I am in the process of planning a campaign for FT and was planning on stealing
as much as I could from Paul Radfords campaign rules(
http://www.paulradford.mistral.co.uk/ft/camrules.html) as possible.
I looked at Roger B. Wests rules as well
(http://firedrake.org/roger/ft/campaign.html), but they had a bit more
micromanagement than I am aiming for at the start. (Allthough the two sets of
campaign rules DO look quite the same in some points:))
I have emailed Paul offlist with most of these questions below, but thought I
would put it out here in the public as well (and he hasn't
answered me yet - if ever ;) ). I have left the questions as is so the
"you" part in them were intended for Paul and not being targeted at anyone
here in particular.
* how do you recieve orders? Do you have a specific format that the players
should use, and if so would it be possible to see it?
* you mention " · When a system is gained or lost, don't forget to tell
the referee or update your FTC file as appropriate." - what is this FTC
file and what does it look like?
* How do you handle the umpire participating in the campaign? If at all
possible?
* where do you get the hex maps with numbers from.(found a numbered hex
map on my own account during the week-end). And what is the legend to
the symbols on your campaign maps?
* I might put up a webpage of my own with pics and battlereports etc and
of course my modified (why can't we wargamers ever just use things as is?:))
campaign rules. I would however very much like to credit the original work and
authors and it seems like your set of rules has some of the same text as
Roger's (or the other way around). To whom should I give credit?
* if you have any objections against me putting stuff like this on the net
please let me know and I will make sure it is only available to my own
players!
----
Additional question (this should really have gone to Paul, but I forgot). He
mentions a spreadsheet
(http://www.paulradford.mistral.co.uk/ft/pp-start.html) which I would
very much like to get my hands on (or similar if any one has a good idea
that I can use).
I am still in the process of determining whether we should transport
RP's from their extraction point to shipyards/homeworld or just make
them universally available right away.
So shoot away.. I have a strange feeling that Captain Vladimir Semenoff
might appear in this campaign as well :) (well - depending on how people
react to the empire.. ehhhrr umpire playing as well:))
Thanks!
> On Mon, Oct 31, 2005 at 02:40:52PM +0100, Claus Paludan wrote:
I was aiming for a very basic extension of the tactical system rather
than a high-level wargame...
I should say I haven't used those rules myself for a while.
> * how do you recieve orders? Do you have a specific format that the
I left this up to the players, but broadly it tended to be simple sentences:
"Ships A, B and C are now known as Fleet Q."
"Move Fleet Q to world J."
"Repair the heaviest ships first."
> * How do you handle the umpire participating in the campaign? If at all
> possible?
In one game I ran a Sa'Vasku invasion - think roughly B5 Shadow War in
style, as the players had to decide whether to share information or
accuse each other of having hideously high-tech ships. :-)
> * I might put up a webpage of my own with pics and battlereports etc
> of the same text as Roger's (or the other way around). To whom should I
> give credit?
I'm fairly sure I didn't take anything from Paul, but some of my material (as
far as I remember, the setup phase for the actual tactical games) was derived
from a battle generator written by "Reason" (whose material is no longer
available).
> * if you have any objections against me putting stuff like this on the
For what it's worth I have no objection to my material's being used in this
way.
> I am still in the process of determining whether we should transport
The former is hard work to keep track of; the latter stops you having
convoy raiding scenarios. :-(
R
> Roger Burton West wrote:
> I was aiming for a very basic extension of the tactical system rather
NP - they are easily understandable and provides a good base for what I
have in mind. But if I understand it right it seems both you and Paul might
have gotten the ideas from a battlegenerator from something called
Reason? Well if that's the case and we have to GZG players using it it sure
must be good:D
> * how do you recieve orders? Do you have a specific format that the
Hehe ok - I can probably handle the same level :)
> * How do you handle the umpire participating in the campaign? If at
OK - my part would be as a normal (ESU) player. During my many years of
roleplaying in a friends world with various characters the art of "My
character does not know what I know" came close to perfect, but I guess this
is still something that needs trust from the other players:)
> [quoted text omitted]
> I'm fairly sure I didn't take anything from Paul, but some of my
Well to be safe I will just credit the both of you - both pages have
helped me a lot (all though I couldn't find any campaign reports on your
page:D *hint* *hint*).
> For what it's worth I have no objection to my material's being used in
Credit will go your way anyway - thanks!
> I am still in the process of determining whether we should transport
Well as the qualified nerd I am I might think of developing some sort of
program to handle that, maybe even a system for the players to enter
their captains log etc.. (and yes - I can see this thing go off in many
different directions...:p)
--On Monday, October 31, 2005 7:16 PM +0100 Claus Paludan
> <cpaludan@tiscali.dk> wrote:
...
> I am still in the process of determining whether we should transport
One way to handle this, more abstractly than tracking resource points and less
abstractly than making them universal, would be to require shipping
lanes between systems. Any system under blockade, or with a blocked shipping
lane would have it's resource production reduced (with no shipping lane, maybe
to 25%, and blockaded to 0%). If a player places warships into an enemy
shipping lane, consider it to be blocked.
To do raiding scenarios, the player could move along a shipping lane which
would not block it, but instead would have some chance of triggering a raid.
Each player could (or perhaps be forced to) also designate a certain
number of ships to anti-piracy duty acting as escorts. When the raid
scenario happens, take some percentage of the escort ships and put them in to
protect the transports.
Then come up with some penalty for losing the transport (some amount of
reduction in resource points for the turn) and give the raiding force a bonus
(especially if they capture the transports!).
That's just a suggestion off the top of my head. I may not have thought it
through very clearly, but it does offer a different solution.:)
> John K. Lerchey wrote:
> One way to handle this, more abstractly than tracking resource points
A very interesting idea - this might be a solution that the roleplayer
in me can live with:) On the other hand I will now have to manage the escort
ships as well hehe.
But any ideas are more than welcome.. I will go where Paul and Roger has
gone before and write the campaign rules down so everyone will know what
to do and what not to do.
In our campaigns the organiser is also playing.
Because we are playing on a map and all the ships are represented by counters
indicating their approximate size there is some information about what is
going on.
We roll for initiative and then each player takes it in turn to move their
ships that impulse. because our ships can move a number of squares equal to
half their thrust, ships with more thrust can either move further or hold off
moving to await initial developments and then move in later impulses.
because all moves are visible everyone can play and you don't need movement
orders.
We also play that ships can "pin" another ship by moving into the same
strategic square as an enemy ship so there can be advantages to movning first.
The main issue with having the organiser playing is that you can't really
discuss potential rule interpreations with that person without giving away
what you are planning. e.g. I wondered about using needle missiles against the
SaVasku power generators but did'nt want to tip my
hand to my Umpire /opponent. It turns out you can't needle beam SV
generators but its not clear in the rules.
The other thing to consider is how much effort you want people to spend on
managing their "economy", supply ships and merchant fleets. if you have to
move resources on cargo ships you can then arrange convoy type games, but the
overhead can be quite large.
We went for a simpler system where ships in supply can get repaired and
resupplied automatically, ships out of supply can suffer mechanical breakdown
and can't replenish or repair.
Keeps it focussed on the battles.
> John Tailby wrote:
In this respect I will still go for the approach taken by Roger and Paul
, besides that the players will be from my own club, from another club as well
as perhaps another friend living some distance from us all. So there will be
no board as such for people to watch at besides the one I will make for them
(probably in The Gimp or something).
> The main issue with having the organiser playing is that you can't
I agree with that, but we have at least one other who can help out with rule
questions so we should be able to stay clear of this black hole.
> The other thing to consider is how much effort you want people to
Somehow I would like to have the possibility of those convoy attacks, but the
most important thing for me is to find out what the players want. If they
don't care for resource trucking I'll have no problem in finding another
system that works out, even if it means only having battles to think of.
> Keeps it focussed on the battles.
Truly an important thing eh;)
> On Mon, Oct 31, 2005 at 09:42:31PM +0100, Claus Paludan wrote:
> In this respect I will still go for the approach taken by Roger and
> will make for them (probably in The Gimp or something).
I don't know what your programming skills are like, but I've found the GD
library is very good for pasting bitmaps on top of other bitmaps... it's
easily accessible from C, Perl or Ruby, probably among others.
> Somehow I would like to have the possibility of those convoy attacks,
One fundamental problem of this sort of campaign system is that the side
that starts winning tends to keep winning - it gets more planets, has
more resources, builds more ships and wins more battles, and several turns
before the game ends it's clear who's going to win. Backstabbing and mutable
alliances seem to be the only way round this that I've encountered.
> Somehow I would like to have the possibility of those convoy attacks,
One fundamental problem of this sort of campaign system is that the side
that starts winning tends to keep winning - it gets more planets, has
more resources, builds more ships and wins more battles, and several turns
before the game ends it's clear who's going to win. Backstabbing and mutable
alliances seem to be the only way round this that I've encountered.
---
Though not as "sexy" as the "build lots of ships" flavor of game, one way to
control this is to make building ships far, far more difficult that repairing
them. This also brings about a more "realistic" style of play that inhibits
the fight to the death syndrome found in many players.
Balancing resource management vs. playability is always a pain.
> Roger Burton West wrote:
Hmm no skills in graphics progamming. These days most of my time are
spent making intranet systems in java/websphere/db2 + mainframe. My
sparetime is all php/apache/mysql and the occasional shell script to
make my life easier;)
> One fundamental problem of this sort of campaign system is that the
Yes, this is a problem we will have to decide on how to handle. It somewhat
depends on whether they want at campaign with a set goal or they are more
willing to have a "world" to play in. The first makes it possible quite fast
to determine who wins, the latter would allow me to introduce more RPG
elements that could tip balances.
I don't even know how many players I will have. There's potential for up
to 9 players at the moment 2 FSE, 2 UNSC, 1 ESU, 1 NAC, 1 NSL, 1 Kra'Vak
and one player who resently moved to Denmark - he has several fleets,
but I don't know which ones.. If all want's to play I will probaly go abstract
in many places to help ease running the campaign. The fewer players (and
depending a bit on which players) more RPG and narrative and detail can be
added.
> From: Claus Paludan <cpaludan@tiscali.dk>
Backstabbing
> > and mutable alliances seem to be the only way round this that I've
One issue that can occur with any "all on all" campaign is that the way
to win is for 2-3 players to ally together and then they crush 1-2
people very quickly for negliable losses. Its not really much fun or even a
test of skill if you are playing battles where you are outpointed 2 to 1.
With the kind of mix you have you could easily get the 2 FSE and the ESU
player allying and then just about everyone else would need to ally to keep
them off.
> John Tailby wrote:
True - on the other hand we have at least some VERY gentleman player
types. Me(ESU), the Kra'vak player, one of the ESU and the NSL player usually
go for the exciting game rather than the game we win. And being the umpire I
wouldn't probably try and limit my allying with anyone to a
fragile alligance at best. But yes players that go for the ultimate kill
might ruin it all. I will try and set up some player requirements that will
hopefully make them sure they want to participate and help out with
the "story" rather than win the game.
> On 31-Oct-05, at 1:17 PM, Claus Paludan wrote:
Your skills are more than enough, if the itch is strong enough... ;-)
> David Rodemaker wrote:
> One fundamental problem of this sort of campaign system is that the
Not really - it changes the dynamics a bit, but the "snowballing" effect
remains. Once one side has built up an advantage in ships (eg. after a
decisive battle where it managed to destroy part of the enemy fleet), it
can afford to pull damaged ships out of battles and still have enough ships
left to win that battle; the side with fewer (or smaller) ships side has to
choose between withdrawing early (concede the battle in order to fight another
day) and staying in the fight to get a chance to win but also risk losing an
effectively irreplacable fleet.
The best-working solution to the "snowballing" problem that we came up
with
in StarFire was to require that newly-conquered resources (planets,
populations etc.) be heavily garrisoned to keep them from revolting, and
also prevent the conqueror from actually getting any use out of the
newly-conquered resources for a while after the conquest. This gives the
"losing" side a chance to recover after a bad defeat.
> This also brings about a more "realistic" style of play that
That it does, yes... after the first few defeats, anyway <g>
Later,
> Tony Christney wrote:
Ohh the itch is there.. but years have taught me to realize that something
takes more time than it is worth. My sparetime is fully used
with wargames, kids/wife and web programming. Taking out extra time to
learn how to do graphics..hmm well sure would be nice, but something that will
have to wait for now...
:) (besides that I have a lot of other itches that pull me in different
directions as well)