Johns Hopkins SAIS Wargaming Club, Round 2!

Big thanks to Alex and the SAIS Wargaming leadership team for inviting us out for a second visit -- we were shocked at such a huge turnout and hope everyone felt it was worth their time!

We used a different structure for this particular visit. Rather than kicking off with an interview-style format, Alex started with an overview and presented some research ideas for attendees to consider throughout their gameplay. From a military background, it was interesting to see the focus areas framed as "research questions" rather than "desired learning objectives (DLOs)." Daoyou (an actual Joint Fires Observer and member of the club leadership team) kicked off the academics by describing what an Integrated Air Defense System is and some of the real-world constraints air defenders encounter as they try to defend airspace.

I remember their slides covering cost (the funds available to pay military personnel and purchase training and equipment) and the different requirements at the tactical, operational, and strategic levels. As a former instructor myself, I couldn't help but add that geography's a key concern, as well. It might make certain systems untenable, for example; or the sheer vastness of the area you're trying to defend might demand new technological investments. Thanks for bearing with me, Daoyou!!

Daoyou really started to nerd out, talk about specific weapon systems -- I couldn't get enough of it. He then started describing a scenario the SAIS Wargaming Club had created using our cards! Topical as always, the club had printed out a custom map centered on the Strait of Hormuz and tried to recreate the capabilities of US and Iranian forces at the start of what's generally being referred to as the 2026 Iran War. Check out the bottom of this post to see my initial thoughts on scenario ideas!

After that portion, we jumped into demos a bit -- I was overambitious and clumsily tried to do this single-card teaching demo we'd used to great success at NOVA and while I was downrange. Problem identified: it doesn't work elegantly with 30 people, lol. Thanks to all the attendees for dealing with that and having a good time despite the start-and-stop nature of it all. I think next time we do something like that, I'll just have people hover while I teach/demo to a table of 2v2 before setting up another 2v2 table.

After the teach/demo, we stopped for reflections from attendees on the research ideas. One item raised was that it's smart to dive in head-first because you don't get points for keeping aircraft alive. I thought this was an awesome insight -- I pointed out that we designed the scoring that way because it was the only way we could get players to engage with each other. We do have a house rule that awards Attrition Points for keeping units alive, but I never use it -- it just incentivizes a gotta-catch-'em-all approach to collecting high-value cards during the draft phase and then bunkering down.

I was stoked that attendees enjoyed the game enough to stay after the official end of the session! One of the tables broke out the Advanced Capabilities and tried to DEFEND HAWAII with Attack Submarines, Destroyers, and Frigates. Another table forgot that the rest of Stanley Baldwin's quote, "The bomber will always get through," was "except in IADS: The Game," and suicided 2x already-detected Heavy Bombers into the threat ring of a Long Range SAM. Shout-out to Olivia for running a table as part of the SAIS Wargaming leadership -- that table really got the hang of it and was neck-and-neck for VUL after VUL. The last table tried playing some of the most complex cards in the game during their very first game... with no military background! Jeez! ...They did just fine -- the SAIS scenario creators and I talked them through the theoreticals of how their cards could or should be employed.

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All in all, a second successful JHU visit! I really love getting to play with brilliant and curious players, and I love that the format provided academics and asked attendees to reflect on what they might have learned from the game. Sounds like there might be an official/unofficial JHU SAIS Board Game Club as well? We loved our time there, and we'd love to get some more VULs in with such strategically minded players!

Issue Orders!!

- Ric

//SCENARIO IDEAS

Looking at their setup for that scenario, I wish I'd had more time to hang out and try to workshop the pieces on each side. Here are some thoughts I had offhand:

The win condition shouldn't be based on Attrition Points or Destroy Headquarters, as it is in the official rules. Instead, maybe something that plays out over several rounds, each relying on the outcome of the previous match? Maybe something like:

• Initial Air Phase

  • WIN CONDITION: Red gets four HQs: 1x represents a nuclear production/storage facility, and the other three represent C2 nodes. Blue Force attempts to get 4x hits on the nuclear HQ and 3x hits on each other Red C2 HQ over the course of 3x VULs. If the Blue Force win condition is met, Blue wins; otherwise, Red wins.

  • Blue Forces would get: A bunch of bombers and strike aircraft (all technology levels), 2x Intel cards, and 4x Upgrade cards. Two HQs start out revealed (ouch).

  • Red Forces would get: A bunch of SAMs, TBMs, Surface Strike Missiles, and Cruise Missiles (all using the one-way attack UAS house rule), plus 2x Deception Tactics cards and 2x Upgrade cards. Do the HQs disappear between VULs?

  • I think there's an interesting discussion on overflight restrictions you could impose... I'd love to talk about it more... hmm... ALEX! OLIVIA! RAFE! DAOYOU! Jakub? Hit me up!!

  
  

• Strait of Hormuz Control Phase

  • I think regardless of where you end up in that first horrible phase, the remaining forces get to stay in play for this phase.

  • WIN CONDITION: Blue Force must support at least 4x of 5x attempted transits by tankers not compliant with Red restrictions through the Strait of Hormuz. Deployed undetected into the Gulf, these would be represented by any unused cards, have a Defense of 8, and travel at a Speed of 0.25 (0.5 once each Action 2).

  • Red Forces get their Surface Strike Missile unit cards back (if they were destroyed) and an additional 2x Special Operations cards, each of which gains Emplace Mines. It costs two Actions and places the card as a one-card-diameter area in the Strait of Hormuz where noncompliant vessels must roll 1d10 during each Action 2. If a 1 is rolled, the vessel is destroyed.

  • Blue Force gets: 2x Aircraft Carriers, 2x Destroyers, and 1x Frigate that loses all its munitions but gains Countermine Operations. Using that ability the Frigate (when touching the mined area) and spends 4x Actions to remove mines.