Throne War Endgames

RPGPundit · September 02, 2009, 02:34:58 AM

Have you ever done a Thronewar where the end result left more than one player alive?
If so, what were the circumstances? Was it that the others had fled, been defeated without being killed, or given up?
Or was it due to an accord being reached by two or more players?

In any of these cases, was the end result satisfying?

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Croaker · September 06, 2009, 04:48:47 PM

Never did see the end of one, sorry

Btw, even if I don't always appreciate some of your comments and attitudes (you know, the swine thing and all

), I just wanted to thank you for your undying commitment to these forums, and will to make them leave through regular topics. I may be wrong in this, but it is my opinion that, without you, these boards would have died long ago, or, at least, be a lot less active.

RPGPundit · September 07, 2009, 02:35:44 AM

Well, thank you.

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downeymb · September 08, 2009, 04:38:09 AM

I ran a "throne war" that resulted in 8 of the 12 major players dying (and the Unicorn). Three of the four remaining were involved in a Mexican Standoff, all unsure of what to do and who to go after. This was further complicated by the fact that it was only set up to look like a throne war by unassuming Llewella, who pursued the REAL objective and was sitting safe and smug in Rebma.

Seemed like a good place to call the game, with everything uncertain, unresolved, and unraveling.

RPGPundit · September 09, 2009, 02:57:12 AM

And what was the real objective?

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darkwolfe · September 09, 2009, 08:36:19 PM

I love Throne Wars. They're great one-shot tournament games.

The last one I played was many, many years ago. I can't say I remember a whole lot of the details mainly because my character was separated from most of the other player characters. But I do remember a few things.

I remember right off the bat, a group of players wanted to create an oligarchy where everyone shared some sort of power. After a short debate on the issue, this group wanted to create a system where a "king" was elected, voted amongst ourselves, who would rule for 5 or 10 years. It was something lame like that. The other players, myself included, thought this was destroying the spirit of the game and minimizing our characters. It seems to me, in every throne war, there is a group of players that try to do something like this. It always pisses me off. At any rate, we, the players against this idea, told them, "Fuck you" and the war was on.

I became the "Brand" of the group. My plan was to go out into a fast-time Shadow, spawn a huge army of brainwashed Amberite children, destroy the Pattern, and recreate it in my own image. I was able to achieve all but the last one. Some other player took advantage of my destroying the Pattern and recreated it in her own image. "The bitch!" I remember thinking to myself.

I was the only one who had an Amberite army. I made all of them walk a broken Pattern so that they would have some semblance of power. I remember almost winning a war in Amber, but something happened and I was forced to retreat. It's been so long, I can't remember anymore. Some other players did something that I wasn't around to hear about so I do not know exactly what they did to stop me. It had to do something with Rebma I believe.

After that, near the end of the game, I decided to start assassinating the other players via Trumps. I got a few, but they started to figure out what I was doing. In the end, I retreated and escaped to the far end of reality that being Chaos. So I lived. Out of a group of 15, I think only 3 or 4 of us survived. One player took the throne and the others decided it wasn't worth their life and disappeared in Shadow.

It was a fun game.

Gothic_Pepsi · October 12, 2009, 02:21:52 PM

I am about to run a Throne War Campaign, having never run one or even played one, is their any advice you guys could give me? i would love to have a smooth and fun Thronewar campaign. I am giving my players 200 points to start with, the only experience gains are to do with obtaining the throne Eg. getting crowned awards points, invading amber gives points (only if it was a success) etc

would also love to hear some more stories

RPGPundit · October 15, 2009, 12:57:11 AM

Quote from: Gothic_Pepsi;337548I am about to run a Throne War Campaign, having never run one or even played one, is their any advice you guys could give me? i would love to have a smooth and fun Thronewar campaign. I am giving my players 200 points to start with, the only experience gains are to do with obtaining the throne Eg. getting crowned awards points, invading amber gives points (only if it was a success) etc

would also love to hear some more stories

I think that one of the main things is to give your players a little more leeway for creative ideas than you would in a regular campaign, and resist the urge to "cheat" to keep players from being fucked up or dying early in the game; if that happens, it happens, and the result of that will be that the others will end up understanding the stakes better.

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boulet · October 15, 2009, 09:51:23 AM

Do you guys think there's a need to expand the rules about retainers and warfare? Do you feel ADRPG has everything you need to decide the outcome of a battle between, say, a superior tactician and average troops against a mediocre general and his awesome army of magic super powered golems? Would this type of campaign benefit tweakings beyond stuff like 200pts character creation?

Ivanhoe · October 15, 2009, 10:49:31 AM

Quote from: boulet;338352Do you guys think there's a need to expand the rules about retainers and warfare? Do you feel ADRPG has everything you need to decide the outcome of a battle between, say, a superior tactician and average troops against a mediocre general and his awesome army of magic super powered golems?

If you perceive a stalemate, just state it so : both lost many men but no clear victory was achieved. Hint to them that they should try to find tricks to get supplemental edge if they want to win.

In case of total stalemate and no clear advantage, you can resort to karma to determine the winner, but this should be a last resort. Warfare alone can not decide the outcome of a battle, it is all the actions around it that will determine it.

RPGPundit · October 20, 2009, 12:28:00 AM

Quote from: boulet;338352Do you guys think there's a need to expand the rules about retainers and warfare? Do you feel ADRPG has everything you need to decide the outcome of a battle between, say, a superior tactician and average troops against a mediocre general and his awesome army of magic super powered golems? Would this type of campaign benefit tweakings beyond stuff like 200pts character creation?

My judgment is that there is no additional rules needed. I think that this is a case of the poorer general "cheating"; by giving himself an edge over the guy with superior warfare. Unless the guy with better warfare does something to make up for his weakness, his better warfare would only be good for telling him that this is not a fight he can win.

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