The "Workload" ratio of different wargames.

[nimtz]

Over time I've realized that a pretty big factor in whether I end up enjoying a wargame/campaign/scenario is the relative workload I have. That is, how many officers am I actually taking decisions for.

So I thought of a very easy way to "measure" said workload and compare some wargames that way. the process is pretty simple: You take the total amount of units under your direct command and you divide that by the amount of work a single officer is expected to have.

So if for example you take a company-lever scenario/campaign of CMx2 that would equate to a workload ratio of 5 (that is a company with 4 platoons). That if you are acting as the Company commander, issuing orders to your platoon lieutenants and also acting as platoon lieutenants issuing orders to your squads. It ends there since you do not have direct control over individuals in each squads (that is the job of squad leader is handled by the AI).

A battalion-level CMx2 scenario has a workload ratio of about 28 (4 Companies, 2 support platoons). Which makes it pretty easy to see why battalion-level scenarios have to be either played WEGO or in RT with lots of pausing to issue orders.

Now I'm curious as to the workload ratio of some other wargames out there, say WitE, WitP, the HPS panzer campaigns, the HPS squad battles etc...

[sburke]

Over time I've realized that a pretty big factor in whether I end up enjoying a wargame/campaign/scenario is the relative workload I have. That is, how many officers am I actually taking decisions for.

So I thought of a very easy way to "measure" said workload and compare some wargames that way. the process is pretty simple: You take the total amount of units under your direct command and you divide that by the amount of work a single officer is expected to have.

So if for example you take a company-lever scenario/campaign of CMx2 that would equate to a workload ratio of 5 (that is a company with 4 platoons). That if you are acting as the Company commander, issuing orders to your platoon lieutenants and also acting as platoon lieutenants issuing orders to your squads. It ends there since you do not have direct control over individuals in each squads (that is the job of squad leader is handled by the AI).

A battalion-level CMx2 scenario has a workload ratio of about 28 (4 Companies, 2 support platoons). Which makes it pretty easy to see why battalion-level scenarios have to be either played WEGO or in RT with lots of pausing to issue orders.

Now I'm curious as to the workload ratio of some other wargames out there, say WitE, WitP, the HPS panzer campaigns, the HPS squad battles etc...

Heh heh and then an evil voice whispers into your ear- "but what if you break up your squads into teams...."

[Michael Emrys]

Over time I've realized that a pretty big factor in whether I end up enjoying a wargame/campaign/scenario is the relative workload I have. That is, how many officers am I actually taking decisions for.

So I thought of a very easy way to "measure" said workload and compare some wargames that way. the process is pretty simple: You take the total amount of units under your direct command and you divide that by the amount of work a single officer is expected to have.

So if for example you take a company-lever scenario/campaign of CMx2 that would equate to a workload ratio of 5 (that is a company with 4 platoons). That if you are acting as the Company commander, issuing orders to your platoon lieutenants and also acting as platoon lieutenants issuing orders to your squads. It ends there since you do not have direct control over individuals in each squads (that is the job of squad leader is handled by the AI).

A battalion-level CMx2 scenario has a workload ratio of about 28 (4 Companies, 2 support platoons). Which makes it pretty easy to see why battalion-level scenarios have to be either played WEGO or in RT with lots of pausing to issue orders.

This is basically what I have been doing intuitively all along. There is a very good reason why real armies have chains of command. An officer with more than a small number of units under his direct control quickly becomes overwhelmed and cannot cope efficiently. The only way we as game players are able to exceed that very small number is by pausing the game or having the game proceed in turns with user-definable lengths of time available to consider and issue orders. Real life commanders almost never have that luxury.

Michael