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Swordhelm
10-23-2005, 06:13 AM
I am planning on running a new pbem in the very near future, but wish to know the level of interest in playing such a campaign. For awhile i had considered running another Brithright setting game, with the usual twists. However i had been toying with creating a new setting to make it alot more interesting.

The idea for the setting would be a much smaller scale game. Not in terms of players, but in terms of realms. The players would vie for success in a single port city. Instead of running small realsm, they would run small businesses, indivudal temples, inns, taverns or even ships. The players would then simply try to eek out an existence in this now budding port city. I have toyed alot with the idea of furthering the uniqueness to making the base setting for the game relative to Spelljammer. I had been a long time player of that setting, and found it one of the more fantastic ones around. And i think a recently settled city on some remote asteroid would be a wonderful setting to start letting loose the dogs of war. Players would try to do their best to out compete rivals, trade for better prices or even pirate their way to the top. Churches would strive to gain more followers and increase the expansion of their faiths. Wizards would delve into the mysteries of the new port and the surrounding area's. Local strong arm operations would keep the peace, or break it.

This is something i think alot of players would have fun as. Especially since it would allow many players to get more involved with their regents, and allow more roleplaying and realm ruling on a personal level. If interested, i will gladly offer more on here and am always wiling to hear opinions and answer questions. THanks for reading and i hope you find this idea intersting. swordhelm@gmail.com for any questions or comments if you don't want to ask them here

Sorontar
10-23-2005, 12:15 PM
I have never played Spelljammer but good luck on your project. Are you planning to include a Birthright-like blooded aspect?

I am surprised that no-one has suggested a sci-fi angle to that, like abilities arising from the mutation of genes. If your parents had a lot of mutation abilities due to their mutated genes, then you are likely to share their genes, and likewise have a strong mutation strength. I am thinking this up of the top of my head, so I don't know how the mutation strength could be transferred to others, nor how the "regent" concept would work. Perhaps the regents would have a special link to the source of the mutation. But if you don't have the right genes, you don't have the mutations. Just like blooded and unblooded.

And yes, I realise that mutation is not an original thing to sci-fi, but if it works and keeps things simple..... use it. As long as you have a fun campaign as a result.

Sorontar

Swordhelm
10-23-2005, 05:44 PM
Well to be honest i am probably going to push away fro mthe blooded aspect of birthright. While characters in the setting will probably be set apart from regular ones, divine blood aspects are something directly related to the birthright setting, and for the msot part, unnecesary in mine. Character's Regenecy and power will instead be based almost entirely upon their expierence and dvelopment. A Rogue who runs a shady underground business in the Slum district will have access to certain advantages that a Bureocrat in the Noble district would not, and vice versa. Add into that the levels of the varied characters and previous adventures/actions, and you'll get new regenecy points. Players who play it safe, while guaranteed probably to live longer, won't have access to many boons that characters willing to take risks will. So instead of bloodline strength, you'd have prestige/notoreity strength.

Mutation might be fun, though i'm holding off for the moment on anything too radical. As it is, the spelljammer setting allowed for numerous races that were often little more then boogie men on grounded settings, and if this takes off as a grounded setting due to lack of interest in spelljammer, then i will have plenty of options to keep the world new and unique in light of creatures and races to interact with. Though i love that idea for mutants, i will hold off making any gurantees on them.

Patrucio
10-25-2005, 02:31 AM
That would be fun. I've considered doing a BR campaign set in a Drow city, but I just haven't had the time to put it together yet...

Swordhelm
10-25-2005, 07:57 PM
Awesome, well if your interested, email me and we can start discussing a character idea. The same goes for anyone else who might be interested. swordhelm@gmail.com

Would love to work some character idea's out with prospective players. All idea's are welcome, though no guarnatee's if i'll let it slide(no half dragons/demons/agnels etc). Teiflings maybe, but we'll see, so ask away, so far have lots of views and not many posts, so hopefully ppl are just a bit shy bout writng :)

velve
10-26-2005, 06:37 PM
Swordhelm,

That sounds like an interesting combination of Birthright and Spelljammer, two campaign settings I have enjoyed running campaigns for (the little I have that is :)). Depending upon how much commitment will be required, I might be interested in joining your pbem. I have been considering joining one for awhile, as my current schedule (graduate school and a family) doesn't really allow for me to join a more traditional gaming group.

Mantyluoto
10-26-2005, 10:14 PM
i actually developed a campaign that got shelved when my last Pc crashed. It was set in Menzoberranzan after the fall of House Do'Urden. ah those were the days.

Sorry for hi-jacking the thread

Manty

Swordhelm
10-28-2005, 05:14 AM
I don't mind ppl bringing up new idea's on here. I'm glad other ppl have experimented with unique settings. I am wondering though why so few ppl seem interested in testing this in an online campaign? Not just this game mind you, but most BR campaigns that aren't in the books seem to fail rather fast(Heartlans was another one). I was hoping to find many of the players who i used to game with alot in older pbems intersetd, but so far not so much. If anyone has suggestions on how to reach more of the avid online gaming community for BR, please let me know :)

Thanks again for everyone reading so far, hopefully i'll upgrade on my current player list and be able to start the campaign soon.

darkon
10-30-2005, 06:05 PM
It is definitely a nice idea. By all means go through it.

I guess that interest in BR has declined during the last years. Not as many pbems as once where.

Patrucio
11-02-2005, 03:40 PM
I would assume that the decline in the number of PBeMs you see is likely because of the ageing of the "core" base of people who have been with BR since it came out (folks like myself.) Once those kids start showing up, less people have the time they need to run a good PBeM. While it's always good to see new blood joining the game, I would imagine that (due to the non-published and relatively obscure nature of BR) those that are taking a new interest in the game are fewer than those who are drifting away from it.

Question
11-03-2005, 07:20 AM
The problem with PBEMs is that 1 turn usually takes forever to run.While playing it in real life you might have 1 turn per week or meet several times per week depending on schedules.

PBEMs usually take 1 month to 1 and a half and 1-4 weeks for turn resolution.

You would need to play for years in a PBEM to make your domain/character really powerful.....the original BR was meant this way,you would need to spend 20+ turns to become a serious power.In PBEMs this translates to a few years.

It just moves too slowly IMHO.If it was faster more people would be attracted to the idea of BR.

Mantyluoto
11-03-2005, 07:30 AM
play by post (PbP) games are much faster, providing your players can post on time.

Question
11-03-2005, 08:32 AM
That seems to be the problem......time.

If the players could devote more time to checking emails,etc turns can easily end in 2 weeks.....maybe even less.

Most of the turn time is taken up by waiting at least 1 day........sometimes more.......for responses to dispatches.

The same of course applies to DM response when interacting with NPcs.

The way i figure it,if people could check emails or PMs several times a day...or just leave a window open to either......you could wrap up a lot of stuff within a few days,max.

Example : Aerenwe(PC) askes for Roesone(PC)'s aid in defending from Osoerde(NPC).

What usually occurs :

Aerewe sends a dispatch asking for assistance,probably pointing out that osoerde would go after roesone next.The next day roesone sees it and agrees.Day 3 Aerenwe sends acknowledgement and thanks.

3 days to wrap up 15 mins of real time conversation,max.

And thats only a very simple matter.

If it goes to alliances.......vassalage agreements......trade agreements.......etc everything usually takes more than 1 week.

Turn sheets dont take much time to do either.If you starting from scratch,rolling characters,checking skill descriptions,etc will take you quite a few hours,but once you have everything settled it takes maybe 2 hours max to write up a turn sheet, and that only shortens as you remember stuff like the skill bonus when you take full regent actions,instead of repeatedly checking the BRCS.

Well of course doing the turn sheet isnt what the entire turn is comprised of.You need to talk with other players,formulate plans,etc but theres only so far current events will let you go......even if you try to secure a vassalage agreement from one realm,a trade agreement with your local guild or talking things over with your court mage about that assassination attempt,it is not going to take 1 month.

My experience in PBEMs so far has been largely spent on waiting.....waiting for PCs to respond,NPCs to respond,waiting for info on something or other,waiting for deadline,waiting for turn processing,etc.

Only a small portion of is actually considered playing the game.

Benjamin
11-03-2005, 02:00 PM
That seems to be the problem......time.

You are absolutely right in more ways than you expect.

I once ran a PBEM with only 12 regents. Resolving turns was a horrendous time consumption. It would take me about 10+ hours to resolve 1 turn. Add on top of that all the NPCs responses, planning, plotting, espionage, etc. and it became too much. I shut it down after 6 turns or so.

Then there is the time delay in players checking email, PMs, etc. As can be seen by our membership, players are from all over the world. The most recent game I was in had people from South Korea, Czech Republic, Denmark, Canada and USA. And it only had 6 players! Clearly all those time zone differences cause problems with communication.

Question
11-03-2005, 03:07 PM
It would be interesting if someone made some sort of turn processing utility......you just load the turn sheet and it auto-calculates the dice rolls, checks for errors,etc.

Having a way to automate NPC growth would also be nice.

Edit : on 2nd thought it seems someone tried to make one.I have no idea how finished this is though.

http://sourceforge.net/projects/birmail/

Mathias Morgan
11-03-2005, 05:43 PM
Honestly, I love the first idea of the limited domains, shops, inns, temples. It would make a good PBEM and an excellent in person game. Lots of adventuring opportunities. Changing it to a Spelljammer campaign however, makes it lose it's appeal. The attraction would be the simple-ness of limited venue of one city. Spelljammer would increase the complexity and negate the appeal.. In my humble opinion. I wish you luck with it in anycase.

I'm just getting ready to start my first PBEM Birthright game, with a few friends. We plan on running the PBEM with their regents, and get together once or twice a month to live play the lieutenants. If I start another game, I may use your idea of centering in one city.

Swordhelm
11-03-2005, 06:25 PM
While i understand the time issues, i always liked pbems cause they were more relaxed pace. I didn't have to constantly try to find time to get together with a group of friends, and in a birthright setting, its near impossible to try and run a live game with more then 8 players, no matter how hard they try to work with the schedule. In a pbem you have several weeks to get everything in order, it allows for life to continue and not try to interfere with it. I always liked that, since i didn't want to be spending hours upon hours upon hours doing dispatches and turns on a weekly basis.

As for the setting in spelljammer, its not the setting, its the fact that its not Birthright published material. BR players i've noticed tend to shy away from anything thats new, and you can take examples from all the failed BR campaigns based on unique or different settings. The game i want to run doesn't even take that much reading to catch up. THe key info is all still based upon the city, its up to each individual player if they want to discover and learn more bout the rest of the universe of if they just want to keep it to their district, which is no different then most pbems. So as i said, its mostly because ppl don't want to put in the effort to try something new. If this was based in Aftane or Anuire, and it was sea going ships, no one would question it, even if there was 100 pages of backstory to read and a completely changed world(i am exaggerating mind you, but i think you all get the point).

Sadly, the rate of gaining players for this game is really low, and i had been hoping to aim for a managable amount of players. I think if i try a unique setting again, i will post it as a strategic D&D game instead of birthright, cause i don't think BR is a vibrant system anymore. Which sucks cause it was my favorate system. The base players as one person said are getting older and have less time to play. Thanks for appreciating the concept though, i am still hoping i can get this started, but interest is waning unfortunately :confused:

Thanks for looking in everyone so far. At least the idea is geting out there.

BrennanHawkwood
11-09-2005, 09:59 PM
Alternate setting-wise I've fiddled with several ideas:


Fading Suns Birthright - This has been bounced around a couple of times on the fading suns listserv
Ancient Greek themed setting with the bloodlines representing the descendants of or chosen of the various greek gods. Lots of little city states and shifting alliances.
Colonization themed setting with the players as some of the lords involved in a land rush into completly new territory. The territories start at 0 and see what develops...

None of them got much further than some jotted notes unfortunately...kind of a combination of lack of interested players and a lack of time.

As to PBEM vs. PbP...from what I have seen they are effectively equivelent. I think PbP is a little more flexible and may lend itself to be slightly faster, but it is going to have many of the same problems. Having a turn processing application would help a lot I would expect. I have downloaded and looked at BirMail, but never really tried to get it working. The impression I have is that it will work, you've just got to figure it out.

I suspect the best option for an internet based game would probably be a PbP style model supported by a game managing web application that allowed the players to enter their turns and automatically processed everything it could and interfaced smoothly with the forums used for communication between all the people involved.

Mantyluoto
11-10-2005, 02:25 PM
I suspect the best option for an internet based game would probably be a PbP style model supported by a game managing web application that allowed the players to enter their turns and automatically processed everything it could and interfaced smoothly with the forums used for communication between all the people involved.

*scratches head* yeah! right!

Question
11-10-2005, 04:06 PM
True but i dont think many coders are interested in the BR setting.If we could get one to make such a application it would be a huge boost to BR.

ausrick
11-10-2005, 04:32 PM
On my list of things to do is write an access database that will keep track of regents and domains using the BRCS rules. Unfortunately my list of things to do is rather large and growing. but as I get it into a working or semi working state I will release it on here.

BrennanHawkwood
11-10-2005, 07:43 PM
On my list of things to do is write an access database that will keep track of regents and domains using the BRCS rules. Unfortunately my list of things to do is rather large and growing. but as I get it into a working or semi working state I will release it on here.

Sounds familiar... :D

On a couple of occasions I've even mapped out a DB and something of a web-flow for an app like the one I described, but have never quite managed to shake free the time needed to build it. That and I've no clue how to do anything with maps...

Mantyluoto
11-10-2005, 07:47 PM
you get it working and i'll run the campaign or at www.callofthehorn.com

Deal?

ausrick
11-10-2005, 09:29 PM
Yeah, if I get this thing working (not so much if as when, which is a good question indeed, please don't hold your breath) I'll give it to everyone. Main reason I'm going to build it is because in the table-top campaign I'm running how much overhead I'm running into trying to run the domain actions. And I'm getting sloppy and making mistakes where income doesn't come out right or there is a temple (2) and a temple (3) in a province (4).

Also, sorry Swordhelm, I had no intention of hijacking your thread.

Swordhelm
11-11-2005, 01:43 AM
Hey, its no problem, a new program to help prospective DM's like myself is always good to hear. Now i just have to break out the whips and chains to get you guys on this faster ;)

However, shameless plug, game still has openings, and is upto half my desired quota to start, keep on showing interest :)

ausrick
11-12-2005, 03:26 AM
Hey,

I just spent some time and put together a list of Entities or "Entity Sets" for the DB. Basically, an Entity is the object/noun that you want to keep track of in a Data Base and is what you are going to turn into tables when you actually build the thing. I'm going to list off what I've come up with so far. They're in no particular order and just the ramblings of a madman. Take a look at them and tell me what you think. If there is anything I've missed/anything you want to add/anything you don't think needs to be in there. I'm not sure how simple/detailed to go.

REALM
HOLDING
PROVINCE
DOMAIN
BLOODLINE
REGENT
TREASURY
ARMY
REGENCY
INCOME
EXPENSE
COURT
ASSETS
VASSALAGE

I always run into trouble when I'm trying to differentiate between Entities and Attributes, so I hope I didn't list anything here that should be an attribute and not an entity or the other way around. (An example for non-coders, an Attribute describes an Entity, the reason Temple, Law,Guild, and Source were not listed here is because they are attributes of HOLDING, namely holding type.)

Anyways, this is the first brainstorming step so all of your ideas are welcome for what you would want to see. From the feedback I get to this, I will move on the the "R" and determin how all of these entities relate to each other.

Rugor
11-12-2005, 11:11 AM
While i understand the time issues, i always liked pbems cause they were more relaxed pace. I didn't have to constantly try to find time to get together with a group of friends, and in a birthright setting, its near impossible to try and run a live game with more then 8 players, no matter how hard they try to work with the schedule. In a pbem you have several weeks to get everything in order, it allows for life to continue and not try to interfere with it. I always liked that, since i didn't want to be spending hours upon hours upon hours doing dispatches and turns on a weekly basis.

As for the setting in spelljammer, its not the setting, its the fact that its not Birthright published material. BR players i've noticed tend to shy away from anything thats new, and you can take examples from all the failed BR campaigns based on unique or different settings. The game i want to run doesn't even take that much reading to catch up. THe key info is all still based upon the city, its up to each individual player if they want to discover and learn more bout the rest of the universe of if they just want to keep it to their district, which is no different then most pbems. So as i said, its mostly because ppl don't want to put in the effort to try something new. If this was based in Aftane or Anuire, and it was sea going ships, no one would question it, even if there was 100 pages of backstory to read and a completely changed world(i am exaggerating mind you, but i think you all get the point).

Sadly, the rate of gaining players for this game is really low, and i had been hoping to aim for a managable amount of players. I think if i try a unique setting again, i will post it as a strategic D&D game instead of birthright, cause i don't think BR is a vibrant system anymore. Which sucks cause it was my favorate system. The base players as one person said are getting older and have less time to play. Thanks for appreciating the concept though, i am still hoping i can get this started, but interest is waning unfortunately :confused:

Thanks for looking in everyone so far. At least the idea is geting out there.


You have it right, the player amount needs to be kept under 10, the players have to be restricted to a certian area and not spread out over vast areas.

The players need to be able to speak freely IC in threads/posts to one another, and have an OOC section as well to resolve issues and clarify points.

To keep interests up, DMs have to be more like referee's and less like task masters and power-fiends. They have to keep NPC play in balance and in in-line with what those NPC's desires and personalities would really be like.

Players choices and decisions shouldn't be blown off, that will get them to quit quicker than anything... I've dealt with that more than once... I'll tell the DM I don't want to attack, or my units stay to defend... and the DM chooses to do his/her own things and ignore my decision because its convienent to what they want to accomplish.

That is probably the Biggest single reason why a PBeM succeeds or fails, the DM has to have the time to proccess turns quickly, and also treat all players fairly... a DM that gets on a power trip, or pushes the game in a direction the majority of players don't want to go... finds himself/herself without a PBeM.

Swordhelm
11-12-2005, 05:51 PM
I agree completely with you on almost all points. My biggest thing as a DM is to keep the game flowing and make sure the world keeps turning. BUt not to turn it off its axle, as it were. In the likely event this game doesn't get started, i will probably try a bit further down the road a Birthright campaign setting(Rjurik prefarbly if i can get the books for it). My big thing is alot of major realms are allowed to be played and that hurts the world. When Ghoere allies with Avanil, it changes the precious balance the game once had. Most major nations should represent constants in the world of Birthright, Avanil should be at odds with Boeruine, Ghoere should be at odds with both of them. And players sometimes need to be prodded into RPing the nation they take, Aftane shouldn't talk with Ariya nor should Diemed or Alamie simply allow their rebel states to get off scott free. While war isn't necesary, they shouldn't suddenly come to terms with years of strife and anger.

I also agree that players should be more focused, and again, if i end up doing a birthright campaign, limiting some of the major nations and distant ones(such as Mieres in Anuire or Suriene in Khinasi) will help the game flow a bit more.

However Dm's should not be pushed to rush things. Players need to understand that if a game is going to run smoothly, they have to be paitent. Life catches up to us and most of us have to work and do other things. I also think though that Dm's shouldn't leave silence in their wake. If you have to spend 4 weeks or more on a turn, don't leave the players nothing to do except mull over and worry bout what happens. GIve them tidbits of info on whats going on, open new threads of intrigue. Add rumors to the pages to throw off character thinknig. Just keep them involved until you can return the turns.

Thats my two cents for now anyways. Thanks for posting your comments.

PS, while i don't mind an occasiaonl hijacking of my thread, perhaps the talk of building a database should be started on a new one, since its gettting farther and farther from a pbem and closer and closer to developing game mechanics?

Question
11-13-2005, 06:12 AM
Im fairly certain that spreading players over an area will work.Thats how BR was designed anyway......to allow players to play pretty much all the regions.

Bialaska
11-13-2005, 10:39 AM
Spreading players over an area will lead to the amount of characters that needs NPCing to increase. Which again leads to an increased burden on the GM, which may in the end cause burnout. I believe that one should start out in the small, for instance with one of the coasts. Around 15 domains playable, which means that you can run a game with 15 players and then as a GM you'd mostly have to focus on the NPCs outside of the chosen coast, and only when people interact with them, which isn't as frequent as interacting with regents in your own neighborhood.

ausrick
11-14-2005, 01:07 PM
Sorry again Swordhelm, I will start that up in a different post. I just got so excited about the prospect of making a DMing tool that would be useful to everyone.

Question
11-14-2005, 02:22 PM
True but it kills variety.You might want to play Dhoesone(a perfectly valid PC realm) but cant,simply because its in the "Wrong" region.

ausrick
11-14-2005, 03:04 PM
Now for once mostly on topic ;) , I've seen spread-out work on games based on a sort of landgrab idea where all the npcs are either non-existant or simple "taking 10" automatons. Almost gives a "CIV" feel to the game. For those who are wanting to role play and have fleshed out npcs that are interacting with the PC's, spread out takes a ton of work.

ausrick
11-14-2005, 03:10 PM
Swordhelm,

Really on topic this time, I would be interested in your PBEM, It is an interesting idea of vieing for control of a single port city. You will have to really work with the rules though to adapt them for that change in scale. The spelljammer idea doesn't quite grip me as much though. Nothing personal, just when one of my old dm's ran that setting in the past it didn't interest me as much as other campaign settings.

Swordhelm
11-14-2005, 03:48 PM
THe rule changes were actually the easy part. Once you scale down a city to its respective districts(representing equivalent of realms) and then break those districts into streets and area's of interest(provinces) you have your setting. The scale mostly just needs to be dropped, but it still works pretty well.

As for the setting, it was a risk i had to take. I love both settings, and i think its a unique twist of fantasy and politics. A space port always makes for a good backdrop, wether its in books or movies, and a fnatasy space setting seemed ideal. I liked playing both settings and felt this would be an interesting game. Thus far the players though have stated roughly the same as you. A new world, especially one so out there as spelljammer, turns away most players. However you are more then welcome to look past it and give it a try, afterall, you don't have to take to space anymore then you would in a FR setting. :)