Wargaming Roots: Wargame Complexity

A fun little snip on the design of the Tunnels and Trolls Adventures mobile game's "about" page strikes an interesting point here about the development of pen-and-paper games and the hobby's wargaming roots:

In 1975, as role-playing games were beginning their rise to popularity among the gaming community, Ken St. Andre found himself dissatisfied by the complexity and inaccessibility which rules systems of other games presented newcomers to the genre. Seeking a game with which to introduce his friends to the world of interactive storytelling, Ken set out to create a lighter and more flexible rules system which would provide players with greater latitude for heroic feats. He did away with the often times dauntingly complex stat sheets and tables found in the wargames from which the first RPG was descended, and created a game more inspired by the deeds of comic book superheroes. Ultimately, Ken named his game Tunnels & Trolls.

We have come a long way from the Chainmail "wargame" style rules to a more player-focused and I feel accessible B/X style, and then from there I feel we went deep into the wargaming side of the hobby again with D&D 3rd and 3.5 Edition, Pathfinder, D&D 4, and then D&D 5. Our wargame roots are clearly on display and this has spawned an entire group of games these days that are more accessibility focused than complex wargame focused.

More Complex These Days?

In some ways, I feel we are way beyond the complexity of the 1970's wargame-roots games, especially with Pathfinder, D&D 4, and software like Hero Lab. D&D 5 I feel took a step back from the abyss, but I still feel the older B/X games and their clones do a better job at controlling complexity and focusing the action more on the adventure rather than the character.

Some products make me smile, like the Pathfinder Strategy Guide, a great book that tries to tamp down the complexity of the base game, explain things to beginners, and make a complex system easy to use. But really, when I think about it, I get this feeling if the effort were put into making the system easier and not needing a book like this would be a more laudable goal. Games that are simple and accessible to beginners do not need how-to books.

Part of me likes the complicated game though, and there are fans of this hyper-detailed genre of gaming, again, hearkening back to our wargaming roots and having detailed World War II wargmaes with rules for jammed turret rings, smoke capacity, the ammunition capacity and depression limits of of bow-mounted tank machineguns. I have played wargames like those, and while the one or two times that level of detail comes up in a 6-hour game you may be happy to have these rules, more often than not I find rules like this slow the game down more than they do add value.

I feel the same with detailed character generation systems. Our tendency as designers is to add more, to make options for every possible character type and background, and through universal inclusivity we weigh the system down so much we end up needing multiple pages for one character. Genesys requires three sides of paper for each character, and that has hurt our desire to play what should have been a simple storytelling game. Pathfinder, the king of complexity, requires Hero Lab these days, and it is not uncommon for us to be printing out six to twelve sides of paper for each character.

Less is More

And I look at the single-sided one-page character sheets of Labyrinth Lord and other B/X games and I see a lot of wasted space, and that is a good thing. I could do a B/X character on a quarter sheet of paper and put four to a side and still have plenty of room. Back in old-school Traveller we put one character on two lines of a sheet of notebook paper.

We still had fun with those games because we ran fun adventures and we didn't need detailed character essays for each player to pour over. I get this strange feeling at times that games use complexity to drive interest these days, that somehow a detailed character generation system makes up for a lack of compelling adventures and stories. That is really an unfair statement for many games, but I see so many games that are 90% character creation systems and then assume everything else, story, adventure, and how to have fun comes for free.

I would rather play a game that was 10% character creation and 90% story and background. Call of Cthulhu and Dragon Age are good examples of modern pen-and-paper games that minimize the game rules while maximizing story content and background information. I would put T&T in this category as well, especially with the incredible world-book in the Tunnels and Trolls Deluxe Edition in the latest version of the rules.

B/X and Labyrinth Lord? These are more giant toyboxes with 10% character design and the rest of the 90% are monster, spell, and magic item lists. That toybox content is the story and background. There are times when I like this, since I make my own stories and worlds anyways, and other times when I miss having that world and story to play through (and save me the work).

How far off are the more modern games from the toybox model? It is a bit tougher to judge I feel, since you have a good portion of these games tied up in character design and it grows in size the more books you add to the system. My generic rule is: if a computer program makes character creation easy and error free, the character design system is heavy. If it takes me more than 5 minutes and a sheet of paper to design a character that is too long.

If you need to pass a book around the table for players to design characters you have dependencies in there that should be streamlined onto the character sheet (or eliminated from the game). If I play Pathfinder with a group again I would love to have class-specific character sheets, one for paladins, one for rogues, and so on...

Everything to Everybody?

It brings to mind the question, "How much character design do you need to tell a story?" There is a point where there is too much, where you are making a feat to cover a bonus to every possible action and interaction, such as a feat that allows you to call a truce during combat. These sorts of feats rub me the wrong way in two ways: this is codifying roleplaying and creativity, and you are adding unneeded complexity to the character design system. Without this feat...you can't roleplay this? When I am refereeing the game it becomes another added "thing I have to remember" in order to play when the one character in a thousand's player actually bought this feat and expects it to come into play.

In T&T or B/X? Hell, make a CHR saving roll or roll under Charisma at a minus whatever and we are done. In most every other game it is an ability score roll, the current situation, and referee judgment. Done.

In the 1970's wargames there was this tendency to start simple, and then balloon complexity with each new expansion and revision. Track performance in taiga and mud for armored vehicles. Fuel performance and ambient temperature. Snowshoe size versus snow type. Curvature of the Earth and muzzle velocity of off-board artillery. Most of the rules had some historical event behind them and they probably affected the outcome of some real-world battle somewhere...but there is a point where enough is enough.

If I equip my desert soldiers with snowshoes does that give them a movement bonus? If my winter partisans carry large desert water packs at what point do those freeze? Do I need a table for that?

And the more complicated wargame goes in the closet and the new game that was designed for fast and fun play goes on the table. That is where I am with Pathfinder. Completely bought in with both books and Hero Lab and we never play it really all that much. Great customers and lousy players.

Simple Games are More Fun for Me

So I come back to the old versions of games, the retro-clones, and some of the classics made back in the day where they saw this problem and designed against it. Labyrinth Lord and B/X. Tunnels and Trolls Deluxe Edition. Other classics. There are some new games, such as Savage Worlds and FATE, that attack complexity of character design versus story and those are worth mentioning too.

I see a collection of huge books for a gaming system and my reaction is, "I don't have enough time for these anymore." Instead of feeling bad I switch games that I do have the time for. I am sensing another round of boxing games up coming here soon. It is a sad thing but also a good thing, since it lets me focus on games I want to play (and it frees up space for more games, like Traveller's new edition).

My thing is, play what you love - and some people love the complexity. I have moods when I love all the detail and choices. Be happy if you can find people who love what you do and play with them. As my players dwindle and I find myself more and more alone, my tastes and needs change. I want less record keeping and design. I want solo play. I want smaller rules and tighter designs. I want more story and world, and less rules. I want attribute systems that handle many things, and less flipping through books to find a rule that handles a special case.

My tastes are changing more towards the retro-clones and classic games that I started the hobby with because those are what I love and where I find the most comfort.