New Kingdoms Britannia hotseat signup (FULL)

[Myth]

Great! I have some questions:

1. Explain the merchant fort please.
2. Why can't we attack docked ships? They die instantly but that's pretty realistic anyway.
3. Why are the majority of the games use auto-resolved battles instead of fought by the attacker? Seems to me that being able to lead your armies is an advantage that can be sought after and thus making being on the offense a strategical advantage, instead of just skipping your stacks.
4. On the destruction of buildings - so i cannot destroy enemy buildings when I capture a town (fair enough, this made M2:TW way too easy if one went on a loot&pillage rampage across Muslim lands). Can I destroy my own buildings though? As England I start with some hard to control settlements in Ireland. If I decide to let them rebel I'd want to give as little an advantage to the enemy as I can, thus I'd burn down everything that I can.

I believe England is first in the turn order, so I'm waiting for the PM.

[Cecil XIX]

Not sure about the others, but the merchant fort exploit exists when you build a fort over a trading resource. Since you can place up to twenty merchants within a fort at one time, just like a settlement, it allows you to collect roughly twenty times the income you would otherwise. Perhaps merchants in forts are immune to enemy merchants too, I'm not sure.

[Myth]

Oh.. Well that's an obvious exploit and was not intended by the designers of the game, so it is only natural to not do it.

By the way, I've been reading the Britannia game listed as completed - it says England and Ireland are victorious? How is that possible? Trough alliance?

[phonicsmonkey]

Great! I have some questions:

1. Explain the merchant fort please.

As per Cecil.

2. Why can't we attack docked ships? They die instantly but that's pretty realistic anyway.

We decided it's an exploit because the AI never does it. Also because of the weird way you have to do it (by selecting the unit cards rather than the campaign map icon) which suggests it wasn't intended. It's not a game-breaker though so if there's a majority that wanted to drop this rule I'd be ok with it.

3. Why are the majority of the games use auto-resolved battles instead of fought by the attacker? Seems to me that being able to lead your armies is an advantage that can be sought after and thus making being on the offense a strategical advantage, instead of just skipping your stacks.

As a player I prefer hotseats where the battles are fought. However in my experience as an admin it's just too easy for things to descend into interminable arguments about what does and doesn't constitute exploiting the AI. Some people can take out whole stacks with a single unit of cavalry, others can't. Inevitably the latter complain that the former are playing unfairly. AR takes away all of these issues.

4. On the destruction of buildings - so i cannot destroy enemy buildings when I capture a town (fair enough, this made M2:TW way too easy if one went on a loot&pillage rampage across Muslim lands). Can I destroy my own buildings though? As England I start with some hard to control settlements in Ireland. If I decide to let them rebel I'd want to give as little an advantage to the enemy as I can, thus I'd burn down everything that I can.

The intention of the rule is to ban exactly that type of behaviour - the reason is that over a longer time period you find the warzones are literally worthless settlements that have been razed and exterminated beyond recovery. It's hardly worth fighting over. It's also totally unrealistic - the 'buildings' don't really represent single physical entities that can be taken apart and sold, but rather a network of facilities and a general level of technology that can't really be melted down for cash in an instant.

By the way, I've been reading the Britannia game listed as completed - it says England and Ireland are victorious? How is that possible? Through alliance?

Through a last minute alliance where untrustworthy and devious Ireland betrayed his allies the Welsh and Scots and split the isles with the English.

[Myth]

Great! Now that you've explained it I agree to all the rules and they are sensible and will make the game more interesting. One last thing - I understand carried siege weapons (seriously, a ballista bolt knocking down the walls of Caen was one of the most ridiculous things i've seen when playing vs the AI). Can we build rams and towers to attack a besieged settlement on turn 2? I prefer this approach sometimes, as the single turn spent in a siege can be faster than lugging the actual equipment from your homeland.

[phonicsmonkey]

Can we build rams and towers to attack a besieged settlement on turn 2?

Absolutely.

This is the same logic that leads me to never convert castles/cities. That's just a personal rule, though.

I almost never do this in hotseats anyway because the time and expense makes it pointless. The increased income from a city will almost never pay off the cost of converting it and redeveloping it (and most mods increase the cost significantly from vanilla), and if you need a recruitment center it's much easier to go capture one!

[Nightbringer]

I do it a lot in single player so I have a nice border of castles, with mostly cities on the inside.

[Zim]

I almost never do this in hotseats anyway because the time and expense makes it pointless. The increased income from a city will almost never pay off the cost of converting it and redeveloping it (and most mods increase the cost significantly from vanilla), and if you need a recruitment center it's much easier to go capture one!

In longer, slower games you can make quite a bit of profit doing this with certain settlements. Guides for Sicily used to suggest turning Palermo into a city because it ends up being so wealthy (the settlement in Norway is another that makes a ton of money as a developed city, and even a decent amount as a castle).

So there's hardly any ai settlements to speak of in the Britannia campaign. I'm thinking instead of specifically having a rule to use autoresolve against players that we make it part of the settings and actually set the game to autoresolve. The campaign also has no crusades or jihads (although England gets some special events, troops returned from the "crusade") so we porbably don't need to list that rule.

Are we all agreed upon for the rules? I can get the game started up any time.

[phonicsmonkey]

In longer, slower games you can make quite a bit of profit doing this with certain settlements. Guides for Sicily used to suggest turning Palermo into a city because it ends up being so wealthy (the settlement in Norway is another that makes a ton of money as a developed city, and even a decent amount as a castle).

Yes, it can definitely be worth it, it just depends largely on your time horizon and how much it costs to convert vs the incremental increase. I haven't yet been able to work out an appropriate discount rate to model the economy in TW games, but one day I'll do it and you can all have my spreadsheet!

So there's hardly any ai settlements to speak of in the Britannia campaign. I'm thinking instead of specifically having a rule to use autoresolve against players that we make it part of the settings and actually set the game to autoresolve. The campaign also has no crusades or jihads (although England gets some special events, troops returned from the "crusade") so we porbably don't need to list that rule.

Are we all agreed upon for the rules? I can get the game started up any time.

All fine by me mate. If you're looking for name suggestions I thought of either 'This Sceptered Isle' for an epic feel, or for something with more comedy value how about 'Anarchy in the UK'?

[Zim]

Why, back in my day we had names like "Teutonic Hotseat" and "Grand Campaign Hotseat 2". And we walked uphill in the snow to our computers to play our turn...mumble...mumble.

Of those two I'm thinking of going ith the first, although I even more favor my rather optimistic for Norway name of "Viking Invasion 2".

Someday I'm also thinking of naming a hotseat "The Rise of Kings", although considering the goal of most hotseats maybe that last word should be singular.

[Cecil XIX]

We decided it's an exploit because the AI never does it.

This is the same logic that leads me to never convert castles/cities. That's just a personal rule, though.