added the link to the campaign header
How outmatched are we by a battle barge?
Interesting question I have found to ask myself as well.
My guts tell me that a battleship is a match for anything between 3 and 6 Cruisers depending on layout and skill of the captain's.
Obviously, adding frigates to the mix makes things interesting. Those tend to be in danger of being annihilated by a single broadside but the collective firepower they can bring to the table is also a great annoyance, especially those equipped with torpedoes.
...
All in all, if you can bring all your ships together, you may be able to take it down or at the very least wound it enough for its captain to reconsider.
Then again, the enemy has frigates and even a cruiser or another as well.
Battle barges are basically purpose-retrofitted battleships, right? So those numbers make sense. If we don't let ourselves get caught separated from each other we should have at least even odds, if not slightly in our favor.
Yes they are.
Same logic as strike cruisers.
Slightly faster and more armoured (especially the front) than their counterparts and with more Close-Range firepower and less lances but (usually) a lot of launch bays and torpedoes.
How is the strategic side of things going guys?
I still mess around with the economy side of the game atm, but otherwise I see us in quite a good shape to get going once we are done with the test combat?
Any open questions from your side?
@Admiral: Still need your strategic holds
It's markedly slow and I worry that the slower pace will lead to forgetfulness.
Is there anything more we can do to lighten your load and help things move along?
It is slow by purpose, because I am already at peak PbP capacity to be honest, but I really wanted to make this game (and did not wanted to get sloppy in my other games), so there had to be a comprise.
I am in the (final) boss battle in a round-robin-GMed game I'm in, so hopefully, my GM time in that game will come to an end soon, freeing up some capacity.
On the other hand, I have a big project coming at work, so yeah...
I had a reason to go with one ROUND a week in this game (which is certainly not the same as one post per week) :-)
@Load-Lightening: Well, as soon as I decide on the principles of the economy, you guys can use those principles to populate the worlds/systems on the map if you want to.
Another point on my agenda is to come up with a strategic overview template for every party with resource and troop status / movement overview. Maybe one of you want to give it a shot and start something in that direction?
I totally understand that, and I'm not trying to complain or anything. Heaven knows we all have limits. I'm just stating the concern.
I'll attempt making a round overview, sure. :)
Cool.
@All: what's your feeling about the way the test war is coming along?
My feeling:
- it is very cool at this speed level ...
- BUT there is no way we can have this kind of detailed war while keeping up the one round / week strategic game going.
So... Hand signs for the following options please:
1) If a major war breaks out (with everyone present), switch to 'tactical battle speed' and play out the war in detail, similar to what we are doing now.
2) Have a higher 'war speed', thus limiting the number of rounds for a war to something more manageable like maybe 3 tactical rounds per week. If you cannot end the war in those three rounds, e.g. because the enemy resisted that long, the war stretches on into the next strategic turn.
Also: go forth and roll your fate die at the end of your posts in the future. Should at least give you the impression to have your fate in your own hands :-)
I think im not used to operating at the strategic level in pbp. My instinct is to go into detail because good detail is the spice of writing but I may need to try to pull back a little. But I think it's going well overall.
Thumbs up on your proposal. Keep things moving in parallel with our tactical moves. That would mean a tactical round is equal to about a month.
Actually, without influencing you *harharr*,I am in favour of variant 1.
One month of pre-planing combat is still A Lot especially with Astartes involved.
Of course we could have both options depending on the size and ... criticality of a war, with option 1 being reserved for the REAL big wars OR those which you really, really cannot loose to a single bad roll...
True. I'd like to keep things moving when possible, so only zooming in when dramatically appropriate seems good to me.
If you want to have a good strategic or grand strategy game then you *have* to pull back and abstract on the tactical side of things otherwise the more granular actions will make the higher level decisions less important. It's like how it doesn't matter what your tactics are if you've got a Rambo type character that can succeed no matter how bad of a tactical situation they're thrown into.
So I'm in favour of 1 as well. Only get into a lot of detail for the most important battles.
We're supposed to be the people pushing the pieces around on a map. Not the people managing what happens moment to moment like we're doing right now.
The Naval part of the game is very boring to me also especially when we're going round to round tactics rather than strategic because it means I'm not doing anything for weeks.
Mhhh I agree with the overall feeling that we're too detailed in the test so option 1 seems appropriate.
What I don't see yet is how to make the macro decisions while keeping up the roleplay side of things.
From experience it is simply more interesting to read in-character action - talking, giving orders, doing things. Rather than just saying 'X tells Y to do Z'.
But writing in-character dialog which will set the course of a war for the next 3 month seems hard. Sending of troops in person and holding strategic meetings every 3 month to give out orders does seem doable but foreshadowing your commanders decisions for 3 month to come in character...
This is not meant as an argument against option 1 mind you. I'd just like input on how to write the posts in our 3 month long rounds.
Honestly, that's my struggle. My entire 25,000+ post history has been of a particular granularity and now I'm having to branch out. It's a challenge.
Would it be feasible that we could somehow all need to cooperate more directly? I know the lore and history in the setting work against this directly, but would all of us in the same room making decisions as one team in a massive game of space chess played out on strategic level Tacticarium tables be... imaginable? Possible? It would give our characters the interaction we (meaning I) tend to default towards.
Maybe after this we will agree to have a regular teleconference where we can argue over what needs to be prioritized?
Don't know about that.
Too much time difference, especially since my post time is either during office or train rides.
Both of which are not a particular good place for having a Telco.
But I could make a discord server for this up in notime.
Chatting in an IM is a much faster and somewhat more direct way than via forum I think?
I done mean us, but our characters in the same room.
Yeah, that's what I meant too :), our characters decide to teleconference each other so we can RP our strategic decisions!
I like the idea. It would allow the flavor of a space marine chapter master calling from the midst of a battle, a Lord Commander under artillery attack(or plain drinking tee if the war goes to plan) and a Arch Magos who's directing servitors and minor acolytes in an experiment in the background all to come together anoying eachother because the others clearly don't see their respective tactical genius.
It would be a large stretch on the available tech level since the beast novels set mid-m32 state that a non-astropath vox link between ships in the same system had like 30 minutes delay(and I think the general consensus is that tech only regressed since then)
But we have an Arch Magos with a knack for soooomewhat experimental tech. Let him combine some astropath brains with a vox link for funky near-insta 'vox telcos'
Honestly most of the time Sieng is going to be well well back from the front lines sitting in the sector's equivalent of the Pentagon.
I knew being in the Investigatus would be a good thing! And if there was ever a time to experiment with instantaneous long-range communication, defending one of the two known breaches in the massive warp storm ripping the Galaxy in two is probably the good time to bring out the maybe kind of sort of tech heresy.
I imagine that the post or posts in the full game will be different to this as well. We will have the Strategic meeting post, economy post, the construction post, unit directives laid out. There will be a lot more to do once we add a couple more layers, I think.
Had some late-night brainstorming with our heretek Magos with experimental tendencies and we came up with a solution for that, allowing you all to have your telcos.
I intended to allow that kind of conferences anyway, somewhat handwaving the details to: we look at three months of time, that allows for a fair amount of astropathic communication, so go forth and plan&discuss away. But I think we found a more interesting solution for that.
@Sieng: Yeah, the Navy/IG complementary tasks is a real problem for this kind of game and I am a bit at a loss of how to tackle that. Luckily it is only a problem when we really go into close-up wars according to option 1. During the major, strategic game, I hope it will not be an issue. Even if there is an enemy fleet in en engagement where you both are sent to deal with it, most of the time your forces will be able to make planetfall at some point, unless the enemy fleet is considerably stronger and more numerable than your navy assistance - but then, it is probably time for a retreat anyway, which then calls for more strategic decisions...
@All: My feeling is that interesting, engaged IC discussions have the potential to drown out round-by-round posts very quickly, thus I have the feeling it would be good to have a clear cut between those two kind of IC posts. That makes for a couple of options:
1) Use two IC threads. One for round-by-round, the other for IC discussion / planing. Clear cut, litters one's campaign page a bit.
2) Use this discussion thread for IC discussion. OOC Q/A can be done via ooc tags or somewhere separate (another thread or via discord)
3) ?
Thoughts?
When the then-Magos Fulcrum recovered the Omnissiah's Will from that ancient battleground around a violent and blood-red star, he reported to his Adeptus superiors that there was nothing more to be found.
This was not entirely accurate.
Orbiting dangerously close to the star by even Mechanicus standards was a small, almost impossible to notice piece of wreckage. What Magos Fulcrum found there was well and truly beyond any glorious tech the Ark contained. It was a collection of spheres of darkest night that reflected unknown stars. The magos smuggled it back to his personal laboratory.
It was secret for centuries as he tinkered and experimented. The stones resisted almost all forms of analysis. They were clearly not Imperial and he could find no connection to xenos tech either, not even Aldari. The spheres even defied all dating methods he employed.
Then, almost by accident, he discovered that the stones were... linked. They could communicate with each other instantaneously!
When the defense of the sector fell to him after the tearing of the galaxy, he took the risk and personally delivered a "device" to each of you. After making you swear several sets of overlapping and interlocking oaths of secrecy on all you hold dear and the Emperor himself, he opened the door to a self-contained room the size of a small conference room. In the center was a holographic Tacticarium table with what looked like a void-black bubble full of stars suspended above it by a mass of cables. A specialized servitor stands off to one side. This is the Nuntis Astra. Or, more specifically, the network is. Inform this servitor whom to contact and it will do the rest. He then explained who the system could contact, but now why. This will undoubtedly be essential in our task of holding back the tide of corruption we face. The Astropaths are unreliable and slow. We cannot depend on them for our most critical communications. The Omnissiah be praised that he has sent us this to aid us in stemming the tide.
As to where to hold the conversations:
I agree that it needs to be separate. We could maybe use the discussion tab? A separate gameplay thread could also come in handy for that, but you mentioned campaign clutter and I totally understand that. *shrug* I'm good with either. Probably not discord though. Not with our time differences.
For the discord option, I merely ment a text channel, no calls.
But yeah, campaign clutter, I can life with that to be honest if everyone is good with it.
As for not-so-important battles, I propose the following game system - stolen from the 4X game 'Endless Space': Tactics
Tactics are high-level commands for units and a way to handle most wars. Each round, you can choose one tactic per (macro-) unit participating in a battlezone - as will enemy forces do. Some Tactics are strong against specific other tactics (meaning these increase your chances of success) while others do specifically counter other tactics. Should the enemy use a tactic which is 'countered' by your selected tactic, your chances of a critical victory are greatly improved.
Some Tactics are available for all units, some are only available to specific units and yet others are only available for composite units that have access to a number of different units able to fill specific 'roles' in a composite tactic.
For more, have a sneak preview in the.notebook under game system, tactics.
it is very work in progress, but it should give first impressions.
I don't know. It seems to be adding a decision point which really feels like rock paper scissors and that isn't very satisfying to me.
In a lot of grand strategy computer games all that stuff is resolved by just unit type counters rather than adding a tactical overlay to it.
I really believe that to be a good strategy game you have to abstract away a lot of tactical decision making. That might be just me though.
I think the idea would be feasible if we were fighting actual battles all zoomed in like we are, but that feels like something we wouldn't decide on the sub-sector level.
Well, I was thinking about a way to give you a matter of influence over the fighting beyond shifting pieces into place.
Your right, breaking tactics down to per-Unit is probably too much, but on a strategic level (one tactic per battle-round?) it will give you the option to adjust your campaign to the wider strategic picture.
E.g. let's say you have send a small battleforce to unroot a chaos cult uprising on a system. Once arrived, your forces find that the enemy is much better organized and equipped than one might have thought and the forces are about evenly matched. An all out war will then heavily weight the fate dice of both sides.
On the other side, if you have possible reinforcements only one or two rounds away, you may opt to have your first battlegroup assume a defensive position (or maybe scouting/hit'n'run/...) while awaiting reinforcements which will be able to tip the balance in your favour for good.
The thing I see is: combat, especially with the guard, may be a long affair unless one side is really overpowering the other by an order of magnitude. It may go on for several rounds and - trying to assume a player perspective - I'd find it unsatisfying to simple hear back: 'yeah, fighting is fierce but no decisive victory was achieved yet. Combat losses reach 40%.' And that for several rounds.
I kinda felt a similar vibe from our earlier discussion about level of abstraction, so I tried to come up with a way to spice up 'strategic level combat' without the need to really go down to the tactical level. But if you feel that it is not necessary or adequate, I'll shift focus back to get economy side rolling.
@Blood Ravens: I still need your holds. I think we had discussed you taking one (or two?) holds inside your fleet, what about the other four (three)? Shoild I just assume that Aurelia keeps your holds?
That's a good point, I'll admit. Maybe instead of a direct counter to one another, the strategem adds a trait to the units that gives them a slight advantage when adding in line with the order? That way it's less rockrock-paper-scisors.
I kinda like the idea of tactics adding bonuses or penalties rather than determining the outcome. Though some tactics could give larger bonuses against the tactics an enemy chose or make a combat roll unnecessary. If both sides decided to fall back, for example.
Another idea that I like from many games of this nature is that of the commander of a force giving his own bonuses or amplifying certain tactics. While we are never going to track the actions or career of a single warrior, not even among an Astartes chapter, a few key commanders is totally doable...
I know I do not weigh in often but I do usually pay attention... ;)
I'd say that a leader giving bonuses is also only applicable when we hare in very near proximity to the action. Say, within a few light-hours of the combat zone.
@Leaders: I had something like that in mind for the Astartes anyway. They'll have a small pool of special characters from which they can draw and 'append' them to a battleforce. And they would give some kind of boni if attached to a unit. Guess we can do something similar for every faction. That should really help to counter the 'faceless mass' problem someone mentioned earlier.
@Strategies: Rest assured that I never intended that picking the 'wrong' tactic would mean certain defeat. If your units are not totally outclassed and the fate dice is with you, there is a decent possibility of winning - or at least not getting butchered.
Plus, total unit annihilation in one turn (read: from one decision) will not be the norm. Sure, picking the wrong strategy might well mean severe combat losses, but not necessarily a unit kill.
With great commanders in place or in certain situations, I imagine that you would get hints about the likely enemy strategy or the chance to retcon strategy (as your commander reads the flow of battle and notices the enemy pattern). Stuff like that sound like they could liven up 'strategic' battles.
Anyway, I will put this idea on hold for now, with the option to go with it once we started. It's not a 'core' part of the game mechanic I guess. (More discussion is welcome of course)
I added an ore import to Forge and Hive worlds. I'm not sure exactly where you were going with those so I'm nt sure if I should change anything else.
I am listening to an audiobook about a Magus Dominus and I'm adding bits to Fulcrum's page as I do so. Just added Tactical and Non-tactical form entries.
Update: Entering the hot phase of resource system development. Currently trying to figure out how much resources your planets are going to produce.
Thus I could REALLY need the remaining holds of everyone.
@Blood Ravens: What about your holds. I remember we talked about SOME of them being aboard your battle barge(s). And some probably are in subsector aurelia. Could need some input on that matter soon.
@Admiral Nibal: Same goes for you. I know we talked about a major double-hold space fort and a promethium facility. That leaves two holds and the question of where you want them to be located.
@All: Shall we kind-of playtest the strategic game as well, or are we just jumping into the cold water and figure stuff out as we go?
I say lets just do it and edit as we need to. There's no test like reality!
I think I am close to a status that we could risk starting the 'actual' game soon.
Currently looking into getting a final, informative map together.
May plan is to get us going in the first week of june.
@Archmagos, Pa-Soa: with the change of 'Fires of Industry' from a Forge World (in Subsector SO-400) to only a particular continent-sized manufactorum on the Forge World Thranix (in the Cirillo Subsector) you two may want to reconsider the placement of Glory-B - the origin of the Knight pilots. It was once planned to be inside the same system as Fires-of-Industry - which is no longer the case.
@All: Deadline for Hold-changes / ideas will be Wednesday the 29th.
I suggest that Glory-B be moved to the same system as By Iron Wrought, the titan forge. That would make sense withput having to change the fluff.
Fine by me.
Heads up commanders:
Head here for your interstellar Commander TelCo.
I'd say that we keep it in the 'now' timeline and not use for the nearlt-done-with test battle.
So, it is M42.112 and you just returned from the glorious endeavour of the Indominus Crusade, tasked with restoring utter Imperial dominance over this region of space which, given the presence of a somewhat safe passage through the Great rift, is of absolute strategic importance for the survival of both Imperiums: the Imperium Nihilus and Dark Imperium.
Guess, we'll just start with IC introductions in the 'new' thread.
So, I need to add to the Archmagos's rank. Aparently there are far more than I realized and Fulrum doesn't have the proper titles to do what he does right now. I'll do that soon.
But it's my anniversary, so I may be rather quiet from here on out today...
I've posted in the tele-confrence thread if anyone wants to join me. :)
Added the thread to my news feeds now. Post coming when I have the time to write it up xP
Might be fun to have the comm be a discord channel?
So, I think I have a strategic map with which I am kinda satisfied.
For now.
***
I settled for a rather flat background with only important system and sub-sector names in it.
Anything in addition, we will use google-slides for overlays.
Every faction has their very own map to prevent clutter - in the upper left corner, there's a text-box indicating which faction the map belongs to.
You all got edit rights - obviously I'd like you to stick to your slides, but you are free to add new slides at any time, e.g. to better track army movements or have one for planing sessions, etc.