Just wanted to say howdy to everyone.

Welcome to my next game-log! (Glog?) This one will focus on my entry into Harlequin's offering of Legends: Crown of Chaos 26

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http://www.harlequingames.com/legcoc26.html
Note, at this time the game hasn't started. If you are interested in playing, contact Harlequin Games so they can give you the details.
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Where to begin? My first impression upon signing up and being shown all the rules and setup information is that Legends is OLD. It has been around for a loooong time. It was upgraded to Legends II a loooong time ago, and I venture to say that this current offering from Harlequin Games should be considered Legends III. This is old-school PBM gaming at its finest, with extensive technical updates for the modern era.

The rules themselves are over 300 pages long. And each game is served up in the form of a "module" which refines and adapts the basic rules to fit a certain storyline. In this case, the module is Crown of Chaos, and this looks to be game #26 -- of that module. Considering that a game of Legends can take 2 years or more to finish, that is a considerable feat of PBM staying power. Indeed, some of my teammates had expressed surprise that there is much activity in the PBM world outside Legends. This game has served a fairly large core base of players so well, and for so long, that they have formed a virtual island in our genre.

The module content serves up over 200 pages of additional rules and context. This is a lot to take in for a new player! But fear not -- there is a well-worn path for newbies to take in getting up to speed. Like some other PBM games, Legends lets you bite off just the size and type of position you want to take on. Newbies are encouraged to start the game as a small party of heroic characters, who can take on adventures and actions that advance the story line, win loads of loot, and lay the groundwork for possible power plays later in the game.

More advanced players (or masochists like myself) can opt for larger starts. You get a population base, like a village or nomadic tribe which can form a socio-economic production base and a small army. In the case of this particular module, I am starting with a town, but more on that later. You also get a cast of individual characters -- 8 in my case -- who are the personalities running your little empire. They are far less powerful that the epic Conan-types that the newbies start with, but hey, you've got an army.

This highlights one of the defining characteristics of the game -- the co-existence and complement of individual characters and large groups of population. There are 5000 characters in the game -- most of them are non-player characters. Your own characters can go on to influence them, bribe them, kidnap them, kill them, resurrect them, etc. This interplay between characters looks like a huge part of the game.

But to conquer territory and defend against the barbarians at the gates (some of whom are other players!), you will need soldiers, mounts, weaponry, ships, fortifications, training, gold, and anything else you can imagine. That's the other "huge part of the game". And as a new player, you get to choose what type of role you're most interested in. Crown of Chaos has roles for individuals (in the form of loyal groups of citizens, free agents, minions of chaos, etc), larger holdings (like barons, which start with a town, or nomadic tribes), and the highest power positions (like dukes, which lead a team of barons and citizens, and the mysterious Chaos Lords who join forces with no one.)

From there, players can interact, team up, or clash on the basis of factions, religion, race/species, mutual interest, and perhaps inevitably the end-game backstabbing. Victories can be won by individuals, teams, etc, and can also come in the form of special titles or achievements. So even if you don't want to become the Imperial Overlord, there are many pathways to victory within the storyline, and you can focus on whatever aspect interests you most.

And that storyline? It is deep. More on that later. I have to cut this post off for now, but will return with some details on my "onboarding" process and how I came to join a team...

Takamo Universe, the successor to the PBM Takamo, launched a Kickstarter project today. The cloud funding project will last from October 15, 2013, to November 16, 2013. In early 2011, a team was formed to redevelop Takamo as a massive multiplayer online game titled Takamo Universe. It is a massive 3D, persistent and continually expanding universe with thousands of player and AI empires operating in real time. Qualified backers will gain entry to the Beta, estimated to start December, 2014, as well as exclusive game content. Beta participants will then roll their empires into the commercial release. Check us out at www.takamouniverse.com and click on the Kickstarter link on the right side bar. Tell every gamer you know about us and support the project!

www.takamouniverse.com

War in Middle Earth has raged throughout the Ages, and we have a module for each age with games reglarly starting up.

Find out more here! http://middleearthgames.com/

Actual Games waiting to start are listed below.

The following new games are filling up.
1650 GB 2 wk (Game 99) 5 nations available (2nation game)
1650 2 wk (Game 2) 1 nations available
1650 1 wk (Game4) 21 nations available
2950 2 wk (Game229) 22 nations available
1000 2 wk (Game145) 20 nations available
Kinstrife 621 8 nations available


Grudge Games we need opposition for:
Untold War
4th age

I have the following drop-outs available - don't forget you get MULTIPLE free turns for GB and a single one for normal game for taking these up:

GB 2 pairs
2950 None
1650 None
1000 None
Kinstrife None

I have uploaded Dani Zweig's report on IR6 to the website

http://www.harlequingames.com/reports/reportir6.html

Its a good read!

You do not have to be a victor to submit a game report for inclusion, so if you can remember enough of a game you were in, write a report and send it to me for inclusion.

Harlequin

To call the roll is to entertain the possibility of silence. Unlike with water, where silence is concerned, one can drown an infinite number of times.

Gjallarhorn sounds! The roll call of the ancients has begun. The Old Guard of PBM, names that populate our minds and our memories stretching back across the last few decades, stirs in our midst once more. Can this be the dawning of a new age in turn based gaming? Or has the Ragnarok of play by mail gaming now begun?

Of late, great champions of turn-based gaming have entered our gates here on the PlayByMail.Net forum. Like boom tubes opening, our e-mail inbox has sounded the arrival of others who have taken notice - and interest - in the launching of a new magazine that orbits around the twin stars of play by mail and turn-based gaming.

The last several weeks have been a blessing. The actual submissions, of either articles or advertisements, has only been a slow trickle, to date. But, with each new commitment to submitting something, the chances of the new magazine being still born are diminishing. I feel good about its prospects for getting off to a good start, in fact.

Of course, if submissions do not actually materialize, then ultimately, we may fall yet fall short. But, if not, then maybe we are all laying the groundwork, together, for something special, for something actually worthwhile.

But, to be certain, we walk in the footprints of giants! Other magazines have tread the same ground that we intend to plow. I do not know that we can improve upon their respective contributions to the legacy that is play by mail gaming. But, perhaps we can bring our own contributions to the table.

Whether we feast upon sweetness of success, or whether we dine on the disaster of failure, let none say that we dared not chart a course, at all.

For far too long, the cupboard has been bare of PBM magazines. No less an authority on the genre of postal gaming than Steve Tierny, himself, whose name has long been synonymous with Madhouse, has recently asserted within these very electronic halls, "We don't call what we do "PBM" anymore though. The only snail mail players we have are in prison. We call it Turn-Based Gaming."

More so than a mere coincidental occurrence taking place, I firmly believe that forces within the PBM community are converging. The moment draws near. Something is happening.

Can you feel it? Are you ready for it?

There is no grand parade - but, there is a gathering. Whether you see it or not. Whether you sense it or not. Whether some of you are even aware of it or not.

Interest increases. Support grows. It all boils down to whether individuals will follow through.

It is more than just a little encouraging to hear back from Rick McDowell (of Alamaze fame) and Lee Kline (of Reality Simulations fame) in the last couple of days. I know that they're both busy persons - but that's what makes the fact that they did take time out to respond such a good sign.

Mica Goldstone is ahead of the pack, having already submitted something. Will there be more from Mica? I don't know. Time will tell.

It's especially good to have Mark Wardell back wandering in our midst. He's an old school PBM gamer, for sure, and his interest in contributing to the success of the magazine is both reassuring and exciting for me, personally.

The point of this article is not to name every name, but rather, to touch upon a few individuals who many old school PBM gamers can relate to, as you think back upon your years in the hobby of turn-based gaming, postal-style.

Lest my own relative silence, of late, be mistaken for nothing happening, let me dispel any semblance of a rumor that nothing is progressing forward on the magazine front.

Not that I have heard such a rumor, which I really haven't. Rather, let me head off any possible chance of any rumor to that effect from getting the jump on us.

It's going forward, people. Things are progressing. None of us are promised tomorrow, but if the good LORD is willing, this project is going to reach fruition.

And that, to me, is a good thing. Good for PBM gaming. Good for turn-based gamers. Good for the hobby. Good for the industry.

It might be easier to keep track of name suggestions for the new magazine, by creating a thread dedicated to that purpose.

So, here are some possibilities to pour over and ponder, for those who are interested.

Turn-Based Gaming Monthly
Imperial Informer
PBM Star
PBM Globe-Dispatch
Gaming for the Heavily Caffeinated
Dead Genre Gaming
Tribal Starfleet Trade Report
PBM Universal II
PBM Frigate
Special Action
Thinking Man Game Post
PBM Panic
Grimfinger's Grimmoire
Grim Post
Obscure Games Quarterly (riff off a scene in 'Dodgeball')
Phoenix
Gamicron Delta
PostGame Dispatch
Screaming Toward Extinction
Game Funk Railroad
Valley of the Ancients
Ready to Explode
PlayByMail.Net Dispatch
The SOMETHING of TBG
Distance Gaming
Turn-based Distance Gaming



BEEYOND
Swarm of the Ancients
Godspacular
Swarming With Interest
Swarmtacular
PBM Titans
Titans of Twilight
Postal Titans
Titanic Swarm
New Guard
Hive
Ancients Scorned
Hordes
Cosmic Swarm
Stasis Vault
Pandemonium
Fundemonium
Stasis Zone
Rising Swarm
The Swarm Cometh
Minions of Mayhem
Postal Fury
Creative Violence
Postal Vengeance
Vengeful Voices
Twilight Swarm
The Swarm Cometh!
Destiny Revisited
Cosmic Spawn
PBM
TBT
Turn Based Titans
Legacy Unfolding
Postal Treasures
Turn-Based Fury
Extinction Level Event
Catastrophic Fun
Extinction Defiance
Armchair Armageddon
Geddon McFun
Beyond The Brink
Toxic Pleasures
Lotta Nerve
Nerve Center
Masters of Destiny
Destiny Ho!
Conquering Spirit
Conquerors of Extinction
American Bismarck
Worthy Souls
Game Train
Bridging The Future
Star Music
Railroad of the Gods
Chosen Friction
You Are Here!
Moon Legion
Time Heist
Groundbreakers
Funderdome
Children of Annihilation
Will Destiny
God's Will
Comes The Lightning
Command Presence
Final Stand
Light From Darkness
Forgotten Bastards
Defy
Feed the Beast
Leviathan Summoned
Population: One
Experience the Xperience!
Follow
The Following
Primeval Struggle
War Footing
For Glory!
Genre Burst
Game Burst
Heightened Experience
Glob
Landslide
Draconian Pleasures
Doohickey
Exploding Mailboxes
Rabid
Gargantuan Challenge
Gathering Irony
Ironic Turns
Turn-Based Exploits
Religious Deadline
Priesthood of the Turn Based
Planet Turnbased

I often write about irony in many different contexts, and when dealing with many different things. I firmly believe that irony is, indeed, one of the greatest blessings from on high.

Today is no exception.

Apparently, site user Smurphboogie and I are in a race, of some sorts, to populate the PBM Wiki with tidbits of PBM-related information. I'm not sure who's winning, but when I look at the Recent Changes page on the PBM Wiki, the wiki keeps awarding him all kinds of points of some sort for his wiki entries. Hundreds and hundreds of points! Clearly, I am going to have to up the ante - but, where to find the time?

On a more serious note, I would like to take this opportunity to extend my personal thanks to Smurphboogie for becoming such a wiki worker bee, growing the wiki for the benefit of others, one entry and one edit at a time.

What does any of this have to do with irony?

Well, after checking to see how the PBM Wiki is progressing, while still in a state of informational infancy, for some reason that remains a mystery even to myself, I got to checking the front page of the PlayByMail.Net website for a link to a Hyborian War related site that I put online a number of years back, one called The Hyborian Tome.

Apparently, there was no link in the PBM Hivemind section of the front page for my own PBM-related website. Go figure! If that's not irony, then I don't know what is.

I titled this editorial, "The Great PBM Race to Nowhere." Why? Well, because that's what it feels like, this tit-for-tat posting to the PBM Wiki thing that is going on between Smurphboogie and myself. Now, for all that I know, he may not even be aware that there is a race going on, much less that he's in it, or that he may very well be in the lead. Fancy that for a double dose of irony, on this day!

Somewhere in all of this, there's likely a point that I want to make and underscore. That point is that I have posted more to the PBM Wiki, of late, as a direct response to Smurphboogie's own postings there. What it boils down to is that his postings have sparked a bit of a competition, competitive spirit, if you will.

In issue # 100 of Flagship magazine, in an article titled, "A Founder's Memories," founding editor Nick Palmer wrote, "The snag was that this success rapidly generated competition. I have always believed that PBM has never been large enough to support more than one major magazine for long, so I saw every rival as a deadly threat."

Nick Palmer went on in that same article to say, "On the other hand, I have to say that I was consistently fairly nasty to our competitors, because I felt that it was basically them or us. Every little mistake or delay in rival magazines' issues was faithfully reported in Flagship, in the polite manner of The Times reporting that a small newspaper in the Orkneys seemed to be struggling - we did hope they'd get better soon. 'You use classy wording to make yourself look good, but you are running us down at every opportunity,' wrote one angry rival privately. I'm afraid that's exactly what I was doing. 50% of magazines fold in their first year, and if you don't fight your corner in a competitive market you eventually go down."

All well and dandy, but the PBM market has long since ceased to have even a single magazine of note covering the market in question. Far worse than that, though, is the seeming absence of competitive spirit on the part of what were once proud contenders for every PBM gamer that they could get their hands on. I find myself wondering whether PBM"s Old Guard has lost its fighting spirit, which was a competitive edge that transcended the bounds of the postal genre, itself.

When PBM's proverbial big guns went quiet, is anybody's guess. What happened to the long procession and glorious parade of new PBM games that was part and parcel of the PBM industry for so very long?

That competition is effectively gone. The PBM industry has grown complacent. Sure, some of the commercial PBM companies are still around. Rather than bulls raging with competitive spirit, though, they've allowed themselves to become cows content with grazing in the pastures of what's left.

In Tolkien's writings, we learn of something called the Flame Imperishable, the Secret Fire. It was Eru, aka Ilúvatar, that possessed the Flame Imperishable, that possessed this creative essence. The irony, as I see it, is that, where the PBM industry, itself, is concerned, is that the fire of competition was not possessed by one, alone - but was free for one and all to possess.

The Internet, like the Borg, appeared on the horizon, one day, and quickly began to assimilate everything in sight. If you can't beat them, join them, became the apparent battle cry in PBM circles.

Such a pity.

Smurphboogie and I are in the Great PBM Race to Nowhere. Why nowhere? Well, because there's no real finish line to be found. It is a work unending, this PBM Wiki. The PBM industry could be a work unending, also. It doesn't have to have an end.

The competitive spirit that once upon a time ago distinguished the adherents to the PBM cause doesn't have to die, either.

Nick Palmer closed his article in issue # 100 of Flagship with these words, "I look forward to issue 200."

Unfortunately for both Nick Palmer and his beloved Flagship, that PBM magazine that he, himself, had launched all those many years before, Flagship struck an obstacle at issue # 131. The good captain, Carol Mulholland, fell ill with health issues, and the ship's passengers and crew have apparently abandoned ship.

Nick Palmer spoke of the "amazing creativity" of the PBM hobby. Where is that very same amazing creativity, now?

Issue # 100 of Flagship was the December 2002/January 2003 issue of that publication. Thus, a full decade ago, Flagship's founding editor described the PBM scene, as he saw it at that point in time.

"The US market has basically disappeared, with a few exceptions, but the UK scene continues, with PBM merging steadily into PBEM and Flagship recognised as the stable centre of the 'fleet', just as we'd hoped back in issue 1."

I am heartened by a couple of e-mails from Flying Buffalo's Rick Loomis that were awaiting me in my in-box, this morning. My apologies to Rick Loomis for the verbosity of my response to his e-mail from last night, but in order to publish a new PBM magazine from scratch, I think that my propensity for verbosity may well ultimately prove to be an asset, rather than a liability, where this undertaking is concerned.

The temptation is great, of course, to reserve my verbosity for the first issue of the new PBM magazine, but that would be akin to cutting off my nose to spite my face.

The fate of Paper Mayhem, Flagship, and other PBM magazines from the past are all a matter of factual record, by now. It's time for someone else to hoist the PBM Colors, once more! It's time to advance the cause, anew!

With allies on both sides of the Atlantic, we chart a new course straight ahead into the future!

All aboard!!

I will be editing this post from time to time. As I see things to add or correct.


First I would suggest trying out some Beamers and looking over the standing order system. Beamer rules are at this link;
http://empyreanchallenge.com/ECWxManual/?page_id=1989
These were changed recently so it is worth a look.

Using Beamers combined with the Standing Orders tool in Central Command will make it possible to automate your raw materiel transportation when you are ready too.

Special Notes on Standing Orders.

It should be kept in mind that CenCom will store your standing orders from turn to turn and when you send your orders it will append the standing orders to the end of your regular order file. If you don't send a turn the standing orders will not be sent either and they are not stored by the processing program data. You should also note that Standing orders can be set for every turn or odd or even turns. If You combine this with the Beamers and a ship it opens the possibly of out system resource transport automation as well.

Another thing to look at is the Robot Probe Vehicle

In the manual the rules for this item are described at;
http://empyreanchallenge.com/ECWxManual/?page_id=154

You can use them to help gather data especially surveys. Also you can by using the Standing Orders Tool again and high tech RPVs set up an automated surveillance system of your local star systems.

These two things should help to keep your empire manageable as it grows larger. Robot probes do many things that would require sending ships to do. With tech level 9 RPVs you can probe any orbit in any system within 6 light years or with enough RPVs all of them.

Another thing to remember is that RPVs cost less to produce at higher tech levels. So you can set a factory group to build the TL 200.
This will build them at the highest level you have for RPVs. You can load some on all scout ships for doing surveys as they go and some orbit probes of nearby systems. As you increase the tech level for RPV the number built by the factory group will increase and you fit more of them into out going scouts. You would also reach a point when you can use plenty of them for local surveillance.

Diplomacy

As soon as you start exploring you will be finding space ships that are not your own.

You should use the Message order to send notes to the ships or colonies you find. It is most likely a good idea to talk to all you meet. You can if you wish supply direct contact information in your message. Your choice of course. The turn after a message is sent both players can find each other listed in the Diplomacy tool.

The rules for using the Diplomacy tool can be found in the manual at;
http://empyreanchallenge.com/ECWxManual/?page_id=323

I really recommend that you make use of this tool. Players in these sorts of games tend to choose the quiet ones as targets.

Good Gaming,