Gamebox Development Tutorial by Kris Weinschenker

From CyberBoard

So, you want to build a CyberBoard game module? By Kris Weinschenker

I've constructed several different modules for various wargames (including Reds!, Glory!, Royal Tank Corps, For the People, etc). The process is rather easy, but can be time-consuming. In this example, I'll construct a CyberBoard gamebox from scratch for The Gamers "No Better Place To Die", a brigade-level game of the battle of Murfreesboro and chart my progress (and 'con'-gress!) in this article.

The Preliminaries

Before you begin building a CyberBoard gamebox, it is best to do some planning. Decide what elements of the game will be essential to the gamebox, what sort of scale you will use for the map, and what game elements will require 'special attention' by CyberBoard. This will save you alot of headaches later.

In this example, besides the map and counters, a chart will be necessary to track brigade losses and stragglers. Also, a way of issuing Orders 'in secret' must be developed

For the map scale, after some experimentation, I find I can use a 40 pixel hex grid. Making a sample counter, I find the names/numbers of brigades will on 40 pixel counters at full scale using 8 and 10 point Arial fonts. At half-scale I'll have to omit only the brigade number, so half scale nearly the entire board will be visible and it will be useful for planning large troop movements.(Sidebar: I used to make maps alot larger, but gaming guru Ted Raicer once told me he never plays Cyberboad games because he has to see the entire map. Since then I've tried to make maps as small as possible and still retain as much counter information as possible. Sadly, there are many gameboxes that suffer from 'bloated' mapscales, where the designer has included superfluous 'clip-art' to make the counters look 'pretty' while sacraficing the playability of the game.)

The Gamers Civil War brigade-level games issue Orders to divisions and corps that are kept secret from the opponent. It will be necessary to include a 'marker' that is kept secret from his/her opponent where the player can write these Orders, as well as a log for if/when these Orders are received.

Drawing the Map

I open “CyberBoard Design” and get to work. I go the “Playing Boards”, select a 40 pixel cell-width with 62 columns and 35 rows and name it “Murfreesboro”. Since the rows are numbered from bottom to top on the gamemap, I check the “reverse rows” box in the Board Properties.

Since there are four levels of terrain, I create four different colors (a light blue-green for Level 1, a pale green for level 2, an orange/tan for level 3 and a brown for level 4) and save each of them to the custom palette using shift-left click. Rather than use these colors to simply fill cells on the maps second layer, I’ll use them to draw contours. I find this technique more aesthetically pleasing.

I’ll do most, if not all the drawing on the bottom map layer. Since level 2 is the predominate terrain level, I use the fill command to make the entire playing board pale green. Then, I select the Polygon/Polyline tool, left- and right click on the level 3 color (line width 1) and begin the outline the level 3 terrain in the top left of the map. I immediately discover a small problem. The row numbering is off. After some searching, I find by going to “Reshape Board” at Board Properties, and checking “stagger first row in”, the problem is corrected. I draw a narrow black rectangle the whole way across the top of the map to block out the ‘extra’ hexes that are created.

Now, I can draw the terrain contours in the top-left section (1/8) of the board. I’ve found by drawing the board a section at a time the task is much less tedious, and one makes fewer mistakes. After completing the contours, I use the poly-line tool (same tool with “no color” selected as outline) to draw in Singing Creek, Stones River, and the secondary roads.

To add trees (and there’s A LOT of them), I make a few 20x20 pixel tiles. I first completely fill the tiles with transparent color (cyan is the default), then draw in some small rough ovals in various shades of green to make tree shapes. I then randomly place these tiles in the proper hexes using the “Place tile” function. For the buildings, I use a similar method, and place some brownish rectangles for the smaller buildings.

One-eight of the map is now complete.

The above image is full scale and also includes the test counters I made. The lettering on the counters has been somewhat distorted by converting it to a JPEG image However, the distortion on the counter turned 60 degrees IS a problem. I’ll add a marker to designate a unit’s facing to alleviate this

So far, I’ve spent 1-2 hours on this game box. The map will probably take another 6-10 hours to complete and I’m also working on a much larger game box for “Three Days of Gettysburg”.. When I’ve finished this map, I’ll continue with the tutorial.

Drawing Tile Images for the Counters

Well, it only took me about 4 hours to finish the map, so now it is on to the counters.I start with my test counter and draw in some background images to create base counters.

Well, for some reason those images aren’t as sharp on here as they are on my computer in Paint (they are NOT SCANNED), but you should get the idea. At this point, I’ll make some custom background colors to differentiate between the Union wings and then use the ‘star’ blanks to make the commanders. I use bold 8 point fonts for full scale leaders. For half-scale, I use some “Small fonts”. For a general rule of thumb, I never use anything smaller than 8 point on a full scale counter, or 5 point on a half scale counter. These are what the CSA leaders look like in CyberBoard….

As you can see, I’ve had to abbreviate some names, But I can still read all the text (even without my glasses!)

Next, I’ll do the Brigade counters using the text utility (available at the Yahoo! CB mailing list)

Using the GTL Text Editor

The GTL Text Editor is a wonderful utility for placing similar text on a large number of tiles. Create your base files in CB Designer, select them using shift-left click, then select “Save Tile Library”. Name this file anything you want, and then open it in the GTL Text Editor.

The Editor allows you the create text of nearly any size and font, then move it around, as well as rotate it, on the tile. You can then “store” the text position, and thus create a similar tile with a different name, combat, factor, etc. When you’ve created your tiles simply save them to file, go back to CBDesign and choose the “Load Tile Library” command.

Here’s a screenshot of the Confederate brigade counters for this example in the GTL Text Editor.

I did not select the “create half scale tile” function at the upper right. This function works well with larger tiles and fonts, but not with the sizes I’m using here. Also, if your stored text requires small adjustments to center it, make sure you turn off the “create tile using position data” function next to it, or it will ‘double print’ the text.

The rotation function also offers a means of placing ‘angled’ text on maps (something some ‘experts’ claim can’t be done!). Simply use a blank base tile of your maps transparent color, place the text on tile and rotate to the proper angle, and save the tile. It might take a bit of trial in error to find the proper angle, but it works very well.

Order Logs and Loss Records

The Order Logs and Loss Records for both players can easily be created as separate ‘Boards’. For the Order logs I created a set of Markers that prompt the player for text when they are placed on the player’s “owned” board. Thus, while the markers themselves are visible, the text written by the owning player is not, and his orders are kept secret. To reveal the orders, the issuing player can simply move his marker to the gamemap and “release ownership”. The text of the Order then becomes visible to the opponent. The player is also free to create ‘dummy’ orders in an effort to confuse his opponent. The Loss Records are created with a few simple ‘blank box’ tiles. Using the “snap” function (similar to the AutoCAD snap function) helps keep all the boxes aligned.

A Note on Ownership

Ownership is a relatively recent development in CyberBoard and can be a bit tricky to understand and incorporate into a gamebox design. Tiles, Tile Trays, and Boards can all be assigned “ownership”. Markers cannot be “owned” but become “owned” when placed on an “owned” board.

I recently downloaded a gamebox for Guilford. The game uses Tactics Chits placed by both players to modify combat results. The gamebox designer had a complicated NINE step procedure for placing these Chits. Had the designer simply created two owned trays for the Tactics Chits the procedure would have been reduced to:

1. Attacker places Tactics Chit, does NOT release ownership and sends .gmv file to Defender.

2. Defender places Tactics Chit, releases ownership and sends .gmv file back to Attacker.

3. Attacker releases ownership of his Tactics chit and resolves battle.

A little fore-thought into game mechanics can make game play much more streamlined.

Finishing Up and Building the Scenarios

Once all the tiles are created, it is time to create the Playing Piece groups. I create Playing Piece groups for each formation, the optional counters, two-sided record keepers, etc. It is then simply a matter of matching all the Pieces fronts to their backs.

Now, I build the scenarios. Go to CB Player and select “New>Scenario”. When building scenarios from a gamebox, you are prompted to create Trays. Often, these are identical to Playing Piece groups, but, in this case, I create many fewer Trays than Groups, since nearly all the units start on the board for the big scenarios, and there are relatively few units in the small scenarios.

For the three large scenarios, I create the “owned boards” by going to the “Project” tab and selecting “Create Players”. The Order logs and Loss Record charts are now assigned ownership.

Now, it’s time TO PLAY THE GAME!

In CB Player, I select “New>Game” and choose the first scenario, Hardee’s Attack on McCook. Willach’s Brigade rolls a 66 on its first Morale check (Rout), and the Union flank begins collapsing like an interstate highway bridge in Minnesota (or a coal mine in Utah). By turn 4, ALL the Union Brigades are Wrecked. In playing, I find the Facing markers I imported from my Glory! Gamebox are a bit cumbersome, so I go back to the gamebox in CB Design and shrink them a bit, Note, any changes made to the gamebox now will be incorporated into the scenarios.

Finally, I pack the gamebox and scenarios into a .zip file and post them to my webpage[1]

You can download it there.