The Aftermath Player-base

Hey guys,

So we are all in this for a couple of weeks now and I am curious about opinions.

Do you feel your order/the project has enough players? Do you like it the way it is or would you enjoy more characters participating? I would personally love to have more players on this, especially since I have not heard in weeks from two of my knights.

At the same time I wonder if I could really keep more players busy, both in the big events as well in the mini events that are to come. I mean as a Grandmaster I can make lots of decisions and it is a blast as far as I am concerned, but I sometimes ask myself if I would enjoy it equally just being a normal knight. So, to all the normal knights: Do you miss something? Would you like to do more? I don't know in how far the experience differs from order to order. I am equally interested in how each order tackles this.

In general I'd say a couple of more players wouldn't do any harm. At times it feels a bit like a "grandmasters' game", but that's probably because we are currently in a big battle where it's mainly the grandmasters giving orders and the others obeying and fighting a bit. I guess that will be different in the mini events.

I'm quite happy as 2nd in command of the Silvermists. I don't have to bother with the big issues alone and can command my part of the troops independently to a certain extent. We are very lucky that all our knights are active and with the personal squad each knight leads they have a certain degree of independence themselves.

Yet I fear players are not that active in the Legion or among the Eventide and I would love to see more Shadow Legionnaires and Eventide knights on the field. There would be plenty of things to do, like commanding the wings of the phalanx (btw Marcus: you said the formation was a phalanx and a roman testudo, I don't think that's possible), leading cavalry charges on the flanks, etc.

By now the amount of posts in the mission thread posted by Silvermists is disproportionate to the percentage of the troops we represent...

All in all it's still great fun and I hope Mitchell will soon have it continue.

Oh, i shouldve mentioned it better then, the testudo broke when my second in command ordered them to protect my unconscious body, then i ordered them to form a phalanx.




Well, i think my second in command is fairly active, a few posts here and there. More men are always needed though, are we sure everyone knows about these forums? MM or Mordred, you should perhaps re-post the thing into the "power struggle in north" or OOC thread at TW forums - or just make these forums the main place where you sign up etc.

It’s going quite well for me. Sometimes I wish it were faster-paced, but I understand the moderators are overloaded.

About the RP, it would also be great if the orders also had the freedom to pursue their own personal agendas, relatively independent from the king. I suppose that, in real life, the greatest problem the king of Pendor would have to face would be to keep the whole Kingdom in order while balancing the highly dangerous mix of different orders and ideologies.

It would be very good to have more players, but then the mechanics would definitely have to change. I had thought of that before. Here are my ideas:

- Dividing the moderation in areas, according to the town in question, ex. the lord of Ethos would moderate events in his region, the lord of Cez in another, and so on. Players can move freely throught the regions when they are in recess from their orders. This means we would need players to RP the town lords. If a lot of people apply, we can even open positions for castle lords and, why not, village elders. These would of course be moderated by their respective superiors, such as: Town lord -->Castle lord--> Village elder.

Doing this way, Mordred, MM and the others would not have to worry about this part of the RP, and could care only about the orders.

Whatever my suggestion ist, there is the question: what can we do? Will we RP only the battles, or will players have the choice to do something else. I mean, M&B is a battle simulator, but will we do more in the RP? For example: Dawn knights burning villages, Eventides trying to convert other villages; KOTEGs raping noldor; someone gathering slaves, etc.?

More like Noldor raping KOTeG

Marcus the Shadow Fighter wrote:

More like Noldor raping KOTeG

Even more likely both trying to rape each other unsuccesfully.

Or the KOTeG getting red-shaped arrows to their eyes from unseen locations, while they try to shoot the trees down with their uber crossbows of doom

Marcus the Shadow Fighter wrote:

Or the KOTeG getting red-shaped arrows to their eyes from unseen locations, while they try to shoot the trees down with their uber crossbows of doom

Please, care to explain why the order is still running? Or perhaps the KotEG couldn't find the Noldor which would certainly explain a lot.

We can do whatever we want in the Rp. It is certainly not restricted to battles. If you have something in mind, talk to the moderators about it. Feedback for the Eventide has simply been awesome so far.

But back in topic, more players would certainly be nice. It would add more to sense of actually being a knightly order. I'm not sure about the play being boring because of orders. We Griffon-players don't seem to follow them that much...

Oh, trust me, disobeying orders will come with a price.

You and Kamos have actually followed them very well.


I see orders as just the backbone of the command structure, you can fill those orders however you wish. There should be enough freedom in that.

How can i see Shadow Legion's feedback? D:

DiabloDude wrote:

Oh, trust me, disobeying orders will come with a price.

You and Kamos have actually followed them very well.


I see orders as just the backbone of the command structure, you can fill those orders however you wish. There should be enough freedom in that.

Well, if we go into technicalities, I did follow your orders by breaking from the front lines.
edit. Cut out some spoiler materials.

Battle plans change.

I put overall command in Kamos's hands. Which overrode my previous orders to you.

He was angry that you weren't fighting with the other men, but to Darlion you're still "knight" rank, and thus aren't tied down by as much responsibility/duty.

DiabloDude wrote:

Battle plans change.

I put overall command in Kamos's hands. Which overrode my previous orders to you.

He was angry that you weren't fighting with the other men, but to Darlion you're still "knight" rank, and thus aren't tied down by as much responsibility/duty.

Good to know.

Marcus the Shadow Fighter wrote:

More men are always needed though, are we sure everyone knows about these forums? MM or Mordred, you should perhaps re-post the thing into the "power struggle in north" or OOC thread at TW forums - or just make these forums the main place where you sign up etc.

Believe me, they will know.. When the first major event is fully over, and you guys post your reports back to the throne room, aka the TW Boards, it should stir up more interest for people who are interested in it. Plus, every major event will always have a link to the OOC Thread and sign-up thread, so in case anyone after a long break from the TW boards comes back to reads it, and wants to get involved, they can easily get involved.

RPing is overall not for everyone, but for those that do it, it will be fun, and the way you guys have been going is just fantastic.. I think you'll guys have more fun too when your own little "mini-events" start too since they basically just have to do with your Order or maybe just another Order (depending on the kind of event it is), so that should be fun .

As always this is a learning process and it's the first time we've done something like this, but we are learning as we go, and the plan is to keep this going for some quite sometime (we're talking months here, not weeks), so the process will defiantly get more streamlined as we all get more familiar with how the major events are played out and such.

MP

Marcus the Shadow Fighter wrote:

More like Noldor raping KOTeG

Your the man who put his men into a phalanx and a testudo at the same time..... which is dumb for multiple reasons, which dont worry I will be going into.

The phalanx is of greek origin and is a foot mans formation (not cavalry) also the romans never used it, likely because they didnt use hoplons and sarissas or other long polearms. You cannot use a phalanx without the large oblong shields hoplites wielded (from which they derive their name) oor spears which ranged in size from the 8 footers of thermopylae to the 12 footers of Phillip of macedon and culminating in the sarissa which was an 18 foot pike wielded with two hands. To have shadow legion centurions use it is nonsensical.

Then the testudo...... a terrible fighting formation its only value is in defeating projectiles which is why he romans developed it for fighting the horse archers of parthia. Its actual use as a close combat melee formation is horrendous your men would be slughtered. Also once again...... it is for infantry with large shields not the kite shields shadow legion centurions use. The foot legionnaires used at first in the republic large oblong shields and then later post marius the iconic rectangular legion shield. Both would be fair to classify as demi tower shields.

I see we have another history buff (Or war buff?) on board.

Knowing a bit about the past helps when you're leading armies equipped like armies from said past.

Centurion1 wrote:

Marcus the Shadow Fighter wrote:

More like Noldor raping KOTeG

Your the man who put his men into a phalanx and a testudo at the same time..... which is dumb for multiple reasons, which dont worry I will be going into.

The phalanx is of greek origin and is a foot mans formation (not cavalry) also the romans never used it, likely because they didnt use hoplons and sarissas or other long polearms. You cannot use a phalanx without the large oblong shields hoplites wielded (from which they derive their name) oor spears which ranged in size from the 8 footers of thermopylae to the 12 footers of Phillip of macedon and culminating in the sarissa which was an 18 foot pike wielded with two hands. To have shadow legion centurions use it is nonsensical.

Then the testudo...... a terrible fighting formation its only value is in defeating projectiles which is why he romans developed it for fighting the horse archers of parthia. Its actual use as a close combat melee formation is horrendous your men would be slughtered. Also once again...... it is for infantry with large shields not the kite shields shadow legion centurions use. The foot legionnaires used at first in the republic large oblong shields and then later post marius the iconic rectangular legion shield. Both would be fair to classify as demi tower shields.

Who told you I used romans as the great grandfather of the Shadow Legion? Who told you we were all cavalry? I can say "testudo" and mean that it's a fucking red walking tortilla.
I also explained that thing ONE THE PREVIOUS PAGE, which you in all your whatever smartassness could not read.

I'm a history buff myself too, but i'm not as idiotic as you. I'm creating new and using the old. History is not your property, and other people actually have as good rights as you do to use their intelligence to process it in their brains, although in all your lonelyness you propably haven't noticed.

In fact, i have read about the romans and greeks for ten years.

Have a good day, sir

Other history buffs. Plural.

- I'd recommend against letting this little thing escalate any further, not good for the overall health of the board.

DiabloDude wrote:

I'd recommend against letting this little thing escalate any further, not good for the overall health of the board.

Seconded.

DiabloDude wrote:

- I'd recommend against letting this little thing escalate any further, not good for the overall health of the board.

Definitely. This is Prophecy of Pendor, it doesn't have to be ultra-realistic, it's low fantasy for crying out loud. Just don't worry about those tiny nitpicky things, and we'll all get along much better.

i say fight to the death

--I'd recommend against letting this little thing escalate any further, not good for the overall health of the board.

Thirded (is this even English?).


But it is possible to use a more agressive kind of Testudo. Cf. 2'15'' ff. in this video (Red Cliff):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r4qbQCJ9QKs&playnext=1&list=PL3B37901C7F1A6019

There's one more by the end of the movie (it has 4:30 hours, I won't look for it).

The film is great, by the way. Too bad the US and European version had to be cut to only 2:30 because no one here has the patience. It's a gold mine for ancient military tactics, I recommend it to everyone here.

I *strongly* recommend it.

Marcus the Shadow Fighter wrote:

I can say "testudo" and mean that it's a fucking red walking tortilla.

Well, Wittgenstein was wrong when he stated "The meaning of a word is it's use in the language." and if everyone could choose what meaning he likes, communication would be impossible. A testudo is a testudo is a testudo and in military context it refers to the afore mentioned roman fighting formation, even more as the Empire in PoP is obviously inspired by the Romans.

As to how the Legion might in fact fight when dismounted, I advise you to have a look at actual Roman battle field tactics: lightly armoured hastati in the front, throwing their spears (the hasta) at the approaching enemy, then retreating, giving room for the second line, the principes (from primo - at first and capere - to take on/ catch), who were the first to engage the enemy. In the course of battle the triarii (the "third ones") from the third line would advance and support the battered principes.

Though the names of the groups vanished after Marius' military reforms, the tactic remained the same until the imperial period.

Of course no one would hold you off devising a new formation for the Legion, but in that case you should give us a short outline, so we know how the Legion is acting in battle.

And please keep this civil. I myself greatly enjoy technical discussions on historical subjects, but personal offenses are no acceptable means of discussion.
We all are here because we like the same kind of pastime and there is no reason we (not including our RP characters of course ) should quarrel with one another.