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Post by kevan on May 14, 2007 11:05:21 GMT -5
I've been considering organizing prepared scenarios for some Thursday night VDP games. Maybe just once a month to mix things up, or more often if players liked it. Aside from a change of pace, I think it might help drive development of the VDP module.
In addition to current VDP players, I would welcome votes from anyone who doesn't play VDP, but would be attracted to do so by scenarios.
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Post by kirkh on May 14, 2007 14:10:53 GMT -5
I would enjoy other missions/planes/rules, however I think we'd need to ensure all players have whatever rules/aircraft data are used - assuming something other than 7th edition is used. Another major consideration is we need to be able to complete the game in a couple hours. It sometimes takes a while to get everybody up and running and with most people only having a few hours to play, we just need to make sure the scenarios aren't so big that we only get in a turn or two before everyone has to leave.
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Post by kevan on May 14, 2007 14:57:12 GMT -5
That's one of the reasons I wanted to get some input here - if people think it's overly-complicated, I won't bother, but I'd like to try it out at least once. Probably not for a few weeks though, as many players are still getting up to speed and we need to get the basic game running smoothly first.
Probably the easiest thing to do would be to post game info here a few days in advance. I think most players check in here, or they likely wouldn't know about Thursday nights in the first place. If players knew that, for example, the first Thursday of the month was set aside for custom scenarios, they could simply get the details a few days beforehand.
I certainly don't want to step on any toes by distributing 8th ed. rules to non-FITS members or anything of that sort. I was thinking more along the lines of testing out user-supplied house rules or making up stats for a one-off plane. Nothing so different as to require re-learning the game from the ground up.
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albpilot
Ace of Aces
Red Baron Fight XVIII Champ
I'm not frightened of terrorism, so please don't go and create a police state on my account...
Posts: 1,181
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Post by albpilot on May 14, 2007 15:21:56 GMT -5
Once I get my ISP problems fixed and get Vassal working, I've always preferred campaign games myself. The beauty of that is that you can mix all the other types into the campaign.
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Post by AP on May 14, 2007 17:23:58 GMT -5
I also like the idea of campaigns...the only problem being what if a player cant make it every week...
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alien01
Lieutenant
"Talk is cheap. Let's go play." Johnny Unitas
Posts: 123
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Post by alien01 on May 14, 2007 17:32:50 GMT -5
kirkh said "however I think we'd need to ensure all players have whatever rules/aircraft data are used - assuming something other than 7th edition is used."
I disagree - the beauty of a judged game is that the judge can set whatever performance they want. A game with a bunch of wily veteran players can degenerate because everyone has all the stats memorized. While I don't advocate making up stats, a 10 MPH variation in top/turn or 50' variation in climb/dive adds spice. AS LONG AS EVERYONE IS AWARE THAT IT MAY BE COMING.
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Post by kirkh on May 14, 2007 17:32:54 GMT -5
Yeah it would be tough to do any sort of campaign, simply because you can't know who will show up until the time comes. Each game has to stand on it's own merits and be able to be played in a reasonable (two hours) amount of time. Unless we somehow set aside a full day for VDP, I don't think we'll be able to tackle any huge games online. That's one of the reasons I've started up the E-Games. By their very nature the e-games take a while to play so having a five on five game (or even larger) would be more easily done than during a realtime online session. Also, e-games will allow people from other geographical areas to participate more readily since they won't have to be up at 2AM to play.
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Post by kevan on May 14, 2007 17:46:13 GMT -5
I think we could make the campaign rules flexible enough to accommodate a rotating slate of players. Each player could, for example, have a substitute pilot for the games when a players has to switch sides to balance things out.
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Post by kirkh on May 14, 2007 21:33:55 GMT -5
I'd just want to ensure that any campaign is flexible enough to allow enough variability so that players won't get bored or frustrated. The way we randomly choose planes and sides right now one player can have the advantage one week and be at a disadvantage the next. In a campaign if the sides are the same every week, that may not be the case.
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Post by AP on May 15, 2007 7:49:19 GMT -5
I think the campaign scenario would be great for a tourney - all day event. Otherwise it would be tough for a weekly night game. How about an email game campaign? That is something I would like to organize & run! Any takers?
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Post by kirkh on May 15, 2007 14:24:55 GMT -5
Andy - You gonna do the moderating? Count me in.
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Post by kevan on May 15, 2007 16:22:44 GMT -5
My only concern with an email game campaign is that it can take so long to finish a single email game, a campaign could take a long time to resolve. Also, the problems noted by Kirk above could be more significant. If you play a campaign over, say, 8 weeks of weekly games some players may get bored or frustrated but they know it will be over at a certain date. Or you can mix in regular games as a break from the campaign. If, instead, the campaign is spread over a year, this problem could be worse.
I'll wait for a few more votes before I make any sort of decision. I'd just like to do something to start distinguishing Thursday nights, make them more of an event.
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Post by AP on May 15, 2007 16:55:52 GMT -5
Kirk, I would do the moderating on a campaign.
Kevan, yes the campaign over email would get long, but no longer than any other email game. Maybe the campaign could start with an email game, then as round one wrapped up, round 2 could be scheduled for live VDP, and round three could be TBD based on what the players would want to do...
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Post by kevan on May 16, 2007 22:30:21 GMT -5
I'll let the campaign idea stew for a bit more. In the meantime, I'll try to log in early Thursday night and set up a balloon busting scenario, since that's the second most popular option.
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Post by AP on May 17, 2007 10:03:26 GMT -5
I'll be there tonight, but not until later around 9PM CST... hopefully i can get into a game!!!
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