Well, here are the Vassal Mods and the rules. Let’s take a breath and read and wait until BSG 26 completes. See what we think then.
http://www.vassalengine.org/wiki/Module:The_Republic_of_Rome
https://boardgamegeek.com/filepage/163417/living-rules-v106
I’m not convinced the game flow recommends itself to PBF done in the BSG style, but I could be wrong. It may work with a guaranteed Moderator, but files still might have to be emailed. But that would take some time to prepare.
BSG at a table has no ‘moderator’. I believe the best thing for a forum game is to have the overseer type person that deals cards, keeps track of things, etc.
All the materials would have to be snapshotted and prepared for PBF a la BSG anyway. They are not now.
Let’s just read and look and research for a bit.
I’m in if there’s space and my schedule fits (I can do a turn per day most days, although not always, but I don’t think with six players we’ll go that fast).
Have you played before?
OK! Let’s take a look at the rules and Vassal Mod for a week or so and see if we can come up with a play flow/method for PBF, assuming 6 players.
I haven’t played, I just know I can spare 30 mins per day for this, given most of my video game playing time has been cut short recently.
In other news I just finished reading the rules to:
Which are really well suited for a forum game (almost no interactivity during a player turn, no secret info…).
I really enjoyed our High Frontier forum game, and this is something I would be willing to manage (so no save files needed, we can play just with forum screenshots).
Anybody interested?
I’ll play if there’s room. Pretty much anything.
Edit: Indeed, was thinking about the idea of a moderated game of Diplomacy some time ago.
Hi Juan! I didn’t see this until now. If you are willing to run that game on the forum I’d love to play.
A forum game of Diplomacy could work, but it is also available on www.playdiplomacy.com with good auto-moderation. We played it quite a bit a decade ago.
Any other takers?
Ideally we’d have 4 players.
I don’t think I can manage the stress of a game of diplomacy. Well, unless it were no press.
Back on the subject of Republic of Rome, I think it would be pretty much ideal as a moderated forum game. The game is extremely structured in most phases, so the moderator can control all the procedural elements.
The obvious difficulty is in the timing of tribunes and particularly of assassination attempts.
Tribunes are on a first to shout basis, which could be modified to a randomisation between people wanting to play them at the same point in the process. With them generally playable at any point during the previous motion, there should be plenty of time for everyone to choose.
Assassinations are designed to be interjected at specific moments in the procedure: eliminating a key source of opposing votes just as they are called to vote but before they can cast their vote, for instance. Happily assassinations aren’t all that common, in my experience. I think we’d just need to allow a little flexibility here and it should work smoothly enough.
I think you are right Rho. Good summation. I’d pinged people at BGG and had little feedback. So the question is, who is the Moderator for a first game? :)
I’d gladly moderate future games, but I am not in the position right now to do all the work regarding JPG snapshots of all the cards, &etc the myriad work of preparing for a first time game.
Ok, so regarding BIOS: Megafauna second edition…
We seem to have a full set of players
@CraigM
@Tom_Mc
@Jorn_Weines
Have expressed interest and I’ll be playing too.
I will start the thread tonight or tomorrow.
Much the same here. I can probably get to it some time in the new year if no-one else volunteers before then.
I’m up for Republic of Rome, but having not played it, I don’t want to moderate it either.
I’ll tell everyone what; I’ll moderate a game if someone can help me snapshot all the cards into jpegs and whatnot from the Vassal module. You know, can help me go through the rules and module and kind of set up all we’d need for a PBF game here. If we could do that, I’d take up the mantle and run the first PBF game here. Maybe we can wrangle Rome enthusiast @tomchick into playing (who is also of the opinion that games made before 2008 basically are inferior - you know…how Wagner “obsoleted” Mozart, music-wise… I dunno about him sometimes…).
By the way, @Brooski are you interested in playing in a Moderated PBF game of Republic of Rome. You know the “dated” classic by Avalon Hill? Though it’s probably been made obsolete by Pandemic…
Sorry, no time for PBF — I would drag the game to a standstill. Good luck though— I love Rep Rome.
No Problema. What is the better Multiplayer political game B? In your opinion? Kremlin or RoR? It’s a tough choice for me, But I have to go with RoR. Both are in the running for “Best Political Boardgame of all time”, IMO.
I prefer Rome for thematic reasons.
If they’re in the module, it should be trivial to extract them.