What kind of game would people like?

[Hoplosternum]

I hope there are room for some team games. And some themed gamed like you are suggesting.

[jimkehn]

I am not partial to eras. I don't care too much about mods/no mods. Matters little. Map choice is not a problem. I suck at all of it.

I only want a game with a 24 hour timer and one that doesn't blow up after 20 turns.

[gowb]

Moderation: I agree completely, but there really is a lot of good roleplaying going on, if you read the right threads. There were a couple I read on the second or third page where the guys were having all sorts of adventures talking about their prophets fighting trolls or whatever. It owned.

Of course there are some people who are bad at it and break character immediately when other people don't play their way...IndyPendant comes to mind. But you have to take the good with the bad and you can just avoid guys like that if you need.

So don't give up hope! I much prefer that my nation works thematically. I absolutely don't care about min maxing and will probably do pretty poorly when it comes to actually playing. For instance I absolutely won't pick a pretender who doesn't fit perfectly with the nation concept (the Pheonix with Abysia makes no sense to me, for example, even though it's probably a great choice).

[moderation]

Hoplosternum said:
I hope there are room for some team games. And some themed gamed like you are suggesting.

Hrm, with the game the way it is now, it might be possible to have a "forbidden magic" theme. For example, "evil" (blood, death, sorcery) magic vs "good" (fire, air, water, earth, nature) magic. Of course the elemental magics and nature aren't really good, but perhaps they could be neutral. And while some astral spells are "evil", like Master Enslave, some aren't, and some specifically target undead. So you'd have some interesting problems figuring out who is allowed to use what and what is forbidden. Maybe it could be addressed through modding at some point, though you can also just do it through the honor system once you agree on some rules.

And of course, you can think of all kinds of good thematic reasons for why the evil magic is forbidden and why some of the gods have banded together to purge the world of those who use it, etc.

Another problem is that I have heard these evil paths, blood, death, and astral are arguably the most powerful paths in the game. Of course, maybe you can come up with a good thematic reason for this, and maybe find other ways to balance it. Or you can also let the good guys use certain astral spells, barring spells that curse, call horrors, or enslave.

[Ylvali]

@moderation: Check out the Primea thread. I�d say we�ve got some nice role playing going on there. Acouchi was good to, but much of the role playing there has migrated into private PMs now.

I would like games with a focus on role playing. Like with a rule you have to introduce your pretenter properly with a personality, motivation etc.. And contribute to the forum thread a little bit every turn. There could also be a main story created beforehand, a kind of scenario.

I would like to organize such a game when I have finished my newbie games and got some more experience, but that may take a while.

[Ylvali]

I like the good vs. evil idea.

[moderation]

gowb said:
Moderation: I agree completely, but there really is a lot of good roleplaying going on, if you read the right threads. There were a couple I read on the second or third page where the guys were having all sorts of adventures talking about their prophets fighting trolls or whatever. It owned.

This sounds interesting, which threads were these?

gowb said:
So don't give up hope! I much prefer that my nation works thematically. I absolutely don't care about min maxing and will probably do pretty poorly when it comes to actually playing. For instance I absolutely won't pick a pretender who doesn't fit perfectly with the nation concept (the Pheonix with Abysia makes no sense to me, for example, even though it's probably a great choice).

Ah, but the difference is I do prefer to minimax as much as possible within the rules. I'm competitive that way. Of course the downside to this is that every nation starts to feel the same, like an evil empire that wants to beat everyone else. However if there are commonly accepted rules limiting what you can do to more thematic choices, well I think that could be fun. That way you don't have to limit yourself strategically to become more thematically enjoyable.

[moderation]

Okay, I don't want to hijack Llamabeast's thread too much so refer to this thread for more details on my crazy Good vs Evil game idea.

[moderation]

Tyrant said:
The question of provinces per player is tricky- it depends on the number of players. I like a fairly roomy map that gives a little space to develop in the early game, but if there are lots of players that makes the total map size so big that the end game becomes management nightmare for the survivors.

Here's another idea: Design a large, perhaps pie-like map with each nation owning a slice of the pie. You could separate each slice perhaps with some mountains or other terrain as desired. At the beginning of the game the map is very large, but as time goes on, the map shrinks as provinces towards the edge slowly die to population 0. Like being surrounded by an invisible Ermor. Anyway, it would be some fancy modding but it could save some late game management issues while allowing room to expand early on.