Faster games.

[Surrealialis]

I've played a reasonable number of multiplayer games now, but took a long hiatus when I was having significant difficulty with time/turn commitments with 3-5 games going over several months. I was part of a large discord community running games regularly.

So for my question. Is there a good, generally accepted meta for faster games? I mean games that take 1-2 game years to get to end game. Accelerated game progression?
I know there is the options, but is there a style of multiplayer game based around less than 1 month games?

[BoboYagga]

I think clockwork hounds has a discord set up for blitz games. It's not PBEM but direct connect I think. I haven't played any, but ai have seen people talk about them a lot on the forum. You could probably get an invite pretty easily.

[✏pencils✏]

It's mostly about throne settings. If they're set too high a game can last most of a year, set them low enough and a game should be done in around a month. Also games with 8-12 players seem to work the best and take about a month to conclude on average for whatever reason.

[Nrak555]

you could try upping the gold and resources cap on smaller maps with faster research to get the game though everything faster but generally having really short games like that favor heavy bless styles of play. since there will be far less mages around

[meglobob1]

An accelerated start will help...don't start with 1 province...have all players start with 9 provinces.

I figure that will speed a game up by at least 12 turns overall.

To be honest, I am surprised most MP games don't do this. Most players know how to conquer at least 12 provinces in the 1st year, alot can take 18-24. So why bother with that phase of the game? I have done it so many times that I find it as boring as hell now...

Obviously very easy research speeds games up considerably and more gold & resources but not too much as every province can end up with a fort...

[Gopher]

even blitz games are brutal. You always have that one guy who's mage heavy or item heavy who takes 15 minutes a turn to do their thing.

Although it probably wouldn't be very exciting and be more of a roll of dice, taking scripting out all together via a mod would definitely speed things up considerably for blitz.

As far as month long games go I can imagine that people play a lot more passive on a PBEM server game

[Surrealialis]

Originally posted by Nrak555:

you could try upping the gold and resources cap on smaller maps with faster research to get the game though everything faster but generally having really short games like that favor heavy bless styles of play. since there will be far less mages around

I think this, and mage turns as far as casting certain spells goes, really hinder the balance of a faster or smaller map with higher settings. I could definitely play with the idea of a start with a few more provinces though.
I may also look into highly symmetric maps for this sort of idea to take form.
Is there a way to increase commander recruitment points? I have modded several nations so if it's a mod solution I can happily do it.

[Norwegian Singbird]

Originally posted by meglobob1:

To be honest, I am surprised most MP games don't do this. Most players know how to conquer at least 12 provinces in the 1st year, alot can take 18-24. So why bother with that phase of the game? I have done it so many times that I find it as boring as hell now...

I have tried setting up games like this I think once or twice and both times there were no players at all signing up. So that's the reason probably. It makes for very different starting dynamics starting with 9 provinces. I have no idea why people don't generally want to try anything different, but always go for the same stuff. Mysterious.



Hmm, I think someone made a mod that removes the recruitment points with the side effect that it also removes them from the commanders, making you able to recruit up to 10 commander a turn in a province. Now, that obviously makes for a VERY different dynamic, but might be a fun solution.

[1337Dude]

Originally posted by Sweaty Gopher:

even blitz games are brutal. You always have that one guy who's mage heavy or item heavy who takes 15 minutes a turn to do their thing.

I've never played a blitz game where a timer wasn't enforced.

Blitz is really the most satisfying way to play the game.

[ÆtherNomad]

Originally posted by 1337MechaHimmler:

Blitz is really the most satisfying way to play the game.

Heh, I'm not sure about that; sure, there are big advantages to playing blitz, but there are cons too. The biggest issue is that blitzes lack the diplomatic depth of long-paced games, and this is where the fun mostly comes from in these games.

[Surrealialis]

Originally posted by Norwegian Singbird:

Hmm, I think someone made a mod that removes the recruitment points with the side effect that it also removes them from the commanders, making you able to recruit up to 10 commander a turn in a province. Now, that obviously makes for a VERY different dynamic, but might be a fun solution.

I'll definitely look for that and try it out. I would worry that if the dynamic was too differenthat many may not even try it.

[1337Dude]

Originally posted by ÆtherNomad:

Originally posted by 1337MechaHimmler:

Blitz is really the most satisfying way to play the game.

Heh, I'm not sure about that; sure, there are big advantages to playing blitz, but there are cons too. The biggest issue is that blitzes lack the diplomatic depth of long-paced games, and this is where the fun mostly comes from in these games.

It doesn't miss the diplomatic depth. How is there any extra diplomacy by simply playing the game at a snail's pace?

I would argue that having too much time to make your decisions actually takes depth away from the game. For example, look at how Chess is played at high levels. High level play takes turn time into consideration.

You're literally taking an entire dimension away from the game when you're not playing blitz (time). There's nothing in Blitz preventing you from conducting diplomacy. If anything diplomacy is more convenient when you have all players in the game at your immediate attention.

What I will say is that PBEM is the most convenient way to play the game. It's nice to have a convenient option for a game like this.

[ÆtherNomad]

Originally posted by 1337MechaHimmler:

It doesn't miss the diplomatic depth. How is there any extra diplomacy by simply playing the game at a snail's pace?

1. Simply playing the game at a snail's pace DOES definitely add much more diplomatic depth, because you have a lot of time to design clever psychological manipulation, and even more importantly, to communicate with other players between each turn.
2. It is not JUST about being able to do your turn whenever you want, it is also about having longer turns. What I mean here is that 15 minutes per turn DEFINITELY isn't enough to get interesting diplomacy going on; some diplomatic exchanges take 15 minutes or more on their own, but you also have to actually do your turn, and for that 15 minutes is a very short amount of time. So, being forced to play that quickly purely and simply kills the diplomatic aspect of the game.

Originally posted by 1337MechaHimmler:

I would argue that having too much time to make your decisions actually takes depth away from the game. For example, look at how Chess is played at high levels. High level play takes turn time into consideration.

The reason for that is simple: chess is NOT a deep game. As soon as you have 24 hours or more to design your next move in chess, you can be sure that your play will be nearly optimal, if you put the right amount of work into it. The most important "skill" in chess is memory, purely and simply because optimal moves are easy to find when you have enough time, and thus the game is only interesting when you DON'T have enough time to do that (AND if you haven't memorized any move beforehand); the same definitely cannot be said of dominions. Dominions is deep enough that, even when you have a whole day or more to play each turn, you can't tell for sure if your current play is optimal or not. It is a much more complex game than chess. You can't win blitzes by memorizing moves.

Originally posted by 1337MechaHimmler:

You're literally taking an entire dimension away from the game when you're not playing blitz (time). There's nothing in Blitz preventing you from conducting diplomacy. If anything diplomacy is more convenient when you have all players in the game at your immediate attention.

I agree, I didn't say that blitzes are inferior to long-paced games. I said that each has its pros and cons. Both are interesting for their own reasons. Long-paced games have a much more interesting diplomatic aspect, while blitzes force to think much faster and to prioritize your moves.