Contest: Arena of Kings

[Myth]

I tagged you to bring this thread to your attention on behalf of Phonic's post since he couldn't do it. You're an innovator, try thinking of a new idea. The EI one is a fine example.

[Húrin the Steadfast]

Okay but only when i have time. Currently i have exams.

[Nightbringer]

I really like that 100 year war game you came up with @Nigel, and would love to play in that!

Sometihng to that effect is a game I have been wanting to do for a long time. I had thought it would be with the 100 years war mod, but that might be hard to track down now and would eliminate the foreign agents which I really like.

[Myth]

Name: Vikingetid (Age of the Vikings)
Mod: The Last Kingdom
Number of players: 3 or 6 or 9 and so on.
Victory Conditions: Found a new kingdom and become "King of Kings", eliminate all other human players, amass 60,000 gold while nobody else has more than 10,000 or eliminate the enemy human faction and claim allied victory.

Details: The mod in question covers the era of the Dark Ages when Europe was tormented by the raids of the Vikingr - the men of Scandinavia. The Eastern Frankish Empire is a great power on continental Europe, Normandy is a fledgling state with a strong host of determined warriors, and England is divided between it's native Celts and recently settled Anglo-Saxons in what are powerful but separate kingdoms.

The players start with an army of their own choosing, comprised in the battle screen when complying with a set limit of gold. For instance, if we have a 12,000 gold limit, you can go into the custom battle screen and see how many Huscarls you can fit into that budget, or purchase longobwmen, cavalry, or a balanced combination. Money wise the armies will be the same, though the composition will vary as per the player's preference. These units are the player's sworn men, his band of vikings. He is their jarl, and he has full controll over them. Each player gets one ship per four units purchased for free, to make a truly mobile and formidable raiding force.

The players start with different faction allegiance - there are three Scandinavian factions: Hordaland, Vestfold and Denmark. If we have 3 players, each one starts owing allegience to one faction. If we have 6, they will be divided two by two per faction. The actual provinces and armies of the home faction are not to be used, only the band of vikings each player has. The players who start from the same faction are supposedly allied, though this may change as the game progresses. Once everyone has their armies and ships, the game may begin. The other factions are left to the AI. The ways to win are such:

Found a new kingdom and become "King of Kings"

With your band of Vikings, you claim a piece of land far from your homeland shores and carve out a Kingdom via bloody conquest. You dominate the region in such a way that you become a King of Kings there, and all the other landchiefs pay you homage. In game terms, you must own at least 40% of the total regions in either England + Scotland + Ireland OR mainland Europe up until the original Danish border. This way you can win solo without any alliance. Players are not allowed to team up their provinces or gift them for this victory - all regions must be won trough conquest for this victory condition.

Eliminate all other human players

This simply means eliminating all armies and capturing all provinces that belong to other human players. The homeland regions do not count towards this as they do not belong to the players per say. There will be a 5 turn forced non aggression pact between players at the start, to prevent a massacre for those who start later in the turn order. Once everyone's moved out and started on their path, player versus player aggression is allowed.


Amass 60,000 gold while nobody else has more than 10,000

Simply put, when you have 60,000 gold you can claim economic victory. Your kingdom is so prosperous it becomes impossible for your neighbours to compete. Once you make the claim, the admin will check if anyone of the remaining human players has more than 10,000 gold. If not, you win. If they do have more, you are told who these factions are (but not how much gold they have). A thing to note is that if you save up your gold from raids you can amass it quite easily. Though getting this much will mean you are either impossibly efficient or you started conquering and keeping your lands.

Eliminate the enemy human factions and claim allied victory.

Similar to rule two, but this one is for an allied victory and has no territorial requirements. You must simply remove the two other viking factions from the map to become the sole harrier of Europe's shores to win. Naturally, you and your allied Jarl need to wipe out the enemy teams, but more importantly, you must also conquer their homeland regions. The problem with that, is that each homeland region will be garrisoned with elite stacks created by the admin, that cannot move past the faction's borders. Invading the enemy homeland region means you have to face that stack, which the other human team will be allowed to control as a "police" unit within he borders. These stacks will be several times better than the starting player armies, so beating them will take teamwork and also off-sea conquests to improve your own armies or to amass more of the lesser units.

During your conquests, you will be allowed the following interaction with your homeland regions:

- Retraining of units (at your own expense)
- Building of buildings (this is to allow you to retrain higher tier armies or to gain smithy upgrades, also at your own expense)
- Building of forts and watchtowers (at your own expense)

You will NOT be allowed to recruit new units or ships, or move the starting "police" stack outside the borders of your faction. You may not use any of the gold that the starting towns generate in any way. You may not conquer any territories in Scandinavia unless those belong to an opposing human faction.

If you conquer any settlements in Egnland or Europe, you may keep them and develop them as you wish. Your starting stack is free from upkeep. Any gold you make via sacking (this mod gives extra gold simply for conquering a province, in addition to the sacking option. This is a lot - 5-15 thousand per city), or via keeping a settlement, is your own and you may use it as you see fit. The finances will be kept by the administrator, so in-game gold will not be used. You will report your income per turn and all the actions you wish to do which take gold, such as building, recruiting or retraining.

Things to note: There is an AI faction called simply "Vikings" which is not player-lead. It is heavily scripted, similar to the rebels in M2W. It spawns huge stacks out of thin air and constantly raids territories which you as players will also need in order to win. Getting around them is up to each player's discretion. The Admin will not control any AI forces. Ships grant a huge movement point increase compared to walking. Archers in the game are currently too powerful because of the way the defence stat works (to make battles longer). There may be an imposed limit on archer spam.

The actual numbers for the rules are open to tweaking.

Rules: As per CoG! but Crusades and Jihads are banned. So yes, this is a lead battles game.

[Cecil XIX]

Well, there go my hopes of winning.

[Myth]

Reminder: Tomorrow is the last date you may enter submissions! Good luck to all!

[Nightbringer]

I love both the 100 years war and the vikingetid, and would jump on any opportunity to play either of those games.