Article on how to organise a Teamgame

[Mr Grumpy]

Teamgames are a fun way to experience playing the larger scenarios that are often beyond the ability of a single player to manage without a huge investment of valuable gaming time, they also allow you to meet new players and as part of a team to discuss and plan strategies. 

There are no rules covering Teamgame etiquette and in many ways they function just like normal scenarios but this article contains my suggestions based on my experiences to allow a Teamgame to function with minimal fuss.

If you don’t already have the teams and scenario organised you can post on the forum to advertise your game stating the scenario you wish to play, optional rules, number of players you are looking for and how the various forces on both sides might be divided between the players. 

The minimum players for a teamgame is three and there is no maximum number that can take part, however in my experience once you have more than six players the turn rate becomes very slow which might be an issue for some players?
The two sides do not need to be of equal numbers, if a scenarios forces divide up better with an uneven number of players or one sides players have less free time than the other players that is no problem, so you could have (for example) one vs three or two vs four and any other permutation. The only small complication uneven sides bring is when you come to report the game which I will cover at the end of the article.

One player from the first moving side set’s up the scenario in accordance with the agreed optional rules and with a filename recognisable by all players, that player play’s his agreed portion of friendly forces (including airstrikes, artillery and reinforcements linked to his area) and when finished clicks “save battle” on the toolbar, do NOT end the turn.
The file is then “internally” emailed to ALL of the first team (so everyone can see where the file is) but ONLY the player next in the agreed order moves his forces as above and so on, when the file reach’s the final player he might want to play his forces and then review if any arty/air/ground forces have been missed by other players on his team before hitting “Turn > Next” to end the turn. *Note on the first turn the final player will need to register the password that the team has agreed on and that every player from that side will use from now on*

The final player of the first moving side “globally” email’s the finished file to ALL of the players in the game so the first side’s players can see the file has been sent to the second team and each player of the second team can see the file has arrived and can review the replay if they wish.

The second team follows the same procedure with each player playing in an agreed order clicking “save battle” until the final player reviews and ends the turn registering the second sides agreed password (on the first turn only).

The game continues along these lines until conclusion, in my experience it is very important that you maintain the same player order that each side moves in as changing the order only tends to end in confusion.
In my opinion (although not necessary to the operation of the teamgame) sending email’s to every team member (internally) or to every player in the game (globally)is very important because if you don’t then it is very likely that when there is a delay players will start to fire emails to everyone to find out where the file is?

At the conclusion of the game the game has to be reported in a particular manner, if the sides have an even amount of players then the two sides need to organise each player on one side to report against a player on the other side.
So for example if side one with players A, B, C reports against side two with players X, Y, Z then A reports against X, B against Y and C against Z. The important point to remember is that each reporting player needs to click the “Teamgame” check box (see image below).



If the teams are of uneven number then the player(s) left over after everyone else has paired up should report against the Blitz Shadow Player again clicking the “Teamgame” check box (see image below). 



So for example if side one with players A, B, C reports against side two with players X, Y then A reports against X, B against Y and C against Blitz Shadow Player.