'Discovering' wargaming history (1) An embarrassment

Everyday I learn something new. This is not a throw-away line, but a genuine comment. A wonderful colleague of mine always asked, 'what have you learned?', instead of 'how are you going?' I have held on to this as an approach to work and life in general. There is so much new to learn about, be they snippets, details or entire new areas. Sometimes though, I am flabbergasted at learning something fundamental about which I was previously unaware in an area where I thought I had the basics covered (at least).

So it was a couple of week's ago with my discovery of a glaring gap in my knowledge of the history of wargaming and of the development of formalised rules for this activity: Kriegsspiel. Forget ya 'latest and greatest' wargame rules penned by some wargamer, it has all been done**, by a civil administrator and his son, a serving artillery officer, and then published—back in 1824.

Cover of the 1824 version of Kriegsspiel, translated by Bill Leeson

A little clarification, perhaps even defence, on my part.

I did not suddenly discover Kriegsspiel as such. I had heard of it before, having been told or read about it, chiefly in brief paragraphs of the origins of wargaming as ‘a game played by members of the Prussian officer corps’. From these descriptions I had assumed that it took a purely narrative approach with copious and constant interpretation by the gamemeister (umpire); some learned, 'god-like' figure. I even misinterpreted the 'spiel' as the English 'speech' rather than the German 'game' and did not realise that the name is spelt with two esses. What an ignoramus!

Thanks to a suggestion from Joe F (no relation) in a comment on my previous post, I purchased a copy of the original, 1824 version of Kriegsspiel from TooFatLardies. Having read it, I discovered something far more fascinating and quite different than I expected. What I had previously been made aware of was 'free' Kriegsspiel, a version from later in the 19th century in which the umpire was encouraged to make his own adjudications. In the original Kriegsspiel, the umpire sets the scenario, rolls the dice and makes the adjudications, but these are highly prescriptive and determined by detailed rules and tables.

The game, the first formalised wargame that was not a derivative of chess or cards, was originally developed by Baron von Reisswitz (snr) early in the 19th century—that's right, during the Napoleonic wars (no wonder Napoleonics are the queen, king and prince of wargaming!). Upon their learning of it in 1811, the young Prussian princes sought to have Reisswitz demonstrate the game to them. Suitably impressed, he was later (1812) summoned to show the game to King William III. "Between 1818 and 1822 the King would now and again make up a party for a game at Potsdam..." (Leeson, 'The Origins of Kriegsspiel'). The game was adapted, developed further and formalised in 1824 by von Reisswitz's son, an artillery officer and shown to the Prussian General staff following interest from General von Müffling (by then Chief of General Staff).

Think about that. We have a set of wargaming rules that was 'playtested' over 12 years by princes, the King and guests, by Prussian army officers (also exported to Russia) and recommended glowingly by von Muffling:

"Anyone who understands those things which have a bearing on leadership in battle can take part immediately in the game as a commander, even if he has no previous knowledge of the game or has never even seen it before" (Leeson, 'The Origins of Kriegsspiel').

That is, none other than an officer from the Napoleonic wars, who has risen to become Chief of General Staff can see this game as a valid and valuable simulation of leadership in battle. That's a five gold-star recommendation for me!

After reading them for the first time I was impressed, even amazed, that it had 'all been done'** back then. As I look at them in more detail and consider what aspects I'd like to adopt I am thinking, more and more, that they will form the basis for rules for my Napoleonic wargaming.

It's all in there, those factors that we consider to be the key elements of Napoleonic warfare: march rates, formations, length of columns, skirmishers, firing of small arms, canister, round shot and howitzers, 'assaults', terrain, impact of morale, orders, rallying and the importance of senior leadership (chiefly through the agency of the players). These are all covered in a direct, realistic manner, which is only natural since they were adapted and tested by serving officers of the time. In fact, ‘modern’ wargaming concepts such as strength points and a range of probablities for different effects that are uncontrollable (chiefly the impacts of firing) are in there too. The range of probabilities that von Reisswitz generated from a D6 by including various numbers of faces and outcomes is quite inspired (something that has morphed in modern rules to the use of dice of various configurations).

It's all there. Two player aids in Kriegsspiel: a card for march rates (note that these are all in paces, a 'modern' approach that makes the rules completely scaleable) shown above and a distance measuring device for the ranges of artillery of different calibres (below).

The rules are quite detailed and 'involved'. While this approach appeals to me, I fully recognise that they will not be to everyone's tastes and needs. I won't go into the system in full here, but will do a follow-up post describing key mechanics and the benefits as I see them (from the perspective of pre-play-testing).

So, having 'discovered' the real Kriegsspiel I realise that, between this and Little Wars (which I have read previously), one has the basis of all of those sets of rules of the 70s and 80s (and their more modern derivatives). For me, reading Kriegspiel is in some ways like reading Bruce Quarrie 's Napoleonic Wargaming rules again. They have generated the same level of excitement as the Quarrie rules did for a far younger self, have a lot of similar detail (though achieved more elegantly by von Reisswitz); the length of turns are even similar, being 2 1/2 minutes in Quarrie two minutes in Kriegsspiel!

Have you ever read them?

If, like me, you are ignorant of this important background in the history and development of formalised rules for wargaming I encourage you to get a copy of Kriegsspiel for yourself. At the very least, read the excellent History of Kriegsspiel under the Articles tab on the Kriegsspiel website (in references below).

Thank you very much to Joe for the suggestion, thanks to Bill Leeson (RIP) for translating the book and, most especially, thanks to Baron von Reisswitz snr and jnr for these great rules.

**I am being somewhat facetious, of course, when writing that it has 'all been done'. More recent rules, beginning with HG Wells' Little Wars, have added other aspects, less formal approaches, adaptations of scale; but the fundamentals were there at this early stage, including some remarkable game mechanics. Readers of this blog will know that a pet hate of mine is sets of 'new' wargaming rules that claim to have come to the author as if by some vision from on high, failing to acknowledge the background or sources of inspiration of rules mechanics that have been adapted (or perhaps even included almost unchanged) in their 'latest and greatest' feast for the ever hungry wargaming market. A failing (at best, outright plagiarism at worst) that I find in the vast majority of sets of rules that I care to pick up.

Don't be misled. I am one who, willingly, checks out new sets of rules to see if they have included anything that I might find interesting, or perhaps comprise an entire mechanice (or even system) that I may like to use at some stage. The development of knowledge in every field of endeavour is about taking the fundamental principles, tried and true aspects, and exploring them in more depth, adding elements from here and there and perhaps even a novel idea or discovery or two to create a 'new' whole. It just drives me mad that there is no doffing, no recognition, no simple acknowledgement of what has gone before.

References

Kriegsspiel, a website dedicated to Kriegsspiel run by a "group of UK based Kriegsspielers, who meet a number of times a year at Little Gaddesdon, Hertfordshire, UK" Link to home page.

B. von Reisswitz B (1824) Kriegsspiel. Available to purchase as ''Kriegsspiel 1824' as a pdf from TooFatLardies.

Wells, HG (1913) Little wars : a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girls who like boys' games and books. London : Frank Palmer. Available on archive.org.