Campaign Game

[quoted original message omitted]

This is a Half-Baked Idea which I'm writing up largely so I
don't forget it, but if anyone wants to run with it, go ahead--I
have flu+narcotics right now so my ability to crunch numbers is
even more limited than usual.

In most campaign systems I've seen, your fleet goes in and crushes his fleet;
then the planet either immediately surrenders, or it surrenders after you make
one successful marine assault. However, most nations don't have the strategic
depth to be able to afford losing anything--the loss of one of
your three star systems would be catastrophic. Further, Canon history doesn't
seem to be written that way, as there are ground campaigns that drag on for
months.

So let's say instead that each system has a certain number of population
units. Let's say each unit has 1,000,000 people; it's a convenient number and
it's enough to run a major port
plus industries (Norfolk/Virginia Beach has about 2 million and
half of them are Navy). Let's also have population centers, which is a place
where you have one or more pop units.

Planting the first pop unit would be the most expensive--new
life support and infrastructure--but also the most productive.
The second unit would be cheaper but less productive, the third cheaper and
less productive than the second, and so on such that it wouldn't pay to put
more than ten units in a center (eg the first unit is the mines, port and
machine shops; the second one is mostly the same but adds convenience stores,
video shops, and so forth, the tenth unit is almost all bars, porno shops and
lawyers--kind of like New York City).

This will allow players to attempt to capture the whole planet at once, or one
city at a time, and to mount relief actions and sieges. It will also provide a
simple mechanism for players to invest in their economies, if you're running a
campaign with that kind of time scale.

--Chris  DeBoe
Quixtar IBO#706882
http://www.quixtar.com

> This is a Half-Baked Idea which I'm writing up largely so I

You mean the bars and porno shops aren't important parts of the city's
infrastructure....? (OK, I'll agree with you on the lawyers!) <grin>

Seriously, this is full of good ideas......

Jon (GZG)
> This will allow players to attempt to capture the whole planet

Good idea to incorporate into a campaign.

The ideal situation would be to have 2 concurrent levels of campaign running.
One on the Stellar (FT) scale and one on the DS2 scale (planetary conquest). I
am not slighting SG2 or FMA Skirmish, but they are more tactical than
strategic in scale. The Stellar campaign would provide the grand strategic
campaign. Create
Space Superiority. Provide for trans-system forces and resources
movement. When a system is taken, troops must be landed. As troops are
landing, switch
to DS2. Use DS2 to land the troops and take/defend territory and
resources. Switch to SG2 or FMA Skirmish for city fighting, special forces
operations, to take a specific objective using infantry. The three biggest
problems to this are: 1. Syncing the time. If you give a FT & DS2 (p. 4) a
turn of 15 minutes that syncs them (easy!). SG2 suggests a turn is about 5
minutes (p. 5). Not having played FMA Skirmish, I do not know the time scale
(I'll guess at 1 minute). Now you only have the Strategic Time scale to
consider. So pick a time frame at random (call it one week.) Now you have:
                               Str FT/DS  SG    Sk
	   Strategic		 1   672  2016 10,080
           FT/DS2            .0015   1     3    15
	   SG2		     .0005   .3    1	 5
	   Skirmish	     .0001  .07   .2	 1
* Please forgive rounding errors. Resources would be generated on a Strategic
turn basis. Production would
occur on a FT/DS2 scale.
The game would have to be run on the FT/DS2 scale. Interruptions for
important SG2/FMASk battles would be at EITHER player's option.
Switching to Strategic scale only when there is no conflict (and players
agree).
     2. Production Units/Universal cost. How to convert production into
FT/DS2/SG/FMASk units. This is beyond me (number crunchers have at it).
But a player should be able to decide to concentrate the war budget on
starships or ground forces. A player should also have to provide for the
populations under their control (do I put extra money into the population to
avoid riots or skimp to build the military) with set consequences (maybe a
table with population response and random events based on the response). 3.
Getting enough players to play. This is the biggest problem.
DS2/SG2
battles would consist the majority of play as taking and holding ground side
objective would be more time consuming than obtaining Space Superiority (see
Los' fine Rot Hafen saga). It is sad that there are not enough players to
carry this out (at least in my area).

-----
Brian Bell bkb@beol.net
http://members.xoom.com/rlyehable/gzg/
-----

> -----Original Message-----
[snip]

> --Chris DeBoe

This looks sorta like FT / DS2 / Stellar Conquest Rules I developed for
a campagin. Planetary population was built in 20 pop. cities. This made for 1
to 4 cities per planet, depending on how much pop. the planet could hold.
Industry was allocated per city. Cities generated "free" militia infantry
(police forces) if under attack. I even did a SpreadSheet in QuatroPro to
automate most of the record keeping. Unfortunately this was all for not,
because the guys I play with wanted no more then one ground battle per planet
(some of them even complained about that)...

IAS

> Laserlight wrote:

> This is a Half-Baked Idea which I'm writing up largely so I

Brian Bell expostulated:
> The ideal situation would be to have 2 concurrent levels of

(snippage)

Campaign Time Scales....

I suspect that one problem with a number of campaigns is confusion with the
level of simulation, trying to mix tactical, operational, strategic and
national levels all in one. Suggestions:

Daily or Weekly: FT operations. Each player has an assigned battlegroup and
maneuvers within the local systems to bring
about battles.  Movement scale = 1 system _or_ 1 battle per
turn.
--"Admiral, you have been assigned Task Force Alif.  The New
Zimbabwe Naval Yard is constructing a dreadnought which is scheduled to be
finished in 12 weeks. Your mission is to destroy the dreadnought before it is
completed, and do as much damage as possible to the Yard."

Monthly: FT strategy. Each player has an assigned fleet, which he can divide
into battlegroups, and maneuvers across multiple systems. Movement scale =
several systems per turn.

Quarterly: Grand strategy. This is the scale at which production and diplomacy
occur (remember diplomacy is limited by jump couriers carrying messages so
it's not instantaneous). Fleets have unlimited movement within the areas
controlled by the player.

You could conveniently combine the Weekly and Quarterly levels
into a two-tier campaign.

> Good idea to incorporate into a campaign.

Of course, for the completist, I will hereby suggest the "Ultimate GZG Gaming
Experience" (note: "ultimate" here as in "last").

Campaign game, with space battles fought by FT rules. As soon as landing ships
hit the atmosphere, shift over to FMA skirmish. At 1"=2m (IIRC) and 1 turn~1
minute, if you take a football field you can hold a very respectable battle
(maybe even big enough for Ortillery). Five or six years later, when THAT
battle is resolved, start another game turn.

Note: In order to carry the campaign to its conclusion, it may be necessary to
train a successor to take your place should you die of old age before the game
ends.

Just a humble suggestion,

Another way to do this is to use SG2 to resolve DS2 close assaults.

Neath Southern Skies - http://users.mcmedia.com.au/~denian/
[mkw] Admiral Peter Rollins; Task Force Zulu
[pirates] Prince Rupert Raspberry; Base Commander

> -----Original Message-----
Create
> Space Superiority. Provide for trans-system forces and resources