Rules for playing a Braunstein

[Crimhthan The Great]

My understanding is that it was basically played like Diplomacy, in that there were win conditions and turns, but beyond that nothing really written down.

Dave Wesley is still with us and has done the convention circuit fairly recently. I'm sure someone can reach out to him to see just how it was done.

I played in Braunstein IV - "Piedras Morenas" (Spanish for Brown Stones) aka "Republica Banania I" - at this past Gary Con.

I didn't see any rules (or if there were even any written down), but there are player handouts for each character in the game.

Here's a pic I took where you can see Wesely in action along with part of the handout for the Peasant Workers' Union Leader, who I played:

www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1837668653224857&set=a.1837662533225469.1073741829.100009452211671&type=3&theater&ifg=1

Each turn involves talking to other players (making allies, pretending to make allies, making threats, trying to get information etc) and then turning in written orders for your character. After all orders for a turn are in, David goes through the pile and executes each one on the board.

Dave Wesley is still alive and just ran Braunstein at GenCon.

He's on Facebook. Give him a yodel!

I've played a few times. Only once in Braunstein I, but I thoroughly enjoyed both. The second (number IV) is more structured with turn taking, action sheets, and a kind of game board for the city of Banania. The first is more structured by location in the room it is held. Certain people are in a jail. Others have offices like the mayor. But movement and discussions between people happen at a rapid pace. Both include handheld resources, like money which may be given to other players. Not to mention information...

So what are they? Well, I think of both games as really about secret agendas for every player. Each player receives a packet with a name tag and lengthy description of who they are, what powers they have, and what their objectives are. Banania includes your movement sheet too, which might include all your forces if you have any. (Think Diplomacy secret action record sheets)

Each packet is unique and you cannot really publish either scenario because then other players would know your role. Instead it's a game of "who do you trust" and how can you work together. I love it because literally "anything" could happen as players proactively develop the situation as they play. For example, we were told one time a marriage was held and conducted by the players and there was nothing about that event in the sheets.

Braunstein is a famously "Never published game", but for obvious reasons. It may be the first ever role-playing game, depending on how you like to parse those things.

I really enjoy both because they blend strategy gaming, freeform roleplaying, and Diplomacy like nothing ever before or since.

Diplomacy Archive dot com

[Crimhthan The Great]

I'll give you what I would consider "rules" for a Braunstein or maybe, instead, criteria of what makes up a Braunstein. First, recognize that what you ultimately need is open minded players and a fair and quick witted ref (GM).

1. Brief introductory scenario to set up game play. What's the situation? and who are the key players? Possible inclusion of illustrative props.

2. Open rules and free player agency

a. Fluid movement and logically determined outcomes.

b. Referee determined methods of adjudication based on the circumstance at hand.

c. Scale is unimportant except for what the GM considers reasonable.

d. Players can try anything within reason.

3. Sectioned map broken into areas. Each player faction would start in an area at set up.

4. Character designated roles, objectives, and motivations (both open and hidden).

5. Miniatures may be used to represent individuals for the purpose of establishing proximity to locations and other people. Figure scale is unimportant.

6. Turn based orders of movement and/or actions for each players unit(s). Players establish who is moving where and doing what. GM will determine how long it takes and possible outcomes.

7. Possible random events that can alter game play.

8. Open and hidden/secret player to player communications motivated by objectives.

9. Unfolding and adaptive game play which can not easily be predetermined. Both players and GM need to be flexible.

10. Winner is determined by tallying Victory Points. These are based on achieving objectives, players perceptions of each other (vote), and GM fiat for good game play.

Lastly, I'll point you to this blog post from the past if you have not seen it >>> Braunstein Memories

[Crimhthan The Great]

@chirinebakal how much of the above two posts is accurate information and what amendments would you make to what is posted above?

[Crimhthan The Great]

Someone said
Questions

* How does Braunstein differ from historical miniatures wargaming?
* How does it differ from (modern) conception of a roleplaying game?
* Is it really just a "re-skinned" version of Diplomacy?
* What is the history of the Braunstein game in the late 60s/early 70s?
* What Braunstein principles were continued into Arneson's Blackmoor game (if any)?
* What is the optimal number of players?
* What roles are essential/required for running this (besides a Referee)?

From a book recently acquired:

A month before, the Austrian force in Silesia, which had numbered barely 600 horse and 3,000 foot, was under the command of the military governor, Count von Wallis, as soldier of Scottish descent whose forbears had come to Austria generations before. Wallis had been surprised by the outbreak of the new war and, having received neither aid nor instructions from Vienna, prepared for siege the nearby town of Glogau, said to be the key to North Silesia, with the only troops he had readily to hand, about 1,000 men. Wallis was a man of energy and he had brought in from the surrounding countryside salt, meat and meal, constructed trenches and palisades and burned down the suburbs to create fields of fire. And yet war was still conducted according to the peculiar mid-eighteenth century rules of Austrian formalism, for when Wallis proposed to blow up the Protestant church outside the town, 'in case the Prussians make a blockhouse out of it', the chief Protestant burgher in Glogau pleaded against this action and was sent to Frederick by Wallis for a written undertaking that the church would not be used by the military. This the King readily gave and the church was spared. (Osprey's The Austro-Hungarian Army of the Seven Years War)

(emboldened italics added)

I would imagine that this would be a scenario ideal for the Braunstein game, if my understanding of its purpose is sufficient.

[Deleted]

Jun 10, 2018 22:52:01 GMT -5 Crimhthan The Great said:

@chirinebakal how much of the above two posts is accurate information and what amendments would you make to what is posted above?

Well, you've already posted the links to my blog where I talk about running these games, so you pretty much have my opinions on the subject.

If you have specific questions, I can try to answer them. I'd suggest sending me an e-mail to let me know what you want, like Piper did.

If I may offer one comment, the notion that a Braunstein scenario can't be published because the other players will know one's secret agenda is complete nonsense and utter rubbish. One of the cornerstones of the Braunstein style of play - at least as we do it here in the Twin Cities - is that at the start of the game, nobody knows who's playing who unless they announce it themselves. A huge part of what makes a Braunstein work is the interpersonal interactions between players, as they move around engage each other in conversation. See also Dave Arneson as Jabba the Hutt in The Great Mos Eisley Spaceport Raid, where he just happened to forget to introduce himself to Princess Leia when he was suggesting that the Rebel Alliance should leave their entire treasury in his safe keeping. The pandemonium that brakes out when things like this are discovered is what makes the game what it is.

[Deleted]

The screaming could be heard throughout the building...

[Q Man]

Jun 12, 2018 12:31:42 GMT -5 @gronanofsimmerya said:

The screaming could be heard throughout the building...

I take it that lacking a "poker face" would be a handicap in a Braunstein.

[Deleted]

When Princess Leia found out she'd just handed the Rebellion's purse to Jabba the Hutt, it was pretty comical. For the rest of us.

[eldrad]

So roll 2D6 and whoever has the highest roll gets to decide?

[The Perilous Dreamer]

Dec 10, 2019 22:21:53 GMT -5 eldrad said:

So roll 2D6 and whoever has the highest roll gets to decide?

I am not sure, you could ask Dave Wesely on FB or contact Jeff Berry at his blog.

[mao]

This is fascinating!

[ampleframework]

I had actually planned on trying to go to an old school convention and play in one of Wesely's games this year (or at least silently observe), but due to the pandemic those plans have been put on hold. I similarly would like to try to get into one of Bob Meyer's Blackmoor games, as I understand he runs them for the public lately now and then.

[hengest]

Would love to do this. It would be great to have video records of how some of these old-timers run things. What seems trivial or not immersive now (nothing is so immersive on video or as an outsider) might seen very valuable in 10 years or so.

[The Perilous Dreamer]

Mar 2, 2021 20:40:39 GMT -5 hengest said:

Would love to do this. It would be great to have video records of how some of these old-timers run things. What seems trivial or not immersive now (nothing is so immersive on video or as an outsider) might seen very valuable in 10 years or so.

I believe that David Wesely has posted some video over on FB.