Interviews by an Optimist # 45 -
Ted Racier
Ted says this about himself...
I was born in a log cabin that I built with my own hands...
Actually I was born in 1958 in NJ to parents from wildly different backgrounds (NJ Russian-Jew, Kentucky Baptist coal-miner's daughter) brought together by WWII (he was infantry, she was a WAVE). Both my parents were teachers.
My father (who was born in 1914) bought me my first wargame in 1970 (Avalon Hill's 1914), so perhaps my future course was set then. I discovered SPI in 1973, and except for a brief period in the early 80s, have been in the hobby ever since.
My first wargame design was an early version of what eventually became When Eagles Fight, titled Armies of the Tsar. It was rejected by Avalon Hill ("there is no interest in WWI games") and that might have been the end of my design career, except Ty Bomba at COMMAND asked for a 1918 design back in 1991 (I think) and I decided to call him up and offer to do it. The result, 1918: Storm in the West, was substantially redesigned by Ty, but most of my other designs have come out of development largely as they entered. I've published 13 games (I think-I lose track) and won 9 Charlie awards, an Alexander, and a Games Magazine Game of the Year. Also an award in Japanese that I've never been able to fully decipher.
On a personal note, I'm a political lefty (the source of proposals by same gamers to boycott my designs), love cats and dogs, movies, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Broadway musicals. For 15 years I've lived in the Bronx with my significant other, Joanne, who tolerates my bizarre career path.
Tom Vasel: Paths of Glory is probably the game you are most well known for. Yet the period (World War I) is one rarely seen in war games. Why do you think that is, and why is your game so successful?
Ted Raicer: Well, I don't think WWI is nearly as ignored a topic as it was in the 70s and (especially) the 80s, but it is still undergamed compared to The Civil War or WWII. Part of the reason for that is that all most gamers know-or knew-about the conflict was the trench stalemate of the Western Front in 15-17, which doesn't provide the "illusion of movement" so important to many wargamers. The realization has come gradually-partly through my designs-that WWI was far more varied a conflict, with a lot for gamers to chew on.
The other reason I found WWI a pretty empty niche when I started designing games is that a number of pretty bad games had been done on the subject (I recognize there are people who actually like The Guns of August or the SPI WWI module for War in Europe, but they are a distinct minority) and that killed what interest there was. Some good games had also been done-most notably by Dave Isby for SPI, but it is only a small exaggeration to say The Guns of August killed off WWI in the hobby for almost a decade.
As for PoG, by the time it came out I had already made a name for myself in WWI designs (I had three best game Charlies by then) and so fans of my previous designs were joined by fans of card-driven games and fans of GMT games, and that coming together of different hobby strands formed a sufficient critical mass to make PoG my all-time hit.
Tom Vasel: Do you believe that a card driven wargame is the best way for a wargame to be designed?
Ted Raicer: Well, I don't believe there is a "best way" for designing wargames. Over the past 40 years we've developed a wide range of tools for designing conflict simulations: hex, area, ptp maps; all sorts of combat systems; all sorts of movement systems from Igo-Hugo to written si-move to random chit draw. So card-driven games (which Mark Herman initially popularized with We The People) are simply another tool in the toolbox, albeit an extremely flexible one, because you can combine so many different parts of a design (movement, combat effects, politics, economics, weather etc.) in one mechanic.
But not every game needs cards, and you shouldn't force any design into a format just because that format is currently popular. Of my upcoming designs, one, Crusader (on the 1941 battle in North Africa, not the Crusades) uses cards, but several others (Red Storm Over the Reich, Clash of Giants II, Great War in Europe 2nd Edition) don't.
Tom Vasel: What are your personal favorite mechanics in a war game?
Ted Raicer: Royalties. lol
I don't know that I have specific mechanics as much as specific effects I prefer that lead to certain mechanics. For instance, even with the internet and Cyberboard/ADC, a lot of gaming is still solo (including a lot of my own) and so I look for ways to deal with issues like Fog of War that don't preclude solitaire play. The best way to deal with Fog of War would involve hidden movement, different maps, and probably written orders. An umpire would be helpful as well. But none of that is solo-friendly, so I look for "second-best" solutions, like random events or variable movement allowances that indirectly provide Fog of War. In Tannenberg you may know where everyone is, but you don't know how far they can move (your side, or the other side).
Which is an area I'm giving more and more attention to btw-variable movement allowances in modern operational contexts. I've used it in my new Red Storm Over the Reich design, where you roll for your leg and mech/motorized movement allowance. You can build an awful lot in terms of command control, weather, and logistics into a variable movement allowance.
Obviously I also like cards; the way you can use cards to not only limit your ability to do everything at once but to introduce a lot of historical chrome in fairly painless fashion. But then I did something similar (in terms of painless chrome) in The Great War in Europe with the event chits. So there is always more than one way to go in design.
There are also mechanics I DON'T like-generally found in designs where you have a rule to account for every factor the designer came across in his research; if it happened, it gets a rule. This is especially true in logistics; you need to get the logistical effects right, but not too many of us really want to keep track of every c-ration; and since there ARE easier ways to get the same effects, there isn't a real need to do so.
Tom Vasel: Can one play a wargame too many times until the point where it becomes scripted? For example, I was watching a couple of gentlemen playing Paths of Glory at Origins, and they had the whole first ten turns planned out, talking about how there were really no better choices...
Ted Raicer: Well, if they were still playing it, apparently it wasn't too scripted for them. I think most games have a limited depth-a point at which you've basically got out of them everything there is to get in terms of discovering something new. For some games that may be only a handful of plays, for others dozens. But that isn't the only reason people play games; at this point no one is likely to discover any hidden depths to chess, but people still play it; and unlike chess wargames have random elements that can always throw a monkey wrench into things. Some gamers have played PoG literally hundreds of times, so I'm not surprised that a lot of the strategy and tactics are "set" at this point, but those same people continue to play it. So the issue isn't so much a game becoming scripted as a game becoming dull. And for some games, that happens first time out of the box.
Tom Vasel: What would be your response to criticism that Paths of Glory is an area control game, rather than a war game?
Ted Raicer: First, I haven't heard that particular criticism before, and I'm not at all sure what it means. But PoG has historic OBs, map, combat fire tables, supply lines, forts, amphibious invasions, advances and retreats, etc. If PoG isn't a war game, then I'm not sure what games would qualify.
Tom Vasel: Following that train of thought, are there games that are considered "war games" that you feel shouldn't be? For example, do you consider Diplomacy or Memoir '44 to be war games?
Ted Raicer: The latter is clearly a wargame. I'd say Diplomacy is a war game as well, but the difference is that Memoir 44 is also a simulation, albeit a pretty simple one. It presents a view of a particular historical period with rules to simulate aspects of WWII western front tactical combat. Diplomacy, otoh, though it uses a map of WWI Europe doesn't simulate any particular period or historical process. The most that can be said is that it can somewhat recreate the mindset of leaders involved in power politics, though more the mindset of a power grab in, say, the Middle Ages, than modern diplomacy.
Tom Vasel: There were many who said that a good game about World War I couldn't be done, yet you've designed a fine game about that era. Did you meet with resistance when trying to get your game published?
Ted Raicer: Well, PoG was my 7th WWI title (and my second design on the entire war after The Great War in Europe) and that undoubtedly helped soften resistance, but there remained a lot of skepticism at Avalon Hill (PoG was sold to them first) and only the championing of the design by Ben Knight caused them to offer a contract for it.
Of course as things turned out, Avalon Hill was sold to Hasbro soon after, and I spent 6 months getting PoG back from them. (It isn't that they wanted to publish it, or keep it from being published; it was that they were unaware it even existed, and that they had the rights.) But once I got it back from Hasbro, GMT indicated they were VERY interested in the design (that and the 2nd edition of For the People were their entry into card-driven games) and once Gene saw it, it moved to the head of their "get it out the door" list. (I could be remembering incorrectly, but I don't think they even bothered to p500 the first edition.)
Tom Vasel: What is your opinion of the P500 system? Do you think it's a good way to sell games?
Ted Raicer: Well I don't know that is a great way to SELL games, but it is a way to make sure that when GMT publishes a game, it will make enough money to pay back its costs. Given the very narrow profit margins of a wargame company, that's a major point. Before the p500 GMT was on the edge of going out of business more than once because a particular title didn't sell; p500 makes that less likely.
Tom Vasel: When designing a game, how do you determine what company to submit it to?
Ted Raicer: Well at this point GMT is my "default" choice; they are certainly one of if not THE leader in the hobby. But GMT for that reason has many designers, and so it can be quite awhile at this point between submitting a design, going through the p500 process, and getting published, so I try not to limit myself just to one company. Often when I publish elsewhere, I've been approached by them-that was the case with the new company Compass Games. I decided to offer them my design Red Storm Over the Reich (Warsaw to Berlin 45) because GMT already has Vance doing east front games on a similar scale-I try not to offer GMT titles that will conflict with their other regular designers.
Tom Vasel: What caused you to start designing board games yourself, rather than simply playing them?
Ted Raicer: I first tried to design a wargame back when I was in high school, but the results were, to put it mildly, amateurish. I didn't try again for another 15 years or so, and when I did, it was because I was frustrated by the lack of good WWI titles. I suspect that is the underlying motivation behind most initial designs; you want to play a game on X and there isn't a good one, so you try and design it yourself. (Of course later I stuck with it because of the riches and groupies.)
Tom Vasel: Funny stuff about the "riches" of designing board games, but have you gotten much back financially from any of your designs? Or in other words, can a war game designer support themselves financially?
Ted Raicer: In VERY rare cases, yes, but not often and not very well. (There is much more potential loot in either Euro games or computer games.) For example, PoG will end up making me a decent year's income-unfortunately spread out over 6-7 years.
Tom Vasel: Was there ever a hope for you that this might become your day job, or did you look at designing games as a hobby? Basically, how seriously do you take it when designing a game?
Ted Raicer: It is pretty much my day job (along with freelance writing/editing) but only because my circumstances don't require me to earn a lot of money to get by. But my approach to designing was the same even when I had other employment-the publisher's take their job seriously (or they soon go out of business), so the designer has to if he wants to get published.
Tom Vasel: Have you seen a lot of aspiring designers crash and burn because they refused to accept criticism of their games?
Ted Raicer: Though I've given some general advice to would-be designers now and then, that's a question you'd really need to ask a publisher.
Tom Vasel: A lot of would-be designers read these interviews - could you share some of that general advice with them?
Ted Raicer: First, design a game you want to play, not a game you think someone wants to publish. (Yes, you'll have to take publisher's needs into account if you get that far, but if you don't put what you like about wargaming into a design and just try and second-guess what OTHERs want, the result isn't likely to be good.)
Second, don't feel you need to come up with some unique design breakthrough-we all steal...borrow...systems from other wargames. At the same time, if you get an original idea, don't be afraid to try it just because it hasn't been used before.
Finally, the writer's rule "Kill your darlings" applies. If you come up with some complex rule you find especially clever and are particularly proud of, chances are you'd be better off without it. The mechanics are there to serve the overall design, not to overwhelm it.
Tom Vasel: Richard Berg, a renowned war game designer, contends that a good war game can be made about any topic. Do you agree with him?
Ted Raicer: Well, ANY may be pushing it (The War of Jenkin's Ear?), but I think most topics can be gamed. But certainly some are easier than others-not too hard to make Gettysburg or Barbarossa or Waterloo exciting, but it takes more work to make a game out of, say, the Somme. (Though Against the Odds has done just that.)
Tom Vasel: In the beginning of the interview, you mentioned the "illusion of movement". What did you mean by that?
Ted Raicer: That's a phrase used by James Dunnigan and Richard Berg (among others)-it refers for the need for a wargame to give the player a feel that things are happening on the map, that the situation isn't static. In trench warfare, where the amount of actual movement is often minimal, you have to create a sense of movement even if the armies aren't actually gaining any ground. This can be done (for instance) but having a lot of player interaction, so the players feel they are doing something even if their troops aren't moving.
Tom Vasel: What have been the most outstanding wargames, ones that have set milestones for other games to attain, over the last twenty years?
Ted Raicer: "Best Lists" are always tough for me-in part because my definition of "best" can vary widely depending on my mood, but I think clearly Mark Herman's We the People, which opened up the entire card-driven game field, is a milestone of the hobby. (Followed, in the CDG genre, probably by Paths of Glory. But We the People is still the gold standard in my view.)
Although overlooked, I think Ben Knight's London's Burning is a brilliant design, which combines micro and macro scales in a unique way (with the actions of two British planes standing in for the entire RAF in the Battle of Britain). Ty Bomba's Proud Monster is probably the best of the simple monster games, while Chris Perello's game Fateful Lightning was a potentially breakthrough design in Civil War tactical gaming (unfortunately his follow-up games were not up to the original, but I borrowed his Fortunes of War idea for Grand Illusion).
I think Monty's Gamble is probably the best of the area-impulse games, and Steve Kosakowski came up with some great ideas in the original version of Krieg (though the game subsequently developed into something more complex than he desired). And I think Blue vs. Gray opened an entire area of wargame design using cards alone (building, of course, on Up Front, but showing that such a system need not be confined to tactical games).
These are just a few that come to mind, but really, there have been many excellent designs over the last 20 years.
Tom Vasel: I've heard that you're designing a "light" war game about World War I. Can you tell us more about it?
Ted Raicer: Well it is already designed and published (in Europe anyway, the US edition isn't out yet). The game is The First World War published by Phalanx, and it’s both my simplest and most abstract game and my first multiplayer design for (2-4) players. But it is a real wargame, and at its chosen level, a decent simulation of the war.
Armies are units, and movement is between various fronts. Within the front are a series of connected cities, and you simply attack the next city in line that you don't currently control. There are some special rules for things like the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and battle tactics (in the form of chits), but the basic theme of the game is the need to decide where to concentrate your limited troops among a number of different fronts. You can play the entire game in 2 hours, which (along with the multiplayer aspect) is probably its biggest selling point.
Tom Vasel: Is a game as simple like this easier or more difficult to design than a more difficult game like Paths of Glory?
Ted Raicer: Both. Something like PoG is a lot more work, but there is greater margin for error. A simple game works, or it doesn't-there is no "flawed but worthy" at that basic level of design.
Tom Vasel: Ted, thanks for you insights! Do you have any final things to say to our readers?
Ted Raicer: I don't have much in the way of a closing statement, except to say that I think the hobby of board wargaming will be around for a while yet. There is a tactile element to it that computers can't match yet anyway.
Tom Vasel
"Real men play board games"
June 9th, 2005