The core design of Bear Trap is now done, and the two-player game is polished. So, in today’s article I thought I’d share some comments on my experience designing Bear Trap.

Ideation

I first thought of creating a game about the Soviet-Afghan War while teaching Military Ethics at university in 2013. I was drawn to the topic because of my interest in the Cold War. But there’s a lot of other interesting things going on in this conflict, beyond being a feature of the Cold War.

The Soviets used a fighting force designed for an anticipated European conflict. The Soviets had visions of a quick war which didn’t align with the realities they would face over the decade long struggle. They weren’t up for the task they would face in Afghanistan. They were ill-suited to deal with under-trained freedom fighters wanting to repel foreign invaders through a widespread insurgency. As the war dragged on, in many ways, the Soviets effectively committed a sunken cost fallacy. While these might be oversimplifications here, these factors—and the narratives around Soviet tanks streaming across the border, the desertions, and the terror wrought by Soviet airstrikes—pulled me in and engaged my interest.  But even for those not explicitly interested in the Soviet-Afghan War, Bear Trap—as a learning tool—can act as a lens through which they can learn more about aspects of history that have helped shape, or have been informed by, other things that that they are interested in. 

In this InsideGMT article, I’ll give some historical comments on a few (but not all) of the strategy cards. I want to unpack the events and people at play behind these cards so you can better appreciate what they represent. But this is a high-level overview of the historical background, and detail here is sacrificed in the pursuit of brevity.

Note that this the second part of a two-part series of InsideGMT articles about the cards in Bear Trap—in the first part, I discussed how the different cards work and what the deck compositions look like in the game.

If you have trouble reading the card text on the card graphics presented here, take a look at the second page of the Bear Trap player aid, which can be found on the GMT webpage for the game, as the card text for all strategy cards can be found there. (And note that the cards depicted here are playtest components and still subject to possible change—including text, art, and graphic design.)

For those unfamiliar with how these strategy cards work in the game, here’s a quick overview: Each side has eight pairs of strategy cards (16 cards total). During setup each player will choose one strategy card and add it to their deck—thereby informing their initial strategic direction. Then, each time a player reshuffles their deck, they add two additional strategy cards to their deck. This allows them to develop their overarching strategy in reaction to the changing game state. It’s also worth noting that, during setup, each player will remove a random pair of strategy cards from the game. This means that a player cannot ever rely wholly on one pair of strategy cards to be a staple of their approach to the game, as it won’t necessarily be available to them in one playthrough or the next.

In past InsideGMT articles, we looked at the gameplay in Bear Trap and provided a simple combat example.

Part of the asymmetry in Bear Trap emerges from the way the cards work. And so, in this InsideGMT article, I’ll explain how the how the different cards work as well as look at the force pools and deck composition for each side. This is first part in a two-part series of InsideGMT articles about the cards in Bear Trap—in the second part, I’ll give some historical comments on some of the more interesting strategy cards.

Broadly speaking there are 3 types of cards in Bear Trap—unit cards, loyalty challenge cards, and strategy cards. (Note: The cards depicted here are playtest components and still subject to possible change—including text, art, and graphic design.)

In this article, I’ll provide a high-level overview of the mechanics found in Bear Trap, and an explanation of the gameplay. This example of combat in a prior InsideGMT article will also help elucidate some of the explanations found here.

Note that, for the sake of brevity, the rules aren’t described here in complete detail—for anyone interested in reading further, the draft player aid and draft rulebook can be found on GMT’s webpage for the game.

In this InsideGMT article, I’ll walk you through a simple example of combat in Bear Trap. This should give you the flavor of the combat system in Bear Trap – as well as how it’s similar to, yet also quite different from, combat in Sekigahara. Because of the timescale over which Bear Trap is played, “battles” resolved by the players don’t represent singular quick events resolved in hours. Instead, they represent weeks-long campaigns over an area that could span more than 15,000 km². In this way, the scale of the game is quite different to Sekigahara.

Note: draft playtest art is use for the cards, blocks, and map here.