Front Page

Content

Authors

Game Index

Forums

Site Tools

Submissions

About

KK
Kevin Klemme
March 09, 2020
35145 2
Hot
KK
Kevin Klemme
January 27, 2020
20825 0
Hot
KK
Kevin Klemme
August 12, 2019
7405 0
Hot
O
oliverkinne
December 19, 2023
3967 0
Hot
O
oliverkinne
December 14, 2023
3497 0
Hot

Mycelia Board Game Review

Board Game Reviews
O
oliverkinne
December 12, 2023
2075 0
O
oliverkinne
December 07, 2023
2583 0

River Wild Board Game Review

Board Game Reviews
O
oliverkinne
December 05, 2023
2255 0
O
oliverkinne
November 30, 2023
2496 0
J
Jackwraith
November 29, 2023
3016 0
Hot
O
oliverkinne
November 28, 2023
1973 0
S
Spitfireixa
October 24, 2023
3692 0
Hot
O
oliverkinne
October 17, 2023
2625 0
O
oliverkinne
October 10, 2023
2461 0
O
oliverkinne
October 09, 2023
2289 0
O
oliverkinne
October 06, 2023
2505 0

Outback Crossing Review

Board Game Reviews
×
Bugs: Recent Topics Paging, Uploading Images & Preview (11 Dec 2020)

Recent Topics paging, uploading images and preview bugs require a patch which has not yet been released.

× For those who like to push chits.

Since GMT's Labyrinth may be GotY material...

More
14 Dec 2010 07:14 - 14 Dec 2010 07:54 #82007 by scissors
Anybody else think the game is flawed as a simulation as the latest review - by a "foreign policy expert" - suggests on TOS? :)


www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/594871/flaw...t-thats-difficult-to
Last edit: 14 Dec 2010 07:54 by scissors.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 08:31 - 14 Dec 2010 08:32 #82016 by dan daly
I've responded a few times in the thread. Is it a "perfect simulation"? No. Is it a very good game. Yes.

A lot of people there seem to think that the the OP really knows his stuff. WHY? Read his profile. He got a Phd in terrorism in 1990. It doesn't sound like he ever did anything with the degree (nothing wrong with that, I don't really use my degree) and now works in the computer industry. So how the heck does that make him an expert on Counter-terrorism/Counter Insurgency circa 2001-present? Based on his comments, I think the OP's dream War on Terror game would be less connected with reality than Labyrinth is.
Last edit: 14 Dec 2010 08:32 by dan daly.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 09:07 #82022 by scissors
Well, I put the expert in ""

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 09:24 #82025 by Msample
Given the polarizing nature of the subject material, at times the CSW game folder has become a train wreck and been far worse than the thread on TOS as people argued the merits of the conflict. While the OP in this thread may have some points, neither he nor anyone else who have criticized the game have offered up any constructive ideas on what they would change that would keep the game rules overhead as clean as it is right now. Basically, they want an ASL level simulation with the rules overhead of Memoir 44.

I also think that many people get too caught up in taking things literally. Its like those who trash Combat Commander because they lack a fire card and the opponent can walk in the open. I look at it as that they maybe did fire ( not explicitly as if they had a Fire card ) but that fire was even less effective than a shitty card draw on the Fire effect.

For instance in regards to Labyrinth the OP calls out that it is wrong for the same terrorist cell to travel from country to country and be able to set off plots. Or that the Jihadist player has too much central control. Where in the game does it say that these are the exact same guys? To me, it reflects the ephemeral nature of trying to track these guys down. Once you play the US player you'll realize how hard it is to pin the other player down.

Finally, I think the game topic just invites self important people to get up on a soapbox. Just play the fucking game - its good. Designing a game on an assymetrical conflict where one side doesn't have an OOB published as an official history or a handy dandy org chart is a lot harder than doing one on say the Battle of the Bulge.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 09:54 #82028 by dan daly

Designing a game on an assymetrical conflict where one side doesn't have an OOB published as an official history or a handy dandy org chart is a lot harder than doing one on say the Battle of the Bulge.


Another challenge for the designer was coming up with victory conditions for the US, which is something else people seem to be griping about. Al Qaeda at least has stated objectives, but the US government has never defined "victory".

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 09:56 #82029 by scissors
Self important is right when you consider the OP has never even played against a live opponent. Yet he can right ten pages about how the game fails as a simulation.Seems a bit obssessive to me and actually nasty when considering the potential damage it does to the designer's hard work. He hasn't really even played the game.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 10:33 #82031 by san il defanso
I love Twilight Struggle, and I'd really like to play this one. Of course, I don't think I could own it without the mere presence of the game starting an argument, since it's such a politically charged topic.

Looks excellent though, I really want to try it.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 11:06 - 14 Dec 2010 13:26 #82034 by Gary Sax
I made my thoughts known in this thread:

www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/585823/how-...-conflict-with-islam

Volko's language and viewpoint all say US policy guy---good governance, hard/soft posture, etc. Think one of the wikileaks cables state department type guys (though my feeling is he works in defense, based on the game). The dude is pretty knowledgeable about the situation, is my read. I'd trust him more than some guy who got his terrorism PHD and likes to use his degree on BGG. That said, some of his choices, like saying that good governance is all about representation, don't ring true with me. I imagine good governance in Labyrinth as primarily really stable governments with institutionalized powers and no major internal rivals... meaning somewhere like Singapore would be something the USA would like in some of these countries while they didn't give a shit about democracy if they could do it some other way.

I find the game itself quite unrealistic in some ways (which I laid out in that thread) but quite interesting and provocative, if not totally accurate, in others. In aggregate, I find the simulation interesting and credible if you start from his mostly reasonable assumptions. I discuss the assumptions I have real trouble getting behind in the BGG posts I linked.

That said, some things in this game that reflect reality are done with some real style, and they are done subtly that someone who played it once or just looked at the rules wouldn't know:

1) The importance of diplomacy and advantages of soft power with relation to the rest of the world and the likelihood of successfully influencing governance

2) The domestic audience for terrorism---the funding track---is really deftly handled and very cool. I think it's right that jihadists are working towards two goals, potentially overthrowing their horrible authoritarian governance AND bringing in the funding from donors that will help them do that. In this game, terrorist acts are primarily a way to raise money and hurt US prestige, which I think is spot on.

3) I really like that there is an adversary/ally track in addition to the governance track. It would have been a mistake to leave out the ally/adversary track. You can have an enemy good or fair regime that simply doesn't like the US. This creates a nice effect of having the jihadist player store troops there, just the way an enemy adversary nation might assist guerrillas to hurt US interests.

4) There are tons of great give/take events. Leak is the best example of this. The USA player is tempted to do nasty things like set up wiretapping or nasty torture methods but if he does could be exposed with one of the Leak cards and be in for a world of hurt prestigewise, which prevents him from influencing Muslim governments.

One point I think that is important to emphasize is the Paths of Glory and Twilight Struggle point that if the game is played well between two equal players, it ends up having some resemblance of reality. If it's played unequally it goes off the rails and ends in a more unrealistic outcome. I find many of the people questioning the reality of the game are questioning the fact that something could be done, not so much that it would happen between good players. So big countries like Indonesia or Saudi Arabia falling to jihadists. Unlikely in real life (well, Saudi Arabia is pretty fucked up) but can happen in the game---but if it does the USA is in some deep fucking shit and a good player probably wouldn't let it happen.

For what it's worth I'm finishing my PHD in comparative politics in a couple months at a tier 1/top 25 university. Terrorism is not my specialty but I do a lot about democracy, democratization, etc and have to watch a lot of talks on security and civil war (snore).

I think Dogmatix is a policy guy in the federal government, maybe he has some thoughts on this.
Last edit: 14 Dec 2010 13:26 by Gary Sax.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 11:27 #82037 by Dogmatix
dan daly wrote:

I've responded a few times in the thread. Is it a "perfect simulation"? No. Is it a very good game. Yes.

A lot of people there seem to think that the the OP really knows his stuff. WHY? Read his profile. He got a Phd in terrorism in 1990. It doesn't sound like he ever did anything with the degree (nothing wrong with that, I don't really use my degree) and now works in the computer industry. So how the heck does that make him an expert on Counter-terrorism/Counter Insurgency circa 2001-present? Based on his comments, I think the OP's dream War on Terror game would be less connected with reality than Labyrinth is.


Ultimately, he's a terrorism buff. No better or worse than any of the guys who post arcane details on Kampfgruppe Whomever OT&E during Operation Market Garden or the Bulge all over CSW. It's an interesting read but it's no better than listening to a graduate student bloviating in a seminar course (and he's so unbelievably full of himself it's kind of painful--although that's kind of redundant with "grad student seminar"). When it comes to capturing the essence of the Labyrinth story from the perspective of a hardcore policy wonk, I'm putting my money on Volkho. He really is an actual day-to-day wonk and is a lot closer to current US thinking. Labyrinth captures a "moment in policy time".

IMO, the OP makes one of those thought errors that is horribly common in this hobby: conflating "simulation" and "game." They aren't even close to the same since the game can't simulate a situation to predict future events. Shortly before its demise, a real simulation expert who happened to be a wargamer (and possibly former SPI designer too) wrote a series of interesting articles for Fire & Movement (F&M) on how simulations (and the training systems they support) work and what their goals are. One of his basic points was that "conflict simulations" really don't (and generally can't) have any real simulation to them. It's just not how it works. Wish I had kept those damn articles since they'd been useful to trot out here.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 11:43 #82039 by Michael Barnes
Whew! Good thing the game isn't intended to be a "simulation", otherwise it'd apparently be an abject failure!

This is one of those "Well, I know all about this" kinds of things where some jerkoff with his head up his ass wants to let everybody know what he got his degree in by demonstrating his superior knowledge of a subject. The problem is that this fucker clearly doesn't understand that LABYRINTH is a _game_, and it's a game that has a particular, authorial viewpoint- that good governance and accountability can prevent Jihadism from taking root in impoverished countries with irresponsible governments. He's also got a lot to say about the US global role in policing the Muslim world. I don't agree with some of Mr. Runhke's extrapolations, but at least he has a viewpoint and something to say rather than "go have fun".

The game is a masterpiece. But it's still a game.
The following user(s) said Thank You: Erik Twice

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 11:51 #82043 by dan daly
Looks like the "review" thread has jumped the shark. I posted some more of my thoughts to the one Gary linked to. Reposted below. I'll try putting together an actual review sometime in the next couple of weeks.

The game certainly makes a lot of assumptions and simplifications, as all games do. I think the designer did a very good job overall finding the balance between amount of rules and making a playable game that still gives a plausible narrative.

A couple things that jump out to me as I look at the mechanics critically from a "realism" perspective:

-It is just as difficult for the US to project military force into Afghanistan, a landlocked mountainous country far from any traditional US allies or bases as it for the US to move against a Taliban-style regime in Morocco which has major seaports and is next door to permanent US bases in Europe. In essence, there is no "terrain" on the board. Of course as you delve deeper you see that it IS more difficult for the US in Afghanistan then it is in Morocco because of the deck. The cards build the terrain in the game. This is not as readily apparent unless the players are familiar with the deck and can play appropriately.

-This goes along with the last point, but there would also be more significant political/victory consequence attached to certain countries. A nuke going off in Israel would be a bigger deal for Al Qaeda then one going off in the Philippines or Denmark. At the same time, an Islamic regime, a US regime change, or the removal of all US forces in Saudi Arabia would seem to be a more significant event then the same things happening in Sudan or Libya.

NOTE- I am not saying the designer messed up by not including all these things. Special case rules can easily gum up the works and make the game harder to learn and play.

What I would have liked to see done differently is domestic US politics. I think the Bush administration had to spend as much effort fighting for "prestige" among the US voting population as it did among the "arab street". Popular support is/was key, and it has eroded gradually, not all at once as the hard/soft marker implies. I think doing Popular support as a track like Prestige or Funding would work better then simply having hard/soft and it's either one or the other. Cards like "Michael Moore", "Cindy Sheehan", "Body Count Milestone", etc would degrade popular support while plots and capture/kill of HVTs could improve it.

The game also ignores the idea of "the terrorists winning" by the US government taking civil liberties away from citizens. There is no negative consequence for the US player to implement the Patriot Act for example. I don't think this is an area the designer wanted to go, but it would have been interesting to see what he would have come up with.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 12:04 #82047 by SuperflyPete
scissors wrote:

Self important is right when you consider the OP has never even played against a live opponent. Yet he can right ten pages about how the game fails as a simulation.Seems a bit obssessive to me and actually nasty when considering the potential damage it does to the designer's hard work. He hasn't really even played the game.


Yeah, the OP is a douche. It's funny, I actually stumbled onto that "review" due to Dan's post here in my review of A Lone Banner. What's funny is that the OP didn't actually review the game, he just popped off about how wrong the game designer was about the game without actually talking much about the game.

I thought the Euro-litist cocksuckers were haughty, but oh my...the "Gronards/Wargamers" are a cheeky bunch of bastards, aren't they. I stirred the pot and was told "looking at your collection, you don't really know anything about real wargames." Oh, and the "it's the historical perspective that makes people like wargames" argument. Never mind that there's plenty of sci-fi and fantasy wargames, because those must not actually be wargames.

Fucking wankers.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 12:05 #82048 by Gary Sax
Yeah, consimers can be a bunch of real fucks.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 13:23 #82052 by Notahandle
I could say I had a Phd in my profile here; doesn't make it true. And he's criticising without having played the game? Maybe he's found the ideal game with which to be a very successful troll. (I'm not going to bother reading the TOS thread to find out though.)

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

More
14 Dec 2010 14:13 - 14 Dec 2010 18:29 #82056 by Dogmatix
Gary Sax wrote:

I made my thoughts known in this thread:

www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/585823/how-...-conflict-with-islam

Volko's language and viewpoint all say US policy guy---good governance, hard/soft posture, etc. Think one of the wikileaks cables state department type guys (though my feeling is he works in defense, based on the game). The dude is pretty knowledgeable about the situation, is my read. I'd trust him more than some guy who got his terrorism PHD and likes to use his degree on BGG.


Here's VR's bio blurb as of 2008: MS:Foreign Service, Georgetown, 1986. Deputy Group Chief CIA Counterterrorism Center. Previous CIA Deputy National Intelligence Officer for Science & Technology. (And, since my employer provides pulls staff from CIA CTC, I'll have to ask around to see who knows him...[edit: we have a large presence at NCTC, not CIA's CTC--I always forget the fucking things are different--though I do know a significant number of colleagues who have come out of and/or provide contractor support for Agency CT jobs)

Pulled from a Georgetown School of Foreign Service on getting a job in foreign affairs: books.google.com/books?id=UBWNE_75ivYC&p...ots=kCpDzpublication

I'm kind of guessing that Volko is kind of clued in to US thinking in the CT policy realm.

Just a guess though... ;)

Edit: not sure why my previous URL link got all fucked up but whatever...
Last edit: 14 Dec 2010 18:29 by Dogmatix.

Please Log in or Create an account to join the conversation.

Moderators: Gary Sax
Time to create page: 0.214 seconds