This report details the theoretical motivation and design of a wargame meant to address the lack of serious games that consider nuclear weapon employment and tools available to teach stakeholders about the challenges of nuclear weapon employment. The game is aimed at players of all experience levels and will be of interest to those in the policymaking community, the nuclear enterprise, and students of nuclear deterrence theory.

Designing A Strange Game

A Nuclear Wargame for the 21st Century

Stephen M. Worman, David R. Frelinger, David A. Shlapak, Katherine Pfrommer, Kelly Elizabeth Eusebi, Jenny Oberholtzer

ResearchPublished Nov 28, 2023

To assist the U.S. Department of Defense and other stakeholders addressing the subsiding interest in and knowledge of a continued nuclear threat, RAND Corporation game designers and subject-area experts developed A Strange Game, named in reference to the 1983 techno-thriller movie, Wargames, which presents thermonuclear war as a conflict that no one can win. A Strange Game, however, very much concerns the present day and the future in that it gives players an opportunity to explore the problems of near- or longer-term future intra-war deterrence where the taboo against the use of nuclear weapons has broken down.

This report provides the scientific and theoretical background that informed the creation of the A Strange Game prototype. This report also offers relevant context that went into game design. Therefore, it should be useful to those considering adopting the game, game masters who will want to conduct fully informed gaming sessions, and players wanting a first-hand account of the diplomatic and military concepts used in the game. The information presented in this report can also assist other game designers as they work toward the development of further games that immerse participants in environments designed to improve decisionmaking before, during, and after conflict.

Key Findings

  • A Strange Game can allow players the opportunity to learn about the fundamental dynamics of nuclear weapon employment theory in a new way.
  • The design of A Strange Game provides players with a better awareness of current-day nuclear strategies, plans, threats, and blind spots that might exist in U.S. national security knowledge.

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Citation

RAND Style Manual
Worman, Stephen M., David R. Frelinger, David A. Shlapak, Katherine Pfrommer, Kelly Elizabeth Eusebi, and Jenny Oberholtzer, Designing A Strange Game: A Nuclear Wargame for the 21st Century, RAND Corporation, RR-A1204-1, 2023. As of September 11, 2024: https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA1204-1.html
Chicago Manual of Style
Worman, Stephen M., David R. Frelinger, David A. Shlapak, Katherine Pfrommer, Kelly Elizabeth Eusebi, and Jenny Oberholtzer, Designing A Strange Game: A Nuclear Wargame for the 21st Century. Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2023. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RRA1204-1.html.
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