Comments Off on Registration for Connections US 2024 now open
Posted by Rex Brynen on 22/04/2024
An update from Timothy Wilkie and the Connections US team.
On behalf of conference founder and co-chair Matt Caffrey and the rest of the Connections organizing team, I am pleased to announce that registration for Connections 2024 is now open! This year’s conference will be hosted by the U.S. Army War College at the Army Heritage and Education Center in Carlisle, PA, June 25-27. This conference is held at the unclassified level and is open to all members of the professional wargaming community, from military to government to academic to commercial hobbyist to contractor to private sector. We especially welcome our international participants.
The day before the conference begins, the Army War College will be hosting a series of classified wargame briefings on Carlisle Barracks. The classified event is open to all U.S. citizens with a SECRET clearance. The form linked below will register you for the unclassified conference June 25-27, and will collect your contact information to receive additional information about the classified session on June 24 if you indicate your interest.
The above link is to a Google Form, which sometimes are difficult to access from some military networks. If you have problems viewing or completing the form at work, please try from a personal device at home.
We have an exceptional program lined up this year and will be posting the conference agenda to the website soon. We are pleased to announce our two keynote speakers: John Nagl and Tom Mouat. The rest of the program consists of panels, seminars, game demos and playtests, small-group workshops, and more!
Since 1993, the Connections conference has brought together practitioners with a professional interest in wargaming from all elements of the wargaming field. Please help us expand our reach even further by passing this registration information along to those you think might be interested.
Comments Off on Connections UK 2024
Posted by Rex Brynen on 16/04/2024
An update from Graham Longley-Brown and the Connections UK team.
The Connections UK 2024 conference for wargaming professionals will take place Tuesday 10 to Thursday 12 September 2024 at Brunel University in Uxbridge, just to the west of London and five miles from Heathrow airport. Tickets will go live in mid-June and are likely to be in high demand. We’ll send more content details presently, but the main themes and sessions are outlined below.
The Connections UK mission remains ‘to advance and preserve the art, science and application of wargaming’. The two main themes this year are: engaging academia; and helping to improve methods, models and tools that contribute to better wargaming.
Connections UK 2024 will feature:
An Introduction to Wargaming course on Day 1.
A half-day icebreaker on the morning of Day 1.
A stream on wargaming in academia.
Practitioner-level workshops and seminars to improve methods, models and tools that contribute to better wargaming.
A stream on wargaming deterrence, escalation and de-escalation.
A stream on wargaming deception.
A stream on gaming social complexity, which will include the use of artificial intelligence to support wargaming.
Games Fairs on the afternoons of Days 2 and 3. See note below regarding entries.
The inaugural Peter Perla Commemorative talk, featuring Phil Sabin and David Banks talking respectively to the growth and future of wargaming.
Social gaming on the evenings of Days 1 and 2.
Semi-organised networking events during the evening social gaming.
Sessions designed to help the next generation of wargamers.
Hands-on workshops exploring topics such as microgames, a ‘game jam’ and a designers’ clinic.
Connections UK follows the week after the Wargaming in NATO (WIN) conference 2 – 4 September at the University of the German Armed Forces in Hamburg, Germany.
Connections (US) is 25 – 27 June at the Army Heritage and Education Center (AHEC) in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
Comments Off on Assises Françaises d’Étude du Wargaming (29-30 April)
Posted by Rex Brynen on 08/04/2024
Institut d’études de stratégie et de défense (IESD) will be holding the first ever Assises Françaises d’Étude du Wargaming (AFEW) on 29-30 April 2024, at the University Jean Moulin Lyon 3.
Le regain d’intérêt pour l’objet et sa méthode est majeur en France : l’objectif de cette rencontre est de lancer une dynamique de réflexion collective sur le wargaming, afin de poser les bases collaboratives d’un réseau d’échanges, et favoriser la connaissance des travaux de chacun des acteurs de cette sphère de réflexion, de connaissance et d’action.L’événement est construit sur la base d’une structure double :
Avec des sessions de conférences permettant d’aborder tour à tour l’objet du wargaming, via sa méthodologie, ses processus de création, ses acteurs structurants (quel lien entre concepteurs et end-users, militaires et civils ?) ainsi que ses usages diversifiés, en mettant l’ensemble de ces enjeux en perspective de manière historique et critique.
Les fin d’après-midis seront pour leurs parts consacrées à la pratique, au travers de la présentation de wargames professionnels par leurs créateurs, l’occasion d’échanger sur les objectifs, processus de création et cadres d’emploi.
Full details and a registration link can be found here.
Comments Off on Connections North 2024 AAR
Posted by Rex Brynen on 26/02/2024
The seventh annual Connections North interdisciplinary (war)gaming conference was held at McGill University in Montreal on February 17. Some 78 people registered for the event, a comparable turn-out to other recent year. The full programme can be found here.
The first panel of the day offered critical reflections on matrix gaming. Matrix gaming has become increasingly popular as a quick and cheap method for both educational and analytical gaming. Is it overused? What are its strengths and weaknesses? What are best and worst practices?
Madeline Johnson (Canada Revenue Agency) started us off with an overview of what matrix gaming is, for attendees who might be less familiar with the approach.
This was followed by two in-person presentations, by Jim Wallman (Stone Paper Scissors) and Sean Havel (Defence Research and Development Canada), as well as four short pre-recorded contributions by Tom Mouat (Defence Academy of the UK), Joe Chretien (US Army War College, ret.), Catherine Jones (University of St. Andrews) and Carsten Roennfeldt (Norwegian Defence University College).
Many excellent points were made by the presenters. There was broad agreement that good matrix games are heavily dependent on having “the right people in the room,” in terms of both expertise and diversity. There were some concerns that they are overused, in part because they are so easily developed and executed. Concerns were expressed about the potential effects that facilitators can have in distorting game outcomes. Finally there was considerable discussion of modifying the approach, whether as an ancilliary to other techniques, to increase analytical rigour (by introducing more structured systems or processes)—or, conversely, by adopting even more narrative-based approaches with even less formal structure. Underlying all of this was broad agreement that game objectives come first—only once you’ve decided on these, and also considered various practical considerations (participants, time, budget, etc.) can you begin to consider whether a matrix game approach is useful (or not), and if so how it might be used or adapted.
The second panel, chaired by Stephen Downes-Martin (US Naval War College), explored gaming deception. Stephen also talked about the new wargaming deception working group, a collaborative effort by Connections US (which will have a session on deception at their 2024 Wargaming Conference) and the Simulation & Wargaming Study Group of the Simulation Interoperability Standards Organization (SISO).
Next, Alex Karasick (Canadian Joint Warfare Centre) offered some thoughts on how deception is modelled in wargames. Central to this was what he termed the “paradox of deception,” whereby the more formally you try to integrate deception into a game design, the less it works.
I also presented some thoughts on the topic, drawing a distinction between “modelled” deception (in which deception is a game effect) and “executed” deception (in which one player is actually attempting to deceive another player). We are Coming, Nineveh! involves a bit of both.
Finally, Scott De Jong (Concordia University) talked about his ongoing work on gaming deception. He emphasized the need to rethink how we conceptualize deception; to more fully examine the “grey ecosystem” in which disinformation is created, disseminated, rebroadcast, and accepted; and to think more about non-traditional spaces (including games and play).
At this point, Connections North did something different—instead of another panel, we broke for an extended (3.5 hour) lunch break and “Connections North Expo.” The latter involved game demonstrations and displays from Archipelago of Design, Calian, Defence Research and Development Canada, HMCS Venture, Stone Paper Scissors, Concordia University, McGill University, and Sheridan College. In addition, students from my POLI 452 conflict simulation course put on a poster display session in which they discussed their serious gaming topics. This proved to be especially popular.
Our last panel of the day, chaired by Ben Taylor (Defence Research and Development Canada) examined wargaming and policy gaming in Canada: retrospect and prospect. The various panelists—Philippe Beaulieu-Brossard (Archipelago of Design), Anthony Robb (Canadian Joint Warfare Centre), Julia Smith (Simon Fraser University), and Christian Caron (Canadian Army Simulation Centre and Calian) offered their thoughts on progress made, obstacles , recruitment and development, and diversity and inclusion. A lively discussion followed.
I think there was broad agreement that despite progress, serious challenges remain, and that (war)gaming and other serious gaming in Canada often remains too dependent on the presence of a few sympathetic or knowledgable people in the right places, who are at risk of moving on, being replaced, or retiring. We also have a way to go in promoting in forging links across related communities, and in building greater diversity and inclusion. The medical simulation community, for example, is far ahead of wargamers in measuring educational impact and refining techniques—and yet we rarely interact. Manual wargamers rarely interact with digital game developers. We don’t do enough to reach out to game-adjacent methodologies, like red teaming.
We also could do more to encourage historically under-represented groups. Only 20% of our panelists at Connections North this year were women, down from 33% last year. However, we also have no travel support to offer, which makes it more difficult to recruit contributors. On the other hand, 37% of our attendees were women, perhaps the highest ever at any Connections conference. Most of these were students, so hopefully that is a positive sign in terms of growing the field and fostering new talent.
In the summer we will start thinking about Connections North 2025. If you’re interested in helping (or hosting), drop us a line!
Photo credits: Rex Brynen, Matt Caffrey, Mathieu Primeau (Via LinkedIn), Jim Wallman.
Comments Off on Save the date: Connections UK, 10-12 September 2024
Posted by Rex Brynen on 19/02/2024
As the headline above suggests, the next Connections UK interdisciplinary wargaming conference will take place on 10-12 September 2024.
The location will be Brunel University in Uxbridge, just to the west of London on the underground and five miles from Heathrow airport. Connections UK is delighted to be helping Brunel to launch a new Masters of Arts course in wargaming.
Detailed conference themes and content will follow in due course, as will information regarding ticketing. For now, please just save the date and note the location.
Connections UK follows the week after the Wargaming in NATO (WIN) conference 2 – 4 September at the University of the German Armed Forces in Hamburg, Germany. Connections (US) is 25 – 27 June at the Army Heritage and Education Center (AHEC) in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.
Comments Off on Last rolls – Summing up the War Games experience
Posted by Rex Brynen on 15/02/2024
The following item was written for PAXsims by Andrew Burtch and Marie-Louise Deruazof the Canadian War Museum.
On 8 June 2023, the Canadian War Museum opened War Games, an exhibition that had been in development through 2019 and delayed, owing to COVID. The exhibition was the product of a long research and relationship-building process between the Museum, wargame collectors, game development specialists, and the broader professional wargaming community. As of writing there remains about a week and change until the final closure of the exhibition War Games, so it seems fitting to summarise the exhibition’s development and its reception.
Fun news first. Since the exhibition opened in June, more than 140,000 visitors have seen fit to explore the world of war games as presented at the Museum, placing the exhibition among the War Museum’s best-performing offerings in recent years. Approximately 70 per cent of all visitors to the Museum decided to take a chance and explore the exhibition. To museum people, these are good capture rates, and we will surely be thinking about what the War Games experience taught us for quite some time to come. That outcome was surely not possible without the active and enthusiastic assistance of many of the regular readers and contributors to PAXSims and Connections North.
Observing youth interacting with contemporary small arms displays in the museum (above) suggested that their point of entry into military history was through online shooters such as Call of Duty. That, combined with the curator’s slothful enjoyment of video games and tabletop games in his off hours, led to the original idea paper which was submitted in 2012. As a series of exhibitions marking the 100th anniversary of the First World War was ending, the idea paper was dusted off and fleshed out with additional research into something more substantial.
There were many resources to draw upon to understand the history of wargaming, from histories of the hobby version of wargaming, such as those written by Jim Dunnigan and others, to historical surveys of professional wargaming by Peter Perla, Anthony Sabin, Matt Caffrey, and many others, there was an embarrassment of material available to produce a narrative of how games and war came to be so inextricably linked well before they became the subject of massive blockbuster AAA video game releases.
In early 2020, the exhibition team submitted the proposed exhibition topic to a series of focus groups based on audiences we were targeting. These groups were broken up into “day out” visitors, typically families or casual visitors, museum enthusiasts, and history seekers, the visitors most dedicated to learning about military history. The focus groups tested some of the assumptions the team had about the direction of the exhibition, its content and potential interactive elements and the research led to a few key findings. The exhibition had to have clear links between games and military history (what else is the War Museum for?). It had to have meaningful and unique interactives (games or things to do), otherwise the Museum risked reproducing experiences people could just as simply do at home.
The sum of the exercise meant that the team had to locate materials and stories that would speak to the international historical interconnections between war and gaming. The team also had to make some difficult decisions about what to include and exclude for reasons of space or feasibility. This meant that a wealth of wargaming history in Canada conducted through operational research outlets might not be covered as extensively as we (well, I) would have liked.
The team settled on an episodic but chronological approach to telling the story of the war and games connection from ancient times to the world wars, to the Cold War, to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, up to recent challenges to which contemporary wargamers had developed tabletop or digital responses. In each section we would seek to balance both the professional applications of wargaming and the ways in which wars seeped into popular culture through games. Where appropriate, we would point out the interchanges where military planners took advantage of game techniques and technologies to develop wargaming products, and conversely, how military techniques and technologies entered popular wargaming. We planned to present stories where possible that highlighted the diverse history of wargaming, a goal embraced in the spirit of the Derby House Principles. The approach was intended to present what we hoped were easily-digestible amounts of content that would speak to the Museum’s general audience of non-specialists who might be time-limited during their visit, so they could leave the exhibition understanding the basics of wargaming, featuring highlights of historical interactions between games and war. We knew that specialist audiences might be disappointed with some of our choices given their extensive knowledge of the subject, so we also wanted to make sure the exhibition was representative of some of the key stories. Specialists, we knew, could fill in the blanks on their own during their visit.
Research and consultation for this project led the team to interested parties at the Canadian Army Simulation Centre, Canadian Army Command and Staff College, the Learning Innovations Team at the Canadian Defence Academy, the Wargaming cell at the Canadian Joint Warfare Centre, Defence Research and Development Canada, the United States Naval War College Museum, the Frontier Army Museum, the Krulak Center for Innovation and Future Warfare, the National Army Museum, the Imperial War Museum, the RAND Corporation, Dundas West Games, the Strong Museum of Play, the Imperial War Museum, among our many contributors. From each contact we learned more about the history and modern circumstances of wargaming.
But one of the most important connections came about when team members had the opportunity to hear Dr. Rex Brynen speak about the art of wargaming at the NATO Operational Research conference that took place in Ottawa in the fall of 2019. It was through the team’s initial acquaintance with Dr. Brynen that we became aware of the broader defence research and wargaming communities, as well as some of the useful debates about the psychology of wargaming, tensions between scenario development and client expectations, and other elements that shaped exhibition research.
We had the considerable advantage in planning the exhibition by having access to the Canadian Museum of History’s Avedon Games collection, which contains a massive variety of Canadian and international hobby games including some of the Avalon Hill games used in the exhibition. We also had the considerable good luck of learning about the sizable collection of rare international war games held by David Stewart-Patterson, a retired journalist and thoughtful collector. His knowledge about his collection and trends in hobby wargaming was a huge help to the team. You can read about his insights and view highlights of his collection at https://www.gamesofwar.org/.
One of the most memorable experiences of the exhibition emerged from a collaboration with one of PAXsims’ own contributors, Kit Barry (Sheridan College). Early in the process we determined that we wanted to tell the story of the Western Approaches Tactical Unit (WATU), and gave considerable thought to how we might try to replicate the experience of convoy commanders passing through the WATU war game. Our own visitor research and previous experience presenting games in exhibitions taught us that the average visitor would not be able to endure a full or faithful playthough of the actual WATU game, so with Kit, we undertook to adapt the experience to engage with as wide an audience as possible. The initial versions of the game Kit had proposed was a tactical game that reflected the work done at WATU.We soon discovered that a fair amount of our audience may not understand the strategic situation in the North Atlantic. In the end, it was too difficult to develop a game that included both the convoy-level tactical decision-making and the strategic level context of the war.
After many iterations (this could be an article in itself) and considerable playtesting during the pandemic with long suffering team members’ families, then later with Museum staff and a few willing Museum visitors, the team settled on the format of the game Atlantic Peril. The game places players in the role of a convoy commander, directing a large convoy across the Atlantic, picking the route most likely to avoid encountering U-boats and temperamental weather, experiencing mechanical difficulty or unexpected intelligence along the way, and situating escorts around the merchant ships of the convoy. In each turn, the convoy fights different concentrations of U-boats, and depending on a variety of factors comes out victorious or limps to the next square of sea on the way to Liverpool. The game has been played hundreds of times in the exhibition space, each playthrough guided by one of the Museum’s well-trained Program Interpreters who adapt play for very young children or wargame novices as well as more experienced hobby wargamers and history buffs (history seekers, in museum-speak). The very positive response to the game suggests that the compromise we reached through playtesting, seeking to make the Battle of the Atlantic understandable in its broader context, was a win-win. The end game communicated a scenario that even young children could understand, while providing essential context for the surrounding displays about WATU, including convoy track charts, illustrations of the actual WATU war game in progress, and artifacts. The convoy escort game pieces for the game were 3D printed based on Helen Coop’s WATU game piece which was graciously loaned to us by the Western Approaches Museum. Unsurprisingly, the museum was asked many times whether the game would be packaged for sale. The short answer is no, but the Museum does plan to make the game available as a free download and will be adapted for the permanent galleries as a staff-led guided activity.
We value the considerable public engagement with the exhibition, and regard it as a result in part of the many emails, calls, in-person or virtual consultations held with specialists in this community and elsewhere. For what we got right, thank you. And for what we left off the table, well, there’s always the next round. The strength of the War Games exhibition lies in considering the games themselves as artifacts rather than as temporary experiences. They tell us about what people, professionals, hobbyists, and novices absorbed about the wars of their time. Some of these stories came out when we toured audiences through the exhibition who would often bring up the role that games had played in their own personal and professional lives. The exhibition presented unique museological challenges, whether it be in tracking down questions of intellectual property from game publishers, reproducing game artifacts as playable experiences. Much as a wargamer’s work isn’t completed when the board is put away, the work of the Museum doesn’t stop once the exhibition closes. We will undoubtedly be reflecting on the experience of the War Games exhibition for some time to come.
Andrew Burtch and Marie-Louise Deruaz, Canadian War Museum.
Comments Off on MIT Summer Wargaming Institute
Posted by Rex Brynen on 11/02/2024
The MIT Wargaming Lab will be holding its inaugural Summer Wargaming Institute from 28 July to 1 August 2024. The Institute will “bring together a group of PhD students, junior faculty, and early/mid-career national security practitioners to participate in classes and hands-on wargaming exercises”—and they will be covering all costs for PhD students who attend.
Comments Off on Two weeks to Connections North!
Posted by Rex Brynen on 03/02/2024
There are only two weeks to go until the Connections North professional (war)gaming conference, which will be held at McGill University in Montreal on February 17.
Last year we were joined by an amazing group of game designers including Jason Matthews, Tory Brown, Volko Ruhnke, Liz Davidson, Elizabeth Hargrave, David Thompson, Sebastian Bae, Jan Day, Maurice Suckling, Gilberto Lopez, Talia Rosen, Jason Perez, Dan Bullock, Alex Knight, Akar Bharadvaj, and many more. Come join old friends and meet new friends at the friendliest game convention on the planet.
This year Circle DC will be hosted at the Planet Word museum. Planet Word is the only museum in the country dedicated to renewing and inspiring a love of words and language. Located in the historic Franklin School on the corner of 13th and K Streets in downtown D.C., Planet Word opened in 2020 as a new kind of interactive and self-guided museum.
We will be listing events and a specific schedule as we get closer to the event date.
Registration for the Connections North interdisciplinary (war)gaming conference is now open (via Eventbrite). The conference will take place on Saturday, February 17, at McGill University in Montreal.
CONNECTIONS NORTH is an annual conference devoted to conflict simulation, wargaming, and other serious games. It is intended for national security professionals, policymakers, researchers, educators, game designers, university students, and others interested in the use of serious games for analysis, planning, education, and training.
Connections North is part of the global network of Connections professional wargaming conferences in the US, UK, Netherlands, Australia, and Japan. Along with many others, we are cosponsors of the Derby House Principles on diversity and inclusion in professional wargaming.
The 2024 Games for Change festival will take place this year in New York on 27-28 June. They are currently accepting proposals for conference speakers and panels, until February 5.
The King’s Wargaming Network 2023 keynote lecture will feature Dr. David Banks speaking on “Do Not Pass Go: Why Establishing the Foundations of Wargaming Matters.” The lecture will take place on 7 December from 1900-2030 GMT at Anatomy Lecture Theater K6.29, King’s Strand Campus, King’s College London.
Wargaming has been used in military, government, and private sectors for decades, with tens of millions of dollars spent on it annually. Yet the epistemological foundations of the method remain poorly understood. Without establishing such foundations the method is unable to convince sceptics, establish methodological standards, and develop a consistent language of comparative evaluation. Wargamers cannot simply ‘pass’ this problem and assume it will resolve itself over time. Instead, it is necessary to identify the prominent distinguishing features of wargaming as a method and investigate if and how they produce knowledge. In this talk, Dr David Banks identifies five such features of wargaming and considers how better understanding them can provide some epistemological foundations for the method of wargaming.
Dr. David Banks is Wargaming Lecturer at the War Studies Department at King’s College London, where he also serves as the Academic Director of the King’s Wargaming Network. He has designed a number of wargames for research and education and teaches two MA modules on wargaming methods and wargaming design. His current wargaming research is focused on determining epistemological standards for evaluating wargames as a research method. This includes projects on the foundations of wargaming, how to link theory to design, and the role of subject matter experts in professional wargames. In addition to his wargaming research, Dr. Banks also studies diplomatic practice in international society, with a special emphasis on symbolic and rhetorical diplomacy. His current book manuscript researches the motivation for and political consequences of state violations of diplomatic practice.
Additional details and registration at the link above.
David Manley (UCL) was recently presented some work that he and Nick Bradbeer (UCL) have been involved in with NATO. The project looks at the use of wargaming as an engineering concept evaluation tool and was carried out for the NATO Specialist Team on Naval Ship Systems Engineering.
He was kind enough to pass on his slides and presentation, which you will find below.
PAXsims 