In a message dated 10/30/2004 7:05:38 PM Eastern Standard Time,
jdsimpson1@hotmail.com writes:
As you know I like the game as it is. We can't go back to the fog of war
because everything is know. Even if Harley develop a new map (none Tolkien)
and new set ups etc this will soon be communicated to others and the fog
will be lost.
I missed out on the early days and regret that. I would love to play with
lots of unknows (but I can only see that Gunboat would do this to any
degree). Other than getting rid of the Internet do you have any ideas how we
could revert back to this fog of war that you like so much and I would love
to take part in?
Cheers
John S
Ah -- but that is the reason some of us play 4th Age for the most part. It
has something like the weaker economies and stronger character bases of the
2950 scenario, but every game is a new world to explore. Sure, the map is the
same, and many encounters are predictable -- dragons are gone but you can
still find Ents in Fangorn and spirits at old ruins sites (even though the
towers are rubble now). But aside from the North Kingdom and South Kingdom, all
the nations are designed from scratch by the players, and even the Kingdoms
have some variability built into them. There are some flaws in the scenario,
and the discussion over nation ability costs and character dominance is hot
and heavy at times, BUT you definitely start out with a fair amount of
fog-of-war at the beginning of each game. Artifacts no longer have powerful hidden
abilities (no access to entire Lost Lists of spells) and have their numbers
randomized, so there is plenty of unknown stuff there -- Artifact VCs are very
helpful in that regard, but only a fraction of the great ones tend to show
up there. So unlike the other scenarios, a 4th Age game doesn't start with
specific opening moves by every nation already over-analyzed... -- Ernie III
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