Editing Wargame (section)

==Professional vs recreational==
[[File:MCWC-wargame-Lacey-13-cropped.png|right|thumb|upright=1|A [[professional wargame]] at the [[US Marine Corps War College]] (April 2019)]]
[[File:Wargaming at CSW Expo 2009 (002).jpg|right|thumb|upright=1|A [[recreational wargame]] (''Here I Stand'') in play at CSW Expo 2009]]
{{Main|Professional wargaming|Recreational wargaming}}
A [[professional wargame]] is a wargame that is used by a military as a serious tool for training or research. A [[recreational wargame]] is one played for fun, often in a competitive context.

Recreational wargames can cover a wide variety of subjects, from pre-historic to modern – even fantasy or sci-fi combat. Games which do not include modern armaments and tactics are of limited interest to the military, though wargames covering famous historical battles can interest [[Military history|military historians]]. As professional wargames are used to prepare officers for actual warfare, there is naturally a strong emphasis on realism and current events.

Military organizations are typically secretive about their current wargames, and this makes designing a professional wargame a challenge. The data the designers require, such as the performance characteristics of weapons or the locations of military bases, are often classified, which makes it difficult for the designers to verify that their models are accurate. Secrecy also makes it harder to disseminate corrections if the wargame has already been delivered to the clients. Then there is the small player base. Whereas a commercial wargame might have thousands or even millions of players, professional wargames tend to have small player bases, which makes it harder for the designers to acquire feedback. Consequently, errors in professional wargame models tend to persist.<ref>"{{harvp|Creveld|2013}}: "Much of the data that goes into the programs is classified: as a result, checking on whether it is correct is difficult, and errors, once they have crept in, tend to stay. Secrecy also makes it hard to update the games as needed."</ref><ref>{{harvp|Perla|1990}}: "Unlike those in the wargaming hobby, professional wargamers work in a relatively closed society. One organization's games are not freely available for all to try, critique, and modify. Professional wargame designers may document their games (usually in classified publications), but they seldom describe the design process they employed to create them."</ref>

Although commercial wargame designers study consumer trends and listen to player feedback, their products are usually designed and sold with a take-it-or-leave-it approach. Professional wargames, by contrast, are typically commissioned by the military that plans to use them. If a wargame is commissioned by several clients, then the designer will have to juggle their competing demands. This can lead to great complexity, high development costs, and a compromised product that satisfies nobody.<ref>{{harvp|Creveld|2013}}: "One is the need to satisfy the requirements of many different user organizations each of which does not wish to buy the game off the shelf but actively attempts to pull it in its own direction. Often the outcome is great complexity and compromises that end up, like the famous camel that was created by a committee, by satisfying nobody."</ref>

Commercial wargames are under more pressure to deliver an enjoyable experience for the players, who expect a user-friendly interface, a reasonable learning curve, exciting gameplay, and so forth. By contrast, military organizations tend to see wargaming as a tool and a chore, and players are often bluntly obliged to use whatever is provided to them.<ref>{{harvp|Creveld|2013}}: "Finally, those who design, manufacture, and market games in the commercial world are obliged to pay attention to users' demands, such as ease of play and creating a good interface between player and game. Their counterparts working in, or for, the military, are not nearly as affected by these concerns. On occasion this can lead to bad games that people simply do not want to play."</ref>

Professional wargames that are arbitrated by an umpire or the players themselves (manual wargames) tend to have simple models and computations compared to recreational wargames. Umpires may even be allowed to make arbitrary decisions using their own expertise. One reason for this is to keep the learning curve small. Recreational wargamers tend to have a lot of wargaming experience (it is usually considered a hardcore hobby), so learning a complicated new wargame is easy if it is similar enough to ones they've already played. By contrast, military officers typically have little or no wargaming experience. A second reason is that the technical data required to design an accurate and precise model, such as the performance characteristics of a fighter jet, is often classified.