DiSp: Dividing the Spoils - Discussion Thread

[kronenblatt]

... His chamberlains put him to bed and attended him closely, but the pain increased and the physicians were summoned. No one was able to do anything helpful and Alexander continued in great discomfort and acute suffering. When he, at length, despaired of life, he took off his ring and handed it to Perdiccas. His Friends asked: "To whom do you leave the kingdom?" and he replied: "To the strongest." He added, and these were his last words, that all of his leading Friends would stage a vast contest in honour of his funeral. This was how he died after a reign of twelve years and seven months. He accomplished greater deeds than any, not only of the kings who had lived before him but also of those who were to come later down to our time...

... For Perdiccas, viewing with suspicion Ptolemy's increase in power, decided that he himself and the kings would make a campaign against Egypt with most of the army, but Eumenes he sent to the Hellespont to prevent Antipater and Craterus from crossing into Asia...

... Consequently about a hundred of the commanders were the first to revolt from him, of whom the most illustrious was Pithon, who had suppressed the rebellious Greeks, a man second to none of the Companions of Alexander in courage and reputation; next, some also of the cavalry conspired together and went to the tent of Perdiccas, where they fell on him in a body and stabbed him to death...

... The Macedonians elected Antipater guardian with full power. When Antipater arrived at Triparadeisus a few days later [...], he distributed the satrapies anew. To Ptolemy he assigned what was already his, for it was impossible to displace him, since he seemed to be holding Egypt by virtue of his own prowess as if it were a prize of war. He gave Syria to Laomedon of Mitylenê and Cilicia to Philoxenus. Of the upper satrapies Mesopotamia and Arbelitis were given to Amphimachus, Babylonia to Seleucus, Susianê to Antigenes because he had been foremost in making the attack on Perdiccas, Persia to Peucestes, Carmania to Tlepolemus, Media to Pithon, Parthia to Philip, Aria and Drangenê to Stasander of Cyprus, Bactrianê and Sogdianê to Stasanor of Soli, who was from that same island. He added Paropanisadae to the domain of Oxyartes, father of Alexander's wife Roxanê, and the part of India bordering on Paropanisadae to Pithon son of Agenor. Of the two neighbouring kingdoms, the one along the Indus River was assigned to Porus and that along the Hydaspes to Taxiles, for it was not possible to remove these kings without employing a royal army and an outstanding general. Of the satrapies that face the north, Cappadocia was assigned to Nicanor, Great Phrygia and Lycia to Antigonus as before, Caria to Asander, Lydia to Cleitus, and Hellespontine Phrygia to Arrhidaeus. As general of the royal army he appointed Antigonus, assigning him the task of finishing the war against Eumenes and Alcetas; but he attached his own son Cassander to Antigonus as chiliarch...

(by Diodorus)

The Dividing the Spoils tournament takes off immediately after the partition of satrapies at Triparadeisus in 321 BC, only a few years after the death of Alexander the Great and Perdiccas' original partition at Babylon, and immediately following the fall and murder of Perdiccas in Egypt while warring unsuccessfully against Ptolemy. Alexander, lying on his deathbed, left his empire to "the strongest", which was interpreted very differently among his generals...!

The first tournament of DiSp - Dividing the Spoils has kicked off, with Karvon, TomoeGozen, batesmotel, deeter, Blagrot, Aetius39, rbodleyscott, and kronenblatt, and concluded with rbodleyscott as the victor.

And... Inspired by the Diplomacy boardgame, I've also adjusted the rules of Dividing the Spoils for a potential sequel. The main change as of now involves dropping the concept of coalitions in favour of opportunities to instead supporting other players' attacks and defences (please see Attacks and Effects of battle outcome in the proposed rules) as a more dynamic round-by-round mechanism for diplomacy, also incentivising player negotiations between and during rounds. All a la Diplomacy, but set in a Diadochi era and still with Field of Glory II: Ancients battles in focus!

[kronenblatt]

[kronenblatt]

Overview

• Each player represents one of Alexander the Great's generals and one of the Diadochi, having been assigned one or more of the 24 satrapies after the death of Alexander.

• The winner of the tournament is the player who controls the most satrapies upon the end of the tournament.

• A player who doesn’t control any satrapies has lost and is eliminated from the tournament.

• The tournament ends as soon as one of the following conditions is fulfilled (whichever is the earlier):
  1. the player with the most satrapies controls at least twice as many satrapies as the player with the second most satrapies, or
  2. the C-in-C of all players have fallen (at least once) in battle, at which time the age of the Diadochi (the generals personally knowing and fighting with and for Alexander) is deemed to be over.

• Notwithstanding the above, the tournament will always continue until one of the players control more satrapies than all the others and there thus is only one winner.

Map

• The map depicts the overall administrative structure with 24 satrapies of the Alexandrian empire, as inherited from the Achaemenids and in turn inherited by the Diadochi.

• Satrapies are connected to each other by land and some in addition by sea.
  • A satrapy with a land border to another satrapy is considered to neighbour the other satrapy.
  • In addition, the following satrapies are considered neighbours due to sea connections:
    • Phrygia and Thrake.
    • Phrygia and Makedonia.

• A player is considered neighbouring another player if any of his controlled satrapies neighbour any satrapies controlled by the other player.

• The neighbouring concept has important implications regarding which attacks can be made and which players can gain control over which satrapies, once attacks and corresponding battles are concluded.

Technical specifications and preparations

• Download the Dividing the Spoils mod with all army lists (to be selected under Select another module button when setting up challenge for battle).

• To download, apply the following steps:
  1. Click on the Download community scenarios button at the top of the main screen of the game.
  2. Select Dividing the Spoils MP Custom Battles v3. (note: should be version 3: v3) (currently near the bottom of the list)
  3. Click on Download the Selected Campaign.
  4. The mod will then be automatically saved into the the My Games\FieldOfGlory2\MULTIPLAYER\ folder, within the MP_DIVIDING_SPOILS_V3 folder..

• Please note that a player must own the Immortal Fire DLC in order to take part in the tournament.

Army lists

• All players use the army lists of the Dividing the Spoils mod, with one army list for each satrapy and with a number of vanilla army lists representing allies. (For more details, please see Armies and allies in battles below.)

Units

• All units within an army list are freely available to deploy (other than the standard in-game limitations on numbers, etc.).

Allies

• Allies may only be selected by players controlling certain satrapies:
  • Only the controller of Makedonia (1) may choose Illyrian 680 BC - 25 AD as allies.
  • Only the controllers of Makedonia (1) or Phrygia (3) may choose Greek 460-281 BC as allies.
  • Only the controller of Thrake (2) may choose Thracian (Triballi) 350 BC-46 AD as allies.
  • Only the controllers of Kappadokia (4), Armenia (8), or Atropatene (11) may choose Georgian 331 BC - 252 AD as allies.
  • Only the controller of Aigyptos (6) may choose Libyan 549-301 BC or Kyrenean Greek 321-276 BC as allies.
  • Only the controllers of Aigyptos (6), Syria (7), or Mesopotamia (9) may choose Arab 312 BC - 299 AD as allies.
  • Only the controllers of Hyrkania (13), Baktriane (17), or Sogdiane (22) may choose Skythian or Saka 550-301 BC as allies.
  • Only the controllers of Paropamisadai (23) or Indike (24) may choose Indian 500 BC - 319 AD as allies.

• In these cases, it is always up to the player whether allies are in fact selected or not, and the player makes this decision for each individual battle.

Rounds

• A round is represents one year, with the first year being 320 BC.

• Each round consists of the following three phases:
  1. Attack declarations: All players announce, one by one in the order as specified below, which atttack that they will make.
  • The decreasing order in which in which attacks are announced in a round are determined by each player's (maximum, if the player's having fought more than one battle) incurred casualties (as represented by routing percentage in upper-left corner at end of battle) from battles in the previous round (i.e., the player with the lowest incurred casualties announcing first, and so on).
  2. Battle resolutions: All battles will be simultaneously played and completed in FoG2 during a period of three weeks.
  3. Satrapy control changes: The victors (if any) of the battles take control over the losers' satrapies-at-stake.

Attacks

• Each round requires a player (the "attacker") to announce an attack, in the form of either:
  A. attacking another neighbouring player (the "defender"),
  B. supporting the attacker in an already announced attack ("original attack") by another player (with the defender of the original attack constituting the "defender" in this attack as well, and the "defender province" being the same as in the original attack), or
  C. supporting the defender in an already announced attack ("original attack") of another player (with the attacker of the original attack constituting the "defender" in this particular attack, and the "defender province" being the same as in the original attack).

• The attack announcement is made in a post in the tournament's thread on the forum, as follows:
  If A: The attacker specifies from which one of his satrapies that the attack takes place ("attacker satrapy") and which neighbouring satrapy that is attacked ("defender satrapy", together with the attacker satrapy, the "satrapies-at-stake" for that particular attack).
  If B: The attacker specifies from which one of his satrapies, neighbouring at least one of the satrapies-at-stake in the original attack, that the support of the attack is made ("supporting satrapy").
  If C: The attacker specifies from which one of his satrapies, neighbouring the defender satrapy in the original attack, that the support of the defence is made ("supporting satrapy").

• None of the satrapies referred to above (for A, B, and C) must be already included as a satrapy-at-stake or supporting satrapy in another player's attack this round.

• Example on how to express an attack announcement
  If A: rbodleyscott attacks kronenblatt, using the army of Gedrosia and Indian 500 BC - 319 AD allies. Attacker satrapy: Babylonia. Defender satrapy: Mesopotamia.
  If B: Aetius39 supports the attack of rbodleyscott upon Mesopotamia, using the army of Armenia and Georgian 331 BC - 252 AD allies. Supporting satrapy: Kappadokia.
  If B: Karvon supports the defence of kronenblatt in Mesopotamia, using the army of Aigyptos and Kyrenean Greek 321-276 BC allies. Supporting satrapy: Syria.

Battles

• Each of the attacks (whether A, B, or C) are fought out as an individual battle in Field of Glory II - Ancients as follows:
  • The battle takes place in the defender satrapy between the attacker and the defender for the attack in question.
  • Armies and allies: in accordance with Armies and allies in battles below.
  • Scenario: Custom Battle - Open Battle.
  • Force size: Large (1600 FP).
  • Map size: Wide (40x32).
  • Map type: selected by the defender from among the available terrains of the defender satrapy in accordance with Map terrain in battles below.
  • No map re-rolls are allowed.

• The defender of the attack creates the challenge in the FoG2 Multiplayer Lobby (always password: DiSp) and always with defender as Side B (in order for the other player to immediately be able to deploy when accepting the challenge).
  • Please note that the Dividing the Spoils module (MP_DIVIDING_SPOILS_V2) needs to be selected and launched under Select another module when creating the challenge.
  • When the challenge has been created, the defender, for information, sends a PM to the attacker and makes a post in the tournament thread.

• Battle outcome, once resolved, is posted by the defender (along with combatants' casualties incurred and whether any C-in-C has been killed) through posting in the tournament thread.

Armies and allies in battles

• The attacker can select any army (and available allies) from his own controlled satrapies, again provided always that there is an uninterrupted route through his satrapies between the satrapy of the selected army or ally, as applicable, and the attacker satrapy (or if, supporting an attack or defence, the supporting satrapy).
  • Example: a player controlling Phrygia and Kappadokia can in his attack of any satrapy decide to select the army of Phrygia with Georgian 331 BC - 252 AD allies, if there is an uninterrupted route between both of Phrygia and Kappadokia and the satrapy from where the attack is made.

• The defender in attack type A can only select the army of the defender satrapy.
  • He can still select any allies available to him through controlling certain satrapies (the defender satrapy or any other satrapy he controls), provided always that there is an uninterrupted route through his satrapies between the satrapy of the selected ally and the defender satrapy.
  • Example: a player controlling Phrygia and Kappadokia must in his/her defence of Phrygia select the army of Phrygia but can decide to use allies available from either Phrygia or Kappadokia, i.e., Greek 460-281 or Georgian 331 BC - 252 AD allies (or no allies at all of course).

• The defender in attack types B or C can only use the same army as he does in the original attack, but is free to decide whether or not to select any allies available to him (as per above).

Map terrain in battles

• The defender in each battle selects which map type terrain to use, from among the available terrains of the satrapy in which the battle takes place (the defender satrapy).
  1. Makedonia: mediterranean hilly, mediterranean agricultural
  2. Thrake: mediterranean wooded, mediterranean agricultural
  3. Phrygia: mediterranean hilly, mediterranean agricultural
  4. Kappadokia: mediterranean hilly, mediterranean mountain, mediterranean agricultural
  5. Kilikia: mediterranean hilly, mediterranean agricultural
  6. Aigyptos: mediterranean agricultural, desert
  7. Syria: mediterranean agricultural, desert
  8. Armenia: middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern mountain, middle-eastern agricultural
  9. Mesopotamia: middle-eastern agricultural, desert
  10. Babylonia: middle-eastern marshy, middle-eastern agricultural
  11. Atropatene: middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern mountain, middle-eastern agricultural
  12. Media: middle-eastern mountain, middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern agricultural
  13. Hyrkania: middle-eastern hilly, steppe
  14. Parthyaia: middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern agricultural
  15. Persis: middle-eastern mountain, middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern agricultural
  16. Karmania: middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern agricultural
  17. Baktriane: middle-eastern mountain, middle-eastern hilly, steppe
  18. Areia: middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern agricultural
  19. Drangiane: middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern agricultural
  20. Gedrosia: middle-eastern hilly, desert
  21. Arakhosia: middle-eastern mountain, middle-eastern hilly, middle-eastern agricultural
  22. Sogdiane: middle-eastern mountain, steppe
  23. Paropamisadai: middle-eastern mountain, middle-eastern hilly
  24. Indike: tropical

Effects of battle outcome

• The player routing the enemy is considered the victor of that battle, and the routed player considered the loser of that battle.

• If neither player routs the enemy, neither player is considered victor or loser for that battle.

• Players can agree to a draw before the battle commences or at any time during the battle, in which case neither player is considered victor or loser for that battle.

• The victor of the battle takes control over the loser's satrapy-at-stake, unless one or more players have supported either the attack or the defence.

• If instead one or more players have supported either the attack or the defence, the following applies:
  • For the attacker or the defender in the original attack to gain the other player's satrapy-at-stake, the number of victors among him and the players supporting him must be higher than the number of victors among the other player and the players supporting the other player.
    • A player can never count as victor more than once in all his battles connected with an original attack and its satrapies-at-stake, despite how many battles he actually won.
    • Example: a defender fighting four battles against an attacker and the three other players supporting the attack, winning two battles but losing two battles, will only count as one victor on the defending side whereas there will be two victors on the attacking side, due to two different players on the attacking side winning their battles. Thus, the defender will lose his satrapy-at-stake to the attacker with 1-2.
    • The reason for this rule is to reward players who are successful in mustering support for their attacks or defences.
  • The attacker or defender in an original attack that (in accordance with the above) gains the other player's satrapy-at-stake will decide who among himself and the players that supported him and already control a satrapy neighbouring that satrapy-at-stake will gain that satrapy-at-stake (independent of who actually won, drew, or lost his battle over that satrapy-at-stake).

• A supporting satrapy is not "at stake" and will therefore not be gained or lost by any players, independent of battle results.

[Karvon]

Put me down as interested.

[TomoeGozen]

me too!!

[kronenblatt]

me too!!

Put me down as interested.

Thanks, guys! You're duly noted.

[kronenblatt]

I'm having an idea of creating 24 new army lists, based on combinations of existing army lists, so that each satrapy will get its own unique army. Tentative distribution below. What do you think? Certain allocations to change, or are fine?

(For example, the controller of Phrygia will be able to go to battle with an army consisting primarily (60%) of Macedonian 355-329 BC, but also (40%) of Greek 280-228 BC. And if you control Karmania, you can for a battle select an army comprised of 50% Seleucid 166-125 BC, 33% Achaemenid Persian 419-329 BC, and 16% Parthian 250 BC - 225 AD. In addition, it will be possible to supplement with certain allies (depending on satrapies controlled), spicing the armies up further, but all with a Hellenistic flavour.

ProvincesArmyLists.png (62.78 KiB) Viewed 11060 times

[Karvon]

Seems like a lot of work to me.

I think it would be far easier to simply create zones of 2-4 provinces and then assign one of the existing lists to that zone. It wouldn't be as historically/geographically accurate, but would still capture the flavor of diversity and save you a lot of time. It would also be easier for players, as they wouldn't have to figure out the ins and outs of a lot of new lists.

[kronenblatt]

Seems like a lot of work to me.

I think it would be far easier to simply create zones of 2-4 provinces and then assign one of the existing lists to that zone. It wouldn't be as historically/geographically accurate, but would still capture the flavor of diversity and save you a lot of time. It would also be easier for players, as they wouldn't have to figure out the ins and outs of a lot of new lists.

Thanks Karvon for reflections!

I actually like the work, or at least don't mind it (that much).

The proposal you're putting forward has been considered, but for me it ends up being too binary and too many provinces with simply Seleucid.

The new lists would still not be dramatically different, since they are made up of existing lists at a predefined proportion and thus not my entirely new creation (although I'll need to do some rounding to integers of course, and a few units may fall out of the list entirely due to their number being too low when weighted at 20%).

Hopefully players like this somewhat new experience too.

One alternative though, if you're right in that the work will prove too much for me, is to not mod the army lists themselves but, in the same ARMYLISTS file, add more allies to the applicable army lists. These added allies can then be chosen in-game, if certain province control is fulfilled.

[TomoeGozen]

How soon after Alexander's death are you seeing this set?
Based on there being so many smallish 'provinces' on your map I'm guessing pretty soon after?
If that's so , I would have thought most of the lists would still be based on the Macedonian list rather than the Seleucid or Ptolemaic lists , with the remainders of Alexander's army, garrisons and commanders/satraps forming the core of each provinces army. I don't think the nuances of the Seleucid and Ptolemaic armies would have developed by this stage.
It has admittedly been a long time since I took a detailed look at this period and I may have forgotten a load of stuff

[kronenblatt]

How soon after Alexander's death are you seeing this set?
Based on there being so many smallish 'provinces' on your map I'm guessing pretty soon after?
If that's so , I would have thought most of the lists would still be based on the Macedonian list rather than the Seleucid or Ptolemaic lists , with the remainders of Alexander's army, garrisons and commanders/satraps forming the core of each provinces army. I don't think the nuances of the Seleucid and Ptolemaic armies would have developed by this stage.
It has admittedly been a long time since I took a detailed look at this period and I may have forgotten a load of stuff

Yep, soon after: basically starting at the death of Perdiccas and the Triparadeisos settlement and then the two to four decades following that, until none of the original Diadochi combatants were longer alive (so roughly 320 - 280 BC). So you've got a good point there, in particular limiting Elephants a little, and that's why I went with an older Macedonian army list (355-329 BC). But the Seleucid army list of 166-125 BC is a remnant from when I played with the thought of using more allies, so probably should be 320-303 BC instead. Anyway, the modded army lists are mainly meant to create some regional flavour for the different satrapies in a simple and reasonably transparent way (without me putting to much of my mark into it, such as creating army lists from scratch, etc.) and will probably not be historically accurate anyway, no matter how I combine them. Overall you're right, I think now after more consideration, that the bulk of the army list in all satrapies should be Macedonian; with decreasing proportion the farther east we move.

[Karvon]

I, for one, would prefer more variety, rather than just shades of difference between lists Thus, I'd rather see the regular lists with maybe assigned allies, depending on the province.

[kronenblatt]

I, for one, would prefer more variety, rather than just shades of difference between lists Thus, I'd rather see the regular lists with maybe assigned allies, depending on the province.

I believe it will actually be quite cool with the new army lists; getting there... And then allies can be put on top of that, for armies outside of the Macedonian realm. (And the allies will be standard... )

[kronenblatt]

Here's a first attempt at the satrapy army lists, with the distribution below. Each satrapy army list is now unique in the sense that their proportions of vanilla army lists are unique too. Allies still missing for them though. Suggestions?

SatrapiesArmyLists.png (31.4 KiB) Viewed 10960 times

[rbodleyscott]

This looks great. Count me in.

[kronenblatt]

This looks great.

Thanks! Here are the files, if anyone wants to have a go in-game. Please note though that you need to own the Immortal Fire DLC for the mod to work.

FoG2_DIVIDING_SPOILS_20200903_2157.7z

(7.62 KiB) Downloaded 112 times

Then extract/unzip into:

...\My Games\FieldOfGlory2\CAMPAIGNS\

And within FoG2, choose Battles, then Custom Battle, and in the upper right corner, click Select another module. and finally in that list Dividing the Spoils.

Please let me know what you guys think. And meanwhile, enjoy.

[batesmotel]

Sounds like a neat idea. Count me in.

Chris

[deeter]

My favorite period. Please add me too.

Deeter

[kronenblatt]

Sounds like a neat idea. Count me in.

Chris

My favorite period. Please add me too.

Deeter

Sure, your're in, guys. Thanks! The good part with having 24 satrapies on the map is that it's easy to distribute them evenly at start, at 2-3-4-6-8-12 satrapies to 12-8-6-4-3-2 players. I'd say 6-8-12 players would be ideal here, since we're adding a level of diplomacy and alliances between players as well...

[kronenblatt]

I'm thinking these army lists as allies and potential border threats:

Arab 312 BC - 299 AD LPI_ARAB for Syria, Aigyptos, and Mesopotamia
Gallic 390-301 BC E_GALLIC threats (not allies) for Makedonia and Thrake (potentially Phrygia too)
Georgian 331 BC - 252 AD E_IBERIAN for Kappadokia, Armenia, and Atropatene
Greek 460-281 BC L_CLASS_GREEK for Makedonia and Phrygia (allies only)
Illyrian 680 BC - 25 AD ILLYRIAN for Makedonia
Indian 500 BC - 319 AD EC_INDIAN for Indike and Paropamisadai
Kyrenean Greek 321-276 BC LM_KYRENEAN for Aigyptos
Libyan 549-301 BC EL_LIBYAN for Aigyptos
Skythian or Saka 550-301 BC E_SKYTHIAN for Hyrkania, Baktriane, and Sogdiane
Thracian (Triballi) 350 BC-46 AD L_TRIBALLI_THRACIAN for Thrake

Thoughts and suggestions?