What's next for A&A?

[timerover51]

The industrial disparity between the North and the South is giving me some problems. I have several systems that I'm looking at, however. For the moment the game is on the back-burner, but I agree that it needs to be published one of these days. Thanks for your all your collective words of encouragement.

Somehow, a game covering the Civil War which would allow the South to win and continue the practice of chattel slavery has very little interest to me.

[AC]

Somehow, a game covering the Civil War which would allow the South to win and continue the practice of chattel slavery has very little interest to me.

But a game covering world war 2 which would allow the Nazis to win does interest you?

[Imperious leader]

You don't understand. All he does is create no win situations for the Historical losing side so students don't get any ideas that anybody wins except "good guys". He makes the games unhistorical so nobody learns anything except what he wants them to learn. Nice "teaching". If by chance a kid will be triumphant as Germany he changes the rules latter to give the Allies an even greater advantage. A joke really.

[AC]

The difficulty for Larry is making a game where on paper one side is destined to lose. The Confederates for example barely stood a chance against the Union. Yet history is littered with examples of victories against all odds. For example, Napoleon's successes and the 'Six Day War'.

[Imperious leader]

"Destined to lose" is cliche. The South had prospects and the ability to keep fighting what many Yanks figured was a war of attrition for little more than Lincolns desire to keep the nation whole. The South squandered their advantages and hastened defeat. But those decisions could be different which support different outcomes. The game must be balanced so that either side can win, which makes it fun.

I implore Larry to look at American Heritage Bruce Cattons Civil War for inspiration..especially the battle scene plates. If you don't get inspired to finish the game after exploring this book, don't know what to tell you.

[Imperious leader]

[Flashman]

Objective for the South should be a tie = survival as an independent state. In essence it has to make the North so sick of war that it sues for peace.

Therefore, the North has to defeat the South in X number of game rounds or it suffers political defeat.

This does not necessarily mean that the South just sits there defending the border; there have to be advantages to fighting the war on Northern soil.

A political "Victory Track" rather than ye ancient "Capture the Capital" would work here.

[timerover51]

Somehow, a game covering the Civil War which would allow the South to win and continue the practice of chattel slavery has very little interest to me.

But a game covering world war 2 which would allow the Nazis to win does interest you?

Not terribly, which is why I tend to modify the game quite a bit. I am presently teaching a class in World War 2, so I am very familiar with what the Nazis did. This morning, as we are covering the start of Operation Barbarossa, we covered Hitler's "Commissar" order, and his instructions for dealing with Russian Jews. Several times in the class, we have discussed who was worse, Hitler or Stalin? We also have covered, to the degree in which it is possible with high schoolers, the Rape of Nanking. The volume covering that subject which we have in the class library is restricted to students 16 and above.

My co-teacher and I also discovered, to our shock, that none of the high school students was aware of the Tokyo War Crime Trials. I am aware of exactly how the Japanese behaved, especially to captured airmen. I have spent time in the Solomon Islands in the South Pacific and spoken with the native people there about Japanese behavior. It apparently was worse than their behavior in China.

As you are in Australia, you might wish to consider the fate of 7 to 9 Australians captured by the Japanese at Buna in 1942. They were all civilians, 2 or 4 men, 4 women, and one child. I have the Allied Translator and Interpreter Section report covering the incident.