Educational Gaming

By Caroline Gilmore

Peace requires patience, and, when there is a history of past conflict, it can be hard to lay the grounds for peace and justice.  Nevertheless, on a sunny Saturday morning in October, over seventy participants and eight mentors gathered at George Washington University to take part in Perilous Peace, a simulation of Colombia’s current peace negotiations.

Perilous Peace was Strategic Crisis Simulations’ first simulation of the semester. Strategic Crisis Simulations (SCS) is an undergraduate wargaming and crisis management organization affiliated with the George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs.

Undergraduates use experimental learning to teach peers about diplomacy, national security, and human rights through simulations and crisis drills. Through creativity and constructive gaming, SCS helps participants become confident, critical thinkers that are ready for the professional world.

In 2020 a group of veteran game designers kicked off the initial Zenobia contest. This is a competition that mentors historical game designers who are underrepresented within the gaming community. Contestants will have a chance to state why they feel that their community needs a voice within the design space.

The contest had over 150 entries and culminated 11 months later with eight semi-finalists and selected Tyranny of Blood as the initial winner of the contest. The Zenobia II contest is now live, and designers have until 14 October to enter a design proposal. This year’s contest opens the gaming aperture with the inclusion of miniatures game designs.

We have another great interview with George Washington University’s  Strategic Crisis Simulations  leadership. Our own Caroline “CWIS” Gilmore is joined by Cormac Brown and Cassandra Micah and we talk all about the excellent program these talented students run.

Today we have Adrian Mandzy who published a miniatures scenario book that focuses on the Ukrainian partisan movement during WWII. We also talk about the great game By Fire and Sword, the use of wargames in academics and historical archeology.

By Caroline Gilmore

Walking through halls with painted murals of America’s biggest historical moments and portraits of George Kennan and President Barack Obama, it felt as if I was stepping into a new world. Well, perhaps not a new world, but definitely a new part of my world. It was June 22nd, the start of my first time attending a Connections Wargaming Conference at the National Defense University.

By Mitch Reed

I hope many of you can recall my article from the Connections Wargaming Conference in 2022 and the podcast from 2019 that spoke to this event. The 2023 event held at National War College in Washington DC was yet another for the record books and we here at NDNG were glad to attend in force as well as help sponsor the Dice-Breaker social event.

By David Garvin

On the 9th of June, Paxsims hosted Connections North, a conference on professional wargaming. According to its website, it is “…a community of practice devoted to the professional use of wargames (and other serious games) for education, training, and policy analysis in Canada.” There were over 70 in attendance, ranging from military members, and civilian members of the defense community as well as many in various think tanks, government departments, and me. The conference was held at the impressive Canadian War Museum in Ottawa.

By Caroline Gilmore

The day is May 1, 2024: China is about to attack Taiwan, North and South Korea are poised at the precipice of conflict, and in India, unexpected floods force people from their homes.

Thus begins “Rising Tides,” the annual kinetics wargame organized by Strategic Crisis Simulations (SCS), an undergraduate-run organization at George Washington University.