A thought on War Resolution

[Valles]

It's been seen that having the GMs just flat-out game out conflicts essentially burns out the game's CPU and crashes the entire system.

Now, I gather that there's some work being done in the back end to create a more streamlined 'mechanical' resolution approach, and in really controversial matches, that may still be needed, but, musing over how Ithekro and I might script things out around the Sea of Japan, I've had a thought that I think might help in situations where tempers are cooler.

Let's say that the war opens with a land campaign involving me trying my level best to throw him out of his territories on Honshu and Kyushu.

Thus, as step one, both Ithekro and I privately write up one-turn projections that slant every event and resolution in our own favor - in his version, outnumbered garrisons hold out against daunting odds, and their enemies starve, strangled by a vicious naval blockade. In mine, outnumbered and demoralized conscript troops are rolled straight under the advancing tidal bore of elite professionals born and bred to their role.

Neither of these is necessarily expected to occur.

Instead, he and I show each other our 'timelines', and then compare them to see where the points of difference and congruence are - for instance, in the Kyushu campaign, both versions point at Japan having superior army troops and the Koreans having naval superiority, and differ in the relevance of one fact or the other. Once we've done the comparison, each of us would then attempt to write up what we'd consider a 'fair to both sides' victory.

Then the mods would take all four options and throw them up in general for the /other/ players to comment on and evaluate, with a poll to pick their favorite.

Final stage before moving on would have the mods execute whatever the 'consensus result' was - or pick their own, if none emerged - and assign losses and gains.

[Desertfox]

I like the idea, would probably require a mod as an intermediary, so say I don't write my orders after receiving that of my opponent.

[Tanthalas]

Scripted wars work great if both players can be Mature adults about it, however this is sadly generaly not the case.  One or both sides will claim they won every battle with 0 losses, or the side obviously loosing will simply refuse to present anything.

[Carthaginian]

I will not participate in a scripted war UNLESS the other player and I sit down and agree on the wins/losses between ourselves. We will then simply post the agreed upon 'news' of the 'war' as it happens in game time.

Any time the war is between two players who don't agree to this, the mods- or their designated appointees- should game it out.

[Ithekro]

The way the Anahuac War was done was basically that.  I offered up some ships that could be lost, and my opponent Dougwise would do the same.  We offered this to Maddox along with a suggestion of what the ground war should be doing.  He recommended how the battles should go to get the story flow working (we had a few battles in mind already, we just hadn't picked a time for them yet).  I actually gamed them out myself, but the system I used was very bloody resulting in massive losses, and sometimes spectacular gunnery.  We then figured out what would happen with an invasion from Rohan...the big battle was orignally suppose to be a Jutland type, but because of how bloody and one sided it turned out, it became a Tsushima type, leading to the invasion fleet making its way south unmolested.

The plan changed after a while.  Orignally the war was going to end in a stalemate, with most of it just to advance tech and remove older ships from our lines.  Give us a reason to build new ships types and new technologies.  About halfway through Dougwise decided he was going to stop playing for a while and decide that the war should go entirely to Rohan...so the change was to have the armies start rolling up the Anahuac lines and a rebellion end the Empire and the Cult of the Eye as the Riders advanced.   Even the purchase of part of New Rhun by France and the pressure Rohan put on it was planned...as was the Arcadia afterwards (the all 12" guns/suddenly Dreadnought was Maddox's idea when I was having trouble figuring out how to fit it with 14" guns effectively).

Basically most of the naval battles were fought ahead of time, and just placed into the story when needed.  I had little interest or knowledge of land warfare, so we just made it out as we went by what sounded good in the papers.  Most of the details were in news article styles so the real details were waved over somewhat.  Only the naval battles took on real detail, and that's because this is s naval sim.  Even then I had to make stuff up (increasing the detail of what the critial hits meant...the result was the same, just the hows and whys for dramatic effect, like the point blank magazine hit on one of Rohan's Belted Cruisers that blew up Hood style).

[Darman]

My personal opinion (without ever having been involved in any wars myself) is that the scripted wars make for better stories but the unscripted ones have a slightly more antagonistic feel to them.  Just my two cents...

[Tanthalas]

I was aware of that about the Anahuac War (I think it may have even been you who told me), and it was a good setup.  That said i'm not sure all our playerbase is that acomidating.  Im afraid Naval battles have to be fought out, and Land campains atleast scripted by the Mod crew looking at the orders given, and troops present (face it there are bound to be players in the sim unwilling to agree to loose anything even outnumberd 10-1)

[Ithekro]

Well the naval battles were basically: We have ships A-D, 3 and 5 that can be lost this quarter....You have Ships M-T that you can lose this quater.  Well lets see what situations they can get into. 

Sometimes at the GMs request.  Niether of us would care particularly if we lost those ships, because they are slated to be lost.  If they survive, then we have gained something, rather than lost something.  Sometimes there was a request to see if a particular ship could survive a fight if it got involved with one for story purposes.  wiether it runs away, or wins, that didn't matter, just that either it (or just the character on it maybe) lived to fight again some other day.   Lord Harlock got this treatment in his one battle during the Anahuac War...though to be fair, it was the second ambush the Anahuac pulled in the same place, so Rohan was more prepared for it that time.  They still nearly lost his ship and it was out of the war until the very end..its sister ship scrapped to repair it.

That or a major fleet action, where you just pick a bunch of ships, and present a set of tactics and strategy and let the GM or someone game it out as best they can without running in as a turn based game were you move then get orders from each player, move again, get orders, move-shoot, more orders.   That can be done too, but it takes longer and usually requires someone to come up with a battle map that fits the system in use.  If one just does it themselves, they can either use a map, or just figure it out in their head based on ranges and approximate angles of travel/speed and such.

[Valles]

The 'competing timelines' approach, in my mind, is intended for cases where both players involved are reasonable, yes, but also as a way of resolving the difficulty that even such persons can experience when something is on the line that neither of them is eager to lose - a tool, if you will, to make the kind of selection process Ithekro describes easier to work through from first principles.

Granted, this might only really be an issue for me, since as far as I know I'm the only one planning on actual PVP Conquest, but it seemed like something that people might be interested in using in any case.

Since the approach is already relying on trust between the two players, mod intervention wouldn't be strictly necessary for the 'timeline creation' stage, though in practice they'd probably be CCed - it could just be a matter of going, 'I've got my timeline ready and waiting, what about you?' 'Yeah, here's mine.' 'Cool, here's mine. Now, I'm thinking that we could...'

[Tanthalas]

as I have said, it would work great if both parties are Reasonable.  For Example im sure you and I could conduct a war in that method and noone else in the sim would even notice a bump (granted odds of us coming into conflict are rather low but its an example).  Im just sure that given the number of people involved in the Sim there is bound to be someone that refuses to make any consesions in the negotiation phase.

[Valles]

Yeah. That's why we'll still need the 'streamlined mechanical' rules, but this kind of 'mediated scripting' could take some of the load off the GMs.

[Tanthalas]

I think personaly having this as an "optional" method of war resolution would be fine.  The players involved can take it to the GMs and be like Oh hey we went to war here is the first year.  Then the GMs can look at it make changes they feal necessary (if any) and give it back, Presto one year combat done.

[TexanCowboy]

As for my part, any wars I shall fight in shall be scripted. Sorry, Foxy....and Tan.

[Sachmle]

That only works if the other guy wants to script too Tex..this isn't WesWorld were you can't declare war on someone else unless they agree..here...well, just ask Fox or Korpen.

[TexanCowboy]

Anyone invading Texas without a scripted war is going to have Chuck Norris soar down on them from above and chop their army into 500,000 tiny pieces.