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Post 05 Aug 2015, 8:12 am

zurn wrote:
steephie22 wrote:I had a great thing going with Brazil, but then he was replaced. I think C powers ought to consider *themselves* D or E powers in a way, not overestimating their own strength. They only have one more center, after all.


lol, Brazil started with three centres. As Tom mentioned, Argentina was buffed due to a missing Chile and was still relatively stronger (helped even more by Brazil's separated centres being hard to defend and acquire); and yet it was a lower class (D) than Brazil (C).

Don't worry, you wouldn't have fared better with the old Brazil around... he would have been even weaker due to you sucking 1BB out of him every year, remember? And I don't see how it would have fixed your relations with everyone else.


He would gain (nuclear) support and I would exempt him from paying BBs when needed, an important reason for the BBs was that it was clear for everyone to see that he and I were allied for the long run, letting it weaken him would defeat the purpose.
Might I remind you that all of that was Brazil's idea?

Let's not dwell on that though. If you think I was extremely shotsighted, it's your right to think that. Don't care and I don't like repeating arguments I already made.

@GMTom: You said yourself that if anything, the middle powers are at a disadvantage! Sendric said the same I believe and that's what I was reacting to.
Last edited by steephie22 on 05 Aug 2015, 8:27 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Post 05 Aug 2015, 8:18 am

steephie22 wrote:Let's not dwell on that though. If you think I was extremely shotsighted, it's your right to think that. Don't care and I don't like repeating arguments I already made.


You brought it up! But yes, I don't feel like retreading either.

Also, misread your bit about C/Ds, edited my previous post.
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Post 05 Aug 2015, 8:33 am

Fair enough, but I wanted to illustrate that perhaps middle-sized powers would have a better track record if they saw themselves more as slightly oversized D powers, rather than a bit smaller than B.
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Post 05 Aug 2015, 8:40 am

What's an example of a C/D doing the "bad" thing you describe?

What about the E's that won in the last game, did they "see themselves too big"?

Kinda feels like you want smaller powers not to be aggressive...
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Post 05 Aug 2015, 10:25 am

I have no example right now.

Small powers form leagues or ally with big powers. Big powers may ally with small powers but rarely with other big powers, with a few exceptions.

Maybe I'm flat out wrong, but it seems to me that middle-sized powers have a tendency not to form leagues or ally with big powers.

Not important though.

Edit: I wasn't referring to aggression. Expansiveness is another thing that seems particularly important for smaller powers, so if not aggressive, I would say expansion should be higher on the C power's to-do list than for a B or A power.
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Post 05 Aug 2015, 10:40 am

I dunno, Mexico (D) and Canada (C) seemed ok being allied with the US. I was constantly asking the US and China for help. India really wanted to work with China.
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Post 05 Aug 2015, 12:05 pm

even small rules changes cascade into things happening differently everywhere. I have seen changes in one area not seem very important that turned into larger problems elsewhere. But I will trust your input that the changes in this last game were insignificant (the Pirates two games ago had great impact on that game). But the changes in number of powers is HUGE, no doubt you attempted to mitigate them but it's still a huge difference.

As far as these other games having mid sized players take part in the end game coalition. I recall Brazil being a part of at least one, India in at least one, Germany in one, and Nigeria in at least one more. That's at LEAST 4 times a mid size player was part of the win. I know the USA, UK and France won several times each. I do not recall Russia or China winning though they may certainly have done so and I know in most games they were usually in the running. It's well balanced AS IS.

As far as the temporary nuke damage, I think we did do that a loooooong time ago in the early stages of the game. No doubt it would bring "different" strategy, we do have strategy on how to use them the way things are and again, it aint broke, why fix it? Unless, you base you arguments on these past two games alone that is! Trying new things is awesome, I love the ideas, but I do hate those who think changes need to be made to the basic game based on games with different rules/power assignment/etc.
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Post 05 Aug 2015, 12:07 pm

zurn wrote:Seriously, Tom, was temporary nuke SC damage ever tried? Wouldn't mind seeing how that turned out. If not, whatever, maybe it'll be tried someday...


I'm not certain that was ever tried specifically. We have tried things like limiting the number of total nukes used in a game. That rule fared poorly. There were other ideas floated around and tried as well, but I can't really get into specifics. My memory just isn't that good.
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Post 06 Aug 2015, 3:44 am

I have to agree the nukes shouldn't be changed. It's what keeps the big powers anxious at eachother; weaken the nukes and they might as well ally because they can't really harm eachother effectively.
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Post 06 Aug 2015, 6:07 am

here's an IDEA and one I have not given any thought to, simply something that jumped to my mind.
What about a dirty bomb? Make it easier to use, maybe the nation using it simply bought one on the black market sort of deal, they still have no nuke know-how but they can use a cheap version to do an attack with limited damage?

Again, no real thought is being used but maybe it costs the same as a real nuke (passed builds maybe even plus one?) but can be built by anyone. Have the damage last only one or maybe even two full years? (the GM could easily color the center red in year one, yellow in year two and then year three it's back to white and fully "functional"?)
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Post 06 Aug 2015, 6:47 am

Hmm..

If you want non-nuclear countries to have something to play with as well, another option would be to introduce buildable terrorist units which can blow up one thing and then be disbanded again, the same effect as a nuke except they have to make the journey to their enemy before being useful, rather than build and detonate.

Another thought without thought :-)

I think leaving it as is might be better in that regard though, without hidden units.
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Post 06 Aug 2015, 10:42 am

GMTom wrote:here's an IDEA and one I have not given any thought to, simply something that jumped to my mind.
What about a dirty bomb? Make it easier to use, maybe the nation using it simply bought one on the black market sort of deal, they still have no nuke know-how but they can use a cheap version to do an attack with limited damage?

Again, no real thought is being used but maybe it costs the same as a real nuke (passed builds maybe even plus one?) but can be built by anyone. Have the damage last only one or maybe even two full years? (the GM could easily color the center red in year one, yellow in year two and then year three it's back to white and fully "functional"?)


This is pretty much exactly what the terrorist units were able to do in the last game. I'll try not to be offended that my ideas were so bad you refused to play in the game though.
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Post 06 Aug 2015, 11:03 am

no offense intended. To be honest, I doubt I would care for a rule like I suggested, it's just thinking out loud. I have zero problem with new ideas being tried, I may not like them myself but I love the great interest. My big complaint in this thread was not over the rules or if they worked/didn't work, my problem was with those who leap to how we need to change the end game because these past two games had odd outcomes. Those games were with new rules and different power numbers/placements Enjoy the differences, just don't get carried away with required fixes for the base game based on the variant game.

Hell, I devised this game and several others, you can't say I'm against change or these games would not have come to be. Nor do I need to like every idea proposed, if someone thinks we should add a martian power with special abilities, it might work!? But that's simply something I do not agree with.
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Post 06 Aug 2015, 10:44 pm

Aliens.

One mysterious pod lands somewhere on earth every year, an alien army pops out but they need supplies before winter falls!
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Post 07 Aug 2015, 5:58 am

steephie22 wrote:Aliens.

One mysterious pod lands somewhere on earth every year, an alien army pops out but they need supplies before winter falls!


I have to admit, I do not hate this idea.