Re: Legends - game progression

From: dani@netcom.com (Dani Zweig)

Date: Sun, 21 Nov 1993 18:01:39 +0000

dresnick@athena.mit.edu (David I Resnick):
>I'm about 6 months into my first Legends game (NIC)... I started with an
>adventurer position, and now have 10 characters, ~5000 pop, ~700 soldiers
>(mostly knights and blessed of shanah knights)... I have had only
>minor interaction with other players (I've eliminated two players homes,
>however one had already apparently dropped).  I am not yet in a faction...

You're doing well.  In terms of positition, you're where you ought to be
or better.  The "only minor interaction", however, should be viewed with
alarm.  So far, it's worked in your favor, allowing you to expand with
relatively little competition.  By now, though, some strong factions will
be forming.  You'd best make it a *high* priority to contact other players
in your area, before you find out that you've annoyed a major faction.
Besides, what you can consider doing half a year from now, you might be
able to do tomorrow with the help of a few neighbors.

Progression in general?  First six months tend to be spent as you've been
spending them, preying on the immediate neighborhood to build up
individual strength.  (There are advantages to starting teamwork early,
but they're not yet overwhelming.)  The second six months tend to see the
development of major positions:  By the end of the first year there will
be a number of players who have ridden the exponential curve to the point
where they can seriously think in terms of conquering cities and of
influencing very major NPCs.  The factional/political landscape will
also be well-developed by this time.  Decisive developments tend to occur
around the eighteen-month point.  During the third six-month period,
players start running out of local targets and start looking longingly
at areas claimed by other factions.  Somewhere around the eighteen-month
mark, one or two factions will realize that they are able to field
armies of several thousand high-level soldiers -- and that there are
major benefits to doing so before anyone else gets around to it.  The
actual length of the game may depend more upon the most tedious victory
conditions than upon the most challenging ones.

The specifics of what happens here depend on the module.  In Realm, the
results have been conditioned by the large number of factions:  Since
many factions are inevitably weak or nonexistent, this creates power
vacuums whose specific pattern largely determines the course of the game.
In NIC, with only eight or so factions, I'd expect four or five to be
up to strength.  (I don't expect the general pattern of game progress
to be much different in NIC.  The new rule changes have closed some
loopholes, but not altered things substantially.  Legends II, with its
limits on training and SEI, may be dramatically different.)

-----
Dani Zweig
dani@netcom.com

The inability of snakes to count is actually a refusal, on their part,
    to appreciate the Cardinal Number system. -- "Actual Facts"

References

Legends - game progression
dresnick@athena.mit.edu (David I Resnick)
Fri, 19 Nov 1993 18:06:10 +0000