Game Rules Ideas - discussion

[Wyvern]

Following all the great changes Johan has made there's a lot less need these days for player rules and such, but I've had a few thoughts about some that could make for an interesting game in the future (perhaps when DoN's or Machiavelli finish, or maybe setup a weekend game).

So what I've been thinking about is something like this:

1. Player alliances will be limited to a maximum of 3 human players to stop the mega alliance syndrome and force players to think a bit about who they ally with.

2. Wars can only be declared with CB. This together with the alliance limit will hopefully encourage smaller wars rather than the usual world war that happens whenever a european nation dow's another.

3. A maximum of 3 provinces can be taken from a human player in a war - no limit against the ai.

4. Depending on number of players, Persia should be used as a block to the east to avoid ai bashing, hence nobody is allowed to annex persia or take persian culture provinces.

5. Gamey play should be discouraged (along the lines of Machiavelli).

Well that's the gist, I wonder how appealing this would be to others? If enough like such ideas I may well try and start a game along these lines in a few weeks time.

 

[unmerged(15967)]

Originally posted by Wyvern
1. Player alliances will be limited to a maximum of 3 human players to stop the mega alliance syndrome and force players to think a bit about who they ally with.

Suggested change: A maximum of two great powers, one great power and two minor powers or four minior powers. Great power is every nation that is in the top two for income or manpower or in the top 5 for both.

 

[Smirfy]

A hard and fast rule has to be developed to slow colonization

The problem is Spain can afford to go daft, France and England to a lesser extent. So it is not cost (that would really kill portugal)
but numbers.

Limiting the number to 1 or 2 a year and bring back Mowers limit on colonies under develoment.

 

[RedPhoenix]

I think rule #3 definately needs work.

Well I mean 3 provinces in europe is allrite, but one should be able to take 20 provinces in colonies or whatever, in real life huge amounts of lands changed ownership in colonial wars.

The CB rule is good though would make people use claim throne and such options I might implement that in ED actually

I my self hate the grand alliance thing, but I'm not sure if limiting the alliances is the answer, sometimes a dominating power needs to be countered by more players. I think its mostly in the players minds, if everyone was not going to create gamey alliances it would be ok. I think this falls under the gamey play category. Like in DON2 as france I have been working to try to split up the mega alliances so the game would go with a bit more limited wars not a world war everytime someone lifts a finger.

Naturally if the situation demands it some rule could be made up... But then you'd have to take into account a situation where one is so dominant that it takes 10 nations to match him, or just in general the position smaller nations are in, compared to a bigger one.

 

[Wyvern]

Thanks for the contributions so far - the alliance limit needs work, something along the lines of what Stein suggests sounds good.

Smirfy, colonising rules might be possible, though they're harder to police. An idea I've also toyed with is that everyone (except for Russia in Siberia) has to build a province up to a level 7 TP before they can upgrade it to a colonial city. This would definately slow things down I think.

RedPhoenix - 3 provinces even outside europe is enough of a gain for one war in my opinion. I know great areas changed hands, but not often and not all at once, so I'm pretty set on that one - It could be opened up a bit come the 18th century though.

 

[Mowers]

Hi,

I agree that there are definitely some gamey alliances and that this is exploited. I am not convinced that a ruling against mega alliances is enforceable. It is disappointing when a series of mega alliances emerge instead of alliances with the AI.

However, my belief was that this was a cultural issue not a game flaw issue. I watched Tsunami follow the pattern, to an extent at any rate, of previous games in terms of alliance building and war. My belief was that over time this cultural restriction would be overcome. But seeing that Tsunami blew a fuse in me and I havnt booted up the game since I don’t know whether there is a cultural change happening, but it seems not.

I also have doubts as to whether European history is really full of local wars. Indeed, European history seems to have lots of very big, all-inclusive wars.

I particularly like the Persian point. It’s a good way to keep a stable game. The cultural barrier idea works well.

Regarding colonisation, the colony limit did work. It was effective, non intrusive and plain to see.

Gameyplay is difficult to define properly. How do you judge effectively something that is abstract? Its an interesting concept but for large games it would be difficult.

But all in all, I am against rules. Odd coming from the person who once had 35 rules - I know - but as most of those rules were incorporated into the game I am satisfied. It might take another person to identity problems in the game that need to be incorporated at a later stage. Pretty much everything I wanted to achieve - short of problems with colonisation - I have achieved and thus am no longer such a zealot in driving change.

Mowers

 

[Wyvern]

Mowers I'm shocked, utterly aghast! You against rules and me proposing them. I remember when it was the other way around .

 

[RedPhoenix]

a good rule would be that none is allowed to brake force vassalization or force conversion for atleast 10 years time. A rule we are using in ED

 

[unmerged(1631)]

I like the 4 Colony rule that Mowers introduced. That neatly slowed down expansion in a tidy way.

A couple of questions though.
What's wrong with the Grand Alliances and World Wars? In our Wednesday night game we've had 7 or 8 of them and I find them quite fun
In our Tuesday night game (Cross, Quill, and Sword) there hasn't been any big alliances created and the game is tense but peaceful (..zzzzzzz...) aside from a few local wars (highlighted by the destruction of Russia by Sweden and Poland).


....and what are some examples of "Gamey" play?

 

[Wyvern]

Originally posted by Mrlifford
I like the 4 Colony rule that Mowers introduced. That neatly slowed down expansion in a tidy way.

A couple of questions though.
What's wrong with the Grand Alliances and World Wars? In our Wednesday night game we've had 7 or 8 of them and I find them quite fun
In our Tuesday night game (Cross, Quill, and Sword) there hasn't been any big alliances created and the game is tense but peaceful (..zzzzzzz...) aside from a few local wars (highlighted by the destruction of Russia by Sweden and Poland).


....and what are some examples of "Gamey" play?

Hi Mrlifford,

there's nothing wrong with world wars per se, I'm not suggesting any of these rules as a standard for anyone else to use, just putting them forward as an idea for creating a one off future game and building upon the Machiavelli game experience.

Gamey play? Well there are lots of examples, the oft quoted one is Austria and the OE splitting Hungary between them rather than fighting over it. Another could be the whole world forcing Poland to release Prussia just so Bran/Prussia can form. Another would be invading Japan just to conquer their CoT with no attempt to do anything else to them. Mapsharing.... I could go on.

 

[Wyvern]

Originally posted by RedPhoenix
a good rule would be that none is allowed to brake force vassalization or force conversion for atleast 10 years time. A rule we are using in ED

Yes I've always liked such an agreement as this. Also no re-dow'ing when you're still in the truce period.

 

[BiB]

Originally posted by Wyvern
Yes I've always liked such an agreement as this. Also no re-dow'ing when you're still in the truce period.

There's nothing wrong with redowing during a truce, the game even has a built in penalty for it, just because it should be possible and come at a cost.

Whereas cancelling vassalization and converting during truces are different. Breaking the vassalization isn't possible during truce (it wasn't anyway, dunno if it by chance got out again) and conversion should be handled the same but isn't (yet). Now if converting during a truce would actually break the truce (as it should) there'd also not be a problem with that.

A rule is necessary for converting because the game doesn't give the penalty for it. The game does give the penalty for breaking a truce thru DOW so no special rule is needed for that.

 

[unmerged(15723)]

Were there any rules in effect in the Tsunami game? Can't remember any. Tsunami worked ok anyway I think (although France and Austria took 6 provinces from poor Venice in a single war ).

I'm not saying rules are bad, just that maybe the players attitude is more important. Specially the Persia rule could be very effective to keep the game scene in Europe in good way.

 

[RedPhoenix]

Originally posted by Wyvern
Hi Mrlifford,

there's nothing wrong with world wars per se, I'm not suggesting any of these rules as a standard for anyone else to use, just putting them forward as an idea for creating a one off future game and building upon the Machiavelli game experience.

Gamey play? Well there are lots of examples, the oft quoted one is Austria and the OE splitting Hungary between them rather than fighting over it. Another could be the whole world forcing Poland to release Prussia just so Bran/Prussia can form. Another would be invading Japan just to conquer their CoT with no attempt to do anything else to them. Mapsharing.... I could go on.

Well I agree to most of that, but I don't think there is anything gamey to conquering nippon cot, not anymore gamey than taking down poor astrakhan, genoa, venice, or whtever AI played nation.

 

[Mowers]

Originally posted by Aldo
Were there any rules in effect in the Tsunami game?

I dont think so. We only had rules like you cant trash your country etc etc.

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

Originally posted by Wyvern
Also no re-dow'ing when you're still in the truce period.

You have got to be kidding. Breaking (stopping) a truce is one of the oldest arts of warfare and is already severely punished in EU2 by the game mechanics. (Extra BB and -5 stab isn't trivial)

 

[Wyvern]

Originally posted by Peter Ebbesen
You have got to be kidding. Breaking (stopping) a truce is one of the oldest arts of warfare and is already severely punished in EU2 by the game mechanics. (Extra BB and -5 stab isn't trivial)

Perhaps you're right, though I'm still to be convinced . You don't get extra BB for dow'ing during a truce (except the normal amount for dow'ing someone) though the stab hit can be punishing depending on circumstances. Still, having pummeled someone in one war, dow'ing them again 5 seconds after making peace seems like an exploit to me regardless of the stab hit.

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

Originally posted by Wyvern
You don't get extra BB for dow'ing during a truce

Guess I'll just have to test it later today. I could have sworn trucebreaking cost +1BB (e.g. my shiite Persia being forced to break truce on sunni Siberia). Easist way to test it is to trucebreak and dow somebody on which you have CB.

 

[Dawkins]

Does the 3 province rule not encourage "victory or death" mentallity in players. Someone who is losing may drag a war on in the hope that something will happen to help them, knowing that they have the safety net of only ever losing 3 provinces.

As for ultra alliances - I'd much rather see them cured at the root cause, rather than just try to patch the symptoms. The reason ultra alliances exist is that everyone has their own definition of "winning" the game. Often that definition isn't mutually exclusive with some other countries idea of winning. The classic example of this is france dominating Europe allied to a Spain dominating the rest of the world.

If there is a clearly defined yardstick of "victory" that applies across all countries then I feel fairly sure you wouldn't see the mega alliance problem. Victory points seem the only way to do this.... the question is can we invent a practical way to use them?

Actually I just thought of something.... one actual yardstick used by countries to measure their "victory" is GDP per capita. I wonder if this could be applied to EU2 somehow?...

 

[Peter Ebbesen]

Originally posted by Dawkins
Does the 3 province rule not encourage "victory or death" mentallity in players. Someone who is losing may drag a war on in the hope that something will happen to help them, knowing that they have the safety net of only ever losing 3 provinces.

Not really. Most players are smart enough to know that they lose much more economically and diplomatically by dragging a war out than if they acquiesque to the loss of a few provinces. It even encourages the aggressor to make peace earlier for a single province or two rather than going for broke. Well, with mature players, that is.