The Rationale
This page exists to explain how turns will be carried out from Turn 10 and onwards until the end of the game.
The short version: a lot of stuff is being rendered down, cut or minimised.
The reason for this is that by and large, it's not really fun for me to have to work through and I'm not sure if it really adds anything anymore. See, the Turn system is not a bad one, I think- it needs some polish, but I think it works overall… But it's also coupled with a lot of characters and moving parts and we're at the point in the game where a lot of it is irrelevant… But still requires work to actually maintain.
Furthermore- this game is getting long in the tooth. I love it, and I hope you all love it too, and it's an anomaly that it has run this long. Especially since for IRC RPGs, games with more than a month or two between battles are considered Dead Games because the GM simply loses the will to keep updating and the players lose the will to care. You all have continued to care and that means a heck of a lot, but it's time to stop having such a long gap between battles and it's time to kick this shit into high gear.
So! These changes are designed around minimising the amount of work I have to do in keeping track of everything and so on. And it's designed to minimise the amount of work the players have to do in making lots of decisions and such that don't mean that much in the long run.
The Changes
Battles and Characters
Battles will, from now on, consist of the following deployments:
1 OD
The Protagonists (Raphael, Yanmei, Sera, and Aline if and when she's rescued)
Plus, 0 or 1 battleships
Plus 0, 1 or 2 allies
Plus 0, 1 or 2 Hordes
Furthermore, character, Magnitude and unit damage will not be tracked across turns, with the following exception: if a non-protagonist unit is destroyed, they can't be used next turn. If a non-protagonist pilot is forced to burn fate to survive an attack, they can't be used next turn either. Otherwise, the unit can be used (Unless an event blocks them)- so if there are any Evas still considered damaged, they count as being repaired as of the end of Turn 9.
One of the knotty issues with this that we've run into before is, if we have limited 'ally' slots, they will inevitably never go to a Superheavy when they could go to an Eva. So, the solution I've come to is this: from now on, the Superheavy squads (Wolf, Fox, Eagle and SOS) will all be truncated into four extremely powerful Hordes. All other Hordes we have will be discarded. The four Hordes will fit into the following roles, broadly:
- SOS: Designed primarily for support for Raphael, so will be equipped with long range weapons and defensive equipment and technology, with some close combat abilities.
- Fox: Designed as an accompaniment for Sera, based around augmenting his damage output at both long and short range.
- Eagle: Designed to support Yanmei, with defensive qualities and support abilities.
- Wolf: Designed to support Aline, possessing high attack qualities that she can augment, but also high speed so it can keep up with her.
Ideally, this will also encourage players to attach the Hordes to their character, allowing them to act on their initiative as well as give the character a bit of soak.
Events
As usual, but probably less detail, fewer of them and with more important effects.
Occupations
Gone.
Investigations
These stay, more or less unaffected.
Skirmishes and Battlefronts
Gone. Instead, the most notable 'cards' from Battlefronts will be rolled into the Supreme Commander Morale System. At the start of a battle, Supreme Commanders now make an Opposed Tactics test, and whoever wins gains +1 Morale, plus 1 per 2 points of DoS over the opponent, and thus can use that morale to activate benefits that Battlefronts would've given.
Resources
This covers CP, Weapons, Research and Letter Type equipment.
Basically, they're gone. No longer serve a purpose. Players are assumed to have unlimited access to weapons and equipment, and all technology is unlocked as of Turn 10.
Prestige Points
Prestige Points are being changed. They are no longer freely regenerative, instead they're now an expendable resource that, once spent, stays spent.
You can still spend one Point to enable the use of an elite unit like the Empress, or the Angels, but you can now only enable one per Campaign Turn.
Other than that, they now have the following benefits:
- Can be expended to restore all units/pilots that can't be deployed this Campaign Turn due to damage from last Campaign Turn instantly
- Can be expended to add a Conditional Fate Point to all deployed characters this Campaign Turn
- Can be expended to add +5 Morale Points to a battle
- Can be expended to replace a character's burned fate point, but only on the turn in which they burn it
Prestige Points are increased through meeting certain battle objectives, and by another method which will be detailed below.
Diplomacy
Diplomacy was never really important, but now it's being overhauled and streamlined.
The world is divided into five Wards: Europe, Asia, Africa, America and Non-Governmental. Each Ward has five states/actors in it (eg. France, Britain, etc).
All States have a Standing score, which is one of five options: Very Good, Good, Neutral, Bad, Very Bad.
- Very Good: Investigations in this area can usually (but not always) take a +20 bonus in social/etc interactions, so long as the team is identifiable as UEF. If every actor in a Ward is at Very Good state, the UEF gains 1 Prestige Point at the end of every Turn.
- Good: Investigations in this area can usually (but not always) take a +10 bonus in social/etc interactions, so long as the team is identifiable as UEF.
- Neutral: No effect.
- Bad: Investigations in this area can usually (but not always) take a -10 malus in social/etc interactions, so long as the team is identifiable as UEF.
- Very Bad: Investigations in this area can usually (but not always) take a -20 malus in social/etc interactions, so long as the team is identifiable as UEF.
Standing can be improved through battles, events and investigations.
Agency Operations
Mainly unchanged. Might roll together some of the options (as well as some of the agents).