Simsiker (sim-sik-er)

A teaching tool used in friendly school competition throughout the capital.

Execution

Basic Rules

The board can be configured to any desired set. But island maps made with mountain terrains are the most common: there would be impassable plateaus, narrow passes that are functionally bridges and every valley is an island. Each player takes turns to make a single move. Players cannot choose to skip a turn - they must move a piece. Each unit moves at a specific speed and in a specific way according to their real world counterparts.

Fog of War

The teachers are the ones who actually keep track unit movements separately from the sand board. Only when both sides can conceivably see each other, are the blocks placed on the terrain for the audience, and student generals, to see.
Messenger units simulate the delay in communication between the unit commander, the generals and the various battle groups of the battalion, regiment or brigade sizes. Until the players get reports from their messengers, even they cannot always be certain where their units are on the sand.

Advance Versions

More advance rules factor logistics management in the game where players are graded on how they utilize pre-placed supply depots, porters and fortification placement.

Does it really make sense for a division to go half way across the field or behind the enemy's back ranks if it didn't have a supply line to support it? Or moving through terrain at a time when you know it will be stormy?

— a retired general explaining why certain game rules exist

Components and tools

In serious gameplay, there are 30 unit types per side.
Command Units

Sapa Superior

Player Avatar (General)

Commanders

Captains

Lieutenants

Division Leaders

Support Units

Messengers

Porters

Medics

Balsa Raft Rowers

Priests

Craftsman

Melee Units

Huaminca

War Chief

Runners

Plumed Spearman

Maceman

Elementals

Ranged Units

Bolas Warrior

Pishtaco

Bowman

Huaraca

Camayer

Skirmishers

Specialty Units

Yellow Fringe

Red Fringe

Sapper

Construction

Espionage

Auca Runa

Play Space

Sand Court

The Roca Courtyard is a virtual sand pit outside the Qurikancha. The piles of sand are regularly reshaped to model different terrain for students to fight in, with sticks and strings to measure distance traveled.

Wooden Board

A significantly smaller, personal board for home play. It employs coloured terrain: blue for water, dark green for forest and red for mountain.

Participants

It's like running a war.

— Introduction to the game

Students

Even students who were not on any army track are expected to play at least twice per term.
The side who lost would be swapped for another on the roster and the previous winner given command over the perpetually victorious Innoit army.
This is to continually reinforce innoit superiority until everyone had a chance to showcase their abilities to their peers and teachers.

Teachers

A collection of retired innoit generals whose experiences in actual combat inform the school's gameplay.
They act as the students' subordinates. And their hands, as the general is not allowed to touch the wooden armies during play.
These teachers can also act on their own accord. While executing an order, they might:

1. rush a division forward as an overeager captain might do
2. refuse to carryout their order because it did not reach them in time
3. move away from the enemy due to cowardice

Referee

One all-powerful umpire who supervises the game, handles disputes and injects randomness. He is the sole arbiter of victory, regardless of whether or not a pre-established condition was met.
This role is rotated among the teachers every game.

Observance

Class Schedule

Despite how it may look. If they attacked us, they would lose. Despite having seasoned warriors and better weapons, we have our own secret weapon.
The terrestrial army is commanded by game players.

— a historian recounting the pros and cons of the army fighting off the Qhapaq Ñan roads

Teachers aim to check the hubris of prodigious student generals before they take a real command. An occasional player would be on a long winning streak and his teachers would deliberately hamper them to gives others a chance to play and to highlight how a general can do everything right and still lose.

Wallpama

As part of the final exam, those on the military track are given a month long war game hosted privately in the Sun Palace on moldable turf. This is particularly stressful for the student generals because during this event, they are not given anything to eat or drink unless their representative icon on the board is:

connected to supply lines

controls a nearby water source

can forage enemy terrain

can restock at a warehouse
Similarly, they can only sleep in rotation with their teammates to simulate the grueling conditions they would experience in the field. In the worst case, the examinees can feint from dehydration or sleep deprivation. During which the referee will announce a random event, such as an enemy assassin or an accident at camp, to excuse their departure from the rest of the game.

Primary Related Location

Ca-Chisneu

Important Locations

• Hawkaypata
• Qurikancha

Related Organizations

• Tawantinsuyu

Related Ethnicities

• Innoit
• Smoggy Cloud Clan

Famous Games

Acahuana vs Vicaquirao

In the second year of their academic life, Vicaquirao proved to be a genius at warfare. Acahuana, by contrast, was destined to be a bureaucratic accountant and was thus a weak player.

Scenario: The innoit army is dispatched under General Vicaquirao to suppress a numerically inferior rebellion.

However, Vicaquirao lost from a lucky (through realistic) charge that killed his general and demoralized his troops to route. Vicaquirao complained as expected of a child.
But this game was retroactively considered prophetic as it exactly describes the battle conditions of his first real generalship and death.

Cuca vs Apo-Mayta

During a series of professional studies on sieges, the generals developed an obsession with the geography of the Bastards.

Scenario: General Apo-Mayta is tasked with taking the Messa settlement of Manta.

After repeatedly failing with conventional tactics, Apo-Mayta became somewhat of a maverick; wanting to deploy unusable methods in the game that had no rules to see them through.

Urcaguary vs Cocomama

One particularly boring afternoon was a lesson more for the teachers than the students.

Scenario: Gain territorial control over a central valley.

Generals Urcaguary and Cocomama were made to fight in a straightforward battlefield under stormy winter conditions to showcase logistical difficulties to the rest of the class. However, the referee had to call the match as neither side could find the other.

Zaramamma vs Khuno

Controversially, this game simulated a civil war with both sides being the Terrestrial Army.

Scenario: General Zaramamma and General Khuno were to race for control over the oasis bridge that leads to the capital.

Both sides were considered to have displayed masterful use of deployment and maneuver tactics worthy of professional generals.

Ilyapa vs Tauchi vs Onpar

The participants took part in a rare three-way Wallpama that lasted two weeks.

Scenario: An innoit garrison led by General Tauchi must march through territory controlled by General Onpar to a friendly fortress while both are harrassed by the Savage Ilyapa.

It was later discovered that Ilyapa was, in fact, a girl disguised with the help of the Coya. Ilyapa did not have the 'general' title in the game, but had won in spite of counterintuitively splitting her forces.
She would never be incorporated into the army but held a ceremonial and advisory role for several nobles and royal panaqa members.