Maelstrom Test Game

[Wookie Panz]

Answers to several questions:

1) Seasons are normal and apply on the appropriate turns. Winter occurs in regions 1,2,3,5,6,7 and Summer in regions 4,8,9,10,11,12,13.

2) Wookie about the Wizard Tower, I don't see one created by your kingdom so no bonus or discount. Your pc listing will display any buildings that you have at the pc. BTW, with a lot of these new buildings, your group has to be located at the pc with the building to get the bonus. It is not widespread throughout your kingdom, just a single pc. You can build at all of your pc's though so have a tower or forge at every pc if you like.

3) About testing requests, I want to see a Great Mage Tower battle. Group vs group with the bonus to the tower wizard's spells including kill leader/wizard spells before battle for both groups. I tested this already, works fine, but I want to see it in action. Also, the battle report should show Great Mage Tower under the Combat Factors section (where leaders, wizards, brigades are displayed). You should also see indication for forged armor/weapons for either group. BTW, someone build a forge for those special items. That shield bonus alone is a pretty good value just by itself. Also, agents that recon your group (even your own agents/palantirs/etc) will show a miniature shield/sword if the group has forged items. Check it out.

4) Customization. Did anyone select Smoke Mojo? That's one of my favorites. After looking over some choices in the test game, most players took customization to speed up their regional control (like new barons, governors, influence increase). You missed out on having something cool like the Smoke Mojo. Sure a new gov can speed up things in the early going but will that gov do anything to protect your king later in the game against high level agents? I don't think so. That Smoke Mojo is pretty awesome in allowing figures to escape kidnap/assassination attempts. I also like Glyph of Protection, especially with these large groups with extra brigades moving around in the early part of the game, a decent increase to your capital's defense would help.

5) Someone build a fortification, all the way up to a Legendary Castle.

I am building a wizards tower this turn so it will show when the orders process.  Because the improvement comes before the 799 and 800 orders I am able to do these on the same turn.
Thanks for your explanations and all the great programming Uncle Mike and RY Vor.

[Ry Vor]

Those of you that have been with us since before The Choosing started remember the resistance some very good players had to the changes in the 3rd Cycle, and some grew frustrated that the old tricks didn't work.  Now you couldn't drown an army by sabotaging fleets at port, now a player wasn't wiped out by an invisible army group on turn 20.  And though not my favorite work around, the constant "NAP" of 2nd Cycle got pushed aside by the anonymous format.  Then of course we had some kingdoms begin in different regions, added the new kingdoms and replaced some old, and added spells and customization and two kinds of Early Strategic Objective with player chosen options, among other things.

So try to view Maelstrom kind of in that light.  With smaller regions other than the Capital Regions, gaining control of a region won't depend on more emissaries, and remember the political side of the game is a bit more difficult with the change in Friendly reaction from 1.0 to 1.5, and PC base resistance higher.  Now there is more emphasis on developing your PC's, and perhaps a many turn strategy around that development.  I think players who felt they couldn't have a defensive strategy in Alamaze up until now may take heart, and gaining that second region may not be quite as easy as a surprise political blitz.  Also, players will have to choose whether they will share their region and so not likely be able to obtain Tight Control and Loyal reaction, or risk war to achieve it.

Again, there were significant changes to spell lists, with two main prongs to make the mage kingdoms more distinct, and to allow the less magical kingdoms to get some staple spells a power level earlier, and sometimes two earlier, as well as all kingdoms having at least four wizard characters including adepts, the mage kingdoms generally with one less starting wizard, and all kingdoms with assured power limit of at least 5.

Too late now for this test, but do consider the new customization options. Grumbling a bit under my breath as we stick with 10 customization points that unless players do explore a bit more on their own in customization, I should have gone with my instinct to raise the cost of Expert Administration and Noble Family and Dynasty - perhaps not because they are the most powerful, but because they seem to be chosen almost reflexively. Try going away from that approach.

We'll look forward to your reviews of the test, hopefully everyone that wanted to be in this test game will give a full review before the end of turn 6, and let us know what you think of Maelstrom and the future of Alamaze.

[gkmetty]

UM, What does smoke Mojo do. The Description in the release notes does not make the benefits clear.

C4 [2 pts] – Smoke Mojo (50% saving throws) [displays SAVES under emissary]

[unclemike]

UM, What does smoke Mojo do.  The Description in the release notes does not make the benefits clear.

C4 [2 pts] – Smoke Mojo (50% saving throws) [displays SAVES under emissary]

I updated the release notes with more info:

C4 [2 pts] – Smoke Mojo (50% saving throws against kidnap/assassination and when pc falls avoiding capture) [displays SAVES under emissary when equipped]

[gkmetty]

Those of you that have been with us since before The Choosing started remember the resistance some very good players had to the changes in the 3rd Cycle, and some grew frustrated that the old tricks didn't work.  Now you couldn't drown an army by sabotaging fleets at port, now a player wasn't wiped out by an invisible army group on turn 20.  And though not my favorite work around, the constant "NAP" of 2nd Cycle got pushed aside by the anonymous format.  Then of course we had some kingdoms begin in different regions, added the new kingdoms and replaced some old, and added spells and customization and two kinds of Early Strategic Objective with player chosen options, among other things.

So try to view Maelstrom kind of in that light.  With smaller regions other than the Capital Regions, gaining control of a region won't depend on more emissaries, and remember the political side of the game is a bit more difficult with the change in Friendly reaction from 1.0 to 1.5, and PC base resistance higher.  Now there is more emphasis on developing your PC's, and perhaps a many turn strategy around that development.  I think players who felt they couldn't have a defensive strategy in Alamaze up until now may take heart, and gaining that second region may not be quite as easy as a surprise political blitz.  Also, players will have to choose whether they will share their region and so not likely be able to obtain Tight Control and Loyal reaction, or risk war to achieve it.

Again, there were significant changes to spell lists, with two main prongs to make the mage kingdoms more distinct, and to allow the less magical kingdoms to get some staple spells a power level earlier, and sometimes two earlier, as well as all kingdoms having at least four wizard characters including adepts, the mage kingdoms generally with one less starting wizard, and all kingdoms with assured power limit of at least 5.

Too late now for this test, but do consider the new customization options.  Grumbling a bit under my breath as we stick with 10 customization points that unless players do explore a bit more on their own in customization, I should have gone with my instinct to raise the cost of Expert Administration and Noble Family and Dynasty - perhaps not because they are the most powerful, but because they seem to be chosen almost reflexively.  Try going away from that approach.

We'll look forward to your reviews of the test, hopefully everyone that wanted to be in this test game will give a full review before the end of turn 6, and let us know what you think of Maelstrom and the future of Alamaze.

Rick, I think it is too early to draw conclusions on customization.  My own personal thoughts are that I will always take the Bazaar and Temple, unless my kingdom traits provide these buildings.  The remaining 6 points will depend on kingdom type.  Keep in mind, early in the game extra influence is very useful to all kingdoms.  Taking away this customization or making it too costly will have more of an impact on kingdoms that start with low influence.  In the current Maelstrom environment a Governor can no longer take a Neutral Town with an influence of 13.  This is a significant change and it makes that 1 extra point of influence through customization even more valuable.  Noble family and Dynasty will be valuable to political kingdoms but promoting a brigade to Veteran and gaining a green kingdom brigade are much more valuable to a military kingdom.

[Ry Vor]

Rick, I think it is too early to draw conclusions on customization.  My own personal thoughts are that I will always take the Bazaar and Temple, unless my kingdom traits provide these buildings.  The remaining 6 points will depend on kingdom type.  Keep in mind, early in the game extra influence is very useful to all kingdoms.  Taking away this customization or making it too costly will have more of an impact on kingdoms that start with low influence.  In the current Maelstrom environment a Governor can no longer take a Neutral Town with an influence of 13.  This is a significant change and it makes that 1 extra point of influence through customization even more valuable.  Noble family and Dynasty will be valuable to political kingdoms but promoting a brigade to Veteran and gaining a green kingdom brigade are much more valuable to a military kingdom.

Good discussion.  There is a line of thought that in The Choosing, the emphasis was on quick control of the region as in itself the true ESO and so customization centered around that end.

Now in Maelstrom, there are no dispersed kingdoms, and some small regions while easier to control, and perhaps geographically defended likely won't be sufficient to propel the kingdom to a leading position, at least not without a lot of economic development.  So this is a new dynamic - just selecting the region and realizing how it will have major impact on the kingdom's strategy.

So the counter school of thought on selecting customization options is to select options that can't be gained through resources - gold, supplies and an order.  That you get it at customization, or you don't get it at all.  Just something to think about when making the selections.

[Draugr]

I took influence but only because I started not enough to take the major city even with 3 emmies. The +1 made a difference. I also took baron but really went back and forth on that one. I really liked a lot of other options. I think in the future I will not take the baron though. With what seems to be so few PCs I really do not need the extra political power.

I will need to see how many PCs are in the various regions before I can put together a good analysis of my thought on the tactics. My current view is it would be better to have more PCs with less productions but same census than fewer PCs. With less PCs regions can be taken multiple at a time. Already I have found in the choosing if you build and plan you can take two regions with one planned attack. My gut tells me you may be able to take three here which would really support your idea to build but also make the game a crap shoot of who builds fastest to launch the winning attack.

[PTRILEY]

I took Bazaar, renowned standard, P1-P2 upgrade (26,000 Gold for SA) a SA brigade, and a upgrade of Lv2-Lv4 agent with my remaining points. (12,000 Gold for me)

SA brigades are my strength as a military power so I thought that was a good selection. I think the bazaar is a no- brainer and 38,000 gold saved with wizard and agent upgrade. I like the standard, I like several other customization items, but I think these were best for this kingdom in the region I took?

[IMPERIAL_TARK]

PI in the Sword Coast. I'm not seeing the new brigades types listed as options for the Transfer (699/700/741) orders.

[unclemike]

Clear browser cache to pick up the latest website files to handle new brigade types.