Quote Originally Posted by selil View Post
I want to create a table top exercise to examine a set of problems or issues regarding techniques/tactics.
The ones with military credibility for Land Warfare, are

Steel beasts
TACOPS4 - Was OK, but it now pretty dated.
Combat Missions (CMAK and CMBB)
Combat Missions Shock Force

Also look up VBS and VBS2, which mixes "game play" with person in the loop simulation. The ADF has actually used this as an Ops Analysis tool.

Played head-to-head, all offer a great deal of utility for professional education. The Australians use all the above. For examing tactical doctrine, these games are useful , but have limits. Once you are aware of those, they are excellent.

I have visited the great global google goodness and came away knowing a lot about dungeons and dragons and not a whole lot about how to create a war game. I'm not interested in entertaining anybody but examining thinking processes.
Dungeons and dragons has some very solid grounding in tactical doctrine!
My interest is in them as a training, education and development tool. There are huge tensions between a commercially viable game, and a good military tool, but they are no irreconcilable given a bit of third party development.