The Campaign Builder's Guild

Declare interest in and discuss Mnemosyne here and declare your interest!

–⊙– Mnemosyne: Rules –⊙– (http://www.thecbg.org/wiki/index.php?title=Mnemosyne)

Looks like I'm not the only one who got the itch to run a PbP! :D

This looks cool. What kind of "alien race" can I play?

Certainly an intriguing premise. Would be interested to read more. Nice soundtrack too.

Hmm. I'm definitely interested in this. If possible, I'd definite suggest you check out at least an issue or two of the Prophet relaunch, since it's basically Conan in space and definitely fits with the whole scifi-pulp theme you've got going on. Though it's even further from being realized, I'm also reminded a lot of Numenera. In a good way.

I've also got a few questions, which you're under no obligation to entertain. What sort of scale do you plan on working with? Will these tribes be fully-realized civilizations like the races in Underdeep, or are we looking at more party-sized groups? Do you have concrete ideas on what races will be on the roster or will we be able to add our own input (within reason, of course)? Will there be neutral factions or settlements to deal with?

Basically you've proposed a game based on one of my favorite sorts of scifi.

Wow, really glad to see the warm reception!  I was afraid it might be too quirky or weird.  Thanks guys!

I haven't yet come up with any "races" so to speak and am totally down with people suggesting/creating their own.  Races don't have to be fully fleshed out, as I'm not imposing the need to roleplay on anyone, but it's nice if they have a flavor, for sure.

Scale will be at least as large as Underdeep - you can build up your towns, build roads to speed up travel between them, send messages to other players with aerographs, expand on the remnants of the Great Canals to syphon off some life-giving water, etc.  I expect populations (not army sizes) to grow pretty big, if resources can be found to support them.  Heck, if you can settle a canal that's still got water, you would probably be able to build up a multi-million citizen civilization, assuming no one kills you trying to take your water.

I wasn't planning on including any neutral parties or NPCs to interact with.  There may be a tribe here or there to raid while you grow, or you might come under attack by someone trying to take your water, but that will largely be randomized and rare.  Expect any natural resources to already belong to someone, though, and someone armed.

Post any other questions or comments you have, please!  I'll respond to them all as I get time!  (A side note: I'll be away this weekend, but I'll catch up on Monday.)

Hmm. As a strategy game, are you aiming for pure Warhammer or will there be a touch of Civilization: will the emphasis be on competitive warfare or will there be the possibility of (and benefit to) pursuing a less-violent route as, say, traders?

Well, I'm not going to institute any sort of auction house or market system in the rules.  Anything you want to do trade-wise would be up to you as a player.  War is definitely costly, so those who are able to exist without having to raise and maintain large armies will likely grow far wealthier than their neighbors.  How those neighbors react to large sums of unprotected wealth may vary, depending on how people roleplay their people.  I guess I'm trying to say that I'm down for either approach, but whether or not other people take advantage of any weaknesses is out of my control as a GM.  As the GM, though, I'm not going go bitchslap you for playing the merchant prince.

All of that said, so far, the only tradeable things I've planned for the game so far are Food, Water, Money, and combat elements (squads of soldiers, airships, artillery, etc.).  My initial intent, based on the Underdeep poll results was to minimize the amount of economy present and do my best to support wargaming and city-building.  Roleplaying and politicking support doesn't really require rules, so have at it if you want to (most seem to).

If you want more economic options, I'm open to ideas, but I really wanted to keep the complexity down, rules-wise.

Just posted initial info about economics in the game and added a track to the game's soundtrack.

What sort of map are you envisioning? Hexes? Arbitrary divisions (a-la underdeep)? Coordinate-based?

As much as I'd freaking love to do this with vectors, I think that'd drive people away, so I'm planning on sketching out something on a hex grid.  Each hex would get relevant information regarding terrain, resources, and, other features.  I haven't settled on a scale for hexes yet, but the map should be several turns across, and may see additions as people build up and achieve more advanced toys, like flyers (which will more closely resemble naval units than aircraft in operation).

I must admit that I am toying with giving each starting player their own map to play on at first, with distances between the maps being arbitrary, so that everyone isn't too on top of each other should they get some fast transport.  Then again, cramming people together could lead to more interesting RP opportunities and for bloodshed.

I probably won't have time to play in this, sadly, but I'm very interested to watch it develop (along with Raelifin's very intriguing game), having now spent a lot of time thinking about/designing/running a forum game.  A couple questions I'm curious about:

1) The kinds of genres Mnemosyne seems to be channeling - pulp SF, sword and planet, dying earth, planetary romance, etc - sometimes have an elemental of the supernatural, sorcerous, or psychic/preternatural.  You mention Warhammer 40k, for example, which has Daemons and the Warp, psykers, telepathic aliens (Tyranids), ghost-like entities (Eldar Wraithstones etc), and alien gods (C'tan).  In Barsoom Martians are telepathic, some of them can conjure illusions, and there's the obvious teleportation of John Carter; similar works sometimes feature astrally projecting heroes and the like.  Dune, which this reminds me of too, has lots of vaguely mystic stuff, from the Bene Gesserit with their Voice to the Mentats to the Weirding Way to the precognition of Guild Navigators.  Do you plan on having possibilities for mystical powers, psychic abilities, magic, or similarly preternatural/supernatural stuff, or are you assuming a more "hard SF" universe without that sort of thing?  If the former, will there be actual mechanics for those sorts of abilities?

2) How advanced are you imagining technology in this world?  Is the only powerful tech found in the form of relics from ancient civilizations (if that), or can players develop advanced technology?  If the latter, how advanced are you picturing?  Computers?  Firearms?  Sentient machines?  Biotechnology?  Motorized transport?  Or just like, steel weapons or something?

3) It seems like you're emphasizing player freedom a great deal in this setting, which is very interesting - for example you mention that people can develop their own races.  Are you going to allow for players to develop their own units as well, or is everyone basically bound to the same set of units that get "reskinned" according to species/tribe?

4) Along similar lines, how much leeway do people have in the construction of their race?  Like, could a player decide "I'm playing a race of gigantic sentient termite-creatures the size of houses who live in subterranean colonies" or "I'm playing a race of vaguely slug-like asexual fanatics whose slime is naturally poisonous to other creatures" or "I'm playing a race of malignant trees whose fruit contain a mind-controlling chemical that makes others my slaves"?  Could they play as a space-faring civilization whose ship crash-landed on (or colonized?) Mneomysyne, as in Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri?  Trans-dimensional invaders (the Combine :P)?  Even plain old humans?  Or is it more that you play as different flavours or subraces of the same species - Red Martians, Green Martians, Black Martians, etc - with comparable social structures and capabilities, allowing for greater balance at the tactical level?

5) Will there be other hazards like disease, predators, weather, or natural disasters (dust-storms, earthquakes, fires, droughts)?  Or do you think this kind of thing would be too frustrating for players?

Just a few to start :).

Omg!  Lots of awesome questions!

1)  I've actually scratched on some paper somewhere "Psychic priests!" so I'm going to have to say definitely on the mystical stuff.  I'm too big a fan of barsoom, wh40k, and even people like Heinlein, to ignore such stuff.  So I'm thinking psychic powers, and maybe some other weirdness.  In terms of units, this is factored into their indivudual Strength scores and special classes, but as far as out-of-combat powers go, I haven't tackled that yet.  I may look into stealing some mechanics from you there.

2) I'm picturing relatively advanced technology, but in a pulpy way.  Barsoomian flyers instead of airplanes, "aerographs" instead of radios and such.  I'm sort of pegging overall tech levels (with the pulpy scifi addons) pegged around Spanish-American War to WWI range.  I'm definitely avoiding actual space travel (although see #4).

3) I'm actually quite cool with player-developed and customized units, even in-game.  I've already put together a spreadsheet for designing and pricing out units.  Of course, I will float out there some generic units that any army should have, and to which people can compare their units.

4) I had started this with barsoom strongly in mind, but I'm not married to "flavors of the same species," but at the same time, in those books, there were constantly weird and different martians the red men didn't even know existed.  So I'm good with giant termite-like creatures, subterranean horrors, or (definitely) interdimentional aliens.  With unit pricing based on capability and nothing else, any weird advantages and such should just result in pricier units.

5)  I definitely think weather should be included, and I intend to roll it randomly.  As bad weather can affect both combat and travel times, it'll be worth mentioning and should occassionally be included as almost a kind of mobile terrain, so to speak.  Predators could be random encounters or things to slay to keep people interested between roleplaying/scheming/politicking/etc.

Keep the questions coming!

[EDIT]
I'm trying to get the combat stuff up as quickly as possible.  Much of this will depend on how much time I can muster, but I'll do my best.

Quick update:  Movement and Combat rules are 90% up.  Once I have that mess going, I'll start putting together the basics of individual units for everyone, and eventually link to a spreadsheet for designing your own units, should you be interested.

Do slow air units move faster on roads?

Edit: Your weather effects are in miles/day rather than hexes/turn.

They move as Foot mobility units do, which move at 16 hex/turn on roads and 8 hex/turn off-road, so yes.  They are still slow to advance, however.

And thanks.  fixing that now.

Lastly, combat stuff is all up.  Next will be unit info most likely.

Just wanted to let you know that I've been following your rules. Am I right that the casualty table isn't posted yet? I was surprised that the troop costs were so high, but that's just because I wasn't aware of the population each person would be taxing. Is each turn one in-game week?

The casualty table isn't posted yet, and I'll get on that now that I've figured out how to post tables in the forum.

Yeah, costs are pretty high, and time to raise won't always be too terribly short, either (as it is based on cost to raise), but each player will begin with cash assets to dispose of as he pleases before play begins (so he can build up his starting city or buy an army, or whatever).  Also, yeah, weekly $ income is based on taxing each individual in the city (populations can range into the millions), so each week, a person could feasibly see incomes from a single city in the 30+ million range (assuming a population of 1M people).  Also, it's worth noting that the cost to raise an element is much, much higher than the cost of that element's upkeep.  So growing a military is very costly, but keeping one going isn't so bad.

Each turn is currently intended to be a week of game time.  I kept it abstract after seeing how SP has varied the length of his turns to rather good effect, once he saw how the game was progressing.  I've yet to set a turn length for this, but I'll probably start with a 1-week turn and see how it goes.  If anything, I may keep the turn lengths a week and give myself a day or two to post the update in between.  I'm not sure just yet.

Casualty Table up!  Logistic Force information up!

Also, I have a question about Commands.  Right now, I've got four "skills" for commands - Administration (for logistical stuff - should be renamed), Intelligence (for Reconnaissance rolls), Leadership (for maintaining control of a force), and Strategy (for winning battles).  I was wondering if anyone thinks it'd be better to have fewer skills (frex, just one that covers everything) or more skills for things I haven't really considered.  Any ideas?

All element-related and combat related stuff is up!  Please pick apart and critique!  I am aware that I need to tweak the pricing on the sample elements.  I uncovered a bug in my spreadsheet (which is currently getting quite the alpha test).

Quote from: Humabout
Each turn is currently intended to be a week of game time.  I kept it abstract after seeing how SP has varied the length of his turns to rather good effect, once he saw how the game was progressing.  I've yet to set a turn length for this, but I'll probably start with a 1-week turn and see how it goes.  If anything, I may keep the turn lengths a week and give myself a day or two to post the update in between.  I'm not sure just yet.

I'm not sure you understood me. Underdeep has a flexible turn length in terms of *real time*, but all the turns in UD are 1 week of game time. I was asking because I'm trying to get a grasp on income/turn (which right now is in terms of $/week).

The other stuff is hard for me to mentally evaluate, and I don't want to build another simulator right now. ^_^

Ah, sorry.  Yeah, one turn is one week.  I think I made that decision partway through writing stuff and forgot to go back and change all "weeks" to "turns."  Less confusing than worrying about counting actual time.

I expect income per turn to begin in the $30,000 to $300,000 range.  I'll probably still tweak numbers a little as I see how other stuff progresses.  Balancing all of this out isn't the easiest thing I've attempted.  I hope ya'll will poke holes and point out issues as I go along.

Settlement rules up.

To Do List:

• Orders
  
• Sample Orders
  
• Maps
  
• Psychic Powers
  
• Psychic Rules
  
• Buildings
  
• Complete Sample Faction
  
• Some General Faction Information
  

Am I missing anything?

I assume that economy/resources/settlements and things will be covered in "Buildings"?
Is the plan for each player to build their own faction? I've been looking forward to reading faction fluff.

Doesn't seem that way to me. I'm getting a much better picture of the game with every update and it seems compelling, if a lot more exhaustive than Underdeep. Especially interested in faction information, mostly so I can ruminate on the fluff while you finish the crunch.

Also, I'm interested in hearing from the other potential players and what, if anything, ya'll had in mind.

I'm brewing some faction ideas in my head.  I'll post a handful and see who likes what and what they'd like to see.  So far, Superbright has been PMing me multiple times a day with ideas about creating her own faction.  My own will include a generic "Mnemosyte" faction (the units posted belong to this faction already).  I'll probably toss up a another one or two who are native to the world.

Economy and resources are covered under Economy.  Settlements are covered under Settlements.  Actual structures will be in Buildings with statistics, prices, and explanations.  Most structures will be generic.  A particular faction may have a couple of faction-specific structures, but I want to keep resource and military production structures genericly statted to keep things balanced across factions.  Fluff can certainly vary, of course - e.g., Training Grounds vs. Brood Womb, Housing vs. Hive, Permafrost Mine vs. Subterranean Pool, etc.

[EDIT]
Okay, it looks like people are waiting more on fluff than on rules.  I'll work on getting something up next for that.  I was trying to get rules up so people could poke holes or otherwise point out things I've missed.  Also, so when I post units and associated fluff, they were in some context.  So, without further adieu, I'm off to write some fluff!

Quote from: Humabout
Economy and resources are covered under Economy.  Settlements are covered under Settlements.

I had not seen that you added settlements. By "economy" I was thinking about things like resource generation/collection. I should've specified.

Quote from: Humabout
So far, Superbright has been PMing me multiple times a day with ideas about creating her own faction.  

See, this is why total player freedom is a double-edged sword: potential for huge variety, but the guarantee of Superbright hounding you to make sure her variety isn't too various

Yeah, Rael, resource buildings will go up eventually.  Frankly, I'm most worried about balancing that mess.  I'm sure I'll still have to tweak numbers, but I'm hoping to at least get relative prices fairly well set against each other, so it'll all just boil down to scaling everything to fit together nicely.

Superbright, quit PMing me and post your ideas here!  There's a lot of really awesome stuff there that I'm sure others would want to poach for their own creations.  You really get this setting, by the way.  You're getting me really excited to run this game!

Lastly, Three Factions Posted!  Working on more!

Sorry Humabout!

Okay, so at their insistence, the faction concept I'm currently leaning towards playing is a motley multi-species band of mercenaries known as Bastard's Bastards, lead by the eponymous Captain Boudicca Bastard (aka the Bitch-Queen of Angmar. Maybe.) Boudicca herself is sort of a mashup of Tank Girl, Col. Hunter Gathers, and George Armstrong Custer, strained through a lens of Fremen, and I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a teeny hint of Daenerys Targaryen in there too. Very punk/dieselpunk/old-school scifi. The Bastards either wander the world in an enormous salvaged (and nuclear-powered!) war-machine/sandcrawler called The Filibuster, or else have their base of operations in some ancient monolith/apartment block (If you've seen the Farscape episode "Thank God It's Friday, Again", it's something a lot like that.) In a metagame sense, the Bastards are basically an army for hire; I'll probably be leaning less towards territorial expansion and more towards keeping everyone alive so I can keep getting paid.

But that's not all! I've got a few other ideas for factions that ya'll should feel free to discuss and/or poach:

A tribe of nomadic androids that cover themselves in layers of robes and wrappings Tusken Raider-style and distill biomass and water into alcohol-based fuels, with even their non-humanoid war-machines possessing defined personalities and considered full members of the clan (think the Tachikoma).

Maybe some Goa'uld style god-parasites, extradimensional or not.

Intelligent, semi-parasitic fungus. Or, alternatively, sentient tumors originally caused by exposure to a spectrum of otherworldly radiation.

Masters of the remaining biotech that engineer all manner of living war-beasts.

The anthropophagous Ghoulherds of Mnemosyne with their cyber-mummified cattle and their necro-autonomous yurts.

Also, are the Mnemosytes basically human-equivalents in the same vein as the Red Martians?

No apologies necessary! I just wouldn't want to rob the forums of your awesome ideas!

Your mercenary faction sounds great.  I've kind of done the bioengineered tech and living war beast thing with the Luria already, so you're dead on the money with these suggestions.

I see ghoulherds as random NPC encounter, though if someone wants to go the icky route, it's certainly fitting.  The rest sound great, too!

Also, I'm using Mnemosytes as a baseline standard.  They're the analog to Red Men or humans.

[note=Wishlist]
Here are some other structures I would like to work into the game eventually, but they aren't necessary just yet.

Psychic Temple
Spy Center
Cryptography Center
Advanced Production Structures
Watch Towers
[/note]
⚶ The Orphans of Civilization are Complete ⚶ (http://www.thecbg.org/index.php/topic,209839.msg222067.html#msg222067)

I realize that the pricing is still a bit whacky and I need some help reeling it in.  I'm trying to get it balanced against itself before scaling it for sake of easy.  Eventually, I'd like 1 population to produce $1, so we can remove a step in sorting out resource production, but that's just a matter of multiplying all prices by a factor.  So any input on relative pricing would be greatly appreciated.

Also, I feel like construction times are potentially annoyingly long, and decreasing those times is inordinately expensive.  I sort of pulled numbers out of the air just to get some numbers for now, but I would like to fix those, as well.  I'm currently leaning toward reducing the price per $1/turn of making new things.  Any thoughts?

The cost of some of the structures seems pretty steep, especially the water-production ones. I'm not an expert on mechanics, but what about the possibility of having inclement weather interfering with Mist Farms (so they produce less in a sandstorm, if any at all) or limiting Permafrost Mines to certain types of terrain (so you can't build them in hot deserts or jungles)? It seems like the advantage of wells would be that they're reliable as much as being cheaper. Or am I totally mistaken in assuming these are "default" structures?

The construction rules seem a little arcane as well.

How do you see the special rules working for player-created factions? Will we be able to copy the ones from the default factions, possibly with some tweaking like trading in starting structures for increased starting cash? I really like the write-up you've given for the Mnemosytes: the unit descriptions especially have helped to clarify what would otherwise just be stat blocks (albeit very interesting stat blocks). Giving me tons of idea for my own faction's possible units.

Now in terms of fluff, how many other races do you envision wandering Mnemosyne, possibly living in their own isolated enclaves? Maybe the ancient myths of once-fertile Mnemosyne have traveled farther than news of its current decay and still attract would-be colonists and refugees like a siren song, only to leave them stranded on the dying world?

The water-production costs were based on taking 3 turns at full population to pay off times an efficiency modifier.  That is probably unrealistic, so that's I'm guessing that's why they look so expensive.  I'm not against reducing prices, but I want to get everything balanced against each other.  Yes, wells are cheap, but they take a lot of food to maintain, per water production (which is required to make food).  The more expensive water production structures have substantially better water to food ratios.  I see water as the single most limiting factor on income in the game.  And yes, these are default structures, although I can see some factions (e.g., sarkth) having limited structure lists because of their fluff.  I'll need help making them more viable, probably.

I like the idea of weather interfering with things.  I was considering having seasons (assuming the game lasted that long), so that come winter, farms stopped producing food, but vats chug along year-round.  That is still in the "This could be a cool idea" phase, however.

I intended for not every hex to have equal resources.  That was the point of the Prospecting Crew (or their analog, depending on the faction).  A prospecting crew determines if there is water, and what it takes to get to it.  Perhaps there's no permafrost in one place or an underground river in another.  Discovering new water supplies would mean more income and more places to squabble over.  That previously worthless tract of wasteland might suddenly become invaluable.

Perhaps I've done a poor job of explaining how construction works.  A given unit/structure is rated for producing $X per turn of structures/elements.  So, as it stands frex, a $1,00,000 Training Ground can produce $35,000 of elements per turn.  Each turn it is pumping out troops, you have to pay for them (at full capacity, $35,000 per turn).  If an element costs more than this amount, it takes more turns to produce (a $70,000 element would take two turns to produce; you'd pay $35,000 each turn for two turns).  Each settlement is rated for production capacity, not the number of "Training Grounds" or "Weapon Factories" etc. it has.  A settlement may be able to produce $100,000 per turn of flyers, frex; how many individual facilities that means it has doesn't really matter.  Similarly, you can divide up how that $100,000 per turn gets built - 1 massive elements, ten smaller elements, ten large elements over a longer period of time, etc.  Construction crews work the same way, except their mobile and have to travel to wherever you're building a structure; that's why they're quantized.

Frankly, special rules are very flavor-based.  I don't have a standardized way of doing those, and I"m kind of winging their balancing.  I'll need feedback on those bigtime.  Frex, atm, sarkth require less fodo and water, so they'll produce more population and money, but they have fewer unit and structure options (and none that are particularly high-tech).  I'm hoping this results in massive hordes of underpowered troops - Orks to the Mnemosytes' Eldar.

I'm glad the writeups helped.  I knew those needed to be done bigtime.  The statblocks alone don't mean much.  I think you'll find the Phthan and Luria elements even more illucidating, since that's where we'll see rules being used for mechanical purposes and flavored into what we actually want - for example if we made a Carnifex, it would be around TS 400, Armor Class, WT 4, and have Mechanized mobility class; it'd add Artillery class if it had the bioplasma option and Fire class if it had any other ranged weapons.

I like the idea of Mnemosyne having lots of undiscovered or forgotten races, although mnemosytes, sarkth, and luria are the main ones.  I think one or two extraterrestrial factions is enough, though.  Too many, and it becomes a constant cliche and loses its mystique and appeal.

Okay, that all makes sense! Now that you've clarified them a bit, the recruitment rules seem pretty compelling: smaller, cheaper recruitment structures would be quicker to produce than more elaborate ones, but they'd be much more limited in how much they can produce. I do not envy the amount of balancing you might have to do and hope some members more competent than me could lend you a hand with that.

I asked about the alien races mostly because I envision the Bastards as a very diverse, not all anthropomorphic bunch, largely inspired by a few scifi artists I'm big fans of:

http://fc02.deviantart.net/fs49/f/2009/233/6/2/Filthy_prawn____by_povorot.jpg
http://media.comicvine.com/uploads/3/31566/2382567-pinwheel_hunters_1.jpg
http://fc09.deviantart.net/fs70/i/2012/115/e/f/the_matriarch_and_the_administrator_by_povorot-d4xjg2q.jpg

Of course, it's likely that they could be "living fossils" or somesuch.

Still curious to hear about any other players interested so far! It can't just be me...

There will definitely be nonhumanoid races.  Fro that matter, the luria are decidedly not humanoid.  They more closely resemble an insectile dinosaur with a flukeworm mouth and opposing digits.

I'm cool with the Bastards being somewhat random and diverse in their composition.  It won't have much affect on statistics except in that you may end up with an inordinate number of different element types (or variants on elements).  As a wandering mercenary group, I could see them picking up many of the forgotten or lost peoples of Mnemosyne, which could make them quite the wonder to behold.

[note=Wishlist]
Somethings I see fitting the Sarkth:

Using the loot rules to recover enemy elements rather than just getting cash - e.g., using looted "cash" to by enemy vehicle or artillery elements that were in the battle[/note]
⚴ The Savages of the Chaos Wastes are Complete⚴ (http://www.thecbg.org/index.php/topic,209839.msg222120.html#msg222120)

They should be (eventually if not already) calibrated to produce lots and lots of elements cheaply, all of which are individually less effective than those of the Mnemosytes.  In other words, Orks-meet-Tharks.

Element and structure lists seem sparse atm.  I like the idea of recovering and using enemy elements, though.  I also like the idea of them being relatively uninventive compared to the Mnemosytes (Who are suppose to be the techie guys).

This is developing in some very interesting ways!  I see that you have divided your races up a bit more dramatically.  Great soundtracks!

Thanks man!  I'm starting to think that each player will receive their own map of the local area and may (or may not) know generally where the other players are (e.g., Player X is about 3 turns by flyer south-southeast of Player Y).  I don't see each "race" living on top of the others, and it'd be really great if some come as a surprise to others.  I tend to think that the only two that really share any history are the mnemosytes and sarkth, one being the "degraded" and savage lineage of the other, sort of.

✸ The Otherworlders are Complete✸ (http://www.thecbg.org/index.php/topic,209839.msg222122.html#msg222122)

I think I'd like to add more structures at some point.  Maaaybe some more units, but their limited list speaks to their parthenogenic production - they are all natural clones of each other.  Otherwise, I think this makes for a slow-advancing, quick-striking faction with very powerful units.  The high cost should keep their numbers down, though.

Updates: 
The information from the threads is getting uploaded to the wiki HERE! (http://www.thecbg.org/wiki/index.php?title=Mnemosyne)

Also...

• Revised the pricing for units
  
• Separated actual speed from Mibility type and then dropped mobility type in order to gain more differentiation
• between factions.
  
• Am reevaluating some of the skill ratings for Commands - Admin rolls every turn for logistics may be detail than is fun
  
• Am still pondering the economy and need for three separate resources; any input here would be appreciated.
  

My largest concern with the prices/formulas is that the numbers aren't round or "simple" numbers to add/subtract. I saw a few 40% and odd numbers here and there. I would need a calculator or an excel program to play- I couldn't do the math in my head or in shorthand.

Could the numbers be more representational? Probably not... but if so it would help me at least.

That being said, don't change things *just* for me; I don't think I will have enough time to join, but I have read your writeups and I wanted to help if possible :)

Thanks for the input for sure!  Right now, I've just settled on rounding to two significant figures, but I see what you are saying.  Most of the pricing is based on 20% or 50% increments.  Rounding those numbers to the nearest 1e Whatever or 5eWhatever wouldn't hurt for the math any.  Right now, I've been primarily concerned with homing in on a balanced pricing scheme.  Since rounding can affect that initial tweaking, I haven't really tried to make anything pretty.  Your comment is certain valid and noted for future reference, though!

April 4 Update

The Mnemosyne wiki (http://www.thecbg.org/wiki/index.php?title=Category:Mnemosyne) is up and running! It has all of the rules, and all future rule revisions, updates and additions will be put there rather than the forum thread.

In other news, I have reached the following decisions:

• Ability Ratings (formerly called skills or skill ratings) will remain as they are:  Strategy, Leadership, Logistics (formerly Administration), and Intelligence.  This will give players more room to differentiate their commands.
  
• I am keeping the food-water-$ tripod for the economy and will eventually shift prices such that Population 1 yields $1 per turn.  That should greatly simplify matters.  I will also make an attempt to round all prices to the nearest factor of 5, 50, 500, etc. based on two significant figures.  Again, this will make math easier and faster.
  
• Production Structures will be simplified so that each produces elements of a given mobility type (Land, Air, or Water).  Another structure will be required to research various Special Classes.  Until a special class is researched, elements with that special class cannot be recruited.
  
• Psychic Powers will exist.  Mechanically, combat powers are subsumed into an element's TS and utility powers are usable on some sort of a weekly basis (probably unlimited unless otherwise noted).
  

Pending Decisions:

• Fog of War:  Should players get a clear view of the entire map at all times or only "see" a certain radius around their positions?
  
• Should Psychic Powers follow some sort of "tech tree," have to be researched individually but without prereqs, or be all available at once?
  
• How to price Special Class research?  How to set research times?
  
• Should production structures differ in cost from each other?
  

Is there a Mobility option on that spreadsheet? Because if so, I'm not seeing it.

QuoteFog of War:  Should players get a clear view of the entire map at all times or only "see" a certain radius around their positions?

Definitely have limited sight. Information asymmetry is such a huge component of military strategy.

Superbright:  I didn't include mobility options because you have to have "mobility" to have that type of speed.  The middle column has variables pertaining to getting around.  The first three (pave road speed, dirt road speed, and off-road speed) all pertain to Land Mobility.  Water Speed and Air Speed are self-explanatory, and Strike Range is how far out from its position a unit can support others - this would be the parenthetical speed.  Weather and Terrain Effects determine if the element is impeded at all by inclement weather or difficult terrain.  Together, those should be able to represent any type of mobility.  I should also mention that it's already set up to accept multiple mobility types, as well (Land and Sea; Land and Air; Sea and Air; or Land, Sea and Air).

Raelifin:  That's sort of my feeling, but I wanted some feedback first.  In UD everyone can see everyone else's movements, unless they have infiltrating units.  No one has balked at that, so I figured it was worth bringing up.  And thanks for responding!  I know you've got a ton on your plate right now with City of the Chosen beginning tomorrow.

{EDIT}Also, Superbright, if you want to get prices for Support TS, you can enter TS numbers in parentheses as well as normally.  It's just a formatting trick in Excel, though; it's just a negatve number, so feel free to use minus signs, too.  The sheet will yell at you when you enter the wrong kind of data.

I'd be in favor of making permanent settlements visible, possibly if they exceed a certain population size: it'd be easier to hide a bunch of smaller, spread-out villages but they'd be less efficient than one densely-populated metropolis.

I'm not sure I want brand new settlements to be isntantly visible.  It might work better if settlement location knowledge spread through rumors and such.  I'm just imaging someone trying to start a new settlement and it getting bombed out immediately because it's instantly visible.

I saw this picture and I thought of Mnemosyne. The amount of water might be too much, but I thought I'd share. ^_^
(http://i.imgur.com/wrSDxPO.jpg)

Man that's awesome!  That actually fits the luria (http://www.thecbg.org/wiki/index.php?title=Luria) perfectly.  They live in the drying corpses of the ancient oceans.  Thanks man!

Update:  Working on luria elements.  The Luria (http://www.thecbg.org/wiki/index.php?title=Luria) will be a mix of the Bugs from STarship Troopers, Tyranids, squishy aspects of HL xen creatures, and the Zerg - all with less insectile flare.  Other inspirational sources would be appreciated!

Also, I think the best way to handle information about new settlements being founded is to simply spread rumors of their existence through weekly updates rather than giving exact coordinates.  That'll alert people to factions spreading without providing the necessary info for instanuke them without a bit of recon.  I figure such rumors will give a general location for new settlements without specific coordinates on a map.  How do you think that'll pan out?

I'll probably play Luria if I decide that I have enough time to play.
You misspelled "tail" twice in the opening.

Thanks for catching that! Also, glad to hear there's a thought of playing!  I'd love to have you in the game, should it work out that way.  As a potential maybe possibly luria player, I'd love to get your thoughts as they develop.  They have the most exotic mechanics right now (i'm intending to implement Creep for them), and I'm sure I'll overlook something or make a weird ruling somewhere.

Update:  Luria Elements (http://www.thecbg.org/wiki/index.php?title=Luria#.E2.9A.98_Elements_.E2.9A.98) are complete and entered!

Things to do:

• Work on buildings for everyone.  Preferences would be appreciated!
  
• Work out psychic powers.  These will be utility powers and predominately revolve around scrying and secure communications, I suspect.  Suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
  
• Make Maps!  I'm really happy I'm approaching this point at last!
  
• Gather players and get started!
  

How long do you plan on turns being? That will be a major factor if I can join - this looks cool, but really complex mechanically, and it'll be hard enough with 2 pBp games.

Luria are definitely my favorites so far.  I like their "creep" mechanic especially (I like that you come out and just use the word creep), and the idea of plasma-vomiting vegetable horrors is pretty sweet.

As for structures, it might help to know what kind of functions you want structures to serve.  Housing, food, and recruitment are obvious.  What else do structures do?  Do they play a big role in defence?  Upgrades?  Other mechanics?

Structures will provide upgrades, allow players to design their own units (for the more industrious/control-freakish among us), and boost Defense Bonus to a degree (basically a settlement automatically provides DB +3, and you'll be able to boost that as high as +10 through upgrades), and I'm toying with buildings that are basically immobile, non-transportable elements that contribute to TS during sieges or might be used offensively (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4XJmoD2qFI) by more creative players.

As for blatantly stealing creep and calling it that, yeah.  I was lost for a better word and probably don't have to explain it as much like this.  Also, I'm toying with more decentralized construction capacity utilizing the creep, although I'm wondering just how to price it.  I'll probably low-ball it by accident, but that's what patches are for.  As of now, I'm considering doing it as a decentralized recruitment mechanic where the player just buys Construction Capacity (in gooier terms), and that can be applied anywhere creep exists and is connected to that Construction Capacity.  Frankly, that's where it trips me up.  I want to make sure that if a patch of creep gets cut off from the bulk of creep, neither creep can influence the other.  It needs to be a disadvantage as much as an advantage.

Are you considering joining the game at all?  Have you any ideas or suggestions for other factions?

While I wish I could join, Underdeep already occupies a lot of my time (probably too much...  :-/).

I like the existing factions - they all feel like they fill a good niche, each very distinctive and unique.  An insectoid race might be fun, but there might be too much overlap with the Luria...

Many Sword and Planet works feature transplanted Humans (John Carter, Esau Cairn, Jonathan Dark, Elwin Ransom, John Crichton, etc).  This might not fit your vision, but what about a faction of humans who've crash-landed on Mnemosyne and now have to adapt to a harsh new world?  Maybe they got sucked through a worm-hole, were testing a new variety of engine that went horribly wrong, got transported by a capricious space-wizard/energy-being, or whatever.  They could be organized around their downed space-craft which they're salvaging for materials (or maybe they're trying to repair it and go home).

I specifically avoided an insectoidal luria because they are already so heavily-inspired by tyranids.  As you said, I'd have to really contemplate how to differentiate a bug race from the other factions - sarkth do the swarm thing and the luria are living weapons.  I'll have to give it some thought, because we really are missing our space bugs.

Transplanted humans might be interesting, though I'm not sure how well they'd work as an actual faction.  I could see a group being run how Sparkle has her coven in UD, though.  Alternatively, what if a human colony ship crashlanded and they're attempting to make the world habitable for themselves?  I had behind-the-curtain explained Mnemosyne's green-hued skies as resulting from florine in the atmosphere, which would make it incredibly toxic to humans.  Removing that florine could make it toxic to all Mnemosynians, but they'd have to know the humans were there and what they were doing....

A shame we can't get you in here.  There'll always be a spot, though.  Just say the word.

This is more just a thematic thing, but some of the language you use to describe the Luria sounds a lot more evocative of insects than plants. Maybe instead of calling it the Hive Mind, what about, say, the Root-Mind? Or, since what little I've heard about plant/fungal intelligence seems to indicate that they think collectively, something like "The Consensus"?

You do have a good point.  "Hivemind" is very insect-ish.  I'll meditate on that for a bit; it's hard to dream up a word that encapsulates a concept so well as that.

Quote from: Superbright's PM
....

I've actually been playing around with your Excel sheet and trying to come up with core Bastard units. I want to emphasize that by and large, they're vicious, heavily-armed fighters: do you think making the basic F/Rec infantry unit TS 50 would work out? Also, of the units you've posted already (all magnificent, by the way), how many take a penalty for moving in poor weather? And is there a way to distinguish between artillery elements that can fire across multiple hexes and those that can't, or can they all? I was actually thinking that extended range might be a possible Special Feature for Artillery, (Air), and Fire elements, assuming you wanted to make a distinction.

And as a final question: do certain types of special class superiority trump others?

I categorically apply poor weather penalties to surface ships (not submarines or marine animals) and the mnemosyte capital ships.  Flyers and most flying animals cannot operate in bad weather, nor can small surface ships (boats, large boats, barges, or lighters).  These are things I should have mentioned in their descriptions.  Thank you for bringing it up.  Also, it is a feature of cavalry that their TS is halved in bad terrain.  I haven't applied that to anyone else, though.  Also, Phthan units generally ignore all of those rules, though I need to doublecheck I priced them accordingly.  99% sure I did.

Artillery ranges are ad hoc, as I found my attempts to price such a thing really didn't impact the price enough to warrant worrying about it (impact was less than two sigfigs.).  As a rule of thumb, light artillery can fire at targets up to one hex away and heavy artillery can hit two hexes away.  Really crazy heavy artillery can hit up to three hexes away.  Also a note on artillery:  if you're not talking about ballistic artillery, you're probably not talking about Artillery, but Fire; the lurian units that have Art are either extremely big and tall (negates horizon issues) with long-range weapons or lob exploding spores.  Phthan are a similar case, but generally lack a lot of Art units.  Of course, you can use Art to represent a unit that is very good at sieges, too.

Your suggestion to make special features for Art, F, and (Air) are intriguing, though I think if I did it, it'd make it akin to Transport - Art 0 through Art 3, with each being progressively pricier.  It is an idea, though with the speeds we are talking about, hitting 3 hexes away isn't terribly advantageous.  I may end up scrapping the "X hexes away" thing and make it a matter of how far away they can apply their TS to a battle (which is really more my intent).  And thinking on that, it sounds much more like adding support range.  I'll have this sorted out by the next update.

And lastly, no one Special Class trumps any other.  They are all equal in effectiveness, although they are priced based on how often they can apply in battles and how often I'd like to see them flavor-wise.

Update!  Nothing is changing.  Anything that appears a little funky or needs any adjudication, we'll just apply common sense.

Also, I have begun work on psychic powers.  I am thinking that

Psychic Powers

• Psychic Static – inhibits psi usage within a given radius
  
• Psychic Ward – protects against psi attacks
  
• True Sight – see through psychic obfuscation
  
• Psychic Seeker – Find a specific person or object
  
• Clairvoyance
  
• Psi Sense – detect when psi powers are used in your vicinity
  
• Psychometry – learn the history of what happened in a location
  
• Weather Sight – learn what the weather holds in the future
  
• Convalescing Aura – Recover TS after a battle.
  
• Serendipity – Gain a bonus to one roll this week.
  
• Telepathy – Communicate directly with one target this week.
  
• Psychic Cloak – Make a force invisible to normal senses.
  
• Illusion – Alter the appearance of your force to others.
  

Combat Powers

• Fear – Potentially force a Leadership roll or enemy force retreats.
  
• Confusion – Force a Leadership roll or enemy force is confused as if ambushed.
  
• Distraction – Penalty on enemy Strategy Roll
  
• Dominate – Treat one element as though it was disloyal and has rebelled.