Where Did Those Numbers Come From?

Yesterday I reposted my thoughts on designing my company's (Lock 'n Load Publishing) popular conflict simulation series, World at War (WaW), on the LNLP Facebook page. The post ends with a promise of more information, and several folks asked when I'd fulfill that promise. So here it is. Sort of. You see, to explain each of the units would take more time than we have. Accordingly, I'll look at one today, and explain more in the future. 

Before I get started, however, let me throw out an apology to my non-wargaming readers.

I pattern these writings after Scalzi's "Whatever," which is arguably the most popular blog bobbing in the cyberstream. As such I write about anything, be it politics, Phil Robertson, Cabin in the Woods, or the advantages of Norse Paganism to Christianity (please, no hate mail, I'm a devout Christian myself). There will be times, however, when I discuss board gaming, and even some times the design and development of said games. This is one of those times, so if you're in it for the Scarlett Johansson references, you might want to sit this one out. On to the game.

The Abrams platoon rolled out of my brain and into World at War land sometime in 1985. The game system had been perking for at least a couple of weeks before that. Interestingly enough, the Abrams wasn't the first counter designed for WaW. That distinction belongs to the Israeli's Super Sherman. When the game system popped into my head, I originally envisioned it for 1973, and made a set of play test counters using the art from the Valley of Tears game that I designed for Armchair General. These counters never saw the light of day, or the ink of printing. After designing them, I decided I wanted to go all out, design the game that I really wanted to play, so I jumped into the Abrams.

Let's look at the counter and the logic behind the values, but one thing first; there are no formula's. I understand that some people design with equations. Those people aren't me. I love math, but I'm just not a design by equation guy.

• Movement: I guess I did some calculations, divided the 150-meter hexes into kilometers, and the projected time of the turns into an hour, or something. Honestly, I don't remember. 6 MPs seemed about right, and gave me the baseline for other units' movement factors.
• AP Range: The range seems about right to me. M1A1s (with a 120mm gun) routinely knocked out Iraqi T72s at a range of 2,500 meters during Desert Storm, and several claimed kills in excess of four kilometers. But these are just M1s, with the 105mm cannon. I didn't want to make the range any longer for a simple reason. The longer the range, the more time-consuming checking line of sight becomes. 
• AP Firepower and To Hit Numbers: Easy Peasy. I wanted a platoon of Abrams to dominate a platoon of T72s (the baseline Soviet tank in Eisenbach Gap, the series' seminal game). At 4@4 every Abrams attack should average two hits. Combine that statistic with  the likelihood of firing twice in a turn (two activation chits), occasionally three times when on defense, and you have a very powerful counter.
• HE Firepower and Range: Okay, I admit it, there is a large fudge factor here. Theoretically, an Abrams can throw an HE shell as fall as its AP counterpart. Tankers tell me that never happens. Tanks use machine guns to engage infantry, and save the HE shells for really tough targets. Hence the HE Firepower is a combination of how many machine guns a tank has, combined with the caliber/range of it's main gun. 
• Armor: The Abram's 3@5 gives it a baseline probability of deflecting one hit each time you roll the dice. Because a T-72 (4@6) will average less than one hit per attack, it makes the Abrams a very tough opponent. As it should be.
• Close Assault: This is a bit of a throw away. Tanks with a main gun, and at least one machine gun get a 2@4. Keep in mind that this reflects fighting within a 150-meter hex. At that range a T-72 is about as effective as an Abrams. Give or take.

Okay, that's it for today. Promise fulfilled, and for those non-gamers that stuck with me, here's a Scarlett Johansson picture.