ThreeFort - Experimental game - Squirrelloid/Bandar Log wins!
 

Summary

The intent of this game is to emphasize the mid-game (to me the most fun part of the game), discourage turtling and have national mages and troops be relevant throughout the game.

This is accomplished by limiting magic to level 6, having all spells (except for some remote attack/movement spells) be set to level 0, having all sites already discovered (and double gem income in your cap), remove all global spells (even those below level 7), no indies (including magic sites that allow recruitment), no mercenary recruitment, no diplomacy.

If you think you might be interested please download the attached mod and two versions of the map (one with preset starts for six nations) and take a look.


Game settings

Era: Middle
Number of players: 5
HoF: 15
Gold: 125%
Resources: 125%
Mods: modified version of CBM 1.6 (see attachment)
Starting provinces: six preset start locations of 8 provinces each (see fort section below)
No indies, no mercenary recuitment
Map: modified version of a section of Cradle (see attachment)
Hosting: 24 hour interval until turn 10, 48 hours until turn 30, 72 hours after that. The reason for this is that I expect turns to become complex very rapidly. Turn 10 in this game should be similar to turn 30 in a normal game in terms of the armies being fielded.
Other rules: Attack orders can be given on turn 3, no sooner.
All other settings default


How it works

1) Choose a nation (see list of banned nations below)
2) Once all six positions are taken rdonj will message everyone their randomly selected starting locations.
3) You will then let him know where you would like your capitol and up to two additional forts located.
4) Play!

Note: Thanks very much to rdonj for his help. His assistance means that we won't know who our neighbors are before the game begins nor will we know everyone's fort locations.


Details

Banned nations - All water nations, Ashdod & Jotunheim (giant nations in a no-SC game), Ermor & Pan (free spawn issues in a game without battlefield clearing magic).

Map - This is a modified version of a section of Cradle. I've tried to balance the terrain types. Most importantly, each nation only has two neighbors (note that the position in the middle of the map does not share a border with the two nations in the northwest corner). The only indie provinces are four water provinces.

NAP to begin game - You cannot issue attack orders until turn 3. I'd like to see some good fights - not just a first turn attack from a flying pretender on an opponent's cap.

Diplomacy - There is none. No trading, no NAPs, nothing. General talk in the game thread about how you are destined to rule the world is welcome but don't reveal any game information such as "nation x has their cap in province y" or "nation x has their army in province y".

Indies - This is a no indies game. I've modded indie units to have a resource cost of 800. But it's quite possible I missed something. If so, we're on the honor system - just don't recruit it. IMPORTANT - no recruiting mercenaries either!

Magic - Magic is limited to level 6. So there won't be a traditional endgame with army destroying spells and SC's dominating the battlefield. Remote attack and movement spells have been put at level 3 for the same reason as the NAP that begins the game. Researching these spells is actually the only reason to have mages research at all - since all other spells are set to level 0. There are no global spells at all - again, to remove any incentive to turtle. If you've got gems use them to summon/forge. If you want more gems or gold, conquer someone.

Forts - Each nation will be limited to 3 forts. With only 8 provinces per nation this means almost 40% of provinces will have forts. The aim is to prevent raiding from being too powerful but also to keep the game moving and not have every province castled. Income and resources will be set at 125% to offset the lower province count. At the start of the game you must select at least a capitol province. You can select up to two other provinces to have forts. The forts will be whatever your nation builds in that type of terrain. The forts will also have labs and temples. If you leave one or two fort slots free you can later build a fort in whatever province you choose, at any stage of the game. You may want to leave fort slots free in order to see if you have particularly valuable provinces you want to protect or to give yourself strategic options later in the game. The cost is one less recruitment center at the game's start and of course you'll have to pay for the fort (and lab/temple) yourself. Note that if a nation has a free fort slot and that nation is eliminated the fort slot is lost (i.e. does not go to the conquering nation). IMPORTANT - fort provinces, once selected, can never be changed and never torn down! If you receive a fort through a random event you must tear it down as quickly as possible (but if you have a fort slot free you can choose to use it on the free fort you received).

Sites - All sites are set to level 0. There is no need for site searching! Mages are for forging, summoning, and fighting. Sites that allow recruitment of units have been removed (this is *really* a no indies game). Sites that cause potentially deleterious effects have been removed (it would suck to preselect a fort province and find it was causing disease, incinerating your undead, etc.). Sites that provide bonuses to schools of magic have been removed (no ultimate gateway ftw). Your capitol province will have double the amount of gems of each type as normal in order to emphasize your nation's magic. However with all sites discovered you may well end up with a strong gem income in a type of magic your nation doesn't have - keep that in mind when designing your pretender.

Blood magic - If you want to play a blood nation take a close look at the mod first. Blood magic was nerfed heavily - all summons more expensive, many spells removed, etc.

Misc. changes - Naiad warriors nerfed; hereos blade, soul contract and lifelong protection not forgeable; Machakan spider forms have upkeep cost; Pythium's cap gem income 10 gems, like other nations.

Balance - Obviously I have some concerns with balance given my list of banned nations, but I can't guarantee anything given all the changes here. It would be nice if some usually weak nations did well (and I think they might) but I also suspect astral nations will be very strong. While they lose some high level spells the battlefield also becomes safer for communions with rain of stones out of the picture (but earthquake is still available). If the game turns out to be fun but with balance issues I'll make changes for the second game. One possibility is having some level 7+ spells made available (perhaps with reduced effectiveness) or even removing some spells currently available. I'd also consider adding more thug options if there's an interest in that - but no SCs.


List of Players

Agartha - NooBliss
Bandar Log - Squirrelloid
Caelum - LoloMo
Eriu - Valerius
Mictlan - LDiCesare


PROPOSED SETTINGS FOR SECOND GAME

Number of players: 6-8
Map: looking for a map that averages 12 provinces/player (no water nations)
HoF: 15
Gold: 100%
Resources: 100%
Diplomacy: Yes
Independents: Normal indie settings; merc recruitment allowed; magic sites with mages/troops allowed
Starting provinces: 4
Forts: Normal fort rules.
Magic: Currently same as first game; max level 6 magic, all spells level 0 (with a few exceptions at level 3 and MoD banned), no globals. *Note: blood magic will be somewhat un-nerfed.
Sites: all sites level 0; 30%+ Conj./Blood and all Constr. sites banned
Banned nations - water nations, Ashdod, Jotunheim, Ermor & Pan

Special rules:

Misc. changes - Naiad warriors nerfed; soul contract and lifelong protection not forgeable; Machakan spider forms have upkeep cost; unique magic items (less powerful ones of course) assigned to Constr 2-4-6 so that random events still grant magic items.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

hmm, must resist joining another game. This looks really good. I would love to see some wind guided flaming longbows. I think mindhunt will be really nasty for non astral nations. with no chance of getting at least lizard shamans or crystal amazons the only protection would be summoning wraiths, having high astral on your pretender or just lots of decoys.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

Thanks! Hope you change your mind. :) FWIW, I think this will play quickly - I'll be kind of surprised if there's more than two nations in contention by turn 40 (and I wouldn't be surprised if it were over by then).

The astral definitely concerns me. And Arco with its ability to heal its mind hunters will, I think, be real tough. If you're not a nation with S mages I think you either need it on your pretender or maybe summon spectres quickly. I hadn't really considered that getting decoys will be tough without indies to recruit. But it also occurs to me that unlike a normal game it could be worth empowering scouts or other stealthy troops to S1 and giving them a starshine skullcap. Expensive, but with the lower province count you'll only need a few to safeguard your armies as they travel and you may luck out with a strong S income so you can afford it.

BTW, in my test games I found my gem income was around 25-30 gems/turn (10 from the cap province).

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

Interesting. I'd try Agartha... but does 'no indies' include indie mages from random sites? That might be an overkill, really.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

Ooh, Agartha actually sounds fun under these conditions, curse you Nooblis.

This is so wacky I simply have to play. I need to think about nation some more though, because this is weird.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

(Evil blissful laughter)

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

Are there any limits on pretender design?

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

Very interesting! Caelum please!

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

I have decided - Bandar Log please!

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

Welcome to the game everyone! I have to admit I was getting a little worried that my niche game was a little too niche... :)

Agartha is the main nation I was thinking of when I mentioned weak nations possibly doing well under these settings. Though Bandar is also promising - nice summons and strong astral.

On such a compact map Caelum's ability to fly should be even more useful than normal. Also note that with the level 6 magic cutoff I don't believe there are any summonable A mages available.

It does. I really wanted to emphasize national units. In a normal game I'm thrilled to find Adepts or Crystal Mages when playing Eriu but at the same time they become second to only my capitol mage recruitment in importance, changing the flavor of my nation.

So I think your pretender becomes even more important than normal in covering for the weaknesses in your national mages. Offhand I'd say an SC pretender with enough magic diversity to open up areas your mages lack would be a decent choice.

One more thing about astral. Some starting areas have areas have wasteland so you may want to also consider Hidden in Sand as a way to get S magic if you start in one of those territories.

No limits and with almost no research to be done I guess the main question will be whether people go with Drain 2 or Drain 3. :)

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

Well its like... a different game alltogether. :)

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

I'm interested. I must check the mod first before picking a nation, though.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

That's what I'm hoping for. :) The core of it is the changes to magic and site frequency. This lets the game jump right to mid-game action - but not proceed past it to a traditional end-game. Most of the other things could be changed easily if they prove unpopular and some were dictated by the small size of the map (which I thought was a good idea both so that if the game settings don't prove to be fun it won't take too long to finish and because I didn't think this would be the most popular game ever posted ;)).

Also, I just want to make sure everyone understands that if you conquer an opponent's fort you don't (in fact, can't) tear it down. In a normal game you almost inevitably have more forts than you can afford to recruit mages from. That won't be the case here (unless you take *really* bad scales). If you begin a war evenly matched with your opponent at 3 forts each and they take one of your forts you'll be at a significant disadvantage since they will now have 4 recruitment centers to your 2 - regardless of how much gold they have available.


Welcome aboard, I'll reserve a spot for you. Only one to go!

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting
 

Correction to above statement: should be "regardless of how much gold you have available."

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I used the mod and the map (not the start versions one) and got an Academy of the Crescent Moon in one province, allowing to recruit some wizards. You might want to check it and remove it, as it's pretty strong (wizard of the crescent moon W2S1+100%WSAD for 160 gold).
: Teleport's level 0. Gateway, Faerie Trod too.
Wolven winter is available too at level 0. Same for Raging hearts.
Fata Morgana is available, and level 0 to boot.

Do you want to leave Mists of Deception in? I think it might be better modded out entirely due to potential abuse.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Thanks for the testing! And if anyone else notices problems when running test games please let me know.

All of the above are errors. Well except for the movement ones maybe. I think at one point I wanted them to be at level 0 - doesn't matter, I should match the game description so all that you've mentioned will be fixed.

I'm inclined to leave that in unless there's a problem I'm not aware of? Despite usually playing nations with air magic I don't know that I've ever used it. I know there was an issue with the caster being able to leave the field of battle and the spell continuing but that was patched. I used level 6 as a dividing line for magic because above that level you start seeing a lot of battlefield-wide spells. It isn't a perfect dividing line, though. Things that may make sense at a certain level in the context of a normal CBM game may not work as well with these settings. If there's a second game I think there will definitely have to be some work on balance but I'm hesitant to start selectively removing spells or (even worse) changing the game conditions from what people have signed up for.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I dont think leaving Mists of Deception while removing other battlefield-wise effects is a good move.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

there are plenty of battlefield wide spells by level 6. You just don't have most of the really uber ones. That said, Mists of Deception is pretty uber. I'd support removing it.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I'm not attached to it myself and have no objections to removing it; my concerns were just about switching settings after people sign up.

LoloMo, you've got the strongest air nation in the game. Any objections to removing MoD? If not, then it's unanimous and MoD is gone.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I will pick Mictlan if it's available. Otherwise, Eriu.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

No objections to removing MoD. But I may change my nation pick. Any other changes that need to be discussed?

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Mictlan is available. Eriu I had already taken for myself. :)

Thanks for being flexible. And that's a good point about discussing other changes now. Anything else that people feel will be a problem?

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Looking through the available spells there's three that stand out as possible problems.

Earthquake - This one I had thought about beforehand and decided to keep in. With rain of stones out of the picture I thought it was important there be one spell that could disrupt communions. It has high casting requirements and is available to anyone by summoning troll kings and giving them earth boots.

Darkness - Darkness is just a tough spell to deal with but that's the case even with high level magic available since solar brilliance has some definite drawbacks.

Iron Bane - This was a tough call and of the three here is the one I'm most inclined to remove. The troop buffs that increase natural protection and have a large AOE start at level 7. It will be real difficult to give your troops natural protection using the spells available. I had also considered giving spells like Iron Warriors/Protection an AOE of 2-3 to help this situation (though N is in better shape since Wooden Warriors has an AOE of 5).

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Also, I'm going to hold off for a bit on posting a fixed mod in case we find any more bugs or decide there are other problematic spells. Looking over the spells just now I realized Sea of Ice was castable. Not that it would be of much use on this map, but still...

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I vote to ban all 3 and communions too :D Or make communions cost gems and make communion stones cost more.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Hey, if we can get a consensus that's fine by me. ;) Actually, I like the idea of communions costing gems. If there were no earthquake, communions would be pretty safe but they'd be expensive - you'd have to limit large communions to when they were really needed.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Sigh.

These three spells are amongst the best things coming for Agartha. :(

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I don't think we're really going to eliminate them. I think LoloMo was (partly) joking. I think it's worth considering if there's a second game and balance changes are made but unless we have the type of agreement we had for MoD we'll leave them in for now.

On another note, I'd really like to get a sixth player but if there's no interest by the weekend I'll either edit the current map to fit 5 players or come up with a different map so we can move forward.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Of those three, darkness is the only one i see as a potential problem.

Ironbane: still requires a strong blow to actually destroy the armor, which means until then you get protection (I like destruction more, even if you have to cast it more frequently). And its a counter to E9 blesses, so deserves to stay for that if nothing else. Note Wooden Warriors isn't all battlefield, but its large AoE natural protection boost.

Earthquake: This spell's performance is so lackluster i'm not even sure it qualifies as real communion disruption.

Darkness is pretty awesome, but it has a counter, and requires a heavy undead or demon strategy to really shine. And demons are probably painfull expensive since you jacked up the cost of all the blood spells. So, definitely good, I'm not convinced its better than MoD with the new blood costs.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

True enough; I've used it a fair amount as Vanheim and always been underwhelmed by the results. In addition to low damage per casting, one problem I had was my later casters getting killed (despite my attempts to protect them and not having any fatigue yet) by the first casting(s). If you had high HP casters like, say, Agartha I think you'd have much better results stringing together the 3 castings you need to really have an impact.

And Agartha. That nation is starting to look OP! :) But I'm not sure what you mean by having a counter? I thought the choices were Solar Brilliance or the Ark (neither of which are available)?

Also, if we don't find another player I've got an easy map fix: I'll combine the two northwestern starts into one and eliminate the water province in the northwest corner (since it will now be undisputed).

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Why not just make solar brilliance castable instead of darkness uncastable?

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I have no issues with the remaining spells, earthquake, darkness, etc. to remain in.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I have some concerns that solar brilliance would be abusable. A strong astral nation could have one mage cast solar brilliance, another antimagic, give them some bodyguards, and blind a good percentage of an opponent's army. You may well sacrifice the mages/bodyguards - but it would be worth it.

Sure, you can do this in a normal game but there your opponent might have recourse to GoH, Chalice, even faery queens or a mage swap with a nation that has healers. Also, a normal game transitions to SCs, who aren't threatened by solar brilliance, whereas this game won't (though it's possible thugs will end up dominating the field of battle).

With the current nation lineup it's mainly Agartha that will really be able to take advantage of darkness. I'm more inclined to give them a chance to shine than to help out astral nations. :)

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

I agree, I'd rather not see solar brilliance.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

High Hitpoint, Ethereal, Stealthy, Life Draining Army of Umbrals from turn 1 with Darkness may be slightly OP. :p

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

We will learn to fear Ashdod! Umm, I mean Agartha.

So the reactions to Darkness range from concern to ambivalence. NooBliss are you ok with removing Darkness but leaving Iron Bane and Earthquake in? You'll still have two spells you can use better than anyone. Other options that come to mind are increasing casting requirements/gems for the spell or having a fixed duration to it (I should be able to mod it to only last a given number of turns).

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Darkness from turn 1? Do you know how hard a time of it Agartha has casting Darkness? Getting a D4 mage is hard!

For some reason I thought solar brilliance was in. Oh well, whatever, still not especially concerned.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Charm is out, but Hellbind heart is in, anyone have any concerns with this?

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Sure, Hellbind Heart is now out. After what I did to blood magic I don't mind hitting it with the nerf bat again. :evil:

BTW, I just finished fixing the tga file for five starts. If we can work out a compromise for Darkness I can make the fixes for the mod and upload everything so we can get started.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

About D mages. There's no mound fiends so I don't think there's a way to summon a mage guaranteed to have D2/D3. You'll probably get a spectre or lamia queen with D2, but getting D3 is more unlikely. Moving Darkness to D5 casting requirement would make it something for pretenders or really boosted D mages.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

If I'm the only one with a concern about Darkness, I'll withdraw my objection. I can work with either Darkness as is, or with requirements boosted.

This is shaping up to be an exciting game. Pretender design will be a puzzle solving exercise! :D

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Recruiting - 1 spot left!
 

Thanks. I think I'll leave it as-is, since even though there were some concerns about it everyone said they could live with it. This way I can finalize the mod and get it out to everyone in the next few hours.

I really hope so. In retrospect adding so many different things in (no indies, fort limitations, etc) might have been a mistake. The core concept I wanted to try out was the idea of eliminating research and site searching so we could jump right into the action. So, we're the beta testers. :)

I'm finding this too. The e9nx bless I enjoy so much with my Sidhe Lords doesn't look like a good choice here. Sure, I'll have Constr. researched but will I have time to equip them and will they find any easy provinces to raid?

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Design pretenders
 

I have updated the first post with a new zip containing the revised mod (same name as before - just overwrite the old one), and a new version of the map for five players (as before there are two map files, one with fixed starts for five sample nations).

List of fixes:

Teleport, Gateway, Cloud Trapeze and Faery Trod moved to level 3

Wolven Winter and Raging Hearts moved to level 3

Mists of Deception and Hellbind Heart removed

Fata Morgana and Sea of Ice globals removed

Academy of the Crescent Moon magic site removed

* A note about magic sites: I used Edi's invaluable database and sorted by sites with recruitable commanders in order to determine which sites to remove. This particular site didn't list any recruitables and I missed it. It's possible there's others like this so if you get one please don't recruit from it.

Also on the first post is a graphic indicating the letter identifying each starting location. rdonj will contact you to let you know where you are starting. Please let him know once you've decided on your starting fort location(s).

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Design pretenders
 

I found another site that might be problematic:
- Brigand Lair. Allows recruitment of brigand. That and increases unrest, but nothing else. Not really fun. It's just bad with nothing good out of it, and the unrest increase on a fort can be an issue. I think it should be removed. Of course it's not as bad as disease spreading sites, but it adds nothing to the game.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Design pretenders
 

IIRC the brigands should have a resource cost of 800 and be unrecruitable. The increase in unrest is a hassle and I agree it's worth eliminating the site but I don't want to drive everyone crazy by continuing to release updates. We'll need to allow some time for everyone to choose their provinces and for rdonj to make the map fixes so let's wait and if more stuff comes up I'll release a final version of the mod right before I setup the game on the server.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Design pretenders
 

PMing people their locations now.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Design pretenders
 

Do we specify our forts before the game starts? Are the gem sites random, or do we get to see where our gem sites are before we decide on where to put our forts?

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Design pretenders
 

Yes, send rdonj at least your cap and up to two other fort provinces before the game starts. Sites are random so if you build all three forts at the game's beginning there may be high gem income provinces you can't protect. OTOH not having three recruitment centers at the beginning has disadvantages as well.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Design pretenders
 

Nice job getting in your start locations guys. We're just waiting on NooBliss, who may be away for the weekend since he last logged in Friday.

Re: ThreeFort - Experimental game - Design pretenders
 

Yep, I was.

Just submitted my fort locations, so we can start.