Military war games often don't involve actual combat, instead being either computer simulations or tabletop exercises intended to test out hypothetical scenarios with something similar to the d20 system being used to determine outcomes. While it may be hard to believe, these kinds of exercises can produce valuable insight into what might happen during a conflict, and some countries have paid a steep price for ignoring the outcome of a tabletop war game.

One of the most famous examples of this was in the Pacific theater during World War 2. Shortly before the Japanese launched their attack on Midway, their military leaders held a tabletop war game where they did a test run of their attack plan. The outcome of the exercise was a decisive American victory. The Japanese naval leadership dismissed the results as implausible and proceeded with their plan, only for the events predicted by the war game to play out in real life.