Subject:
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Re: Pirate fleets
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.pirates
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Date:
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Mon, 5 Nov 2001 19:29:54 GMT
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Viewed:
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1201 times
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Christopher Weeks wrote:
>
> In lugnet.pirates, Frank Filz writes:
>
> > So far we've been playing the campaign game variant where folks start
> > with a cutter. I've been doing some thinking about how to start with
> > larger ships or get them into play faster.
>
> OK, so what have you been coming up with? Where does the problem lie? Is it
> just in the time it takes to battle it out? Or does the going to port and
> transacting cause much of the problem?
Turns still took too long to process. The time to battle it out is also
significant (perhaps for the campaign game, two shots should be taken
per turn?). Going to port took too long. Running NPC ships took too long
A 2nd GM would help a lot. Having a solid count of players is vital to
knowing you have a big enough crowd to justify and require two GMs. I'm
not sure how to develop that commitment at an event like Brickfest, yet
still also allow room for the "ooh, cool! can I play?" and not have the
drop ins overwhelm the game to the point of needing another GM after
things have started.
I'm wondering if for the campaign game plotting moves should be
dispensed with, though how to fairly determine turn order then is a
problem (I'm willing to move NPC ships first).
Steve Jackson apparently divides the players into teams even for the
campaign game, though I think the alliances which arise out of play add
play value. Teams would probably speed the game (and if plotting is
dispensed with, the whole team can move together, reducing the number of
turn slots which must be decided upon).
> > I like the additional role
> > playing of the campaign game, but it just runs too long to get much
> > chance to upgrade ships.
>
> Agreed. It's even the more interesting part to me, but at some point it might
> be trying to be too much. Maybe it makes more sense to break the two ideas
> into two kinds of games. They could even still be linked.
It's probably worth looking for simplifications in the combat for the
campaign game, but I think the individual figure scale needs to remain
to keep the link to the modeling aspect of the game (I'm not sure if I'm
explaining what I'm saying here, but there's a certain something to the
game which is important and relies on minifig scale).
> > Perhaps next year we'll do a combat game and
> > then we can give each player 4-7 classes of ship. Of course if we got
> > all the ships available out, I think we'd need a larger play area.
>
> If we were doing a pirate fest, we'd have time to play several games and
> include both. That's harder at brickfest because they inconsiderately schedule
> all those great distractions. ;-)
A Piratefest would definitely allow more or longer games. We probably
only got in about 5 solid hours of gaming. It would also result in a
much clearer indication of how many people would be playing making it
easier to assign assistant GMs (and with multiple games, assistant GMs
wouldn't need to give up competely on playing).
> > I'll have to think about ways to still involve some of the scenario
> > islands.
>
> Or not. If it's a pure battle game, then the islands could just be obstacles
> around which we sail.
Actually, I wonder if the scenario islands actually are part of the
slowness. Perhaps the islands should be minimized, and primarily just be
obstacles. On the other hand, treasure islands have always been a part
of pirate lore. One thing might be to make the interractions simpler.
For example, from this years game, if the island Lindsay landed on had
just a few undead guarding the cave, the battle would have taken fewer
turns and less of my time.
I also wonder if playing more melee turns per ship turn would make the
land combat and boarding actions take less overall time.
Another thought would be to make up cards describing the minor islands.
They could be like little event cards, randomly drawn. Each should give
an opportunity to fight for some treasure, find some treasure, specify
some stranded pirates (which may be recruited), or give the player an
opportunity for repairs or R&R (if the player does not need repairs at
this time, he may hold onto the card and return in the future, of course
if another player is on the island at the time...). The cards should
describe the things which must be fought, and then the GM need only be
involved to hand out a treasure (or there could be a separate treasure
deck).
> > > I'm game to add a fleet to the battle should a time and place be appointed.
> >
> > Perhaps you could scout out some locations?
>
> Y'all can come over to my place and sleep on the floor and we can play on the
> grass of my back yard. We have some great islands already out there... But if
> we schedule it for a weekend and you drive ten hours and then it rains, what do
> we do? We could make due with my family room, but it's somewhat small for a
> game with more than maybe five players.
I think we need to look for an indoor place. One worry about outdoors is
loss of little bits. Weather would be a serious problem also (it also
limits the length of time for the game, even in the summer). I'd also
like to try and find somewhere in the DC area to avoid the ten hour
drive each way. Of course if we can make it two solid or even three days
of gaming, and I have the time to burn, ten hours of driving wouldn't be
so bad.
It would be nice to shoot for something also that would be worth folks
travelling for. I know Lindsay was trying to talk folks into making a
trip across the pond, and perhaps Bruce would fly in for a big event.
One thing we want to not repeat is trying to form the event around Steve
Jackson. Inviting him to come on his own would still be a must though
(just make it clear that we don't want to deal with significant money so
we can't plan on paying him at all).
--
Frank Filz
-----------------------------
Work: mailto:ffilz@us.ibm.com (business only please)
Home: mailto:ffilz@mindspring.com
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Pirate fleets
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| (...) OK, so what have you been coming up with? Where does the problem lie? Is it just in the time it takes to battle it out? Or does the going to port and transacting cause much of the problem? (...) Agreed. It's even the more interesting part to (...) (23 years ago, 5-Nov-01, to lugnet.pirates)
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