ITNES Ib Development Thread

[Swissempire]

The T/L/U/T system

I like the way you're thinking for economic system, and heres what i say would be good.

T=L/U/T


T=The total of your Economic Power, i.e Spending Points. Having this in front will streamline the system and help player WHILE keeping the level on complicatedness

L= Land Areas. Regions that you have that are rich in manufacturing or Agriculuture or something. Like Iggy's system. I already explained how this is more realistic. You could if you want to make it more compliacted, make some regions worth more than other, depending on richness. Infrastructure has a big role in this one.

U=Urban Economy. This is the sum total of your Urban power. It represents industry, city services, and other facets a city provides. Living Standards and Happiness and Confidence have a big effect on this, as it will go up or down with people's contentment and if people are rioting in the streets or live in cushy apartments. This encourages in warfare people to either try to capture a city or destroy it. Cities could be worth different amounts if you wanted that too. I.E. During WW2 Pittsburgh was worth much more to America than Los Angelos....

T=Trade Economy. Your Import/Export ratio and your trade with other nations or within your nation. This is impacted by your foreign relations and infrastructure. This way is someone embargo's you it isn't just an update event, it has dire economic consequences. This would also encourage the use of Tariffs and Free Trade. If nations choose to be mercantile and trade internation and intercolony, then it can show here too.

And thats the TLUT system.

Now, as for Economic Sacrificing and Growth, i say get rid of it. No sacrificing, but instead during wartime you can Mobilize your economy or get your a$$ into gear. This stops Siam from in 1 turn building and elitely training a huge army.

For economic growth, have factors that can be ENCOURAGED by the player grow or decrease it. They can fund government programs to grow the economic power in one area, but they can't put in 1 ecopoint to grow economy. Instead treat it like a research program, so intial investment and then keep working on it until it happens. Like a irrigation system someting like that. But when doing that take into account then infrastructure increases and Legislation and stuff like that to do it.

And lastly, whenever someone does something make them have a reason. No 1 point into growing infrastructure, make them describe what that one point is doing and WHY it deserves to grow the infrastructure, or WHAT is making the Living Standards higher.

Thats my thought.

 

[alex994]

Personally I prefer the current eco center and etc policy. Though I would say Lord Iggy's region system if it ever expands has great potential

 

[Birdjaguar]

Other than small numbers of elite, specialized troops, training only changes the quality of new recruits and the skill with which a "unit" responds under pressure. Training should only be effective at the conscript, recruit, & normal levels. Getting to veteran or better should only come through actual combat experience. A professional army without combat is no better than well trained recruits.

In most armies Veteran develop over time with combat victories. Elites are usually selected from veterans and then perhaps trained some more. I would limit the number of "units" better than "veterans" to only one or two and give them some special skills. UU would be different, they should be a different type of unit, but I would also limit them to some percent of the total army size (say 30% max).

In game term this would mean that EPs could be spent to improve training to "normal" but not higher. Victory on the battlefield coiuld improve things to veteran. One ortwo veteran unit could be designated as elite and a player could buy some number of UUs. UUs would also follow the same training/veteran path of regular units.

 

[Symphony D.]

One problem: keeping track of combat victories becomes exponentially more complex or arbitrary if you expand it beyond simply "have seen combat = veteran," which would be necessary to make such a system meaningful.

A much easier system with the same net effects is to have exponential decay of the units acquired for the same cost depending on their training. EG: 1EP = 20 Untrained Divisions, 10 Conscript Divisions, 5 Green Divisions, 3 Regular Divisions, 1 Professional Division, 2 Veteran Brigades, 1 Elite Brigade. Obviously subject to some revision in numbers, but it has effectively the same outcome with far less hassle. I've been thinking of doing something like this myself.

This also allows for far more flexibility in terms of military composition. You can have a decent sized all-Regular force, or perhaps a small but very Elite one, a large Untrained horde, or perhaps something unique like a core of Elites surrounded by Untrained meatshields.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Nice idea. It does create the right game effect.

 

[Israelite9191]

In my opinion the solution to all of this is, simply, the Mod. Mods should use their power ore than they normally do. Everything should be subect to the decisions of the Mod. For instance, when I Mod, I may use the traditional training rules, but I also take into account other factos. For instance, if one player has been succesfuly at war constantly, then that will result in training and military leadership levels going up somewhat. Or, if someone has developed their culture to be mercantile in nature, then they will have some economic benefits. Mods lock themselves into the written rules too much, which means that when things seem too unrealistic they come up with new rules, but these rules tend to make playability worse. If Mods utilize the "unwritten" rules more, it creates more realism, better playability, and more overall fun NES.

 

[alex994]

I agree with israelite, and bash those players who are against "god-modding" such as the usage of anything aside from the stats in determining combat and etc. No one in particular of course...

 

[Sheep]

I really think you should rename that system. My young son reads these things sometimes.

 

[Thlayli]

*disagrees with almost everything, and raises the banner of rabid reactionaries in the corner of the thread*

The major roads are rather unnecessary, IMO. Though I do agree that training should be reformed, the current NES2V/VI economy system works just fine.

Let's not just change for the sake of changing things...

 

[Symphony D.]

I agree with israelite, and bash those players who are against "god-modding" such as the usage of anything aside from the stats in determining combat and etc.

It's called random-events, and "Because I say so" is generally a very poor reason that makes people angry. Why bother with rules at all then? I don't see any of these rules making playability worse definitively. In fact, asserting any of them do is pretty much just an arbitrary opinion as there's no evidence either way until they're tried. Most of the events are affected by other things such as tactics and what not, at least in das's NESes, so that complaint is useless anyway.

That said, several of the additions don't seem necessary, except economy and military, which are really part of the core of gameplay since they're the main "tools" for "interaction." I'm not in favor of a more finicky economic system involving farms and other doodads unless it's easy to make it clear how all the numbers stack up.

I would like to say, however, that major roads, if implemented are rather quite different from major sea lanes. A ship can go anywhere on the water (except shallows or shoals obviously), and sea lanes are only demonstrative of the most frequently traveled routes. A major road is an actual physical construction that may traverse terrain that's otherwise impassible, and is not just there to demonstrate the way most things flow; there is a concrete difference. Major sealanes can pretty much be guessed rather easily anyway, since at least on Earth, the geography's the same and there are certain logical routes (usually the shortest distance), whereas a road can be built any which way.

 

[das]

I suppose that's what I get for inviting your suggestions (am mostly... irritated by Swiss, though).

On Economy - I am presently considering switching to a point-based system (integrating taxation and trade); as for the farmlands, I am considering dropping them, or keeping them as semi-eyecandy (as with the trade centers) that will influence the economy (and other things) indirectly.

On Training - I am presently considering switching the stat to a general "Quality" stat (generalizing the training, the experience, the equipment and the leadership, and other factors), that still could be raised by eco. point (or from military experience), and will probably still be based on the Dis system as it still works just fine (unless someone has any better ideas); in connection with this, Leadership will also undergo changes - I am considering creating a Government Efficiency stat (the same quality stat, but for the government itself instead of the military).

On Culture - I intend to move away from the oft-confusing level system (see Panda's situation in NES2 VIb), and instead write down the major cultural (in this case also meaning ethnic/religious) groups in the country, their relative strenght and loyalty and the various foreign influences on the country. I might also make some mention of the key nation traits there (although I might just put that in the nation background as I tend to do in any case).

On Roads - the KEY roads only. In any case, it will be useful for strategic planning, and will limit the amount of time people bug me about roads (although admittedly in NES2 VI that was mostly about railroads...).

One idea I've been toying around with is showing army positions on the map; I will only put up rounded numbers and (probably) the army's central position, though. This is largely based on my NES2 VIb experience, during which a) virtually everyone of importance kept asking questions about other people's military positions and b) lots of people apparently had no an idea just where exactly did they leave their troops. Now, a seemingly-major argument against this decision would be that it will grant other people way too much information about the player's army; but, consider that most of the times large armies are difficult to hide; that enemy spies will probably find out the same information by bugging me persistantly and clogging up my PM box; and finally, that you could always try and hide your armies, or put up decoy ones (like the Americans did before D-Day, for instance). This will in general make things more interesting (due to the added capability for trickery), AND this will drastically decrease the amount of strategic question PMs I keep getting, AND this will generally make things far easier for both me and the players, as we will all now have a better idea as to what the hell is going on. Many NES2 VI and particularily NES2 VIb updates took as long as they did because I always had to check and double-check troop positions. So yes, I'll probably do this.

 

[das]

The leveled culture system is more to show cultural dominance and developedness IMO.

Culture is a terribly ambigous thing, you see, if only because most empires tend to be multicultural (but there are other reasons too, like the lack of clear criterias for judgement).

Ranking cultures is a practice in Western cultural superiority that, as intelligent people, we should be above engaging in.

By saying that ranking cultures is a practice in Western cultural superiority that "intelligent people" should be above engaging in, you claim that the Western culture is an inferior one (because it claims to be superior, apparently), thus yourself engaging in an act of ranking cultures. Caught ya!

Also, technically the words "a practice in Western cultural superiority" imply a completely different extreme - if Western culture isn't culturally superior, it would be impossible to practice its superiority. I'm in a jovial mood tonight, so bear with me please.

Paradoxically, though I find your argumentation laughable, I still do agree with your point - ranking cultures is impossible to do; as I had already said, culture is way too ambigous a thing.

As for eco centers, I suggest if you don't use them, to switch to the fairly popular system that Jal and Iggy use, since the levels stat is moronic.

I am beginning to lean towards that position as well (see above).

And for certain, don't downgrade powers just because they are powerful. Major nations SHOULD be powerful. It's the definition of them. NES2 VI was unbalanced, but the REAL WORLD is unbalanced, and if you don't like playing small nations, make your nation bigger or DON'T PLAY!

Thanks, I know. Don't worry, I never destroy empires for gameplay's sake (otherwise neither the FK in NES2 V nor the HRE in NES2 VI would've survived, much less triumphed) - I do destroy them when their survival is unfeasible, though (like I did with Dar al-Islam).

And thus shall be done with ITNES.

Can we have realistic army sizes?

What exactly do you have in mind (i.e. do you want them bigger or smaller?)?

No, I just want it impossible to create a huge, highly trained army unless you are very rich and big.

Here's the problem - a nation's wealth and a nation's army training don't really have to correlate. It depends more on military tradition, experience and necessity, and training methodic. Army size depends more on population than on anything else (although to maintain a huge army, a strong economy is needed).

In my opinion the solution to all of this is, simply, the Mod. Mods should use their power ore than they normally do. Everything should be subect to the decisions of the Mod. For instance, when I Mod, I may use the traditional training rules, but I also take into account other factos. For instance, if one player has been succesfuly at war constantly, then that will result in training and military leadership levels going up somewhat. Or, if someone has developed their culture to be mercantile in nature, then they will have some economic benefits. Mods lock themselves into the written rules too much, which means that when things seem too unrealistic they come up with new rules, but these rules tend to make playability worse. If Mods utilize the "unwritten" rules more, it creates more realism, better playability, and more overall fun NES.

Change a few words and you get some perfect arguments in favour of absolute enlightened monarchy - I wonder if you have gotten too much into character. In any case, I do operate in that manner when and where rules don't work or create an unrealistic effect. Consider that an argument in favour of a Gaullist democracy.

I really think you should rename that system. My young son reads these things sometimes.

Seconded!

Let's not just change for the sake of changing things...

I never do that, you know. I change things for the sake of making the whole system work better. And for the sake of decreasing my workload - trully, laziness drives progress.

 

[North King]

Thanks, I know. Don't worry, I never destroy empires for gameplay's sake (otherwise neither the FK in NES2 V nor the HRE in NES2 VI would've survived, much less triumphed) - I do destroy them when their survival is unfeasible, though (like I did with Dar al-Islam).

And thus shall be done with ITNES.

Well that's good, but some people seemed to be advocating it and I felt like a second (more correct ) opinion was needed.

Can you also stop inflicting religious troubles on the East, when those never really came about in those areas until the Westerners introduced their fanticism? I mean, seriously, Hinduism and Buddhism competed, but almost every update in ITNES I for some reason had all these religious fanatics rising up, when the core of Kalinga is religious tolerance. You don't see Jewish rebellions in the USA, do you?

What exactly do you have in mind (i.e. do you want them bigger or smaller?)?

Fortunately we're mostly out of the offending ages. In the ancient age, though, an army size of even 50 hundreds was laughable. Assyria mustered 60,000 in one battle.

Here's the problem - a nation's wealth and a nation's army training don't really have to correlate. It depends more on military tradition, experience and necessity, and training methodic. Army size depends more on population than on anything else (although to maintain a huge army, a strong economy is needed).

Agreed.

 

[Swissempire]

System renamed, and Sheep if your son is old enough to surf the internet and read sites like these and absorb and understand, he's probably seen and used the word before.

Protectionism for children is no better than the economic theory of the same name.


And Das, on the farm land areas, i think it would be easier to create regions if you would want to do that.

 

[Israelite9191]

I still say that elimanting the eco centers is foolish. Without eco centers or, preferably, special cities there is pretty much no way to show the value of individual cities unless, of course, you g-d Mod.

You don't see Jewish rebellions in the USA, do you?

For now, my friend, for now.

 

[North King]

Gah! Don't you people ever learn? Remember the last time you rebelled against a Rome-like power?

 

[Oruc]

Rome-Like? haha you american pig-dogs

 

[KrimzonStriker]

Hey das, since Finmaster has disappeared I'd like Dacia if you don't mind. The Charatian Dominion isn't looking too appealing after all this time.

 

[Oruc]

finny might come back though

 

[KrimzonStriker]

Ehhh I'll deal with it when it comes. If he doesn't get back in time though I'd like to say too bad, so sad, goodbye now. If not I'll figure something out, The Empire of the Rising Sun might survive hopefully...