This game is experimental; Rules subject to change
Game Basics
In APITS, you control an industrial age country striving for power and glory. The map is divided into Provinces which may be owned by you, another player or NPC country, or not controlled by any recognised state.
Turns and Orders
The game is divided into turns each taking half a year in real time. Orders can be placed in the thread or sent by PM, with the newest order overwriting any previous one. Please send complete orders every time you change/resend orders.
Events
Each turn you may be called on to respond to events happening to your country. These will be based on your roleplaying actions, or they may be based on historical events, or they can be random events.
Core Provinces
Of the Provinces you own, they may be Core Provinces or Non-Core Provinces. Cores include all the Provinces that you start the game with, along with any other Provinces which gained Core status at a later stage, and are indicated by your Country’s flag.
Cores are the most integrated and loyal regions of your country; each core province gives an additional 50% defensive bonuses to units in that province and gives you one free unit. For each additional unit you build over the number of your core provinces you must pay an Upkeep.
Culture
APITS uses a highly simplified culture system with 15 Culture Groups. Their relevance mainly pertains to the expansion of cores. Certain levels of Civics Tech and some events allow you to nominate a province to be upgraded to a Core, but only a Province with a Culture Group already present in any of the country’s existing cores can become a Core province.
Culture Groups can overlap and may change by events.
Industrial Capacity
The “currency” of the game is Industrial Capacity, or IC. Each turn each Province produces an amount of IC, called Base IC, as indicated by numbers on the map. The sum of your Provinces’ Base IC modified by bonuses or other effects (if applicable) is your Total IC for the turn. From this, any Upkeep that you need to pay is subtracted to give your Available IC, the amount of resources you have free to spend on building units, researching technologies, and so forth.
IC Cost is the cost to expand Base IC in a province by 1. This is equal to your average Base IC (Total IC / number of provinces) at the start of the game.
Note that only IC from provinces connected to your capital by either land or sea is counted towards the sum of Base ICs. Blockades can be used to disrupt the connection. If your Available IC is negative, an event will fire giving you unpleasant choices.
Stability
Each country has a Stability level indicating how secure your government is that turn, with 10 being most stable to 1 being least stable.
Each stability level from 5 and below increases the probability of an armed rebellion happening somewhere in your country by 10% each turn.
Technology
The tech tree in APITS is split into four branches: Military, Civics, Economics, and Science. The exact nature of what is researched at each Tech Level and the corresponding bonus is determined by whichever country reaches it first. In addition there are basic bonuses for each level:
- Each Military Tech level increases unit strength by 1 and cost by 2
- Each Civics Tech level increases Stability by 1 and Upkeep cost by 2
- Each Economic Tech level increases Base IC by 1 and Base IC cost by 2
- Each Science Tech level decreases one of Unit Cost, Upkeep or Base IC cost by 1 (your choice)
Diplomacy
Players can conclude diplomatic agreements between themselves or with NPCs. Breaking treaties may trigger penalizing events as appropriate.
Espionage and Special Missions
A list of espionage missions and their costs will be posted later.
You can also suggest any other special missions (eg building a canal through Panama for instance) to the GM.
War and Combat
APITS uses a combat system similar to Diplomacy, with a few key differences:
- Units don’t have the same strength, so a country whose single unit has strength 3, for instance, would win in battle against two units each of strength 1.
- In addition, there are other modifiers such as provincial defensive bonuses from terrain, cores, or fortifications.
- There are two types of army units, infantry which can move one province per turn, and cavalry which can move up to two provinces per turn. Cavalry can move through provinces already occupied by another unit.
- Fleets can move up to five provinces per turn; crossing a sea zone takes two moves, and crossing an ocean take three moves.
- Ferrying army units works by loading directly on to fleet units
- Units may be built or disbanded at any time
- Units are built with IC and their costs start at 1 for infantry units and 3 for cavalry and fleet units. Upkeep costs for non-free units start at 1 per turn. They can be built anywhere that is connected to the capital either by land or sea.
