FROM TABLETOP TO LAPTOP

Tabletop games spawned board wargaming and gave rise to computer wargames, and in many respects the computer has the potential edge in terms of both realism and ease and convenience of play. To try to achieve realism in a tabletop game, huge terrain maps are needed with hundreds, if not thousands, of lead figures on them. Moves and combat are achieved by applying rulers and bits of string to the task in hand after consulting massive tomes of rules and tables. The only other approach was to throw the realism away and just get down to the nitty gritty in ritualised combat in games such as chess, where the rules are easy to learn and neither player starts with a material advantage.

Theoretically, a tabletop game taking up the entire East Wing of your stately home can now be accurately modelled with a few square inches of silicon chips and a disk file or two. This is, of course, fortunate for those of us who do not have a spare acre or so indoors, and only get to play our wargames when the ironing board is put away. Even if you do have the room for a traditional tabletop game, the computer can take much of the pain out of applying complicated sets of rules a package such as Eaglebearer from Battle Honours (0746 32627) can be used in conjunction with lead figures and landscape models to run battles. Eaglebearer takes care of morale and casualty calculations, and introduces variables such as weather and the deaths of commanders as well as dispensing with written rules.

Secrecy is of major importance when fighting a real battle, but is difficult to achieve on the top of a table when all is on view. The more you can conceal your shape, as Sun Tzu, the oriental strategist, would say, the more you are in command of the situation. Computers allow some measure of secrecy - for instance, units can be placed at the start of a game but only revealed when they are spotted by soldiers from the other side. Of course, with two players using the same screen it is rather difficult to maintain your sneaky flank attack. Nowadays though, more and more people have got their own computer. By using the ports out of the back to connect two or more computers together, it is possible to get round this problem and going one step further, by using phone lines and modems, the players do not even have to be in the same room.

And of course, with the computer you don't need a friend to play with - virtually all wargames include a computer-driven opponent to pit your wits against. Not ideal tor secrecy, however: there is some truth to the rumour that computer opponents cheat by peeking at your units in memory.

Juste pour me faire mentir, un article issu d'un magazine de JV dans un dossier consacré... aux jeux de plateaux, et qui évoque donc l'existence de ce jeu pour jouer en solo ou avec un ami mais en s'en remettant à la machine pour le déroulement du scénario et des évènements

Eaglebearer (BATTLE HONOURS)

Non, ce n est pas un jeu micro, mais un gestionnaire-arbitre de wargame napoléonien avec Figurines. Incroyable, mais ça existe : l'ordinateur gère les déplacements, les combats, le moral, la météo, l’artillerie, les pertes, et sert accessoirement d'adversaire aux solitaires désireux de s'entraîner. Eh ben !... Inutile de dire que s'adresse à des amateurs chevronnés, car c'est tout en anglais et pas convivial pour deux sous. Édite par Battle Honours (un Fabricant de Figurines 15 mm) et disponible (en nombre limité !) chez Jeux de Guerre Diffusion, rue Mcis-sonnier, Paris XVIle. 265 F les règles et la disquette pour Atari ST.