Napoleonic HITS Game June 6-7

I think to much is being made of this. From my limited understanding, Sunday's battle was a true KS situation. Based on the limited information available, Mike made a rational decision. I agree that that CinC has to be allowed to decide whether an attack goes forward or not. Yes it is a game with no real consequences, but as Roland said, what's the point of having a CinC if he's not really in charge.

I suppose we could have decided that for the purpose of that scenario the Russians were defeated and then carry on with the battle just to see if that would really be the case. Afterall this was a co-op battle. What would be the outcome if it had been PvP? If the attacking side calls off the fight without achieving the objective, the other side wins. The scenario is over. If the CinC is to be ignored in this situation, then the we always know that every battle will be fought to the last man. I don't find that to be a palatable philosophy for our style of play.

We are a group, the C-in-C is only a player in that group. The C-in-C surely has authority to break off an attack and withdraw, or retreat if he's on the defensive and thus bring combat to an end, or almost so. However if some players are still active in one area of the map and wish to play on, we, as a group, should respect their wishes.

This isn't something that will affect every game, possibly not even many games. Its the principle I am highlighting here.

A C-in-C only issues orders, he doesn't control the game.

Of course I imagine much of the time when the C-in-C issues commands that result in the battle ending then the game will end as well since the players will mostly agree. All I wanted to say here is that we as a group run the games we play, or a scenario author does, not any individual in the chain of command.

I don't see this as analogous with every battle being fought to the last man at all, far from it, we as mature wargamers will mutually agree when a point has been reached that the battle is decided. My reason for posting this was because we clearly had a player who was enjoying the game, it was not much time into the scenario, people may have allocated (important!) game-time away from their family for these events and he preferred to play on.

Roland - nothing to do with me being away or referencing games I was not in. The banter issue has been growing for many weeks and I have been mulling over making a comment on it for a long time. The fact I wasn't in the battle where the C-in-C called it without all players agreeing is not relevant; its a matter of principle, not of presence.

Of course in PvP games the side that is losing/has lost/clearly has little chance would be the ones to request the game be ended.

Like Magua from the Last of the Mohicans, Pepe of Villaflor didn't want to go home with his tomahawk unbloodied.

I think there were a few who didn't want to go home - including me... but I respected the decision that was made... one can always continue the fight another day...

PS: the "not being present point" was related to Digby's comment on "friendly rivalries" being moved over to in-game battles... it simply never happened like that while I was present... which is of course not very long... but long enough...

Digby, you were not even there and have chosen your on view/or side as to what happened.  If this is how things are with the armchair generals you can have it all to yourself.

All the other players respected my call except for Pepe.  Pepe only answered a fraction of my messages, I had no idea what was going on and his last message was that he was blocked and could not advance to the flank to help us out.  The center was crushed and we were in dire straights. The enemy was pouring through the middle. My plan failed andit was time to pitch tents and fight another day.  I thought that we were supposed to play like we were real commanders and that is why I made the decision to call off the attack.

Then Pepe was quite rude said he could not believe that no one took charge then he accused me of calling the game because I had no troops then he carried it onto the forum. The short time I have been here I have never seen a CinC treated so poorly. Good grief!

The other day one was assigned to Pepe and he said only if I can court marshal him for not falling his orders and yet he can't do the same to other CinC's.  That person has not returned to play another game.  Furthermore Pepe in games that he is not CinC has ordered me to do things contrary to the CinC orders.

But I kept quiet and just pushed on.

I was going to keep this out of the forum but since the slinging is out so be it.

I don't know where you got your facts from since you never even asked me you just assumed

Quite disappointing.

Since I have appeared to have broken the unknown law of CinCism I shall self discipline myself with a long visit to the stockade.

Have a nice day!

As I said above, this is not incident-related but principle-related.

It is the principle of making sure all players want to end a game.

I am not pointing a finger at individuals and there is no need to take any criticism personally. That is why it isn't relevant if I was not in that particular game.

If another player is not communicative in any game that is no reason to make any judgements against them. Pepe may have had to deal with events in his household distracting him from the game, in any case it doesn't matter. Each of us is as important as the next person whether they seem to be "into" a game or not. We can't judge them.

Why do people always take things so personally?

The argument is fruitless.



This statement applies.

• Kriegsspiel Website • Kriegsspiel Event Schedule
Welcome to the Kriegsspiel Forum. We like to play mainly for fun. Competitive games are good for those who enjoy that
atmosphere, but we aim to attract a wider group of players for some of whom a much more relaxed environment is important.
All types of player are welcome to join us, but we do ask everyone to respect the ethos of our group, which is that winning isn’t everything.

Well, Josh, MJP, and I certainly didn't want to end Santander when we were killing Spanish at a rate of 100 to 1 a minute at the end. I'm an extra 3,000-4,000 allied casualties would have looked better in the campaign, non?

I, at least, understood why the Spanish wouldn't want to continue in that regard.

I do a great effort in order to be able to play these games, and I don't play daily, so I don't like to see a battle finnish before started.

Never ever has one person decided to end a game, at least since I am playing. It is always spoken.

Pepe only answered a fraction of my messages

I sent you many messages, I was getting yours so I guess you were getting mines, I don’t know if you did read them.

Pepe in games that he is not CinC has ordered me to do things contrary to the CinC orders

Don’t remember. Maybe you can refresh my memory.

I am not going to go into to anything with you Pepe or anyone else.

This was just a simple game and look where it has gone.

If I ruined your day I am sorry, but to continue talking about it serves no purpose.

You could have expressed that if wanted to but instead you snidely accused me of quitting because I had no troops it pissed me off.

Time to move on.

AWESOME!

And this is why HITS is a useful approximation to real life uncertainty in highly dynamic situations, like a battlefield, only without all the blood. I saw similar behavior, dynamics and assumptions in my own limited combat experience. Except the noises were much louder. A while back when I taught military history at the USAF Academy I dedicated a couple class session to this exact scenario, only it was with miniatures vice PCs, radios vice courier and a living opponent vice AI and it was WWII Russian front vice Napoleonic. I had the cadets write after action reports and we discussed a lot of things based on selected readings from Clausewitz.

Just as this post series has a wide variety -- even quasi polarized -- opinions I found the same with cadets. We had a couple friendly fire incidents. The cadets who did the shooting more or less dismissed it or never noted it. The cadets who got shot by their friends pretty much made it THE headline of their report. And when we sat down to discuss the exact same situation as viewed by different command echelons, the perspectives were sometimes wildly different.

And THAT in my view is why HITS is so cool. I wish I could play more often than once or twice every 2 weeks. Regardless, Sunday was the best couple hours of gaming I have had in a long time. Look forward to the next one!

Sorry if I was rude Mike.

Thanks and no problem Pepe, sometimes the heat of the battle make us all (me included) act, say or do something we wouldn't normally say or do.  So goes life!

All water under the bridge.


Thanks again.