Gunboat 1000

[Clint]

Gunboat 1000
note some rules are considerably different to 1650/2950 Gunboat games


Each player running a normal duo of nations chooses at least 3 duo of
regions from the following regions:


Lindon, Angmar, Mirkwood, Northern Wastes, Lorien, Eregion, Dunland, Rohan,
Rhovanion, Rhun, North Mordor, South Mordor, North Harad, North Khand, South
Khand, South Harad. A total of 16 regions.


Region duos are as follows:
Free Peoples
Lindon/South Khand
Angmar/South Harad
Northern Wastes/North Harad
Mirkwood/South Mordor
Eregion/North Mordor
Dunland/North Khand
Rohan/Rhun
Lorien/Rhovanion

Dark Servants
Lindon/South Mordor
Angmar/North Mordor
Northern Wastes/South Khand
Mirkwood/North Harad
Eregion/North Khand
Dunland/South Harad
Rohan/Rhovanion
Lorien/Rhun


Eg
Clint Oldridge 108974
1st choice, Lindon/South Khand, 2nd Choice Eregion/North Mordor, 3rd Choice
Rohan/Rhun, 4th Choice Lorien/Rhovanion. Either allegiance is fine with me.


Eg 2
Fred Bloggs 101234
North Kingdom, South Kingdom or a normal duo as FP (any location is fine).


The two additional regions: Arnor and Gondor are exempt from placing as
these belong to the Kingdoms.


Regions
*** Not available here - if you want it go to:
http://middle-earth.darkfortress.us , the regional map at the bottom of the
page.



Map courtesy of Mike Mulka


Only one nation of each allegiance can be in each region. Deposit is then
taken from your account. When these regions have been allocated I'll allow
players to send in their set-ups for those regions. You'll have 2 weeks to
send your set-up. One nation of their duo of nations must be placed in one
region, and the other in the second region.


No Strategic Site victory allowed - if you get one your team LOSES. Two
teams of 5 players plus 1 Kingdom player. 5 players control 2 nations, and
the Kingdom player plays solo. This gives 6 players and 11 nations per
side. SK is FP and NK is DS.


LAS format - so no double Scout, nor +20% Kidnap/Assassinate, nor extra
chance of Stealth SNAs are allowed. Please note you CANNOT talk each other
about this game. (Nor pass any information in any form whatsoever). 2
nation game - you must play 2 nations. Exception 2 players control one
Kingdom each (ie one nation per player).


Players are allowed to take offensive actions against unknown characters
upon their OWN population centres. In other words, if Elrond, Erestor and
John Smith appear on the Cloud Lord capital the latter is now a legitimate
target for challenge, curse etc by the Cloud Lord even though the nation of
the character is unknown.


Note Game ENDS (then and only then are the players names revealed) after 52
turns - highest total team victory points wins (unless within 10% - then
draw declared) - Or one side has a greater than 4 to 1 player advantage. No
Diplomacy - under ANY circumstances :-)


Drop outs can be filled - but we will be discrete. List of players who
started playing the game but not nations nor side. If a nation cannot be
replaced then you are an allied player is allowed to pick up a nation of the
duos remaining. (They also get all the old turns). Only when all
team-mates have had the opportunity to do is the respectively aligned
Kingdom allowed a pickup.


Individual victory points at end of game determine the winner = average of
your two nations (dead nations = 400 )


If you are playing the Kingdom nations you will have a character called:
Lead a-b these are there for you to 175 (correct allegiance) and 740 - no
other orders allowed. Check your relations and allegiances - we can't fix
any problems if there is an error later - check before hand and we can.


Trust the players not to try and find out who their team mates/oppo are -
and not to diplome even if they come by such knowledge - it being considered
unsportsmanlike. You are not allowed to use camp or character names to
exchange information or 948s.


No influencing, stealing, cursing etc on or from or to your team (or unknown
characters not at your own PCs). No ass/kid if you do not know the nation of
the character if you are not at your own PC. If you think it is forbidden
by the rules it probably is so don't do it (ask us for clarification BEFORE
the event). If you can provide feedback that would be very useful - the
first game is going very well so we hope to make this one better.


You are able to transfer produce/gold from your nation to others in the
game, and use information from 925's Lore spells etc for your other nation.


Variant rules:
500 (Double character) allowed for all nations.
List of Dropped nations once every two turns.


FAQ:
Question: I know that we aren't allowed to assassinate, influence or
anything against your own team. However in one of the games I am in one of
our Nations has died and they have some very powerful artifacts in their
possession. In this instance are we allowed to Personal Challenge or
Assassinate their characters to get the Artifacts or do we have to Recruit
them through the Bribe/Recruit character order?
Answer: this is fine to do if you KNOW that the nation is dead. Get in
touch if there's any doubt.


No information transfer is allowed or allowed to be attempted in Gunboat.
So transferring 23 gold (attack 23) or say 3221 gold and say 6 gold
(indicating attack 3221 on turn 6) is allowed. The ATTEMPT is what is
against the spirit and rules of the Gunboat game - successful or not.


Hence the rule about naming characters, or arranging your armies into a
number 1 on the hexes for attack player 1 - although a facetious situation
it's something I've been asked - is not allowed.

[Clint]

Map attached

[Kitirat]

With your listed rules, won't the same two people be playing against each other?

For example, if I pick north wastes, north harad. I will be playing against the person on the otherside who also picked those same two locations...

Should we not have different listings for free and dark so as to prevent this???

See ya,
Ken

[Mormegil]

the first thing I want to say is that I find this a great idea and that would love join the game

I agree with all of the rules (especially LAS) but would like to discuss the distribution of regions.

I agree with kitirat, plus I see a problem in the fact that only the kingdom regions are set regarding the alliance. a FP player chosing Lindon will have to fight against the DS player in that region AND the close North Kingdom, the same goes for a DS player in Rohan. I think there should be some DS and FP exclusive regions and some regions were the two allegiances clash (the frontlines would have to be debated about, but I think the classical NW/SE division would do). Thus everybody could play one military nation and one character/support nation and enjoy the whole width of game options.

any other opinions??

[Clint]

Excellent point and good catch. Suggestions welcome.

I've split the North and South somewhat, so the two Harad, two Mordor and two Khand are prime real estate normally. They then go with the North relatives. Pretty easy to fix but I'd like to see what you guys suggest.

Clint (GM)

[Mormegil]

this is a first rough sketch:

I would split the regions into a northern and a southern alliance (no need to fix it on the allegiance, I think the GM should flip a coin before beginning to setup to decide which alliance is DS and which FP).
Between them is a kind of "war zone"
Every player has to place one of his nation in the home zone and one in the war zone.
To egalise the disadvantages in climate and resources, the NA has 5+1 home regions, the SA has 4+1 home regions, and there are 7 regions in the war zone.

NA regions: Lindon, Angmar, Northern Wastes, Eregion, Lorien plus Arnor for NK
SA regions: N+S Harad, N+S Khand plus Gondor for SK
War Zone: Dunland, Rohan, Mirkwood, Rhovanion, Rhun, North and South Mordor

Each player would have to chose three different combinations of home and war regions, it might be lot of work for the GM to sort that out but I think it is worth the effort

In the home regions a nation can build up with relative safety while in the war zone immediate conflict is to be expected. The home nations can support the war nations what will make the game more interesting IMHO.

I'd like to read other opinions on this

[Kitirat]

I would make it more simple.

A player chooses a northern or centeral region for one of his nations, and a southern or central region for the other.

Then have 1-2 zones exclusive to only one side.

For example:

If the NK is dark then Lindon and Eregion are dark only.

In the south, north harad and south harad are FP only.

North Regions:
Lindon, Angmar, Northern Wastes, Mirkwood, Rhun, Eregion.

Southern Regions:
North Harad, South Harad, N&S Khand, South Mordor, North Mordor

Central Regions: Dunland, Rohan, Mirkwood, Rhovanion, Lorien

So the FP have a better climate and resources, but the DS have their kingdom not as much on the front line and have the misty as protection. Kind of a reveral of the normal game (with the FP northwest and dark south-east).

Or flip who gets what...

So I could choose a mirkwood/lorien position, and would be in the middle of it all, but close, etc.

I agree with a safe zone or two at start, but I like keeping it otherwise simple.

See ya,
Ken

[Mormegil]

only two safe "home regions" per side would not suffice, bear in mind that every FP and DS player would want to place one nation into their home regions, which would be a little crowded, no?

I don't think my design is too complicated if we generally like the idea of splitting the map into the tree parts: DS regions / neutral-open-war regions / FP regions.

the only alternative would be just having two zones, one DS and one FP. but I see the problem that the southern side would be too powerful economically, therefore I would stick to the three-zone idea.

[klub]

The GB 1000 game format outlined above sounds excellent and thanks to Clint & co for being continually innovative. I played one regional FA grudge game before and the LAS format and regional approach will lead to an exciting and challenging contest, though I hope my allegiance will be doing the kicking this time. :rolleyes:

The nation possibilities are endless and it is difficult to outline a standard 'winning' nation design, since so little is known about the enemie in advance. No doubt the GB format will throw a few spanners in the works every turn, so I hope this game gets off the ground sooner rather than later.

I have spent many hours designing FA nations, so it will be difficult to create 2 compatible nations at once, but then this is a very enjoyable and exciting part of FA. I guess some of us will have to think about new nation names so we will not be recognisable to other players.

Paul Young

Clint, please sign me up.
Bernd, hope to see you in game again.
All, lets hope there are enough of us to get this game rolling. :D

[Clint]

I don't think that there's going to be a problem getting enough for this game. Should be fun.

Paul Young - we've got 3 Paul Youngs on our list - can you email me direct please? I am 90% sure of who you are but not 100% so would prefer to be careful.

Thanks

Clint (GM)

[klub]

Darned usurpers! :(

Clint,

My request has been confirmed by email.

Thanks,
Paul

[Clint]

Note the changes below. Not such a fan of the warzone/no-mans land idea at present (although I understand where you are coming from). This should give enough variety and challenge I reckon.

Are the Kingdoms interesting enough to want to play at present? I intend that they don't get the start locations though. (Maybe for their own team - thoughts?)

Quick change for regions.

Free Peoples
Lindon/South Khand
Angmar/South Harad
Northern Wastes/North Harad
Mirkwood/South Mordor
Eregion/North Mordor
Dunland/North Khand
Rohan/Rhun
Lorien/Rhovanion

Dark Servants
Lindon/South Mordor
Angmar/North Mordor
Northern Wastes/South Khand
Mirkwood/North Harad
Eregion/North Khand
Dunland/South Harad
Rohan/Rhovanion
Lorien/Rhun

[Zalendar]

I sent in an email to Clint a couple mins ago to sign up :) Make sure I am in!! hehe

Looking forward to this gunboat varrient!

Shayne Gray.

[Zalendar]

I've never liked that the Kingdoms get the start locations of everyone at game start. It kinda takes a bit out of the game, that allure of trying to find another nation etc.

So I would for sure say no to start locations of the opposing team.

As for getting the start locations for your team, I'm not sure. It gives the kingdoms another advantage that the other players don't get... but on the other hand if you play the kingdom you don't get a second nation, sure you're stronger at game start but as the game progresses 2 nations are better than one.

With reguards to wether the Kingdoms are intresting enough to play at game start. Playing a Kingdom I always find intresting hehe. I've not decided wether to put in for a Kingdom start-up for the Gunboat game or not.. but playing a Kingdom does have its perks that can be enjoyable.

Shayne Gray.

[Clint]

How to make the Kingdoms competitive for final placement is one question. One simpe way is a modifier to the VPs - so say

Turn Number /50 +100% x their final VPs. So say you had 1500 VPs on turn 19 you'd get 19/50 + 100%x1500 = 1.38 x 1500 = 2070. Might be too little though but it's an idea and might be usable for this tester game.

With some extra information they can use that to benefit their side more - I can think of ways that would be beneficial without being too strong.

Thoughts?
Clint (GM)

[Zalendar]

I was thinking about the artifacts that the Kingdoms start with.

What you could do is trade the 2 random evil artifacts that the South Kingdom starts with, for a palantir and the starting good artifact that North Kingdom starts with.

That way both nations would start with 2 Palantirs and 3 aligned artifacts of the right alignment.

Shayne.

[Clint]

Lot of potch for little gain. :-)

Clint (GM)

[Mormegil]

basically everything is fine with me but if we have no "safe regions" and everybody must expect to find an enemy right on his doorstep, most nations will have a very military based design. we won't see many mage or character nations in this game, out of fear to be overrun in the early game. that would be quite a loss to the game depth and quality IMHO

[Clint]

I can see lots of areas where you can have safe nations so I don't see that as a problem.

Clint (GM)

[Zalendar]

Not counting the Kingdoms

There are 16 regions and 10 players per side. If one nation from each side can be in a region. That means that there will be 6 regions that don't get used per side.

Now that doesn't mean that there will be 6 unused regions total, but I imagine that there will be a couple that wont overlap, and you'll have nobody in a region. Also there will be a few regions that will only have 1 nation in it.

So that will also contribute to safe nations.

Shayne.

[Mormegil]

all right, but that is just statistics - the BIG PROBLEM is that you don't know if you will have a "neighbour" or not when designing your nation - the only way to influence that would be to chose a rather remote region, but even that is no guarantee - so one would rather prepare for the worst. making up a mage nation for artifact retrival would be a nice thing, but when you find out that there is an enemy six hexes away who has "hire armies at no cost" you won't enjoy it for long...
but taking risks is part of a FA game so I will stop whining now and start yearning in anticipation :D

[AA Enforcer]

A simple query for thee:

__________________________________________________
Players are allowed to take offensive actions against unknown characters
upon their OWN population centres. In other words, if Elrond, Erestor and
John Smith appear on the Cloud Lord capital the latter is now a legitimate
target for challenge, curse etc by the Cloud Lord even though the nation of
the character is unknown.
_________________________________________________
If one cannot act offensively unless someone lands in their pop center, and they don't know the characters, why would one move characters into the pop centers of another nation unless by sheer accident?

Once the offending parties are offensively acted upon, is all out war allowed? If not, does this not make the game mostly military anyway???so why the LAS stipulation?

Curiosity abounds,

Love the concept of this btw, just want some clarification...

I of IV

[Clint]

If one cannot act offensively unless someone lands in their pop center, and they don't know the characters, why would one move characters into the pop centers of another nation unless by sheer accident?

If you know who it is then you can aggress if it is an enemy.

So if you get assassinate by Jim Bloggs (at a non-friendly pc) then you know that he is an enemy and hence can act on that information. If you see Mavis Davies but don't know it's an enemy then you can't aggress against that character.

only way to influence that would be to chose a rather remote region, but even that is no guarantee -

Just like in the normal 1000 game right... :-)

Actually the game will be much more spread out than normal I suspect - we have to wait and see. Normally we get half the players ask for a very few regions.

Clint (GM)

[klub]

There are 16 regions and 10 players per side. If one nation from each side can be in a region. That means that there will be 6 regions that don't get used per side.
Now that doesn't mean that there will be 6 unused regions total, but I imagine that there will be a couple that wont overlap, and you'll have nobody in a region. Also there will be a few regions that will only have 1 nation in it.

Looking at the regional pairings it is very difficult to choose an area in advance which would be free of enemies.

Paul

[Mormegil]

Paul, that was just what I wanted to say...
But hey - my nations will be prepared for ANYTHING :D

So lets get that thing going - I want to start scheming...

[Clint]

If you are interested then send me your area choices please and we can organise the rest. (As per the instructions in the GB 1000 rules I sent out recently).

Clint (GM)

[Clint]

Note we have 7 players so far (I'll be playing as I need to see it from a player perspective). So we need 5 more. I've got a lot of interest so far.

Clint

[DaveHolt]

This will be a GREAT game for folks that detest agents. They will be the least important class I think because not only is it LAS, but given GB rules, you will have to get incredibly accurate scouts for the agents to do their stuff. yes they can steal gold and sabotage at enemy pops... but that's not as important as taking down your enemies armies without risking your own forces.

Thus, this seems to be a really military & economy focused FA variant, and there's nothing wrong with that! Mages also benefit because it's now more important to go find those combat artifacts to help out your numerous armies.

I think it will be pretty interesting, but alas, given timing and my commitment to an existing GB and a soon to form normal FA, I must pass.

Clint and players - it would be great if you could publish a "lessons learned" article at game end.

cheers,
Dave

[Mormegil]

Come on, ladies and gentlemen,

only five positions to fill... join while you still have a chance!
This will be a completely new experience to ME-PBM:
- Total fog of war
- No classic victory conditions
- No chesslike starting moves
- No overwhelming killer agents
- No classic artifact race

I can't wait to get this game started, what about you?

[klub]

Aye this should be a unique and challenging mepbm experience. My regional preferences are in and I would like to know my allocated locations so I can continue designing my nations.

Send in your regional preferences now, you will have 2 weeks afterwards to complete your nation designs.

:D

Paul

[Nintelten]

My preferences are in and awaiting the filling :)

[Nimdraug]

I'd love to sign up for this one; but I'm at my limit of games right now (all Gunboat :D ). As soon as one or two end, I'll be looking to join a FA1000 Gunboat game. (And given some of my play of late, I may find myself out of one or more games quite soon. :eek: ).

Let us know how this one goes.

[Clint]

This game now needs one more nation and then it can start. (Either a Kingdom or a duo).

Ta
Clint (GM)

[Mormegil]

Hey, yadda, yadda...

Hey yadda, yadda...

C'mon lads and ladies out there, just one more player!!!

If we don't get that filled by the end of the week, Clint will ask Sam and two GMs in one game is something we all want to avoid... :D :D :D

[Mormegil]

wooohooooooo!!!!

too late, game is filled, setups are running....

I am already working towards the inevitable demise of my enemies - whoever, wherever and whatever they are - always remember: I am out there somewhere...

Good luck to my allies - whoever, wherever and whatever they are - always remember: I am out there somewhere...

:D

[klub]

My enemies in this Fourth Age conflict are in deep dodoo, or ... perhaps is it my allies? :confused:

Paul

[Clint]

We're now taking set-ups for the next 1000 GB game. Duo or Kingdom (if your pocket isn't upto the full costs) available.

Thanks
Clint (GM)

Can't wait to work on my set-up for the GB 1000 - got to "think outside the box" on this one... :-)

Clint (Player)

[klub]

My nation set-ups are in for GB 1000, get the finger out allies and enemies.

:D

Paul

[klub]

Hurry up guys (gals?) and get your nation setup's into ME Games for this GB 1000 game. I cannot wait to get this game kicked off.

:(

Paul