Successor game rules, draft one.

[econ21]

I guess I'm a little confused. Given that the Chancellor is the guy who can recruit soldiers (true in KOTR and LOTR, although the former didn't have a regular civil war system) it makes sense that getting him to recruit troops for you before declaring war is a good idea.

If after the war the winner succeeded because he managed to ensure he had more troops at the outset...well, that also makes sense to me.

It makes sense from the point of view of rational player behaviour given our rules. I am just questioning whether the game played by those rules is the most fun. "Get a Chancellor elected; recruit; win civil war" sounds a less interesting game than "Get a lot of powerful players on your side; win civil war." But that's just my opinion.

One thing I would like to explore is what we want the PvP system to be for. What kinds of conflicts do we want to lead to PvP action? Then we can review what rules would make them play out the best. Perhaps we could brainstorm on that question and see where it leaves?

Let's start with a few possibilities:

EDIT: 0. War of secession: one party wages war to break away from the faction. This is very historical, but does not really fit M2TW. We don't have a good way to split up the finances etc of a single faction. So I think we should allow this only if it marks the end of the game, ie is of the next type...

1. Terminal civil war: a climactic struggle to end the game, leaving one side utterly victorious and the other dead or exiled. This is the WotS and KotR civil war. Given that such a conflict will be a one off, I think we don't need to worry too much about it - we could improvise as we have done and it would be pretty ok.

2. A grab for power: maybe to depose a King? or a Chancellor? The difference from the terminal war is that it is expected that the game continue after the war is won. In this case, we might want to work out clear rules as it will happen several times. Also, we might want to consider safeguards so that the losers are willing to play on. Perhaps limits on the fate of their avatars or their lands?

3. A war of principle: to me this would be the most fun kind of war to play, where there is a cause beyond self-advancement. An example might be the American Civil War. I am not sure what the principle might be with us - republicanism is what we fixed on in WotS and KotR, but religion and foreign entanglements were also themes. Functionally, this kind of war would look rather like the grab for power. But it would be different in that the "coup" type mechanics we currently have don't feel very right for it. The war of principle should depend more on the allegiances of the many - hence the loyalty test mechanic etc.

4. A war between Duchies: one or more Duchies wanting to weaken a rival Duchy, by taking their land. This might lead to a lot of neutrals or interesting "semi-neutrals. Personally, I am leery about allowing this kind of war. It seems both too big and too messy. I'd rather a civil war was national or limited wtihin a Duchy. Otherwise, we could end up playing 4 or more factions rather than one, and M2TW is just not set up for such decentralisation.

5. A grab for power within a Duchy: this would be like the Swabian Civil war, where different players fight to be Duke. This might lead to some interesting meddling from outside, like Lothar helping the Swabian rebels. But there might have to be some constraints if we are ruling out wars between Duchies - like no noble from another House can fight.

6. An attempt to break away from a Duchy: like Becker in KotR. Again, this seems interesting but perhaps hard to balance.

7. A war between minor nobles. Personally, I would not want to see this - too much effort OOC for too little gain IC.


Anyone have anything to add to this list?

If we identify what kind of wars we want, we can choose rulesets to deal with them.

For example, my preference would be to have one set of rules for "real" civil wars of type 1-3; rules to deal with intra-Duchy conflicts of type 5-6; and not allow 0, 4 or 7.

With real civil wars, we might consider:
(a) there can only be two sides: you are with us or against us. A three or more sided war would just be complicated and ahistorical. This would imply the war would have to be resolved before any other civil wars and indeed intra-Duchy fights.
(b) the Chancellor should not be the only player recruiting units: it just feels utterly wrong. In the ACW, only Washington DC could recruit units...; or worse, IMO, no one could recruit units.
(c) strategic movement could be of the first type TC listed - using in-game restrictions on movement. The war is big enough and important enough that we can take our time.

With intra-Duchy civil wars, we could consider:
(a) there could be multiple conflicts coexisting and inter-mingling: neutrality would make more sense than in a real civil war, where soldiers would probably end up taking sides.
(b) again, the Chancellor recruiting all units does not feel right to me: we could introduce rules to allow local recruitment based on lands and perhaps mercs.
(c) given that these wars are more local, I still think strategic movement of the first type TC listed would be fine. The distances woudl presumably be short, so there would be less risk of a war of words.

Any thoughts? I think if we clarify what we want to simulate, we will be able to identify suitable rules. I am not terribly sympathetic to the KISS argument here, as I think at the moment it's not a question of rule complexity but us not having any rules to cover some of the issues.

[GeneralHankerchief]

I'm not really sure we need to limit PvP here. Eventually, the concept becomes pretty self-policing. LotR, while an extraordinarily lethal game, was especially so when it came to matters of PvP. As a matter of fact, the climatic Battle of Antioch actually stands out in my mind because, if memory serves, every general was actually able to come out alive, and this was only because the dice were exceptionally kind.

If you get into PvP, avatars *will* die, that's a fact of life. I think that concept alone will prevent people from engaging in a war just because they feel like it and compel them to work in more subtle channels to get what they want.

[Cecil XIX]

An interesting categorization of possibilities econ. I actually like the idea of having seperate rule sets for different kinds of conflict, since you'd only have to consider one set of rules at the time it'd still allow us to keep things simple.

Since PVP is the one major issue we have left to resolve, perhaps it should have it's own thread?

[econ21]

Since PVP is the one major issue we have left to resolve, perhaps it should have it's own thread?

I was thinking about that. When I get a little more feedback, I may try to draft some possible PvP rules that put a little more structure on what we have.

On non-PvP matters, re-reading the rules, I had the following comments/queries/suggestions:


1. (f) The Games master insert ”Can use the console to add money or units to AI factions and to move AI stacks.”

2 a. Starting Houses I think we have three, not two, starting RBGs - see the Frenchifying thread. Can we introduce some concept of Duke as Steward so these initial Dukes are replaced when the King’s sons come of age? Should we ban adoptions until the King has a fourth child?

2 b RBGs: what does it mean about an RBG marrying a King’s daughter being free to “attempt to create his own House”. What is involved in the attempt? Is it just 2c getting a 2/3 majority edict to be a Duke? Is so, why mention the marriage, as all can become Dukes by 2c? Maybe it is better to drop this bit about marriage and instead talk about the missing 4th line on the family tree - it could be filled by a son or a daughter. Anyone marrying said The 4th son or anyone marrying the daughter would automatically become head of the 4th House.

3a Gaining and losing provinces what’s the point of “While a province is not ratified taxes must be set to the highest level possible and no recruitment can be made in that settlement.” Is it to put a break on expansion? Otherwise, it is simpler to say that before the full session, the province is royal and can be taxed/recruit freely. After the full session, if not ratified, you have said it must be abandoned - which means no recruitment (and max taxes if you like).

3 c retinue: why allow people to remove retinue? are we condoning killing mother in laws here? It seems to lose some RPG character if we allow that. Your character has ornate armour, live with it. What is the meaning of the “title” retinues?

Prioritising units: what is to say these units become owned by the player who prioritised them? Suppose player X has Toulouse, the only castle we have. All units in Toulouse are garrisons by definition and so may not be taken by lieges. Should we say explicitly these units belong to the player prioritising them and should be moved by his instruction? And are exempt from seizure even if led by captains?

Seizing armies: perhaps clarify that you can’t seize armies outside of your feudal chain?

Can we “protect” some national armies from seizure or must they always be led in person? What I am thinking of is suppose the King or Chancellor or Prince want to stay at home, for whatever reason, but get a noble to lead “their army”. Can we allow for that somehow? Allow these figures - only - to “lend” their armies to another noble without surrendering ownership? It will require some book keeping I know.

On a related point, I am not seeing any power of the Chancellor to move armies led by nobles. So if he wants anything reliably doing, he must do it himself? This is rather stifling if he is relatively minor and does not have much of a personal army (he must recruit all prioritised units before he can get more men for himself).

fleets what about fleets that don’t start their turn in a port or with a noble? do you mean they are owned by the person owning the last port they were in? I am wondering whether they should owned by Houses, to simplify matters.

[Ibn-Khaldun]

I can say my opinion about that retinue matter..

If you start roleplaying a pious character and all of the sudden you receive a pagan magician then I guess you really want him to be removed because this would affect your RP. The game shouldn't control our RP that way.

Edit: I'll get back to other points soon..

Seizing armies: 5(b) "A Noble may not move his avatar onto an army owned by a Noble from outside his feudal chain unless both Nobles agree to the move beforehand."

I do like the option of seizing Captain led armies though.

fleets: fleets that do not start a turn in a port or with a noble are there for chancellor to move around.

[econ21]

If you start roleplaying a pious character and all of the sudden you receive a pagan magician then I guess you really want him to be removed because this would affect your RP. The game shouldn't control our RP that way.

Well, I can you see your point but personally I like trying using the traits and retinue as some of the fixed points that you have to RP around - kind of like an actor being given a script. Your example puts me in mind of TCs first character in KotR who was a lecherous sob (Lothar mkI) who then got a holy woman character as a retinue - he then had an epiphany and became a holy warrior. He was one of the most memorable characters in the game because he got an "odd" retinue. Also, I had great fun with my King Henry getting a pagan magician - Overknight ended up sticking him (in the leg).

But I guess we can keep our retinue if we choose, so allowing others to dispose of them is ok.

[ULC]

I was thinking about that. When I get a little more feedback, I may try to draft some possible PvP rules that put a little more structure on what we have.

On non-PvP matters, re-reading the rules, I had the following comments/queries/suggestions:

You have a strangely high amount of questions - next time, don't disappear

1. (f) The Games master insert ”Can use the console to add money or units to AI factions and to move AI stacks.”

As Gamemaster, I thought this was a given?

2 a. Starting Houses I think we have three, not two, starting RBGs - see the Frenchifying thread. Can we introduce some concept of Duke as Steward so these initial Dukes are replaced when the King’s sons come of age? Should we ban adoptions until the King has a fourth child?

The King has 4 children - one son and daughter of age, and two sons coming of age. I think that immediately replacing each Duke once a son of the King comes to age simply does not make sense - the House does not belong to them, it belongs to the RBG Duke. They may inherit it, but that is all. One Royal House, led by the Prince, is more then enough.

2 b RBGs: what does it mean about an RBG marrying a King’s daughter being free to “attempt to create his own House”. What is involved in the attempt? Is it just 2c getting a 2/3 majority edict to be a Duke? Is so, why mention the marriage, as all can become Dukes by 2c? Maybe it is better to drop this bit about marriage and instead talk about the missing 4th line on the family tree - it could be filled by a son or a daughter. Anyone marrying said The 4th son or anyone marrying the daughter would automatically become head of the 4th House.

Marrying the Princess simple gets you a free ticket for a House, bypassing the 2/3rds requirement otherwise needed.

3a Gaining and losing provinces what’s the point of “While a province is not ratified taxes must be set to the highest level possible and no recruitment can be made in that settlement.” Is it to put a break on expansion? Otherwise, it is simpler to say that before the full session, the province is royal and can be taxed/recruit freely. After the full session, if not ratified, you have said it must be abandoned - which means no recruitment (and max taxes if you like).

To limit expansion, without being forced to give it up, which leaves it in the players hands. This allows player freedom at the cost of becoming bogged down y their own success, most likely doing more harm then good.

3 c retinue: why allow people to remove retinue? are we condoning killing mother in laws here? It seems to lose some RPG character if we allow that. Your character has ornate armour, live with it. What is the meaning of the “title” retinues?

If I have Ornate Armor, I'm not going to ride with into battle. I would also not wear ornate armor period, if it went against my characters type which has already been established. Title Retinues are provincial titles that came with SS4.1, and were vastly annoying to keep track of.

Prioritising units: what is to say these units become owned by the player who prioritised them? Suppose player X has Toulouse, the only castle we have. All units in Toulouse are garrisons by definition and so may not be taken by lieges. Should we say explicitly these units belong to the player prioritising them and should be moved by his instruction? And are exempt from seizure even if led by captains?

Units are owned by whomever controls them - so if they are in a players stack, or settlement, or fort, then they belong to him. Prioritization has nothing to do with whom controls the units, it is simply players asking for units to be train at X location - for instance, player A could use his unit prioritizations in city B, which belongs to player C. The Units, once trained, belong to player C, not A.

Seizing armies: perhaps clarify that you can’t seize armies outside of your feudal chain?

Can we “protect” some national armies from seizure or must they always be led in person? What I am thinking of is suppose the King or Chancellor or Prince want to stay at home, for whatever reason, but get a noble to lead “their army”. Can we allow for that somehow? Allow these figures - only - to “lend” their armies to another noble without surrendering ownership? It will require some book keeping I know.

On a related point, I am not seeing any power of the Chancellor to move armies led by nobles. So if he wants anything reliably doing, he must do it himself? This is rather stifling if he is relatively minor and does not have much of a personal army (he must recruit all prioritised units before he can get more men for himself).

fleets what about fleets that don’t start their turn in a port or with a noble? do you mean they are owned by the person owning the last port they were in? I am wondering whether they should owned by Houses, to simplify matters.

You are allowed to seize armies led by another noble of lower rank then you inside your feudal chain, and avatarless stacks as well. The King, Chancellor, or Prince must find someone they trust to lead said army, otherwise it becomes fair game. That is the only way to protect your soldiers and fleets from being taken.

The Chancellor cannot get what he wants done, then he must deal with it - you can have an ineffectual Chancellor afterall. We are already giving the Chancellor position significant power, he does not need to suddenly take control of someones army unless explicitly allowed to.

Fleets belong to the owner of the port they are in, until they are moved out, at which point they are now the Chancellors. If at anytime an avatar would to be onboard, that avatar controls those ships instead.

[Zim]

YLC actually has everything pretty much as my answers, with just a few small differences.

I was thinking about that. When I get a little more feedback, I may try to draft some possible PvP rules that put a little more structure on what we have.

On non-PvP matters, re-reading the rules, I had the following comments/queries/suggestions:


1. (f) The Games master insert ”Can use the console to add money or units to AI factions and to move AI stacks.”

To be honest I kind of thought of that as a given, but I can add it to the rules.

2 a. Starting Houses I think we have three, not two, starting RBGs - see the Frenchifying thread. Can we introduce some concept of Duke as Steward so these initial Dukes are replaced when the King’s sons come of age? Should we ban adoptions until the King has a fourth child?

Starting RGB Dukes (2 or however many we need to get 4 houses) are real dukes and exempt from any of the special rules regarding joining the House of any adopted parents. Adding stewards as in KOTR is easy enough but I didn't see any reason to...having all four Houses going to the King's first 4 male children doesn't sit well with me.

2 b RBGs: what does it mean about an RBG marrying a King’s daughter being free to “attempt to create his own House”. What is involved in the attempt? Is it just 2c getting a 2/3 majority edict to be a Duke? Is so, why mention the marriage, as all can become Dukes by 2c? Maybe it is better to drop this bit about marriage and instead talk about the missing 4th line on the family tree - it could be filled by a son or a daughter. Anyone marrying said The 4th son or anyone marrying the daughter would automatically become head of the 4th House.

That part is pretty confusing, and likely didn't need put in the rules. I just meant that if you marry into the royal family in such a way you're exempt of the requirement to join your new parent's house, so you've started a new line of sorts that hasn't been placed by default into the House structure. It probably didn't need to be added since King's aren't member's of a House any way so becoming one's son-in-law wouldn't force you into one.

3a Gaining and losing provinces what’s the point of “While a province is not ratified taxes must be set to the highest level possible and no recruitment can be made in that settlement.” Is it to put a break on expansion? Otherwise, it is simpler to say that before the full session, the province is royal and can be taxed/recruit freely. After the full session, if not ratified, you have said it must be abandoned - which means no recruitment (and max taxes if you like).

Mostly I wanted to make it tough on a player who decided to go along with the option to refuse to hand over a settlement. Until things are resolved and the settlement ratified he gets no use out of it. Otherwise a friendly Chancellor could just treat it as if it belonged to the squatter.

3 c retinue: why allow people to remove retinue? are we condoning killing mother in laws here? It seems to lose some RPG character if we allow that. Your character has ornate armour, live with it. What is the meaning of the “title” retinues?

Title revenues were some from the mod we used for SS. The purpose of being able to move retinues was to allow avatars to make gifts of say a crusader relic or fine sword, and to allow the removal of pagan magicians, which were a huge pain in LOTR, at least in the early days.

One player (Tristan) rolled with it but most found them an annoyance and out of character. And they threatened to drop players out of the crusader House in LOTR as there was a minimum piety requirement.

Prioritising units: what is to say these units become owned by the player who prioritised them? Suppose player X has Toulouse, the only castle we have. All units in Toulouse are garrisons by definition and so may not be taken by lieges. Should we say explicitly these units belong to the player prioritising them and should be moved by his instruction? And are exempt from seizure even if led by captains?

Players can only recruit prioritized units from their own settlements. If they have no castles, then they have no castle units unless they make an agreement with some other House.

They're only immune to seizure if in a settlement owned by the player or led by him or an ally.

That was one thing that worked very well in LOTR with no problems that I recall...

Seizing armies: perhaps clarify that you can’t seize armies outside of your feudal chain?

Can we “protect” some national armies from seizure or must they always be led in person? What I am thinking of is suppose the King or Chancellor or Prince want to stay at home, for whatever reason, but get a noble to lead “their army”. Can we allow for that somehow? Allow these figures - only - to “lend” their armies to another noble without surrendering ownership? It will require some book keeping I know.

If armies are sent led by captain they can be seized by any noble. That's a risk players need to consider (as is the fact the Chancellor has to move them for you).

On a related point, I am not seeing any power of the Chancellor to move armies led by nobles. So if he wants anything reliably doing, he must do it himself? This is rather stifling if he is relatively minor and does not have much of a personal army (he must recruit all prioritised units before he can get more men for himself).

He has command of all captain led stacks. If people are seizing them he has to figure something out, but in LOTR this was never a huge issue. Nobles move their own armies.

fleets what about fleets that don’t start their turn in a port or with a noble? do you mean they are owned by the person owning the last port they were in? I am wondering whether they should owned by Houses, to simplify matters.

Fleets outside of port with no noble leading them can be moved or disbanded at the will of the Chancellor, as in LOTR... We can make them House (or King) owned, but that will remove some of the Chancellor's power to manage the affairs of the Kingdom, while adding comparatively little to the game, in my opinion.

[econ21]

On the king's four bloodlines automatically becoming Dukes, the key point is that this will lead to the four starter Houses being visible as the four branches of the family tree. I think that is really neat. It will also encourage more "familial" role-playing if Houses each have a core group sof blood relations (I am thinking here of the von Kastiliens, the Steffens). With Houses led by starter RBGs, there will be no inheritance by blood unless RBGs marry into the King's family tree. Duchies will just be political collections of players rather than family-based groupings - that may be what people want but I prefer the more organic KotR model. There will be enough starting RBGs that the "political collection" feature of Houses will still be there.

A Steward Duke mechanic would tide us over nicely until the four branches are established on the map. It is not complex and worked pretty well in KotR.

EDIT: On another matter, what are the rules about converting cities to castles and vice versa? Owner's discretion?

[Zim]

I'm not too worried about having stewards making the rules too complex but am not sure doing so will add much. Several players will end up playing in an almost Duke sort of position for a lengthy amount of time while the King's young children come of age. I suppose it looks neat and orderly on the family tree page, but it rubs me the wrong way to have all four Houses run by the King's children. It seems at odds with the decentralized feudal feel I believe we're going for. Never mind that since Dukes can name anyone they want their heir the neat 4 branched tree could break down.

I suppose the fact that I played an RGB for the majority of my time in KOTR and didn't pay much attention to the family tree in LOTR (beyond the immediate Imperial family) colors my perspective...

All in all I think it's a fairly minor point so I'll make the change if most players prefer it.

As far as changing castles to cities and the reverse, I think that would fall under the rules for players setting the build queue for their settlement. It did happen once or twice in LOTR but wasn't much of an issue. All Houses were able to obtain at least one castle early on.

[TinCow]

I'm not really sure we need to limit PvP here. Eventually, the concept becomes pretty self-policing. LotR, while an extraordinarily lethal game, was especially so when it came to matters of PvP. As a matter of fact, the climatic Battle of Antioch actually stands out in my mind because, if memory serves, every general was actually able to come out alive, and this was only because the dice were exceptionally kind.

If you get into PvP, avatars *will* die, that's a fact of life. I think that concept alone will prevent people from engaging in a war just because they feel like it and compel them to work in more subtle channels to get what they want.

I completely agree. LotR had total freedom on PvP, and people were still very wary of engaging in it. I think there's too much thought going into when and why it should occur. Just let it occur as it will, the risks involved themselves are enough to keep it from getting out of hand. Most players are not interested in upsetting the system in this manner, which results in a powerful collective security system where aggressors quickly find themselves opposed by a large number of people. PvP is thus more of a risk for the attacker, not the defender. Let those who want to take the risk do so when they feel like it. It's mainly their own necks on the line and it makes the game more interesting for everyone.