Legacy of the Revolution - Sign Up and Rules Thread

[Lumine]

Legacy of Revolution

Victory, Glory and Defeat in the Napoleonic Age

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The Year is 1802.

Thirteen years after the outbreak of the French Revolution, and ten years after the start of the Revolutionary Wars, Europe is, for the first time in a decade, at peace.

The signing of the Treaty of Amiens puts an end to ceaseless strife between Britain and France, but many observers do not expect such a peace to last for eternity.

And in the meantime, nations gear up for what’s to follow while the effects of the French Revolution continue to violently shake up the continent.

Three years after seizing power in a brazen coup d’etat, First Consul Bonaparte has shown himself a genius at politics as well as warfare, but the ceaseless growth of his ambitions signifies that France’s struggles have only just begun.

Across the sea, King George III goes in and out of madness while Pitt the Younger clamours for French blood. And just as an Empire is lost in the Americas, another one is being won in India.

In Central Europe, the old Austro-Prussian rivalry is somewhat tempered as Hapsburg and Hohenzollern feast on the Polish corpse, but it remains unlikely that they’ll share a common battlefield and foe.

In the frozen fields of Russia, a wary Alexander I uneasily succeeds his unstable father after a violent palace coup, and he must contend with the heavy weight of expectations.

Decadent but not finished, the Ottoman and Spanish Empires maintain their hold over vast dominions, with an aspiring Sultan and unscrupulous Minister keen to succeed.

And across the sea, the new American Republic experiences the first years of Democratic-Republican rule, as Thomas Jefferson tries to tame the Hamiltonian beast.

The future is open to all in this world, which ever since July 14th, 1789, can no longer be the same.

In an area of Kings and Revolutionaries, where the old clashes with the new, can you and your nation find success?

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Basic Rules:

1. Turns: We will play yearly turns lasting for a week in real time, with a midturn on the fourth day featuring one or two stories at most, starting on January 1st, 1802. For the purposes of the simulation, the Treaty of Amiens is noted as having been already signed, allowing players to move on from there.

2. Coalition Wars: At any such point in which three major European powers (out of France, Britain, Austria, Prussia, Spain, Russia, or the Ottomans) are at war with each other, we shall consider it a “Coalition War”, slowing down the simulation to allow for military midturns covering the early and later part of a given year.

3. Messages: The GM must be informed of the internal talks that are taking place between players, and - ideally – added to all PMs and key group chats. Given the nature of the period (see: Congress of Vienna) players are encouraged to negotiate more openly and less covertly.

4. Historical Simulation: We will be using the dice system for various player decisions, events and warfare, accounting for advantages or disadvantages if necessary. Although there will be significant room for flexibility, players will be encouraged to remain within the grounds of plausibility, and the GM may override decisions which are found to be too out of character (Example: the Romanov Tsar abdicating to allow for a parliamentary democracy). There will be special events or announcements as certain situations arise, including historical and fictional crises.

5. Hindsight: Given the wealth of information about the Napoleonic times, there is temptation to benefit from hindsight. The GM will look carefully at orders or decisions that could only be made with hindsight and would not reasonably be known to the nation/playable character at the time. Players will not be able to order research into pieces of technology that they would only know of based on hindsight. Weapons of mass destruction (including biological and chemical weaponry) will NOT be available.

6. Stats and Warfare: The stats for each player will be focused on "Popularity” and “Economic Status”, which are fairly self-explanatory.

The warfare system will be based around an abstract naval system judging navy sizes and qualities; and a direct land system which accounts for men using the corps-system. Armies will also come with a tier of doctrines, depending on the historical nature of their nation's armed forces at the time.

Armies will be measured in terms of corps of multiple divisions, ranging from 20,000 to 30,000 men. The lack of specificity in the numbers will add to the fog of war. A series of logistical barriers will determine how many corps can be put in the field without SEVERE and drastic logistical penalties (see: the Grande Armeé in Russia).

Should a particularly decisive battle take place in an endturn, players will be provided context and given a number of choices. Said choices will influence the outcome of a battle. 

7. Declaring War and Real Time Simulation: This is IMPORTANT. All warfare between players MUST come with a formal declaration of war in the Gameplay Thread, representing the formality of warfare and diplomacy in the Napoleonic age.

If you declare war against another player within the last 24 hours of a turn, the eventual campaign will be shortened to account for the lack of time to react, slower mobilization, and for fairness to players.

You are not obliged to formally declare war on an NPC, but NPCs in general will start becoming hostile to players that abuse undeclared invasions.

8. Game Over: Game Over can come in four ways: Surrendering, being captured, or being deposed by another player in an invasion, being deposed in a coup or revolt, being assassinated without a clear designated heir, or losing an election.

Players in democratic nations may be able to continue playing after the voluntary resignation or term-limit of their original character if the designated successor wins the election or retains the parliamentary majority.

9. Intelligence: Players may make use of their respective intelligence services for intrigue or espionage purposes. There are finite resources available, so the more operatives you use, the more you may lose, the less effective you are or the less operations you can pull off.

10. Assassination: Assassinations are nerfed for the purposes of this game in terms of dice odds, becoming far rarer to achieve. Player characters with have lower odds of success than NPCs. The odds of successful discovery have also been increased, as well as the penalty associated with it. If an assassination fails, subsequent attempts will face increasingly lower odds as well as higher odds of discovery.

11. GM Requests: The amount of info or feedback provided by the GM will be more limited than in past games, and focused on providing answers from the advisors surrounding the player. This means NO objective answers, forcing players to take risks and accepting that no action is guaranteed of success.  The GM will not be answering any questions between the end of turn and the posting of a new turn (looking specifically at player negotiations).

[Lumine]

Unlike other games, the eight top spots for Legacy will be allocated by the GM. The second tier and faction tier will be first come, first served as usual. Players who wish to play one of the top eight nations are encouraged to provide a list of alternatives they'd like to play as, in case the GM decides a different allocation than their first preference.

Sign ups will remain open until early May, so I can make a judgement around the 7th or 8th, and start on May 15th.

Players and Countries:

Special Tier:

(GM will decide after asking a few questions)

French Republic – First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte

First Tier:

(Players must apply, GM will prioritize "newer" players)

United Kingdom – King George III Hanover
Hapsburg Monarchy – Emperor Francis II Hapsburg
Kingdom of Prussia – King Frederick Wilhelm III Hohenzollern
Russian Empire – Tsar Alexander I Romanov
Ottoman Empire – Sultan Selim III Osman
Spanish Empire – First Secretary Manuel Godoy

Second Tier:

(Open to All)

Kingdom of Sweden – King Gustav Adolf IV Vasa
Kingdom of Naples – Queen Consort Maria Carolina Hapsburg
Kingdom of Norway-Denmark – King Christian VII Oldenburg
Kingdom of Portugal – Prince Regent Joao IV Braganza
Electorate of Bavaria – Prince-Elector Maximilian Joseph
Electorate of Saxony – Prince-Elector Frederick Augustus
United States of America – President Thomas Jefferson
Kingdom of Sardinia – King Charles Emmanuel IV Savoy
Batavian Republic - Ambassador Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck

Faction Tier:

(Intrigue/Diplomatic/Political-based gameplay, different to nations)

Latin American Revolutionaries – Francisco de Miranda
French Royalists – Charles Philippe, Count of Artois
French Republicans – Lucien Bonaparte, General Moreau, or Lazaré Carnot
French Opportunists - Charles-Maurice de Talleyrand / Joseph Fouché
United States (Opposition) – Former Secretary Alexander Hamilton / Vice President Aaron Burr
Ottoman Vassals - Muhammad Ali (Egypt); Karadorde (Serbia); Ali Pasha (Albania); Constantine Ypsilantis (Moldavia-Wallachia)

[Lumine]

Godoy for me please!

1) Spain
2) Naples

Almost forgot! Would be ideal if you could give me more alternatives, in the sense that Spain is among those reserved for newer players, and Naples could potentially go for Spamage. You may still get either Spain or Naples, but it helps to have options.

[Lumine]

About a week left for sign-ups! (just a reminder)

[Lumine]

Thank you all for applying and stating preferences! I have more or less allocated about 12 people, trying to remain close to their priorities while putting newer players ahead, but there's three cases in which I'm not sure.

Thus far the tentative cast would be:

French Republic – Spiral
United Kingdom – OBD
Hapsburg Monarchy – DC
Kingdom of Prussia – Gotfan
Russian Empire – Kuumo
Ottoman Empire – AFE
Spanish Empire – TBD

Kingdom of Naples - Spamage
Kingdom of Norway-Denmark - SuzerainOfSwat
United States of America - TimTurner
Kingdom of Sardinia - FalterinArc
Batavian Republic - Dereich
French Royalists – Carolyn
Kingdom of Sweden - TBD
Kingdom of Portugal - TBD

Given the preferences stated, a solution - since the newer players put Spain way behind or didn't request it at all - would be to give Spain to Windjammer, Portugal to Dkrol, and Laki to be indeed allowed to play Haiti or the Latin American Revolutionaries (and/or Sweden if Windjammer takes Spain). I also regret that Dkrol was pushed back more on his preferences, though an alternative could also be the opposition role in the US opposite Tim Turner.

Mostly, I'd like to hear from the three just to be on the safe side, and/or whether they want to consider other options. Then we'd have a tentative cast of 15, and we could make a start a bit later than expected this month (coinciding with OBD's availability as he'd be playing the UK).

[Lumine]

I will stick with Muhammad Ali.

I assigned you Russia! So sorry, I just saw I made a mistake with the post.

Waiting on Laki regarding the ones I did mention.

[Lumine]

Laki has expressed he'll take Sweden. Thus, this is where we stand at:

French Republic – Spiral
United Kingdom – OBD
Hapsburg Monarchy – DC
Kingdom of Prussia – Gotfan
Russian Empire – Kuumo
Ottoman Empire – AFE
Spanish Empire – Windjammer

Kingdom of Naples - Spamage
Kingdom of Norway-Denmark - SuzerainOfSwat
United States of America - TimTurner
Kingdom of Sardinia - FalterinArc
Batavian Republic - Dereich
French Royalists – Carolyn
Kingdom of Sweden - Laki
Kingdom of Portugal - Dkrol

[Lumine]

The game formally begins in less than three weeks: Sunday 26th of May. Sign-ups are still open for non-allocated roles, but those already handed out are set in stone. And here's the full cast:

Players and Countries:

French Republic – First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte (Spiral)
United Kingdom – King George III Hanover (OBD)
Hapsburg Monarchy – Emperor Francis II Hapsburg (DC)
Kingdom of Prussia – King Frederick Wilhelm III Hohenzollern (GoTfan)
Russian Empire – Tsar Alexander I Romanov (Kuumo)
Ottoman Empire – Sultan Selim III Osman (AFE)
Spanish Empire – First Secretary Manuel Godoy (Windjammer)
Kingdom of Sweden – King Gustav Adolf IV Vasa (Lakigigar)
Kingdom of Naples – Queen Consort Maria Carolina Hapsburg (Spamage)
Kingdom of Norway-Denmark – King Christian VII Oldenburg (SuzerainOfSwat)
Kingdom of Portugal – Prince Regent Joao IV Braganza (Dkrol)
United States of America – President Thomas Jefferson (TimTurner)
Kingdom of Sardinia – King Charles Emmanuel IV Savoy (FalterinArc)
Batavian Republic - Ambassador Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck (Dereich)
French Royalists – Charles Philippe, Count of Artois (Caroyln)