Jutland is one of the most intriguing and controversial battles of all time. Nearly 100 years later and new books are being released almost annually. We all have an interest in the history and that is what makes this game work. We have studied the tactics and counter-tactics, we know intimate details about many of the personel involved, I mean outside of this club, these days, who really knows who Walter Cowan, Hugo von Pohl, or Reginald Tyrwitt was?
The game works because we have basically the same conditions that existed at the time of the actual battles, with the exception that we can't look through a pair of Zeiss binoculars at the enemy ships burning and we don't wake up in the hospital tomorrow morning. It works because we tend to take on the personalities of the actual commanders that were present. Sir Carl and I talked about this after Terschelling, I have read numerous posts about "I understand better how Jellicoe (or von Ingenohl) must have felt." In the planning for "Runs with Scissors" and "Extender" I remember asking myself "what would Tyrwitt do?"
For those few hours in 1916 the outcome of the war hung in the balance for some "cosmic" reason we seem to identify with that and overlook the deficiencies of the game engine. To a certain extent I think that this why we play Jutland more than Tsushima or G3. What we know about Daniel Callagahan and Norman Scott would barely fill a couple pages compared to what we know about John Jellicoe, David Beatty, Franz von Hipper, or Reinhard Scheer.
Hope I didn't get too deep for anyone.
What is it ...
Posted - Nov 28 2003 : 22:14:28
), and all that stuff and still ... when I am right in the middle of a big battle with some good guys to give orders to, or to receive orders from, there just ain't nothing like it. It's so damned exciting. Wonder what it is? And normally I don't even like RT games. 
, you would think other wise about burning ships 
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