On Saturday I took part in the second Wargame Developments Annual Virtual Gathering. To enable US members to take part, it began at 2.00pm and lasted - with breaks for snacks, meals etc. - until almost 10.00pm.
After a very brief introduction (2.00pm to 2.05pm), the first session (2.05pm to 3.00pm) was a presentation about Oxford during the English Civil War.
The next session lasted from 3.15pm to 4.15pm and was a discussion and workshop about Wargaming Positional Warfare during the Great War.
From 4.30pm to 5.30pm was a discussion about the future of Wargame Developments and saw the launch of the draft of the third edition of the Wargame Developments Handbook.
This was followed from 5.45pm to 6.45pm by a presentation about Wargaming in the Royal Navy from 1900 to 1915.
After a long break for attendees to eat a meal, the next session ran from 8.15pm until 9.15pm and examined the efficacy of professional wargames fought between 1970 and 1995 at predicting the future.
The event ended with a session about the Battle of the Atlantic.
As usual, the whole event was well organised and now that so many people have experience of using Zoom, went off without any significant technical problems.
Please note that attendance at the Virtual Gathering was restricted to members of Wargame Developments, unlike VCOW (the Virtual Conference of Wargamers) where non-members can pay to attend.
Bob, Saturday's gathering was enjoyable. My attendance was cut short by a phone call but I was able to listen in on the first two presentations.
ReplyDeleteWhen I first saw the agenda, the first presentation on "Oxford in the ECW" sounded moderately interesting. What I discovered was that the topic was very interesting especially from an American not that familiar with English geography, city defenses, and road networks. Fascinating stuff.
On the topic of positional warfare in WWI, I expected a more wargame-centric discussion on helpful techniques and approaches to modeling static warfare. With David Isby in attendance, I figured a discussion on changes in thinking and simulation since his publication of "To the Green Fields Beyond" for SPI in 1978 would have been very enlightening.
Jonathan Freitag,
DeleteI am pleased that you were able to ‘attend’ at least part of the Virtual Gathering.
The session about wargaming in the Royal Navy was very interesting, and I look forward to reading Toby’s book when it is published.
I missed the last two sessions myself due to a prior commitment, but I understand that they went very well.
All the best,
Bob
Just out of curiosity, what is the Wargame Developments handbook?
ReplyDeleteChris,
DeleteIt explains some of the game design terms used within WD (e.g. Megagame, Plumpire, SCRUD). The current second edition can be downloaded from the WD website.
Read and enjoy,
Bob