So many ASL stuff around that you can create a plethora of different situations and scenarios with the given number of counters
So I will quote a little US army doctrine here recognizing that this isn't universal (docs dated 2019).
There four types of offensive operations: movement to contact, attack, exploitation, and pursuit. Attack can be broken down into a couple of different varieties, such as deliberate and hasty, as well as flavors like ambush, counterattack, demonstration, feint, raid, and spoiling attack. Most of these are represented in ASL in some fashion although I think a counterattack, demonstration, feint, and spoiling attack would be flavor in the description and aftermath.
Generally, there are three types of defensive operations: area defense focuses on terrain, mobile defense focuses on the movement of enemy forces, and retrograde focuses on the movement of friendly forces. At least at the below battalion/company level, ASL does an fair job of representing these.
If you look around, I am sure you can find other doctrines from other militaries which would allow you to quickly map out the fact there aren't really that many types of engagements to model. So, you can mix any combination of counters, maps, and scenarios, but at the base level, your scenario mostly likely breaks down to one of these types of engagements. Recognition of this is why militaries the world over, train and re-train on training grounds the world over. Once you have planned and executed a deliberate attack against a hasty defense, you know what needs to be done. If, as in ASL, you have done it over and over, it does begin to become "more of the same". Our real-world counter-parts that
ACTUALLY lead flesh and blood soldiers into combat would kill to have the commensurate real-life experience we have gained on the cardboard battlefield.
In the main, I agree there are a gadjillion different combinations of boards. overlays, and counters we could cobble together, but the reality is, we are just playing the same basic scenarios over and over. Given the collective ASL body has begun to recognize what A needs to beat B and still remain challenging, it doesn't surprise me they all start to look like one another. JMO, YMMV. -- jim