Chronicles_MA - General Game Discussion
 

Well, since the game's now up and running I'm going to split this thread and the other one and sort out the EA game in there...

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Extra roleplay is always delicious.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Sounds fun, I'd be up for it.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Seems great, I too was thinking (without having read of Baalz' idea) about creating a roleplay/dar/aar-heavy MP game.

I'd be up for this gladly but unfortunately, only if it would have 48hrs timer (even with quickhost), or even 24hrs but without quickhost... university schedules s*ck. :D If not, don't worry about me, my english is unluckily quite poor so I wouldn't possibly be able to write something truly epic anyway :(

The idea is anyway very nice and I wish you best luck with this, I would read with passion :) My personal suggestion for you is to go for the CBM. As it makes many spells and Pretenders much more viable and interesting, you would have diversified and enjoyable reports, instead of maybe having 3 or 4 nations with Cyclopses going for similar strategies... ;)

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

This game sounds more fun then a barrel of monkeys :D
I am up for this.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I would be interested in playing in this game.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Thoughts from the "Yarnspinners 2" game in Dominions 2 (search the forums, it's all still there):

-- writing even one contribution per week is hard to keep up, so don't have the turns too often
-- crowded map! the best stories come when nations interact, so make that happen early
-- consider de-incentivizing the elimination of players (no VP in capitals?); it sucks to get knocked out if you're having fun writing

Yarnspinners 2 was a whole lot of fun. Hope you can get this one going. In the past, heavy RP games have had bad luck.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Well, it looks like there's sufficient interest to pursue the idea, so here's a few of my thoughs/preferences.

CBM would certainly be an important choice, and I'm in favor of it, specifically because it promotes diversity, rather than having the midgame AARs all consist of "[My puny mage groupies cast spells on me/I cast spells on me] and I smashed the entire opposing army with my magic sword"

Given whay djo says, I broadly agree. An alternative would be to use one of the maps with specific VP sites, but the only ones I'm aware of are the ones on the Llamaserver, so suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

I was initially thinking of doing the first few turns as 24 or 48 hour quickhost, while the initial expansion goes on, then throttling back to between 72 and 120 fixed hosting. As I see it, the difficulty is more to do with having something you wish to write about, rather than the time and effort to write it. A reasonable hosting time allows players that feel inspired to thrash something out during a single turn without people that don't feel like writing something getting too drained by the delays.

Depending on the number of players, I would probably set an expected contribution rate at once a fortnight, which would mean that the tales would be coming in almost daily, on average, if people can keep up that pace. More, of course, would be better.

What I'd really be interested in trying would be a map that had starting positions for every nation of the age chosen and victory point locations that were special sites of interest. However, that would mean making a new map, which is quite a lot of work.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Have you considered using the dawn of dominions scenario?

Oh, and I'd definitely be interested in this game.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

It's too uneven, really. Since there's no built in victory condition the odds are good that some nations would simply get obliterated early.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Can I be LA Ermor? :) Or Ashdod at least?

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Yes you can, and you can have a special starting location that links directly to eight other regions...

All of which are deep sea regions, all of which have zero income.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I personally don't think everybody will write every turn. Spoiling your tactics when you're still working on them, giving away precious informations talking about your important battle the very turn you won/lost it, or just those turns when nothing happens... :D I think it will be more likely that people interested in writing during the game will do it once every 3-4-5 turns not to spoil their tactics immediately and just to find their muse ;) Of course, as you said, many players will make for stories to come more often :up:

If you're planning turns long enough and it's ok for you, I hope you'll keep a lil' spot for me :p But before deciding the map I suggest to wait for a decided number of players (as djo suggested, a crowded map seems a great idea, at least for the variety).

Oh, if i can make my last suggestion (I hope you aren't finding me intrusive, I'm just chatting and advicing friendly :) ) I'd tell you to at least -consider-, on the basis of the dimension of the map also, going for easy magic research. Tales of wild spells and enchantments, enormous summons and legendary artifact are much more interesting than the simple steamrolling national army going around - and with turns eventually being long, getting to the interesting part early would boost the attention IMHO. :smirk:

All from me. Best regards!

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

If I get LA Ermor I can promise to report growth of Empire of Darkness every turn! [muahahahaha!]

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Then can I get Hinnom. You can never have too many stories about evil demonic giants eating everything under the sun. :D

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

To be honest I think that Niefel, Hinnom and Ashdod are the nations that would totally own Ermor in 1:1 fight.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Right, if you're not in the list in the first post and are interested and willing to keep up a narrative, please say so. I'll give it a few days then start organising things.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

PM Kristoffer O about that game, it could be fun if we could get him here :) And I probably vote on LA, as it has the most vibrant and polarized nations, best for storytelling.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Sounds fun. I'm in.
-SSJ

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I would prefer EA (not because of hinnom)

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

On the matter of which era people prefer, one thing I'm considering is allowing the custom mod nations. They're usually reasonably balanced, and they have the advantage that if somebosy wants to play them it's almost certainly out of a love for that nation's style, which increases the chance that they'll be able to keep up the writing.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

How about the single age mod as well? It would allow everybody to use their nation of choice.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

But then I'd have three times as many anthropophagous giants to contend with!

Also, I'm not too sure that the Single Age mod would be compatible with the mod nations. If a nation modder could verify/deny that it's possible I'd appreciate it.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I would like to take part, though am not sure about the shedule. Also, I would personally prefer Early Age for such a game - more different races and more magic. On the other hand, I wouldn't make research Easy - it may get out of hand too fast!
Considering maps I also like Dawn of Dominions. Other possibilities I'd like to mention are Hyborean Age (maybe too small for # of nations - but you mentioned crouded map!), Pangaean Earth, Tyrande... And one other map you probably should consider is World of Geometry/Symmetry!

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Pangean is a very nice map but with no chokepoints I think it would be a very dispersive game...

Any era works for me really :) As we started talking about nations, I (surely too innocently and naively :angel ) hope ppl will choose their nations more because they feel the mood of them (thus providing better entertainment for everybody with inspired reports and stories) than to just pwn the game - not that it would be bad, stories of bloody triumphs are always epic, but still... :D

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Tifone:

Hmm... that puts me closer to Niefelheim as a choice :)

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I'm not sure it's that uneven, compared to an average map. RP wise I don't think getting completely wiped out is a huge issue- anyone that wants to keep up a guerrilla campaign can usually do so almost indefinitely. Anyway, I'd certainly volunteer for one of the 'at risk' nation and probably other vets would do the same.

I just think it would be hard to find a more perfect map for RP purposes.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I don't see why it could be thought of as a particularly good map for RP in general, or a narrative game such as I'm proposing in particular. I suppose the province names and poptypes being specifically chosen to reflect the terrain and proximity to nations is nice, but that's about it.

Plus, it restricts the possible nations, which is definitely going to hurt the chances of getting people writing, since there's less freedom to pick and play a nation you love.

If this one goes off acceptably I might make a semi-regular feature of it and put together pseudo-scenario maps for future games.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Re mods: yep, you can use mod nations along with the single age mod. Just make sure to use mod nations from the middle age. If you want to use late age nations you'll just have to modify them to make them middle age (which is trivial to do, I can help if there are any difficulties).

I recommend using mod nations by the way, they are generally thematically excellent. The ones listed on the LlamaServer are all recommended by me. Someone play Tomb Kings!

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

And I suppose most mod nations are unlikely to use the same nation number, yes?

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Yep. All the ones from the same age are compatible. If you want to use some from a different age then it's worth checking. Easily fixed though.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Oh yeah, and it's a good idea to PM KO, he might be interested.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

If there are mod nations included, i think i will go with the Skaven.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Hi, thanks for the invitation. I am interested, but I just signed up for another game that is on turn 3 now. I need to consider a bit.

How frequent hosting and how frequent AAR's are we talking about?
Should the AAR's be individual or organized collectively in some way?

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Early hosting would be as fast as people were comfortable with (probably for the first six to ten turns, where everyone is essentially 'setting up' their expansion), but that could easily be 48h quickhost. After that, slowing considerably, probably to 96h or 120h. It would be a very slow game by the standards most MP players seem to prefer, but I think it will need it.

Depending on player population I was hoping to convince people to get something written once a fortnight, which is roughly once every three turns. I'm not necessarily asking for AARs (though they'd probably be a big part of it) but just something that exists broadly within the world of Dominions. It could be an entry in the diary of the Prophet talking about the nation's activities (if it's from three turns ago it's not exactly going to give much away, after all), it could be a discussion of battle plans between troop commanders and mages. Consider something as simple as this one, from Caelum in the Dominions 2 game 'Yarnspinners'

I think initially it would be easiest to either just have people shove them on here or use the old wiki from the Yarnspinners games.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Mmm, the idea certainly captures the imagination. Assuming theres still room, I'd be happy to participate.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I wouldn't mind giving it a try, if you can find some place to put me in.I'm not much good at the game, but I like to think I'm a decent writer,at least.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I thought of a couple angles

... a prostitute following a battalion's campaign

... war rumors heard in the capital by a scullery maid

... propoganda laden news releases

... a non believer's perspective

... a spy's/assassin's adventures

-SSJ

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I played a game that turned out something like this, it was my best one yet. I´d love to play this one if there is room for me.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Unfortunately, the player who hosted the YS2 wiki did not make the jump to Dominions 3.

The wiki was nice, but the forum works well enough.


I am intrigued by this game, but I don't think I can make time for it. Ironically, I am also in the game KO is in. But I will keep an eye on your proposed hosting speed just in case.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Sounds like I can manage the amount of writing. I'm in.

Hmm, I've only joined two simultaneous games once before in my life :)

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Well, K_O, I suppose I'm honoured on behalf of the reading public...;)

djo: Um, I've just gone and made an account for the YS wiki and cleaned out all the random links to cialis adverts on the main page (which somebody seems to have started filling it with some time this year). So it's actually still usable.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

It might be a good idea to try to contact puffyn and ask permission. S/he was a good person and deserves the courtesy.

When I am back home after the holiday, I may try to find an email address for them.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

Yeah, I sort of fell off the Dominions wagon. Anyhow, I'd be happy to let you guys use the wiki if you'd like. Thanks for cleaning up the link-spam, Lokean. I think there's some way to restrict new users, which I may try to figure out how to turn on in order to cut down on some of that crap. I'll be in touch by e-mail with the details.

Yarnspinners was a lot of fun. I look forward to lurking, and maybe reading your stories will motivate me to dust of my copy of Dom 3.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I love the concept of this, and I figure I've got room for one more ongoing game. Do you have room for one more?

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

This concept sounds quite similar to a game I started back in the days of Dom2, call "Yarnspinners". In that game, writing your AAR was the main point and that was reflected in the rules of the game as follows:

1. Each turn, each player submitted a couple of paragraphs of narrative to an independant, non-playing gamemaster that scored the submision as follows:

- 0 points if nothing was submitted
- 1 point for overly terse (one-liner) or excessively verbose submissions
- 2 points for anything else

After a nominated number of turns (I think we chose 60) the game ends and nations are awarded further points for being the front-runner (10 points) or runner-up (5 points) in each of the score graphs except army size.

Nation with the most points is the winner. The idea was popular enough to spawn a second game (Yarnspinners2) although I wasn't involved with that, and I think they tweaked the rules a little.

Anyways, good luck with Chronicles!

Zap

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

In YS2, we ditched the points. We had a neutral nation that handed out astral pearls for each posted story.

In my opnion, people are going to write or not regardless of reward. As long as people are into it, you'll get good stories.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

First thing I did was email the person who owns the domain, who could well be puffyn, too.

EDIT: And who appears to be a web developer, if the blog on there is anything to go by.

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

I would like to join this game.

I prefer a "normal" game with VPs and a lot of writing/AARs.

I'm not such a fan for giving points/awards for paragraphs submitted. If people don't want to write they don't need to join the game. There are enough others...

Re: Chronicles - Inspired by Baalz, engineered by Lokean - Pre-game discussion
 

This is one of the few games offered that have tempted me to play (as me).

So just to toss in my 2-cent opinons.
Dawn is a good map but might be limiting here. Id prefer a really large random map. Especially if modded nations are added as it can drive the number of players quite high. Most know that I prefer maps with high mountains in order to generate more choke points. I think those AAR well. Like this...
http://www.dom3minions.com/RandomMaps/TriMega.jpg

Normally I like what VPs do to games but how would you AAR it? How do you recognize a VP in role? "I am proceeding toward the important province to the north"? Unless the VPs are just capitals of course, then its simple.

Heros mod would be good, nations would be fine. Im not sure if any others would be a good idea (except maybe single age if there is enough interest).

I prefer Era 1, Hall of Fame 15, Renaming on, Indepts 9, magic sites higher than average for AAR. Maybe noscoregraphs for AAR sake.