[UPDATE] We had several readers recommend games they have used or would be suitable for simulating Multi-Domain Battle and Operations (MDB/MDO) concepts. These include several classic campaign-level board wargames:
The Next War (SPI, 1976)
NATO: The Next War in Europe (Victory Games, 1983)
For tactical level combat, there is Steel Panthers: Main Battle Tank (SSI/Shrapnel Games, 1996- )
There were also a couple of naval/air oriented games:
Asian Fleet (Kokusai-Tsushin Co., Ltd. (国際通信社) 2007, 2010)
Command: Modern Air Naval Operations (Matrix Games, 2014)
Are there any others folks are using out there?
A Mystics & Statistic reader wants to know what wargames are being used to simulate and explore Multi-Domain Battle and Operations (MDB/MDO) concepts?
There is a lot of MDB/MDO wargaming going on in at all levels in the U.S. Department of Defense. Much of this appears to use existing models, simulations, and wargames, such as the U.S. Army Center for Army Analysis’s unclassified Wargaming Analysis Model (C-WAM).
Chris Lawrence recently looked at C-WAM and found that it uses a lot of traditional board wargaming elements, including methodologies for determining combat results, casualties, and breakpoints that have been found unable to replicate real-world outcomes (aka “The Base of Sand” problem).
There is also the wargame used by RAND to look at possible scenarios for a potential Russian invasion of the Baltic States.
What other wargames, models, and simulations are there being used out there? Are there any commercial wargames incorporating MDB/MDO elements into their gameplay? What methodologies are being used to portray MDB/MDO effects?
Highly recommend Gary Grigsby’s War in the East & War in the West games.
GMT’s Next War series is good at providing operational level employment of forces in a variety of potential modern conflicts. I would strongly recommend them to anyone interested in war gaming. All games that are developed are high quality with a lot of realistic detail. The game series and system is probably the best on the civilian market. Unless anyone can point me in another direction…