Connections UK 2025.
Dates: Connections UK 2025 took place from Tuesday 09 to Thursday 11 September 2025.
Proceedings: These are placeholders - audio and video content will appear here in due course.
The Connections UK conference for wargaming professionals took place at Brunel University, just west of London.
Programme: The final 2025 Programme is here.
Speaker Bios: Speaker and Chair Biographies are here.
Tuesday 09 September 2025:
Welcome and Opening address: Graham Longley-Brown. Slides. Audio.
Barriers into Wargaming: Jessica Viccars and Philippa 'Pip' Cawdell. Slides. Audio.
Conference Icebreaker Megagame: Green and Pleasant Land.
Introduction to Wargaming: Short Course:
- Why Wargame: Tom Mouat. Slides. Sorry - no audio.
- Types of Wargame: Guy Selway. Slides. Sorry - no audio.
- Facilitation: Perry Jago. Slides. Audio.
- Dice, Risk and Adjudication: Tom Mouat. Slides. Audio.
- What Next for a Professional Wargamer? Alex Vince. Slides. Audio.
Keynote Presentation: Admitting what we Know and Knowing what that Means. David Banks. Slides. Audio. Video.
Networking and Social Gaming.
Wednesday 10 September 2025:
Postgraduate Research into Wargaming.
Exemplars of Defence Wargaming Delivery.
- Graham Longley-Brown (Chair)
- Nimble Titan 26 - Mark Kyriss. Slides. Audio.
- Strategic Communications Wargame - Wes Odum. Slides. Audio.
- Army Exco Cyber TTX - Georgina Rice. Slides. Audio.
- Revolutionising Wargaming in Nigeria - Olakunle Olayinka and Eyitayo Shoda (Team Nigeria). Slides. Audio.
Insights from Historical Wargaming.
- John Curry (Chair)
- Armies who Wargaming Win? - James Halstead. Slides. Audio.
- Naval Wargaming up to WW1 - Toby Ewin. Slides. Audio.
- Learning Lessons from Vietnam Games - Pete Sizer. Slides. Audio.
- Wargaming History - Steven Wagner. Slides. Audio.
Game Jam with Evan D'Allesandro.
Sharing Best Practice in Professional Military Education Wargaming Courses:
- Tom Mouat (Chair)
- Empowering Wargame Educators - Rob Burks. Slides. Audio.
- Best Practice in Wargaming PME Courses - Georgie Eckersley. Slides. Audio.
- Best Practice in Wargaming at Brunel - Iain Farquharson. Slides. Audio.
- A Different Approach to Best Practice in PME - Keith Martin-Smith. Slides. Audio.
Under the Hood of Analytical Wargaming:
- Patrik Bjorkholm (Chair)
- The Usefulness of Analytical Wargaming - Anders Melander. Slides. Audio.
- The DEWH Lessons Process - Mike Tickner. Slides. Audio.
- OA and Wargaming for Defence Procurement - Nick Bradbeer. Slides. Audio.
- Wargaming and red-teaming - Natalia Zwarts. Slides. Audio.
- The Generic Low Operational Wargame system - Dominic Rougier and Benjamin House. Slides. Audio.
Games Fair:
Networking and Social Gaming.
Thursday 11 September 2025:
Brunel MA Update: Iain Farquarson. Slides. Audio.
Innovations in Commercial Wargames:
- James Blair (Chair).
- Applying a Commercial Wargame Design Mindset when Making a Professional Wargame - James Buckley. Slides.
- Next War Iran - Ali Ansari. Slides.
How our Adversaries Wargame:
- Alan Edwards (Chair).
- How an Opponent Wargames - Stephen Downes-Martin. Slides. Audio.
- Russian Wargaming - Neil Verrall. Slides. Audio.
Artificial Intelligence in Wargaming:
- Dangers and Benefits of Generative AI use in Wargaming - Ruby Booth. Slides. Audio.
- Artificial Intelligence Opportunities and Risks for Defence & Wargaming - Tom Mouat. Slides. Audio.
- Summary Advice - Ruby Booth. Audio (The slide referenced is at the end of both presentations above).
Keynote Presentation: The Intersection of Commercial and Professional DOD Wargaming. Mark Herman. Slides. Audio. Video.
Good Reads in Wargaming:
Insights from Resilience Wargaming:
- Iain Farquarson (Chair).
- On being in, Above, and Between Places - Stuart Andrews. Slides. Audio.
- Climate Security Wargaming - Andrew Crooks and Mary Hazelgrave. Slides. Audio.
- Serious Games to Build Community Resilience - Vikki McCall and Rob Grayson. Slides. Audio.
- Summary Comments Sally Walker. Slides. Audio.
New Members - the Way Forward: Jim Wallman and Alex Vince. (This was a workshop without slides or audio recording).
Games Fair:
Close. Slides.
Privacy/Security: As part of the Connections UK conference proceedings, photos of the event may be put on this website. The assumption is that the name on your badge and your image does not amount to the definition of "personal data" under GDPR. If you do not wish to have a photo with you name/face on it used in this way, you MUST ensure you wear a RED lanyard (available when booking in).
New Attendees: If you have never been to a Connections event before, you are encouraged to attach a Green Dot to your name badge (available when booking in). You won't be alone - at previous events almost half of all attendees were new and we don't expect this event to be different.
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Guidelines: The aim and purpose of Connections UK is to help bring together two main audiences: People that have something to say about wargaming in order to help build / generate / broaden the community; and People that want to use wargaming to help understanding in order to find out if it is appropriate for their needs. You are therefore asked to note:
- Wargaming is mainstream. To this end, we don't need to waste any time on justifying our existence or apologising for ourselves. All the delegates attending a "professional wargaming conference" will know what they are getting themselves into (and if they aren't, they should be). Let's just assume that they are and you can spend more time concentrating on your area of expertise.
- Timings are tight. Please don't overrun as it simply messes up the programme for everyone else.
- Do not advertise. It would be remiss to not mention that the cardinal sin for a presenter is to give a thinly veiled advertising slot for your sponsor's products or services. The delegates want to be informed and educated about Wargaming ways, means and methods - you are the expert so please concentrate on these. If any delegate wants more commercial information, they can contact you afterwards. Please include your sponsor's details in a slide at the beginning or the end, but no organisation diagrams or other company details that have nothing to do with the topic.
- Making Changes. We understand that you are likely to have to make changes to your presentation. This is completely acceptable, and new versions can be sent at any time up to and including the event date.
- Conference Proceedings. We will try to have an audio recording and a PDF copy of your presentation (but not questions) placed on the Connections UK website following the conference, except in the case of Senior Government Officials. You have been invited on the basis that this is acceptable - the clue is in the title "Connections" - we are trying to share information and best practice with each other.
- Presentation File Formats. Please provide your presentation in PowerPoint or PDF format, but ODF is acceptable.
If you have any questions, please contact the organisers here.
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