{"id":2948,"date":"2012-06-19T11:00:34","date_gmt":"2012-06-19T15:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/?p=2948"},"modified":"2012-06-16T18:01:39","modified_gmt":"2012-06-16T22:01:39","slug":"making-the-connection","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.playthepast.org\/?p=2948","title":{"rendered":"Making the Connection"},"content":{"rendered":"

Registration is now open for the annual Connections interdisciplinary wargaming conference<\/a> to be held July 23-26 at the Center for Applied Strategic Learning at National Defense University in Washington DC. Connections serves the professional community of practice around wargames, conflict simulation, and serious games. Let me reproduce the official invite from conference co-chairs Matt Caffrey\u00a0Col USAF (ret) and NDU’s Timothy Wilkie before I take a moment to explain what this has to do with PtP.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s conference promises to have the most international participants to date.\u00a0 Of the previous 19 conferences, only little more than half had any international participation, with our two best years having participants from three nations.\u00a0 This year, if all attend as planned, we will double that level with participants from Canada, the United Kingdom, Germany, Sweden, South Korea and Singapore.<\/p>\n

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Perhaps our success in attracting broader participation stems in part from an exceptionally strong agenda.\u00a0 Our keynotes this year include Prof Phil Sabin of King\u2019s College London, the pioneer of using wargame design and development as an aid to teaching history as well as Prof Robert Rubel\u00a0 and Dr. William Lademan, leaders of, respectively, the US Navy\u2019s and US Marine Corps\u2019 wargaming efforts.\u00a0 Our new tutorial this year on wargame design will be taught by the world\u2019s most prolific wargame designer. We will include a panel of prominent wargame designers, which will be followed up with our first ever game design lab during the core of the conference.\u00a0 Add to this strong speaker panels, including our first parallel track in years, more demos than 2011, and working groups addressing significant issues and you can see why many are making time for Connections 2012.<\/p>\n

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To learn more about Connections go to Connections-Wargaming.Com.\u00a0 If you like what you see \u2013 please register today.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

A while back I wrote a post here called “War, What is it Good For?<\/a>” based on my experience at last year’s Connections. It provoked some interesting discussion and still gets links and traffic. As a long-time recreational wargamer (“grognard”), I wanted to get across a couple of points I thought important to PtP’s readership:<\/p>\n