Fontan's Surprising Strength

[Velax]

Anyone have any suggestions as to how Fontan's managed to put together such a massive force (the second largest on the continent, possibly the largest now given the 7-day delay on the stats) with just 7 regions and one of the weakest economies on the continent? Would it be cheap to mention that the leader of the "Saxons", and someone well known for being in a clan, is now part of Fontan?

[Indirik]

You can do amazing things with guaranteed 100% cooperation and a good knowledge of game mechanics.

[Chaotrance13]

I have often wondered the same question myself, Velax. I can't really say much more than that.

[T Strike]

Well some people do believe the Saxons have taken over Fontan's military. Which is why they went from 40 nobles to 55 in less than a week and a half.

[Tom]

It's obvious that some groups of players have found ways to be extremely efficient within the game.

I fear their way of accomplishing this efficiency is through ruthless powergaming, i.e. maximum efficiency at the expense of fun, internal conflict, politics and all the other social details that make the game interesting.

I have no proof, which is why I've not acted, yet. But if I'm right, than these people would be better off playing some other game, where maximum efficiency is in fact wanted.

[Chaotrance13]

It's obvious that some groups of players have found ways to be extremely efficient within the game.

I fear their way of accomplishing this efficiency is through ruthless powergaming, i.e. maximum efficiency at the expense of fun, internal conflict, politics and all the other social details that make the game interesting.

I have no proof, which is why I've not acted, yet. But if I'm right, than these people would be better off playing some other game, where maximum efficiency is in fact wanted.

I actually think my old game, Cybernations, would be a better fit for them now that you mention it Tom.

[Zakilevo]

Well the only way to find it out is to join them and see how they do it. Too bad I made a character in Perdan .

I don't think it is too hard to reach such CS. CS diminishes as you hire more men but rises quickly when you have a low number of men which means you just need to make everyone hire even number of men to reach the maximum efficiency. Have you guys seen the battle report between Westmoor and Fontan? or other Saxon battle reports? Hits from Westmoor were being dispersed over 25-30 people (some hits weren't enough to wound).

Having 2 people with 1000 CS isn't as good as having 5 people with 200 CS each.

[Anaris]

Well the only way to find it out is to join them and see how they do it. Too bad I made a character in Perdan.

No, that only works if they're willing to share the secrets of their success with outsiders.

[T Strike]

Did some research and the general of Fontan has a character in Aurvandil which is supposedly a saxon realm. Also suspicious that they would let a relatively new noble become general

[Sacha]

These Saxons are a recurring theme around BM... and wherever they go, rumors of powergaming, multi-cheating, bug exploiting and other shenanigans are quick to follow. But somehow they always manage to get off scot-free (on an OOC level at least).

[T Strike]

Well there isn't much proof. All we know is where ever they "go" there is a sudden rise in noble count and military strength. Also, look at Fontans size do you really think they can pull of a 16000 CS army. Also, almost 100% movement on almost 100% of the time is something to be wary about as well, eh?

[Zakilevo]

Probably because no one has found a solid evidence?

[Lorgan]

There is nothing wrong with aiming for maximum efficiency or working like a team, under the condition that you do it with an open hand to other players in my opinion.
I personally enjoy fighting against and working together with other realms - really achieving something in game-terms - much more than the internal politics side of the game. Even though it can be very enjoyable, and really you need to have internal conflicts up to a certain level to keep things interesting at all times, it just too often leads to a bad atmosphere that cripples your realm. Then I rather work together closely with everyone in my realm and enjoy the occasional brawl amongst our own, all in good fun. That is, as far as I'm concerned, the perfect realm.

[Anaris]

There is nothing wrong with aiming for maximum efficiency or working like a team, under the condition that you do it with an open hand to other players in my opinion.

In and of itself, no, there's no problem with that as a goal.

I personally enjoy fighting against and working together with other realms - really achieving something in game-terms - much more than the internal politics side of the game. Even though it can be very enjoyable, and really you need to have internal conflicts up to a certain level to keep things interesting at all times, it just too often leads to a bad atmosphere that cripples your realm. Then I rather work together closely with everyone in my realm and enjoy the occasional brawl amongst our own, all in good fun. That is, as far as I'm concerned, the perfect realm.

This is perfectly true, too. Internal conflicts can be fun within certain boundaries, but in the end, you really want to play a team game most of the time.

However, the problem with the Saxons is that they have a team that has certain advantages that normal BattleMaster realms simply cannot mimic.

They have 100% movement, even late in the turn.
They can communicate outside the game to pass along orders or remind each other to move, or to switch from misdirection to moving, etc.
They can trust that none of their number will ever betray them.
They are willing to commit 100% of the resources of the realm to producing for war.
They can funnel gold en masse from other continents into whatever realm they have decided to take over.
They transfer gold around as a matter of course so that as little as possible is sitting unused at any given time.

None of these things, taken on their own, or even all together with a small group, would be a problem.

The problem is that they can do all this with a couple dozen players. That's enough to completely populate a reasonable-sized realm. (A relatively large one, if they each run two characters, which, on the EC, they can.)

BattleMaster was never designed to accommodate an entire realm's worth of players playing at perfect efficiency.

A realm like this is likely to steamroll almost anything in its path. And even if the rest of the continent manages to get together and defeat them, they'll just pick up and move somewhere else, causing more grief as they take over another realm, and then even more as they proceed to use that realm to destabilize the entire area it's located in.

[Lorgan]

A realm like this is likely to steamroll almost anything in its path. And even if the rest of the continent manages to get together and defeat them, they'll just pick up and move somewhere else, causing more grief as they take over another realm, and then even more as they proceed to use that realm to destabilize the entire area it's located in.

I agree they're spoiling the game for the original nobles of realms they join and I do not like the way they keep their ranks closed at all times, or how they come marching in a realm with immediate undying support of their clan-members, without giving the other side a chance.
I've had it happen to a realm of mine so I know it sucks and we were really fortunate to have a large enough power base of our own to ban them when they became too troublesome. And then I'm talking months of insults at my and the king's adress and the questioning of our every move, we tried to integrate them.. what can I say?

But... I also think that it is a good thing for EC that Fontan is punching above it's weight and managing a one on one war with Westmoor. If that war hadn't happened, it would have been a long and boring age of peace for EC once again.

And to be completely honest, because we had a comfortable power base in our realm, that was one of the times that we did have very serious internal conflicts that I enjoyed. Had we not had that solid powerbase... I can imagine it would've been very different though and I suppose that is what is happening in Fontan at the moment. Which really is deplorable.