#503 - The Choosing 2nd Beta

[unclemike]

Dark Elves  in The Choosing or better name  "The Good, Bad and Ugly" (my turns not the game )

1st couple of turns this coming from some one from a newer person to this game view

The Good is .... ( crickets heard chirping in back ground )

The Bad...  after reading a couple of post I thought there was a new map not old so that was first thing I had problem with finding the map someone playing this for first time going to have real problem.  2nd the rules you have to have 2nd cycle rules out the search the threads for the supplement. 3rd chrome  "ekk" I am one of those people who have to get there son to show them how to use email.

So right off the bat I am wondering why I sign up for this it was so hard to get started.

The Ugly .... Well after getting this going I really look at the DA position I figured I had played them in 2nd cycle how much different could they be.  Boy was I wrong and (the first thing I thought of is if Jumping Fist ever plays this one it will be a short game).  Political  gutted compared to 2nd. Agents  must have been on sale at Walmart  and with there max lvl that they can be train to scares me, what the max is on the Underworld. Wiz # nice not going to have to recruit adepts for awhile. On other hand going to have to raise them up fast if you want to go artifact hunting.  DA elf troops you better attack at a lvl 3 or more because those archers are going to hurt. 565 troops 6 different types all needing 3 kingdom brigades or a veteran brigade to get. Navy don't even go there you start out with a rowboat and a kitchen knife.

Well few turns have gone by now things I do like  ( hold on a second while I try and find that order number and info in the supplement) 979 for lvl 7 agents.  Another is the blue print out on the turn sheet of sightings and pc so that I don't miss it.
 
      On my first couple of turns what I did was change my King to queen and name ( agree with rule if you want to change name/sex it should cost you a order). Raised a noble up to prince so I could get city (thought getting human pc were going to harder). Raise first agent up to lvl 7 so 979 order would tell me if pc or US in any 4 squares I search.
Pc's were hard to find I kept finding others.  One of the things I had to make sure I was doing was to calculate human controlled pc's when trying to flip them.  Seems like there is at least 3 other people in this region. What I took on traits was the trait for ( wait while I find that supplement rules again) g2 figure needed something to help with US encounters.  Was  surprised that it was a artifact that could be moved to another group since rules stated that the "ability" would be assigned to 1st group. And influence (with all nobles, wizards and army groups doing something that comes out to 20 plus orders on turn 1). Of course limit gold and region low production turn did not help.


        Over all at this point (No more crickets) I look forward to playing these guys again just so I could try some things different. DA would be a good Kingdom to play as there is many ways to play with it agents, lots but need to be trained / military lots of different ways to build them up from bats (flight) to huns and wood elfs for archer or ogres for smashing / Or wiz .  If you like hunting for artifacts this one is not for you as you will have to get your wiz up high enough to get past those higher lvl encounters

 

For maps and other documents, click on the "Help Guides" link on the login page. There's another link at the bottom of the Home page after you login but you'll have to scroll down for that one (which is why I added the link to the login page for easy access). On the help page, if the file sizes are not below each link then refresh your browser to pick up the latest version. There are two maps on the help page, Resurgent and Classic, both are possible for 3rd Cycle games but just about all use the newer Resurgent map.

The website not supporting Internet Explorer is due to the fact that browsers have different ways of handling data and IE has an issue with session storage which I use between menu pages (rather than cookies which stores data on your device). So until I get that working, it's not a good idea to use IE which will be problematic while filling out your turn. In addition, Microsoft announced in 2015 that they will no longer support IE which means that everyone will need to start using other browsers anyway.

About the differences of 3rd Cycle to 2nd Cycle: it should be a slower start since every kingdom has smaller militaries and fewer assets but on the plus side, nearly every kingdom starts off in a region by themselves (12 vs 15 kingdoms) so you don't have that early struggle for survival as you did in 2nd Cycle (and no natural enemies which was an automatic enemy starting the game). So the beginning part of the game should be slower and safer for the most part.

About the blue coloring on the kingdom report (search recons), I added that because without a successful find being in another color, the report was really difficult to read (from the Aug'15 test game). Blue stands out more and is easier to quickly gather the important information. The alternative would be to just report a successful find and not display any text for failed search areas but I didn't want to change what people may be used to or liked reading. So I just added blue coloring for successful finds. Ry Vor added a blue encounter segment in the group section as well as red for artifacts. We added more color for the regional control section (green for control, blue for significant,...) as well as graphic symbols for leader decorations (gold/silver/bronze medals for successful battles and blue/yellow ribbons for braving encounters) with more for the future. Which looks better than 2nd Cycle.

Overall, I think once 3rd Cycle becomes official, not many will want to play 2nd Cycle due to all of the new changes and actions in the game but that's my opinion.

[unclemike]

Few questions
   (1st) on 565 orders in 2nd cycle you could recruit at capital. 3rd says no pc in spot so can you recruit 565 types at capital.  And if there is a US at spot can you recruit.

    (2nd) in 3rd cycle confusion on how much influence cast to hire lieutenant or what ever that rank is ( don't want to lookup the supplement again) 

     (3rd) with 2 kingdoms per region but only one playable chances are you will not have a natural enemy when you pick you SVC it would see that you would want to pick one that has you doing more then your nature enemy who is not even playing. example 7a  7b  

All of your questions should be answered when you click on the Verify Orders button but I'll go over them below:

1. Recruiting companions (via 565) is not possible at your capital since a pc exists there. This was intentional. You may recruit a companion from any other spot on the map even if there is/was an encounter there.

2. Too lazy to look up what you want to ask  ... ok, I'll try to guess. Under the kingdom menu, you can hire a new Centurion or Adept to your group. When you press the Verify button, it'll show your adjusted influence after hiring the new guy so you can reference that if need to.

3. If natural enemy selections for SVC display on the dropdown list then let me know and I'll remove them because 3rd Cycle no longer has natural enemies in the game.

[Thudargh]

AT - Continuing Impressions

I think this has been mentioned before, but I'm definitely noticing how a navy being able to only do one thing on a turn is somewhat limiting.  For example, I can either move troops across the sea or patrol the sea - not both.  This means that I can either be on naval offense or naval defense, not both.(At least, not until I can cast Summon Kraken.)  I also can't do a trade mission if I'm doing any of those other things.  This is somewhat annoying - but also may be entirely appropriate.  While it's good that the Atlantians have the potential to become truly dominant in a sea, they shouldn't start out dominant - only advantaged.  Otherwise the seas are simply conceded to a Seafaring power at the get-go.

Another limitation on sea power is the need to have a PC on or next to the water in order to build fleets or do a trade mission.  This will make starting luck a significant factor for the Atlantians - if their starting village in Amberland happens to be in the Sea of Foreboding, their sea power there will become much more potent.

[twhitewolf10]

that's something I always wonder about why do you have to have PC near water to build boats. Do not trees grow almost ever were and if the workers need some were to sleep while make boats they can use tents.
 

[Jumpingfist]

UM
This last turn I issued a 790 order to find "any", region 2, wild

shows up as 790 [blank] 2 W

in the results it states there are no Weapon artifacts. I know there is an unexplored US in region 2 I am on it. seems the any just picked one type and checked rather than looking at all types and picking one still in the wild at random.

if the "any" is working correctly that is fine just would like to know because it is not what I thought it would be.

[unclemike]

UM
This last turn I issued a 790 order to find "any",  region 2, wild

shows up as 790 [blank] 2 W

in the results it states there are no Weapon artifacts.   I know there is an unexplored US in region 2 I am on it.  seems the any just picked one type and checked rather than looking at all types and picking one still in the wild at random.

if the "any" is working correctly that is fine just would like to know because it is not what I thought it would be.

Leaving that column blank always meant that an artifact category will be randomly chosen for you so don't read more into it than that...

[Jumpingfist]

UM
This last turn I issued a 790 order to find "any",  region 2, wild

shows up as 790 [blank] 2 W

in the results it states there are no Weapon artifacts.   I know there is an unexplored US in region 2 I am on it.  seems the any just picked one type and checked rather than looking at all types and picking one still in the wild at random.

if the "any" is working correctly that is fine just would like to know because it is not what I thought it would be.

Leaving that column blank always meant that an artifact category will be randomly chosen for you so don't read more into it than that...

I am not leaving the column blank I am selecting "any".   So no way to divine any unexplored artifact in a region.   When you leave towns or villages blank for the 750 order it gives them all to you because you completed the other 2 out of 3 column.  So there was the logic.  I am sure others would make the same mistake I did as it is not very clear in the order "any' means randomly one of these.

[unclemike]

UM
This last turn I issued a 790 order to find "any",  region 2, wild

shows up as 790 [blank] 2 W

in the results it states there are no Weapon artifacts.   I know there is an unexplored US in region 2 I am on it.  seems the any just picked one type and checked rather than looking at all types and picking one still in the wild at random.

if the "any" is working correctly that is fine just would like to know because it is not what I thought it would be.

Leaving that column blank always meant that an artifact category will be randomly chosen for you so don't read more into it than that...

I am not leaving the column blank I am selecting "any".   So no way to divine any unexplored artifact in a region.   When you leave towns or villages blank for the 750 order it gives them all to you because you completed the other 2 out of 3 column.  So there was the logic.  I am sure others would make the same mistake I did as it is not very clear in the order "any' means randomly one of these.

There are three versions of 790 to choose from the divine dropdown list:

790 Divine Artifact Name (where you specify the category or any for a random category)
790 Divine Artifact Name Region (where you specify category as above and region)
790 Divine Artifact Name Owner (where you specify category, region, and if you want kingdom owned or wild artifacts)

So there's plenty of options to choose from if you want to issue this order but 'any' or leaving a column 'blank' for this order has always represented a randomly chosen artifact category, not any in the sense of all artifact types.

[Ruingurth]

Hi,

Just an update with the BL and the struggle to get a veteran brigade. I had a battle this turn with a town with 5 BL and 2 WV (I start with two they were not recruited). with 26% loses I lost one BL brigade and one WV. 1BL increased to Veteran and the other 3 are still regular and all now have 26% Attrition. I can now recruit into one of my brigades.

Matthew

[HeadHoncho]

Nice info! FYI, I didn't dome the town out of playtest courtesy, but I may return there with my own group to test out the combat subroutines myself.