TWS2 RPG Discussion Thread

[Zim]

Should the penalty scale up with the level of censure?

Speaking of the nefarious Chosomonkey and his ideas, I forgot about another he mentioned that might give another thing for influence to apply to. That is choosing techs whenever we finish one. I like this idea, especially as many of the techs seem to be faction-wide cultural trends rather than something that only a single member of the faction would decide (for instance, I don't see the Daimyo or CoD getting up and saying "Our clan should work on their Chi"). Maybe a short (24 hours?) voting period when it comes up. After the first few are done it should come up infrequently enough not to slow the game.

[phonicsmonkey]

yeah! I like that idea, who came up with it? ()

yes I think the penalty should scale for a failed censure. trying to get someone stripped of their titles and finding that no-one supports you would result in quite the loss of face.

also we should have a 'double jeopardy' rule to prevent spamming censures for the same offence.

AND I notice that in your rules censure is not restricted to when an offence has been committed. perhaps we should make that restriction, to tie the censure directly to disobedience, which will cut out spurious, politically motivated censures?

[Kogitsune]

not sure about the number of prospect participants, but if there are a lot, might want to consider to make the commisioners non-avatar players?

[TheLastDays]

Nice rules so far, good job, Zim.

Maybe the penalty for a failed censure should be the same influence penalty they wanted to infrict on their "target" just without the imprisonment or title stripping. WOuld keep things simple.

Also, I still like the idea of every player controlling a part of the clan's Samurai "pool" sending to or keeping them from war when they see fit. That, in and of itself, would limit the Daimyo in how much he can go against the counsel of his subordinates.

Also I think maybe commissions should only be there for actual ingame generals... as long as we don't have enough general characters to fill them.

[phonicsmonkey]

Also, I still like the idea of every player controlling a part of the clan's Samurai "pool" sending to or keeping them from war when they see fit. That, in and of itself, would limit the Daimyo in how much he can go against the counsel of his subordinates.

Yeah I'm warming to this idea too provided we can implement it simply. Maybe we can tie the amount of the Samurai pool controlled to the influence level, making influence even more important? Apologies if that was already suggested...

[Zim]

Ok, so to make a list of things to add:
-Penalty for failed Censures (maybe influence penalty. Also making people immune to censures for a good number of turns after a failed one might lower censure spam)
-Write up some civil war rules
-Assuming no objections add in a way to vote on new techs to research as we finish the old.
-Funding agent missions: So far I like the idea that the agents can do whatever and the commissioners are left being annoyed at them if they overspend.
-Samurai (or monks in the head monk's case)...limit by rank or influence? Note this will add complexity. I think we can avoid making the economic side confusing but there will still be more work for the commissioners of warfare and supply. We'll need to keep track of who owns which samurai units and in what numbers and decide how we figure out who a newly recruited one "belongs" to (warfare commissioner makes the suggestion? Supply decides when he recruits?).

[Nigel]

-Write up some civil war rules

Here are some thoughts about this:

Any player who is unhappy with the daimyo’s rule can become disobedient.
He would then receive a censure which he can accept and carry out – and that’s it.
Or he can choose not to accept it and turn to open rebellion = become a Rebel/Ronin.

The Daimyo can then order his loyal followers to hunt down the Rebel. The Rebel can try to persuade other players to join the rebellion.

Hunting down and apprehending a player would be done by bringing your in-game character into proximity (Area of Effect) of your target and use the following rules:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

A Metsuke can be apprehended by another Metsuke, a General, a Captain or a Ninja of higher rank.
A Ninja can only be apprehended by a Metsuke of higher rank or another Ninja of higher rank.
A Monk can be apprehended by anyone, but the permission of the Head Monk is required for the arrest.
A Captain can only be apprehended by a General (without battle) or another Captain (with battle).
A General can only be apprehended by another General or Captain (both with battle)

For battles between Rebel and Loyalist armies, we could either play them online in Multiplayer or offline setting up an AI vs. AI custom battle.

[TheLastDays]

Yeah I'm warming to this idea too provided we can implement it simply. Maybe we can tie the amount of the Samurai pool controlled to the influence level, making influence even more important? Apologies if that was already suggested...

I think that was the idea, yes. Maybe something like 2 samurai units per influence point? Or even only 1. It all depends on how much we want to limit our clan's Samurai pool in general and how much power influence actually brings. I like the idea of having to rely on Ashigaru as well throughout the campaign, it's a shame we can't impose it on the AI as well.

[phonicsmonkey]

Here are some thoughts about this:

Any player who is unhappy with the daimyo’s rule can become disobedient.
He would then receive a censure which he can accept and carry out – and that’s it.
Or he can choose not to accept it and turn to open rebellion = become a Rebel/Ronin.

The Daimyo can then order his loyal followers to hunt down the Rebel. The Rebel can try to persuade other players to join the rebellion.

Hunting down and apprehending a player would be done by bringing your in-game character into proximity (Area of Effect) of your target and use the following rules:

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

A Metsuke can be apprehended by another Metsuke, a General, a Captain or a Ninja of higher rank.
A Ninja can only be apprehended by a Metsuke of higher rank or another Ninja of higher rank.
A Monk can be apprehended by anyone, but the permission of the Head Monk is required for the arrest.
A Captain can only be apprehended by a General (without battle) or another Captain (with battle).
A General can only be apprehended by another General or Captain (both with battle)

For battles between Rebel and Loyalist armies, we could either play them online in Multiplayer or offline setting up an AI vs. AI custom battle.

So far with censure we have something like this:
- someone disobeys an order from their direct commander
- the commander has a chance to censure or let it slide
- if he chooses to censure, he picks a level and everyone votes on it
- if the vote is passed, the penalty is applied automatically
- if it fails, the commander receives an influence penalty and the disobedient character is immune to any further censures for the same offence

So, with regard to Nigel's suggestion, we could say that this applies to disobedience to anyone except the Daimyo, which would be a special case and dealt with differently. Would there be a vote on a censure levied by the Daimyo or would it simply either be accepted or not (triggering rebellion)? I think the second makes more sense.

Also, for censure in general I think we should put in place a rule to handle the case where the commander decides not to censure. It would be nice if he could retain the option for a time (for example if he wanted to do some behind-the-scenes work to find out the chance of his censure being accepted in the vote), but there should be a time limit on it so that he can't have it hanging over the disobedient character's head for ever and blackmail him.

So, 2 or 3 turns or something?

[Arjos]

Retaining the option seems something that would encourage spam to me...
And I agree that censure on Daimyo is meaningless, as he's "above the law", only way should be to take up arms...

[phonicsmonkey]

Retaining the option seems something that would encourage spam to me...

I guess what I'm getting at is sometimes the only people who know that an order has been disobeyed will be the commander and his vassal (not sure if that's the right word). I can imagine a situation where it might take a turn or two for the commander to discover the vassal has been disobedient. Also, I can imagine a situation where he goes "Oh! I've been disobeyed! I really want to stick it to that guy but I'm not sure I have the support. Let me sneak around and see who might back me on this one..."

Both of those situations seem fun to me and so I think you should be able to censure someone for something for up to x turns after the actual act of disobedience. The limit is there to avoid the constant threat of censure for acts committed a long time in the past - this should encourage acts of disobedience, which should be good for the game!

The question then becomes, what is x? 3, 4, 5?

[Nigel]

Personally I'd go for 4 turns = 1 year.
Once a matter has been covered by snow, let it rest.

It also offers some time for the offender (retainer, subordinate) to talk to his liege and perhaps explain the reasons for his actions, ask forgiveness and offer amends. But at the same time gives a strikt deadline for the commander to decide if he wants to censure or not and not let the matter drag on for ages.

Still, I hope censures will be the exception and not daily business and that we will have our hands so full of work with building our empire that we will have to work together and not spend time fighting each other.

[phonicsmonkey]

Still, I hope censures will be the exception and not daily business and that we will have our hands so full of work with building our empire that we will have to work together and not spend time fighting each other.

I think we'd like a healthy balance of both!

By the way Nigel, I've been meaning to ask you how the other TWS2 RPG you were in worked out? The one started by emotion_name and hosted offsite?

[Nigel]

Yes, a healthy balance of both would be it


As for the RPG started by emotion_name, sadly I have to say that one did not go beyond turn 2.
It is not that it hit a technical glitch or conceptual dead end, but rather players just stopped responding. Especially, one key character, who needed to make a decision before we could go on, seemed to turn inactive. Emotion_name even PMed and chatted to him, and "yes, I am still interested in playing and will post something soon". But then he never did. Technically the game is still going, but there has been no activity for almost 4 weeks now.

I believe we are better set up here at the org, as we have a lot of players with a long history of RPGs and Hotseats and I would think that people here tend to stick to what they have started. It may still be good to have some way of making sure that a drop out or non-responding player does not hold up the game for too long.

[Cecil XIX]

Ok, so to make a list of things to add:
-Penalty for failed Censures (maybe influence penalty. Also making people immune to censures for a good number of turns after a failed one might lower censure spam)
-Write up some civil war rules
-Assuming no objections add in a way to vote on new techs to research as we finish the old.
-Funding agent missions: So far I like the idea that the agents can do whatever and the commissioners are left being annoyed at them if they overspend.
-Samurai (or monks in the head monk's case)...limit by rank or influence? Note this will add complexity. I think we can avoid making the economic side confusing but there will still be more work for the commissioners of warfare and supply. We'll need to keep track of who owns which samurai units and in what numbers and decide how we figure out who a newly recruited one "belongs" to (warfare commissioner makes the suggestion? Supply decides when he recruits?).

I agree with all of these. Regarding censure spam, I think we can minimize the number of censure attempts with the penalty, but I'm also worried that having to stop the game every time there's an attempted censure will get old fast. Maybe vote on each censure at the next Council Meeting?

[kptb42]

Hello all!
I am willing to play a minor part (as this is my first TW RPG) but I like the idea of it.

[phonicsmonkey]

I'm also worried that having to stop the game every time there's an attempted censure will get old fast. Maybe vote on each censure at the next Council Meeting?

Do we have to stop the game? Can't we have a vote running concurrently with the rest of the game proceeding? A time limit could be imposed for votes to be cast and if you don't vote it is counted as an abstention? That way, no delays

[Cecil XIX]

Do we have to stop the game? Can't we have a vote running concurrently with the rest of the game proceeding? A time limit could be imposed for votes to be cast and if you don't vote it is counted as an abstention? That way, no delays

Yes, that sounds fine as well. Also, welcome kptb42! TW RPGs are what got me into the Org community as well! (I'm assuming it didn't count that I would ask for tech support for Medieval I every few months. )

[Nigel]

This is taking shape nicely.

I just want to let you guys know that I will be away for a 2 week vacation now.
Just in case you are progressing so far, that you want to start before I return, that would be fine by me. You can assign me my role and the gamemaster can make my first move. Then again, this may take some more time before it starts. But I just dont want my vacation to be the hold up for everyone.

[TheLastDays]

How are we going to distribute roles? First come first serve? Or should we do a random role between all players and the first can pick first and so on?

[Zim]

It's been done differently from game to game. In the past sometimes the main starting roles were given to players who were experienced and known to be active in prior games. I've not noticed this to make much difference in how the game plays out. We've had very experienced members have to drop out and completely new players become among the most active for the whole game.

After the rules are hashed out I plan on opening a signup thread where people can post that they still intend to play (and of course I'll add anyone to the list like Nigel who have stated they're in but that they'll be gone for a while). From there I'll find a way to randomly assign a player order and that will be the order they get to choose.

The last few days have been a blur of overtime and being sick but I have a little bit of time off (about a day and a half followed by a day of work and another half day off....yeah, my schedule is complicated right now) so I'm going to incorporate the suggested rules changes during that time. I think at that point we'll be pretty well set and just need to give the rules a look and some minor changes before getting the signup.

[Cecil XIX]

Can't wait!

[Kogitsune]

what he said

[Nigel]

Hi guys,

just to let you know that I am back and ready to take part or help where help is needed with this.

[Nigel]

Hello guys,

I have been in touch with Zim and he has been busy with doing overtime at work lately. He is still at it writing the rules and I promised him to help by drafting something about the civil war rules and thinking about how the ownership of samurai units could be made to work.

So here is my go at Samurai Unit Rules:

Ownership of samurai units by players is a neat idea and would give more importance to the “minor” characters, like Metsuke, Ninja, etc. However, there are two main hurdles/risks which we have to avoid.

1. Keeping track of unit ownership could be so time consuming that it becomes a real burden on the game master (i.e. Zim) and slows the game down.
2. We could loose track and end up arguing about who owns which unit.

The following rules are intended to avoid these risks.

Each player acts as a member of a noble family and is entitled to raise as many samurai units as he has influence points.

If the daimyo and his commissioners decide that they need another samurai unit, the daimyo chooses one nobleman and honours him by letting him raise that unit. The money comes out of the clan treasury (so we don’t need individual funds for each player). The nobleman is then expected to send his unit to serve under the command of whomever the war council has decided.

Each player is responsible to keep track of his own samurai units.

If we loose track and end up with some samurai owned by no one – or two noblemen claiming ownership of the same unit of samurai- this unit goes under the direct control of the daimyo.

If a nobleman looses influence points for whatever reason, he can keep all his samurai units, but cannot raise more until he has again more influence points than units.

After a battle, a general can request permission from a nobleman to merge his depleted samurai unit with a larger unit. The nobleman is expected to grant this permission unless he has a good reason not to. A good daimyo will consider to compensate the nobleman for the loss of his unit (e.g. by giving him permission to raise a new one at the next opportunity).

I hope these rules will enable us to play with ownership of samurai units. Especially, Zim, let me know if you think that letting players keep track of their own units themselves will work and you are happy to allow that. I guess it means that we are all willing to play along in good faith, but I am sure but I am sure the players here are prepared to do that.

[mini]

Why let keep THE Samurai when influence points are lost?

If ppl lose those together with points, adds drama :)

And eases burden on treasury

[Zim]

Thanks for the help Nigel.

The only thing I'd wonder about is how to decide if a samurai unit is not owned by anyone. Does than mean noone cliams it? What if someone claims it but seem unlikely? I don't have any problem with people stretching to get ownership of a samurai unit but I wonder what it takes for one to go to Daimyo control.

Hello guys,

I have been in touch with Zim and he has been busy with doing overtime at work lately. He is still at it writing the rules and I promised him to help by drafting something about the civil war rules and thinking about how the ownership of samurai units could be made to work.

So here is my go at Samurai Unit Rules:

Ownership of samurai units by players is a neat idea and would give more importance to the “minor” characters, like Metsuke, Ninja, etc. However, there are two main hurdles/risks which we have to avoid.

1. Keeping track of unit ownership could be so time consuming that it becomes a real burden on the game master (i.e. Zim) and slows the game down.
2. We could loose track and end up arguing about who owns which unit.

The following rules are intended to avoid these risks.

Each player acts as a member of a noble family and is entitled to raise as many samurai units as he has influence points.

If the daimyo and his commissioners decide that they need another samurai unit, the daimyo chooses one nobleman and honours him by letting him raise that unit. The money comes out of the clan treasury (so we don’t need individual funds for each player). The nobleman is then expected to send his unit to serve under the command of whomever the war council has decided.

Each player is responsible to keep track of his own samurai units.

If we loose track and end up with some samurai owned by no one – or two noblemen claiming ownership of the same unit of samurai- this unit goes under the direct control of the daimyo.

If a nobleman looses influence points for whatever reason, he can keep all his samurai units, but cannot raise more until he has again more influence points than units.

After a battle, a general can request permission from a nobleman to merge his depleted samurai unit with a larger unit. The nobleman is expected to grant this permission unless he has a good reason not to. A good daimyo will consider to compensate the nobleman for the loss of his unit (e.g. by giving him permission to raise a new one at the next opportunity).

I hope these rules will enable us to play with ownership of samurai units. Especially, Zim, let me know if you think that letting players keep track of their own units themselves will work and you are happy to allow that. I guess it means that we are all willing to play along in good faith, but I am sure but I am sure the players here are prepared to do that.

[phonicsmonkey]

Why let keep THE Samurai when influence points are lost?

If ppl lose those together with points, adds drama :)

And eases burden on treasury

I like this idea but maybe we can add in that if the samurai are on campaign they wait until they are finished before disbanding - after all I can't see an honourable samurai simply deserting in the hour of need

[Nigel]

Thanks for the help Nigel.

The only thing I'd wonder about is how to decide if a samurai unit is not owned by anyone. Does than mean noone cliams it? What if someone claims it but seem unlikely? I don't have any problem with people stretching to get ownership of a samurai unit but I wonder what it takes for one to go to Daimyo control.

Well, a “natural” cause for samurai units coming under the daimyo’s control would be if the nobleman dies (in battle, by assassination or whatever reason). His samurai would then fall under the daimyo’s command and he could decide if he wants to keep them or use them to reward another deserving clan member.


If we do want to play with ownership of samurai units, I guess we will need a way to keep track of them in public. Perhaps each player could post and maintain a post with his personal game information. Something like this:

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Player: Nigel
In game character: Sugawara Akitada
Position: Metsuke (overseeing Sanuki)
Influence Points: 3

Samurai Retainers:
1 bow samurai, garrisoned at Tosa
1 katana samurai, serving under general Ishikawa (Phonicsmonkey)

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Of course things would be much easier, if we could give units individual names, like we could in NTW. But I dont think this is possible in S2TW anymore.

[deguerra]

Sigh. Them and removing functions previously available...