Limited Wars

[Anaris]

I just can't see how any changes to looting would make attacks on capitals any easier or even different than they are nowadays.

The point is that the changes are intended to make it feasible to completely deny your enemy the productive capacity of their regions, without completely destroying those regions.

The extent to which they will have their intended effect, only time will tell.

[pcw27]

It seems like the key is essentially to encourage border disputes that don't usually end with sacking a realm's capital. What if distance to the capital also effects the ease of capturing a region?

Maybe the problem is that it's too easy to keep even your most distant regions at core. That message "distance from the capital causes anarchists to prosper" really isn't accurate since it's so easy to keep regions at core.

Adjusting this system could create the potential for more limited wars. Distant border regions can remain contested provinces ready to turn coat for whoever happens to show up with an army while the core regions will resist invaders to the bitter end.

Also border regions could have a "sympathy bleed".  If your region borders another realm sympathy gradually improves unless diplomats or priests intervene.

[Jaden]

Realms will just keep more of the army as police force/home defense force to counteract those effects. 
the sympathy bleed is a nice idea, though am I the only one who's thinking that Diplomats are now playing a larger role in region maintenance than actual Courtiers (assuming that lords are holding court and doing their jobs).

[Ketchum]

Realms will just keep more of the army as police force/home defense force to counteract those effects. 
the sympathy bleed is a nice idea, though am I the only one who's thinking that Diplomats are now playing a larger role in region maintenance than actual Courtiers (assuming that lords are holding court and doing their jobs).

You are not the only one who thinking Diplomats play a key and larger role than usual. Even Priest that has a lot of people following can play the same role as Diplomats. Both Diplomats and Priests have laud the realm and badmouth other realms. Even work much better than Courtiers. Ever hear the saying "Pen is mightier than sword"?

In my humble opinion, the key during peacetime is to run low tax on border region with your going-to-be competitor region, drawing away all their region peasants. Then you have sufficient peasants, your region Production will recover much faster. Speaking from my previous Region Maintenance Master experience of course 
That is as much limited war as it can be, without war declaration at all.

[Tom]

I just can't see how any changes to looting would make attacks on capitals any easier or even different than they are nowadays.

real-life wars often ended when one side could not feed the frontlines anymore, with either food or fresh men. Production and logistics have decided more wars than battlefield strategy. Looting has always been intended as a part of that strategy.

[Lorgan]

Looting will be changed. It will be made significantly more effective in the short term, so that economic warfare becomes truly viable as an alternative to conquest.

Huzzah! \o/

[Poliorketes]

Much as I like the idea of this, we did try it, and it was totally unworkable. The problem is that a realm that is losing a war has very little incentive to grant you the legal claim to the regions you have taken. All it leads to, sadly, is a lot of griefing.

The incentive of not to be destroyed is not enough? It's a shame (and somewhat a bit OOC)... Maybe council members/Dukes would loss a big amount of Prestige/Honour (and gold?) if their realm is destroyed?
...

Two (or three) maybe-stupid ideas:

Make looting more destructive, but only to production, and make civil work much more efficient, too.

If looting is changed to a more 'economic' level (hurrah!) Why not to eliminate the take overs? A defeated (and looting-ruined) realm would agree to loss some regions to gain peace (and access again to their looted regions), or accept the possibility of total destruction.

To make more limited wars, we could make winters destructive for any unit out of cities (or town-lands?... or home regions?). Men would fall sick and die (as occurs with starvation)! Usually, when winters comes, all wars are stopped... This would avoid the fast destruction of realms.

[Azerax]

real-life wars often ended when one side could not feed the frontlines anymore, with either food or fresh men. Production and logistics have decided more wars than battlefield strategy. Looting has always been intended as a part of that strategy.

This has so much potential.  Cutting off supply lines causes troop starvation which drives up desertion.  A poorly fed army vs a well fed army....

[Indirik]

... am I the only one who's thinking that Diplomats are now playing a larger role in region maintenance than actual Courtiers (assuming that lords are holding court and doing their jobs).

I have said it before, many times, and I will say it again here: Diplomats have become too powerful, and too invisible. The effects that a highly trained diplomat can have in a region are absolutely ridiculous. Add on the Ambassador tag, and you've got an insane propaganda machine that is totally untrackable. IMNSHO, influence actions by diplomats/ambassadors should not ever be invisible. They should be just as visible to other players as priest actions. When one of them walks into a region next to your capital and starts badmouthing your realm, you should know it's happening. As it is, they are too essential, and too powerful for them to merit the kind of invisibility they have.

[Indirik]

To make more limited wars, we could make winters destructive for any unit out of cities (or town-lands?... or home regions?). Men would fall sick and die (as occurs with starvation)! Usually, when winters comes, all wars are stopped... This would avoid the fast destruction of realms.

Three weeks of enforced sitting in your city, with no travel, and no battles? You want people to quit?

Besides, only two islands have seasons. This would only affect Dwilight and FEI.

[Poliorketes]

Three weeks of enforced sitting in your city, with no travel, and no battles? You want people to quit?

Besides, only two islands have seasons. This would only affect Dwilight and FEI.

Oppsss!... Maybe I'm a bit too patient player...  ...Well... We could do winters shorter! 

[pcw27]

Realms will just keep more of the army as police force/home defense force to counteract those effects. 

That's the point. They can't conquer their way straight to the enemy capital if they have to keep their border provinces in line. Gaining and holding a couple regions will be doable, but destroying an entire realm will take a series of wars over several in game years.

[Vellos]

Looting will be changed. It will be made significantly more effective in the short term, so that economic warfare becomes truly viable as an alternative to conquest. However, it will lost much of its long-term effectiveness, because the form that effectiveness takes is swaths of wasteland that no one wants, that take months or years to recover.

Right now, if you want to force a realm to surrender, you most generally have to do one of two things: Either take or loot rogue enough of their regions that they are utterly unable to produce an army, or serve them defeats for so long that they are utterly demoralized and no longer wish to fight.

Imagine, instead, a BattleMaster where you can win wars by actually winning battles in the field, combined with sabotaging your opponents' production, so that you can successfully march your army across their realm to their capital, where you can camp and, again, destroy their production to prevent them from recruiting. Their regions, while unproductive during the war, would recover relatively quickly once peace came, whether they held them or you did. This would allow the next war—for both realms—to start again sooner.

Wait, you're saying this WILL happen?

That's very good news. It's often bothered me how many battles happen in BM wars: RL armies are hard to rebuild. A few decisive battles can win a war.

[Anaris]

Wait, you're saying this WILL happen?

Yes. The general plan and several specific changes have been discussed and approved. I plan on implementing this stuff—war and combat related improvements—this fall and winter.

[Kai]

This has so much potential.  Cutting off supply lines causes troop starvation which drives up desertion.  A poorly fed army vs a well fed army....

Obviously doesn't work in BM. Long campaigns are already difficult with EQ dmg and payment. If you are warring 3-4 regions from home, and someone 'cuts off supply lines' (what a romantic notion), you just turn around and fight them like you were already going to. It is just a meaningless concept. There is no front line in BM, only army balls.