The effect luck plays in Alamaze

[Frost Lord]

I love the Fool.  As soon as I recon a Capital, I throw everything I've got at trying to kidnap one... "I pity that Fool!"

And yes, I typically set my Fool up on standing order, but I also keep a standing order to guard him (oh yea, and my king too, since Agents can guard 2 characters).  :-)

That's 2 standing orders that are not being used on something else, so using your Fool on standing order does come with a cost.

Guard is normally used for your characters in non-owned PC's.  Counter Espionage is recommended for your owned PC's and groups.  An agent will protect all your characters as well as the PC itself in one PC. 

My question/point on using the one order available for a Fool as a standing order is it seems sort of automatic, and one objective I've had is to try to eliminate reflexive orders.

I have many automatic orders.  If it is not the Fool, I would have multiple Agents training, special healing orders for my groups, counter espionage, recon/scrying, sea patrols, guard prisoners...etc.

I think that you will have an excellent opportunity to "fix" standing orders when you get a chance to move forward with your suggestion to split Influence so that each kingdom has a Rulership value and a separate Influence value (which will be awesome).  When that happens, you could raise the starting Rulership for all kingdoms and eliminate standing orders altogether.  You could not do that right now, because increasing the number of orders you can issue per turn would also off-balance strength of all Emissaries for each kingdom.  --just a thought.

[Ry Vor]

The Fool really makes it more feasible to hire more agents, governors, and noble maidens. Not to mention promoting them. I would say that this one is not broken and doesn't need fixing.

Tell us more about the Sage...

Can the sage tell me who assasinated my Fool?

That would be nice!

  Hawk.  Always makes me smile.  Alright, we won't go further with banning Fools doing their thing without costing an order. 

Yes, I know experienced players generally have a fairly similar core of turn 1 orders.  I just haven't found a way to counter that without making the game more complicated and I am convinced the current complexity of the game, and the demands on the player to use various applications like PowerPoint, Adobe, possibly Excel and really having for the most part to figure out what to do is the limiting factor to attracting new players.  I am pretty sure successful new players like Tomag and Atuan were tutored by someone like Imperial Tark or Jumpingfist.  Otherwise, to the fear and dread of some, when Kingdoms of Arcania comes around, it may have to be a simpler game at least in the first release and then add the Alamaze nuances somewhat gradually.

[Ry Vor]

I love the Fool.  As soon as I recon a Capital, I throw everything I've got at trying to kidnap one... "I pity that Fool!"

And yes, I typically set my Fool up on standing order, but I also keep a standing order to guard him (oh yea, and my king too, since Agents can guard 2 characters).  :-)

That's 2 standing orders that are not being used on something else, so using your Fool on standing order does come with a cost.

Guard is normally used for your characters in non-owned PC's.  Counter Espionage is recommended for your owned PC's and groups.  An agent will protect all your characters as well as the PC itself in one PC. 

My question/point on using the one order available for a Fool as a standing order is it seems sort of automatic, and one objective I've had is to try to eliminate reflexive orders.

I have many automatic orders.  If it is not the Fool, I would have multiple Agents training, special healing orders for my groups, counter espionage, recon/scrying, sea patrols, guard prisoners...etc.

I think that you will have an excellent opportunity to "fix" standing orders when you get a chance to move forward with your suggestion to split Influence so that each kingdom has a Rulership value and a separate Influence value (which will be awesome).  When that happens, you could raise the starting Rulership for all kingdoms and eliminate standing orders altogether.  You could not do that right now, because increasing the number of orders you can issue per turn would also off-balance strength of all Emissaries for each kingdom.  --just a thought.

For those who do not know, in Fall of Rome it worked well to have both Rulership, which determines how many commands may be given, separate from Influence, which determines how powerful the emissaries are.  Separating them obviously makes choosing King orders harder, and relatively more expensive, changes strategy, and allows for criteria to hire characters based on either Rulership or Influence.  So for example, the trait Order could effect Rulership without also making emissaries more effective.  AKing might need a certain level of Rulership to hire an Engineer, or a certain level of Influence to attract a Hero.  Maybe a combined total to attract a Sage.

Once again, I would ask each player to prevail upon a smart friend to try Alamaze in a Duel contest, mentor them through, see if we can get some converts.  Converts: now don't start saying I favor the Devout kingdoms over the Wizard kingdoms. 

[Lord Diamond]

I liked the complexity offered by Rulership/Influence and it looks like Rick has more ideas along those lines.

Rick might be happy to learn that I left the incedibly complex Excel spreadsheet behind with 2nd Cycle. I do occassionally use Frost Lord's player aid, but I can usually get by with just my turn report, the order entry site, and my Power Point map. I have three 27" monitors, so it works out perfectly. The downside is that I can barely get anything accomplished with just a measley laptop screen. Hell, I even took one 27" monitor with me on vacation.

[Tomag Ironfist]

I personally don't use any computer programs - I print out hard copies of the Alamaze resurgent map for each one of my games, and have a pretty lengthy legend to keep all of the information organized on each map with different colored pens and pencil. Having all my information consolidated on one medium helps me keep organized

[Ry Vor]

It is kind of amazing how almost everyone does it differently.  We have come a long way with what Mike has done for the interface, but someday we hope to have it even more streamlined, like with an integrated and computer updated map, ala Fall of Rome.  Players could make annotations on that map, but it otherwise marked all your PC's and known groups for you and let you click to move groups.

For those newer players, it wasn't that long ago orders were submitted via Excel.

Mike has begun a major project that will have various benefits, including at some point, the legendary "ready" button.

[IMPERIAL_TARK]

I love the Fool.  As soon as I recon a Capital, I throw everything I've got at trying to kidnap one... "I pity that Fool!"

And yes, I typically set my Fool up on standing order, but I also keep a standing order to guard him (oh yea, and my king too, since Agents can guard 2 characters).  :-)

That's 2 standing orders that are not being used on something else, so using your Fool on standing order does come with a cost.

Guard is normally used for your characters in non-owned PC's.  Counter Espionage is recommended for your owned PC's and groups.  An agent will protect all your characters as well as the PC itself in one PC. 

My question/point on using the one order available for a Fool as a standing order is it seems sort of automatic, and one objective I've had is to try to eliminate reflexive orders.

I love the Fool as is..... but.... it would be nice if he had some other options. Perhaps if he could also issue the 360, 365, and 380 orders at 1500 gold each?

[Lord Diamond]

I am not exactly advocating this, but if the Fool had a small chance of offending someone enough to get executed, it would make the turn report that much more exciting.

[Atuan]

I'm not down with the influence loss on this option. It likely could eliminate people's willingness to use him

[Frost Lord]

I love the Fool.  As soon as I recon a Capital, I throw everything I've got at trying to kidnap one... "I pity that Fool!"

And yes, I typically set my Fool up on standing order, but I also keep a standing order to guard him (oh yea, and my king too, since Agents can guard 2 characters).  :-)

That's 2 standing orders that are not being used on something else, so using your Fool on standing order does come with a cost.

Guard is normally used for your characters in non-owned PC's.  Counter Espionage is recommended for your owned PC's and groups.  An agent will protect all your characters as well as the PC itself in one PC. 

My question/point on using the one order available for a Fool as a standing order is it seems sort of automatic, and one objective I've had is to try to eliminate reflexive orders.

I love the Fool as is..... but.... it would be nice if he had some other options.  Perhaps if he could also issue the 360, 365, and 380 orders at 1500 gold each?

IT

I am not sure those actions would be appropriate for a Court Fool (a.k.a. a Jester).  But once Rick starts working on new characters (like he just shared with the Engineer, Sage, & Hero) he could go crazy with all types of special characters with intrinsic abilities and special commands (and possibly buildings too)...

I have fantasized about new characters for years....

Librarian - reduces Wizard training cost by 5% at the PC he is located in
Training Captain - reduces training costs for brigades (by a percentage) at the PC
Tower Guard - increases defense in the PC he is located in
Assassin - gets a bonus to assassinations & a penalty to all other agent activities
Thief - bonus to thievery, penalty to everything else
Saboteur - specializes in sabotage
Spy Master - specializes in reconnaissance
Squire...
Town Magister...
Guard...
Hand of the King...
etc...(just to list a few)

Knowing Rick...he is probably going to surprise us with some really cool stuff....!