Overlords - Experimental game. Concept thread

[rdonj]

Alright, so my Factions concept never really took off (well, maybe it secretly did and I should have tried setting up a game for it). Here's another.

Overlords: These nations have pre-defined empires, 10 provinces large with 3 starting forts (including the capitol). No labs/temples added on the extra forts. Their provinces already have magic sites at the beginning of the game so their advantages over lesser nations should be even more so. However, they can only attack normal nations or independents if their pretender is in the army or if they have dominion in the normal nation's (or independent's) province (an overlord cannot take a normal nation's capitol unless all other overlords are dead). They can attack other overlord nations whenever they want though. Overlord nations will be seperated by normal nations, but will be given gatestones to allow them to attack each other more easily. Gatestones will also be moved down to construction 6, and made forgeable only with e9s9. Overlords will start with one gate stone.

Victory conditions: Either all other overlords must be dead and the sole surviving overlord in control of at least 5 capitols for 3 turns OR control 10 capitols for 3 turns(assuming all nations).

Only more experienced players will be considered for overlord positions. Otherwise the game would quickly come unbalanced. Either all overlords will have stealth preachers, or none will. Overlords will not be able to choose blood sacrificing nations.




Normals: Normal starting empires, one province, no extra sites or anything. May do whatever they wish, except that they may not cast ANY globals. Note that the Overlords may cast these spells should they so choose.

Victory Conditions: For a normal nation to win, they must control at least 5 capitols for 3 turns, including an overlord capitol.


Since there are spells that some people are allowed to use and others are not, either they will have to be made into nationals (annoying, and possibly mod conflict inducing?) or there will have to be a game master to deal with unallowed globals. I am leaning towards the game master idea as without one, it is possible one of the players of an Overlord nation could mess up the game by doing things he's not supposed to. Plus as I intend to admin rather than play, it would give me an easy way to know what turn the game is on and when hostings are.



Suggested Settings:
Age - QM has suggested MA, this seems a decent starting point. Any should work though.
Pre-set starts
Mods - cbm 1.5 or whatever the latest version happens to be at the time, no gem gens, and if water nations are included UWGIM.
Gold/resource/supplies/indies - normal
Players - as many as possible
Magic sites - 20
Renaming - on
HoF - 15
Research - difficult
All other settings default, on a 15-20 PPP map.


Comments, criticism, and sign ups welcome. Veteran player input on settings is particularly desired and may result in changes to the above.