Game Preference Poll

Which type of game would you prefer to play?

  • Total voters
    51
Birdjaguar

Birdjaguar

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If you don't have a preference, you may check more than one. Other suggestions are welcome.

I am developing a new NES and would like to know what kind of game you all might actually want to play. Whatever the game, the rules would be an improved and expanded version of BirdNES and written specifically for the game. So they will be complex in how they work, but hopefully easy to play. BirdNES taught me alot. To make sure that the rules are a good fit, I need to decide what the game will be first. In any case I expect it to take about 2 months to develop depending upon the map used.

Any game will feature things like:
• Voyages of discovery (in a modified form from BirdNES)
• Heavy emphasis on trade and economic components
• Probably some sort of very basic tech tree
• 100 year turns so actual progress through time can be made. I think that I have figured a way to have long turns and still keep the game interesting and personal.

1. Fresh start on earth with a 1000 BC start date.
2. Fresh start on earth, but excluding the Americas and southern Africa
3. Fresh start on an earth-like world that starts in an equivalent place in time.
 
• 100 year turns so actual progress through time can be made. I think that I have figured a way to have long turns and still keep the game interesting and personal.
Click to expand...

It'd be interesting to hear it... but maybe 25 or 50 years could work too? Things didn't happen *that* slowly in the Iron Age, you know. ;) Seriously, the 10th century BC was more than enough for Ancient Israel to reach its zenith, decline and fall apart, for example.

I'm not sure as to what are the real differences between 1 and 2 are, but all variants sound acceptable to me. EDIT: More than acceptable seeing as it's going to be a BirdNES. ;)
 
I agree with das. 50 year turns are just about perfect for most of history.

The first option would be all right so long as there was a limit on what kind of civilizations were in the Americas. European-style nations simply should not work in an area which isn't European. The second is also fine. The third is my strong preference, though, simply because I don't feel constrained to develop a civilization based on an Earth one. Taking all that into account, I'll vote third.
 
das said:
It'd be interesting to hear it... but maybe 25 or 50 years could work too? Things didn't happen *that* slowly in the Iron Age, you know. ;) Seriously, the 10th century BC was more than enough for Ancient Israel to reach its zenith, decline and fall apart, for example.

I'm not sure as to what are the real differences between 1 and 2 are, but all variants sound acceptable to me.
Click to expand...
They are only different in the amount of the world included.

As far as the 100 year turns, every turn would be combination of BT and IT. But it would be player driven and not mod driven. Players would break their orders into the reigns of their rulers for each 100 years covered by the turn. Spending and diplo instructions would be allocated by them across the whole 100 years. When I update, I will do it in 20 year increments with maps. That way kings can wage wars and their reigns can be followed by years of peace and consolidation. Each update would be 5 mini updates. Spending constraints would be a limiting factor for players.

Family trees would be an important part of the game so players would have to provide for ongoing family trees. Marraige between royal families could prove intersting.

Do you think it would work?
 
That seriously depends on the amount of time you allotted to each mini-update. If it's too long, you'll still have the problem of a slow pace; if it's too short, people can't write about each king, so it hardly matters.
 
North King said:
That seriously depends on the amount of time you allotted to each mini-update. If it's too long, you'll still have the problem of a slow pace; if it's too short, people can't write about each king, so it hardly matters.
Click to expand...
Players would write orders for the whole 100 years.I figure that I could write the five mini updates in about the same time it took to write one BirdNES update, so from a modding stand point it would move along faster. If every player spend most of their efforts in the first 20 years or so, then the last updates would be mostly BT.

Essentially, this is just a change from 300 years of IT followed by 300 years of BT into 50 years of IT followed by 50 years of BT repeated over and over again.

EDIT: What does "other" mean to those of you who chose that option? What would you like to see offered?
 
Do you think it would work?
Click to expand...

While the dynasties sound neat, the mini-update system sounds redundant. What's the point of breaking it up into mini-updates if the orders are the same for the entire period? And if they aren't, then what's the point in having mini-updates?
 
das said:
While the dynasties sound neat, the mini-update system sounds redundant. What's the point of breaking it up into mini-updates if the orders are the same for the entire period? And if they aren't, then what's the point in having mini-updates?
Click to expand...

I want players to be thinking in both IT and BT terms. The descrete updates will allow for story details relevant to specific people that players may be attached to. A long lived king that does great deeds (or tries to) can get attention in the update, but those who follow may be less prominent.

For example:
King Rex of Ebla 1000-950:
Invades Egypt 990 (campaign details)
Other works of note (details)

King Rex II 950-941
BT emphasis on whatever player thinks is important (general guidelines)

King Rex III 941-920
Spends to improve trade and explore Mediterranean (details)
Builds great lighthouse project (details)
Researches naval tech

King Rex IV 920-900
BT continuing to follow in Rex IIIs path (general guidelines)

In the update these events would be matched in time to the actions of neighbors. BT passages could have deaths and unintended changes or even involve wars started by others. The course of any nation would be heavily influenced by other players, but unlike long BTs guided by the mod, these would more heavily controlled by players and there would be more opportunity to salvage downturns.
 
The Strategos said:
Anything with a short enough timeframe that my characters I write about and roleplay can live over mutiple updates.
Click to expand...
That would require a turn length of less than 20 years. How about families that live for many updates? ;)
 
So you'd want BT orders, but split in fives, essentially? I guess that works, but since they'll be changing it anyway, why not ask for five really short sets of orders? A word limit, perhaps.
 
Meh. It still seems a bit redundant; why not just have ordinary updates, only divided into sections by time (as was done in BirdNES I) and orders divided by rulers?

Also I think this model is going to suffer as far as diplomacy is concerned. Incidentally, why have diplomacy in the "general" orders for the period? Monarchic diplomacy in particular has always been prone to rapid changes from ruler to ruler.
 
North King said:
So you'd want BT orders, but split in fives, essentially? I guess that works, but since they'll be changing it anyway, why not ask for five really short sets of orders? A word limit, perhaps.
Click to expand...
That would work too. the most important aspect of orders would be that they be assigned a time frame within the turn.
das said:
Meh. It still seems a bit redundant; why not just have ordinary updates, only divided into sections by time (as was done in BirdNES I) and orders divided by rulers?
Click to expand...
Given the way players write orders (very detailed), the problem I see with that is that five regular updates would be a huge task to actually write. That would be just like using 20 year turns. BirdNES took almost 8 months to move 75 years.
das said:
Also I think this model is going to suffer as far as diplomacy is concerned. Incidentally, why have diplomacy in the "general" orders for the period? Monarchic diplomacy in particular has always been prone to rapid changes from ruler to ruler.
Click to expand...
I was waiting for this issue to come up. I do not have a solution for it yet.
 
Ahhhhhhhh, I see. I retract my objection to the system, but the diplomacy bit must be solved.
 
North King said:
Ahhhhhhhh, I see. I retract my objection to the system, but the diplomacy bit must be solved.
Click to expand...
Here are two ideas:

A written diplomacy doctrine that is similar to the military doctrine concept. This would provide guidelines for handling situations as they arose.

Posted "news flashes" (or pms) that would alert players that had a diplo crises to be dealt with as part of the next update section. EP allocated to that segment could be changed to meet new conditions. The goal would be to allow responses without slowing down the game.

At the start of each 100 year cycle, players could plan diplo with other players on a grand scale and even schedule joint wars or other actions. In any case the diplo nature of the game would change. It would be more reactive than proactive.

The whole approach designed to mimic the rise and fall of empires over centuries rather than decades. Players could even plan their own internal revolutions to change dynasties if they wanted.
 
A written diplomacy doctrine that is similar to the military doctrine concept. This would provide guidelines for handling situations as they arose.
Click to expand...

Or a general diplomatic line; that seems more appropriate (diplomatic doctrine sounds more like the actual style of negotiations and such), as well as more malleable, which diplomacy necessarily is.

Well, I still am slightly dubious about the system as a whole, but yes, it sounds like it's worth a try. Still not sure what to vote for, though; the options aren't all that different, you know.
 
Well, I would say a non-Earth map compared to an Earth one is pretty significant. :p
 
North King said:
Well, I would say a non-Earth map compared to an Earth one is pretty significant. :p
Click to expand...

That is the biggest difference: It means, one, the players need to develop their own cultures and two, a lot more work on a map.
 
Birdjaguar said:
That is the biggest difference: It means, one, the players need to develop their own cultures and two, a lot more work on a map.
Click to expand...

Oh? Not all players will need to develop their own cultures ;)

I am expressing no opinion as of now and will continue to see what others post and comment upon before making a decision :)
 
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