”XV century AD – Mediterranean Campaign”

[batesmotel]

2nd action

Land attack.
Castilian attack Murcia from Andalusia.
750 points, DM on, FoW off.

Chris

[hidde]

Ok, time to step things up a little...enough with the pussyfooting

2nd action:

Amphibious Attack.
Hafsid attacks Sardinia (target) from Ifriqiya (starting point).
750pts. DM on, FoW on.
Naval encounter randomly decided with the lottery draw of Thursday.

[hidde]

I'm wondering...
Losing capital province means being out of the campaign but how does a core province differ from the rest?

[Lysimachos]

I'm wondering...
Losing capital province means being out of the campaign but how does a core province differ from the rest?

Well, a core province is part of the "metropolitan" territory of a nation and, though not so much defended as the Capital Province, it is much valued and streghtened than any other normal province.
Moreover, limiting the possibility of attacking core provinces renders more difficult pushing a player out of the game and helps to keep the campaign alive and more spicy.

By the way, what do you think of introducing the diplomatic feature in the campaign?

[FedeM]

Hi, is there any room to play?

Tks

[ericdoman1]

Me too wondering if there is another place.

[FedeM]

Maybe Eric and me could play some of the battles as the independent nations.

[stockwellpete]

Hi all!
As I stated above with pete the original rules don't foresee any diplomatic action.

But his words and the comment by TGM makes it clear that something has to be done about this, given the fact that players seems to like diplomacy while at the same time informal agreements aren't clearly suited to manage such things like ceding the control of a province.
So, if the majority of players is going to agree, I will add money and diplomacy in the game with this kind of rules, wich takes care of the fact that every agreement is liable to be disregarded by one of the party.

1) Every players at the beginning of the game owns also 500 ducats.
2) The players may conclude agreements of every kind making them formal with their declaration on the forum. No agreement is enforceable in any manner but the contractors may determine a fine in money for the case of a violation. Every aspect of the treaty that has already taken place won't be liable of being reversed if not specifically sanctioned in the agreement.
3) The player that at the end of the campaign will have the greater number of provinces and much money will win the game. Every 100 ducats will be counted as 1 province. If two or more players will have the same number of provinces the player with much remaining money will prevail and then the one with the highest stability level. Otherwise both players will be declared winners “ex aequo”.

Let me know your opinion about this.

I am in favour of trying this out. We have to be careful not to make things too complicated but the basic "action" process is very straightforward and clear so maybe other features can be added if there is general agreement?

With the money there needs to be some way of replenishing funds though. Maybe one week in "real life" equals one year in the game and tax is collected once a year (on a Sunday?) - something like 10 ducats per capital and the core province, 5 ducats for any other province.

You mention fines above in relation to diplomatic agreements. Presumably these fines are enforceable?

[Lysimachos]

I am in favour of trying this out. We have to be careful not to make things too complicated but the basic "action" process is very straightforward and clear so maybe other features can be added if there is general agreement?

With the money there needs to be some way of replenishing funds though. Maybe one week in "real life" equals one year in the game and tax is collected once a year (on a Sunday?) - something like 10 ducats per capital and the core province, 5 ducats for any other province.

You mention fines above in relation to diplomatic agreements. Presumably these fines are enforceable?

Hi Pete,
first of all, yes, the ideas is just that the fines are enforceable.
About the other ideas I remember that about one year ago I tried to run a campaign where a lot of features were present (fleets, fortifications, various kind of diplomatic actions, buildings of different type like suburbs, cities, markets, money raising) but it proved too much difficult to manage, with me ending to loose 3/4 of my spare time trying to make everything go running smoothly and having only little chances of devoting to think my actions and playing battles (wich is the one thing I'm really interested in).
So that everything ended with the stop of the game.
This is the reason why I prefer to take the rules as straightforward and simple as possible, "self executing" if I may use the term, in order to concentrate on the game and not on the managing of it.
In this respect a fix amount of money should be enough to give the players the chance of making any kind of agreemen they like without having the task of controlling every week what measure of ducats anyone has earned.
Money should anyway flow here and there because who has earned some of it with an agreement will be more interested in spending it for obtaining something else.

[Lysimachos]

Maybe Eric and me could play some of the battles as the independent nations.

Alas all the places in the campaign are already assigned but, if you like and if the players agree, I may insert you and eric in the list of the commanders of the independent armies, giving the chance of leading them against the regular players.

[hidde]

Maybe Eric and me could play some of the battles as the independent nations.

Alas all the places in the campaign are already assigned but, if you like and if the players agree, I may insert you and eric in the list of the commanders of the independent armies, giving the chance of leading them against the regular players.

Woe the player unlucky enough to face an independent army lead by Eric

[FedeM]

Hi, that sounds good to me.

Cannon fodder

Tks!

[ericdoman1]

Excellent thanks L.

Very interesting armies. SHame you don't have Oath of Fealty as Hidde woud prob be the Fanatic Berbers. Only a few differneces with Hafsids and fanatics (I used them in a TT comp last year but the earlier, Almohades option). Anders could have about 2 sup kn, 2 camels and prob 4 sup def spear prot drilled.

Fedem, Anders - I reckon the independent armies may not have as many pts as the main forces, so cannon fodder might be a good definition:)

[stockwellpete]

first of all, yes, the ideas is just that the fines are enforceable.

OK that is good.

About the other ideas I remember that about one year ago I tried to run a campaign where a lot of features were present (fleets, fortifications, various kind of diplomatic actions, buildings of different type like suburbs, cities, markets, money raising) but it proved too much difficult to manage, with me ending to loose 3/4 of my spare time trying to make everything go running smoothly and having only little chances of devoting to think my actions and playing battles (wich is the one thing I'm really interested in). So that everything ended with the stop of the game.

This is the reason why I prefer to take the rules as straightforward and simple as possible, "self executing" if I may use the term, in order to concentrate on the game and not on the managing of it. In this respect a fix amount of money should be enough to give the players the chance of making any kind of agreemen they like without having the task of controlling every week what measure of ducats anyone has earned. Money should anyway flow here and there because who has earned some of it with an agreement will be more interested in spending it for obtaining something else.

Yes, I understand what you are saying here. You certainly do not want to get bogged down in detail so it spoils your own enjoyment. The reason I was thinking about these things is that I would like to learn how to run a proper multi-player historical campaign in future (6-8 players). I have my own basic template for a 2 player campaign game. My "Wars of the Roses" game has now finished its play-testing and I am researching a second idea "Henry IV: the Usurper King", which will include Glyndwr's revolt in Wales.

I suppose the secret to adding extra features is to do it in ways that are fairly inobstrusive. So, if I can give this as an example, the idea of fortifying or militarising the borders of capital province and core province (and maybe any other province come to think of it) - what you could say is that for 100 ducats the player in question has "fortified" their capital province and thereafter any enemy army attacking that province is minus 50 army points. Very simple. The player announces he has spent the money on the forum and then claims the 50pt bonus should he be attacked (if he forgets - tough!) So something like that would not be too difficult.

With diplomacy I think players can agree what they like together and decide whether they want to make it public or not - so that would be largely self-executing, I think.

The issue of fleets would be fairly simple too, a bit like the fortifications. Players would just state they are buying a fleet on the forum - and after that they could only suffer naval attacks from enemies who had a similar or larger numer of fleets. A bit of historical research could set different maximums for each nation if desired. Again that would not entail very much work from the organiser.

The really big difficulty would be how to handle finance - this I see as the real thorny issue with running a historical campaign. Tax revenues, plundering, trading(?), costs of equipping armies and fleets etc. I haven't got any simple ideas for this at the moment but I will think about it.

The final thing that I would like to be able to do is to fix my campaign in historical time (i.e. give it a starting date and thereafter measuring the passage of time) and then introduce the possibility of real historical events from the past taking place in the game (invasion from outside the area, plague, papal schism or whatever).

So please excuse me if I pipe up with things during the campaign - it is only my imagination carrying me away!

[ericdoman1]

I know I am not involved but I once had a boardgame called Machiavelli.

It was based on the boardgame Diplomacy but about the same time as this (maybe later)had a pretty simple means of financing forces. Maybe each region you occupy = X pt (for army pt allocation). Some regions will be far better than others, farming or montains for example and so they would have different "points".

Machiavelli also had a random chart (although I know there is enough randmoness in the game itself), where there was a possibility of famine, revolts and armies could be lost completely, maybe x percentage loss. Can not remember the exact figures but I think there was a 1 in 3 chance a famine etc could occur?

Also there was a lot of notes being passed around the players with reference to forming alliances and an army would support another. That would certainly be a great thing to include in the game or is it going to happen with ref to multi multi players.

[hidde]

I just checked the lottery and it appears my fleet didn't reached Sardinia...this time
But after reading the rules a bit closer I get it that all amphibious attacks are decided by the same two numbers.
Wouldn't it be better if the first attack were resolved by the two numbers of the first wheel, the second attack by the two numbers of the second wheel and so on?
That way up to five amphibious attacks could be separately decided.

[stockwellpete]

I know I am not involved but I once had a boardgame called Machiavelli.

It was based on the boardgame Diplomacy but about the same time as this (maybe later)had a pretty simple means of financing forces. Maybe each region you occupy = X pt (for army pt allocation). Some regions will be far better than others, farming or montains for example and so they would have different "points".

Machiavelli also had a random chart (although I know there is enough randmoness in the game itself), where there was a possibility of famine, revolts and armies could be lost completely, maybe x percentage loss. Can not remember the exact figures but I think there was a 1 in 3 chance a famine etc could occur?

Also there was a lot of notes being passed around the players with reference to forming alliances and an army would support another. That would certainly be a great thing to include in the game or is it going to happen with ref to multi multi players.

Here it is (you have to click on another link on the next page) . . .

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machiavelli_(board_game)

And there is this too . . .

http://condottierigame.net/

[stockwellpete]

Just to say - my attempted invasion of the Papal States against Ian by the lobotomised knights of Milan is underway as is my heroic Serbian resistance to the hordes of Lysimacho's Venice.

[Lysimachos]

Hi all, these are in chronological order the attack vs independent provinces waiting to having determined the name of the player taking up the independent armies:
Hafsids (hidde) = Tripolitania from Maghreb
Castilians (batesmotel) = Navarre from Galicia
Ottomans (TGM) = Karaman from Rum
Ottomans (TGM) = Aetolia from Attica
Byzantine (iandavidsmith) = Raska from Macedon
Castilians (batesmotel) = Murcia from Andalusia

And these are the results of the lottery draw:
Roma 57 (Lysimachos)
Cagliari 56 (Triarius)
Palermo 51 (TGM)
Genova 46 (hidde)
Milano 38 (batesmotel)
Bari 29 (iandavidsmith)
Napoli 15 (kilroy)
Firenze 7 (stockwellpete)

So, neatly matching the attacks with the lottery draw results, we have that:
Lysimachos will defend Tripolitania vs hidde
Triarius will defend Navarre vs batesmotel
TGM (who has to get down 2 steps in order to avoid battling himself) will defend Raska vs iandavidsmith
Hidde (who then scales 1 step) will defend Karaman vs TGM
Batesmotel (who also scales 1 step) will defend Aetolia vs TGM
Iandavidsmith will defend Murcia vs batesmotel

And these are in chronological order the amphibious attacks waiting to having determined the exit of the naval encounter:
Venetians = Morea from Crete
Hafsids = Sardinia from Ifriqiya
Because the attackers get a 29 while the defenders a 56 the naval battles are lost by the attackers and the amphibious attacks aborts (the attackers have now the chance of launching a new action given the fact their second one is aborted).

[hidde]

Guido, prepare to be conquered!
PW=conquer

Did you see my earlier post?

...all amphibious attacks are decided by the same two numbers.
Wouldn't it be better if the first attack were resolved by the two numbers of the first wheel, the second attack by the two numbers of the second wheel and so on?
That way up to five amphibious attacks could be separately decided.