Monthly Archives: March 2021

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“It’s All in the Cards”: A Compendium of Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East’s Cards: Chapter One, Part Four – Great Person “Power, Money (Mina) & VP” Cards

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Introduction by ACME Game Developer Fred Schachter:  The previous parts of this Chapter One introduced readers to the game’s Great Person Investment, Competition, and Spy cards. This exposition now proceeds to cards with much varied, but never-the-less valuable attributes.  Having additional background regarding this forthcoming GMT P-500 listed game should assist a reader’s appreciation of this article series.  This can be obtained from material resident in GMT’s site for the game: GMT Games – Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East

But first a word from Designer Mark McLaughlin…

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Laban! Chapter 2: Support, Opposition, and Resistance in People Power

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Unlike other COIN games, People Power does not simply measure the Support for, or Opposition to, the Government. In most COIN games, Support and Opposition measure the willingness of a population to actively enable or hinder the operations of a faction through supplying guerillas, providing intelligence, and supporting Government operations.

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It’s Not Easy to Be the Sultan: Modeling the Collapse of the Delhi Sultanate in Vijayanagara

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Introduction

With Vijayanagara we are seeking to present a detailed look at an epic period of medieval history, and in a region and time which has seen scant attention in the historical gaming community, or in entertainment media, or even in educational domains. We have yet to meet a single person not of Indian descent who has heard of any of the important figures of this era, or even the names of the once-great kingdoms and dynasties that appeared in the time covered by this game. And yet centuries later a nation of over 1.3 billion people has emerged from this turbulent past, with modern perspectives still influenced by an ancient history.

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Factions in Red Dust Rebellion: Earth Government and the Space Battlefield Domain

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The future of our species depends on us becoming a multi-planetary society. And it is to this end that the United Nations of Earth have poured our collective efforts into the Martian project.

And what a project it is, the great of human endeavors, reaching out into the stars to bring life, love, and society to a barren world.

It is an enterprise bigger than any national concern, or bigger than any corporate concern. It is an enterprise founded in the long-term future of us all. For humanity, we must put aside partisan concerns and focus on the real goal.

Our future as a species hangs in the balance. Which is why I ask my fellow council members for more resources to suppress this rebellion. The childish wants of the rebels on Mars must be denied. They seek to pervert this most noble of goals to their own ends. And they seek to deny us the home we have built for humanity.

We must not let this adolescent temper tantrum ruin what is our best hope for survival.

We must bring Mars back into the fold, at all costs.

Ekon Imbrahim, UN Secretary for the Council of Martian affairs
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“It’s All in the Cards”: A Compendium of Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East’s Cards: Chapter One, Part Three – Great Person “Spy” Cards

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Introduction by ACME Game Developer Fred Schachter: The previous part 2 of this series examined the game’s Great Person Competition cards. We now proceed to cards whose function is not overt on the game map… the “Spy” cards of Ancient Civilizations of the Middle East whose shadow role occurs before a turn’s first Competition is resolved! 

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Almoravid: A Quick Look at Forces

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Here from the game’s designer with its researcher is an at-a-glance introduction to the units in the soon upcoming second volume of the Levy & Campaign Series, Almoravid—Reconquista and Riposte in Spain, 1085-1086, with comparison to the forces used in volume one, Nevsky.

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Laban! Chapter 1: Corruption and Patronage in People Power

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Whenever I develop a game, I am always looking for ways to make the narrative shine. Usually, that involves consistent terminology, clear rules, concise player aids, and suggestions on what tweaks can be made to help the game get out of the way of the player, and allow for full immersion in the story. Occasionally more major changes occur, and while painful, these almost always improve the end result.

People Power is one of the latter cases. Ken Tee (the designer of People Power) has always had a strong personal story in mind for People Power, but playtesters were not experiencing the narrative in the way Ken intended. One major hurdle was the MNLF (Moro) faction, which ended up being dropped, but the main narrative issue with People Power was the victory condition for the Government. While many COIN factions use Victory conditions centered around Support for the Government (US in Fire in the Lake, Batista in Cuba Libre, France in Colonial Twilight), the Marcos regime was fundamentally unlike these governments.

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What is the ‘Irregular Conflicts Series’?

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As COIN Series Developer, I see a lot of cool prototypes. One of the hard things about my job is determining which prototypes will work well as COIN games, and which prototypes belong in a different series. There are lots of reasons that a game may not be perfect as a COIN Series game, but often it’s as simple as a game not adhering to a well-established and specific COIN conflict model. What is the COIN model, and why is it so important that a COIN game fits into the model advanced by Volko back in Andean Abyss? If COIN can portray the Gallic Revolt against Caesar or the American Revolution, why can’t it work for conventional warfare or purely political conflict? There are many great games that aren’t COIN games, and it is hard to determine how best to organize them!

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Recreating History with Prime Minister’s Scenarios

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Prime Minister already offers a highly thematic gameplay experience in its standard format, but if you want to take that experience to a higher level, you can try one of the twelve scenarios planned for the game. In this fifth InsideGMT article for Prime Minister, we’ll take a closer look at those scenarios, starting with an overview and then delving into some examples.

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“Poland is Not Yet Lost”: Playing Next War: Poland (Part 3)

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Ian M. Sullivan is the Special Advisor for Analysis and ISR at the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence, US Army Training and Doctrine Command.

Disclaimer: All views expressed in this post are the author’s and do not necessarily reflect those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Army, or Army Training and Doctrine Command