Overview
This masters is an innovative, unique and industry-facing course which provides you an opportunity to gain practical experience of the design and analysis of wargames.
We offer immersive teaching designed to engage you with a range of wargame types and formats. Which can be applied in a range of policy areas from public health and environmental disaster relief to defence. You will develop a toolkit of professional skills designed to equip you for a career in a range of sectors and industries. Through your modules, you will gain an understanding of the contexts in which wargaming can be utilised and apply this knowledge to inform your own designs.
As the first full master’s course in wargaming, this degree offers you the opportunity to gain key skills in an emergent field with a growing demand for knowledgeable graduates. Taking advantage of Brunel’s leading Games Design and Intelligence and Security Studies provision, you will develop skills sought after by employers and have opportunities to demonstrate these skills through your final project. This will include the opportunity for an ‘industry day’ where you will demonstrate and explain your games to industry and defence experts.
The programme will also offer you the opportunity to network and engage with industry and defence professionals via guest lectures, extra-curricular visits and opportunities to attend core professional wargaming events in the UK. Through this will establish important connections throughout your study and for future employment.
Have some questions? Contact the Programme Lead via email at iain.farquharson@brunel.ac.uk.
You can explore our campus and facilities for yourself by taking our virtual tour.
Course content
The MA Wargaming and Resilience Planning is structured around a series of core modules and one optional choice, plus a final design project. The core modules deal with elements of games design and the specificities of wargames design. Running alongside these are an analysis and research module to equip you with appropriate qualitative research methods and understanding of data presentation and analysis from the games you design as well as the influence of organisational culture and learning on the assimilation of such data. The Performing Resilience module will introduce you to ideas and concepts of resilience beyond a military setting and engage with considerations of perception and engagement of resilience planning in practice. Finally, a module on strategic thought will provide understanding of how strategic thought in various contexts can be applied to the development of wargames in simulating and analysing a range of challenges.
Optional modules are drawn from the College of Business, Arts and Social Sciences in order to provide insight into areas such as international development, migration and the law, postcolonial impacts on decolonised society and modern conflicts.
Compulsory
- Wargame Analysis and Research Methods
Spanning two terms, this module links the two design modules completing the spine of the programme. Students will critically analyse the games they design and the data extracted from their play. Alongside this, it will provide knowledge of core social science qualitative research methods to ensure students are confident undertaking academic research into wargaming.
- Wargame Design and Delivery
Alternating between task and play sessions, this module will introduce students to the concepts and methods of designing wargames for professional practice. Students will learn to design games based on sponsor requirements and gain practical experience of design and facilitation of a range of professional wargame types while reflecting on their successes and challenges.
- Games Design: Mechanics and Context
This practice facing module will support students in developing their own design practice emphasising games for serious purpose. It will provide knowledge of different game types, their core mechanics and allow the application of these methodologies to a personal design practice.
- Military History and Strategic Thought from the Ancients to the Present
This module examines how war has affected the world and the various factors affecting the development of war from the classical period to the present. It provides a sophisticated understanding of military thought and provides the historical understanding to fully contextualise the use of wargames as a methodology.
- Performing Resilience
This module engages students in the practice of resilience through the investigation of connections between ideas, practices and policies with the performance of resilience. Through analysis of case study projects, this module encourages students to think creatively about the performative aspects of engaging in resilience.
- Design Project
The design project allows students to demonstrate the full range of skills obtained across the course through the investigation of a topic and the design and production of a wargame. It will be required to meet the specifications of accepted wargame design and students will provide a write up, justifying design choices, selection of data sets and the sponsor requirements the worked from.
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Please note that all modules are subject to change.
Read more about the structure of postgraduate degrees at Brunel
Careers and your future
Graduates of this pioneering course have the potential to enter a range of industries as a result of the skills obtained. Opportunities for roles in professional wargaming range include working directly with defence and government departments such as the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) and the Ministry of Defence. In addition, there are a range of private consultancy firms who undertake wargaming and simulation for a variety of government and non-governmental stakeholders.
Beyond the sphere of defence, opportunities exist to work in resilience planning for large organisations such as the NHS, British Transport Police, alongside NGOs and charities concerned with aid supplies or medical provision in the Global South.
UK entry requirements
2:2 or above in an Arts, Humanities or Social Science degree
EU and International entry requirements
If you require a Tier 4 visa to study in the UK, you must prove knowledge of the English language so that we can issue you a Certificate of Acceptance for Study (CAS). To do this, you will need an IELTS for UKVI or Trinity SELT test pass gained from a test centre approved by UK Visas and Immigration (UKVI) and on the Secure English Language Testing (SELT) list. This must have been taken and passed within two years from the date the CAS is made.
English language requirements
- IELTS: 6.5 (min 6 in all areas)
- Pearson: 59 (59 in all subscores)
- BrunELT: 63% (min 58% in all areas)
- TOEFL: 90 (min 20 in all)
You can find out more about the qualifications we accept on our English Language Requirements page.
Should you wish to take a pre-sessional English course to improve your English prior to starting your degree course, you must sit the test at an approved SELT provider for the same reason. We offer our own BrunELT English test and have pre-sessional English language courses for students who do not meet requirements or who wish to improve their English. You can find out more information on English courses and test options through our Brunel Language Centre.
Please check our Admissions pages for more information on other factors we use to assess applicants. This information is for guidance only and each application is assessed on a case-by-case basis. Entry requirements are subject to review, and may change.
Fees and funding
2025/26 entry
UK
£12,125 full-time
£6,060 part-time
International
£22,320 full-time
£11,160 part-time
More information on any additional course-related costs.
Fees quoted are per year and are subject to an annual increase.
See our fees and funding page for full details of postgraduate scholarships available to Brunel applicants.
Scholarships and bursaries
Teaching and learning
Teaching on this course is largely practice-based. In both design modules you will be briefed on a design concept or defined problem, and then undertake a series of design tasks based on addressing these problems or concepts. These modules will familiarise you with the three distinct types of wargame (education, analysis & decision support) to encourage a reflexive, informed approach to the study and design of wargames.
A mixed approach will be taken in the Wargames Analysis and Research Methods module, combining reflexive, practice-based sessions with traditionally based learning of key research methodologies applicable to the analysis of wargame data and its dissemination to stakeholders.
Other modules will adopt a range of discipline-specific teaching and learning methods. This ensures transdisciplinary learning and ensures you develop the ability to cross pollinate knowledge in the development of innovative approaches to wargames design and resilience planning. Following the Games Design utilisation of a 'Bauhaus approach' to unify craft, art and theory; the programme supports students in developing their own artistic, creative design practice whilst also ensuring they have the practical skills to realise their vision and the critical, theoretical knowledge to inform that design and understand its purpose.
Assessment and feedback
Students are assessed through a mixture of practical design work and written assessments. To complete the MA, you will undertake a substantial design project accompanied by a write up.
Read our guide on how to avoid plagiarism in your assessments at Brunel.
