New Player Aid Spreadsheets?

[HeadHoncho]

Just wondering if there's any guestimate as to a new player aid spreadsheet for Third Cycle?  I'm noticing that unusual encounters, in particular, have been more challenging.  Thanks!

[Ry Vor]

Just wondering if there's any guestimate as to a new player aid spreadsheet for Third Cycle?  I'm noticing that unusual encounters, in particular, have been more challenging.  Thanks!

I don't think we made design changes from what was announced in 2nd Cycle regarding survival in Unusual Sightings. 

Sometimes rolls go badly, and I know no one likes that, but it is necessary for the credibility of the game.  All our percentages we publish are actual percentages.   So when your Marshal doesn't die taking a town, don't assume that was easy. 

We have been fortunate to have Frost Lord produce lots of the player aids, but also Lord Diamond, Bananas and others.  And just the way things are, we are still counting on them, as well as Lord Diamond's work with Valhalla.  To flesh out what we have, as lately with the new Centauria map, and the multitude of changes Uncle Mike has been able to introduce that we ultimately hope makes Alamaze a lot more accessible to the friends yet unacquainted with Alamaze of the most steadfast players that are our bedrock. 

[Jumpingfist]

From reading 3rd cycle forums the encounters are not harder per say but you do not always have a chance to succeed. So if your in a fine encounter you need between 25-50 for the encounter strength. If you go in with 20 and the encounter is a 40 strength you do not have a 50% chance of success. You would need to go in with a 40. And could still fail with a bad roll.
UM can confirm how it works. I figured it was going back closer to how game 300 was vs how the current 2nd cycle is. From the few I have done it seems to follow 300 rules pretty well. I have only failed one I already knew I was at risk.

[Atuan]

From reading 3rd cycle forums the encounters are not harder per say but you do not always have a chance to succeed. So if your in a fine encounter you need between 25-50 for the encounter strength. If you go in with 20 and the encounter is a 40 strength you do not have a 50% chance of success. You would need to go in with a 40. And could still fail with a bad roll.
UM can confirm how it works. I figured it was going back closer to how game 300 was vs how the current 2nd cycle is. From the few I have done it seems to follow 300 rules pretty well. I have only failed one I already knew I was at risk.

I swear I think I read a bunch on the forums... and I am not even close.

Does anyone have a new tool for the 320-330 series with the kingdoms and their bonuses that incorporates 315 orders?

[Ry Vor]

From reading 3rd cycle forums the encounters are not harder per say but you do not always have a chance to succeed.  So if your in a fine encounter you need between 25-50 for the encounter strength.  If you go in with 20 and the encounter is a 40 strength you do not have a 50% chance of success.  You would need to go in with a 40.  And could still fail with a bad roll.  
UM can confirm how it works.  I figured it was going back closer to how game 300 was vs how the current 2nd cycle is.   From the few I have done it seems to follow 300 rules pretty well.  I have only failed one I already knew I was at risk.

Hmm.  Most players know I want them to know we are not BS'ing about how things work, but also don't want to turn it into an Excel spreadsheet for players. 

I'd like the next Dwarven King to have some battles to see how it goes, and also that they will think, "hmmm, I guess that made sense." 

So, don't get in the plains with the Red Dragons or Amazons, or in the Mountains with the Dwarves, or perhaps others like the Gnomes.  Obviously, if you are against an Elven army in the forest or a Lizard King army in the marsh, don't ponder too deeply: that's what happens. 

And I like that players are coming around to the nuances of gaining various Companion brigades.  An example being, if you are the leader of the Red Dragons, you need a Marshal, at The Fire of the Void, at the end of turn 4 with at least 3 brigades to be able to recruit one brigade of Phoenix, and potentially may come to think when you are at the end of the game that the brigade of Phoenix might have been the difference maker.

Thanks again to Uncle Mike and other contributors.  I couldn't do it on my own.  Have fun!  That's why we do it. 

[Jumpingfist]

It has come to a point not having a spreadsheet or calculator likely puts you at a larger disadvantage to experienced or players that fully read and digest everything in the forums.

For Atuan question above for intrinsic status quo 5 kingdoms (BL, CI, DE, RD, SA) have a value of 2 which is like a pro gov issuing a 310 order in a tolerant region with influence 12. So if your using the 2nd cycle player aid put in a pro gov issuing a 310 order. 4 kingdoms (DA, LI, NE, TY) have a value of 4 which would be like a count issuing a 310 order influence 12.
For 315 if your issuing a 320 order then add the full value of your 315 or if you are issuing a 330 from a controlled PC add half value of you Emmy. Tricky to make the player aid do this but it is possible. An example would be if you have a baron issuing a 320 order and wanted to have a pro gov issue a 315 to help then is the player aid make the baron into a prince. Another way would be to add the effective influence the pro gov has to your total influence and then see how it turns out using your barons example if you have 12 influence your pro gov has an effect influence of 3.6 so change your influence to 15.6 and see what the results look like
Hope this helps

[Ry Vor]

Again, I have to make everything able to be coded.  But I don't want players dragged into thinking they have to know every detail to be competitive. I just want a new player to play the Dwarven King as he would expect, and that the game and code behave pretty much as expected. 

And to know beyond that, that the main focus is to not have any one kingdom be dominant, or a kingdom being un-selected.  

We want the 24 Kingdoms in The Choosing to be equally appealing.  Its not an easy objective, like do you like these 24 pictures equally? 

Anyway, we think we do multi player strategy the best, even though we may have to turn our attention to single or duel player strategy to expand the Alamaze universe.

[Lord Thanatos]

Again, I have to make everything able to be coded.  But I don't want players dragged into thinking they have to know every detail to be competitive. I just want a new player to play the Dwarven King as he would expect, and that the game and code behave pretty much as expected. 

And to know beyond that, that the main focus is to not have any one kingdom be dominant, or a kingdom being un-selected.  

We want the 24 Kingdoms in The Choosing to be equally appealing.  Its not an easy objective, like do you like these 24 pictures equally? 

Anyway, we think we do multi player strategy the best, even though we may have to turn our attention to single or duel player strategy to expand the Alamaze universe.

For what little it matters . . . I have never once used the calculator to determine whether my emissaries would be successful.

I just make an educated guess based upon . . . well, lots of orders issued.   

Maybe that is why I do not win very often!  I, for one, do not like the game being reduced to a math exercise.  I hated calculus in college.  I tend to guide each kingdom as Rick described above.  I do like to know what each kingdom can do (i.e. once I have a set-up for each kingdom I am content) but that is so that I can contemplate what my opponents may do to hinder me and work to similarly hinder them.  I do NOT believe this type of information should be restricted, but have no problem if the underlying math remains opaque.

Guess I am saying that I share Rick's opinion on this issue.

[unclemike]

I won't go into detail but the encounter code was changed a bit for The Choosing. Not at game 300 level which was brutal but you need to remember that I originally wrote Alamaze back when the game was no longer offered and I was just playing around with my friends (who'll say I was a tough but honest DM). So the software is not close to game 300's level of toughness which considered artifacts as rare and precious items to own.

For The Choosing, I think some of the baseline encounter ratings were increased a bit by Ry Vor back in August '15 but nothing that would put the system out of whack and those ratings have been played with for a while now so there's not an issue with them. The Adventurers trait was added which provides an additional bonus to the soldier factor as well as to the group's overall strength value (which normally is kingdom dependent with military kingdoms having the stronger soldiers). And of course the Excellent and Superior level encounters now requiring a spell to access along with some other changes like that but nothing that should question the validity of how an encounter is resolved.

So encounters for The Choosing is nearly the same as it was previously with some additional improvements being considered.

About 320/330, don't forget about Stir Unrest which isn't included in the 2nd Cycle calculator. That ability is very powerful and is also considered in the early part of the following turn for parley/diplomacy attempts. In fact, I'm planning on doing that for my Duel test game as the Lizard King. On the Resurgent map, there's only one city in Synisvania so the top two emissaries of the Lizard kingdom are fine to rebel/usurp on turn 2 but on the Centauria map, there's two cities and splitting up emissaries will take longer to gain control of either city. So I'm planning on Stir Unrest to weaken one of the human cities on turn 2 so that my group's diplomacy spell will be enough to gain control of it on the following turn. Why do it this way instead of just usurp control? Because if your group is successful, you'll gain gold from the city on turn 3 instead of turn 4 and my greedy lizard wizards need the gold :0

To be fair, I'm also increasing my wizard's level so a pwr-3 will be doing the diplomacy. It may be possible to do it with the pwr-2 along with the Lizard kingdom's bonus to Stir Unrest but a pwr-3 would help ensure success. So opening orders for a Lizard king could be something like:

turn 1: duke move to one city, count to the other (where group will go), pwr-2 raised to 3rd level
turn 2: duke rebel city, count stir unrest (+15% Lizard bonus so really 75% influence not 60% for count), move troops/pwr-3 and combine at city
turn 3: duke usurp city (no gold), pwr-3 diplomacize other city (and rake in the gold!)

[Hawk_]

I won't go into detail but the encounter code was changed a bit for The Choosing. Not at game 300 level which was brutal but you need to remember that I originally wrote Alamaze back when the game was no longer offered and I was just playing around with my friends (who'll say I was a tough but honest DM). So the software is not close to game 300's level of toughness which considered artifacts as rare and precious items to own.

For The Choosing, I think some of the baseline encounter ratings were increased a bit by Ry Vor back in August '15 but nothing that would put the system out of whack and those ratings have been played with for a while now so there's not an issue with them. The Adventurers trait was added which provides an additional bonus to the soldier factor as well as to the group's overall strength value (which normally is kingdom dependent with military kingdoms having the stronger soldiers). And of course the Excellent and Superior level encounters now requiring a spell to access along with some other changes like that but nothing that should question the validity of how an encounter is resolved.

So encounters for The Choosing is nearly the same as it was previously with some additional improvements being considered.

About 320/330, don't forget about Stir Unrest which isn't included in the 2nd Cycle calculator. That ability is very powerful and is also considered in the early part of the following turn for parley/diplomacy attempts. In fact, I'm planning on doing that for my Duel test game as the Lizard King. On the Resurgent map, there's only one city in Synisvania so the top two emissaries of the Lizard kingdom are fine to rebel/usurp on turn 2 but on the Centauria map, there's two cities and splitting up emissaries will take longer to gain control of either city. So I'm planning on Stir Unrest to weaken one of the human cities on turn 2 so that my group's diplomacy spell will be enough to gain control of it on the following turn. Why do it this way instead of just usurp control? Because if your group is successful, you'll gain gold from the city on turn 3 instead of turn 4 and my greedy lizard wizards need the gold :0

To be fair, I'm also increasing my wizard's level so a pwr-3 will be doing the diplomacy. It may be possible to do it with the pwr-2 along with the Lizard kingdom's bonus to Stir Unrest but a pwr-3 would help ensure success. So opening orders for a Lizard king could be something like:

turn 1: duke move to one city, count to the other (where group will go), pwr-2 raised to 3rd level
turn 2: duke rebel city, count stir unrest (+15% Lizard bonus so really 75% influence not 60% for count), move troops/pwr-3 and combine at city
turn 3: duke usurp city (no gold), pwr-3 diplomacize other city (and rake in the gold!)

My only concern is players still think the spreadsheet tool is accurate and it may be creating false expectations of success on 140 orders.