The Brick Mill Games Blog
This last Sprint (34) we pivoted slightly to bring the third TOCS Game Module “Utah Beach” up to the level of the other two modules (Advance to the Moselle and Operation Market Garden Nijmegen). By focusing all Stories and Tasks on UB, we made significant progress defining the Utah Beach OOB and the GameBox.xml scenario…
Continue ReadingAnother piece in the TOCS-MASL infrastructure is the ability to map battles that occur on the TOCS map into MASL scenarios, and then to map the scenario combat results back into the TOCS game system. Part of this infrastructure was to create the metadata descriptions of the available scenario boards, so that the Board Generation…
Continue ReadingOriginally the TOCS system had been called MASL (Macro-ASL) but we decided to split the system into TOCS (Tactical Operations Command System) and a separate extension to resolve combat as ASL scenarios (called MASL). Part of this was to appeal to a wider audience, and to extend the TOCS concepts to other time periods. This…
Continue ReadingI suppose you are wondering what the differences are between the new TOCS (Tactical Operations Combat System) and the MASL (Macro ASL) system, so I thought I’d spend some time trying to explain a little more about these new systems and what the gaming experience will be like. MASL was initially conceived and developed to…
Continue ReadingWhy play a game that isn’t fun… better yet… why even bother developing it? My approach to game development follows that same approach that I’ve used to map out many professional projects. In the age of agile software development, it requires flexibility to make changes as you go and to be able to refactor or…
Continue ReadingOne of the motivating factors behind the TOCS design and development was a litany of pet peeves that I had with other games that resulted in tactics that were either illogical or close to suicidal. In my opinion, when gaming the system becomes necessary to win, it cheapens the entire experience. Designing a game that…
Continue ReadingInitially the game system was called MASL, but after play testing the new CRT combat system we decided that the game was so much fun by itself that fighting the battles out as scenarios wasn’t mandatory. The decision to split the game rules into TOCS with a MASL rules addendum for WWII modules was the…
Continue ReadingI have been an avid war gamer since I was in the 8th grade and played many tactical, operational and strategic games of all sizes. I’d like to say that had the TOCS (Tactical Operations Command System) and MASL (Macro-ASL) system came during a flash of brilliance, it would be less than truthful. The design…
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