IOT Developmental Thread

What setting will the game be? Traditional IOTesch? Iron and Bloodish? Mars? Space? Fantasy? War of the Worlds? Ancient times? Space fantasy?

Whatever the case welcome back RC!
 
TL;DR: Roleplay bonuses are dumb. Macros are a thing. Work a bit on the written body of the update everyday, even during game phases.

In this case I would want to be able to put orders in a box turn a little handle and get out the updated stats in 5 minutes. Now I'm sure any GM who has run an excell based game would be looking at me in horror. "You can't do that!" they say "Its impossible" they cry. Well I would agree with them in terms of an excell based game. From experience I can say that for all its utility and sleekness excell still requires more time that it has any rights to especially when you factor in role-play decisions.

Err, huh?

Any GM who has run an Excel game should be able to look at you and say yes, it is possible. TF did it years ago, and IU2 uses the same basic idea when it combines legislative and player executive spending at the end to determine the final stats. The only difference is that I copy-and-paste the results, but only because I'm too lazy to set up an Excel macro to do it for me.

Excel only requires more time as far as you don't want to use macros in Excel.

The ease of updating would be reduced to filling in boxes (I could even find a neat way of collecting orders from players such as a form of some type) and then pressing go.

This is what TF did in MP3 or 4. I can't remember which, but he requested that you only send i a string of numbers for spending.

The only drawback would be the harder implementation of so called Role-Play Bonuses however I don't see this as too much of a drawback for just the reasons that I mentioned earlier.

Since Interna Universo, I've been arguing this, so I'm going to argue it again: Get rid of roleplay bonuses. There is no reason for roleplay bonuses to exist. I use roleplay to shape events, but I never in a trillion years give straight bonuses to roleplay anymore. Once you get out of the mentality of "roleplay bonus and penalties" and into the mentality of "roleplay shaping", most of the issues go away and you and players no longer feel hamstrung in what can and can't be posted roleplay wise.

Also, the best way to cut down on the time between orders lock and the update is to work on the update throughout the entire week. For me, the most time consuming part isn't the statwork or military stuff, but the events and body of the update. I usually go through the thread every day or two, look at the most recent posts and roleplay, and write a few good, bad, or mix-bag events for a few players, plus at least one player who hadn't posted anything. That way, by the time you're doing the stat work, not only do you already have a good chunk of the time consuming part finished and hopefully edited, but all you need to do is go back through the sheet and tweak a few sections to accommodate what you've already written and you may not even have to do that. If you're using Excel and your sheet is separate from the public sheet posted, you may already had edited your own sheets as you go.

In other words, the turnaround time is drastically reduced and events can be added post-lock based on orders. It saves you much time on having to dreg through both the thread and orders for stuff, and basically the workload is spread out over the course of two weeks instead of a few days.

Edit:

There are a few other things that help, especially post-Windows 7. For example, Windows 10 allows for corner snapping of windows. Usually, I have the two excel workbooks opened up, one underneath the other, on a half screen, the Word document and map opened in a corner screen since I don't have to flip to the map often, and CFC opened in another quarter. You'd be surprised by how much the simple organization tools at your disposal can improve workflow.

The only flow is that Excel 2010 is a bit dumb and won't let you open multiple windows, but Excel 2013 will.

Spoiler :
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Edit: nvm Regularly updating IOTs are clearly not what's wanted here, I should have known better
 
Edit: nvm
 
An update to my next game's progress. I'll be highlighting new/changed sections in blue.

Current updates include the politics section (parliament elections/structure, as well as some more details on the two main coalitions), as well as the areas requested by Omega (LGBT issues in the country) and Polyblank (foreign relations/interactions).

Also, anybody who can help me with toponyms from (in order of importance) Chinese (Mandarin, Hokkien, and Cantonese), Malay, Sanskrit, Arabic, Tamil, or Dutch (way way less important), please let me know. There are about 30-40 districts that all need unique names.
 
Game is live. Character-and-story driven game set in a fictional Southeast Asian city-state. I've put a substantial amount of work into the background (there's a link to the Google Doc form of the OP in the first and last post; it's 12 pages of material and another 5 of resources and notes). Please join.
 
Fire from Ice

“This is a mistake,” Lindsay Graham said, “A mistake of monumental proportions.”

It was Saint Paul, Minnesota, in the 2008th year of the Ican Calendar, and the world had not yet ended. In the halls below him secular and spiritual lords from across America had gathered to anoint a successor to the Ordained Office. A war captain who would marshal their armies and fulfill great prophecies. Who had defeated them, one by one, and extracted a promise to come when called to his side.

That leader looked at him now through mica eyes. The Mac Cain sighed, which sounded like the whistling of winds through a great cave. He was old, the veteran of a thousand battles in countries near and far. He was huge, twice the height of Graham and half again that of a normal man. And he was tired, because it is a discussion he has had with himself every day since he began this quest.

“It is too late now in the year for such counsel: the decision is made. She is privy to our innermost meetings and plans and to cut her off now would risk her going rogue.” His voice sounded like the grinding of continental plates, and each word was as true and certain as their movement. He turned away and walked to the balcony, below which endless feastfires stretched across the river plain. They had come from fifty states to hear him speak the next day, to lay ceremonial ballots at his feet that committed themselves to his cause for the coming war.

“I am the only one of your advisors immune to Sarah Palin’s charm, and you did not seek me out before this?” Lindsay questioned. “Was it because you knew what I, the only man with clear eyes when viewing her, would say?”

“No. I see her for what she is too,” Mac Cain answered, and it was Lindsay’s turn to sigh. “The struggle against That One is not the true challenge. That is what follows.” That One, the Man Obama, who was more than a man. Who even now gathered his own followers and instilled them with hope and courage that Mac Cain could not match.

“The doom that will befall America?” As spoken of in prophecy.

“Aye. And that is why we need Palin. She is its harbinger, a sliver of the dark power. Even now it seeks a vessel, one that can contain it and give it voice. Sarah is not it: it will consume her, but that will take time. I would know this enemy before I battle it, and I would use it against Obama while I still can, while it can be controlled.”

Then the doors of the chamber opened and in strode Palin, thronged by adoring politicians. Her red eyes sparkled in the firelight and the flames rose higher in her presence.

“I hear you boys were talkin’ ‘bout me?”

Mac Cain and Graham smiled empty smiles, smiles that didn’t reach their eyes. Her charm washed over them, like a hurricane before a mountain, full of power but to no avail. But it was there: the power to turn men into beasts, that no man who desired a woman could resist. There was more to that, of course. There was something deeper reflected in the eyes of those she had enthralled that was not yet understood by her or they.

“You ‘betcha, Sarah,” Graham replied. There was no lying to her. There was no running from her. And there was no hiding from her, even though the shadows grew longer.

-------------

Trumperdammerung is coming.
 
We need a thumb up button. Ceremonial ballots at his feet indeed.
 
I find myself back to the drawing board. Despite my consistent and undeniable failure rate, I will press on.

So here’s some concepts I’ve been messing with.

1. A not-generic post-apocalypse bio/cyberpunk game
The idea here is that the world as we know it ended not by nuclear fire, but from internal turmoil due to the rise of biotechnological beasts. Players will be limited in their expansion and most will likely only have one *big* settlement, a fortress-city of sorts. While players will have internal stability and such to manage, another facet is recruiting and commanding able-bodied individuals to fight against the remaining horde of the horrors of the old times. Armed with their skill, special abilities inherited from a brighter era, and actual weapons, they provide the best means to lead humanity forward.

2. A low fantasy medieval-era game
Here, we would explore earlier in human history. A comet flies overhead, and this time instead of just destabilizing all the nations of the world putting everyone ~200 paper mana behind, it causes special thingsTM to happen. People are gaining inexplicable abilities, creatures never before seen have appeared out of nowhere ransacking settlements, and new substances are being found in places which were thought to be barren. For this, I want to see how you all would imagine things like religion, culture, and technological progression would change when the real world meets things that simply should not exist. We won’t be following totally traditional fantasy tropes. While there may be things akin to dragons, they won’t exactly be such. I have an irrational hatred for elves, so expect that not to be a thing too. I don’t want to give too much away because I want players to truly “react” to the world.

Any interest in either concept?
 
I find myself back to the drawing board. Despite my consistent and undeniable failure rate, I will press on.

Effort is life; give up when you die.
 
1. A not-generic post-apocalypse bio/cyberpunk game
I've been binge-reading Endtown so you have my full support.
 
option 1. the answer is ALWAYS more cyber/bio punk.
 
The actual game part of Still Waters is up now. I'm still writing part of the update - taking a break because I underestimated the amount of time this would take - but most of it is there to see, if you've been debating joining before now.
 
It will be fun!

The more the merrier!

Its a CivO game, how can you not be excited?
 
i dont do much at work
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The sky was singing.

All of us looked above, towards the domain of God. It looked as if a great war was being fought. The white streaks the filled the night made it seem as though it were day. Each moment was like its own hymn. Hundreds of choirs seemed to be singing in unison, but all very different songs. Some of us ran screaming about the end times. Others demanded we all repent. But most of us could not keep from looking up.
And then it came. Perhaps it was the face of God himself. The sky filled with white, much brighter than the sun on the hottest day of summer. And then it all stopped. The heavens returned to peace, as if it hadn’t just been ravaged by the most divine of conflicts. The stars were exactly as they were every night before. How many assumed that was the end of that?

How foolish can we be?


Setting
The Song of Another World is a low fantasy game taking place within the context of essentially our world within the medieval era. A cosmic event, described above by an anonymous witness, preceded drastic changes in the world. Great beasts have emerged from seemingly nowhere, some have been seen to exhibit extraordinary abilities, and mysterious substances are being found around the world. Now, you will take the reigns of one of the many countries trying to sort out the mess this event has caused. You will be responsible for how this event shapes the future of mankind - culturally, religiously, and technologically.

Player Setup
For creation purposes, create the country as it was pretty much before or only just after the cosmic event. Note that you will be playing a country in the 12th century. I will allow for some historical “stretches” - that is, slight differences from what happened OTL. Just make sure that your history at large does not conflict with other players’ own histories. Everything here is not optional unless stated otherwise.
Country Name:
Flag/Coat of Arms:
Capital Name:
Government: Just remember this is the 12th century.
Religion: We’re still using OTL religions as of game start. You can create “new” or modified religions after things go full swing.
Army/Navy Tradition: Distribute five points to each. EX: 3 Army, 2 Navy
Leader Name:
Leader Traits: Pick 3 from list below.
Leader’s Betrothed Traits: Pick 2 from list below. Not necessary if the government is not hereditary.
Cultural Base: Describe your culture in a way that shows what it really stands for. Is your country a great empire with core imperial traditions? Does your country crave a strong industry to power its markets? Maybe a strong military is your forte? In case I’m being too subtle for you, this will dictate two things: your country’s special “national trait” and what your country starts out with in terms of buildings and military.
History: Somewhat optional. I would like an explanation for countries that break from OTL. If you’re literally an actual country, completely unchanged, then you don’t have to fill this out. Be aware not everyone is a scholar of early indonesian history, so some background anyways would still be nice.
Starting Location: Fill in your slice of the map. Be reasonable. Mark your capital.

Traits
Skilled Strategist: +2 General Capacity, +1 Admiral Capacity
Skilled Tactician: +2 Combat Value for all units.
Heard the First Hymn: Increased Chance to find Dust in controlled territory, +1 Combat Value against Creatures of the Spectrum for all units.
Scholar of the Spectrum: +5 base Science gain from each source of Dust in controlled territory when country is researching Dust, +1 Combat Value against Creatures of the Spectrum for all units.
Skilled Politician: Increased stability gain, lower penalties for committing actions against national values.
Skilled Diplomat: Increased chance for NPCs to agree with your proposals, increased favor with other countries’ citizenry.
Skilled Economist: Increased tax efficiency, Resources and trade grant higher income increases.
Skilled Industrialist: Increased soft resource gain from all sources.

Actual Rules!
Spoiler :
Taxes and You
So there will be tax income, and you may think that means I’ll track population somehow. You’d be very wrong. I haven’t tracked population for my games in over a year and I’m not starting now. Way too much a headache. Instead, your taxes are determined primarily by the size of your country. How can I relate country size to taxes? Don’t worry about it. Just know that bigger means more taxes. However, it also means more instability. More on that later. Also, you can increase your tax income less invasively by increasing tax efficiency, which is related to your stability among other things.

Resources
Resources are a constant in any self-respecting nation-builder. For this one… It’s a bit complicated. Numerically, there is Tax Income(discussed above), Production, Food, Research, and Dust. However, these numerical values(sans taxes-ish) are derived from actual resources you come across. Some of these “hard” resources might give you a bit in each “soft” resource, while others will give you a large amount of one “soft” resource. For example, an iron vein would give you a huge production boost while something like horses would give you a fairly large production boost as well as some food.
What do these Resources do? Well, most of them are rather straightforward. Tax income gives you a medium to trade with players as well as to obtain bodies to field your armies. Production allows you to build various structures as well as equipment for your military units. Food is more subtle; you spend it to combat instability from expansion. Your men also require an upkeep in food. Research is pooled together in order to complete research. That is discussed later in the Technology section.
Now, you’ve also seen this “Dust” business thrown around. What is it you might ask? Well… Go find out. I’m not spoiling the game because you’re too curious for your own good. However, if you wanna know more… Look in the technologies section. Probably.

The Map and the Calendar
So the map is pretty basic. There will be all the players clearly marked, as well as a handful of NPCs you can interact with. Because I’m lazy, I won’t be filling /all/ places that probably should realistically be filled in. I’ll use the excuse that they were largely wiped out by the onslaught of the Creatures of the Spectrum, discussed later.
The Calendar is pretty straightforward. The first turn will start on Spring. The next turn will begin a year later, but the season will be Summer. The next year, Fall. You can see a pattern by now I hope. This affects a few things, such as the effectiveness of your armies, some resource yields, and the frequency of certain events. It also does other things that I won’t reveal yet.

Military and Combat
Each of your countries will have to build a military, either to subdue your adversaries or combat the forces of another world. To do this, you must field armies and navies. However, one unit does not an army make. How this works is you build units and throw them together in groups - this is what I refer to as Armies or Navies. While a single army might be fine to start out with if you’re that small, as you expand it will be obvious you’ll need to field more and it’s possible you won’t be able to cover all your bases all the time due to economic or logistical constraints.
In addition, armies cannot be reasonably composed of many units without a leader fit for the job. You, in all likelihood, want a leader for each one of your armies. However, the number of generals and admirals you can train is limited by the starting traits you choose and the buildings you erect. the actual skill of the general or admiral is based on your Army Tradition and Navy Tradition respectively, each having a maximum of 10. Essentially, I roll a 1d20+[Tradition] which determines the skill of the leader. You increase tradition by fighting battles and from particular structures, or perhaps even special traits derived from your culture. Tradition is decreased by being inactive militarily or losing favorable battles. Barring that, all players start with 5 tradition that you can distribute to either focus.

Stability and Leadership
Your stability is a measure of your people’s approval of your leadership. People are fickle, and the current state of affairs means the situation is quite volatile. Most will be afraid and view the new inhabitants of this world, whether they’re alive or not, with contempt. Trying to interact with them positively might not be well received. However, the people react to wealth and prosperity and who knows how much these possibly new resources can do for society? You will have a choice to make, to be sure.
Your leadership is founded upon the decisions you make and the traits you chose. A popular king with a like-minded son would definitely cushion the blow when inevitably the time comes for the prince to succeed their father. However, if the King is widely unpopular in the same situation, it could be a recipe for disaster. Your betrothed traits does not affect your country, but your successor’s traits will somewhat depend on the traits you’ve chosen. Therefore, you must think carefully when selecting your traits for them as well. Each time an heir rises to meet their destiny, you will select a new significant other for them with, perhaps, totally new traits.
If your country happens to be a republic, things are different. While the stability reduction is more or less the same when a leader leaves their role, the selection for the successor is not. Three candidates will be brought in. You can select one to “endorse” and then a vote is held. The one who wins becomes the new leader, even if they are not the one you endorsed. It is possible, through subterfuge,to change the outcome. This runs the risk of upsetting the populace if another candidate is obviously more popular, however.

Religion
Kinda a big deal in the 12th century, and it has been turned on its head. The map will show the religions and their domains at large as they are in the 12th century more or less, but as time moves on, cults revolving around the new state of the world are bound to rise. The question becomes how will you deal with them?
Your country will have a “Faith” stat for each faith within its borders. High faith will likely yield positive events about that faith. Having low Catholic Faith while running a nation dominated by Catholics is something of an issue. Meanwhile, having high Faith in two or more faiths can lead to religious disputes and outright civil war if the situation sours. On the flip side, it could lead to syncretism between faiths and the creation of a new one within your borders, almost seamlessly if you play your cards right. Religion in this game is very fluid, but also quite volatile.

Technology
Along with Religion and Culture, this is one more thing that could define the future of this world with the changes that have taken place. There will be four technological paths to undertake. These paths are: Civic, Seafaring, Military, and Dust. Civic technologies advance the society, allowing better organization of the administration and construction of better economic buildings. Seafaring technologies advance your naval capabilities and opens the window to colonialism. Military technologies advance your military might for the security of your people and to defeat your enemies, and also encompasses espionage. Finally, Dust. Not much is known about this new substance, but many scholars believe that if it is applied to our way of thinking, it could advance technology well ahead of your rivals focusing on the mundane. Essentially, it is a “catch all” technology. Before going further, I will explain Technological Tiers.
So, on the technology “tree”, there will be Tiers. The first tier of any technology has to be researched in order for the second of that same technology to be researched. This is pretty obvious. Military 1 comes before Military 2. The cost for advancing the first three paths, that is all of them besides Dust, is as follows: The first Tier for each path will all cost 100 research. The next Tier will be 150. The next, 225 and so on. When the first milestone of a Tier is complete, your research will reset to 0.
Dust is, like I said, a “catch all” technology. Advancing in dust will give you advancements in Civic, Seafaring, and Military. However, these advancements will be decidedly different. Furthermore, researching Dust before the others locks you out of actually researching the others in that Tier. For example, Researching Dust Tier 1 disallows you from researching Military Tier 1(and the others), and you must now either continue with the Dust research path or research the Tier 2 mundane technologies separately. Dust costs are as follows: The first Tier costs 350. The next, 525. The next, 788 and so on. Like before, with each completed Tier, research will reset to 0.
If you have researched a mundane technology before the respective Dust technology, and then research the Dust technology, you’re in for !!special surprises!!. However, this puts your country at the risk of falling behind of others in technology at the larger scale; while you’re playing around with different toys on Tier 1, others could be farther ahead. Still, completing mundane technologies before their Dust counterparts has interesting implications. It’s up to you, though.
 
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