1e gets you a unit, which can be military, or cultural, or religious, or merchants, or whatever you want, on sea or on land, whatever you can reasonably build. Units require upkeep, which automatically eats into your income unless you want to risk not supplying your things.
2e gets you a building, something that gets you more money via tax (nomads, cities) or trade (resource workers, ports) or helps defend your territory (fortress) or prevents rebellions (palace) or spreads/improves your culture (monument).
(X)e will get you tech level (X) in a given tech catergory (Culture, Engineering etc) provided you already have the previous tech level (X-1).
LONG VERSION:
I am overjoyed to share the energy-thought matrix that is the third official DaftNES. This is probably not the kind of NES that people want to play, however it is what I want to mod, so here goes
This NES might seem strange and awkward for a few reasons, even considering who is modding it. Firstly, its more or less a mash-up of all my other NESes ever, and of course steals lots of ideas from the NESing collective, especially Bil's SLYNES. Its closest relatives are probably the Alternate Timeline Experiment, DaftNES 1, Civ3 NES 1, ZPNESV and Nesse. Secondly, for once I've actually playtested this idea quite a bit by myself before trying to run it. Thirdly, my whole approach is going to be more abstract, than say DaftNES2 for example...
In this NES, I won't be attempting to deliver a detailed snapshot of history every turn. I will not be going into details about population, military equipment, the exact location and size of individual cities etc. I will not be ramming details down the throats of players, even though it has pleased me to do so in the past. Instead, I will be concentrating on the core mechanics of the game, using an icon-intensive map to cut down on the amount of stats needed to represent things (which, for me personally, is actually easier).
That doesn't mean that I'm ignoring all the usual variables of a NES. This is not meant to be a pure board-game experience. It is supposed to represent a real world, but on quite an abstract level, so that I can actually handle it all without freaking out. And more importantly, I should not need weeks, months or indeed years to complete a single update. In some ways the updates will be more specific, but in most ways they will be less so. It is up to the players to build as much on top of that as they want.
The only solid rules will relate to your income, and how you spend it. Otherwise I will be doing some dice rolling, but mainly I will be making decisions on the level that I can best do that, which is pretty abstract. I'm not a history buff by any means. I'm pretty uneducated compared to a lot of people here, and I realise now that guestimating lots of specific numbers and things has always made me uneasy, and that indecision has been a major obstacle slowing down my updates in the past.
Therefore, as mentioned, the stats for this game are quite simple. The less I try to pin everything down as specific stats, I believe, the better things will be able to possibly fit into a picture of realism, and the various definitions thereof, at any point in time, should you wish to see things like that hmm. Most details will be on the map in fact, and the icons will relate directly to your income, or things you can use in the game, like armies and fleets.
After this point I assume the reader is actually interested in playing, so please excuse me for being so presumptuous...
THE WORLD
The world is a remix of Earth (ALT-WORLD FRESH START), populated by tribal humans, who have recently spread out to cover the whole globe. But now some of them are acting strangely, settling down to farm and build unhealthy cities, which is where you come in.
You can expect the same plants and animals to exist in this world, with a few extras. The continents of this world are rather different, however. In the beginning I have named every territory with something random. The continents themselves are unnamed. You are welcome to suggest new names for things.
Spoiler:
CRADLE #1: this 'eurasia' is roughly similar to the one found on the real earth, complete with cattle and horses, except that it has fully absorbed 'africa', and what might be called the 'east asian' peoples are missing.
Spoiler:
CRADLE #2: the enlightened 'east asian' peoples have a continent all to themselves, more or less. It lies south of the equator. There are some horses lurking on the edge of extinction, but no suitable cattle, aside from alpaca-like mammals.
Spoiler:
CRADLE #3: The 'native americans' have already been invaded by another, later wave of immigrants, what might be called 'indo-nesian' peoples, who also live on the other two continents. 'South america' is missing, replaced by several large islands. There may be no cattle species at all, but lots of interesting plants. This cradle is likely to be the quietest and slowest to develop, but note that it is not as isolated as the real-world Americas.
PLAYERS / FACTIONS
You will start off with an 'advanced tribe'. You could end up controlling multiple separate factions later on. As usual you can play as the 'powers behind the throne', or roleplay as specific leaders at times, up to you. Just note that you do not control the minds of the common people.
I don't want to force people to go down the route of civilization and empires. I use the term 'faction', since we might end up with epic pirate fleets or something like a Papacy being listed in the stats. A 'faction' is just anything interesting enough, organised enough, with a noticeable income - which might not come from cities or resources at all. The game mechanics should allow you to be a religious power, or a trading power, etc, without needing vast armies and having lots of cities to defend. Or you can play as nomadic peoples. You can have many specialisations not listed in the stats.
There will be no 'winner' of this NES, and I dislike 'awards' too. You have to set your own goals
TIME
The timescale will be somewhat civ-like, in that the early turns will consist of longer time spans, up to several centuries long. Exactly how much time passes depends on what I think is appropriate for what is going on. I will be keeping track of how many years have passed since the start of the game, which would equate to roughly 4000 BC in the real world. You are welcome to mark your own year-zero at some point significant to you.
MAP
This game will of course focus on the map, which is different to normal NES maps, as it gives quite an abstract picture of the world, and is icon-intensive. It is quite empty to start with. So you are looking at the world as it is divided into various territories, based on geographical boundaries instead of political ones. The territories represent fairly large chunks of the world (up to Kazakhstan size, or even bigger). A faction can be spread across several of these territories or concentrated in one area, and still be fully functional, without specifically controlling or owning any single zone. Because the territories are just geographical location-holders. Example:
Some important things about the map:
SpoilerIMPORTANT THINGS :
First and foremost, I will repeat, territories can be shared by any number of different factions. Nobody has to 'own' a territory in order to get income from there! Cities of different factions can coexist peacefully in the same territory, and the resources in those territories can also be worked by different factions at once. Worker icons are shown next to the resources they work on. All other buildings and things are represented by the rows of individual icons above the name of that territory. Exactly where all these things are located physically, within that territory, doesn't matter at all for my purposes. They are just in there, somewhere, within reach of each other. However, there are limits to the number-of-cities-per-territory and workers-per-resource that can be supported, and all cities/workers of all factions count towards these limits. IE in a crowded territory, the faction with the best techs will be able to support more cities and workers, and this can even allow for non-violent colonisations to occur. This should all become clearer as the game progresses.
IF one faction becomes the undisputed power in a territory, it will get a coloured inner border to match the colour of the owning faction, which means that the geographical frontiers are better guarded, and it will be harder for outsiders to invade or influence these particular lands. It also means more power and influence can be projected from there.
BUT territory itself gives absolutely no income by default. In this NES, your main sources of income come direct from the cities (placed in territories) and workers (placed on the resources found inside territories), which are always owned and controlled individually. Cities can be built with money, and/or they will randomly duplicate themselves over time, depending on the suitability of the terrain. By default, discovered resources are always worked by a single worker from (and give income to) one faction or other. Additional workers may also be bought with money, or may randomly appear depending on your tech levels. Some resources are fixed, while some can sometimes be imported from elsewhere (crops and cattle). Some resources may not become visible until they are randomly stumbled upon, and/or new technologies appear. There will never be more than three separate resources in a single territory, and sometimes none at all. There are many other ways to get income besides, but these all involve building things, researching things, or raiding/demolishing things.
Territories have one kind of dominating terrain, shown by the base colours and scenery icons like mountains and bits of jungle. Grey = 'Mountainous', grey/green = 'Hilly', light pale green = 'Grassland', leaf green = 'Dense Forest', darkest green = 'Jungle', sandy = 'Desert', and light grey/blue = 'Tundra'. You can also see that water is differentiated into shallow/calm and rough/deep. The effects of all these on health, travel, warfare, and natural population growth should be obvious.
Some territories have blue borders separating them instead of light grey. This, of course, represents one or more major rivers separating them. Trade/contacts can flow along rivers, but they can be obstacles to warfare as you might expect. Rivers can also be used by fleets, to a certain extent.
Armies/Fleets - Units - are shown by the Civ2 style icons. If units have a little shield icon above them, this is to indicate who owns them. White is the 'Barbarian' colour. All units without shields can also be assumed to be tribal barbarians, since there are lots of them. A 'broken' shield represents a unit in a 'disrupted' state - lacking morale, manpower, supplies, or weapons, or all of those things. A chevron above the shield represents a 'veteran' unit, which can also be 'disrupted'. Given the timescales of this game, the only limits on the movement of your armies and fleets are your lines of communication, as will be covered later.
Island groups are lumped together into single territories for convenience, and fleets will be as useful as armies for doing things here. Island groups with a '+' after their name are large enough to support all the usual buildings and things. But islands marked with a '-' are actually tiny archipelagos, shown at exaggerated scale on the map. These are only important because of their position at sea. They are unable to support more than one of each type of building.
BARBARIANS
These are all over the world and they all share the same colour, which is white. But they are not one big collective. Each barbarian unit can be assumed to be an individual tribe or warband or etc, and they will often fight each other. Barbarians can also spawn Workers, Nomads and Cities (see BUILD-ABLE THINGS), but they all function independently. They do not have economies exactly, but they will not get masses of units out of nowhere. Barbarians can of course be influenced by civilized factions, and eventually form new factions themselves.
Although I use the term 'barbarian' for convenience, note that they can be useful allies, trading with you and supporting your religion and helping you defend your territory etc.
ECONOMY
The 'e' is the universal unit of currency/motivation/man-hours/general 'economic potential' (idea stolen from Bil's SLYNES). I expect to be dealing with small, simple sums, at least for the early game. I will not deal with any fractions besides exactly 0.5e, and multiples thereof.
The 'e' is gained from tax on Cities, profit from Workers on resources, raiding your enemies, and special things like trade and religion. It is spent on new buildings and units, and on the upkeep of units and palaces. Your income can also be stolen by your enemies, drained by corruption, or ruined by disasters and the like. Your stats will show you how much 'e' you currently have to spend at the start of a turn, as well as how much was automatically deducted for upkeep, and how much was actually received last turn. You can of course give your 'e' away to others, or demand it from them, via the usual diplomacy. Note that I always require confirmation from both players regarding any deals.
Overview:
1e builds you any kind of 'unit', on land or sea, of your definition, spawning from any territory where you already have units or buildings (see UNITS). Note that units will eat 0.5e per turn to support themselves. Of course you can only have units that are realistically available to you, depending on your tech levels and inventions and available resources.
2e builds you a 'building' of your choice, in some territory you have reasonable access to (see BUILD-ABLE THINGS). Of course, whether it actually functions or not depends on who else is there and what they feel about you. Buildings will either give you more 'e' one way or another, or help you protect the income that you have. Only a 'Palace' requires any upkeep, starting at 0.5e per turn.
Xe gets you tech level (X) of the desired tech type, assuming you already have tech level (X-1). You can also raise other people's techs up to your own levels at reduced cost (see TECHNOLOGIES).
Overspending:
You are allowed to overspend by a few 'e' and go into debt (negative treasury). The safe limit is the negative of your Economics level. Being in debt hurts your prestige a little, and there may be some small debt payments eating into your income, but otherwise you can carry on as normal. However, if you get below the negative of your Economics level, you are risking economic collapse and all kinds of difficulty.
Underspending:
Obviously, the opposite of being in debt is having a surplus, which increases your prestige and stability a little. It also improves your resistance to random disasters and the like. If the 'e' left in your treasury at the end of a turn (after spending, and before new income is received) is equal or greater than your Economics level, then you receive this bonus. As such it becomes progressively harder to get.
Trade:
Trade will happen automatically, unless you specifically blockade people, or some big wars are going on in the area, etc. Your units can sometimes act like traders, or at least protect trade routes, or make contacts with new tribes and people to trade with etc etc. Trade income is an arbitrary 'extra' amount taxed from merchants etc, which you may or may not recieve each turn. Obviously, the more people make use of the special resources on the map, the more trade will be going on. Cities will also like to trade miscellaneous things with each other. But you do not even need to have any cities or resources in your territory - just to occupy the right places where the trade routes might converge.
BUILD-ABLE THINGS
Each of these costs 2e to build, and it might also yield 2e to pillage and destroy them. I repeat that you do not need total control of a territory in order to try to build something there, but you must have reasonable access to it, and preferably a friendly unit of some kind there to guard it.
Basically, you can think of these in Civ terms, and you will understand them quite well.
SpoilerADDITIONAL DETAILS :
City: represents a quanta of settled population, and usually gives 1e per turn in tax. You can also 'overtax' a City for 1.5e, but this risks leaving it 'disrupted' for next turn - giving only 0.5e tax, or perhaps none at all, as well as other penalties, as will be explained later (see SPECIAL THINGS: Disrupted Cities).
The same tax is received regardless of the underlying terrain. However, the terrain will affect the chances of disease, or the chances of population growth - settlements are quite likely to multiply in favourable terrains, which are Grassland and Forest. There will be almost no random growth in Mountain, Desert and Tundra, and those places are often more susceptible to disasters.
Each City allows the building of an extra unit (of any type) in this territory per turn (see UNITS: Spawning Limits).
Cities can be razed and massacred, usually yielding around 2e. Or they can be pillaged and enslaved, usually yielding around 1e and converting the City into 'Slaves', which are also described in the next section. Obviously, massacring or enslaving people will stir up bad feelings towards you.
When it comes to defence against enemies, Cities are assumed to have some basic militia for defence, although these are best teamed up with a Fortress and some military unit(s) of some kind.
Your 'Infrastructure' tech level determines the safe number of Cities that can be supported per territory, including any other Cities built by other factions there. So if your Infrastructure is higher than your rivals, they may have overcrowding problems in the same territory, while you do not. The more favourable the terrain, the more tolerance there is before disease and unrest sets in. Regardless of such overcrowding, Cities can be difficult to control for various reasons, especially if you have occupied foreign Cities, or are being influenced by a foreign culture. The middle 'dot' of the city icon will always share the colour of whatever faction the people most associate with, so watch out. This can be different to who actually controls the City, which is shown by the colour of the outer circle.
Nomad: basically, a well organised bunch of nomads and/or optimistic settlers, capable of forming a city of sorts at short notice, wherever they choose to stop. Nomads only give 0.5e tax income, and still count as a City in terms of Infrastructure support (see BUILD-ABLE THINGS: Cities). But they are more resilient and less likely to rebel, be pillaged or suffer disasters. Like Cities, they can multiply over time. They also count as having some combat power themselves, and of course, they can move from territory to territory under your guidance, just like units (see UNITS: Ordering Units Around). You can try to convert some of your Cities into Nomads, especially in the early game, if you can inspire your people to leave home. Barbarian lands are quite likely to spawn Nomads, especially after the spread of Horseback Riding. Finally, Nomads can turn into fully-fledged Cities if they remain in place for a few turns.
Worker: these also represent merchants and traders etc. They give 1e per turn by default, regardless of the resource they work. Resources usually always have one free Worker on them, given to one of the nearby factions. More Workers can then be assigned for 2e a time, up to a certain total, dependent on your own tech levels, whichever is highest - Economics will cover all resources, but Engineering will also work for heavy goods (mines and tree felling), and Infrastructure can cover crops and animals. These tech limits are not absolute, but you accept increase risk of failure if you try to exceed it. Note that in the case of shared resources, the Workers of other factions still count towards your own limits. But if you have higher tech levels, you may be able to support more Workers on a resource, while your rivals may not.
Different resources can have different behind-the-scenes effects on your faction and those you trade with. But while simpler to deal with than Cities, these resources can usually be raided quite easily, and can become unprofitable suddenly (see SPECIAL THINGS: Unprofitable Workers).
Workers can be transferred to a different territory, but only to an identical type of resource, and only if there is room. You can safely disband a Worker at any time for 1e.
You should only attempt to develop resources at sea (fish, whales, and oil later on) if you have a port nearby.
Port: this will help trade and diplomatic contacts overseas, possibly generating more income, and/or leading to the appearance of new resources. A Port also supports your ships in the local area, making them generally better in battle, or trading, or whatever they are doing. Each Port can support three sea units like this. Each port also allows the building of one extra naval unit per turn from that territory (see UNITS: Spawning Limits). Finally, each Port is also assumed to support some basic patrol ships for defence and to give advanced warning of any naval invasion.
Fort: helps protect your Settlements from casual raiding, and protects your Resources to a lesser extent. This makes your people feel more secure, and thus makes it more likely for special things to appear in this territory (see SPECIAL THINGS). For defending Cities, there is no benefit to building more than one Fort per City in a territory. A Fort will also support your ground forces in the territory, making them more effective in battle, or trading, or whatever they are doing. Each Fort can support three land units like this. Forts are more effective in hills and mountains as you might expect. They also benefit from higher Engineering tech levels, although enemies can also get better siege engines that way. Finally, each Fort supports the building of one extra ground unit per turn in that territory (see UNITS: Spawning Limits).
Monument: this might also be called a temple, church, shrine, obelisk, stone circle, etc. It spreads your culture by means of religion or just impressing people. Once you have built a Monument, and if your Culture tech is high enough, you might start to get free Monuments in the neighbouring territories, as other peoples adopt your practices. This is especially true of the 'barbarians'. If your Monuments spread far enough, and influence enough people, you will start to get some extra income from 'Religion', aside from the subtle benefits of having greater influence.
In time your Culture may spawn one or more specific religions, with specific icons and etc. In the beginning, your 'Culture' and 'Religion' are assumed to be interchangeable. In general, Monuments promote peace and order in your Cities.
Foreign Monuments cannot be converted by force - you can either try to destroy them totally with your units, or spend 1e to convert them to your culture, which may take several attempts. The more Monuments you own, the greater chance you have for random free Culture tech increase each turn, and the more likely you are to spawn a Holy City or get a Wonder of the world (see SPECIAL THINGS).
Note that the effectiveness of Monuments decreases as your Enlightenment tech increases.
Palace: unlike all other buildings, a Palace is actually a drain on your income - by default it costs 0.5e per turn to maintain, and this might increase as your regime becomes more decadent. If you choose not to pay this on any turn, then bad things may or may not happen. But a Palace is a useful seat of power and government, inspiring extra loyalty in the nearby territories (including your army units) and enhancing your diplomatic influence, as well as lowering the loss of income from corruption. Having a Palace in place also lessens the risk of evolutions occurring. It also promotes the appearance of (SPECIAL THINGS).
Industry: These will appear in the late game (with Steam Power, or maybe earlier), each giving 1.5e per turn by default, probably. The idea is that Industry will be a quick new thing to develop for lots of extra money, at a time when there may be a shortage of empty territories and resources. The number of industries you can build in a single territory depends on your Industrial tech level. You must also have one City in that territory, or one Worker on a source of iron, oil, coal, uranium, or rare minerals in that territory, for each Industry you plan to build there. Each Industry will also allow the building of an extra unit (of any type) in this territory per turn (see UNITS: Spawning Limits).
Airbase, Civil Defence, Other Things: More info as and when we get that far!
None of these are build-able. They either happen to you when conditions are right, or you get them from doing special things.
These may take a little more explanation...
SpoilerADDITIONAL PYLONS :
Slaves: act just like a Worker when placed on a resource, yielding 1e per turn. If you don't have the tech to develop any resources further, they can be sent to serve domestic chores in one of your Cities, giving 0.5e per turn. Slaves cannot be made from scratch. You may be able to buy or sell them via diplomacy, but they are actually created from enslaving a City (or Nomad, see below). It doesn't matter if the target consists of foreigners or your own people, though the Slaves are likely to retain their original culture (the colour of the top part of the icon), and can rebel at any time for various reasons. If so, their desperation can make them a match for your military units. Note that Slaves never become 'unprofitable' like Workers (see below). Instead they will be reassigned, or they will rebel, or just die. Slaves may mutate into normal Workers over time, or they might multiply into more Slaves, or they might randomly disappear, depending on what is going on with your Faction.
Also, please note that Slaves are not ideal for cattle herding, or hunting wild game, or whatever else that requires freedom of movement over large areas, since they will just escape.
Disrupted City: a City that is suffering a disaster, unrest, or enemy action. Income is reduced to at least 0.5e a turn, perhaps 0e. If called upon to support unit building spawning (see UNITS: Spawning Limits), the unit will start in a disrupted/damaged state. A disrupted city should soon return to normal if conditions improve. Otherwise it is more vulnerable to enemy attack and influence as you might expect. If a city remains disrupted for a long time, it might rebel to another faction, or implode into one or more rebel units, or spontaneously convert into a Nomad, especially if there are less-crowded lands within reach.
Unprofitable Worker: created from a (formerly profitable) Worker by enemy raiding, blockade, or an excess of supply in the region. It doesn't produce any income at all. It may eventually return to normal, if conditions are right. If not, it may just disappear (merchants go bankrupt etc). If you want to protect your investment you can bail out the merchants for 0.5e per turn, per unprofitable icon.
Workshop: a territory with a workshop will produce higher quality units, and provide a little extra income from special goods, and slowly raise your Engineering tech especially. It also increases the chances of certain special Inventions turning up (see INVENTIONS), even if your Civilization Level is not quite high enough yet (see TECHNOLOGIES).
Academy: similar to a Workshop, this provides a little extra income from scholarly visitors, and will slowly raise your Enlightenment tech especially. It makes it more likely that you will learn new things from abroad, especially if you have contact with a foreign Academy somewhere. It also increases the chances of certain special Inventions turning up (see INVENTIONS), even if your Civilization Level is not quite high enough yet (see TECHNOLOGIES).
Wonder: can randomly mutate from any Monument at any time. However it is more likely to happen with newly-built Monuments, and typically you will need cutting-edge tech levels in the areas of Culture, and/or Engineering, and/or Enlightenment. A Wonder is a great boost to your prestige and cultural influence, and provides some actual income from visitors. Wonders can never be converted to other cultures. They are a great source of pride and will last forever unless destroyed by disasters, of if someone else deliberately destroys them, which would be remembered as a great act of vandalism.
Trade Centre: will appear where there are enough trade routes between enough developed resources converging on one spot, with little disruption from wars and unrest etc. A trade centre will obviously boost your trade income, as well as giving you some power to exclude other factions from trade, or show favouritism to others. Trade centres also become places of cultural exchange. They are quite vulnerable to blockade and warfare.
Holy City: appears if you have alot of cultural influence in the region, and usually the spread of many Monuments in the surrounding territories. A Holy City reinforces your religion and inspires the devotion of your people. There is also some extra income from donations and the visits of pilgrims etc. A Holy City cannot be converted and will be tough to eradicate, but might eventually disappear if your culture starts to decline. Note that the effectiveness of Holy Cities decreases as your Enlightenment tech increases.
Great City: usually appears in an extended period of peace, stability and prosperity, combined with a strong culture, and/or the presence of a Palace or some other special things listed above. A Great City is also more likely to generate more of those things in future. It acts a triple settlement, proving 3x the usual tax income, and can spawn 3 units per turn. Since it constantly consumes resources, it may prompt the discovery of new resources and inventions to fulfil its needs. It is also a massive reservoir of cultural power that influences the region and will be very difficult for any conqueror to assimilate. It still only counts as a single settlement in terms of Infrastructure support. However it can also become 'disrupted' like a normal City, and can then spawn massive plagues and/or rebellions. It can be reduced back to a normal City by warfare or extended unrest.
UNITS
Each unit, regardless of type, costs 1e. It also costs 0.5e per turn to maintain, which is automatically deducted from your income at the end/beginning of a turn. Obviously, as technology advances, each unit represents greater fighting power per manpower. Certain special units - fanatics and the like - may appear randomly, and be exempt from upkeep costs, at least on the first turn, until you decide to keep them or not.
With experience in battle, units can become 'veteran', meaning they are generally better and more loyal. Units can also be 'disrupted', which means they are still functioning, but weakened by loss of morale, or manpower, or supplies, or some combination. Obviously these are weaker in combat and more likely to desert or be bribed. Note that a unit can be both 'veteran' and 'disrupted' at the same time, making it unpredictable. Disrupted units will recover next turn, assuming they are in supply and are not doing much fighting.
Units can be disbanded for a return of 0.5e, usually, depending on circumstances. Units can morph/upgrade into different things, but the most extreme cases will result in damaged units or some other penalty.
Potentially you can disband units the same turn you build them, like levies/conscripts that you only want for one particular mission. You won't pay any upkeep at the end of the turn. It still costs 1e to build them in this case, but you might get some 'e' returned, if the conscripts are able to return their arms to the armouries and haven't been captured or annihilated. Given lack of upkeep costs, the total expense could be just 0.5e per usage.
Unit Types: Basically, you will have your armies on land, and fleets at sea (or up rivers, or all around islands), and perhaps aircraft and other things later on. I had planned to include a list of specific unit types, but I found it wasn't really practical. So, in theory, you can build whatever units you want, and specify whatever kind of weapons and tactics you want, out of what would be realistically available to you. I am however constricted by not having infinite graphics to choose from, so things might look more generalised on the map. I will try to take into account as many details as possible. Note that sea units are assumed to have crews who are capable of raiding and fighting inshore for a while, especially in the early game, though obviously they lack the strength of actual ground units.
Spawning Limits: You shouldn't usually run into problems here, but I don't want massive armies appearing suddenly out of nowhere. So, by default, you can only spawn one unit per turn, of any type, in any territory where you already have a unit or building. Each City (or Nomad, or Industry in the late game) allows you to spawn an additional unit in that territory per turn, of any type, though obviously naval units will need an adjacent coast (or river possibly). Each Port supports the building of an additional naval unit per turn, and each Fortress allows you to spawn an extra ground unit, so you may end up with territories that can produce a whole lot of units in a single turn - provided you have the money, of course. If the opposite is true, and you have more money than manpower, then you can hire Barbarians or bribe some other units to fight as mercenaries.
Ordering Units Around: Your units can fight, explore, be traders, be ambassadors, or be mercenaries for other factions. With the timescales of this game, there are no real limits on unit movement. The only limits are supply and communication. If your units are not leaving your home territories, there is no need to worry. But if you are launching a great campaign into foreign lands, you may wish to assign a few extra 'e' for supplies and suchlike, especially if you are heading overseas. If you send them too far, you can expect them to rebel, disappear, or otherwise mutate into another faction. Similarly, if one of your boats happens to get lost and stumble across a new continent, you might not hear about it at all, or you might just get a vague description of what lies in the darkness. Since your leaders are not psychic, you will need the boats and seafaring skills and the organisation to keep up contacts over time, before you can actually see the new lands on the map. Psychology is perhaps the greatest barrier to exploration and expansion, either on land or sea. Some kind of motivation is needed!
Transports: Obviously, the more land units you want to send overseas, the more ships you should assign to ferry them. A 1:1 ratio is ideal, especially for the late game when shock landings are needed, but it is not always essential for the early game. Also in the early game, ships loaded with ground units will be able to fight boarding actions, but this will get less effective as heavy ranged weapons get more powerful. If aircraft carriers ever make an appearance, these will probably be considered to have their aircraft 'built in', as it where, since carrier aircraft are usually quite specialised.
Battle performance: this is modified by your Tech Levels and Inventions, and many other things outside the stats, like morale and loyalty. I will be rolling some dice, and making some decisions myself, taking into account any tactics and etc you wish to suggest. Also, if you build alot of a certain kind of unit, and/or have some great heroic victories, then you might get special elite/upgraded versions of those units for the rest of the game, which will be noted in your stats, and represented on the map.
SPECIAL UBER AWESOME UNITS
These appear from time to time, similar to the Great People from Civ3 and Civ4, or just uber elite awesome units. Usually you will not pay any upkeep for these. They should be able to do various kinds of special things for you. Their abilities will be listed in your stats, along with their current 'task'. If you play it safe, they may stick around for a few turns, like forming a dynasty of good leaders, or something. If you use them for something epic, like building a Wonder or conquering half the known world, they might well succeed, but it is likely they will be consumed by the task. If that makes sense.
GIANT KILLER ANIMALS
I basically put these are on the map to amuse myself, but they do represent areas where agriculture will face extra resistance from nature, until your population grows high enough to kill/scare away all the predators. Or maybe they can feature in rites of passage for your warriors and etc. Anyway, the critters cannot damage or kill your units like in Civ4.
TECHNOLOGIES
The cost to advance a level is [1e x the next level up]. For example, going from level 1 to level 2 costs 2e, while going from level 4 to level 5 costs 5e. If you have the money, you can even advance multiple levels per turn. Given that there are eight different tech categories to begin with, progress is going to be quite expensive overall. Most tech advancement will probably happen as a result of special events, trade contacts and cultural influence, although obviously you have little control if you just wait for this to happen...
In this game, your tech levels are also your 'domestic settings'. So the more development you have, relative to the other techs, the more your civilization is considered to be focused in that area. Some techs conflict with each other, and it may be hard to keep high levels of both Power and Enlightenment, for example. Other techs go together quite well together, such as Engineering and Infrastructure, as one may bleed into the other.
These techs might also be thought of as like the 'genes' from NESlife. Every time there is a major war or revolution, it is likely that old factions will morph into new ones, with some free tech levels added, and perhaps some others lost.
In any case, techs will tend to 'trickle down' to any neighbours who are less advanced in most areas, especially if they are two or three levels behind. You can also attempt to directly invest in other people's techs, with or without their consent, provided that you have already reached the next tech level yourself. This will cost you half the usual amount, rounded DOWN. For example, to help your 'friend' go from level 4 to level 5 in one area, will only cost 2'e'. But perhaps you wish to charge 3e for the service, etc.
SpoilerLIST OF TECHNOLOGICAL STATS :
Note that the Tech levels are supposed to roughly correspond to these historical eras:
Late Stone (1) - Bronze (2) - Iron (3) - Classical (4) - Medieval (5) - Renaissance (6) - Enlightenment (7) - Early Industrial (8) - Late Industrial (9) - Electronic (10) - Modern (11) - Future? (12)
Civilization Level: This is a special case. It represents your overall level of sophistication, kinda like the 'age' you are in, with subtle benefits in all areas. It cannot be invested in directly, but will increase to match the average of the other techs, or because of special events. It will take a major disaster to decrease this rating.
Culture: With more investment in this tech, you will have more influence, especially over 'barbarians'. Your religion(s) will spread faster. Your people will be more patriotic, and will be slower to be assimilated by any invading faction. In fact, the invaders may find themselves being assimilated by you, or the occupiers will form some kind of hybrid faction.
Enlightenment: You will have more influence, especially among high-culture factions. Your own people will be more patriotic, and you will receive more free technology and innovation. Note that Enlightenment often clashes with the concepts of Power and Military, and religion and slavery in general.
Power: You will have more influence generally. Your military will be more loyal, and any potential rebels will be feel more intimidated.
Military: Naturally, you will have a more effective military when it comes to fighting. Just watch out for generals getting too ambitious.
Organisation: You will eliminate waste and corruption, especially important if you happen to have an expanded empire. To a lesser extent, this also improves your military, trading and religious power. You will also be considered more adept in the areas of subterfuge and general sneakiness.
Infrastructure: You will be able to support more cities per territory without disease and unrest. You will be able to develop crops and cattle farming further. This also aids trade within your borders, and your military will be able to respond quicker thanks to roads and etc.
Economics: You can develop all resources further, and you will have superior traders and seafarers. Just watch out for greed and corruption.
Engineering: You will have superior siege weapons, fortresses, artillery, river crossings, ships and seafaring, mining and etc. You are also more likely to get random special buildings and things.
Industry: This will require Steam Power (probably), and so is non-existent to begin with. The idea is it will eventually allow you to support more 'Industries' per territory, increase the chances of getting free Industries, as well as giving your better weapons, an extra trade bonus, and more chance to get the late-game special Inventions.
Other Techs: such as 'Electronics' or 'Aerospace', may appear in the late game, if things get that far.
INVENTIONS:
This is an arbitrary selection of some important world-changing inventions. I am willing to accept suggestions on this part! The idea is that these Inventions appear partly when I think is appropriate, partly randomly. You cannot get them by request. You can however try to make conditions right for them to appear. But, to have a theoretical knowledge of these things is not enough. To be listed in your stats, your faction must be able to use them practically. IIRC the real-life native Americans did know how to forge iron, and they did make wheels, but only for ceremonial objects or toys.
Each of these inventions will boost living standards, have other subtle effects, and may give special one-time bonuses when first gained. Those with inventions will usually have a competitive advantage against those without, especially with regards to warfare. Bronze Working gives you much better melee weapons, and you cannot build chariots without The Wheel, for example. Though, these Inventions are likely to spread quickly after a turn or two.
SpoilerLIST OF INVENTIONS :
The brackets here show the ideal Civilization Level (See TECHNOLOGIES) for them to appear, plus any prerequisite invention. NOTE: inventions may actually appear earlier than hinted at, or never at all.
Note that as time progresses, it will be assumed that most civilizations will have the earlier inventions, else they will be noted as Missing Inventions.
SHENANIGANS
Here the formal rules doth end. But your 'e' can be used in any number of other ways, like spying and stirring up rebellions, or bribing individual units, etc. Feel free to PM me with any questions. I just wish to remind you that I don't want to deal with any fractions other than half an 'e'.
Returning to what I did in DaftNES1, inspired by Bil, there will be stats posted in the thread after each update. Therefore you will have old stats to refer to for whatever reason.
As of update#2, if anyone reading this is actually considering joining, there is plenty of room in Cradles #2 and #3, IF you are willing to claim an NPC to start with and then morph it into something you want (none of them have much of a defined culture at the moment). I am resistant to starting brand-new player factions now, unless you have a really awesome idea. In any case Cradle #1 is too full for now!
Anyway, if you really want to make a new faction as opposed to claiming and NPC, your template is as follows:
Faction Name: (the general name of your people, for example Roxorlani) Start location: (Cradle #), (Territory Name) Colour: (colour of your icons and stuff on the map) Culture: (a brief description of the lifestyle, values and beliefs of your people... a small city state worshipping giant squid? a peaceful alliance of nomadic tribes worshipping trees?) Attitude: (a brief description of how your people relate to their neighbours... are they aggressive, or do they favour trade and exchange, or do they ignore them?) Leadership: (a brief description of who is in charge, and what their methods are) Great People: (any suggestions you want to give, for names of special people who may feature in the updates) City / Place Names: (any suggestions you want to give, for names of special cities and places that may feature in the updates)
And a clean version for your convenience:
Faction Name: Start location: Colour: Culture: Attitude: Leadership: Great People: City / Place Names:
Faction Name: Nomesters
Start location: Siach, main world
Culture: The cutlre of these people can easily be summed up as "Egyptians that decided to become raiders". They live by the gold and plunder, and nothing else. They are athiests mostly, beliving that wealth makes the world go around.
Attitude: Very agrresive, would gladly slit the throats of anyone they meet, taking their gold and such.
Leadership: The leader of these Raiders is the "King". However, this is no monarchy. When the current King dies, anyonewho thinks they should become the next ruler goes to the palace in a dead-or-alive tournament to see who is the best ruler.
The Kings are very warlike, aggresive, and expasive. They kill for a living, it seems, but it pleases the populance.
Faction Name: Nartozieroni
Start location: Lothas, Cradle #1
Culture: Revolves around the worship of the Sun God and that of minor human sacrifice; emphasis on personal valor in battle and in life yet the adulation of sacrifice for the greater whole. Hardworking and industrious. The best I could think of is a weird eclectic mixture of Persians and Aztecs
Attitude: Imperialistic, proud but pragmatic militaristic-traders
Leadership: Councils of "divinely" appointed elders rule domesticlly while sharing power with a Shahanshah who is in charge of military and foreign affairs
Faction Name: [the] Novai
Start location: Cria (islands in Cradle 1, preferably the big one])
Culture: a pseudo-confederation of aligned seafaring settlements, structured initially along family ties but now more loosely organized by tribal location. Predominately fishermen. (more to come)
Attitude: Mostly isolationist, assuming that they do not have the opportunity to interact with very many outsiders -- and those they do meet, they have limited communications with.
Leadership: a Great Chieftain named Chrons the Wise, an aged, yet strong, centerpiece in the unification of the several settlements. He is well respected for his knowledge and wisdom, but also his strength.
Not at all. I enjoy sprite-based fun times as much as the next guy.
@alex: Howdy neighbor!
CRADLE UNO
Faction Name: Shahanar Start Location: Tharn Culture: Rigid caste-system. Tribes/villages/cities carry out specialized tasks, and trade with each other and the outside world. Very mercantile and savvy, specialized warrior castes protect the others for tribute. Cities separated into quarters based on caste. Attitude: Very mercantile/expansive/assimilative. Castes will set up in foreign areas and slowly expand their holdings until they outnumber/overpower the neighbors. Despite this, the Shahanar are very welcoming, willing to give caste membership to trusted groups who have traded or lived with the Shahanar for many years, and are willing to adopt their ways. Leadership: A council of caste patriarchs meets semi-regularly. Generally each caste is self-governing. Trader castes have growing influence, but on great matters, like defense and public works, the matter is put to a full vote of all the available Patriarchs.
@Kraz you are looking at the special cradle for east asian type people, which I count as indochina up to yakuts in real world. If you want middle eastern could you please go cradle #1 (the big one)?
Culture:
Once a culture of ritualistic but pragmatic traders, the Grape Tribes have "evolved" an emphasis upon ritual. As the rituals overturned older superstitions, they came to be to treated as sacred. All rituals had to be performed absolutely correctly, or the result would be disaster (messing up a ritual even slightly was a crime punished by execution). This would lead to an enormus amount of conformity in ritual, enforced with the threat of execution even by pragmatists as any difference of opinion on the matter between tribes could start a war.
The Grape Tribes recieved their name because they also believe in treating the grape with reverence, as it is a symbol of the Grape Tribes collectively and the home of the spirits of their ancestors. (They can still trade some grapes, as depending on their nature they have either good or evil ancestors in them) The reason for this is related to a creation myth in which the Grape Tribes were once a united tribe, but then collapsed.
The final notable feature of their culture contrasts greatly with their conformity in ritual- large-scale linguistic diversity. Whilst the tribes are united by common economic interest, they have had no pragmatic reasons for cultural contact until (in linguistic terms) recently. No two tribes are mutually comphrehensible, and a new social class ("Translators") has emerged to allow a meaningful confederation to exist at all.
Attitude:
Traditionally, the Grape Tribes would give small (ceremonial) gifts of grapes to other tribe's leaders, in exchange for produce- a ritual, but one which gave them most of what they needed to support themselves. In this period, they were peaceful traders who had no inclination to expand.
Their culture is, however, changing in response to that of others. Outsiders are beggining to throw off ritual insofar as that they demand much more for the Grapes, knowing perfectly well that either they or the Grape Tribes could easily invest more effort into them (or at least, they could if they didn't want to breach Grape tribe religious doctrine). They still remember some of their trading traditions, but are mostly warlike now.
The hostility is mutual- a few of the Grape tribes united, exterminated those tribes who were neutral or accepted foriegn terms, and formed a loose alliance with control over Grape tribe land. Such actions are still within the living memory of the people...
Leadership: Each tribe has a "provincial" governmental gerontocracy (that is, the eldest are in charge). In conquered provinces, the system is more formal- everybody has a number of votes equal to their age in years. A few of the respected elders travel from tribe to tribe, taking a few young men with them to act as bodyguards and/or potential sucessors. They have very little real power, but thanks to their prestige are the closest thing to a unified government.
Faction Name: Aquen
Start location: Maulan, Cradle 2
Culture: Aquen generally live in confederacies, which have a habit of shattering and reforming frequently.
Attitude: Strong emphasis on strength and authority. Not necessarily manifesting in aggressiveness, although when push comes to shove, the Aquen won't hesitate to take what they believe is rightfully theirs.
Leadership: Chiefs rule the confederacies, advised and guided by Shamans and close relatives, who themselves may attempt to seize the title of Chief.
Faction Name: Tarezisis Start location: Yalu, Cradle 2 Culture: Hermetic folk worshiping the elements Attitude: Not violent, but mostly they tend to ignore their neighbors. Leadership: The group is lead by the Taures, the eldest woman. She shares her leadership with her husband, who plays a mystical shamanistic-type role as the Zishi. Her word is law, but he often holds the heart of the people in his hands. The Taures of any given group is considered equal to the others.
OOC: Oy vey indeed. No need for namecalling, In Daft's first post he said he was reserving 5 posts. You need to keep your rude fingers at bay when typing; you wouldn't want to hurt anyone's feelings.
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