Ideas for a multiplayer campaign

[Altan Urag]

Well it's a long shot. I will throw out my idea and see if I get a
response. As this will have to be a community project for sure.

I have been playing the game since it came out and find myself dissatisfied
and bored with playing against a dumb AI (for most games in fact). The only
true challenge and enjoyment I find is playing multiplayer online games
(mainly Red Orchestra nowadays). Mind pitted against another mind in a tactical situation with first-person shooter games. The downside is that it gets old, player spawns as much as he wants, and the best players usually end up owning everyone else. Well I have a dream, to paraphase MLK, to play, nae, immerse myself in a truly global gaming experience. A 4th dimension multiplayer online gaming, if you will. An online chess game with as many people on the board as M2TW allows.

Basic idea: You are a character in the Medieval period. You may be a general
and a lord, you may be the King or Sultan of your kingdom (aka the Clans system that we see in the community), or the Pope or Caliph himself. Each lord (players who sign up) are based in a certain region of their respective kingdoms, and the king (elected from the players who choose to be in that kingdom) administers, plans, strategizes, leads the faction to conquest and victory. But beware kings fall and lords envy your throne.
You are born in the Medieval period in the imaginary sense, and hold power as a King or a Lord in the real sense.

How will this work: Through the treasury system. Each faction has a certain amount of gold depending on the regions it holds. The money is the King's, collected from all the regions, but it is actually the Lord's if he chooses to recruit an army to rebel against the King. The amount of gold collected from each region will be set and constant. The King or the faction does not accumulate gold, and we assume expense is zero, but the amount of gold available at each turn (or day in the real sense) increases by a certain percentage for all factions to reflect the 'progress' of time. This system and constraint basically sets up the possibility for a camgaign game and the battles. Example:

England board:

Treasury:
York xxx
Wessex xxx
...
King's chest: xxx

How would this really work: We need three rules to be sorted out AFAICSee. First, we need a bulliten board of some sort (I am not computer or internet savvy so I will need help). It shall contain messages from each
kingdom, as well as the pope's and caliph's daily summary message of important events of his see (religious sense). You are your kingdom's spy so to speak. You shall post first and foremost the gold you receive from every region (this is constant so you just need to post the total for each day and any significant changes), changes in diplomatic relationships, army movement
from region to region, and anything else you feel like. Go Medieval! Example:

France board:

Treasury:
Diplomacy change: -xxx
Total increase per turn by +5%: xxx

Diplomacy:
Pierre of Anjou accepts marriage to England's daughter of Paul of Wessex. Terms:
- 5 year peace between Pierre and Paul
- xxx for bride from Pierre (lol)

I hope you have the general idea. Please post as I take a break to elaborate further. I know it's a long shot. I imagine the rewards would be worth the effort and if we just set up the rules and idea clearly, it could be a source of enjoyment and challange. What happened in reality, I believe can be approximately simulated with this game. I know there are a few people who are trying to create a multiplayer online game, and I hope to hear a response from them.

[Dunc]

I like how they did it with Napoleonic total war. I never played it so I don't know exactly how it worked, but it looked to me like:

-There was a program that did the campaign side of things. Like, kind of a less in-depth campaign map in the normal game. It showed where everyone's armies were and stuff I guess.

-For the battles, there would be like three human players on each side (the Russians and the French).

I'd definitely do something like that for this game.

[Altan Urag]

Yes, well I am trying to think of a way and establish a workable system where ....
Say, if you logged on to the internet and see a full raging campaign game you can join from anywhere from the world. You will be recruited in the faction of your choosing as an upcoming general. (I am trying to simulate reality as I can). But this is will not be within the game but outside. Outside on bulliten boards that will say:

England board:

Upcoming general Dunc promoted to defend York, etc.

The key to multiplayer battles is the money, we know that for sure. So if we set up a constraint on the money for battles depending heavily on the campaign game we can simulate campaign and battles. Of course we will hopefully sign up players who want the experience not just winning. The point is not to conquer all provinces (that's just dreamy and ridiculous) but challange yourself with real nations (who are backed by not AI but real people). And act out your Medieval fantasies!!! Thanks for your reply and please contribute to the discussion.

[Altan Urag]

I will just add that my idea has nothing to do with the game campaign, modding, or mechanics. It's purely imaginary as given by the strategy map on vanilla M2TW, and the battle system. The real action takes place outside the game, on bulliten boards where you see all the information (reported by your spies, we assume in every region). The game is used only when a battle takes place (so we can just use the multiplayer feature as it is). But it's heavily dependant on your campaign strategy.