RAND releases Hedgemony: A Game of Strategy

RAND has now published its strategic board game, Hedgemony. The rules and players guides are available for for free at the RAND website, and a boxed edition can be ordered for USD$250.

U.S. defense strategists and policymakers have the perennial challenge of developing capstone documents that can coherently articulate and guide how the U.S. Department of Defense will deliver and maintain combat-credible military forces to deter war and provide national security in alignment with national strategy. These forces must be ready to fight and prevail should deterrence fail against a variety of threats in an evolving and uncertain global security environment, and they must be able to do this with acceptable risks — both in the present against today’s threats and in the future against threats that might emerge. Key audiences for these capstone documents include defense planners, programmers, budgeters, managers, analysts, and policymakers who support the development and management of forces that can be postured and employed in alignment with a given defense strategy to accomplish objectives.

Against this backdrop, RAND researchers developed Hedgemony, a wargame designed to teach U.S. defense professionals how different strategies could affect key planning factors in the trade space at the intersection of force development, force management, force posture, and force employment. The game presents players, representing the United States and its key strategic partners and competitors, with a global situation, competing national incentives, constraints, and objectives; a set of military forces with defined capacities and capabilities; and a pool of periodically renewable resources. The players are asked to outline their strategies and are then challenged to make difficult choices by managing the allocation of resources and forces in alignment with their strategies to accomplish their objectives within resource and time constraints.

The game itself is multi-sided, with an umpire/facilitator.

Hedgemony is a global, multi-sided, turn-based, facilitated, adjudi- cated wargame designed to teach U.S. defense professionals how dif- ferent strategy and policy priorities could affect key planning factors in the trade space at the intersection of force development, force manage- ment, force posture, and force employment. Players, representing Blue (the United States, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization [NATO], and the European Union [EU]) or Red (Russia [RU], the People’s Repub- lic of China [PRC], the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea [DPRK], and Iran [IR]), are presented with a global situation, competing nation- al incentives, constraints and objectives, a set of military forces with de- fined capacities and capabilities, and a pool of periodically renewable resources. Players are also asked to summarize their strategies and ob- jectives in writing before play starts. The game is about players making difficult choices by managing the allocation of resources and forces in alignment with their strategies to accomplish their objectives within re- source and time constraints.

Hedgemony is designed to be expertly staffed and facilitated. Facilitation is provided by a White Cell, a team composed of two or more experts who act as game masters and referees. Facilitators are responsible for

•Advising players on game rules and play strategies to accomplish learning objectives

•Keeping play on pace and on track through the various phases of each game turn

•Advising and walking players through the adjudication procedures for each action and event

•Maintaining and summarizing the overarching “story” of what player actions or interactions, game events, and their outcomes would likely represent in the real world

•Resolving disagreements over interpretation of game situations and rules

•Overseeing notetaking and data collection.

Although players are expected to try to “win” by achieving a certain amount of Influence—either in absolute terms or relative to one or more other players—within a certain number of game turns, the game is primarily focused on the learning objectives of the U.S. player, with the NATO/EU player, the Red players, and the facilitators all serving, essentially, as “training aids.” Thus, play balance, particular strategies and priorities of specific non-U.S. players, and the specific sequence and frequency of events played by the White Cell may all be shaped by session learning objectives as part of a given session scenario.

And yes, in case you are wondering, the game IS called “Hedgemony” with a “d”:

The name Hedgemony arose from the nature of a common challenge facing those who craft U.S. defense strategy. For the past 30 years, U.S. defense policymakers have been focused on an environment that has presented the United States with options for employment of defense forces in many different roles (such as humanitarian assistance, counterinsurgency, and major power conflict) and in many different locations (such as Afghanistan, Estonia, Haiti, Iraq, Korea, and Somalia). U.S. defense policymakers must prepare for a variety of near-term contingencies while also building U.S. armed forces for the future. The tension inherent in this set of challenges led us to think in terms of “hedging strategies”—the kinds of strategies investment professionals use to deal with uncertainty in the investment markets. This challenge also typically entails efforts to either maintain parity or achieve overmatch with one’s adversaries. Hence, we have the term Hedgemony.