Overlords - Game Thread. (playing) - Page 11

rdonj · #1 September 10th, 2009, 05:44 PM

Okay sorry guys, I couldn't get to this before now. I hope you'll forgive me. Nation picks will be up shortly. Chrispdersen sent me a list of ea and la nations. I don't want to keep anyone else waiting any longer so I am going to work out the list now, and if he gets to me before I have finished making it, he'll get a choice, if not he'll have one of two nations available.

It is very possible the overlords have the advantage... but I think it is also very possible the normals have the advantage. I really don't know that I could say for sure who will come out on top. If this were a team game it would be more obvious probably. But since I am letting the players figure out just how to conduct themselves, I personally have no idea how it'll turn out. Hopefully the advantages the overlords get will not just allow them to run all over everyone else.

They can't attack any normal at their desire though. They have to have dominion or have their god in the army. Since I am sure everyone will be spamming dominion in this game I don't know just how easy that will be.

rdonj · #2 September 10th, 2009, 06:16 PM

Nations are posted. Anyone with an asterisk got one of their picks. Anyone without an asterisk, you may feel free to trade nations amongst yourselves. I will note that many people chose the same first couple of nations. A significant number of lists were along the lines of "van, aby, x" to be precise :P. People who picked vanheim and abysia probably would have been well served sending lists longer than 3 nations. I even had two people send me the exact same list.

rdonj · #3 September 10th, 2009, 06:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by atul

For the record, I want to apologize to rdonj for our constant collective bugging I've been a part of and thank him for all the work he's done thus far to get this thing to this point:

Sorry! Thank you!

Thanks

Hopefully all that bugging me will make for a much better game than it would have been otherwise.

LumenPlacidum · #4 September 10th, 2009, 09:02 PM

Thank you very much, rdonj! Time to get to work building a strategy.

iainuki · #5 September 11th, 2009, 12:56 AM

I'd be open to trading MA Oceania for some other nations. If you'd be willing to help me, please get in touch.

chrispedersen · #6 September 11th, 2009, 01:45 AM

Overlords,
Cmon you guys are the experienced ones. Do you really believe this is even remotely an equitable contest?

Put your judges hat on for a moment. Do you believe the victory conditions are such that a normal nation has even close to the same chance of vicotry condition that an overlord does?

Lets reduce this to simplest cases.

Suppose an overlord chose an awake pretender, good dominion, and fairly horrible scales. With 10 provinces and three forts, at the very least he is able to outproduce a normal nation at least 3:1.

Let alone stealth preachers.

Frankly, the overlords can use the gatestone to teleport 2 away from any starting normal nation. They can use this to deny normals expansion. Once there they just walk into an adjacent province.

Even if it doesn't happen turn 1 - it could certainly happen turn 3.

The victory conditions are fairly meaningless. Even if the overlords were required to eliminate all other overlords to win, it would still be that the overlords would attack normal nations. There is no way an overlord is going to attack a roughly equal overlord when they could instead grab independents or crush normals. It is only after the vast majority of normals or indies are gone that there will *really* be significant chance of conflict betweeen normals.

Personally, I believe that even if the overlords were prevented from attacking a normal until attacked that this would *still* inevitably result in an overlord victory.

I would suggest this, instead. No overlord can attack a normal until he has taken at least one other overlords capitol, he is free to attack any normal that attacks his territory. Still not even remotely fair.. but at least a nod in the right direction.

namad · #7 September 11th, 2009, 02:49 AM

nevermind... arguing is not going to benefit anyone.

rdonj · #8 September 11th, 2009, 03:11 AM

As I said in pm, at this point I would really not make any further changes to the rules. This game needs to start eventually, or players will start to bail. If things don't work out this time, hopefully issues can be identified and fixed for any other games in this style should people still find it interesting.

My main goal with this game was just to do something different and have it hopefully be an entertaining deviation from the normal exactly similar starts that you go through in every other game. Not that that isn't fun, but it can be nice to do things differently once in a while. I want everyone to bear in mind that this is an experimental game and I'm not sure anyone can say for sure how it will turn out. Obviously overlords start stronger than everyone else. But is that enough to keep the other overlords at bay? I've seen a crafty idea or two from normal players about what they might do to hurt an overlord. The game is obviously not going to be completely balanced. I hope that will prove to be part of its charm

.

Hoplosternum · #9 September 11th, 2009, 04:14 AM

Well we new the conditions before we signed up so there is no point complaining about them now

Although I agree they do favour the Overlords a lot.

I am curious about the diplomacy stance. I don't have a problem with a back stabbing diplomacy game. We all know that diplomacy in this game is not binding and that betrayals don't carry over in to other games. So trust between players is not encouraged

Yet the whole set up of the game seems to require a great deal of diplomacy to work especially if the normals are to have a chance. So while I don't have a problem with this diplomacy option in games, I am surprised it was selected for this game.

This doesn't mean I want this changed. I signed up with these terms. Just wonder why this was selected. It seems to be aimed at an issue some people have with lazy napping in standard mp games. But this is not a normal mp game....

rdonj · #10 September 11th, 2009, 01:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Hoplosternum

Well we new the conditions before we signed up so there is no point complaining about them now

Although I agree they do favour the Overlords a lot.

I am curious about the diplomacy stance. I don't have a problem with a back stabbing diplomacy game. We all know that diplomacy in this game is not binding and that betrayals don't carry over in to other games. So trust between players is not encouraged

Yet the whole set up of the game seems to require a great deal of diplomacy to work especially if the normals are to have a chance. So while I don't have a problem with this diplomacy option in games, I am surprised it was selected for this game.

This doesn't mean I want this changed. I signed up with these terms. Just wonder why this was selected. It seems to be aimed at an issue some people have with lazy napping in standard mp games. But this is not a normal mp game....

There are two main reasons I thought diplomatic agreements should not be binding for this game. One, it fits my thematic sense for the scenario. Two, with the victory conditions so low it would be very easy for someone to get a victory without really having to fight properly for it (without getting into that murky situation of people trying to decide whether it's okay to ignore your NAPs if the game is on the line).

Quote:

And if I recall, he only has to have the OL cap. he doesn't have to hold it.

I guess it's not specifically clear from the first post in this thread, but normals still have to control all their caps for 3 turns. However, instead of an overlord cap they only have to control any one of an overlord's starting forts.