Monthly Archives: November 2016

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Next War: India-Pakistan – Strategic Choices, Part 4 (and final)

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Doug Bush finishes his Next War: India-Pakistan strategy series with this look at the India player’s strategic options. See Part 1 and Part 2 for a discussion of the strategic choices faced by the Pakistan player. See Part 3 for the first look at strategy from the Indian perspective.

In the first two articles of this series, I focused on the war depicted in NWIP from the Pakistan player’s side. In the third article I switched to the Indian player’s perspective on the defense. Here, I examine the choices  facing an Indian player in the four scenarios where they are on the offense (“Lahore”, “Enough!”, “Unification”, and “Loose Nukes”).

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B&T Warpath Chronicles #6: Vassalization, Or How I Learned To Love Online Gaming

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screen-shot-2016-11-15-at-8-49-08-am In the old days, to be a vassal meant that you would agree to submit to a king in exchange for their protection against other kings and lords.  We’ve moved past those days; today in the gaming field it means to submit your board game to someone for creating a Vassal module.  Since most of the folks who follow this field don’t have much free time (the exception being our fortunate retired chaps), creating online play kits are important to playing.  In game development though, this becomes pivotal since you can design an entire virtual game (including graphics) and do all the development work without ever creating any real playtest kits.  Once you create a Vassal module, you have unlimited playtest kits.

My introduction to the online gaming world began in 2005 when I had to play Triumph of Chaos and really wanted to do it virtually.  At the time, I had only a faint idea what that entailed.  After many months of playing around on Cyberboard, in addition to learning a wide range of graphics editing tools, I somehow managed to finish the playkit.  Fortunately, I had a good friend on hand to get me going on Photoshop and I developed a skill set for making all the pieces needed for a virtual game.  Fast forward 10ish years and 12+ playkits later, Cyberboard is no longer the king – that honor now belongs to Vassal.

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Altitude in Skies Above the Reich

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The feared combat box formation of heavy bombers was a three dimensional “object” flying across the sky thousands of feet above the ground. It was not a flat object, like a pancake, but a round and thorny cluster of aircraft that was just as tall as it was wide.

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Next War: India-Pakistan – Strategic Choices, Part 3

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Doug Bush continues his Next War: India-Pakistan strategy series with this look at the India player’s strategic options. See Part 1 and Part 2 for a discussion of the strategic choices faced by the Pakistan player.

In the first two articles of this series, I focused on the war depicted in NWIP from the Pakistan player’s side. In this article I’ll switch to the Indian player’s perspective. India is the strategic attacker in four of the six scenarios in NWIP, including two standard game scenarios (“Lahore” and “Enough!”) and two advanced game scenarios (“Unification” and “Loose Nukes”). In the other two scenarios (“Kashmir” and “Border War”) India is on the defense.

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The Last Hundred Yards Example of Play – Part 2

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This is the final installment of the Extended Example of Play for the Last Hundred Yards Mission #2 “Flushing Quail”. The first installment, The Last Hundred Yards Example of Play – Part 1, can be found on InsideGMT.

In continuation of this mission, two American platoons had been tasked with driving a German outpost from Hill 192. To win, the American player must complete the mission with a final score < 20.

As we left it, the American 1st squad, of the 1st platoon had just taken one of the positions on the left side of Hill 192. Lt. Murphy was maneuvering swiftly to support the 1st squad’s gain with the balance of his platoon.. Meanwhile, Lt. Cherry was maneuvering his 1st and 2nd squads through the farm complex to attack the German left.

The German commander, Lt. Lang, realized that he must immediately counter-attack to regain the position now occupied by the American 1st squad before it could be reinforced. He continued to request the much needed mortar support for the defense of Hill 192.

Read on to see whether the Americans get the job done.

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B&T Warpath Chronicles #5: From Bellin’s Map to B&T’s Game Board: How I Use Cartography in Game Design

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“Bayonets & Tomahawks Biweekly” is an article series appearing on InsideGMT periodically every two weeks. It features articles from the Bayonets & Tomahawks development team regarding the game’s design, development and upcoming release.

Issue #5: From Bellin’s map to B&T’s game board: how I use cartography in game design.

First my heartfelt thanks to everyone who pre-ordered the game so far! We reached 500 pre-orders on Halloween night.

The Bayonets & Tomahawks board was key to generating interest in the project. Most people have a positive reaction when they see it and they become curious about the game, which is good because they end up playing it! In this article, I’ll tell the story of its development.

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Colonial Twilight: Operations and Special Activities

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In this article I will write about the menus of Operations and Special Activities available to the two factions in Colonial Twilight: the Government, representing both local Algerian and metropolitan French authorities; and the political and armed fighters of the Fronte de Liberation Nationale (FLN), the insurgent force.

You may wish to refer to the previous two posts on the game, which explain the major differences and features of the game, and the forces and structures that meet in conflict within the game.