October Alliance

[Ry Vor]

Form Your Alliance!

Alliance games are four teams of three where communication is limited to your teammates, who typically coordinate fairly closely. Newer players especially are sort of expected to share their proposed orders with their teammates. It has been a great learning vehicle for even experienced players to see how two others develop strategy and how they make decisions. How much micro management just depends on the personalities on the team. Sometimes its just strategic and internal trading. Win by your Alliance controlling six regions. No naming High Council issues for kingdoms in other alliances though you can vote either way, and you can name an issue to damage them.

While this is a favorite format for many of us, the important thing is to not drop as you'd be letting your teammates down.

Within Alliance, we have two formats: preset teams that purpose to make them all balanced, and drafts like Warlords. This time I think players wanted a draft although we could revisit that.

This was the signup so far from a previous thread that has been closed.
We need three more in a team to get going.


Teams so far:

Ohman *
Dupont
Warmaster

PTRiley (Strongwill)
Rellgar
Jon Doe *

Avantar
The Gray Mouser
IMP_TARK *

[Mad Hatter]

I'm hesitant going against the experienced teams above, I know....it's a learning experience (like putting my hand back on the stove). Can you re-post what type of game this is so I can re-consider?

[Ry Vor]

I'm hesitant going against the experienced teams above, I know....it's a learning experience (like putting my hand back on the stove). Can you re-post what type of game this is so I can re-consider?

   It's a great format, Mad.  I edited the first post here to better explain the conditions.

Also, please if any of the nine signed up have changed their mind, please post here.  Meanwhile, we need a team of three with an experienced player as Captain.

[unclemike]

I would like to throw myself into this mix if the present group of players are willing to have these options:

• Random Cities (love the exploration aspect of this option and it makes me feel that I've earned my way)
  
• Ice Age Epoch (will be ready in a couple of days)
  

I've played some test games with the new Ice Age option and I think it'll work out best in a team format with players being able to share food/gold resources with each other. It'll be a new and exciting twist to the game that will hopefully be interesting to play. Here's an updated link to the upcoming Ice Age Epoch:  http://www.kingdomsofarcania.net/forum/s...1#pid47031

So if everyone is ok with the above two options, I'll sign up for this Alliance game though not as a captain since this is my first team game.

[Avantar]

I would like to try both options.

[JonDoe]

Sounds like fun. In this case I do not mind random cities. Do you even want to own one starting at -10k food 10k gold. I would only ask before we start drafting all Ice Age Epoch special rules be defined.

[unclemike]

Sounds like fun.   In this case I do not mind random cities.  Do you even want to own one starting at -10k food 10k gold.   I would only ask before we start drafting all Ice Age Epoch special rules be defined.

For the rules, just follow the link above (here it is again http://www.kingdomsofarcania.net/forum/s...1#pid47031). There may be a few differences from that list (I'm waiting on any last minute changes from Ry Vor) but it's pretty much there.

Also, I updated the kingdom turn report a little to help distinguish Ice Age games from others (see the attachment). Some of the cosmetic changes are:

• Title page has a new picture to let players know that special Ice Age rules are in play for this game (shows every turn)
  
• Section I (emissary section) has note about Ice Age (only turn 0)
  
• Seapower section has the word frozen next to each sea name (every turn)
  
• Section III (economic section) has note about receiving extra food from the royal pantry (only turn 0)
  
• Section III, season names were changed to always display Deep Winter (every turn)
  
• [Not shown since other file] Turn 0 kingdom setup file has new movement rates for Ice Age games
  

BTW, for turn 0, I also added a note in Section III if your kingdom received a chivalry gold bonus.

When I'm done modifying the web sites (order entry, game queue) to allow for the Ice Age option, I'll move the final rules to the UncleMike Corner forum listing so it becomes official.

[JonDoe]

Ice Age really hits home look at that food production. I like all the warnings, nice job.

Any team would be lucky to have UM on it. Besides knowing all the orders in deapth. He is one of the most skilled player for resource management, which will be critical in this format.

I would consider removing the CI winter production bonus. That may be too unbalancing. I believe the NO only gets a summer bonus so no need to remove

[unclemike]

Ice Age really hits home look at that food production.  I like all the warnings, nice job.

Any team would be lucky to have UM on it.  Besides knowing all the orders in deapth.  He is one of the most skilled player for resource management, which will be critical in this format.

I would consider removing the CI winter production bonus.  That may be too unbalancing.  I believe the NO only gets a summer bonus so no need to remove

Yes, Ice Age should cause people to think differently about the game.

Instead of Hidden Ore all the time, Fertile Fields and Create Food should become popular. Also, instead of just blindly building massive groups to crush others now requires some thought towards supporting those forces (and the sacrifice in other things for producing that extra food).

Players should consider alternatives to their typical opening strategy like relying more on weapon artifacts or casting the proper spells to win the battle. Summon Death (to destroy opposing forces) becomes more powerful in this version as well as Meteor Storm (to damage pc defenses) since one's forces may be smaller in size to conquer the pc. Ice Age may end up providing a taste of what's to come in Maelstrom regarding defeating tougher pc defenses in that regard.

Different strategies and approaches which were previously overlooked in games may now have to be considered due to having a reduced production every turn. Previously, having a healthy food/gold production, and in some cases overwhelmingly large production after conquering a couple of regions, may have been too much of a good thing and not much of a challenge deciding what to develop for your kingdom since there was plenty of food/gold to go around.

And that's the whole point of introducing a new scenario like Ice Age: provide a different kind of challenge and different gaming experience for everyone that they may not be used to in a game.

BTW, I may also add a new title picture for Pagan games as I did with the snowy scene for Ice Age games. The reason why is that we've had some complaints about people forgetting that they're in a Pagan game and they tried to created a temple or hire a noble maiden and such only to be in error. I guess when you play several games at once, it can get confusing between them so I may add a picture or icon on the title page to distinguish a game's special options (currently, only pagan and ice age are special options but the future may offer more).

[Wookie Panz]

Sounds like fun.   In this case I do not mind random cities.  Do you even want to own one starting at -10k food 10k gold.   I would only ask before we start drafting all Ice Age Epoch special rules be defined.

For the rules, just follow the link above (here it is again http://www.kingdomsofarcania.net/forum/s...1#pid47031). There may be a few differences from that list (I'm waiting on any last minute changes from Ry Vor) but it's pretty much there.

Also, I updated the kingdom turn report a little to help distinguish Ice Age games from others (see the attachment). Some of the cosmetic changes are:

• Title page has a new picture to let players know that special Ice Age rules are in play for this game (shows every turn)
  
• Section I (emissary section) has note about Ice Age (only turn 0)
  
• Seapower section has the word frozen next to each sea name (every turn)
  
• Section III (economic section) has note about receiving extra food from the royal pantry (only turn 0)
  
• Section III, season names were changed to always display Deep Winter (every turn)
  
• [Not shown since other file] Turn 0 kingdom setup file has new movement rates for Ice Age games
  

BTW, for turn 0, I also added a note in Section III if your kingdom received a chivalry gold bonus.

When I'm done modifying the web sites (order entry, game queue) to allow for the Ice Age option, I'll move the final rules to the UncleMike Corner forum listing so it becomes official.

Very well done Uncle Mike.  This should offer some interesting challenges.  It would seem that there is little reason to pick the AT or PI in this one.