I bought Ash Barker's, of Guerrilla Miniature Games fame, 2018 zombie skirmish game Last Days: Zombie Apocalypse yesterday and I am reading through it. I love it when wargame authors go over their creative process and I enjoyed the foreword by Ash. Specifically, he was talking about wanting his game to produce three things while a player engages with it: Memorable Moments, Crackerjacks and Ever-Afters. I liked his description of these three elements; I'll keep them in mind when writing my own stuff. I think, in an example of convergent evolution, Ivan Sorensen’s works also includes these three elements, specifically in 5 Parsecs from Home, and these three elements are one of the reasons I like good skirmish games.
Memorable Moments are just that: the thrill of escaping a firefight with one hit point left, making an almost impossible shot, things that can really put a spotlight on a character in a skirmish game. Crackerjacks, as Ash describes, are the feelings of anticipation you get when you can possibly obtain something really cool, specifically like a treasure from a skirmish game. It is often the reward at the end of the scenario that you acquire, regardless how beat up your skirmish units are. Ever-Afters are the "threads that tie the games together". Ash says creative players will think about how the story continues after the skirmish ends or what happens in between skirmishes to motivate the characters to get from story point A to B.
When I was writing up my 5 Parsecs After Action Report, the skirmish details made the narrative I was weaving around the characters emerge organically and logically. To be frank, thanks to Ivan's tables and details, specifically about the background of the skirmish characters, a cohesive plot emerges very easily. And the characters lived on in my mind, making it even more simple to figure out why they would have their next skirmish. Anyway, I'm liking Last Days so far.
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