[Consim-l] Re: [wargame-creators] Writing Rules

[Mike NotSpecified]

Designers notes are a great idea and usually interesting reading.  The purpose 
is to describe some of the design choices the designer faced and his rationale 
for the choices he made.  I don't think there can be any hard and fast rules 
about what to include, but some items I've seen beneficially addressed would 
be:

1) Why this scale?
2) Why include/exclude this or that particualer unit that was/could have been 
there?
3) What do certain combat modifers represent?
4) How were the unit values determined?
5) What happened historically (not very interesting, too brief a space)
6) What might have happened historically?
7) Some startegic options players might consider. (actually I'm kinda leery of 
this one, let the players discover the game for themselves.  But I've also 
seen this done really well and it can be a kind of jump start to learning the 
game, so you might consider it)
8 What design changes occurred during the design process?

Well, you get the idea.  The game before you represents a lot of choices the 
designer had to make.  Knowing what some of those choices were, and why he 
chose as he did, can be interesting.

(cross-posting to consim-l and boardwargaming at yahoogroups.com)


On Thu, 11 Jan 2007 00:27:25 -0900
  Abrigon Gusiq <abrigon at gci.net> wrote:
> Hum, helps the beta testers and more? To give credit to people
> and more?
> 
> Mike
> 
> 
>From: "Michael" <mike40k at shaw.ca>
> To: <wargame-creators at yahoogroups.com>
> Sent: Tuesday, January 09, 2007 3:08 PM
> Subject: Re: [wargame-creators] Writing Rules
> 
> 
> That looks good. Be sure to provide plenty of examples.
> Designers notes are the end are somehting you could add as well.
> Mike
>  ----- Original Message ----- 
>  From: boyce
>  To: wargame-creators at yahoogroups.com
>  Sent: Tuesday, January 09, 2007 2:53 PM
>  Subject: [wargame-creators] Writing Rules
> 
> 
>  Does anyone have an outline that rules should follow. I am
> tying to
>  get started writing rules for a individual low-level combat
> game. I
>  had an idea of how the rulebook should flow, but I wasn't too
> sure.
>  right now I am thinking
> 
>  1 - intro
>  2 - list of components
>  3 - list turn sequence a,b,c,d
>  4 - explain a
>  5 - explain b
>  6 - explain c
>  7 - explain d
>  8 - conclusion / historical notes
>  9 - scenarios
> 
>  any help would be appreciated. don't be afraid to email me at
>  boycedaniel at yahoo.com
> 
>  I am finding that this is alot like explaining a game to a
>  newcomer. you dont want to rush in but inadvertantly you do.
> 
>  thanks
>  Boyce
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
> 
>