Well Otis, sounds like you’re not a happy man.
I agree that Hire armies and conjure mounts are powerful. But I think there are lots of other combinations that are also powerful now and that work well against a nation w/Hire armies & conjure Mounts…
I bet there are lots more SNA combinations now days as the costs have been balanced quite a bit.
Huh? Whats this got to do with ME? Its not even a taunt!
Unfortunately, I’ve recently learned that there are engines out there that randomly post ads to the blogsphere and message boards. This looks like one of those. Darrell, do be kind enough to block this user…
Question: Does every 1000 set-up include the possibility of internet romance and the love of a lifetime? If so I might just sign myself up.
The Wayfarer
I’ve never heard of people getting together because of PBM before but heh, it could it be something we expand into in the future. You could get special encounters in your turnsheet… :eek: 
Clint
Great, new 285 options that cost thousands of dollars…!
Only thousands? You spoil them Brad… 
I agree - Mike is a God - but a spotted an error yesterday. If you try and put a location starting with 0 in the two bonus camps you get an error. A work around is to put a ’ before the number. All the other cells seem to work OK with these numbers.
The Mordor regions from a neutral point of view are just not that good. Neutrals cant place in the mountains and as you dont get any regional bonuses they really aren’t as useful as they should be. If I was playing FP or DS they’d be more attractive, but everyone seems to like the regional bonuses more than the safety.
Gavin
Overall, the 4th age changes do seem to be an improvement.
While the neutrals have an advantage in numbers if they stay together in the current format, they have several disadvantages, most notably including:
A requirement of having to downgrade nations of two other allegiances (as opposed to just one for FP and DS) just to be able to attack them.
No +20 k/a SNA
No starting PCs in mountains, which is relevant for some regions, but not all.
Overall, if the neutral team stays together, I think the 9/8/8 scenario with 9 neutrals, including both kingdoms is fairly balanced. In fact, I even think a game where two neutral teams were allowed (one of 5 and one of 4), and none of them could change allegiance (but they wouldn’t be able to contact each other prior to game start, just like FP and DS).
Way back in the GSI days, I played in a 3-team grudge game that was fairly interesting:
There were 9 neutrals, but they did not have any kingdoms.
The FP and DS teams were 8 each, and each had a kingdom.
All allegiances started as disliked with each other, so the neutrals were not disadvantaged this way.
This was back in the GSI days, so all 3 teams had multiple nations with the +20 k/a SNA. Despite this, the game was still pretty much of a standstill with each allegiance having a front against the other. Overall, it worked out fairly well. A grudge game of this format might be OK, but again, the neutrals would have to start disliked versus the other allegiances.
I know that changes that would affect programming would be difficult, but adding a few interesting new SNAs wouldn’t hurt. Maybe something like these:
Mages can learn all spirit mastery spells (cost, maybe 12000 or so, limit of one nation per allegiance). This would be powerful, but the fact that a single nation would have to devote many turns and 3-4 characters to kill one character plus giving it a high cost might make it OK. This would give mages another option to be more powerful. Overall, would this be stronger than conjure mounts? Armies at no cost? etc.? I’m not sure that it would, if a single nation had to tie up all of the characters for it, or work with another nation that only had weakness. The second option would still require a lot of characters, and 2 companies if there were a partial curses squad working with a partial weakness squad.
Multi-classed characters only cost 5000 gold. This would have to be expensive - at least 10000 or so, but it’s another option for a varied character SNA.
Multi-classed characters are hired with a total of 40 points. Again, this would need to cost at least 10000 or so gold.
Nations can recruit twice as much LI as HI and twice as much LC as HC. So at a MT, a nation could recruit 800 LC instead of 400 HC. Because the light troops generally do better in more terrain types, this should probably cost at least 4000-5000 gold. This might just make the game a little less boring, with more varied armies, and would lead to some benefits with threaten orders, etc.
I know that anything involving new SNAs would require programming changes and therefore wouldn’t be easy to do, but these are just some ideas if such changes are being considered at a later time,
Mike
Yeh we’ll open up that discussion of programme changes when we get there.
There’s been some 3way games but they’re generally not very popular. The latest game filling is now 6 away though.
IMO Neutrals still have more advantages than disadvantages though. Mountain placement has been reduced with the advent of road/non-mountain bonuses for example.
Clint
Clint
Well I can see your point to the advantages of nuetrals going to an aligned side eventually would have some advantages if porperly played and commiting only late around turn 10 … Early in game Nuetrals are way weaker than aligned nations and vulnerable. As game wears on like Nuetrals in the other variants they become powerful once again aligning with either FP or DS…
They have no advantage even if they are not attacked early if they remain nuetral … the sheer number of downgrades means they have to keep excessive numbers of Command characters at their capitol hinders thier military use… This gives both the FP and DS the extreme advantage 8-9 downgrades plus more military flexibility.
So playing Nuetrals as friends/team of even just 2 players is suicidial. The players in todays 4th age are just plain to smart and even paranoid that everytime a Nuetral team does form they are somehow the frontrunners to win the game… The Nuetral team win percentage even if they form would be considerably less than the aligned sides.
To make matters even worse there is no way to prevent nuetrals pretending to want to be on nuetral team from joining usergroups and using the information to destroy any chance of success… Even if the usergroups didn’t form until turn 12 that gives FP and DS of 12 turns to learn to work well as a team…
Even if Nuetrals given the right to camp mountains in the future. They still have the downgrade/upgrade disadvantage if played well by the opposition gives Nuetrals vulnerability to aligned sides no matter how long they have been allowed to build. This I speak from having played Nuetrals many times.
Terry
I have to agree with the above and add one minor point.
Should a neutral starts to work with a faction, whichever it is, against another neutral, it means 2 downgrade before said neutral is safe from an emmy strike even with troops in, and one more before being able to hit back. The cost in Capital Comm orders is quite dire.
There’s been some 3way games but they’re generally not very popular. The latest game filling is now 6 away though.
I attempted to get a 3 way going some time ago and couldn’t even get the game 1/2 full so that it could be posted. If anyone else wants to give this a shot I’d certainly be interested.
GB
FA is the best game! The only ME game where you can still get surpriced and where your opponents dont know everything about you before you starts.
Best of all you can design you own nation. So you never get bored.
The new set-up is very good.
I miss a navy order that would allow you to land an army from sea where you are not allowed to enter at the current rules for the price of one turn delay.
Probably 2 difrent orders. One works like transfer ships/troops. One likes split army. Both orders should requirer that the navy is at a hex next ,(but not at) the landhex where it wish to land an army and it should work so that the navy is forced to remain at its posistion (not allowed to move while issuing this order) and so that the “landed” army cant start moving before in the following turn.
A kind of an amfibie-operation if you like.
With this order armies can be landed at any landhex next to a sea-hex, but if there is no harbor/port/or suitable terreng then the operation will take longer time.
Speaking of which, The extra gold you get according to the new set-up for having harbour and/or port(s), what if you have both a port and a harbour? Will the extra gold be added together or will you only get the “port-gold” ???
Sverre
Cumulative for Harbour/Ports so if you get both then you get both bonuses. That’s clarified in the new rules.
Clint