So I've been playing some
Warlords 2, but I think the nature of the game really suits a PBEM. With plenty of faction customizability (While the different factions are ostensibly themed, and cities reflect the theme, there's little actual meaning to them and you can pretty much make them whatever you want) there's a lot of room for roleplay if you're into that. The game has kind of a boardgame feel in that it's very simple rules-wise but with plenty of strategic depth and decision making, especially when you've got seven or so other human players to befriend and backstab.
Something important before I go on. I know Abandonia says the game is sold, but that's out of date. The developer has stated on the official forum that the game is no longer generating revenue and to obtain it however you like. I'll link to a download of the Deluxe version (Which is way better, with better graphics and lots of customized themes and campaigns) at the end of the post.
Anyway, Warlords 2 is a turn-based fantasy (Although the deluxe edition has historical themes as well) strategy game, in the vein of Master of Magic or similar games but without quite as much magic. There are no world enchantments, summons, or anything like that. There are wizards, but they behave the same as any other unit. In it, eight players compete to control the entire map, which can be quite large. Each empire starts with a hero, who can be given a name and all that nice stuff, who is quite powerful on his own and improves the power of other units by being with them. The hero can explore ruins to obtain magic items which boost his stats or recruit powerful monster units.
You win the game by conquering cities, however. On a large map there are eighty cities, and if you want to be the winner you'll have to take them all. Combat is very simple and occurs over a few seconds. There aren't any tactical options in it, you just watch the units kill each other. Most of the depth of the game is in the higher strategy of recruiting and maneuvering troops around the map, as well as relating with the other factions.
The game is very balanced, as each faction has full access to the entire unit list. Unit selection is city-based, not faction-based, so if the humans take over an orc town, they can recruit orcs (Or they can buy human unit selections and replace the orc selections). I should probably go into that a bit. Each city has four unit slots, and not all of them will always be filled. You can buy new unit choices with gold (And that is the primary use of gold) and add them to your options or replace a previous unit. That way you can customize your cities to the best strategic use? City in a remote, open plain? Gear it for cavalry production? Marshy, mountainous, or otherwise difficult terrain? Use flying units to mobilize faster. The game is simple, but has a depth and elegance that make it good.
The basic unit sprites are simple enough that they can represent any race you want, as long as it's humanoid and human-sized.
Anyway, that's pretty much it for a description of the game, it can be downloaded
here, and is playable in DOSBox, although you may need to do some tweaking in the INSTALL.exe or whatever to get the sound to work.
It's PBEM, so I don't really need times available, just post if you want to play, your email address, and what faction you want. We'll need to agree on a deadline for turns, though. It's old, and not very sophisticated PBEM-wise. You don't all send your turns to a central server. Instead, you email it to the next person in line. We're going on the honor system here. While it's possible to just reload and try again if you get a bad battle result, I'm trusting you not to and if I find out you did you will be removed from the game.
Optionally, we could make one email address for the entire group, and share the password so no one has to give out their email. A problem with that though is someone turning in a fake turn pretending to be the real player. Again, I think higher of Bay12ers, as that's an extremely dumb and dickish thing to do, assuming we even do a communal email.
We'll also need to decide on a map, or if we want to go random, as well as going over game options. Random has the chance of giving one or more players a bad start though, but maybe losing is fun.
Anyway, players and factions:
White - Holy knights, crusading order, King Arthur, etc.
Yellow - Vikings, Fire/Frost Giants, you get the idea.
Orange - Dorfs.
Red - Orcs, Goblins, Ogres, Trolls, DA WAAAGH!
Green - Elves. High, dark, whatever. Also human rangers.
Dark blue - Higher, more sophisticated human kingdoms. Maybe a kingdom ruled by mages or something.
Light blue - Highlanders, Rohan, Gondor, lower, more dark ages-style human kingdom.
Black - Evil knights, evil kingdom, undead, the bad guys.
Note that these are not set in stone. Feel free to modify these themes as much or as little as you want, although keep in mind that city sprites generally follow the above themes, so if you customize too much your cities might look weird. I'll pick a faction later.
Also note that the factions aren't named. While the game gives suggestions, you can also name them whatever you want. I'm not going to give any rules on this, although if it looks like everyone wants to roleplay, you should probably avoid naming it Kingdom of Dongsland or something like that.
If there's enough interest, I'll start putting up the various pre-game options for discussion.
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Topic: Anyone interested in a Warlords 2 Deluxe Edition PBEM game? (Read 3876 times)