What's your strategy?

[MetalDog]

I was thinking about this earlier today.  A couple of weeks ago, I picked up a game of Warlock:Master of the Arcane that I had left for dead.  With hard work and persistence, I have brought things back on track.  My main enemy, the Grand Librarian, has an empire as large as mine and is every where I am.  I want to bring him to heel, but, it will be a tough slog.  I am no where near his capitol and getting to it would take an inordinate amount of time and treasure. 

What occurred to me is, that I could fly a scout unit close to his capitol and start to Teleport my best troops, two a turn, to just outside and start pounding away.  Taking his capitol would eliminate him and make the rest of his empire into Neutral cities which anyone could take at their leisure.  What I found interesting about that idea is that it is unusual for me to even think about doing that.  I am usually very linear in my approach to games and achieving goals and victory conditions. 

What I wanted to know from the rest of you is, how do you approach your objectives and victory conditions?  I realize that a fantasy game has options available that a real life conflict game does not.  Magic chief amongst them.  But let's say you are sitting down to play a game based on the Normandy invasion.  Or the American Civil War.  Knowing what has come before, do you follow history closely?  Or do you look at terrain, forces arrayed against you and resources available to you and come up with your own plan?

[-budd-]

I consider the factors and come up with my own stupid,doomed to fail plan and roll with that ;D but thats what i call fun.

[GDS_Starfury]

it really depends on the type of game and what I can get away with.  and it follows that the games that let me get away with the most have been my favorite games.

[Bison]

I sometimes wonder if the notion of a truly historic game is more a sense of perception rather than reality.  Generally historical accuracy in a game deals with the TOE, OOB, and maps but the strategies don't necessarily follow the historical ones. 

I just play the games and usually don't give too much thought to how so and so commander executed the battle plan.  Once the game starts it's all armchair general Bison in command.

[MetalDog]

I sometimes wonder if the notion of a truly historic game is more a sense of perception rather than reality.  Generally historical accuracy in a game deals with the TOE, OOB, and maps but the strategies don't necessarily follow the historical ones. 

I just play the games and usually don't give too much thought to how so and so commander executed the battle plan.  Once the game starts it's all armchair general Bison in command.

So, for instance, you wouldn't go into an ACW game as the Union with General Winfield Scott's Anaconda plan in mind? 

[Bison]

I sometimes wonder if the notion of a truly historic game is more a sense of perception rather than reality.  Generally historical accuracy in a game deals with the TOE, OOB, and maps but the strategies don't necessarily follow the historical ones. 

I just play the games and usually don't give too much thought to how so and so commander executed the battle plan.  Once the game starts it's all armchair general Bison in command.

So, for instance, you wouldn't go into an ACW game as the Union with General Winfield Scott's Anaconda plan in mind? 

I guess but what scale and what game are you playing?

[GDS_Starfury]

I'll say it again.  the more sandbox you give me the more creative I get.

[Anguille]

In Historical games, i often play the losers and therefore a) try to succeed in a good strategy they had but didn't manage b) try to find another solution.

Cheers

[ComradeP]

It depends, sometimes the historical strategy is the most efficient but in many cases I'll use my own strategy.

Wargames tend to give you a lot of freedom to do so, as C&C and logistics are often simplified and movement - and stacking limits also tend to give you more options than your historical counterparts. There's often no penalty for sending most of an Army Group down the same road or relocating forces to the other side of the map, for example. There are usually also no clear areas of operation, units from different corps and armies can cooperate with at most a small combat effectiveness penalty when attacking together, but there's no penalty for mixing units from different corps or army in a certain sector.

That can also make scenarios in wargames more interesting than their historical counterparts or unbalanced and boring, depending on how onesided the advantages offered by the simplification of military operations are to the attacker or defender.

[Martok]

I consider the factors and come up with my own stupid,doomed to fail plan and roll with that ;D but thats what i call fun.

That's pretty much what I do as well, regardless if the game is in an historical setting or not. 

[MetalDog]

I sometimes wonder if the notion of a truly historic game is more a sense of perception rather than reality.  Generally historical accuracy in a game deals with the TOE, OOB, and maps but the strategies don't necessarily follow the historical ones. 

I just play the games and usually don't give too much thought to how so and so commander executed the battle plan.  Once the game starts it's all armchair general Bison in command.

So, for instance, you wouldn't go into an ACW game as the Union with General Winfield Scott's Anaconda plan in mind? 

I guess but what scale and what game are you playing?

No specific game.  I play a lot of TBS and Grand Strategy games.  I was just wondering how people apprached their victory conditions.  Star seems to be of a mind to find solutions that are unorthodox.  I tend to look for the path of least resistance.  Rarely do I have a well thought out plan, like Anaconda.  And I VERY rarely historical game and if I did, I am usually unaware of any plan likely to have a code name.

[Greybriar]

In Warlord: Master of the Arcane, I always go for the capital city of the wizard(s) I am at war with.

[MengJiao]

What I wanted to know from the rest of you is, how do you approach your objectives and victory conditions?  I realize that a fantasy game has options available that a real life conflict game does not.  Magic chief amongst them.  But let's say you are sitting down to play a game based on the Normandy invasion.  Or the American Civil War.  Knowing what has come before, do you follow history closely?  Or do you look at terrain, forces arrayed against you and resources available to you and come up with your own plan?

  I usually fix the scenario first.  For example, in WiTE, there was a 1942 start, but it started after the Russians had already gotten messed up in the Crimea and 2nd Kharkov.  Or maybe things were about to go bad in the Crimea but hadn't yet.  Anyway, before playing the scenario, I set the time back to April, gave the Russians their troops and turf back that they had lost in 2nd Kharkov and got almost everything out of the Crimea.  Then things got rolling and I merrily obliterated the Axis AI forces.  I think I did the roughly the same thing in Case Blue.  1942 can be so satisfying for a Russian player who resets the scenario to April.

[JasonPratt]

In Historical games, i often play the losers and therefore a) try to succeed in a good strategy they had but didn't manage b) try to find another solution.

This +1

I consider the factors and come up with my own stupid,doomed to fail plan and roll with that ;D but thats what i call fun.

And/or this.

As a general rule I try to ignore any historical pre-knowledge and play historical games as though they're fantasy and I don't know the plot already.

I'm vaguely plotting a giant game experiment where I install all the major WW1 games I can find, for example, and play them all as Russia, more-or-less simultaneously, with as close to the same basic plan as possible per game, and see what happens. But my basic plan isn't the same as Russia's basic plan: I'm going to stake out a defensive line, get the country up to snuff before I go on the offensive generally, and otherwise try to help Serbia defend against the AusHuns. Survive the War intact.

[W8taminute]

In general I try not to game the game by exploiting the ai or gameplay elements.  Doing a Kobiyashi Maru scenario Captain Kirk style just to get a quick win is not my cup of tea.  I'm like Khan and prefer my conflict more open, more honest. 

So what I try to do is if I'm playing a historical strategy game I try to recreate history as close as possible.  I might try to change one or two variables a little just to see what would have happened if...

But I get great joy over executing the Schlieffen plan or fighting France 1940 the same way it played out in real life over and over again.  It's not just about winning a game it's about connecting with the past somehow and reliving it as close to history as possible.  I love this kind of play and eat up any history type strategy game.

For games like Warlock or Armada 2125(sp?) I try to play as orthodox a game as possible.  I won't try to go after his capital and take it out.  Mopping up the leftover neutrals is not fun to me even though it would mean I will win the game.  No, I prefer titanic struggles pitting shear strength of military and industry with a little brains thrown in.  I like to roll play in these kinds of games and imagine the anxiety someone in this position must be going through as the war drags on. 

If I'm playing a strategy game against human players be it PBEM or live IGOUGO over the internet I play to win by whatever means necessary.  As long as those means are honorable and do not resort to gamey tactics or Captain Kirk style altering of the game parameters.  (IOW cheating)

Above all I play honestly and honorably because if I am to ever play the same human again I don't want my reputation destroyed because I was a total tool who resorted to rush tactics or other gamey tricks.