Twilight At Last Inside the Design of Twilight Struggle by Ananda Gupta

Designing the basic mechanics of Twilight Struggle (TS) Once that painful process was finished, a newproblem reared its head.Our games immediately posed a number of challenges. As we say in the game's simply did not have enough events occurring. Luckily, the lightning bolt of published Designer's Notes, Jason and I wanted many things from inspiration hit, resulting in the mechanic TS: a quick-playing game to accommodate busy schedules as well you see in the rules today: when an opponent's event card is played for Ops, the as the tournament crunch; to move away from the trend of event actually occurs. This not only went a long way towards remedying the not- increasing complexity in card-driven wargames; and to maximize the enough-events problem, it also led to some impact of the card-driven system by applying it to a conflict that was delicious dilemmas in-game, as players ask themselves if the three operations points almost entirely off the battlefield, dominated by politics, intrigue, and they will get is worth handing their opponents the benefits of a favorable event secrecy. We also wanted, for individual idiosyncratic reasons, to stick play. However, doing so does come with a to a single deck. Separate decks are all well and good, as in GMT's consolation prize (as Steve Carey points out in Fighting the Twilight Struggle in this issue Paths of Glory, but there is just something about a single deck that of C3i Magazine): the player can determine really emphasizes the conflict between the players. the timing of the event, and spend operations points to minimize its benefits Early versions of Twilight Struggle same units?). Having a mutable map was to his opponent. looked very different from the one on your even worse, and led to all sorts of extremely table or game store shelf today. Countries ahistorical situations, requiring a raft of This in turn led to an interesting effect had more attributes: they were rated for special rules to ensure that the players didn't of the Space Race – it provided a means by difficult terrain and anti-air capability, as do something like partition Mexico or which an opponent's events could be well as political stability. The superpowers France. Abstracting the combat allowed us dumped, insulating somewhat against a had military units as well as influence to simplify the map tremendously; all we hand totally full of unfriendly event cards. markers; combat was still fairly abstract, needed were the stability numbers and each We wanted to do something besides just but not completely so, as it is in the final country's status as a Battleground (or not). I awarding victory points for Space Race version. There was a mechanic that feel that many of the ideas Jason and I milestones, and the dumping mechanic permitted players to modify their coup rolls came up with early on were very good, but provided an excellent way to tie the Space after seeing the dice by flipping over cards fundamentally they undermined the two Race more tightly to the rest of the game. from the draw pile, with the cards' events related goals of reduced complexity and occurring during the coup attempt if they taking maximum advantage of the cards' Other unique and new mechanics in TS belonged to the opponent! There was a ability to reduce rules weight and make the were easier to devise. Doing the scoring as China track governing China's alignment, game accessible. an uncertain, blind exercise tied to the cards with the possibility of a "Stalinist China" was a straightforward and obvious way to and a "Liberal China." Perhaps most We encountered two related problems capture some of the (usually justified!) differently, the map itself was subject to almost immediately. Card-driven games paranoia of the Cold War. DEFCON as a change: new spaces and connections could have a card limit in the neighborhood of means of focusing action and manipulating be added to the map during play, as the 100 to 110 cards. Most other CDGs are nuclear tensions was a good way to have a players partitioned warring proxy states spoiled for space: they can easily fit all the very simple, easy to understand system and agreed to treaties. important events of the time period they are about one of the Cold War's most covering into the deck, with some room for important themes. Unlike other games Most of these systems never made it past quirky combat cards or alternate history involving the possibility of nuclear war, in one or two trial runs. Every non-abstract events. TS covers almost 50 years of history TS one player still wins even if the world is combat system we came up with was subject at five years per turn — there are five-year destroyed. We felt very strongly that having to various player exploits, not to mention periods during the Cold War containing an everyone loses condition is too easily the fact that the size of the forces was never enough card-worthy events to fill an entire gamed by players who, after all, are only constant (how could we represent the U.S. deck all by themselves! So Jason and I had riskingcardboard,andthatsucha mechanic intervention in Vietnam and the U.S. to be extremely ruthless about which events would be fundamentally unsatisfying. Thus, support of the Nicaraguan Contras with the made it into the deck. if nuclear war starts, the player whose turn Designer's Notes: Twilight Struggle it is not gets the win. So don't play the rundown of classic design principles. Many working with a co-designer is that we could Olympics when the missile silo doors are clever and interesting ideas were discarded focus our strengths on the areas of the game open — all your opponent must do is as being contrary to the fundamental that most needed our specific attention, and boycott, and you lose! guiding principles of the game — fast play, Jason's enthusiasm for Cold War historical simple rules, and getting a lot of gameplay minutiae shows very clearly in the finished China posed an interesting problem. In value out of the cards. Jason and I feel that product. I would be remiss not to say, early versions of TS it was simply ignored, by staying true to those principles, we though, that Jason's contribution to the except through some events in the deck. ended up not just with a game we like to game's development, particularly after we We felt that was not enough, and that its play (and have time to play!), but also one had gotten the systems and mechanics more role in the Cold War was too important to that captures the historical flavor and or less down, was far greater than mine. handle that way (plus, it took up too much currents of the Cold War in a way that no The game (and I) thus owe him a unique space in the deck). Hence the China Card, other game on the Cold War has done. If debt, since without his tireless efforts, its which not only provided the opportunity we broke some new ground with the final transformation from a few playtest for a Cold War pun, but also perfectly mechanics, that was icing on the cake. Since copies into the total package GMT Games' captured China's opportunism and TS was released, we have heard many stories customers are now enjoying simply would canniness in playing the two superpowers of garners playing against their wives and not have occurred. But now that that has off against one another. The temptation to children, and of people playing it ten times happened, our struggle to produce the best use China's influence is always high, in the first few weeks after they got it. It is possible Cold War game is over. Now it's particularly when the Asia Scoring card always wonderful to hear that because it up to you to decide whether we have hasn't reared its head in a few turns, but it means that the game is being played more succeeded — the fate of the post-World War could also bail your opponent out of a and that Twilight Struggle is a good II world is in your hands. tough situation, if his hand is poor. gaming value.

The design process that produced Designing Twilight Struggle with Jason Twilight Struggle was in many ways a was a pleasure. One of the best things about