really present
•  Long term strategy is necessary

Con

•  Large gap between a beginner and an experienced player. (Need to give an extra advantage)

Chaos in the Old World, subtleness in Warhammer, 4-5 players’ game

With powerful magic and hordes of demons, the 4 Gods of Chaos want to ravage the world. However, the real contest is to be the best at it. The game has a lot of character from artwork to design. Clearly, you do not play the same game with Khorne, the God of war and blood, as with Tzeench, god of change and deceit. You progress on 2 tracks, victory point, plain and simple but only usefull if the game reaches the last turn and a wheel. The progression on the wheel depends on who you are. Slanesh progresses by corrupting Nobles, while Khorn only needs to kill. By progressing you unlock new abilities, gather more power and ultimately win the game. Some gods are better at scoring points, while other have an easier time advancing on the wheel. So the tricky part is that you need the full attention of all players to control the progression of the game. Give Khorn free kills in the early turns, and it will not be possible anymore to avoid his victory. You need to bargain with the others to keep everybody under control, ally sometimes to ravage a region and split the rewards, but most of all you need to be selfish.  

Pro

•  Replayability
• Mechanics are simple
• A healthy lot of difficult choices

Con

• Need careful play (and some experience) from the players to maintain balance
• Artwork and theme do not fare well with everybody. A pity, because the game itself is not morbid / dark at all.
•  3 players’ game is very weak in term of balance

Game of Thrones, Diplomacy with hype, 4-6 players’ game

Let’s start by saying, that no, you do not need to know the books to enjoy the game. It clearly stands out on his own. Basically it is Diplomacy: There is no winner in a 1vs1 fight. You will never have enough troops to defend your borders and attack on one front. So to push the odds in your favor you need allies until the very end, when you backstab to grab the last remaining victory location. The beauty of the game is that orders are given with face down tokens, so that until the last second you can never be sure if your plan for the turn will unfold as planned. How many times you see a defense token instead of the support token on top of your ally army. He was not in a position to betray you, but he was clearly not sure that you could be trusted. You then lose the battle where he should have supported you, and a new round of diplomacy opens, with your allies now having the upper hand. On top of this diplomacy/hidden order aspect, Game of Throne has many interesting addition: Event cards that set the pace of wildling invasion and political events, recruitment center and supply, battle cards to add a tactical layer to the game. In my view, it is a really nice game. One of the few 6 players’ game that have depth and reasonable gaming time due to the simultaneous order phase.

Pro

•  Reasonable gaming time for 6 players
• Simplicity of the mechanics. Diplomacy prevails over tactics.
• Open race till the end, not really a king making game.

Con

• Victory can come quickly if some players are not careful.

Link

BGG Twilight Struggle

Twilight Strategy: Take your games to the next level

BGG Chaos in the Old World

BGG Game of Throne

If you were looking for easier games:My article about "Gateway" games

And you, what are you favorite strategy games?

EuroExark

Abandonware of the week: Settlers II

First if you don’t know how to play old games on Widows Vista/7/8, go read this article. It’s quick and easy.Then jump with me in Settlers II!

Settlers II is a real time strategy game but definitively not a click fest like other RTS. Here building an economy has a real meaning. To deploy new warriors you need to forge weapons. To get these weapons you need a forge, and ore, and coal. Of course your mines will starve without farms, windmills and bakeries. You need a complete industrial and agricultural infrastructure to succeed.

The game put great emphasis on logistics: between each waypoint there is one of your settler transporting resources back and forth. If too many resources need to travel on the same road you create a bottleneck and you entire economy will slow down. Of course you can breed mules to help, but the key is to balance priorities, build alternative routes, and create new independent logistics hub closer to the frontline. Settlers has many parameters to play with and remains amazingly user friendly for such a complex game. It is fun to design a little animated empire of builders and workers, so that when everything is ready you can watch your small roman warriors crush the enemies.

Why would you want to play it?

1. The initial exploration of the game is really fun, with many things to discover.
2.  A short game is enough to have fun. With a 4 hours session you can be satisfied with your experience and go to something else. You do not have the feeling of investing too much energy for no direct result.
3. You can play at your own pace. There is no need to be good to enjoy the game. I am not saying that the campaign is easy, just that it is very well balance right from the start.
4.  Graphics are still cute for such an old game.
5.  While the start of the campaign is nice, the sandbox mod works well like in a Civilization game.  

Why you won’t play it for too long?

1.  The strategies to beat the higher difficulties are not worth the effort. It’s only a cheating IA after all.
2.  The campaign starts to be too long after the 3^rd mission. You can stop here and already have a very good feel of the game.

Never played it? some advice for a quick start.

1. Build barracks at each end of your territory. Once built soldiers will occupy it and expend your empire.
2. The first thing to develop at first is the building material industry: 3 lumberjackers, 1 planter and 1 mill (medium building) should take care of basic needs.
3.  Link every construction site with roads and workers and materials start flowing out of the base.
4. Once you have mountains, create a road on them, send a geologist, and see what he finds. Once you have coal you can start building other industries.

Have a good time with the oldies dear reader! In your opinion, what should I play next.

EuroExark

Could the Indians have resisted - a Gamer's view

While surfing on one of my favorite forum, I came across this question, again. Games are meant to explore the possible, what do they tell us about this question. I selected 3 games that offer different perspectives.

• Civilization: Why wouldn’t they  be able to survive?
• Europa Universalis: 400 years of struggle for survival.
• Colonization: The brutal confrontation

Civilization: This game asks us what must a nation do to survive the tides of time. You are dealt with an open hand and you can freely choose your path. Terrain is the only limit, but the start in Central / North America is as good as any in game terms. Like real life Pre-Columbian nations you are able to thrive in your new environment. Like them you can focus heavily on mathematics and astronomic after the construction of your first pyramids. However in our timeline, these technologies did not lead to many practical developments for the Indians. No sailing with the help of the stars for example.  In game terms it is like rushing astronomy and religious technology without taking time to invest in libraries, commerce and machinery… You won’t score high, and the IA might crush you.

They already have gold and silver. Development of tools and weapons in iron was one of the possible next step. What if they had? They might have expended just as we have.

Europa Universalis: For those who do not know, I encourage you to try one of the Europa Universalis. It is historically quite accurate with a lot of depth. Here you can start 100/200 years before contact with the Europeans. You might think that with historical foresight you will be able to prepare and expend before the clash. You fool! You are already doomed by your slow moving culture. Despite a very limited technological lag at start, you will not be able to compete. Why? Is it unfair?

Look at the technology panel:  First you get a large malus for isolation. True you don’t a lot of caravans from the Orient nor Arab traders selling you old greek books.  Then you get another malus for being a Theocratie. I guess that this kind of regime is less progress oriented that an Italian Renaissance Republic. On top of that your “society sliders” are geared heavily toward conservatism. You can change them, but the game rightly force you to do it slowly (1 slider change every 10/15 years), you can’t revolutionized a country in 1 year!  So even with an heavy investment in technology, will not be able to keep up with the Europeans. These malus will decrease with time and contacts with other nations, but it will be hard to survive long enough for it to have an impact.

To add insult to injury you, it will be harder for you to colonize America. Your society sliders indicate that your population is not very willing to go out colonizing. So while you can increase your empire, you will not be able to color the continent as fast as the new comers. Your only option is to overwhelm the conquistadors. You have to send hordes of warriors to stop them on the beaches but as if technological underdevelopment was not enough, you have no cavalry. Like real life Indians you have to wait for Europeans to master the art of horse riding. As you imagine, there is an important malus in battle when you can’t field any horse during the XVI Century...

In conclusion, you game survive with a perfect gameplan, including in radical revolution and intensive efforts toward administrative and military technologies. But does it feel right to invest all the gold of the Incans in funding colonies and researching better tax authorities?

Colonization:  Here they are! And it is too late. Despite being IA only, you can learn a few things about the Indians in this game. Sure they will adapt very quickly to gun and horses but their main weakness is that they are very naïve and unorganized. They will accept gifts, welcome your missionaries, teach you how to survive in the wild even sell you lands. Sure they will raid your settlements when unhappy, but that doesn’t mean that the whole tribe will launch an extermination campaign against you. Surely the Europeans who dealt with the Arabs in Spain and then with the Turks across the Mediterranean had a much more cynical view on inter cultural experiences. They were prepared for a relentless campaign with no compromise. Indians come unprepared to this clash of civilizations.

Historical addendum: A major aspect missed by all these game is the genetical diversity enjoyed by Europeans. We had dealt with much more viruses and bacterias during our History (from Asia and Africa), so that our diseases had a much larger effect on Indians that their on us. The scale of their losses (80% for some nations) was such, that no recovery was possible.

Various Links

Spanish Conquest of the Americas

Population History of indigenous peoples

Epidemics in the Americas

Download:Civilization

Paradox Interactive and their superb catalog of historical games

Aztec After Action Report EU3

Did gaming help you understand History? Or on the contrary do you think that games distort reality too much?

EuroExark