2nd Edition of 1650 mepbm

mepbmlist
#1

Hi,
First of all, I really don't think that any potential
discussion centred around possible changes to the game can
simply be dismissed as ...

a pointless and frivolous thread that should not be continued.

Would you prefer we went back to politics? I thought we had
agreed that the purpose of this list was to discuss Middle
Earth?

Bluecheese, whoever he may be, feels that ...

Change is a hard thing to do for people, espcially if
they are making many monies off of the status qou. Maintaining
pointless dialogue and consistent whning about what one thinks should
and should not be is inconsequential in the grand scheme of the
game.

Having had some experience in running a business, can I
inform Mr. Bluecheese that an integral part of a successful
business is a willingness to change. Every product has a
shelf life, and if you are not willing to invest in new
products, or update your existing products, then your
business will not be as successful as it might otherwise be
- it may even go under.

In the case of Middle Earth, if I were GSI I would be
desperately working on a new scenario times to be released
in conjunction with the film. We are all going to be flooded
with hype and marketing connected with the film, so I cannot
think of a mroe natural thing than for GSI to try to make
some money off the back of it with a new or updated
scenario.

Now, if we could discuss the interesting point originally
raised?

I e-mailed Clint and he stated the pressure had to be put on
GSI (Bill Feild) who owns the rights to the software.

Sadly true. If only Harlequin owned the rights to the
software (how much would that cost Clint?) The trouble is
that GSI have never really shown much interest in making
player-suggested changes. Some years ago I got together with
a couple of other experienced players and wrote to GSI
suggesting some ideas for new scenarios, changes to the
existing game etc. All were very much in keeping with the
basic milieu of Middle Earth. Sad to say we did not receive
even an acknowledgement.

1)John (my buddy) had the ideas of a chief administrator. This
character would have to order himself one turn to be the position. He
would have to be in the capital, no one could challenge him, and he
would be harder to kidnap and/or assissnate. He would be allowed to
issue a limited amount of orders such as Improve or Downgrade
relations, Change taxes, Sell good, and have them tranported.

I'm not sure whether this fits in to the basic scheme of
things. After all, the idea is for every nation to have some
sort of King (or Wraith). However it might be interesting to
ensure that kidnap and assassinate orders were harder on a
capital.

2) Why is it that a Troll(Evil HI for some postions) has the same
attack/con as a dwarf with a battle axe or a Beornling footman
w/axe.
Can't the troop levels be modified.

Ah yes, now here I agree wholeheartedly. Something really
needs to be done to give a point to recruiting anything
other than HI or HC. Why should Dwarven ponyriders have the
same combat strength as Dog Lord cavalry or the mighty
Eothraim? One would have to be careful not to unbalance the
game, but I'm sure a few tweaks could make life more
interesting. Perhaps more of a terrain factor could be
brought into play. Cavalry should be weaker in forest, as
indeed should heavy infantry - light infantry on the other
hand should be excellent. Equally light cavalry should be at
least as good as heavy cavalry in hills and rough.

3) Why is it that an army that loses it commander decide to go home
and take there state issued weapon and armor with them?

There's certainly a case for suggesting that an army which
loses it's commander should simply sit still and defend (no
orders can be issues). Every turn it continues without a
commander it will lose both morale and troops until such
time as it dissipates or is beaten. I would suggest however
that it should not be possible to voluntarily leave an army
without a commander.

4) Outside of HI HC and MA,does anybody really recruit anthing else.
No "steel" weapon on an archer will ever offset the 10 consititution
on a HI.

See above.

5) Does every battle end in slaughter for one side. One of the
greatest defeats in military history inflicted on a nation was in
216 BC at Cannae. Hanibal completely surronded a Roman army of 4 double
legions (about 80,000) and inflicted 55000 dead. 25000 still got
away. This battle is the most decisive double envelopements ever and still
the enemy lived.

Are you arguing for some sort of retreat setting? i.e. as
part of your battle orders you could give orders to retreat
once you had taken x% losses. Obviously the enemy would get
a free shot at you as you retreated, and morale ought to be
brought into play somehow as should command skill.

6) Why is that an entire nations treasury can be at a village in the
extremes of their nation. Did they leave it there? How do 5 guys get
10000 gold out of east jesus gondor. Did anybody see the James Bond
movie "Goldfinger" Do you remember his state to Goldfinger about the
logistics of stealing huge amounts of gold. Try that every 2 weeks.

The game is not meant to be an economic simulation in any
way. Once you start trying to make the economics work you
may as well tear everything up and start again. Some things
are necessary simply for ease of game play. However,
remember that there is a maximum quantity of gold one can
steal from a pop centre (other than the capital?). Perhaps
it ought to be more difficult to perform multiple steals on
the same pop centre in one turn.

Finally Mr. Bluecheese ...

Of course the origin of this thread is from the same person
that believes every elf should come with stealth and every troll
should come with double healing and a bonus challenge rank.
NUFF SAID.

Actually, that's got something going for it. Trouble is of
course that characters don't really have races. It might be
fun if they did - a minor programming change, but one that
would add something to the atmosphere of the game. All Dwarf
characters names are Dwarves, and to some extent Elves tend
to look Elvish, but that's about it really. More
defferentiation between the characters of different nations
would be a bonus I feel.

Colin.

#2

Colin Forbes wrote:

Every product has a shelf life

Oddly enough, this brings to mind one of the concepts I had for tweaking
the game. In real life food goes bad, timber rots, and steel rusts.
Yet you can store food in the cellars of Dol Guldur for years and
nothing happens to it. If products had a shelf life - best expressed as
a certain percentage 'ruined' each turn, say from 0% for mithril to
5-10% for food - it could have some very interesting effects.
   And I heartily agree that caravans should be subject to the same
movement restrictions as characters, or even armies. Heck, imagine if
you could intercept that gold shipment to the Noldo, or steal food
destined for the Long Rider's cav army threatening your capital.
   However, this would again make things more complicated, which some
people would like better than others. Games like Victory and Legends
are just too much number crunching for my tastes, although Legends at
least has some style to recommend it.

In the case of Middle Earth, if I were GSI I would be
desperately working on a new scenario times to be released
in conjunction with the film. We are all going to be flooded
with hype and marketing connected with the film, so I cannot
think of a mroe natural thing than for GSI to try to make
some money off the back of it with a new or updated
scenario.

As far as the movie goes, I just pray they don't make a hash out of it
like R@#^!# & 8@$$...

I'm not sure whether this fits in to the basic scheme of
things. After all, the idea is for every nation to have some
sort of King (or Wraith). However it might be interesting to
ensure that kidnap and assassinate orders were harder on a
capital.

One would think that a King (esp. the Nazgul) would have a bonus for
things like adjusting taxes, increasing loyalty, changing relations and
so on. As it is, they don't appear to have any special status except
for being tougher on average than a nation's other characters.

-ED \1/

#3

--- "Edward A. Dimmick" <dukefenton@earthlink.net>
wrote: > Colin Forbes wrote:

>
>
> Every product has a shelf life
>
Oddly enough, this brings to mind one of the
concepts I had for tweaking
the game. In real life food goes bad, timber rots,
and steel rusts.
Yet you can store food in the cellars of Dol Guldur
for years and
nothing happens to it.

I use to chat to a person who was in charge of the
blankets for disaster relief for the area I live in (
I think he had to have 200 blankets or some such
number). Blanket did wear away in storage (not to
mention they might smell a bit if he buried them in
month balls).

His plan was to regularly replace the older blankets
with newer ones. While the magic number never went up
or down, the blankets were always good.

I wouldn't add a wastage percentage.

If products had a shelf life
- best expressed as
a certain percentage 'ruined' each turn, say from 0%
for mithril to
5-10% for food - it could have some very interesting
effects.

not to me. I would natsell (which I do a lot anyway).
And if I was the target of agents, I would buy steel
(been there, done that, when I was a free harad).

As far as the movie goes, I just pray they don't
make a hash out of it
like R@#^!# & 8@$$...

like what ? Robin hood ??? I'm only disappointed I
have to wait three years to see all three movies. My
attention span was never that good. At least in star
wars each movie was a stand alone movie. I pity the
person who see movie 2 and 3 without seeing the
previous ones.

And the LoTR movie made the news in oz again. Our
papers said that it helped pour heaps of money into
the NZ film industry (I wonder if hercules and zena
are still being made over there ???). It even had a
photo of the hobbits hiding from the nazgul.

what would I like in 1650 ? Have a free nation with
+20 on kill.

:slight_smile:

thanks
din

···

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#4

Well it depends how you do it.
Intercepting gold, means you need caravan units etc. and that would make
it much more complicated.

Having characters able to carry gold like artefacts (doesn't have to be
12,000 gold pieces, could be a pouch of diamonds) would be slightly more
complicated, but pay off in adding spice to assassinations and
challenges.

Restricting the distance/speed at which goods move would not be
complicated at all - it's a computer program remember. So if goods were
only allowed to move 12 hexes per turn, you could TranCar to an allied
nation 24 hexes away, and the computer would deliver those goods 2 turns
later. Players need to do a little more forward planning, that's all.
The payoff is a more believable world.

Regards,

Laurence G. Tilley http://www.lgtilley.freeserve.co.uk/

···

Edward A. Dimmick <dukefenton@earthlink.net> wrote

And I heartily agree that caravans should be subject to the same
movement restrictions as characters, or even armies. Heck, imagine if
you could intercept that gold shipment to the Noldo, or steal food
destined for the Long Rider's cav army threatening your capital.
  However, this would again make things more complicated, which some
people would like better than others.

#5

Restricting the distance/speed at which goods move would not be
complicated at all - it's a computer program remember. So if goods were
only allowed to move 12 hexes per turn, you could TranCar to an allied
nation 24 hexes away, and the computer would deliver those goods 2 turns
later. Players need to do a little more forward planning, that's all.
The payoff is a more believable world.

Hi,

I love MEPBM mostly because of its scintillating game play. I am perfectly
happy to sacrifice realism on the altar of playability.

In chess, knights are meant to leap of castles! How unrealistic! :slight_smile:

I hope that no decision on the game's future ever improves realism at the
cost of ANY game play.

Laurence - do you think this new rule would improve the game play? I suspect
it would add a layer of complexity with little improvement in the quality of
the game. My main fear is that it would further disincentive rich players
sending money to poor players, due to the difficulty of getting it right.
This would lead to more nation deaths and bad games.

Can you imagine the Witch King saying to the Blind Sorcerer 'I know that
I've got 40,000 in the bank right now, but I need you to send me 20,000 now,
which will arrive in three turns'. The BS would tell the WK to stuff it! :slight_smile:

Sam

#6

I love MEPBM mostly because of its scintillating game play. I am perfectly
happy to sacrifice realism on the altar of playability.

In chess, knights are meant to leap of castles! How unrealistic! :slight_smile:

Sure but if very simple games were eternally satisfying to all, then
we'd all be playing chess, all of the time, and more complex rule
systems would never have evolved

I hope that no decision on the game's future ever improves realism at the
cost of ANY game play.

Likewise. Any game design or redesign, always has to balance these
aspects. The aim of any revision should always be to improve the game
both in terms of depth AND game play.

Laurence - do you think this new rule would improve the game play? I suspect
it would add a layer of complexity with little improvement in the quality of
the game. My main fear is that it would further disincentive rich players
sending money to poor players, due to the difficulty of getting it right.
This would lead to more nation deaths and bad games.
Can you imagine the Witch King saying to the Blind Sorcerer 'I know that
I've got 40,000 in the bank right now, but I need you to send me 20,000 now,
which will arrive in three turns'. The BS would tell the WK to stuff it! :slight_smile:

(Idea was that goods transferred over excessive distances might take
more than one turn to arrive) Yes I think it would improve the game,
because it strips out an aspect which is contradictory. Armies have
their movement restricted, characters do (though clumsily), but huge
convoys of raw materials fly around without restriction.

BUT I hear your concern, and stress that any changes would have to be
part of a wholesale revision of the game. So if you reduce (slightly)
the ability of nations to support one another, then you first have to
ask if those exposed nations, need to have the startup modified to make
them a little more self sustaining in the first place. Even then,
that's not enough. A 2nd edition would need extensive playtesting, and
if it transpired that WiK kept going out because nobody funded it, then
you need to tweak more.

Gold is used for trade because it's highly portable (among other
reasons) so it might be that gold could move 16 hexes per turn, but
other goods move no more than say 8.

Regards,

Laurence G. Tilley http://www.lgtilley.freeserve.co.uk/

···

Sam Roads <me@MiddleEarthGames.com> wrote

#7

Play Serim Ral or Legends... :slight_smile: They both have mechanisms - one is a Thief
in SR that does an intercept order. There are huge amounts of interesting
orders out there - Create Spell say (not in either Leg or SR btw).

Multiclass (or solo-classed) orders seem intersting as well. There are a
few in FA - Move Turn Map etc.

Make Magic Item? Wow there are some great things that could be done. I
wish.. :frowning:

Clint

···

>And I heartily agree that caravans should be subject to the same
>movement restrictions as characters, or even armies. Heck, imagine if
>you could intercept that gold shipment to the Noldo, or steal food
>destined for the Long Rider's cav army threatening your capital.
> However, this would again make things more complicated, which some
>people would like better than others.
Well it depends how you do it.
Intercepting gold, means you need caravan units etc. and that would make
it much more complicated.

Having characters able to carry gold like artefacts (doesn't have to be
12,000 gold pieces, could be a pouch of diamonds) would be slightly more
complicated, but pay off in adding spice to assassinations and
challenges.

Restricting the distance/speed at which goods move would not be
complicated at all - it's a computer program remember. So if goods were
only allowed to move 12 hexes per turn, you could TranCar to an allied
nation 24 hexes away, and the computer would deliver those goods 2 turns
later. Players need to do a little more forward planning, that's all.
The payoff is a more believable world.

Regards,

Laurence G. Tilley http://www.lgtilley.freeserve.co.uk/

Middle Earth PBM List - Middle Earth and Harlequin Games
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#8

"Laurence G. Tilley" wrote:

Armies have
their movement restricted, characters do (though clumsily), but huge
convoys of raw materials fly around without restriction.

Here's an idea: What if you had to use armies to move stuff? They can
already carry food, and transfer to or from a pop center or another
army. (They can carry and transfer weapons/armor as well, but strangely
can't put them into a pop center.) How much trouble would it be to
allow other goods to be transported?

-ED \1/

#9

>I love MEPBM mostly because of its scintillating game play. I am

perfectly

>happy to sacrifice realism on the altar of playability.
>
>In chess, knights are meant to leap of castles! How unrealistic! :slight_smile:
Sure but if very simple games were eternally satisfying to all, then
we'd all be playing chess, all of the time, and more complex rule
systems would never have evolved

More complex does not necessarily mean better. More people play D& D than
Hero - although (arguably) Hero is a more realistic system. Wargaming-wise
you don't see too many Napoleonic week long games being played, etc
(Monopoly is consistently played throughout the world - people keep adding
complexity "we'll keep all the taxes and put them in the centre and whenever
anyone lands on FParking you get it" but does not add to the game.) More is
not necessarily better. ME has a lot of hidden depth to it - lots of
tactics (it's strongest point, I think Team-play comes around 3rd here) but
hiding that in complexity would make the game unplayable for lots of
players.

The aim of any revision should always be to improve the game
both in terms of depth AND game play.

This might not be possible.

(Idea was that goods transferred over excessive distances might take
more than one turn to arrive) Yes I think it would improve the game,
because it strips out an aspect which is contradictory. Armies have
their movement restricted, characters do (though clumsily), but huge
convoys of raw materials fly around without restriction.

This seems to be a Realism argument. Are the 947, 948 rules good or bad?
Do they improve game play or subtract from it? I know from my own
perspective that I look at the numbers rather than the atmosphere of the
game, so realise that other players look at it differently so am happy to go
with the flow here. If the 947/948 are bad then how to change them -
SPECIFICALLY so that they can be improved? Hexes over 14 squares take 2
turns? Over 28 Squares 3 turns?

BUT I hear your concern, and stress that any changes would have to be
part of a wholesale revision of the game. So if you reduce (slightly)
the ability of nations to support one another, then you first have to
ask if those exposed nations, need to have the startup modified to make
them a little more self sustaining in the first place. Even then,
that's not enough. A 2nd edition would need extensive playtesting, and
if it transpired that WiK kept going out because nobody funded it, then
you need to tweak more.

Yes - very astute.

Gold is used for trade because it's highly portable (among other
reasons) so it might be that gold could move 16 hexes per turn, but
other goods move no more than say 8.

Or PC to PC?

Clint

#10

No trouble, but the knock on effects would be huge. Your suggestion
changes the current system whereby goods can fly 1000 hexes, to one
where an unfed army can drag the goods one hex along a mountain road.
That's a huge change, that would completely throw the current economics
and logistics of the game. Admittedly they're stupid but the
challenging part of the problem is maintaining the balance if you change
them.

I think that merchants should probably move goods more efficiently than
armies - I can't see a merchant caravan ever being stupid enough to set
out without food. The army movement as is, considers the logistical
difficulties of moving large bodies of men, and keeping them all
together.

It might not be impossible (or too complicated) to have caravan units.
For example, if you brought in and built on the idea of commander-less
armies, a caravan unit might be treated as 100 LC, fed, but without
commander, and unable to initiate combat. If it could carry commodities
as you suggest, we'd be beginning to get towards a more believable
logistical system. A character would have to order the caravan to set
off, but it would then travel on its own until arrival. Transporting
goods by sea or river would make naval matters more interesting (a
weakness in the current game). Any you could even have an agent order
"Ambush Caravan", where the guy sits on a hex, and knocks off anything
that comes through. Then there's "Guard Caravan" where the agent
travels with it....

I know, dream on :wink:

Regards,

Laurence G. Tilley http://www.lgtilley.freeserve.co.uk/

···

Edward A. Dimmick <dukefenton@earthlink.net> wrote

Armies have
their movement restricted, characters do (though clumsily), but huge
convoys of raw materials fly around without restriction.

Here's an idea: What if you had to use armies to move stuff? They can
already carry food, and transfer to or from a pop center or another
army. (They can carry and transfer weapons/armor as well, but strangely
can't put them into a pop center.) How much trouble would it be to
allow other goods to be transported?

#11

I think you should really step back and think about the type of

game you end up with if you want to start going for realism.

This game isn’t based on any sort of simulation of

reality. You’re playing the power behind the throne of an

empire, yet you directly control the action of up to 20

characters, all with knowledge of what is going

on everwhere else in the game world. If 12 hexes is as

far as a person can travel, then how can you know if that

assassination attempt 20 hexes away failed and your

agent was killed? Information, like the caravans, have no

distance bounds and if you want to limit one thing in the

name of ‘realism’ then you should rationally limit all things

that are unrealistic. There are plenty of other campaign

games out there that strive for realism, however I doubt

they’re nearly as popular as this one which aims for

entertainment and not rational explanation.

To me, its more like a chess game…Why can a knight

only move in an L pattern?..that just doesn’t make sense,

but thats just what his piece does because it makes the

game entertaining. Caravan’s go wherever they want

because it adds playability to the game, just like knowing

what is going on with a single agent on the other side

of the world adds playability to the game. If we compiled

everything that isn’t realistic in this game, and submitted

a list of changes to be implimented based on this, the

only thing that wouldn’t change would be the name of the

game.

#12

Well guys, since I started this thread on Saturday night (In the USA
-6 GMT) I will put my ideas into a hard list.

1) The Biggie- Characters need to reflect the race they are from. All
elves need stealth 15 for sylvan elves (The bulk of the elves
recruited) 20 for sinda and 25 for noldo. Enemy races have chances of
getting trolls with bonus challenge and double heal to make them
tougher. This list in just a begining.

2)Changeing of army troop levels. A troll is not a dwarf is not a
dunadan footmen.

3) Restructure army combat. Archers get first fire, Light troops
should be massive in non clear terrain, light cavalry should move 16
by itself and/or provide a recon of icons not co's or numbers. Combine
arms armies (Infantry and cavarly) should get a bonus.

4)Make recruitibale NPC's. In 1650 why can Galadriel or Celeborn be
recuited in the fight against evil.

5)Make magic or special weapons. For mage poor nations like woodmen or
cardolan. Why not allow mithril to be used to make a +500 sword.

6) Tranport Caravans-Allocate the distance product can be moved by hex
distance. 1-14 hexes 1 turn 15-28 2 turns and so on.

7) Purchase from the Caravans. A caravan should only have x amount of
product to by. The amount buyable should be factor of the amount
available.

8) Strategic Commands. Be able to allocate characters to national
jobs. Chief admin. can do only certain capital orders. Head of
nations rangers, they provide information on troop movements within a
giver area, maybe ambush or delay troop movements. Head of national
security, provide a minor amount guarding across the nations pop
centers. These all are from the capital, the person cannot be
challenged and is harder to kidnap or assissinate.

9)Provide special buildings. Have armories at start that store weapons
and armor along with stored magical weapons. Have forges to build the
stuff. Have magical libraries that improve on prentice magery on maybe
give a lost spell. Have military buildings like barracks. They feed
troops over the popcent limit.

10) I like the idea of scramble artifact numbers. the ones held at
start are fixed but the hidden ones should be at random. (Isn't this
who it is done in forth age).

11) allow armies to retreat. Maybe the will lose a huge amount of
morale on be driven back several hexes but every battle should not be
a wipe out of one side.

12) Minor tweaks to the current setup. A few more popcenters and a
some character changes.

13) The other Biggie-This is the hardest to do. Why do the evils have
to pay for orcs. Aren't the Evil Men foot soldiers looking for power
and booty.

14) Population limits need to be done per nation. There are only x
number of elves left. Orcs live in tribes and are bred. These tribes
can be wiped out.

Lucas

#13

Some thoughts in response. I like what you are trying to do, but I will say,
this is not a game designed for realism. It is, as another poster claimed,
more of a super advanced chess... that said:

1) The Biggie- Characters need to reflect the race they are from. All

elves need stealth 15 for sylvan elves (The bulk of the elves recruited) 20
for sinda and 25 for noldo. Enemy races have chances of getting trolls with
bonus challenge and double heal to make them
tougher. This list in just a begining.

This is kind of in place already with the SNAs each nation has. I don't like
the "automatic" bonus. I like the random "outstanding" character. However,
I like the idea you are getting at...

2)Changeing of army troop levels. A troll is not a dwarf is not a dunadan

footmen.

The game is abstract right now. X troops = x troops. Having 500 Troll
Footmen may really only be 100 trolls, each fighting with the strength of
5... None the less, I think this is the BIGGEST area I'd like to see
changed.
I would have the recruitment list broader than it is, and have the "heavy"
"light" breakdown determined more by armor and weapons. The size of the pop
center determines initial training and morale, as modified by race. Some
nations could not hire certain types, such as cavalry...

3) Restructure army combat. Archers get first fire, Light troops should be

massive in non clear terrain, light cavalry should move 16 by itself and/or
provide a recon of icons not co's or numbers.

Eh - Combat is too complex as it is, for me. see the next comment...

Combine arms armies (Infantry and cavarly) should get a bonus.

Actually, they already do... read the combat rules VERY carefully. Its just
that you need multiple commanders for this to work...

4)Make recruitibale NPC's. In 1650 why can Galadriel or Celeborn be

recuited in the fight against evil.

Again, eh. Yes, it would be cool, but then you get into the old "Gee, we get
dragons you don't" sort of thing...

5)Make magic or special weapons. For mage poor nations like woodmen or

cardolan. Why not allow mithril to be used to make a +500 sword.

Doesn't thrill me. Might thrill others.

6) Tranport Caravans-Allocate the distance product can be moved by hex

distance. 1-14 hexes 1 turn 15-28 2 turns and so on.

No way. WAY too complex for this level of game. The economics are fun, but
if this game becomes World In Flames, I know I don't have enough Advil to
handle it!

7) Purchase from the Caravans. A caravan should only have x amount of

product to by. The amount buyable should be factor of the amount available.

Already in place, sort of.

8) Strategic Commands. *snip*

Goes to the "Too Complex" category for me.

9)Provide special buildings. Have armories at start that store weapons and

armor along with stored magical weapons. Have forges to build the stuff.
Have magical libraries that improve on prentice magery on maybe give a lost
spell. Have military buildings like barracks. They feed troops over the
popcent limit.

Intriguing, but too warcrafty for me. Just a matter of taste...

10) I like the idea of scramble artifact numbers. the ones held at start

are fixed but the hidden ones should be at random. (Isn't this how it is
done in forth age).

This is always a good idea...

11) allow armies to retreat. Maybe the will lose a huge amount of morale

on be driven back several hexes but every battle should not be a wipe out of
one side.

Doesn't interest me one way or the other. The ultimate Destruction principal
works fine for me...

12) Minor tweaks to the current setup. A few more popcenters and a some

character changes.

Well, maybe more random character set ups...

13) The other Biggie-This is the hardest to do. Why do the evils have to

pay for orcs. Aren't the Evil Men foot soldiers looking for power and booty.

Nobody works for free... Consider the payment upkeep for their weaponry,
etc....

14) Population limits need to be done per nation. There are only x number

of elves left. Orcs live in tribes and are bred. These tribes can be wiped
out.

Actually, a cool idea, but again, perhaps more detrimental than intended
unless each nation gets its own special ability. I.E., is one elf worth 10
orcs, then?

Good discussion....
Jeff

#14

A lot of these are interresting ideas, but I think the majority of them

would add complexity to the game that wouldn’t necessarily make

the game more fun. The only two that I personally feel would add

entertainment to the game without overly complicating it is the

scrambling of artifact numbers and the alteration of startups to make

all of the nations more ‘cool’ to play. I don’t feel archerers should

get the first attack, as traditionally they did very little damage at

long ranges. The majority of the current troop types are pretty

useless, however you can go about correcting this in several ways.

  1. Remove the usless ones.

  2. Make the amount you can recruit, the food consumption, and the

gold upkeep linearly based off of troop strength/constitution. In

this case, it really wouldn’t matter what you recruited, except that

the different troops used would add color.

  1. Make the troops a complex version of paper-rock-sissors.

Archerers - 250% in woods, 150% vs. mounted troops.

Mounted - 200% vs LI, 150% vs HI, 25% in mountains, 50% in rough

Etc…

Not that these percentages should be used, just using them as

examples…If you want a force to defend the City Fortress in the mountains

then the bonuses for some troop types in the mountains would actually

make them better than recruiting their heavier equivelents.

#15

--- In mepbmlist@y..., "Alan Hamilton" <jhamil00@h...> wrote:

A lot of these are interresting ideas, but I think the majority of

them

would add complexity to the game that wouldn't necessarily make
the game more fun.

This is an important point. If the system gets more complicated,
there are a lot of bad things that can happen.

First, you end up having a lot of important battles that end up
getting decided simply by mistakes. I forgot to issue the correct
complicated series of instructions/one order failed and I got
a cascading series of errors etc. and my better force got stomped.
This sort of thing makes people permanently quit games, especially
after they've invested months and lots of money.

Second, you can't really properly playtest really complicated systems.
There are frequently hidden "optimal" combinations that greatly
imbalance things. This was a fatal flaw with many old-style
boardgames; I own a lot of wargames that made me wonder if the
designers ever *played* them, because I could make one side or the
other always win with some rules trick or another.

That's why I'd keep the overall combat shell, and focus on a couple of
questions for battles. Whenever looking at rules changes, I'd also
look first at the game play consequences and second at what they do to
the learning curve.

Can shipping junk around be made *simpler*, not *harder*, so that
newbies mess up less often and we see more creative military forces?
See the prior post about 947 orders...I think more cavalry would make
for more interesting games.

Can raising troops be made easier and more flexible?
Is there a creative function for light troops? If, say, you could
raise a fixed *strength point* total per population level, or recruit
mixed troops in one location, people might actually use the other
troop types. This wouldn't change the overall game balance
drastically (same maximum strength from the usual spots), but it would
add some spice and variety. Harder to guess exactly what your
opponent has, for instance. Sieges, overruns, threats become more
useful orders; beef up the recon order so that you get information on
force composition. I haven't issued any recruitment order except 400
and 408 for years. I've rarely executed a siege order. Maybe they
reduce the fortification level if successful?

cheers,

Marc

#16

Hmm...not sure you can get away with this, Laurence. Almost all more
complicated games are for multi players, and I would suggest that there are
few games as popular as chess - none spring to mind.

Can you name any more complex game than chess for two people that is more
popular?

In fact its probably the other way: loads of people play backgammon.

>I love MEPBM mostly because of its scintillating game play. I am

perfectly

···

Sam Roads <me@MiddleEarthGames.com> wrote
>happy to sacrifice realism on the altar of playability.
>
>In chess, knights are meant to leap of castles! How unrealistic! :slight_smile:
Sure but if very simple games were eternally satisfying to all, then
we'd all be playing chess, all of the time, and more complex rule
systems would never have evolved
Laurence G. Tilley http://www.lgtilley.freeserve.co.uk/

#17

Damn! Learned an interesting lesson. My 5,000
SG troops was stopped by an IK army with barely
more than 100. We were puzzled why the frigid
fat ones didn't end up as roadkill on our march
to Os. Now we know -- the IK was packing heat
(Lamthanc). Did not realize that 50-1 is not
an "overrun" when a Dragon is along.

Nothing we could have done, but an expensive
lesson. Well met!

Joseph
SG-318

···

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#18

I think you should really step back and think about the type of
game you end up with if you want to start going for realism.

(snip)

if you want to limit one thing in the
name of 'realism' then you should rationally limit all things
that are unrealistic.

It isn't about a quest for realism, it's about trying to improve
something by increasing the amount of pseudo-realism. Most Fantasy
worlds have magic systems, which defy our laws of physics. But in
successful, popular fantasy worlds, those systems have laws of their
own, which the reader (or player) finds consistent, and which therefore
become credible.

Chess, which someone gave earlier as an example of the ultimately
"unrealistic" battle game, is still simulating something. Capture the
enemy King, and you win the battle - that reflects the idea of a primary
tactical objective making other losses irrelevant on the field of
battle. Chess has heavy troops, light troops, battle lines reinforced
with the most powerful troops at the flanks and in the centre. It has a
measure of reality. That's what we're talking about here - increasing
the measure of reality. I believe that it could be done _without_
reducing the game play - I'm not saying it will be easy.

But you example of rumours spreading is an example of something which is
unrealistic, but which enhances the game play. The fact that _it_ is
unrealistic, does not give you a valid argument for keeping something
else which is unrealistic. The unlimited caravans are a much more
irritating concept than rumours, which are always considered
metaphorically to "spread like wildfire". Though actually...

Even rumours could be rationalised, and it would take a little
reprogramming, which would make no reduction whatsoever to game play or
complexity for the new player. I'm not a programmer, but even with my
elementary knowledge, I know that it would be fairly simple for one to
write an algorithm like this:

Rumour generated from order given (% chance) >>> 50% chance that the
rumour is reported in nearest capital, 25% chance that it's reported in
next nearest capital, 10% chance that it's reported in third nearest
capital.

Regards,

Laurence G. Tilley http://www.lgtilley.freeserve.co.uk/

···

Alan Hamilton <jhamil00@hotmail.com> wrote

#19

lucasc68@yahoo.com wrote

4)Make recruitibale NPC's. In 1650 why can Galadriel or Celeborn be
recuited in the fight against evil.

Yes, I like that in principle. It would balance out the DS ability to
recruit dragons. But here we open a small can of worms and a big one.

The small can: The fact that most of the dragon recruiting responses are
all known.

The big can: The entire encounter system. I would be VERY interested to
hear if anyone has any intelligent idea for a complete overhaul of the
encounter system. The stock encounters are all known, so are the riddle
answers, and 19 times out of 20 the encounters of one's characters are
irritating or boring. This is another weak point of the game, and it
should be one of the strongest. _Surely_ we could come up with
something better?

Regards,

Laurence G. Tilley http://www.lgtilley.freeserve.co.uk/

#20

A lot of these are interresting ideas, but I think the majority of them
would add complexity to the game that wouldn't necessarily make
the game more fun. The only two that I personally feel would add
entertainment to the game without overly complicating it is the
scrambling of artifact numbers and the alteration of startups to make
all of the nations more 'cool' to play.

You're too late. They've already done what you suggest. It's a rather
weak effort (IMO) called 4th Age. But actually you seem to be at odds
within your own mind here (I've been there too on this one!) because you
go on later to make reasonable suggestions on one of the major changes
under discussion - the army combat system, and troop types.

I don't feel archerers should
get the first attack, as traditionally they did very little damage at
long ranges.

I think the suggestion was based more on the concept of ranged fire
(even short ranged) doing it's damage before hand to hand combat (and
the mathematics of it begun).

I'd also dispute what you say about long range damage anyway. Long
range volley fire of archers, in mediaeval battles often did a kind of
tactical damage. A commander whose troops are under long range fire has
his options reduced. He can retreat, or he can charge, but he can't
hold his ground waiting for the enemy - he can try, but the longer he
does so, the more stray arrow injuries his men get, and more
importantly, the more unhappy they get.

Hastings I believe is an example of this, Harold came down off his hill
not because his shield wall couldn't hold against Norman cavalry, but
because Flemish archers were causing slow losses. One of his flanks
broke, and chased the Norman feinted retreat, but when you understand
the fact that the arrows were eroding the shield wall, you can
understand why the men on that flank were so anxious to do something
decisive. Modern historians argue that Harold would probably have lost
_even_ if that flank had not have pursued the Normans, because, he was
taking losses, and was attempting to win a battle by defending only. (A
few years I think since I've read up on Hastings, so I'll defer politely
to anyone who's more up to date.)

Regards,

Laurence G. Tilley http://www.lgtilley.freeserve.co.uk/

···

Alan Hamilton <jhamil00@hotmail.com> wrote