KotR cataclysmic event discussion thread

[Stig]

I don't agree to this:

econ21 and TinCow are authorised to engineer a cataclysmic event during the 20 turns after the coming Diet. This may involve temporarily abandoning some parts of the Charter - for example, Emergency Diets may not be able to immediately undo what they are engineering - and implementing things in game that the Chancellor in character has not authorised.

I think we together should agree on what we want to happen and Lothar as Chancellor lets that happen. This should ofcourse be within the thinking world of Lothar (less Outremer is one of them). And at some point Lothar gets impeached.
I am against giving one player all control over the game to turn it into something that is as bad as possible, we together should agree on this, not just one player (or 2 for what it's worth).

[TinCow]

My goal would not be to simply wreck everything, but to create a real storyline IC that ends by creating new and interesting challenges for future years. I would not intentionally get any avatar killed, but the world will certainly become far more hostile than it is now. People who insist on fighting every enemy head-on instead of making strategic withdrawals will be risking their own lives. That will be their choice to make, though. Furthermore, no House (or Outremer) will be prejudiced in the process. All will suffer equally.

The end state will be much weaker than it is now with our enemies much stronger. Many difficult decisions will have to be made in the Diet about how to rebuild and regain what was lost.

I am against giving one player all control over the game to turn it into something that is as bad as possible, we together should agree on this, not just one player (or 2 for what it's worth).

This thread is to make sure we're all in agreement beforehand. We're not going to do this unless people want it. As for requiring group consent before acting, that's fine but you'll have to find someone else to do it. I have ideas about how to implement this in-game as well as plotlines and stories to justify it IC. That said, it will be very, very complex to implement and doing it my way will take forever if I have to check with other people before acting. Furthermore, it will ruin the surprise. Part of the point is to inject some excitement into the game and the 'plot' of the event will be spoiled if I have to get approval for everything.

For example, if I decide I want Swabian city X to revolt, I will probably have to disband some of the garrison, raise the taxes, and move the capital to Outremer for a couple turns. For the purpose of the 'event' none of that would have occurred. IC, the only thing that would have happened would have been that Swabian city X revolted for the reason I give IC. You will simply have to ignore whatever OOC actions I am taking and concentrate on the storyline that I put over it. The results are the important part, not the in-game methods I use to achieve them.

If you are concerned about my ability to successfully implement this in-game, ask econ21 about what I did with Appolonia in WOTS. I assure you that I can get it done in a logical manner without simply wrecking the Empire. I would also provide several stories to advance the 'event' plotline so that there is background info on why and how these things are happening.

Maybe we could use the hotseat program to help the other computer factions to build powerful armies, and use those armies to assult the HRE, or something along the lines of that.

Can this be enabled on the savegame without any problems? If I could control everything the AI factions do for 10 turns, I could do wondrous things with the game.

[Ferret]

I am definately for the 'disaster' in that case, but I think it would be good if it only afected mainland Europe and not Outremer so that when the people over here hear about it we can sail some men back to help cope with the 'disaster'. Btw how would a civil war work becuase that could also be very interesting

[Tamur]

I don't think we have an IC rationale for a civil war quite right now, and I don't think that's what is planned. However, we did that at the end of WotS and it was tremendous fun. Basically two sides arose, one loyal to the Senate (sort of), the other loyal to the Consul that Lucjan was playing at the time. econ21 GM's battles between the two sides via PMs, images, and "real" board battle mechanics. In all my years of TW, that was without doubt the most memorable series of battles ever.

But again, not sure we should go that route here. There are plenty of external forces that can be brought in.

[gibsonsg91921]

I got something up my sleeve...

[Stig]

Can this be enabled on the savegame without any problems? If I could control everything the AI factions do for 10 turns, I could do wondrous things with the game.

No

Going the read what's left of your post now

[GeneralHankerchief]

Having PBM'd with these two loonies for well over a year now (wow! Has is been that long since WotS started) I trust their judgement completely. econ, TinCow: Act like a two-year-old playing with toys.

[Stig]

As to city revolts, I think they most be done realistically, not artifically (no moving capital). There are enough cities that can easely rebel (Hamburg, Stettin, Marseille, Milan, Bologna, Venice, Budapest, etc etc).

Also I think we shouldn't disband too many armies. Electors should get their own little armies with which they decide to protect something they call theirs (read further down). Armies should simply be split up.


Steps I would take:
1320: Massive rebellion in the Reichs Armies, some cities lose garrisons, other get disbanded. Only the crack troops of the HA stay loyal to us, and only those Armies with commanders with authority and a great name (think of Hans or Arnold, or even Ansehelm (he conquered Moscow)) remain fully intact. FH, or someone else, will give out a little mod that TinCow will use for 2 turns. This will make sure many more rebel armies spawn (this can be easely done by changing a number).
1322: The rebellions continue and the Diet begins to talk. Because we foolishly agreed on an CA we cannot impeach Lothar, but we do call on a Emergency Session at the end of this year (more a less official one) in which 2 main sides (I already see people as Lothar, Ansehelm, Helmut and some others grouping together, as they share similiar views) form and argue with eachother, this only results in more chaos. We decide to be ruthless to the normal people the plebs, which results in even more chaos and rebellion.
1324: The Chancellor loses control of the armies (well IC he does, OOC he doesn't). Noblemen start to use their army for what they think works best, Dieter Bresch for example could start attacking the Turks (as he wanted to) against the Charter.
1326: Things keep going worse and worse more cities rebel (hopefully) and quickly armies are formed from those armies that are still left. The Kaiser is still in Byzantium, because his wife doesn't want him to go back, and because the road is blocked by Hungarians. The armies proof not-capable of defending the Reichs borders and those electors that are still of reason decide to retreat to a Heartland Reich (hopefully 5 cities close to eachother won't rebel) and defend that. While others have small armies or loose bands and they wander around a city they claimed as theirs.
1328: It continues electors keep arguing and nothing gets done without proper leadership. Some advocate a independence of the Outremer as a Crusader State, some want to give it up as they don't like it. Others want to go out to fight and others want to keep what they have now. At the end of the year Kaiser Siegfried returns to Rome ... or Frankfurt, or whatever, and he imprisons Lothar claiming he is responsible for all this (Lothar gets released for lack of evidence later on) and he tries to bring some order back into the Reich by starting recruiting armies again.

[gibsonsg91921]

yeah, but ur missing something...

[econ21]

What is basically being proposed here is that TinCow act as a Games Master, kind of like a Dungeon Master for those of you familiar with Dungeons and Dragons. He will use the console and various in-game manipulations to mix things up. I will help with the lead up and act as an agency of restraint in case things get too hairy for people.

The Apollonia event in Will of the Senate that TC referred to was an instance of this kind of thing. We had passed a controversial law mandating an expedition from Italy to Apollonia, a city controlled by Greece. TC was the Consul (read Chancellor) and was opposed to the expedition for in character reasons, so he decided to obey the will of the Senate to the letter only. He despatched a very modest expedition which my avatar commanded. Initially, we thought it would be like marching into the lions' den, as the Greeks had multiple stacks wandering around. Unfortunately, RTWs strategic AI being what it was, it was more like marching into a lions' den where the lions are all tame, well fed and very sleepy. So what TC did was use the console to manipulate a large Greek army into attacking my modest garrison, giving me the fight of a lifetime.

The cool thing about this episode is that I believe no one apart from TC and I knew what he had done to manipulate the game to provide the challenge. We built the tension up around the episode, with TC as Consul organising a relief army to rescue the Apollonia garrions. It was a sort of Gordon of Khartoum episode and one of the more dramatic parts of the PBM. This is the battle report of the final battle of the expedition:

https://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showp...2&postcount=11

Here, because we are proposing something of much wider significance in the game, we can't manipulate the game without you knowing. But we are asking that you allow us to take care of the details. We can use this thread to discuss possibilities, suggest ideas etc. We will listen and ideally steal the best ideas, but won't publicly commit to a specific plan. On Friday, I will ask you to vote yes or no to something like the proposal in my first post - essentially trust Tincow to sort out the details.

Don't feel compelled to vote yes just because you think other people want this. If you would rather stick with the rules we have been playing under, that is fair enough. It's just that now seems a good time to mix things up and TinCow is well positioned to do that for us.