Query on policy

General
#1

[i]There is a basic disconnect between GSI and Harley. It revolves around the ability (or lack thereof) to function in an ambiguous environment. The great majority need structure—whatever form that may take. There are those that can do well in chaostic situations.

Then there are situations when both order and chaos exisits side-by-side and you are given a moral choice as to which you choose. Then there are situations so well disguised that you don’t even realise there is a choice or such things as freewill.

Perhaps you will recall, about, four years ago. Both this Forum and the List were being censored. Methinks it was because some alien concepts that contradicted the preconceptions of the ‘Brit Clique’ were being spread. These issues were brought forward then—not that it seems to stuck very well in Cardiff.[/i]

Yes we’re different to GSI, GSI sold up and left shortly after they brought out 1000, ie they decided they no longer wanted to be a part of running ME Games at that point pre-2000 - just 7 or years ago). If they wanted to do it they’d still be here, and you’d be, I suggest, making similar comments to them. :wink: Having chatted to them a lot they were ready to move onto other pastures (for reference we met them a few times, Pete has recently married btw, we’re in contact with them both from time to time) which I think is fair enough, and they were very happy for us to move things forward with their blessing. If they’re happy with that I don’t know why you’re not. Asking us to do it the GSI way isn’t going to happen, because players, on the whole, don’t want that.

So whatever their vision was it’s no longer around, we make do. It’s our vision now. So we took on the mantle and are moving things forward as we, with player feedback, think best suits the game. There is no game of 10 years ago, the internet modified it so drasticallly as to, IMO, kill it, the fog-of war (and I still don’t understand why you don’t play Gunboat - it’s all about f-o-w!) has now cleared, there are many mapping and data parsing applications out there that players use. We just try to make sure that everyone has access to that and then let their skill define the outcome. We’re just dealing with the aftermath.

Censorship: that was dealt with, as you mentioned, a long time ago, I’m not aware of any complaints recently about that policy. I can’t avoiding being British I’m afraid… :smiley: You make it sound like it’s a bad thing to be… LOL. Our policy is in the house rules and discussed here at that time. Our forum is excellent, there’s lots of lively debate, players and GMs agreeing and disagreeing about many points. Great! Unanimity is impossible (well with one player we might just get there) but I can, and do, look after the interests of players as best I can.

I hope that’s helpful, have fun and help make it fun for others…

Clint (GM)

#2

Mr. GM, I DO play Gunboat—look at your current game roster–game 55. Gunboat is a partial roll-back of your erosions to the Stassun/Feilds game and it was not your idea, but it came from a fan.

#3

Enjoying it? (I am corrected, you have my apologies for erroneous posting). Yes it did come from a fan, many ideas do and we implement them as appropriate (never claimed it wasn’t). We’ve modified it, updated it and so on and I personally think it’s great, all with player feedback. I’ve got some thoughts for future development of it, modifications etc which I’ll discuss later as I think it could do with a little tweaking.

Thanks
Clint (GM)

#4

Out of curioisity: For six years I have been explaining the seven alien concepts (alliances, realpolitik, ambiguous environments, moral freewill, stealth/deception/ruses, psyops and opsec) that were present in the preAllsorts game. Presuming some, or all, of those particular balls have been caught in Cardiff will they be present in Kin Strife?

#5

From what I know of Kin Strife some of what you are after will be there and some will not. Ambiguous Environments is the one we are really looking at here. Whilst 1650 has a set data pattern, Kin Strife you will be able to modify your nation in a number of ways. That army may not always start at 2924, you could have paid to move it elsewhere and upgraded the armour on it for instance. Characters you can choose to make strategic boosts in strength at game start and can choose to find the locations of NPCs at game start. The character names and pop centre names are fixed however. Artefact ID’s will be randomised so you have to find out their numbers before locating them. SNA’s nations can choose from a small list, so you cannot always know that a nation will have that double scout for instance. You can choose to build roads for some nations and some nations can change small amounts of terrain. You can also pay to move your map to centre on another of your pop centres at game start.

From what I understand encounters will occaisionally be changed so you won’t always know the right answer and they may be dependent on a charcaters skill being sufficient to gain the big reward.

There are less neutrals in the game (2) who are heavily encouraged to turn so there may be less alliances / realpolitik than you are expecting.

Hope this helps answer your question Ed.

Gavin

#6

Sigh…“Free will” = Presume what you want… LOL:)

We’ve created a game that I think might appeal to our current player base taking the best elements of 1000, 1650 and 2950 as I perceive them and then testing that perception against that of the players and other members of staff and using that feedback to modify the game appropriately. If you have a few hundred players wanting the Seven Concepts then I’m happy to run such a game. At present I’m finding it hard to get 25. I don’t feel that we can get the players for such a game and make it financially viable.

When we get it out, finally, then you can enjoy or dislike it as much as you want… :smiley: We’ve added more fog of war elements to the start-up but rather than a free for all, we’ve limited each nation to a set of strengths and weaknesses. We’ve removed lots of knowledge in the form of encounters, ie players will need to re-evaluate what they know and re-educate themselves I suspect. We’ve not added elements where players attack each other or the like. It’s very much a team-game though with ability to play each nation more individually if you wish.

The map is new, characers are new and we aim to develop SNAs, SCAs (Special Character Abilities) and possibly even SPAs (special Pop centre abilities) along with long term plans for Quest (extension of the Encounter system).

Sorry just been in a discussion with Sam of why the Multi-stellar system of Serenity is flawed from a scientific perspective… :rolleyes:

Clint

#7

It’s flawed because we all end up dead in the end… :smiley:

#8

The map in the Serenity RPG rulebook is quite impossible from an Astonomy point of view, but hey for Roleplaying purposes I’m prepared to ignore physics for a while.

Gavin

#9

Thanks Gavin.

#10

Clint: I look forward to the KS and hope it will be even more sucessful than your hopes. Perhaps then the erosions will be repaired for the Stassun/Feilds game, which was festooned with American game awards. It did not win those awards because someone could only imagine ‘teams’ and ‘fairplay’.

#11

Having said that… there are some choices to make in the game set up where team mate A can particularly help, or not, team mates B through F. So maybe there is a slice of realpolitik to get stuck into before games start :wink:

#12

Ed, in your list you forgot an eighth concept: propaganda. Repeat a statement over and over again, and people start to think it is common knowledge.
the frequence and obstinacy of your ventilations on this board could make the bystander believe it to be something greater than it is: just your opinion. :wink:

#13

Thanks for the reply Bernrd.

Yes, preconception is a powerful force. It can persuade men that American game designers would incorporate British Fairplay into their creation. ME junps-the-pond and the locals apply local conventions to it. To be expected I guess. Take it for fact and not opnion, the conventions differed in Miami from Cardiff.

On both the List and this Forum there have been several discussions along the lines of: “This is a great team game, except the game designers cluttered it up with ‘this’, ‘that’ and the ‘other’. What in the world was wrong with them?” It never seeming to enter the thought patterns that the game designers actually knew what they were doing and achieved it quite well.

So Ed Mills comes along and, more-or-less patiently, explains this was not a team game at all but a game of 25 individuals. This excites the ire of some persons unwilling to re-examine their preconceptions.

#14

Address the difference between “was” and “is” Ed. Law of Unforseen Consequences. Ie communication technology, Mouth of Sauron, etc. The “was” became a “was” from the start. Great game they designed, too bad they didn’t understand human behaviour in the real world (regardless of their supposed understanding in a 25 person role-play environment…) to predict the [natural = unforseen] demise of what you so cherish.

Now, the self same technology that ‘ruined’ the game has an opportunity to rectify it. Run the game completely on-line and anonymously with build it “recipe card” chat ability. But the “smart rats” will still find the workaround, poll their friends to connect “off-line”.

I think you give the designers too much credit - the necessity that the Individual winner is tied to the Allegiance win is your downfall. Because playing the game the “British” way, aka Team Play, provides a drastically improved chance of the Allegiance Victory. From which, the Game Winner can emerge. Somewhat a zero sum game - and you know there’s no breaking out of that viscious circle…

#15

Ed,

do you never ever get irritated by the fact that you seem to be the only one to bemoan the situation? this is a market. players do not adapt to company demands, it’s the other way round.
else it would not have taken so long to fill the alliance game, don’t you think?
and don’t you see the irony that just the “fair play” you are constantly mocking about allows us to create a “protected game environment” like the alliance setup which comes close to your vision of the game?

the way I see it, the “olde game” like you described can be put down almost entirely to an involuntary lack of communication and information of the players. of course, subtleness was possible, but in fact very little was involved, I am afraid.

#16

Ah, yes, “That depends on what the definition of is, is.”

ME WAS NOT a team game, although many people went down that primrose path. ME IS a team game, but only because it has been pruned and eroded. Then there is “ME SHOULD be a team game.” Perhaps so, but I think some of that is ego protection—something along the lines of “well maybe I was wrong but I shouldn’t have been.”

We are currently engaged in an experiment (G75) to see if the game designers’ vision can be more-or-less replicated under ‘modern’ conditions. Hopefully bruised egos and preconceptions can be set aside and a fair read done.

#17

Everyone makes good points in this string of posts IMO.
Ed is right in that the game was originally designed to be a game of 25 players where intrigue & backstabbing & subterfuge were a “designed-in” part of the game, enhanced by the precarious nature of communication using 3x5 index cards.
Brad is right in that time passed, communication mechanisms evolved, and nations of the allegiance that more effectively cooperated as a team found victory a much easier goal to achieve than did the nations of an allegiance who fought each other as well as the “enemy”. This evolved into “grudge games”, which require ultimate cooperation and coordination for either side to have a hope of achieving victory.
And Bernd is right in that Ed seems to be the most vocal voice with nostalgia for the way things were before the ugliness of progress (internet, email, free long distance calling) peeled away the curtains of communication inefficiency that facilitated the original designer’s intent for selfish individual play (particularly on the DS). The market (player community) does indeed seem to mostly want to leverage technology.

The Alliance Game is now running. It’ll be interesting to see how it pans out and whether people really do backstab each other, or whether the needs of the many (allegiance) outweigh the needs of the self (nation) on one or both sides. The jury is in session and will return its verdict in due course.

cheers,
Dave

#18

Ed Ed Ed. Your righteousness shows it’s blinders. The designers were brilliant, fine arteests whose creation is only understood by the few, wise and experienced open minded folk, unlimited in vision and outlook. Fine, so be it. Hang it on a wall, brag to all your friends, yadda yadda.

And you and they can meet up for a fine wine that the rest of us likely don’t appreciate either, and complain about the ignorance of the masses.

Or you can grant they made mistakes both in design and their judgement about the market and you might find your audience more receptive. Really Ed, I have a hard time putting this hero worhip aspect of your personality within the context of everything else I know about you. Talk about limited vision, etc…

#19

Brad, I don’t mind a certain level of personal abuse, so long as I can train a younger generation in the Ways-of-Sauron.

Part of the genius of Stassun and Feilds was that a player could actually attempt to become Sauron, using Sauron-like behavior. Never mind your name was Argeleb. Sometimes it would work, for many of the same reasons Tolkien’s Sauron achieved his goals. Allsorts gave us what? How to behave like an English Gentleman? Which requires more imagination and is harder to simulate?

At bottom Harley flinches away from thinking the unthinkable. If you are forced to be good, you are not actually Good. Your moral freewill determines if you are Good.

This whole business has given me a greater appreciation of one of Tolkien’s themes. It is indeed difficult to explain evil to people.

#20

Actually, I find it quite difficult to behave like an English gentleman, frankly… :wink: