Island Cluster campaign
- Thread starter Frostvarg
- Start date
Gray Lensman
SOC-13
PBM or PBEM (Why not PbP?), How many turns per week?
In Other Words ... Be more specific please.
In Other Words ... Be more specific please.
I would also be interested in playing.
I have just got back into CT after an absence of 25 years. I played in a couple of AD&D PBeMs a little over a decade ago before starting to GM a very intense and long-running campaign of my own.
Now I am just starting off a CT online campaign using a virtual table top program.
I would love to play in someone else's game as a player as well though if you have any vacancies.
Please let me know what the next step is if you would be interested in having me as part of your group.
I have just got back into CT after an absence of 25 years. I played in a couple of AD&D PBeMs a little over a decade ago before starting to GM a very intense and long-running campaign of my own.
Now I am just starting off a CT online campaign using a virtual table top program.
I would love to play in someone else's game as a player as well though if you have any vacancies.
Please let me know what the next step is if you would be interested in having me as part of your group.
well i whipped up a small website that i will use for the game. Feels better to have the functions i need at my fingertips.
www.svartmagi.org/ICC
Those interested should post which of these powers they would like to lead as the high commander.
New Colchis
Esperanza
Joyeuse
Serendip Belt
Neubayern
New Home
Amondiage
Sansterre
if several wants the same its first come first served.
All gameinfo will be posted at the website.
www.svartmagi.org/ICC
Those interested should post which of these powers they would like to lead as the high commander.
New Colchis
Esperanza
Joyeuse
Serendip Belt
Neubayern
New Home
Amondiage
Sansterre
if several wants the same its first come first served.
All gameinfo will be posted at the website.
For those that are interested in this game please head over to the dedicated website for the game.
http://www.svartmagi.org/ICC/
register there and look around. Comments are welcome and lurkers too.
http://www.svartmagi.org/ICC/
register there and look around. Comments are welcome and lurkers too.
The game is dead & it looks like the forum is now down too.
FWIW, heres a summary from the perspective of Serendip Belt, the workers paradise where everyone gets bonded to a 30 year work contract for no charge. Immigrants are welcome and photos of Secretary Matt are provided FOC for every work lunchroom.
Pre-game diplomacy was quite vigorous. Most discussion seemed to revolve amongst those in close proximity with each other & a definite Old Islands vs New Islands divide seemed to be developing.
I set up a Babylon station in Serendip & roleplayed that for a bit as well. I was quite pleased how well that went down. Much in player-character grumbling from the Old Subsector, lol. Everyone sent Ambassadors and I was sending news from Babylon as well, I especially enjoyed writing up the Esperanza attack on Serendip. Sadly I doubt anyone got to read it.
The decisive pregame diplomatic moment was when New Home announced an alliance with Neubayern, including the sharing of TL13 technology (I wouldn't have allowed that myself, but
). With a few posts to the rest of the New Islands, I seemed to have evoked some good ol' New/Old Island prejudices. That combined with the thought Neubayern would have TL13 computers made the New Home / Neubayern alliance a catalyst for combined action.
We quickly agreed to a 4 world assault on New Home to prevent their inflammatory technology upsetting the balance of power.
My Serendip fleet could be best described as 1/3 attack fleet, 1/3 tenders/fuel carriers and 1/3 defense/reserve/home fleet. Literally 2/3 of my budget was dedicated to the New Home mission, a figure I was not shy in posting to my fellow conspirators in an effort to ensure they new I was committed.
Turn 1, my attack fleet leaves. And around 26 scout/courier fleets.
Turn 2 & I got attacked by one of my allies! Esperanza decided that as I was stripping my home world for the attack, the better move was to attack me instead.
The battle report was:
[FONT=arial,helvetica]
Esperanza's design flaw was using computer-0 fighters, while all mine were computer-6 essentially making mine impossible to hit and his almost impossible to miss...
I sent Esperanza a peace offering in return for 10% of their budget, otherwise I would send the debt collectors around. I pointed out it would take a while (perhaps several weeks) but my fighters working in shifts will destroy his fleet.
But, I didn't want Esperanza. What I wanted was that 10% of Esperanza's budget, near the equivalent of doubling my own budget. And if I took Esperanza I become the target of everyone else in the ICC campaign. So I sweatened the peace deal with the offer of supplying a third of that budgets worth in fighters, in effect making Esperanza gameable again, rather than easy fodder & also gaining hopefully a good ally.
The game collapsed in turn 3 due to ref exhaustion. Sadly before Esperanza got my very generous peace offer
For what its worth, for anyone else considering starting a campaign, the ref made three errors.
It'd be interesting to hear from others in the game too. Was the New Home attack alliance (Serendip, New Colchis, Joyeuse) going to hold together? Or was there another fleet or two heading my way!
To Frostvarq if you read this, good on you for giving it a go. If you decide to give it another try at some point I have no doubt that you will do it better and have a better appreciation of the scale of the task. I'd join a new game in a flash - but not one with outside agents at work, like the TL15 Ant fleet.
Cheers!
Matt
FWIW, heres a summary from the perspective of Serendip Belt, the workers paradise where everyone gets bonded to a 30 year work contract for no charge. Immigrants are welcome and photos of Secretary Matt are provided FOC for every work lunchroom.
Pre-game diplomacy was quite vigorous. Most discussion seemed to revolve amongst those in close proximity with each other & a definite Old Islands vs New Islands divide seemed to be developing.
I set up a Babylon station in Serendip & roleplayed that for a bit as well. I was quite pleased how well that went down. Much in player-character grumbling from the Old Subsector, lol. Everyone sent Ambassadors and I was sending news from Babylon as well, I especially enjoyed writing up the Esperanza attack on Serendip. Sadly I doubt anyone got to read it.
The decisive pregame diplomatic moment was when New Home announced an alliance with Neubayern, including the sharing of TL13 technology (I wouldn't have allowed that myself, but
). With a few posts to the rest of the New Islands, I seemed to have evoked some good ol' New/Old Island prejudices. That combined with the thought Neubayern would have TL13 computers made the New Home / Neubayern alliance a catalyst for combined action.We quickly agreed to a 4 world assault on New Home to prevent their inflammatory technology upsetting the balance of power.
My Serendip fleet could be best described as 1/3 attack fleet, 1/3 tenders/fuel carriers and 1/3 defense/reserve/home fleet. Literally 2/3 of my budget was dedicated to the New Home mission, a figure I was not shy in posting to my fellow conspirators in an effort to ensure they new I was committed.
Turn 1, my attack fleet leaves. And around 26 scout/courier fleets.
Turn 2 & I got attacked by one of my allies! Esperanza decided that as I was stripping my home world for the attack, the better move was to attack me instead.
The battle report was:
[FONT=arial,helvetica]
[/FONT]
Esperanza's design flaw was using computer-0 fighters, while all mine were computer-6 essentially making mine impossible to hit and his almost impossible to miss...
I sent Esperanza a peace offering in return for 10% of their budget, otherwise I would send the debt collectors around. I pointed out it would take a while (perhaps several weeks) but my fighters working in shifts will destroy his fleet.
But, I didn't want Esperanza. What I wanted was that 10% of Esperanza's budget, near the equivalent of doubling my own budget. And if I took Esperanza I become the target of everyone else in the ICC campaign. So I sweatened the peace deal with the offer of supplying a third of that budgets worth in fighters, in effect making Esperanza gameable again, rather than easy fodder & also gaining hopefully a good ally.
The game collapsed in turn 3 due to ref exhaustion. Sadly before Esperanza got my very generous peace offer
For what its worth, for anyone else considering starting a campaign, the ref made three errors.
- He gave every system a population multiple. On the surface this appears to fix a flaw in that the ICC campaign unrealistically doesn't use population multiples. In practice however, the only 'fair' multiple to use was 5 for everyone, in effect multiplying everyones starting budget by 5. It didn't unbalance play, if fact it didn't really achieve anything except make the referee's combat resolution task 5 times as large.
- He underestimated the work involved in running the message system. In wargaming terms, the ICC game is a double blind game. I can explain that further if desired, but in essence when you are divorced from the potential battlefields, you crave information and use scouts and messengers extensively to fill in the information vacuum. Its not a coincidence that the game fell apart in turn 3, the message system couldn't be ignored any longer.
- He decided to make the game "more interesting". It seems one system was attacked by a fleet of ships that looked suspiciously like ants. Apparently these were a TL15 fleet. Thats a bit like throwing a unit of M1A1 Abrams into a WW2 wargame, because obviously vanilla WW2 wargaming is not interesting enough... Fortunately that system was Neubayern, run by one of the refs local friends, if it was me facing that I would have quit in disgust on the spot. If you decide to add stuff like that, make sure your players know it before they commit to join your game.
It'd be interesting to hear from others in the game too. Was the New Home attack alliance (Serendip, New Colchis, Joyeuse) going to hold together? Or was there another fleet or two heading my way!
To Frostvarq if you read this, good on you for giving it a go. If you decide to give it another try at some point I have no doubt that you will do it better and have a better appreciation of the scale of the task. I'd join a new game in a flash - but not one with outside agents at work, like the TL15 Ant fleet.
Cheers!
Matt
Well, it's interesting to see the other side of the coin. I was running Sansterre, and had a 3-way alliance with Amondiage and Joyeuse started. Most of my fleet was set up similar to yours, although I went for many escort-sized ships (1000 to 1900 tons, agility 6, 50 ton missile bay + secondary armament) designed to chew up fighters - Size code A still gets you the -1 size DM, computers are equal, and agility 6 means a fighter can't hit you, while the missile bay hits on 11+. Although, IIRC, the fighter rules we added later pretty much invalidated that concept. But by then, I already had my fleet put together. 
o: I more than likely would have gotten pounded like a tent stake.
My opening move was to take St. Genevieve, as well as establishing several deep space fuel sites around New Home and Neubayern. The three of us were busily establishing communication routes and fueling points when the game folded. The New Home/Neubayern alliance was our driving factor as well, and we decided to do unto them before the did unto us.
I agree, the population modifier would probably have been better off being 1, to keep budgets a bit more manageable and ref workload down. In all honesty, IMHO, the best way to deal with it is drop the populations down by 1 digit, which would go a long way to reducing fleet sizes to something manageable.
Long ago I had written an access database that handled all the combat, although it was fairly limited in what kind of orders you could give it. It's long lost somewhere, but if I get some time I might try to rewrite it. If it could incorporate message handling, it would make things a bit more manageable.
As Matt said, good on Frostvarg for taking a shot at it...I ran one game with 3 polities in a subsector, and THAT was a nightmare.
o: I more than likely would have gotten pounded like a tent stake.My opening move was to take St. Genevieve, as well as establishing several deep space fuel sites around New Home and Neubayern. The three of us were busily establishing communication routes and fueling points when the game folded. The New Home/Neubayern alliance was our driving factor as well, and we decided to do unto them before the did unto us.
I agree, the population modifier would probably have been better off being 1, to keep budgets a bit more manageable and ref workload down. In all honesty, IMHO, the best way to deal with it is drop the populations down by 1 digit, which would go a long way to reducing fleet sizes to something manageable.
Long ago I had written an access database that handled all the combat, although it was fairly limited in what kind of orders you could give it. It's long lost somewhere, but if I get some time I might try to rewrite it. If it could incorporate message handling, it would make things a bit more manageable.
As Matt said, good on Frostvarg for taking a shot at it...I ran one game with 3 polities in a subsector, and THAT was a nightmare.
Yes, our Triumvirate Alliance, as I liked to call it, I think would have worked out well.
We had agreed to not advertise it, and I don't think anyone else let the cat out of the bag as of turn three. We had set up a good coordination of assests and I think that we even would have made it intomid game, if the alliance held up.
My fleet was a mixed bag of ships, ten thousand fighters maybe, with good computers; a mix of a dozen large battleships/cruisers and a dozen ridership carriers with 4-8 riders, depending on the tonnage; and a good smattering of screening vessels and the like.
Like the others, I salute frostvarg for having the moxie to go after this project; looks like it is easy to bite off more than one can chew as a TCS ref!
We had agreed to not advertise it, and I don't think anyone else let the cat out of the bag as of turn three. We had set up a good coordination of assests and I think that we even would have made it intomid game, if the alliance held up.
My fleet was a mixed bag of ships, ten thousand fighters maybe, with good computers; a mix of a dozen large battleships/cruisers and a dozen ridership carriers with 4-8 riders, depending on the tonnage; and a good smattering of screening vessels and the like.
Like the others, I salute frostvarg for having the moxie to go after this project; looks like it is easy to bite off more than one can chew as a TCS ref!
I was not involved on this campaign, but allow me to make a comment or two
I have already pointed several times it's a big flaw (IMO) of HG not putting a cost for the missiles, nor a volume for their reloads. As you say, most of your ships had missiles as main weapon (and I guess, though you don't specify, most of them nukes). With MT rules, those ships should have magazines for the reloads and the cost of each salvo (if nukes) would be MCr 3.75 (50 dton bay) or MCr 7.5 (100 dton bay).
While in TCS contest this may not seem important, in a game as Islands Cluster Campaign, where budget is so important, this could unbalance the military budget of any fleet that becomes involved in battle, even in he doesn't lose a single ship.
Another fleet based on beam weapons would have more operative budget (and so having more ships), just because he doesn't have to mind about munitions. It should also be less dependent on supplies for the same reason.
I agree in your cheer to frostbarq just to try it. It's very dificult not to bite more than one can chew when trying to referee a game like that (or any mastered game with more than 2 sides, even more with all the communications problem Traveller gives the master).
Surely he has learned quite a lot about that, and if ever tries again to referee something symilar, he will make different errors, but surely will do it better.
Well, it's interesting to see the other side of the coin. I was running Sansterre, and had a 3-way alliance with Amondiage and Joyeuse started. Most of my fleet was set up similar to yours, although I went for many escort-sized ships (1000 to 1900 tons, agility 6, 50 ton missile bay + secondary armament) designed to chew up fighters - Size code A still gets you the -1 size DM, computers are equal, and agility 6 means a fighter can't hit you, while the missile bay hits on 11+. Although, IIRC, the fighter rules we added later pretty much invalidated that concept. But by then, I already had my fleet put together.
I have already pointed several times it's a big flaw (IMO) of HG not putting a cost for the missiles, nor a volume for their reloads. As you say, most of your ships had missiles as main weapon (and I guess, though you don't specify, most of them nukes). With MT rules, those ships should have magazines for the reloads and the cost of each salvo (if nukes) would be MCr 3.75 (50 dton bay) or MCr 7.5 (100 dton bay).
While in TCS contest this may not seem important, in a game as Islands Cluster Campaign, where budget is so important, this could unbalance the military budget of any fleet that becomes involved in battle, even in he doesn't lose a single ship.
Another fleet based on beam weapons would have more operative budget (and so having more ships), just because he doesn't have to mind about munitions. It should also be less dependent on supplies for the same reason.
I agree in your cheer to frostbarq just to try it. It's very dificult not to bite more than one can chew when trying to referee a game like that (or any mastered game with more than 2 sides, even more with all the communications problem Traveller gives the master).
Surely he has learned quite a lot about that, and if ever tries again to referee something symilar, he will make different errors, but surely will do it better.
This is hardly an issue in an ICC campaign. If such rules were present, everyone would be equally affected. A bit like adding in the population multiple (introduced to Traveller after TCS was published) "because we should", which increased everyones budgets by 500%, the refs workload considerably and yet added little to game play, strategy or player enjoyment.
But, a decision was made for HG2 to remove the magazine rules introduced in HG1 due to the game having a very high admin load already. One might say too much, given how few games, including this one, get past the first few turns. A decision to help increase campaign playability by reducing the refs workload.
Subsequently of course magazine rules (and many other details) were re-introduced in MT, but a Naval Strategy game wasn't.
From Joyeuse
For my part, I realized early that New Colchis's economy was twice that of Joyeuse, and the greatest threat, with the New Home/Neubayern axis the second threat. I made an alliance with Sansterre and Amondiage to contain NNH early, which fortunately paid off when the other three New Islands states decided on a huge operation to knock New Home back to the Stone Age.
Back in the New Islands, Joyeuse had also made an alliance with Esperanza against New Colchis and Serendip, but in theory that was to be put on hold until AFTER the New Home operation. I don't know if that was an error in timing, or Esperanza's intent, or what, but essentially once the game began, Joyeuse received almost no messages from couriers. As far as I could tell they were arriving, but who knows.
My orders for the New Home Operation were to join up with NC, Serendip, and Esperanza at Bescannon, etc. However I heard nothing about the outcome. Was anyone waiting to ambush me?
Thee New Colchis assault was planned for week 7 (sorry John!) with the vast bulk of Joyeuse's forces jumping in, followed up by reinforcements from the New Home operation on Week 8 (I think). It was definitely a kitchen sink operation, hopefully with Esperanzan support, but once the game began I realized that there was no chance to finalize D-Day coordination due to the time and distance involved - once the Esperanzan courier arrived with Thumbs Up or Thumbs Down, Joyeusan ships would be already en route.
In retrospect it was probably a foolhardy operation, but hey, it beats sitting at home waiting to be invaded. :^)
I agree on the pop multiplier, that should have done away with, and even had the populations reduced by 1. Joyeuse had the 5th smallest economy, and yet still my fleet numbered in 20,000s or so.
I think another helpful adminsitrative tool would have been announcing the turn order of operation before each turn. I got the feeling during the negotiations that we did not all have the same idea about when forces would arrive, etc. In fact, I think was a week late getting to the rendevous points.
-Peter / Joyuese
For my part, I realized early that New Colchis's economy was twice that of Joyeuse, and the greatest threat, with the New Home/Neubayern axis the second threat. I made an alliance with Sansterre and Amondiage to contain NNH early, which fortunately paid off when the other three New Islands states decided on a huge operation to knock New Home back to the Stone Age.
Back in the New Islands, Joyeuse had also made an alliance with Esperanza against New Colchis and Serendip, but in theory that was to be put on hold until AFTER the New Home operation. I don't know if that was an error in timing, or Esperanza's intent, or what, but essentially once the game began, Joyeuse received almost no messages from couriers. As far as I could tell they were arriving, but who knows.
My orders for the New Home Operation were to join up with NC, Serendip, and Esperanza at Bescannon, etc. However I heard nothing about the outcome. Was anyone waiting to ambush me?
Thee New Colchis assault was planned for week 7 (sorry John!) with the vast bulk of Joyeuse's forces jumping in, followed up by reinforcements from the New Home operation on Week 8 (I think). It was definitely a kitchen sink operation, hopefully with Esperanzan support, but once the game began I realized that there was no chance to finalize D-Day coordination due to the time and distance involved - once the Esperanzan courier arrived with Thumbs Up or Thumbs Down, Joyeusan ships would be already en route.
In retrospect it was probably a foolhardy operation, but hey, it beats sitting at home waiting to be invaded. :^)
I agree on the pop multiplier, that should have done away with, and even had the populations reduced by 1. Joyeuse had the 5th smallest economy, and yet still my fleet numbered in 20,000s or so.
I think another helpful adminsitrative tool would have been announcing the turn order of operation before each turn. I got the feeling during the negotiations that we did not all have the same idea about when forces would arrive, etc. In fact, I think was a week late getting to the rendevous points.
-Peter / Joyuese
Sounds like the New Home attack plan may have worked then, unless we hear otherwise from New Colchis .
Esperanza tho' wouldn't have been involved after attacking me instead & I suspect would not have ventured to attack New Colchis either.
My Fleet after New Home was ordered back to Serendip to await news on developments which would have likely been followed quickly by news of Joyeuse/Peter's subsequent attack on New Colchis.
It would have been an interesting game.
.Esperanza tho' wouldn't have been involved after attacking me instead & I suspect would not have ventured to attack New Colchis either.
My Fleet after New Home was ordered back to Serendip to await news on developments which would have likely been followed quickly by news of Joyeuse/Peter's subsequent attack on New Colchis.
It would have been an interesting game.
It certainly would have been an exciting game - albeit a brief one in the event of Esperanzan perfidy - for Joyeuse.
But I saw little other option for Joyeuse - with the population multiplier, NC could easily afford an assault force capable of eviscerating Joyuese's capabilities and yet still protect itself from other attacks, particularly if the clusters rallied against Esperanza.
And because the New Home operation would have drawn away a considerable part of the New Colchis forces, I saw no better time to strike. And while it would have been prudent to be patient and allow others to weaken, I didn't want to waste the month designing my fleet.
-Peter
But I saw little other option for Joyeuse - with the population multiplier, NC could easily afford an assault force capable of eviscerating Joyuese's capabilities and yet still protect itself from other attacks, particularly if the clusters rallied against Esperanza.
And because the New Home operation would have drawn away a considerable part of the New Colchis forces, I saw no better time to strike. And while it would have been prudent to be patient and allow others to weaken, I didn't want to waste the month designing my fleet.
-Peter
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