AAR Subforum?
- Thread starter The Kingmaker
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I’ve noticed that several Paradox games that aren’t from their main series (EU, CK, HoI, etc.) haven’t received AAR forums, so that has me worried.
AoW4 seems tailor-made for some awesome stories.
AoW4 seems tailor-made for some awesome stories.
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An After Action Report. Basically people that play sessions or mp games and then in narrative format detail what happened to share it with the community.
We didn't have one for Planetfall though. If it's something that really takes off we can always look into adding a subforum for it somewhere.
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I would love that. ParadoxPlaza has a whole AAR section under “Fun Forums,” which seems like a natural place to host the AoW4 AARs.
Here: https://forum.paradoxplaza.com/forum/forums/aars-lps-and-fanfiction-general-discussions.224/
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Given AoW4's more freeform lore style, it really lends itself to extempore storytelling. I think that a dedicated AAR or fanfic subforum is a great idea.
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A dedicated section would be great, though I feel this would most likely happen if it starts dominating the "other" section. In the meantime, that's where I suppose it will go and depending on how many AARs people make, the mods may find it necessary.
I suspect they will, I for one am very much hoping to do at least one. Actually wanted to do one for AoW3 but those random map games didn't lend themselves to storytelling hardly at all.
I suspect they will, I for one am very much hoping to do at least one. Actually wanted to do one for AoW3 but those random map games didn't lend themselves to storytelling hardly at all.
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Agreed, I always wanted to do one for AoW3, but couldn't find a hook to start a story!
For me it wasn't getting the story started as much as coming up with explanations for the weird diplomacy that would occur as well as why such "heroic" characters were brutally murdering node guards for loot. I like that now there is far more explanation and possibilities for what's going on when you encounter a node.
I’m actually really excited to do an AoW4 AAR. Each new character could be a new “chapter” in the story.
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It's fiction. You can gloss over the less interesting or uncharacteristic activities.
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You can almost omit the acquisition of nodes, if not for the fact that it is something your hero is doing pretty much constantly when not at war.
The diplomacy is just a mess, any reason you come up with that your character might ally one group gets cancelled by a different set of relationships, no consistency at all.
And, well, I don't see fantasy as being an excuse to be less consistent. It just means that as long as you have internal consistency you are good to go, unlike historical fiction, where internal consistency doesn't even cut it since there are real trends to take into account. Not that you can't get away with it, Woman King and that one Australian one sortof got away with it but anyone that is familiar with the times knows how low quality those two productions were.
Example explenations for killing node guards:
1 the guards are brigands holding the node hostage from the local people, who lived nearby before being included into your empire (cities grow in a matter of days because people from rural areas join in, not from birthrate)
2 the node seems to be empty and your party is inspecting it for use by the empire. Oh no you're ambushed.
3 the guards are wild monsters that need to be put down
4 the node needs to be claimed for the good of <empire>!
5 got some greedy heroes
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The game's new narrative system will be really great for this, and I believe the devs have already said its something that is easily moddable so I imagine there will be plenty of said mods adding hundreds of more unique events later on.
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With the exception of numbers 4 and 5, that doesn't work very well when it's creatures that literally have "devoted to good" as part of their stats. 4 is still very much a stretch, in that if there was any justice in it, generally guards that are devoted to good will give you what you need. 5 works if it isn't your leader. I suppose you can just avoid attacking those nodes, but there's still the issue with diplomacy.
For 4: Just because your devoted to good doesn't mean you agree on what is good. Perhaps the devoted guards are convinced that the wizard kings returned because people had overused magic, and thus the only good thing one can do is limit or even prevent magic use. And your champion is like, even if that is true killing the problem, we have now is a bigger good then not. Or maybe your wizard is like, I was going to use that mana to heal the sick and dying, I'm doing my best to improve the lives of all around me. So no, I will be doing more good by tacking this from you than leaving it be.
One of the biggest failings morality systems have is that they make it really easy to assume all 'good' factions will agree in general and work together. But reality is never so simple. Just because the game says that they are good doesn't mean they actually are in agreement on how to achieve said good, or even what is good in the end. Just look at the arguments on this forum over the faction creation system. Everyone wants to make the game better, but no agreement is ever going to be reached on what the 'better' faction creation system is.
The protagonist of your AAR doesn't have to be a hero either. You could write them as an anti-hero. Or even a villain.
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Plus there have been plenty of civilizations “devoted to good” led by leaders who were lawful evil.
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But see, now we are already specifying what beliefs/themes the fantasy would need to be based on. In most moral systems, wisdom / proportionate means are considered a part of goodness.
Your argument only makes sense if you agree with moral relativism. Even then, I think it is safe to presume that creatures from a realm based on goodness have a better idea of what goodness is than your leader from a morally gray realm. Furthermore, it would be intuitive to any good character to trust them for that reason.
In reality, good people may not agree on things, but they generally don't start killing each other the moment they disagree, especially if they only recently met. It really is pretty convoluted to even try to come up with something, and if you try to force a fit that doesn't work, it will show in the quality of the story.
Pretty big difference between "devoted to good" in name only, and mystical beings that, by their very nature, have an innate understanding of what that means (e.g. unicorns).
edit: "The protagonist of your AAR doesn't have to be a hero either. You could write them as an anti-hero. Or even a villain."
Very true. But it is still very limiting.