Read this, important!

[bab]

I'm quite new in the CM community. Maybe there were attempts to do the project that I will describe below - if so, forgive me. And sorry for my possibly bad English, too - I'm from Hungary. So.

My idea is to organize a virtual world war.

I have many many ideas to do this, the basic ones are these:

1. We set up 3 groups: God, Allied High Command, Axis High Command.

2. Both sides get EQUAL amount of points, which they can use to buy units, which are then distributed to the people joining the project.

3. God Team (responsible for fair play and organization) creates a map, which is big enough to conduct operations by both sides (my ideas are many: industrial areas for both sides, which give the High Commands points in every turn or month)

4. People who join tell the High Command (HC) what are they qualified in - HC decides what kinds of units and battalions they get.

5. The war begins. PBEM or TCP/IP allowed, God team summerizes the battles in every two weeks, and publishes the current state of the war (fog of war on the main map could be discussed later, etc)

6. Generals may get reinforcements every two weeks from the HC - of course it takes time to deliver them, so they should be requested earlier than needed.

Well, I think that's all for the first time... Please give me your comments and wishes - we should do this thing, it would be fun!

[bab]

Is the idea THIS bad, or I just gave the topic an unfortunate title?

Come on, come on.

[Stilletto Rebel]

Sounds big and will require a lot of administration from the (Impartial) God Team, but does sound like a good idea. I've had a think about this and can see it being highly political too as all the commanders/Generals will be clamoring for reinforcements from their finite pool of manpower and materials available.

Favouritism and victory points (from winning engagements) will help secure Commanders their reinforcements over other Commanders. Other factors would play a part too, such as the theater of operations (you're hardly going to prioritse reinforcements to a sideshow are you?!)

The world map would have to be carefully thought out, with them seperated into theaters of operations with objectives in each.

Trial this idea with just a theatre first and see how it goes. This will bring to light any problems in God Team's impartiality, collating results of actions, timing attacks using several players/Commanders on a theatre front, etc. This game would probably need a forum all of it's own too!

[bab]

Originally posted by Stilletto Rebel:

Sounds big and will require a lot of administration from the (Impartial) God Team, but does sound like a good idea. I've had a think about this and can see it being highly political too as all the commanders/Generals will be clamoring for reinforcements from their finite pool of manpower and materials available.

Favouritism and victory points (from winning engagements) will help secure Commanders their reinforcements over other Commanders. Other factors would play a part too, such as the theater of operations (you're hardly going to prioritse reinforcements to a sideshow are you?!)

The world map would have to be carefully thought out, with them seperated into theaters of operations with objectives in each.

Trial this idea with just a theatre first and see how it goes. This will bring to light any problems in God Team's impartiality, collating results of actions, timing attacks using several players/Commanders on a theatre front, etc. This game would probably need a forum all of it's own too!

God Team would be responsible for the map layout. They would act like the "highest command" so they would decide any debate or misunderstanding that players have.

I did not mention cool things like gaining experience, etc. We should decide whether artillery is a non-pictured thing, or if it's destroyed by the death of FO's... many other things should be discussed, but we have some time until we get the game...

Let's do it. Maybe one should contact sysops to give us an independent forum for this.

[Soddball]

Bad title

I like the idea, but you need to contact Treeburst155. He has alot of experience of running championships and can point out the big problems with players disappearing, keeping it organised, and so on.

You might also want to investigate the Combat Mission Meta Campaign (CMMC) which is doing something similar to what you're talking about.

[Mannheim Tanker]

Originally posted by Soddball:

Bad title

I like the idea, but you need to contact Treeburst155. He has alot of experience of running championships and can point out the big problems with players disappearing, keeping it organised, and so on.

You might also want to investigate the Combat Mission Meta Campaign (CMMC) which is doing something similar to what you're talking about.

Good call. Also, Slapdragon is working on a similar, smaller CMMC.

[Ozzy]

bab, check

http://www.cmmc2.org

and you will find most of what you are suggesting ,)

[bab]

Thanks. Now I'm not that happy for this idea . I'm checking out the site right now.

Thanks again.

[bab]

So far so good, but I still haven't found any way to subscribe to cmmc1. Is there a chance that I can participate in the campaign? Or is it over yet?

I tthought for a much more fictional war, with no "already happened" scenarios - so that both sides have the chance to win in the end.

[Hortlund]

I like this idea. And such a campaign is definitively something I would like to play in.

A suggestion would be to start with one battle first. One interesting, well know, and well balanced battle... not too big, not too small. (My choice would be something like the battle(s) for Mozhaisk in october 1941)

If you can get that to work with 4-6 players on both sides, then we can start making plans for the big one. I thinkn it would be best to focus on the real operations. It would be very interesting to play a large operation with 10-20 players on each side, with a CO on both sides giving orders and allocating reserves etc...Kursk anyone?

[bab]

Gather more people who would like to participate in a thing like this - let's use this topic to communicate.

[Ozzy]

Originally posted by bab:

So far so good, but I still haven't found any way to subscribe to cmmc1. Is there a chance that I can participate in the campaign? Or is it over yet?

I thought for a much more fictional war, with no "already happened" scenarios - so that both sides have the chance to win in the end.

CMMC1 is about to conclude (the second last turn is running). Contact Head GM here: jbailey@resolutecapital.com

He will tell you more. I think it is almost too late to participate (before you got familiar with concepts and rules, the campaign might be over). But soon after, the CMMC1 forums will be opened to public, and a debriefing will take place.

CMMC is semi-historical, i.e. only time, place and ToE are (almost) historical. The rest is absolutely depending on skills and leadership of the opposite chains of command.

[Bruno Weiss]

Ooo Ooo, I wanna be God!

[bab]

Can both sides win the war in CMMC? If so, what happens, when the enemy beats you - you get reinforcements, or you're out of the campaign?

Details pls. I could not find anything at www.cmmc2.org just under contruciton pages (noted or not).

thx

oh, even if cmmc exist, we could conduct a separate campaign, like we stated before. m.

[imported_argie]

Originally posted by bab:

Can both sides win the war in CMMC? If so, what happens, when the enemy beats you - you get reinforcements, or you're out of the campaign?

Details pls. I could not find anything at www.cmmc2.org just under contruciton pages (noted or not).

thx

oh, even if cmmc exist, we could conduct a separate campaign, like we stated before. m.

The scale of CMMC I was roughly 2 Corps fighting each other. A lot less than a whole WWII Campaign. But even that scale was a nightmare of management, with more than 100 players and around 10 to 15 GMs, especialized software (COCAT), etc.

If you want to do a realistic Campaign covering all the war, be ready for a life commitment.

[Dirtweasle]

Originally posted by bab:

Can both sides win the war in CMMC? If so, what happens, when the enemy beats you - you get reinforcements, or you're out of the campaign?

Details pls. I could not find anything at www.cmmc2.org just under contruciton pages (noted or not).

thx

oh, even if cmmc exist, we could conduct a separate campaign, like we stated before. m.

Take a look at this link for the CMMC-1 information. Lots and lots of rules, backgrounds, etc...

[Zarquon]

I've toyed with the idea of a _small_ campaign before and started to make sketches for the map, the rules, units involved etc. etc.

All I can say is: *keep it simple*

Please. I've downloaded the CMMC rules. All 10?12?15? MB of them. Do so. Read them. Then think again. How much time did it take to design, *test* and write those? how much time does a player have to invest before he can actually play?

1. How much time can you invest in this? To to it, you'd have to _write_ the rules. Explicitly. Clearly. I've played a lot of boardgames before, most of them were done by professional game designers. Most are incomplete or have holes big enough to drive a KV-1 through them. Players lose interest if they decide the rules are badly done. Then they drop out. Can be a chain reaction.

2. If, after some time, you decide it's too much for you and drop out, you'll really piss off many people who relied on your commitment. Then try and find somebody who's willing and able to take over your job.

3. If you think it's enough to find some people helping out with the rules so that every one of them does one part of it, wellll.... In the end it won't make things much easier because you have to design a rules _system_. Then try to coordinate the work of 3,4,5, whatever, people over email or IRC or ICQ. It could easily be much more work and take longer than doing it all yourself.

4. A web board (Yahoo?) for the three groups would definitely help. A common area, then three separate closed areas for each group.

5. It would be easier to take an existing, simple system and change it according to your intentions. Trying to adapt a monster system like CMMC would get you nowhere IMHO.

I'd say, try and make some simple rules and find a few players. Then test your system. Let it evolve. But don't try to do a complete WWII simulation.

I don't mean to discourage you in any way . If you do it, just email me and I'd like to play or perhaps help with rules or maps.

Jörg

[ September 04, 2002, 07:52 PM: Message edited by: Zarquon ]

[Priest]

With Slapdragon putting something together and with CMMC2, there will be some choices, I am sure. Even ones that have not been announced yet...

[imported_argie]

I'm thinking in something also... Evil, of course.

[Panzer Leader]

Me and Michael Dorosh have been kicking around a few ideas, too. Anyone ever heard of Grossdeutschland?

[ September 04, 2002, 08:41 PM: Message edited by: Panzer Leader ]

[KNac]

I asked for available position long time ago in CMMC, the head GM answered me with available positions (which were very few, almost as staff officers).

Unfortunatly I ran out of time to play the game, I had quite a few important tests and examns in 3 months or so. So I decided not to join because the problems I could cause, learning all the rules and gameplay is not easy, and more if you have an important position, like a staff player (artillery and/or supply was available I think) when you poor actuation can affect a whole division or regiment.

I will sing in for CMMC2 for sure when possible. With the already experiencied players of CMMC 1 and their experiences, AARs etc. it will be easier to learn and addapt (note how the game will change with an experienced cadre like the players of CMMC1).

For a personal note, me and some other m8s are trying to run a campaing much lower in scope than CMMC1 (due to available manpower). I can assure you that cordinating all the effort is very difficult, and our rules are much much simplier than the CMMC rules (mostly because there is only 1 GM and he runs all the process without a written rulebook). We are trying to elvolve and I think someday we will get within the same complexity as CMMC. Now we are running some type of CPX and I have suggested to move to CMBB for the official campaing (we will begin it in October/November).

Just good luck with the task if done and keep us informed.

[bab]

For the first time, the idea seemed very tempting and interesting. Right now I found out that it would be far more difficult than I've ever imagined before. Even if I have plenty of time to sacrifice (what a good sacrifice! ), managin the whole thing alone by myself would be impossible. To conduct a project like this I would need many people willing to do hard work, etc.

I think I just dropped the idea because a working project is already online (CMMC), and I don't think that I could give people something better (even if different)...

So I guess we're going to have one less campaign project in the future...

Looking forward to CMMC2 tho.

[Bruce70]

I think for this to work well you need lots of non-players to run things. The problem is that there are never enough people who want to do this. If CMMC2 is smaller that is a start. I think that if you can have a small system but run 2 campaigns simultaneously with one group of players acting as the admin staff for the other and vice-versa that might work well. You would have a one-to-one ratio of administrators to players.

And yes, bad title, when I see an uniformative title I wait until it gets a few responses and I'm very bored before I have a look.

[ September 05, 2002, 05:26 AM: Message edited by: Bruce70 ]

[Hensworth]

You may also be interested in this :

Wreck's Single Player Campaign Rules

Not quite the same massive scope. But you get to live a normal life beside it :cool: .

I thought this was a very laudable effort by Wreck. Is anybody using this still ?

I've started 3 or 4 times now. Each time I get a succession of battles against crack Germans right at the start and my favor goes sub-arctic.