The Warlords II
Players' Encyclopedia -
 
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This page last revised 27-Apr-02 by Bob Heeter
Scenario Selection
This contains all our accumulated wisdom on
selecting scenarios for Warlords Play-by-Email games. It's not complete, but
it is still very useful.
There are basically two choices you must make:
- Will this game use the WarBOT to determine the battle outcomes?
- If so, you will need to use a WarBOT-compatible scenario.
- If not, you can use any scenario, but you will need to customize
the game rules.
- How many players will be in the game?
- The size of the scenario depends on the number of players, particularly
for games using WarBOT and the Tournament Army Set.
- A good rule of thumb is a minimum of 10 cities per player,
and a maximum of 20 cities per player for games using WarBOT and Tournament armies.
You can "shrink" a larger scenario by declaring some parts of the map to
be "off limits".
Scenario Selection: Existing Scenarios suitable for WW2L play
For starters, see the three archives:
- Tournament Archives
- Tournament Downloads page
- General Scenario Archives
Here is a list of scenarios worth investigating.
Existing Scenarios suitable for League Play with WarBOT:
- Aerolandia (Tournament Round C)
- Duel of the Ancient Gods (Tournament Round B)
- Dwarven Mines (Tournament Version - Deluxe only)
- Hand of Fate (Mac only)
- Isles of Sorcery (Tournament version - Deluxe only)
- Olympics I (Tournament Practice Round)
- Olympics II (Tournament Round A)
- Shades of Hadesha (Tournament Version of Hadesha - Mac Classic only)
- WC Wars (Deluxe only)
- Any random scenario using the Tournament Army Set
- Any scenario with any army set using an imported army data file for WarBOT 1.6
Custom Scenario Guidelines:
Note: When you are trying a new scenario or set of game options, you'll
need to generate a starting gamefile with the appropriate modifications.
City production, ruin contents, item types, and so on may all need to be
edited. If you need a hand with this, just ask; we have several volunteers
willing to help; just ask on ww2l-talk. (Also see the Scenario Editing
pages in the Warlords II Encyclopedia.)
Eventually we hope to have many many prearranged game
and scenario packages, so that games can be fought from interesting starting
conditions with less work required!
- Selection Criteria:
- Compatibility with WarBOT. You may need to generate a new army data
file for importing into WarBOT.
- Games playable in no more than 2 months per player.
For a 2 player game, this is about 8 turns at an
average speed of 1 week per move per player, 12 turns at 5 days/move,
20 turns at 3 days/move, 30 turns at 2 days/move, or
60 turns at 1 day/move. So you need a combination of fast-moving,
fast-building army sets, relatively small scenarios, and fast-moving
gung-ho players. :)
- Not too many cities per side. When WarBOT is used with the Tournament
Army Set, more than 12-15 cities per side becomes unmanageable.
The number of possible movement/battle combinations gets too large.
- Not too few cities per side. This becomes boring and games stalemate.
- Fair starting conditions. Challengers, remember that the defender
picks his side first, and you get what's left!
- Army Sets - Successful:
- Tournament Army Set (Rounds A to C and Practice Round)
- Tournament Round E Army Set (Tarot)
- Scenarios to be Tested (One-on-one games):
Note: all of these need to be modified to use the Tournament Army Set;
other modifications (set cities to build only scouts, increase
starting gold, etc.) may be needed as well. If you are planning
on customizing a scenario, try these first!
From the Deluxe CD-ROM:
- Island Wheel - 21 cities
- Knights Isle - 21 cities also balanced
- Dragon Realms - 40 Cities
- Elemental Problems - 43 Cities
- Elkor's Tomb - 26 Cities
- Essessge Isle - 40 Cities
- ... and many others ...
- Scenarios to be Tested (4-player games):
These should have a maximum of 60 cities and good balance for 4 players.
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Eugene Lee, Elam Birnbaum, Glen Barnett, Dirk Pellett, Vern Vaillancourt,
Gary Best, and others where indicated.
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