David Thompson, Moratain, France while doing research for Undanunted: Normandy
David Thompson was born in Savannah, GA, and grew up playing Dungeons & Dragons and other roleplaying games. In the 2010s, he turned his attention to Eurogames and wargames. He began designing games in 2014, after moving to England and meeting the Cambridge-based chapter of Playtest UK. His first published design was Armageddon in 2016, followed the solitaire wargame Valiant Defense series of games published by Dan Versen Games (DVG) (Castle Itter, Pavlov’s House, and the upcoming Soldiers in Postmen’s Uniforms), the award-winning War Chest, and Undaunted family of games, and many others. He now lives in Dayton, OH, with his wife, two daughters, and son.
So, how did you get started in writing wargames? Was there an “aha” moment, or did you fall into it?
Board Game Geek
Around 2012 or so, I discovered the board game hobby. I had grown up playing roleplaying games, but as I grew older, got married, and had kids, I just didn’t have the time to dedicate to that hobby. The board game hobby offered me a similar experience in some ways, but without all the prep time required to run an RPG campaign. After a year or so of playing games, I started dabbling with design. This was also around the time I played Martin Wallace’s excellent game about the French and Indian War called A Few Acres of Snow. I thought the game was brilliant, and it has influenced my design sensibilities ever since.
In 2014 I began working on the game that would eventually become Undaunted: Normandy around the same time I moved from the US to the UK. Within a month of moving, I was visiting the beaches of Normandy and decided that I would focus the campaign in Undaunted: Normandy around the 30th Infantry Division - the unit my maternal grandfather served in during WW2. The game follows the 30th ID’s footsteps across Normandy. Ever since I stepped foot on Omaha Beach and made that decision about the setting for Undaunted: Normandy, I’ve been obsessed with military history and wargame design.
30th Infantry Division Patch | MilitaryPX.com
How did the Undaunted series come to be, and how did you get Osprey Games behind it? Was it influenced by games such as Squad Leader, Ambush, or Close Assault?
Board Game Geek
The original concepts for Undaunted: Normandy date back to late 2013/early 2014. As I mentioned above, I was working on the design heavily by the summer of 2014. Fortunately for me, I was able to attend the Spiel convention in Essen, Germany, in September 2014, where I met with Duncan Molloy of Osprey Games to pitch the game. Duncan was just establishing the fledgling game division at Osprey and was juggling quite a bit, so even though he like Undaunted, he wasn’t able to immediately sign it. Meanwhile, I asked my design partner, Trevor Benjamin, to help me develop Undaunted: Normandy, including helping me create and test all the scenarios. For the next couple of years, we refined the game, and then Osprey officially signed [the contract] at Spiel in 2017 and released [the game] the following year. I had not played any of the well-known tactical wargames such as ASL or Ambush when I started work on Undaunted. Instead, it was influenced by A Few Acres of Snow (as you can see with the combination of deck-building and spatial board play) as well as all the tactical skirmish games I grew up playing, including everything from tactical roleplaying videos games like Final Fantasy Tactics to Dungeons and Dragons and Blood Bowl.
Don’t Panic Games
Your take in Undaunted on geomorphic maps stood out to me. Is this something you’ve wanted to do for a while?
Board Game Geek
The board composition for Undaunted Normandy dates to the beginning of the design. I wanted to combine the simplicity of squares (both in terms of the physical board assembly and the ease of use for art and graphic design) with the benefit of hexes in terms of movement and range counting. Offset squares just seemed the perfect solution. The geomorphic nature of the board configuration was necessary to build out the wide range of scenarios I wanted to create across the Normandy countryside.
What made you choose the units you chose for Undaunted Normandy and Undaunted North Africa?
Board Game Geek
The core gameplay in Undaunted: Normandy was modeled to evoke the actions of the rifle platoon. We used the US rifle platoon construct from June 1944 as a guideline, and we supplemented the platoon with snipers and a mortar team.
The command group consists of the platoon leader, platoon sergeant, platoon guide, and three squad leaders. The role of platoon leader is taken on by the players themselves. The platoon sergeant, the platoon guide, and the three squad leaders are represented as Command Cards in the players’ decks. Command Cards are not used in direct combat but are instead responsible for command, control, and support. Each Command Card offers a player a choice of two actions. One of these actions — Bolster Force — allows players to add extra Combat Cards (Scouts, Machine Gunners, Snipers, and more) to their deck, either supporting existing units or adding new ones. Managing the cards in your deck lies at the heart of Undaunted: Normandy.
The Platoon Sergeant is your second in command, assisting in controlling the direction and rate of advance of the platoon. It is also the most powerful card in the game. The Platoon Sergeant lets you play more cards on your turn or vastly bolster your deck. The Platoon Guide is a versatile card, letting you move any combat counter on the board or add any card you might need from the supply. The Squad Leader amplifies the effectiveness of its squad by allowing you to bolster it or repeat already played cards.
Each of the three rifle squads consists of an automatic rifle team (automatic rifleman, assistant automatic rifleman, and ammunition bearer), five riflemen, and three scouts. Each of these three elements within the squad is treated as a cohesive unit and has an associated counter and Combat Cards. The Combat Cards are used to move these counters around the board, attack with them, or perform other special actions.
Riflemen are the core of the platoon. These cards are the only ones in the game that can take control of objectives. As Riflemen are vital to claiming key locations, it is essential to keep these units alive! Scouts are highly versatile, allowing you to scout new terrain tiles to before moving your units, to re-establish communications (removing Fog of War cards from your deck), and to employ deception tactics to confuse the enemy. Machine Gunners excel in attack and defense, with more firepower than Riflemen or Scouts and the ability to lay down suppressive fire to neutralize enemy units.
Snipers and mortar teams are also represented by counters and associated Combat Cards. Snipers are expert riflemen and effective infiltrators. Snipers have the highest attack and defense value in the game and can move through areas not yet scouted, making them excellent units for taking out important enemy targets. The Mortar is one of the most powerful cards in the game. It is slow to set up, requiring a separate action to target a terrain tile, but once ready, it is hugely effective at taking out concentrated enemy forces and avoids any range penalties when firing.
Amazon.com
In Undaunted: North Africa, we changed this model. Now instead of commanding a rifle platoon, you’re leading commandos from the Commonwealth’s Long Range Desert Group. This drove us to change the scale of the game (where one counter = a team of men in Normandy to one counter = one soldier in North Africa), and it meant that each unit (or soldier) in North Africa would be unique. In terms of gameplay, the North Africa deck composition became extremely asymmetric because of this design change.
What is in the future for Undaunted?
MiniaturesMarket.com
This summer will see the release of Undaunted: Reinforcements. It serves as an expansion for both Undaunted: Normandy and Normandy’s stand-alone sequel, Undaunted: North Africa. Reinforcements add four new scenarios each for Normandy and North Africa. It introduces tanks to Normandy and lots of new units for North Africa. But most exciting is that it introduces a new solitaire system for both games, which allows you to go back and play through every scenario in Normandy and North Africa in an official solo mode. The Reinforcements expansion also adds the ability to play as teams (2 vs. 2) with the new scenarios included in the expansion. Trevor and I are just now finishing up the design for the fourth title in the Undaunted series, but we can’t talk about it just yet!
Is there a period of history you want to write a game for but have not?
WW2 is certainly my sweet spot. I love skirmish-level games, where each counter represents a single soldier, and I love integrating detailed history into the designs. WW2 really lends itself well to both of those. I’m also a bit skittish about designing modern games, both because it aligns too closely to my day job and because it just feels a little too current. One specific topic I’d like to explore, most likely in the context of my Valiant Defense series of solitaire wargames, is the defense of the [Congolese village of Jadotville in 1961].
Can you tell our readers what goes into developing a board game, especially for a major publisher like Osprey Games?
Sure, though I’d like to start with a couple of major caveats. First and foremost, each publisher is different, and each relationship with a publisher is different. In some cases, like Osprey, the relationship is what you’d call “traditional,” where the publisher takes on the role of development, art direction, managing manufacturing, etc. Whereas my relationship with Dan Version Games (better known as DVG) is vastly different, where I’m essentially managing all the creative elements even beyond the design. Second, the process for a wargame is quite different from that of a “non-wargame.” When I start on a wargame design, the first step for me is a massive literature review, primarily focused on gaining access to as many primary sources as possible (often in the form of things like unit after-action reports). In some cases, I must settle on secondary sources, though, as was the case for my game Castle Itter, for example. The research usually takes about a year. After that, I model the conflict the game is based on, not to create an accurate simulation of the engagement but rather to identify the key elements of the conflict I want the game to evoke. I want the gameplay experience to result in a narrative that helps convey the key elements of the story of the conflict. Then the actual game design starts.
That part of the process can vary widely in the direction it takes, depending on whether it’s an entirely new design (such as when I recently created my game By Stealth and Sea, which is about Italian human torpedo operators) or if it’s an evolution in a game series (such as Undaunted or the Valiant Defense series). Usually, the design takes about a year. Then the game moves to development, where it is refined and stressed tested by unguided playtests. After that, my part of the design is mostly over if I’m working with a traditional publisher like Osprey. They take the design on, continue the development process, integrate the art and graphic design, and then it’s off to the printers. In some cases, like my relationship with DVG, I manage the entire creative process, to include managing the art and graphic design, but that’s rare in the board game industry.
Board Game Geek
Has desktop publishing technology changed the face of the hobby? Has it affected the quality of the product we see today?
It’s certainly made games easier to prototype. When I first started designing, I was using print-on-demand services such as The Game Crafter to have high-quality physical prototypes of my designs made for my core playtest groups. However, in the last five or so years, I’ve essentially transitioned to digital design and prototyping, using Tabletop Simulator for the full design cycle of my games. The only exception is at the very end of a design when I want to confirm the ergonomics of the game work as intended. At that point, I’ll have a single high-quality physical prototype made to ensure everything “feels” right physically.
Game Crafter Website
What are your favorite historical periods and why?
Certainly, WW2, as I mentioned above, but I’m also intrigued by the Seven Years War, especially in North America (or what we in the US would call the French and Indian War). I haven’t explored the French and Indian War as deeply as I would like, but I find its role in the creation of our country very interesting. I now live in Ohio, so I expect to explore this chapter in military history to a much greater extent…and one day, it might even be the subject of a game!
What do you see for the future of historical wargaming?
One common theme discussed in historical wargaming is the influence of the broader hobby game world (especially “Euro” style games) on wargaming. I’m personally a fan of this movement, as hybrid Euro-wargames are my favorite genre of game, and the influences of Euro-style games can absolutely be seen in my designs such as Undaunted, Europe Divided, and even my solitaire wargames like Pavlov’s House, which is well-known for its resource management elements. Having said that, what I’d personally love to see is more wargaming concepts make their way into the Eurogame world. For example, the chit-pull system common to wargames for many, many years would work brilliantly as a seamlessly integrated turn-order and action selection system in board gaming in general but hasn’t been widely adopted (despite sharing similarities with bag-building, which is derived from the extremely popular deck-building mechanism in Eurogames).
Board Game Geek
I see the general evolution of historical wargames continuing to blur the lines with Eurogames, but that doesn’t mean we’ll see the death of traditional “hex-and-counter” games. I love those games too, and while individual titles may not sell in the same numbers as they did during the height of the Avalon Hill days, we’ve never had more options in terms of publishers, designers, and topics.
You’ve got an opinion on what works and what doesn’t in wargaming? Can you share with new wargamers what’s the best way for them to avoid common pitfalls?
This a tough question to answer because each wargamer is so different in terms of what they’re looking for. I guess my recommendation for new wargamers would be to try to identify what interests you. Are you interested in the history? If so, which periods? What scale are you looking to play? Are you focused on competitive gameplay or just looking for a strong narrative? What are you looking for in terms of complexity and game length? Ask yourself these questions and then turn to the vast wargame communities on the internet and ask for game recommendations based on how you’ve answered these questions.
Anything else you’d like to say to our readers?
I’d just like to say thanks for taking the time to read my lengthy responses! For folks who might be interested in reaching out to me with questions about any of my games, the best place to find me is on Twitter @djackthompson or Board Game Geek where they can send me a geekmail at skirmish_tactics.
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At Epoch Xperience, we specialize in creating compelling narratives and provide research to give your game the kind of details that engage your players and create a resonant world they want to spend time in. If you are interested in learning more about our gaming research services, you can browse Epoch Xperience’s service on our parent site, SJR Research.
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(This article is credited to Jason Weiser. Jason is a long-time wargamer with published works in the Journal of the Society of Twentieth Century Wargamers; Miniature Wargames Magazine; and Wargames, Strategy, and Soldier.)