The Map is Not the Campaign

Generating random terrain for wargames

This column will be a bit different, in that it’s a bit of a review of a couple of magazine articles, and some ideas of my own, inspired by them.

The articles are from Miniature Wargames magazine, and both are by Conrad Kinch, from his column Send Three and Fourpence. In MW #472 Kinch pens a scenario (the second of two) for the Black Ops (Osprey) rules, Fighting Patrol. This article showcases a scenario where the terrain features very heavily. In fact, the terrain and how it is discovered during play is as big a part of the game as the forces involved!

Using Blinds in Black Ops

For the Fighting Patrol scenario, Kinch provides a map of the 6’ x 4’ table marked into 1x1 square grids. This map is used to manage the action on the table, specifically related to “Blinds”, or unknown features of the terrain or area of the table.

Blinds are a mechanic used in Black Ops to represent the Fog of War. The rulebook recommends using playing cards, but they could be 3x5 cards, chits, tokens, or specially-made miniatures. The Blinds represent hidden or as-yet-unobserved troops or vehicles.

Player A places Blinds on the table, including some blank ones, to represent unknown forces, their type and strength. Player B will then flip the cards to identify the forces when they are scouted or another unit moves within range. This is a common and highly effective method of representing hidden forces. It’s especially useful for making solo wargames more challenging and entertaining.

The article includes a list of 23 custom-made Blinds for the scenario. Many of these are very much narrative in nature, not adding troops or mechanical effects to the scenario. For example, “You find a wrecked civilian car. the driver, and elderly man, is slumped over dead at the wheel.” This result, and others like it, fairly scream for long-term campaign play.

Who is the dead man? Which side was he on?

Quite the hook for another scenario!

Downloads

A list of Event Cards can be downloaded from the Tabletop Gaming website - Downloads (this list is a little bit different than the one in the print magazine).

The Map is Not the Country

In the second article, from issue #474, Conrad Kinch visits the Boyne Battlefield and walks the actual land where the battle took place. He says what made this visit interesting was, “…the nature of the battle was dictated by the ground, but also by the combatants’ limited understanding of that ground.”

In this particular battle the fortunes of war depended heavily on this lack of understanding. Units attempting to outflank the enemy were literally bogged down by wet ground. Cavalry charges were disrupted by walls and hedgerows. These same obstacles provided cover for those forces the cavalry were hoping to attack! This cover gave them an opportunity for a deadly counter attack.

As in the previous article, Kinch provides additional rules for scouting unknown terrain and using more of the Blinds mechanic from Black Ops. The terrain cards that accompany this article are of a different nature than those mentioned before. In this case the cards are divided into Terrain Types, and each card contains slightly different effects. As an example, Player A might place a piece of forest terrain on the battlefield, but neither player knows exactly what effect it will have on movement or shooting!

Only scouting ahead, or actually moving a unit into the forest will flip the card and reveal its effects. It may or may not block line of sight. It might provide cover from fire, be counted as difficult ground, or both.

These specific cards are based on a WW II era game, so there is a set of cards for built-up areas too. It would be a simple matter to generate cards for hills, swamp, open ground, and so on. Kinch describes this example as a proof of concept piece, rather than a complete system, but I definitely think he’s on to something.

In fact, I think there is one more piece to this puzzle that bears discussion: combining blind terrain effects with actual random generation.

Creating a Foggy Battlefield

The playing area of the Oregon Trail boardgame is generated randomly by drawing tiles and “building” your trail as you move across the board. Each tile has a fixed mechanic associated with it.

I can envision a wargame where the players take turns assembling the battlefield, more or less randomly depending on the scenario. A second pile or deck of cards with a variety of mechanical terrain effects would be drawn from as play progresses and units move across the battlefield. Even open terrain could play a part, as low-lying areas could be marshy and impassable. A relatively small and otherwise fordable stream could be swollen and treacherous due to rain upstream. The brush and scrub on a hill could conceal dangerous loose rocks, or smooth climbing on an unknown cow path.

The Map is Not the Campaign

These kinds of terrain challenges, both mechanical and narrative, are perfectly suited for campaign play. They will require a larger variety of troop types, especially those that excel at scouting or recon, in any era or genre.

I believe both the HEXTRAIL and FANTASYGRID concepts could benefit from random terrain placements and effects. Especially when both games are used in parallel for creating a multi-session campaign. Not only these games, but I suspect the concepts can be applied to virtually any wargame, in any era, mass battle or skirmish.

In coming weeks we will definitely be applying these concepts to the ongoing design parameters of both boardgames. And the Aliens vs Cowboys game videos…

Resources

Link to blank cards on Amazon - miniature blank playing cards

Tabletop Gaming website