Editing Wargame (section)

===Level of war===
A wargame's level of war determines to the scope of the scenario, the basic unit of command, and the degree to which lower level processes are abstracted.

At the ''[[Tactical wargame|tactical level]]'', the scenario is a single battle. The basic unit of command is an individual soldier or small group of soldiers.<ref>{{harvp|Perla|1990}}:<br />"A player's decision level is strategic if his responsibility extends to allocating resources, possibly including economic and political resources as well as military forces, to fight and win an entire war. A player is making tactical-level decisions if he is most concerned about positioning relatively small numbers of men and weapons to apply violence directly to the enemy; that is, to fight battles."</ref> The time span of the scenario is in the order of minutes. At this level, the specific capabilities of the soldiers and their armaments are described in detail. An example of a tactical-level games is ''[[Flames of War]]'', in which players use miniature figurines to represent individual soldiers, and move them around on a scale model of the battlefield.

At the ''operational level'', the scenario is a military campaign, and the basic unit of command is a large group of soldiers. At this level, the outcomes of battles are usually determined by a simple computation.

At the ''strategic level'', the scenario is an entire war. The player addresses higher-level concerns such as economics, research, and diplomacy. The time span of the game is in the order of months or years.<ref>{{harvp|Perla|1990}}:<br />"A player's decision level is strategic if his responsibility extends to allocating resources, possibly including economic and political resources as well as military forces, to fight and win an entire war. A player is making tactical-level decisions if he is most concerned about positioning relatively small numbers of men and weapons to apply violence directly to the enemy; that is, to fight battles. The operational level game is less easily described; here the player is concerned with maneuvering relatively large forces so that they can be positioned to win the battles they fight, and so that those battles can help win the war. In the sense of decision making, then, the level of the game reflects the scope of the players' decisions."</ref><ref>{{cite web |author=James Johnson |date=30 June 2014 |title=The "Four Levels" of Wargaming: A New Scope on the Hobby |website=www.beastsofwar.com |url=https://www.beastsofwar.com/historical/levels-wargames-exploring-scopes-hobby/}}</ref>