Possible LotR Successor Game discussion thread

[ULC]

I'm still going to push for Denmark or England - I dislike Milan too much, but Spain might be okay. However, I see Denmark and England having more Fronts while each front is very close at hand.

[KnightnDay]

I always like cranking up the Mare Nostrum tune when attacking with the Spanish.

[woad&fangs]

Allright, I've got a few more ideas...

Tie voting influence heavily to land. Have all avatars start with an allegiance to a house when they spawn. All avatars must always be part of a house. Avatars can change houses at any point. New houses can be formed in one of two ways. The first way is that when a crusader captures the crusading target, he may choose to keep it for himself and start a house instead of the land going to his lord. The second way to start a new house would be if a player had two adjacent provinces he could "secede" from his current house and start a new one. If the player only has 1 city, he could ally with another player with an adjacent city and they could secede together (with a previous agreement about which one would become Duke).

I'm thinking of houses in terms of geography. An avatar would orignally hail from a certain house's territory. He would likely be aqcuainted with the higher ranking members of that area. This provides a role playing "springboard" similar to the family relations in KOTR while still allowing RBGs and House creation like in LOTR. I believe it would provide more PvP conflict because Dukes obviously won't want to lose influence because some scheming vassal ran off with a province.

I believe the ranks should be...

Baron- voting power is equal to 1+ # of provinces in his control
Duke- voting power equal to 1+ # of landed vassals
Prince- voting power equal to that of his other rank +1
King- voting power equal to authority

Any opinions?

[Ramses II CP]

I still favor the simplest system when it comes to voting. One province = one vote. Kill someone and you get all the provinces they had when you declared war. We don't have to give people a reason to distribute land to their vassals, let's keep the game heavy at the top and new avatars will have something to do... steal from the old generation.

Ranks and provinces never really meant much in LotR. We almost immediately had more land than active players. It'll mean more in the next version if a successful field general can hoard some of it and build himself into a threatening powerhouse. No matter how powerful someone gets in the end they can only control one stack of troops, can only attack in one direction at a time. If you want more than that you've got to trust someone, and if you don't want more than that then you will quickly find that younger players are just as happy to siege your cities with just their bodyguards as they are the AI's cities.

It's a simple scenario, right? One big player with 5-6 provinces, well established, powerful, and 3-4 new players with just what they can scrape together. If they want to advance they need land, and the big guy can't protect it all. Let's give each other motive and opportunity to be distrustful and aggressive.

We still have one other thing to fix, however, which is what we vote on! Voting sessions in LotR tended to be rather dull. The edicts were rarely impactful on gameplay. This has to be solved in the game by the players that start off with powerful avatars IMHO.

[Zim]

I see some very good ideas here to discuss. I just finished a test and have spring break this week (seems odd for someone of the ripe old age of 25... ). I will be making some rules proposals this coming week. We've got a lot of ideas now, it seems a good time to start thinking about how to implement them.

In the meantime I'm thinking of moving the faction choice discussion to a poll. So far I've seen the following factions brought up:

England
Denmark
Sicily
Spain
Milan

Am I missing any? We might want to think a little bit more about whether we're using Kingdoms, since there are some fairly light mods that add Kingdoms specific factions we might consider (like the Order of other crusader factions).

[mini]

Kingdoms is fine by me.
What does it cost nowadays in stores?
I picked it up for 3 euro few weeks ago.

England and Milan are my favourites.


Just one Q: why aren't we considering France? The tensions between the king and all the barons could be easily translated into the game, it's quite central in Europe and pretty much has enemies on every border. It can expand in a lot of directions, and has a nice troop roster.

Since we're playing a christian faction, it will be a matter of not expanding too much to keep our papal relation in check?

[TinCow]

Ranks and provinces never really meant much in LotR. We almost immediately had more land than active players. It'll mean more in the next version if a successful field general can hoard some of it and build himself into a threatening powerhouse. No matter how powerful someone gets in the end they can only control one stack of troops, can only attack in one direction at a time. If you want more than that you've got to trust someone, and if you don't want more than that then you will quickly find that younger players are just as happy to siege your cities with just their bodyguards as they are the AI's cities.

I agree that it would be good to find a way to give more significance to provinces. When writing the LotR rules, I tried to make it so that people would become invested in their provinces and work towards improving them. I very much wanted to encourage the type of thing that Cecil did during the KotR Cataclysm, but it simply didn't work out in LotR. For LotR, the problem is accurately identified as being way too many provinces. This wouldn't have been an issue if the player base was higher, but despite consistently having a much larger base than KotR, LotR still had too few players to make province ownership competitive.

Making provinces more valuable is definitely one area that should be explored. However, I also think there should also be some focus on slowing down expansion a bit. If provinces can be kept somewhat scarce, their value will naturally increase and people will be more concerned with keeping and improving what they have. I'm not sure how to slow down expansion without imposing rules that feel artificial, but if a method can be discovered for doing this it would be a good idea IMO.

[mini]

Like I said, if we play France for instance, we cannot lash out in all directions because of papal relations.
We can snatch a few rebel provinces, and then it's waiting until the AI triggers war with us so we can justify snatchign a few christian provinces.
Also France is big enough to give us atleast a few starting provinces, since we will have a serious starting player base.
I wouldn't be suprised if we are 10+ to start with, and if we play milan/denmark for instance, and we slow expansion, we might be too tight for such a player base.

[ULC]

Like I said, if we play France for instance, we cannot lash out in all directions because of papal relations.
We can snatch a few rebel provinces, and then it's waiting until the AI triggers war with us so we can justify snatchign a few christian provinces.
Also France is big enough to give us atleast a few starting provinces, since we will have a serious starting player base.
I wouldn't be suprised if we are 10+ to start with, and if we play milan/denmark for instance, and we slow expansion, we might be too tight for such a player base.

France was used for the test game I believe, and was voted fairly high - However, their unit roster is very similiar to the HRE's, where as the Danes and English unit rosters are much more unique.

I too like Ramses system, it's simple, and well thought out. However, can I suggest a vote cap? Thus, the guy with 5-6 provinces needs a few vassals to gain a little bit more power. Not sure how that would work out, but it at least begins to force the creation of Houses - you gain power from doing so, but your vassals also have a lot of indepedence as well.

As for slowing expansion, EDICTS! We could need an edict to capture a settlement, and another to commission the units to be trained. This should help I should think

[Ibn-Khaldun]

May I suggest something. It's not something new and was in LotR as well..
Well, I propose "Rules-Constitution-Edicts" system something like this:

• Rules - They will always be OOC and they are .. well.. Rules!
• Constitution - IC laws that are discussed and accepted before the game starts. These are laws that must be followed all times. Only high ranking player can propose Constitution Amendment. Here can be mentioned what settlements England(example) considers theirs and thus those settlements become fair game for players to take from AI or another player.
• Edicts - Laws that are in effect only between two Council Sessions. Penalties for braking them could be mentioned in the Constitution. Edicts can not contradict Constitution.

This way you can slow down expansion and make all those settlements be worthy and most of all.. there will be lot of fighting for taking/keeping those settlements.

Hope that what I just said makes sense!

[AussieGiant]

KotR was fairly effective at using edicts and CA's as a means to limit expansion.

It's down to resources and game balance.

If it costs too much to have more than one war going then the internal fighting over who could expand and who had to wait was a big part of KotR's balance mechanism. The problem is that some players can take on whole armies with little or no support except GB units. Likewise an ingenious piece of legislation was that all provinces taken had to be "ratified" and officially absorbed into the Empire. Because this was further legislation it became very political, which was very effective. If you set out expansion in the “constitution” of the game it can be role played as such and allows land to be the centre of political manoeuvring and voting.

I think it was fairly realistic that you had to decide as a group of Baron's and nobles in the Diet about who to attack and who not to.

-EDIT-

I honestly think CA and Edict that are "in-game" need to be policed and enforced in the game and not outside it. If you don't do this you will need a babysitter for all the toys that get thrown out of the pram. *grin*

[GeneralHankerchief]

Let's definitely add France to the "probable" list. I advocated that to be our faction for LotR, and I will continue to advocate it in this next game.

As far as the rules/CAs/Edicts go, I think TC's three-tiered system implemented midway through LotR was a very good solution to a somewhat flawed system and we should continue it.

[ULC]

Hmmm...if we combine 1 province = 1 vote with edicts and amendments being required for troops and land, we might run into one House gaining all the power.

We might also get some very heated Council sessions, since edicts and amendments literally mean power. Such a system makes the IC rp aspect seem more signifigant, and I'd vote for such a system, hands down.

[flyd]

I think LotR encouraged expansion because of the finders-keepers rule. In Kotr, the Emperor always got new provinces, and Edicts were later required for that too. This provided little incentive to go out and risk your bodyguard in the early game. It also gave more power to the Emperor (and Diet). It might be worth bringing something like that back; after all, if it was the Imperial treasury that paid for the armies, who are you to take the settlement.

It would be a good way to give extra strength to the legislative body and bring back the debates, if each new conquest had to be absorbed by an Edict. Then another Edict could be necessary to give the province to somebody. If the body could not agree on whom to give it to, it could remain unpossessed, with the current Chancellor having control of it. Maybe it would even require 2/3 majority to assign a permanent ownership; a simple Edict could, perhaps, only grant the kind of ownership that could be taken away by another simple Edict.

These kinds of things would really make people seek out votings blocs, and feces would once again be flung across the blood-stained marble floors. It would also reduce the benefits of expansion, or at least make you do a lot of politicking beforehand.

[Zim]

I like the idea of tying expansion to edicts again. If land is going to be so important. It would certainly encourage less anemic Senate sessions.

So if a province was taken in war an edict would be required to keep it, and yet another to give it to a specific player.

How far would we want to go in tying land to influence? I would say there should be some sort of cap, or diminishing returns. Would landed vassals count? Would the King's authority be tied to the size of his "demesne"?

I think it's pretty much certain we're keeping the rule/edict/etc. enforcement system from LotR. However, how would this mesh with edicts to keep land. If someone takes a settlement and decides to keep it against an edict (say, by squatting in it) would it be his for purposes of counting influence until the powers that be enforce the law?

Edit: Will add France when it comes time to poll for faction choices. They do have some advantages like being able to absorb a larger number of players early on. So far probably France, Spain, and England have the most room to "grow" without coming into conflict with the pope for attacking christian factions.

[GeneralHankerchief]

So far probably France, Spain, and England have the most room to "grow" without coming into conflict with the pope for attacking christian factions.

Where's the fun in that?

[Zim]

If we're starting without the smaller scale test game it would make the beginning game (with at least ten or so players) smoother.

Where's the fun in that?

[mini]

plus if we play a christian faction, we should RP to curry favour with the pope, or atleast avoid excomm.

Another incentive not to expand too much.

YLC: I agree england has better roster than france, which is why I will vote england.
I just proposed france as it has the best starting conditions for a larger playerbase.

If we start out with the Danes, you can only start off with a handful of player max.
I can't imagine the SS map right away, but the Dane starting position gives for some serious distances aswel?
Wehereas france/england are right in the middle of western europe.

[AussieGiant]

the process that flyd outlined is exactly what I was talking about.

Zim, honestly, I would get the rule set from KotR and make that a base. Controlling land is what KotR was all about and the Kaiser controlling it's distribution was well done and realistic.

YLC mentioned the idea of council sessions being heated and meaning something.

I can tell you, I never walked into the Diet in KotR without getting up to date on everything. If you didn't have your head screwed on straight you were going to get a pasting very quickly.

[Zim]

My impression was that most of the players were against switching back to the KotR rules set, at least going by posts here after it was brought up.

Is it just the House structure which you think would make for a better game?

I thought the way new Houses were set up midgame in LotR had great potential to be interesting. Sadly, we all decided to get along. Forcing people into certain Houses based on where they get adopted/born to wouldn't necessarily fix that problem if it were to repeat.

If we do bring back the older rules we'd need to think about what we'd do with rgbs. Would adoptions be banned unless they were to join the House of their potential adopter? Would someone marrying one of the King's daughter's get the chance to start a new House?

Perhaps we could do a poll to see which rule set people prefer.

Edit: I walked into a few Diets without really knowing what was happening, partly because I was new and many of the character dynamics escaped me. In fact, given what the Illuminati were doing behind the scenes the whole game, I can safely say I had no idea at all what was really going on.

[TinCow]

GM's Code:

You can please all of the people some of the time.
You can please some of the people all of the time.
You will piss off everyone eventually.

[AussieGiant]

What can I say.

I'm biased and I'm quantitatively sure KotR had more dust ups, wranglings, arguments, threats, venom, spiteful activity than LotR.

The general dynamic worked for a number of reasons.

Therefore I'm suggesting that it is used again, with some changes.

In this instances the method of edict and CA power tied into the game very well, plus how land was secured and distributed, plus the houses was very well done.

Adoption handling, no RBG's, Family Tree usage and a limited understandable rule set are all still arguably well done.

[Zim]

I recall a major problem in the lategame for KotR when players playing important fms became inactive (or rather worse, almost inactive, preventing us from finding new players to fill in). At least that was the view from House Swabia. Didn't Ruppel end up being the only active fm in Swabia?

I did strongly consider the KotR ruleset when it was first brought up. I'd gladly gm such a game, or one closer to LotR. I consider both to have the potential to make the new game great and I'll go for whatever most people prefer.

However, remember when I joined KotR. The Cataclysm was a brief high point of activity followed by a long slow down. I did not experience most of the things you're talking about. I experienced a House with no leader, a manufactured conflict I had no stake or real desire to join (for that matter, when I did try to participate in it I was rebuffed by the players who were already planning the end of the game) and a sudden decision to end the game that I didn't see coming.

I spent the latter months of KotR working with Matthias Steffen to save Outremer (the best part for me, rivaling the Swabian rebellion) and sharing joking complaints with some of my fellow new players about how the Swabian leader was always absent.

The beginning months of LotR, on the other hand, saw a ton of scheming and constant changes in the relationships between my character and those of players such as deguerra, TheFlax, YLC, Tristan, Rossahh, and Smowz (listing only the newer players since I've noted some of the more veteran players seemed not to have known just how much was going on outside of their own admirable attempts to push the game along). I suspect that things might have done much better in the mid-late game had it not been so hard to fight a civil war, and if active players did not drop out without warning (myself included for those months I had no working computer).

I read most of the links in KotR's history thread, and I do think the game's "active period" was longer than LotR's, for various possible reasons. I also agree the Diets were more interesting, and we were much too cooperative in LotR. I think it's important to investigate why that's so. If it turns out that scrapping the LotR rules wholesale and taking up the KotR rules then I'm all for it. If people would rather keep what they like from LotR (flexible Houses, rgbs, etc.) and change the parts they felt hindered the game I'm all for that as well.

I guess what I'm getting at is that KotR does not hold any special magic for me that made it better, largely because I'm not a KotR vet. I joined the game during its waning period, when it's rules were no longer enough to help conflict along and instead events like Siegfried's planned death and the Cataclysm and everything that resulted from it caused most of the conflict. That is, outside forces.

So, for me and I suspect many of the players that weren't in KotR, some convincing is needed. Preferably a serious debate. If such arises I'll gladly start a poll to decide which rules to use. We could begin by asking TinCow to move the longer posts you and Ituralde made in the OOC thread supporting the KotR ruleset here.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Already seeing an upside to this conversation. I'm starting to remember those German names again.

[AussieGiant]

Fair enough and I'm glad you posted a counter position to mine Zim. "Perception is everything" in many ways.

A lot of development went into LotR and I certainly think certain things must be included and melded with KotR. A "super set" of slimmed down rules from both would be ideal.

[mini]

indeed.

[TheFlax]

GM's Code:

So very true.


Now, from what I read, most people seem to want a compromise between KotR and LotR. (Correct me if I'm wrong).

I'll talk about Houses in an instant, first I want to talk about Ramses' proposition that votes be tied to land. While this has some merit, making land much more important and promoting conflict over land. I think it takes out too many newcomers out of the equation. I think it would be much more sensible to have some sort of system where the number of landed vassals are more important. Not only does land remain important, but people also become an important resource. I'm thinking it would make for a fun game if people had to fight for vassals and loyalty would become rather important.

If I remember correctly, LotR wanted to do that, but by tying voting power to stats, even the people with the highest ranks (like deguerra) never got high enough stats to benefit from their rank.

Now for the Houses, perhaps a mix of established "permanent" Houses and other more fluid Houses could be established. So lets say we go with the family tree being split into Houses, like KotR. We could also have RGBs who form small units of their own, similar to Houses, and who can pledge themselves to a House for a certain amount of time, at the cost of the established noble House. Just an idea and it could be more refined, it also does not remedy what to do with adoption. (I guess they could be treated case by case.)

[Zim]

I figured being on the short list of guys left who joined KotR in it's later turns my perspective might be different from people who were in it longer or never played the prior game at all...

I actually already have a few ideas for a hybridized system as far as House structure goes, the first time I've thought I could sit down and write up some rules. I'll save the details of it for after we have some discussion of the KotR rules set, though.

One strong point of KotR was that the fixed Houses meant very different characters might have to work together with common goals, something that happened less when you chose your House (although there was potential in LotR for Houses to develop around types of personality, say a dread House and a chivalrous House, in practice I thought they were quite similar). There would also be interesting situations like Swabia. Having its Duke be inactive caused problems, but it also meant that Ruppel had to step up to the plate. Because he wasn't officially duke there was some resistance to his leadership. All in all it meant a very interesting dynamic that I don't think was explored properly.

Fair enough and I'm glad you posted a counter position to mine Zim. "Perception is everything" in many ways.

A lot of development went into LotR and I certainly think certain things must be included and melded with KotR. A "super set" of slimmed down rules from both would be ideal.

[TinCow]

Fair enough and I'm glad you posted a counter position to mine Zim. "Perception is everything" in many ways.

A lot of development went into LotR and I certainly think certain things must be included and melded with KotR. A "super set" of slimmed down rules from both would be ideal.

I think our views of KOTR can sometimes be clouded a bit by the Illuminati-effect. One of the reasons KOTR is remembered so fondly is that there was a dedicated group of people who decided to play the bad guys over the long term. This in turn encouraged other people to become similarly dedicated in their opposition to the bad guys, resulting initially in a subtle political struggle and eventually moving into open warfare. From my perspective, it wasn't the KOTR rules that caused this, it was the players themselves: the Illuminati who played the bad guys and the loyalists who then stood up against them.

I would be interested in hearing Northnovas' perspective on this, because I distinctly remember being told that he was very bored with KotR and was close to dropping out. One of the reasons we invited him into the Illuminati was to make the game more interesting for him. After that, he was a major player the entire time. If this is in fact true, the only thing that caused Northnovas' feelings about the game to shift was the Illuminati.

I may very well be biased here, because this game was my brain child. I definitely made huge mistakes with the rule system which cause serious, long-term problems. However, from my perspective as an impartial observer of the game from the very beginning, it seemed like no one every really took much of a lead in the game. I always felt like I had to do things myself to inject conflict and excitement into the game, and that wasn't how it was designed to work. LotR was meant to be a RPG sandbox game. It was designed to let people have a lot of freedom in their actions. Yet it felt to me like people were always waiting around for someone else to do something to cause the excitement.

There were a couple early sparks, like Elite Ferret getting kicked out of his House, but these were always soothed over and everyone tried to be friends. That's the perfect way to act in the real world, but it's damned boring in a game. The first person who took a lead on generating conflict was, not surprisingly, Ignoramus. Iggy played the only true 'villain' we had in LotR and while he did a great job, always remaining consistent in his actions, it took FOREVER for anyone to stand up to him. His blatant abuses of power were handled with a CA banning him from automatically taking the Megas position. That's it, that was his only penalty. The first time anyone really stood up to him was when Tristan stopped him from marrying off his daughter, and even then I had to step in and use my powers to try and make that conflict serious.

It was only about a month or two ago that people finally DID catch on to what was needed and what was possible. Ignoramus, YLC, Ramses, Cecil, Zim, TheFlax, Ibn... all of these people stepped out of the 'friend zone' everyone was playing in and decided to shake things up. Suddenly, the game became exciting, but unfortunately the damage had already been done.

I personally don't think it truly matters which rule system is used. I think a new game based on the KotR rules could be a massive success or a massive failure. I think a new game based on the LotR rules could be a massive success or a massive failure. The determining factor, IMO, is whether the players decide to take risks and rile up the system. No matter how good the rules, a game will be dull if this doesn't happen. No matter how agonizingly bad the rules (well, within reason), a game will be exciting if the players give it exciting plotlines.

These games are sandbox games. Sandbox games give players the tools to do whatever they want, but they have to create their own entertainment. If everyone just sits in the sandbox waiting for someone else to start building something interesting, eventually they'll all get bored and go home. Or someone will pee in the sandbox.

[Ramses II CP]

Regarding land and voting consider this: If we return to a 'fixed' House structure, which I can definitely see as a good thing for causing conflict, then vassals will be placed automatically and we can maintain a one province = one vote system without risking new players being unclaimed as vassals and losing the will to participate. If we combine that with a system to replace inactive leaders so the Houses stay active at the top we'll have a good mix of simplicity, engagement, and conflict.

Which is to say, following the KotR example, House Franconia has 3 members. The Duke has 3 provinces and his two counts have each conquered one. When a new general or family member comes into the House there's a huge amount of tension created automatically within the house. Does the Duke give up a province (And a vote) to invest his new vassal in the house? Does he give the new man an army and tell him to go get his own province? Which province can the new man go after anyway, surely the older counts want to expand in all the obvious directions already? Is it time to take a look at Swabia's lightly held central towns? Etc, etc.

There was none of this tension within Houses in LotR.

I like the LotR ruleset. I think TC built a good framework for open roleplaying and cooperative storylines, but during the test we didn't see that there weren't enough restrictions on the players to cause internal conflict and too much complexity in the ranks and powers. I think if we simplify things so that power is directly tied to land there will always be conflict, there will always be Houses and players eyeing each other's loosely defended settlements in the center of the Empire, which, let's face it, is one of the core flaws of MTWII. After you grow to a certain size there are vast regions where nothing is going on.

The fixed house structure is frustrating when you're playing it. Believe me, Fritz was in the worst possible spot in the KotR ranks with his younger brother being first Duke, then Prinz, and finally Kaiser. He had essentially no possibility of feudal advancement... which is why, in my mind, the Illuminati were so appealing to him. Conflict created, conflict resolved, interesting story produced.

I don't oppose having some modifiers to the votes because obviously the King, Prince, and perhaps former Megas/Chancellor should have some added influence, but I think the essence of the system for most players should be one province = one vote. I can nearly guarantee we won't reach the sort of static 'lock down' we have at the end of LotR where you have to march 5 turns across the Empire to try to find a fight.

I particularly think that if we keep the system for siezing captain led stacks we're going to see some interesting developments.

[KnightnDay]

What about an in-game victory awarded to a house that controlled a certain percentage of provinces? So if there were 4 houses, victory might be achieved if a single house controlled a third or more of the factions provinces. The condition might not be enabled until a minimum number of provinces were controlled by the faction. It would certainly make for conflict as a house looks at weakly defended places belonging to another house.