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Post by kenmeister on Jan 6, 2016 11:30:17 GMT -6
What separates a war game from a board game that has combat in it?
For instance, Avalon Hill's Dune - board game or war game? There are certainly armies clashing, but the combats aren't even resolved with dice.
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Post by makofan on Jan 6, 2016 14:59:59 GMT -6
I classify Dune as a strategy game, but I guess it's like pornography - I know it when I see it
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 6, 2016 21:21:59 GMT -6
Strategy is part of war.
If it's a game and it's about war, it's a wargame. Occam's razor. Dice have **** all to do with "being a wargame."
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Post by Finarvyn on Jan 7, 2016 4:53:24 GMT -6
I tend to think of a wargame as a "hex and chit" kind of thing, but I'm sure this is waaaay too limiting for a decent definition. This means that games like Dune and RISK are more strategy games than wargames to me, even though they feature lots of combat.
With games there often is a huge grey area, sometimes in the distinction between wargame and strategy game and sometimes in the distinction between RPG and strategy game. For example, Dune features playing the role of various characters from the novel and this hints at a role playing element as well as the traditional strategy found in a game. Not so easy to create simple categories.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jan 7, 2016 12:24:25 GMT -6
So TRACTICS WW2 miniature wargame isn't a wargame? ??
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Post by Finarvyn on Jan 7, 2016 13:52:18 GMT -6
Not sure. To me, a miniatures game isn't a "wargame" even though it clearly models combat and warfare. I doubt that mine is a good definition, but it's the way I think of things.
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Post by kenmeister on Jan 8, 2016 12:27:44 GMT -6
What about Axis & Allies?
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skars
Level 6 Magician
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Post by skars on Jan 9, 2016 3:43:24 GMT -6
Wargame definitions are pretty broad and many games (video, paintball, miniature, board, etc) could claim that category. But to narrow it down for me and most tabletop gamers i interact with, I tend to consider hex & counter board game simulations containing a TEC and CRT concerning historical or fictional military conflict as "wargames" . I classify "miniatures" games as such because the only types of miniatures game i play are wargames
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Torreny
Level 4 Theurgist
Is this thing on?
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Post by Torreny on Jan 9, 2016 7:34:29 GMT -6
As an avid wargamer, I do not consider the usage of miniatures to disqualify anything from being considered a wargame. While games like Kriegspiel used blocks, other games like H.G. Wells' Little Wars certainly did use tiny tin men. I'm sure it goes without saying that Chainmail is a wargame, as was Tractics.
Typically those games that consider themselves "more realistic" utilize the smaller scales of figures, such as 1/200 or 1/300, and often based figures count for more than one man, (Chainmail's mass battle rules being an example), such as DBA and DBM rules, Warmaster Ancients, and the like. Other systems maintain a 1:1 ratio on men and materiel.
The main difference between hex & chit and traditional wargaming is that one uses a map to push one's forces around, and the other likes to survey the battlefield before himself.
Various video games, even those made today maintain the hex & chit experience. I would recommend Hearts of Iron III for one such example of the genre. On the other hand, games such as the Total War series, is a thrilling example of a real-time strategy games that feel similar to the machinations of games like Chainmail or Ancient Warfare, right down to the useless peasants. In particular, I enjoy Total War: ROME II, of those sorts of games.
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premmy
Level 5 Thaumaturgist
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Post by premmy on Jan 9, 2016 15:09:30 GMT -6
I recall a conversation a number of years ago somewhere online about the old Eurogame/Amerigame categorisation. An interesting point was made by someone who said that Euro-style boardgames place an emphasis on the elegance of rules (with the downside that the game will only have a tenuous link to its purported theme); Amerigames emphasise drama, with the possibility of bitter conflict and spectacular turns of fortune built into the rules; and finally, wargames emphasise realism, insofar that the rules attempt to model what "would happen in real life" (to a certain of level of resolution).
I like that division, and how it defines wargames and contrasts it to boardgames.* And since it's been mentioned before, Dune (which I really like) would not be a wargame in this sense, since even though it's about war, the rules are not focusing on the realistic depiction of futuristic desert warfare. Which is hardly surprising, since, IIRC, the game's rules were originally written for a Roman Senate-themed game of intrigue, and were later transplanted into the Dune setting later.
* Obviously, wargames can also be boardgames in terms of what representation they use.
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