True, but some players want to be part of a team.
Another option could be that one person plays both nations in his own team (twice the work, but perfect communication, assuming the player does not have a split personality!).
I also think we need a bigger map, if its scaled for only six (assuming ten provinces per?). We would just get a repeat of Hangman’s money problems. Strato, where are you finding these maps? Desura? And I wonder if we can trust the random map generator at all.
I want to keep teams if possible given the broad range of experience. I’m of the belief that King of the Hill offers a different sort of dynamic in that the pressure always has to be on the middle. A 2v1 scenario will play out, but then so too can a 4v1 situation if team numbers increase, that’s the nature of the game. 3 players in a team does give some capacity for holding the mid point, plus defending the homelands from opportunistic invaders.
By having three teams, each team has a shared border with each other. The current set up is all players starting equidistant from the throne in a ring. The map itself is a flat, edged map (no wraparound) shaped like a hexagon. All provinces are set up as though they are shaped like hexes similar to hexrealms in QTAnon. The map has 154 land provinces, 15 sea provinces, so plenty of room for 8-9 people. The sea provinces are small 2-3 province lakes scattered around. Unlike Estates of Econometrics, there is ample farmland present, somewhat clustered together so I don’t think income will be a problem. In the middle of the map, immediately surrounding the throne are “large provinces” with “many sites” tagged. I’m inclined to leave that as per the mapmaker’s design. My only edits would be to readjusting the start locations, and removing the excess throne sites. The start locations have players within a team starting 2 provinces from each other so a ring can be set up around the capital, and for those bordering another team, three provinces between each other.
The throne will be a level 3 throne to prevent a team from rushing it too early. After all, not all nations are created equal, compounded by randomised independent arrangements, and there is still a bit of effort required to get into the middle of the map.
The map itself I found via Desura forums. I spent a bit of time looking around Desura, and also going through the llamaserver game setup page for maps. This is, admittedly, a harder game to setup, and I want to thank everyone for their patience. And also, please, any commentary, I’ll gladly hear it. I do want to try and get this happening sooner rather than later. I suppose the real sticking point is getting the team arrangement right (ie: 3 teams of 3, or 4 teams of 2, 5 teams of 2). I don’t mind doubling up and playing as two nations myself if there is strong demand for pairs, I have some holidays coming up soon as it is to paint the house, so Dominions can be a welcome distration ;)
I like the sound of all of that, much better than what I was initially thinking. So just so I understand, we have:
1.strato
2.otthegreat
3.belouski
4.botbaddict
5.direaussie
6.evilsteve
7.psyanojim
8.akaoni
9.pyrhic
10._____________
So right now we have 3 teams of 3. If we get a 10th, we can have five teams of 2 (which I think would be much better). Failing that, we could have eight people in teams of 2, and strato playing two nations.
I would recommend we have someone good with random numbers (cough pyrhic) come up with the teams once we decide which format. Then we can determine nations, probably based on one pick at a time per team.
Also, we would have to check the map after strato is done modifying it, before we start. Is that it?
Sounds good to me. People were interested in a Middle Age game, right?
Tempted, but I’m in 2 games right now (and in 1, I’m running 2/3 of a disciples team).
Yup, I like it all!
I’ve emailed everyone at the domqt3 mail service the .map files for the KotH game. I hope I have gotten everyone. If not, let me know. By all means offer feedback etc. Still want to play around a little bit and see how it is all balanced out. I’m not particularly fond of the KotH5 map given the variation in start locations for the 5 potential teams, but that is about the best I can come up with in terms of positioning right now. Changing maps is an option I want to consider last. Also, I don’t totally trust the game to cluster starts and will suggest we consider locking in nation locations.
And yep, the game will be MA. The only nations restricted will be underwater nations. They will be seriously compromised in this map as it is given the small pockets of water that exist. I haven’t decided on excluding Ermor or Asphodel yet, but I think they’ll have to be removed as Dom pop killing mechanics just adds another headache to their neighbours who will be in fairly close proximity.
MA Ermor and Asphodel dominion doesn’t play nicely with teammates either
done and dusted
Just a thought, if we’re going with a disciple game, I don’t think we need to ban MA Ermor and Asphodel
Because as pretender nations, their dominion would be very antisocial for their own disciples too wouldn’t it? Don’t think it would be an advantage for anyone who wanted to try something that crazy
And Asphodel as a disciple for any other nation wouldn’t be too bad either… tricky, but not impossible
Unless, of course, we are randomizing the nations for each player?
Not really knowing much about Asphodel, but what if Ashen Empire and Asphodel were on the same team? Would that be viable, with one of them as the pretender?
Regardless, even if they are on a team, the game would devolve into KILL THE UNDEAD ( we had one of those on this board, QTFOUR, ugh). I vote to not allow either, there are plenty of other nations.
Looking forward to this, hope we get a tenth player. Kelan, Sharaleo, Pypercub (come on, early game isnt THAT time consuming), TurinTur, Nikolaj, Lloyd Heilbrunn… just to name a few.
In regards to nation picking: I was thinking, since it is a team game, we would do round robin. We did that for QTDOOM, and it worked out pretty well.
MA Ermor as a pretender would kill its own disciples population far too quickly, even for Asphodel as a disciple I doubt it would work out well. Asphodel still relies on gold to hire units.
MA Ermor as a disciple would be pretty pointless, since without the dominion they have no units!
MA Asphodel as a pretender would also be pretty unpleasant for any disciples… not as bad as Ermor, but still bad. Maybe someone can think of a strategy for this to work, but I wouldnt try it.
MA Asphodel as a disciple would work I think, would just be a version of Pan with D magic instead of E, and undead casters available but no chaff, and no pop-killing dominion to change the dynamics of the game.
So I don’t think MA Ermor is viable in any combination, but MA Asphodel could work.
QTAnon
Added 48 hours
Need to pass, less and less time lately, but thanks for thinking of me…
Aw, heck. Sign me up of no one else wants the spot. My other games have slowed due to the holidays.
I’m a glutton for punishment.
woot!
Thank you Pyperkub. I’ll send you an email with the map file so you can have a look at the 10 player arrangement.
I problem with the map I found is that the nations starting in 33 and 139 will be 6 provinces away from the throne, as opposed to 5 for everyone else. Those two starts are next to a forest, 2 farmlands and some swamp, so they have the potential to be decent starting positions anyway. I noticed there is an incorrect link between 57 and 6 which will hopefully be rectified soon. Haven’t checked every single province for neighbour connections yet.
Clustering the starts, I propose 134, 138 for team one, 139, 108 for team 2, 33 and 66 for team 3, 32 and 11 for team 4, 106 and 6 for team 5. Not all starts will be the same of course, but it is the most optimal arrangement to ensure every team has a chance of securing the farmlands that form a ring next to the mountains. There is six, and they are all large provinces also.
If we are ready for arranging teams, I’ll see if I can call in a favour from someone not participating in this game to arrange them.
I think we are, at least I am ready. I am sure that the nation picking process will take some time, so the quicker we determine who are team mates are, the quicker we can get started with that.