I say strategy, but first of all I want it to be a role-play game, where each player takes a role of a whole nation evolving, adapting and weaving itself into something unique. Growing up a nation with rich history, distinguishable personality quirks and a library full of biographies of historical figures and their heroic accomplishments.

I've got a set of home-brewed rules, but those are more like guidelines, a setup to help players feel what the game wants from them, not to limit them. The game plays more like somewhat-progressed godgame (if you know what I mean.. if you don't:) basically, each player gets several actions per turn that they use to describe (couple of paragraphs story) what their nation is up to (like researching new technologies, exploring the map, constructing new buildings, moving armies around, sending diplomats, assigning spies and so on..) then we progress 1-10 years forward and gm describes the outcome of those actions, and new turn begins.

We start at stone age and slowly progress from there. Slowly because I want each nation in each era to have, at the very least, a couple of notable leaders and memorable heroes, and maybe a global historical event (or two) to celebrate, witness, or struggle through.

And again, I can't stress it enough: first of all, if I ever start this game, its gonna be a role-playing game. It means each action should have a story behind it, a meaningful background, historical ties and etc. Leaders should not all be perfectionists, they should have weaknesses, dreams, desires, silly ideas, corrupt thoughts, and weird hobbies (maybe not all of these at once, but you got the idea, humans should be humans).

So, anyone wants to build their own, personal civilization from scratch?

(I'm also ready to adapt myself (as long as rpg element stays), if you have some alternatives to offer. Ideas? Desires? Thoughts?)

I’m in

Sounds fun, I'm in.

I would give this a look, although compared to a god game, this seems more like a cooperative writing game than a full-on RPG, since there isn't really a player avatar to speak of if I understand the concept correctly. Would it be possible to have some kind of immortal leader role, like in the Civilization series, or is that too far from what you have in mind?

Global idea is to role-play a nation (as a whole and, if player desires to do it, each and every individual: commanders, politicians, nobles, traders, commoners, soldiers, criminals, bums...)

As for leaders, initial idea is to have multitude of them; different, vulnerable, mortal. And the game taking place in parallel universe, but on Earth. Different landscape, but same physics/resources/animals. Different civilizations, but same eras advancement paths (so no steel before bronze, and no helicopter tech rush).

BUT, I personally love godgames, so in short the answer to your question is no, it's not a stretch at all for me, to let you all play immortal rulers. As I said, I'm totally up to any adaptation as long as rpg element stays ...IF that adaption is what everyone agrees to. Because I can guess there might be people who would want to play a realistic version of leaders.

By the way, have you played/seen Crusader Kings game? The idea there is that you play a mortal leader who (usually) has a lot of influence on his heirs, their upbringing and training, and once your leader dies you just play next heir in line of succession. You can always come up with something like this. Some strong undisputed rules of successions, strict and highly secret heir upbringing and tunneled training, up to the point that your entire nation might actually believe its the same immortal person ruling them through generations. This way you also get A TON of new rp possibilities, and even some character flexibility (if you as a player ever decide you want to spice things up a bit). Hell, even if your leader and all heirs die (due to some weird gm brain lag? idk, I don't usually play against my players) You can always come up with another family/caste/political group/some random sect of fanatics/rogue guild/whatever-your-imagination-would-allow deciding to take the throne, discovering tomes/scripts uncovering the truth, describing upbringing and training secrets. That group of people might easily come to one and only correct conclusion: the only way to rule this nation is to continue with this biggest fraud in history...

Would it be possible for you to play this kind "immortality", or is it too much of a stretch for you?  ;)

I get what you're saying, don't get me wrong :) I just enjoy keeping track of things like character development and views of other PCs, so having those be frequently "reset" or built anew on the fly would be far from what I'm used to. I'd give it a look either way though, it sounds like an interesting game.

I'm interested. These games are always fun in principle, but a word of warning: I know from experience that these games are a lot of work for the GM to run well. I've rarely seen one last for more than a few months. But I won't give up on it if you don't!

Yes, I understand. If I was a little bit more confident I'd run godgame instead, but those are ridiculous, without any rules or boundaries they put too much strain on gm. I feel civ-like game should be more manageable for me, with some guidelines in place already. Also, if we would actually go for several months and the game would grow big enough, I'd definitely try to find a co-gm, or a couple of players to role-play most npcs for me. Obviously, it all depends on how the game would progress, which way we will go...
Saying this to assure you I have a long-term plan for my game.

I am interested in this.

I too am interested.

So, uh... still planning to do this...?

Dawn of Worlds RPG?

Yes, I'm sorry. First I got distracted by the International(dota2) which is a weird one for me, I don't even play the game, but I do enjoy watching international tournament.

And now I almost got too carried away by trying to twist and tweak the rules. And they inflated up to the point that I am not even sure I want to use them all. XD (Thing is, I never GMed it via pbp. We played with friends table top, and by email, but it turns out when you want to describe it all to someone new from scratch, its not as easy).

Guess, I'll just setup the game THIS WEEK and we shall see if I mess it up too much right from the start.



Not sure, I am not familiar with dow rpg, but a quick look at it suggests its not that similar. What I want is more or less civilization (that is sid meier's pc game). Obviously we should have a lot more freedom in civs, techs, resources, diplomacy, situations aka events...

Um, so... need any help...?

link to another game

Here's the link, but its empty right now. Anyone willing to help/discuss feel free to rtj. But if you're waiting for the game, you will have to wait a bit longer... Just add it to your watch list, I'll mark it as "searching for new players" when I feel ready for it. Will post in players wanted as well.