Tani Coyote
Son of Huehuecoyotl
- Joined
- May 28, 2007
- Messages
- 15,191
May as well see how this goes.
Countless decades ago, a great plague ravaged the human race. Combined with social discontent and economic instability, the old order did not stand a chance.
But a new order has arisen. The collapse of the old diplomatic and economic systems has created a world ripe with opportunities for countries once confined to inferiority to reach for supremacy. With so many contending for hegemony, however, the world is a place not just of ambition, but of multipolarity.
In the future, this day shall be called Year Zero. But this is not the future. This is now.
==Starting Out==
The Map
Claim 50 provinces. After some signups, you may PM me another major power and will receive free spies inside it.
Beyond that, it is up to you. Details on your society, government, etc. are rewarded, however.
Be warned that not all positions are equal, but any player country will still be a good deal more powerful than any NPC.
==Economy and Finance==
The economy is mostly out of your hands. Based on some chance, your bio, and balance, your provinces will be assigned values indicating the types of resources they produce.
There are five sectors of production, running from organics and raw materials at the beginning to energy and manufacturing in the middle to services at the end. Supply and demand determine the strength of these sectors and in turn how much economic power you can bring to bear. You will have some ability to adjust your economic parameters (depending on what style of society you are running) but are mostly beholden to the tides of the market.
One thing you can most definitely influence is in the field of trade. If you’re a state with say, a ton of factories, it is in your interest to keep access to foreign and domestic deposits of raw materials, energy, etc.
Your government is funded primarily through taxes. The tax rate for all nations starts at 25%. Nations with lower than average tax rates experience faster growth but have less funds.
You may overspend, in which case you will be marked as having debt. You can own up to 100% of your economy in debt without penalty. Going beyond that, interest rates will become higher and your economy will sag as your government eats up what could be used for private use. You can always default on your debt, of course, but it should go without saying that has catastrophic results.
==Military==
You have a population statistic that is mostly for fluff up until the military is in play. You can recruit only so much of your population per turn, which is reflected in your manpower. Manpower is not cumulative between turns. You also have a "Militarization" meter which runs from 1 (minimal) to 5 (maximum) that will determine your overall ability to make war on other nations, including espionage.
There is no cost to recruit soldiers. However, they will not be fully-trained until the next turn. You may use them the turn you recruit them, but they will suffer catastrophic casualties which will make your people angry.
Units of all types do have upkeep, and they also increase your overall demand for resources, especially if they are of good quality. In the event you are consistently in the red, troops will desert.
Exactly what your army is composed of is really up to your roleplay. Your military quality, number of troops, and war plans are what are really tracked. Please be somewhat realistic as a courtesy, of course.
==War and Expansionism==
Your military is the backbone of expansion, and they attack both neutral and owned provinces for this purpose.
Neutral provinces that are conquered by your army are treated as colonial territory, and yield little in the way of money until they are assimilated. Keep in mind the more colonial territory you have, the slower the rate of assimilation. It pays to keep your expansion within reason. No more than 20% of your nation should be colonial at any time. Given time, most people will accept your rule and all its benefits, but sufficiently large colonial territories will be emboldened to seek their own path (while keeping anything you’ve happened to spend on the colonies, of course).
It is inevitable that states cannot always find a compromise, and so might shall make right in these cases.
When you send your forces to do battle, the outcome is determined by a mixture of quality, quantity, luck, and battle plans. The more detailed the better… keep in mind that plans are executed simultaneously. It is extremely profitable to steal an enemy’s war plans, as it allows you to know their movements and counter. A long, drawn out war can be ended with a little espionage.
Keep in mind that I will factor in the terrain of the battlefield. You may benefit by studying terrain maps while making your plans… being able to fortify a pass or river would be of immense benefit, to say the least.
Poorer nations have less advanced defenses and so can generally be attacked without a declaration. Wealthy nations require espionage efforts to sabotage to such a point you could squeeze an army in without resistance.
Resistance in occupied territory is generally passive. It takes reasonable circumstances to cause violent resistance on a large scale.
==Espionage==
Sun Tzu said that it was better to win without fighting than to win every battle. Espionage is a means to achieve this.
You are allotted a certain number of spies each turn based on your Militarization, population, and culture, and you may choose to distribute them either in your country or in others. Spies can undertake practically any mission you can think of, though naturally they must get past the local counterintelligence to succeed. Spies that are left idle automatically engage in counterespionage where prudent.
Periodically information will land in the hands of your spies (even if they are on the defense) and they will pass it on to you. Be warned there’s a chance it’s fabricated (and indeed, the more devious player will deliberately fabricate evidence and “accidentally” let rival spies find it). Mass recruitment in a spy’s city, for example, would not go unnoticed and they would inform their mother country of a possible attack. Thus, for you warmongers out there, victory is more than just having the most troops; it’s about ensuring only you have access to information.
==Finance==
What funds you have left after paying maintenance fees can go towards whatever you desire. However, you will probably use them on technology. Technologies are in several fields and are self-explanatory. Quality improves effectiveness in that field, whereas efficiency increases the yield of that resource in your country.
Offensive Land (OL)
Defensive Land (DL)
Navy Quality (NQ)
Air Quality (AQ)
Raw Material Efficiency (RME)
Organic Efficiency (OE)
Energy Efficiency (EE)
Manufacturing Efficiency (ME)
Service Efficiency (SE)
You can also invest in weapons of mass destruction if you want bargaining chips at the war table. The classes of weapons are nuclear, biological, and chemical. Despite their pessimistic nature, each weapon has positive externalities due to the research inherent in their design. The more you pour into these programs, the better grade weapons you will receive. There is, like armies, no cost to create them, but the number you can create per turn is limited by your industrial base. Weapons can be designed for both battlefield use and for use against static targets like cities. Weapons can be sabotaged, destroyed or even stolen through espionage.
Missile shields similarly can be built to counter weapons, and allied states can combine their missile shield. Simply specify money to be put towards a shield and it will be underway. Missile shields can be shut down or hindered by espionage. Note that shields are only good against long-range projectiles, and so won’t be able to help your boys in the field if your enemy decides they want to play with anthrax or chlorine.
==Diplomacy==
When you’re not actively working to undermine another player, simply talking to them is always good. While a lot of agreements are player to player and are not hardcoded, there is a client system in effect.
Unlike in prior MPs, there are actually rather few NPC powers on the board, stimulating competition and ensuring there will always be top dogs and underdogs. Whether you wrest control of these powers through alliance, trade, war, espionage or some mixture thereof is up to you. Having a power that cuts your merchants better deals than the competition and who will back you up in global affairs never hurts, though.
While everyone trades with everyone else by default, you can issue embargoes to increase pressure.
You have a powerful tool in the form of foreign investment. While a lot of this goes on behind the scenes, with the wealthy elites of various nations investing in certain markets, you may also direct your tax revenue into purchasing property in a foreign economy… with that government’s permission, of course. Foreign investments your citizens make generate income which you receive tax revenues on. Conversely, you can buy up your own economy to get the full share of revenue, but understand that (long-term, i.e. outside of emergencies and war) command economies carry efficiency penalties.
Countless decades ago, a great plague ravaged the human race. Combined with social discontent and economic instability, the old order did not stand a chance.
But a new order has arisen. The collapse of the old diplomatic and economic systems has created a world ripe with opportunities for countries once confined to inferiority to reach for supremacy. With so many contending for hegemony, however, the world is a place not just of ambition, but of multipolarity.
In the future, this day shall be called Year Zero. But this is not the future. This is now.
==Starting Out==
The Map
Claim 50 provinces. After some signups, you may PM me another major power and will receive free spies inside it.
Beyond that, it is up to you. Details on your society, government, etc. are rewarded, however.
Be warned that not all positions are equal, but any player country will still be a good deal more powerful than any NPC.
==Economy and Finance==
The economy is mostly out of your hands. Based on some chance, your bio, and balance, your provinces will be assigned values indicating the types of resources they produce.
There are five sectors of production, running from organics and raw materials at the beginning to energy and manufacturing in the middle to services at the end. Supply and demand determine the strength of these sectors and in turn how much economic power you can bring to bear. You will have some ability to adjust your economic parameters (depending on what style of society you are running) but are mostly beholden to the tides of the market.
One thing you can most definitely influence is in the field of trade. If you’re a state with say, a ton of factories, it is in your interest to keep access to foreign and domestic deposits of raw materials, energy, etc.
Your government is funded primarily through taxes. The tax rate for all nations starts at 25%. Nations with lower than average tax rates experience faster growth but have less funds.
You may overspend, in which case you will be marked as having debt. You can own up to 100% of your economy in debt without penalty. Going beyond that, interest rates will become higher and your economy will sag as your government eats up what could be used for private use. You can always default on your debt, of course, but it should go without saying that has catastrophic results.
==Military==
You have a population statistic that is mostly for fluff up until the military is in play. You can recruit only so much of your population per turn, which is reflected in your manpower. Manpower is not cumulative between turns. You also have a "Militarization" meter which runs from 1 (minimal) to 5 (maximum) that will determine your overall ability to make war on other nations, including espionage.
There is no cost to recruit soldiers. However, they will not be fully-trained until the next turn. You may use them the turn you recruit them, but they will suffer catastrophic casualties which will make your people angry.
Units of all types do have upkeep, and they also increase your overall demand for resources, especially if they are of good quality. In the event you are consistently in the red, troops will desert.
Exactly what your army is composed of is really up to your roleplay. Your military quality, number of troops, and war plans are what are really tracked. Please be somewhat realistic as a courtesy, of course.
==War and Expansionism==
Your military is the backbone of expansion, and they attack both neutral and owned provinces for this purpose.
Neutral provinces that are conquered by your army are treated as colonial territory, and yield little in the way of money until they are assimilated. Keep in mind the more colonial territory you have, the slower the rate of assimilation. It pays to keep your expansion within reason. No more than 20% of your nation should be colonial at any time. Given time, most people will accept your rule and all its benefits, but sufficiently large colonial territories will be emboldened to seek their own path (while keeping anything you’ve happened to spend on the colonies, of course).
It is inevitable that states cannot always find a compromise, and so might shall make right in these cases.
When you send your forces to do battle, the outcome is determined by a mixture of quality, quantity, luck, and battle plans. The more detailed the better… keep in mind that plans are executed simultaneously. It is extremely profitable to steal an enemy’s war plans, as it allows you to know their movements and counter. A long, drawn out war can be ended with a little espionage.
Keep in mind that I will factor in the terrain of the battlefield. You may benefit by studying terrain maps while making your plans… being able to fortify a pass or river would be of immense benefit, to say the least.
Poorer nations have less advanced defenses and so can generally be attacked without a declaration. Wealthy nations require espionage efforts to sabotage to such a point you could squeeze an army in without resistance.
Resistance in occupied territory is generally passive. It takes reasonable circumstances to cause violent resistance on a large scale.
==Espionage==
Sun Tzu said that it was better to win without fighting than to win every battle. Espionage is a means to achieve this.
You are allotted a certain number of spies each turn based on your Militarization, population, and culture, and you may choose to distribute them either in your country or in others. Spies can undertake practically any mission you can think of, though naturally they must get past the local counterintelligence to succeed. Spies that are left idle automatically engage in counterespionage where prudent.
Periodically information will land in the hands of your spies (even if they are on the defense) and they will pass it on to you. Be warned there’s a chance it’s fabricated (and indeed, the more devious player will deliberately fabricate evidence and “accidentally” let rival spies find it). Mass recruitment in a spy’s city, for example, would not go unnoticed and they would inform their mother country of a possible attack. Thus, for you warmongers out there, victory is more than just having the most troops; it’s about ensuring only you have access to information.
==Finance==
What funds you have left after paying maintenance fees can go towards whatever you desire. However, you will probably use them on technology. Technologies are in several fields and are self-explanatory. Quality improves effectiveness in that field, whereas efficiency increases the yield of that resource in your country.
Offensive Land (OL)
Defensive Land (DL)
Navy Quality (NQ)
Air Quality (AQ)
Raw Material Efficiency (RME)
Organic Efficiency (OE)
Energy Efficiency (EE)
Manufacturing Efficiency (ME)
Service Efficiency (SE)
You can also invest in weapons of mass destruction if you want bargaining chips at the war table. The classes of weapons are nuclear, biological, and chemical. Despite their pessimistic nature, each weapon has positive externalities due to the research inherent in their design. The more you pour into these programs, the better grade weapons you will receive. There is, like armies, no cost to create them, but the number you can create per turn is limited by your industrial base. Weapons can be designed for both battlefield use and for use against static targets like cities. Weapons can be sabotaged, destroyed or even stolen through espionage.
Missile shields similarly can be built to counter weapons, and allied states can combine their missile shield. Simply specify money to be put towards a shield and it will be underway. Missile shields can be shut down or hindered by espionage. Note that shields are only good against long-range projectiles, and so won’t be able to help your boys in the field if your enemy decides they want to play with anthrax or chlorine.
==Diplomacy==
When you’re not actively working to undermine another player, simply talking to them is always good. While a lot of agreements are player to player and are not hardcoded, there is a client system in effect.
Unlike in prior MPs, there are actually rather few NPC powers on the board, stimulating competition and ensuring there will always be top dogs and underdogs. Whether you wrest control of these powers through alliance, trade, war, espionage or some mixture thereof is up to you. Having a power that cuts your merchants better deals than the competition and who will back you up in global affairs never hurts, though.
While everyone trades with everyone else by default, you can issue embargoes to increase pressure.
You have a powerful tool in the form of foreign investment. While a lot of this goes on behind the scenes, with the wealthy elites of various nations investing in certain markets, you may also direct your tax revenue into purchasing property in a foreign economy… with that government’s permission, of course. Foreign investments your citizens make generate income which you receive tax revenues on. Conversely, you can buy up your own economy to get the full share of revenue, but understand that (long-term, i.e. outside of emergencies and war) command economies carry efficiency penalties.
