If you have ventured into this thread, I would guess that you are thinking of the many times I or others (Slargos for one) have proposed this idea and nothing has come of it or of the games that have tried this and failed. While I cannot guarantee you that this attempt shall succeed, I can tell you this: it has a far greater chance than any attempt before it for three reasons: experience, improvement in CK itself, and an already established group of players(HERE is a link to the thread of this game in the CK MP forum, please post in either this thread or the linked thread if you are interested in joining this game or contributing to it in some way). Before I go into all of this stuff, I will set out the basic details of the game.
Time: Sundays 1100 EST/1500 GMT/1600 BST (to be discussed if new players join)
Players (many, many spots are open as the nature of this game requires):
binTravkin
Lurken
Sterkarm
Varyar
Kujy
Joohoo
Insane
CSK
Tzare
Sander
Germax
Drozh
Start Date: April 23rd (one week after Easter)
First of all, the players as of yet for this game have already gathered together a general feeling for how to organize games such as this. Two of the players (Lurken and I) played (I still am playing) in the game March Through Time (which has passed from CK into the EU2 era) and we have seen both the successes and the failures of large-scale games such as MTT. I will elaborate on my views of these:
Successes
* playing EVERY week, no matter who showed, so the game kept going (once a game like this stalls, it takes a lot to get it going again)
* players who were willing to put in the work to make conversions and such successful (King of Men created a custom converter which I feel is far more advanced than the vanilla one made by Paradox)
* a semi-success was the democratic style of GMing which declined later on (but started out as something similar to the Friday Night NA Game=good)
* initial players (at least some of them) had played together in Tides of War 2 (Victoria) and knew a lot about each other, but still accepted newcomers into the group well
Failures
* The lack of players and lack of dedication in some players. While, when we started we had plenty of people willing to sign up, many of these people did not even show for the first session. Furthermore, some players would drop out as either their countries would lose power or they would lose interest for one week or so. Many would do so without even so much as a word of warning. This is where I hope coming to the EU2 community first would help, as many are veterans of MP.
* Ineffective GMing, due in part to the fact that the official GM was never established nor was there a direct statement that it was fully democratic GMing. Traveler, I and others feel, was a slightly biased GM but more importantly did not effectively enforce rules or punishments when needed.
* Lack of competition. This essentially is the same as lack of players, but I feel it needed a seperate section. Due to the shortage of players who were consistently playing, nations started to grow very, very large, as AI (especially Pagan/Heathen AI) was ripe for the picking with nobody to oppose some players. I feel that other players and I now know that balance is the single most important component in keeping a game like this fun for a long period of time. Without competition, gameplay feels very repetitive and it can seem like you're just fighting the same war again and again at times when there are few powers to intervene on either side or to weaken either country. Not only can this create a stale atmosphere, but it can also foster animosity between players (I know that I at times felt such towards King of Men, as he was my constant opponent, but I was conscious of this and realized that it was just a game and he was a good player to fight against).
* Failure to retain dedicated players. Many dedicated players (such as Lurken), I feel, were driven away by certain aspects of the game, be it ineffective GMing, overexpansion by all powers, or something else. Yet, as the game went on, we failed to recruit new players to fill the void left by their absence. Eventually, this led to a small group of the same players which felt very static as described above.
I believe that, together, we can improve upon previous attempts and manage to create an experience which could set a precedent for games of this nature in the future. Note that this will NOT be the game thread for this game as of yet, this is simply a thread to make EU2 players aware of this game, the game thread will be in the CK MP forum (HERE is a link to the thread of this game in the CK MP forum)
Please post in either this thread or the linked thread if you are interested in joining this game or contributing to it in some way.
Time: Sundays 1100 EST/1500 GMT/1600 BST (to be discussed if new players join)
Players (many, many spots are open as the nature of this game requires):
binTravkin
Lurken
Sterkarm
Varyar
Kujy
Joohoo
Insane
CSK
Tzare
Sander
Germax
Drozh
Start Date: April 23rd (one week after Easter)
First of all, the players as of yet for this game have already gathered together a general feeling for how to organize games such as this. Two of the players (Lurken and I) played (I still am playing) in the game March Through Time (which has passed from CK into the EU2 era) and we have seen both the successes and the failures of large-scale games such as MTT. I will elaborate on my views of these:
Successes
* playing EVERY week, no matter who showed, so the game kept going (once a game like this stalls, it takes a lot to get it going again)
* players who were willing to put in the work to make conversions and such successful (King of Men created a custom converter which I feel is far more advanced than the vanilla one made by Paradox)
* a semi-success was the democratic style of GMing which declined later on (but started out as something similar to the Friday Night NA Game=good)
* initial players (at least some of them) had played together in Tides of War 2 (Victoria) and knew a lot about each other, but still accepted newcomers into the group well
Failures
* The lack of players and lack of dedication in some players. While, when we started we had plenty of people willing to sign up, many of these people did not even show for the first session. Furthermore, some players would drop out as either their countries would lose power or they would lose interest for one week or so. Many would do so without even so much as a word of warning. This is where I hope coming to the EU2 community first would help, as many are veterans of MP.
* Ineffective GMing, due in part to the fact that the official GM was never established nor was there a direct statement that it was fully democratic GMing. Traveler, I and others feel, was a slightly biased GM but more importantly did not effectively enforce rules or punishments when needed.
* Lack of competition. This essentially is the same as lack of players, but I feel it needed a seperate section. Due to the shortage of players who were consistently playing, nations started to grow very, very large, as AI (especially Pagan/Heathen AI) was ripe for the picking with nobody to oppose some players. I feel that other players and I now know that balance is the single most important component in keeping a game like this fun for a long period of time. Without competition, gameplay feels very repetitive and it can seem like you're just fighting the same war again and again at times when there are few powers to intervene on either side or to weaken either country. Not only can this create a stale atmosphere, but it can also foster animosity between players (I know that I at times felt such towards King of Men, as he was my constant opponent, but I was conscious of this and realized that it was just a game and he was a good player to fight against).
* Failure to retain dedicated players. Many dedicated players (such as Lurken), I feel, were driven away by certain aspects of the game, be it ineffective GMing, overexpansion by all powers, or something else. Yet, as the game went on, we failed to recruit new players to fill the void left by their absence. Eventually, this led to a small group of the same players which felt very static as described above.
I believe that, together, we can improve upon previous attempts and manage to create an experience which could set a precedent for games of this nature in the future. Note that this will NOT be the game thread for this game as of yet, this is simply a thread to make EU2 players aware of this game, the game thread will be in the CK MP forum (HERE is a link to the thread of this game in the CK MP forum)
Please post in either this thread or the linked thread if you are interested in joining this game or contributing to it in some way.
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