Designer Blogs

The Factions of Plum Island (or … What Futility Personified Looks Like)

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As I’ve explained to you all numerous times before (ad nauseum, to be honest), each player involved in The Plum Island Horror will be controlling one of the six available factions. These factions represent groups of people who are associated with one another for one reason or another … work, recreation, favorite bourbons, culinary tastes, […]

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Designer Blogs

Cross Bronx Expressway: Positioning Players in the Bronx

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Asymmetric game design often lives and dies on the way players relate to their positions, frequently expressed through factions. In historical simulations, the faction design provides a framework through which players can execute their strategies. When done well the strategic choices presented to them create a decision space which mirrors the history, or at least

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Designer Blogs

The British Way: Cyprus

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In this article, we will conclude our coverage of the games in The British Way by overviewing the British emergency in Cyprus from 1955 to 1959. Cyprus is probably the easiest game in the pack to learn for those new to the COIN series, but will offer a drastically different experience for COIN veterans due

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Designer Blogs

War or Diplomacy? The Struggle Between the Wargamer vs Eurogamer Soul in the Design and Development of Congress of Vienna

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Introduction by Congress of Vienna Assistant Designer & Editor – Fred Schachter:This article is appearing after conclusion of an InsideGMT article series, a Standard Game After-Action-Report (AAR) of one of Congress of Vienna’s Scenarios, “The Clash of Armies”, which starts in August 1813 and runs through the end of that fateful year which encompasses many

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Designer Blogs

18 India: Mitigating Randomness (Part 2)

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In the previous InsideGMT article, we shared how 18 India mitigates the randomness of the initial distribution of certificates in Francis Tresham’s 1829 Mainline. In this issue, we will discuss another mechanic tweak that further decreases the randomness found in 1829 Mainline while maintaining its unique fun.

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Designer Blogs

The British Way: Kenya

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We continue our chronological coverage of the individual games in The British Way by moving on to the British counterinsurgency campaign in Kenya from 1952-1960, although the game only covers the most intensive years from 1952-1956. While the British were beginning to gain the initiative in Malaya, they responded to rising violence and unrest in

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Designer Blogs

Cross Bronx Expressway: Modeling History Through City-Building

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The map for Cross Bronx Expressway shows eight out of twelve community board districts in the southern section of the Bronx. A few communities in the city of New York, in the state of New York, in the country of the United States, on this planet we call Earth. The game zooms into this small

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Designer Blogs

18 India: Mitigating Randomness (Part 1)

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In the previous InsideGMT article, we mentioned that some of Tresham’s mechanics for 1829 Mainline contained randomness that we did not enjoy. In this article, let’s discuss those mechanics and what we did to preserve their flavor, while also managing to mitigate the random elements. As we have made our way along the 18 India

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Designer Blogs

The British Way: Malaya

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In our last InsideGMT article we covered the British counterinsurgency campaign in Palestine between 1945-1947. Just as the British were withdrawing from Palestine, labor unrest was rising in the British colony of Malaya. In July 1948, the British declared a state of emergency against the rising unrest and violence being organized by the Malayan Communist

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Designer Blogs

Arrows in a CDG? How the Map of The Bell of Treason Outlines the Upcoming Crisis

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The Bell of Treason: 1938 Munich Crisis in Czechoslovakia is the next installment in GMT Games’ informal ‘Final Crisis’ series. It is a successor to Mark Herman’s Fort Sumter, which depicts the secession crisis that culminated in the U.S. Civil War, and Fred Serval’s Red Flag Over Paris, which depicts the crisis following the formation

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Designer Blogs
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