Revolution rules
From Boulder-GameDevwiki
Here are the tentative-but-official rules of the game Revolution, by Luke Palmer, Daniel Crumly and the rest of Boulder Gamedev. The original concept post is located at http://luqui.org/blog/archives/2007/12/02/revolution/.
The game needs (at least) one GM who is impartial to the results, and who is also creative.
The game is set just after a violent uprising against the government in a country, some time in the 17th-19th century. It is heavily mythos-driven, many decisions riding on whether you can convince the GM something is possible. The state of the nation is completely anarchistic, and the revolutionaries are in charge of setting up all governmental infrastructure.
Discussion of possible rules should take plase on the discussion page.
The game should support many people, but we run into scaling problems with the catan board and the number of turns per round. It's hard to imagine it with fewer than 7 players; maybe as few as 5 would work if the number of revolutionaries were changed to 2.
Contents |
[edit] Setup
GM: The game is played with a Settlers of Catan kit. In the board deck, include only the standard land (no water, no desert), and add 3 water. Then lay out the board in an interesting configuration of your choosing.
Each player pick a color (if there are more players than colors, improvise; players only have one type of piece).
Either by player choice or by random draw, pick three players to be the "revolutionaries". These people were just in the right place and the right time during the revolution and now have the power to start a provisional government with many people's (fleeting) trust. Each revolutionary choose a water square an place a piece on it. Each revolutionary then gets one food for each non-revolutionary player in the game.
In the same way, pick three players to be farmers. They are allowed to place initially on farms.
Starting at the button (a marker indicating who starts the round, initial position arbitrary), the remaining players place a piece somewhere on the board, not on a farm, where another player has not already placed..
[edit] Gameplay
The game is a series of rounds. A round proceeds in several phases:
[edit] Lawmaking Phase
During this phase, the revolutionaries announce all new laws that will take effect in the following round (that is, right before the next lawmaking phase -- there is one round to let players respond to the new laws). Any law announced may be vetoed by another revolutionary, in which case it does not take effect (this essentially enforces a unanimous vote among the three revolutionaries). Laws may also be vetoed by the GM (and questionable ones should probably be discussed with the GM before announced).
On the first round, the revolutionaries should be given ten minutes or so to discuss new laws.
[edit] Player Actions Phase
At any time during the player actions phase, players may make deals with other players, trading goods, land, providing support, etc. Players may not act on deals (actually transferring posession of things, etc., but they may talk about it of course) at any time other than the actions phase and the deals phase. Players who are not the currently acting player are still allowed to make deals.
Proceeding clockwise starting with the button, each player meets with the GM (and may request a private meeting, which it is always illegal to evesdrop on, exempt from modification by law) to perform an action. This may be invading another land, producing a good they are entitled to, or other such actions. This is where the heavy lifting in the game world goes on. Essentially, you ask the GM if you may do something, and according to your resources and the mythos, the GM will decide if you can, or what you need to do first in order to do that. The idea of what a "single action" means is pretty much up to the GM. There are rules for standard combat and trading, which may be modified based on technology and laws. See below for more details.
Once you have passed, you may not perform any other actions for the rest of the round (but you are still allowed to make and act on deals).
Any law about actions must still permit every player at least one action per round.
[edit] Player Deals Phase
This is just a short "call for deals" after everyone has passed, to finalize any deals remaining.
[edit] Maintenance Phase
Every other turn starting with the third, each player pays one food for each territory he owns. If he does not have enough food to pay, then he loses one territory of his choice for each food he comes up short. After this happens, all food in the game perishes unless properly preserved.
[edit] Goals Phase
The goals phase operates in two subphases. First, any goals which were met (there will be no goals on the first round because the goals phase is at the end of the round) are cashed in for points. Then, any players who wish to, consult the GM privately and establish new goals and their point values, or modify existing goals based on changes in the environment. The point assignments and allowances for modification is at the GM's discretion.
[edit] Details
[edit] Land Types
There are 6 types of land (district):
| Name | Tile | Neutral Roll |
|---|---|---|
| Capital | water | 5 |
| Agricultural | light green | 2 |
| Mining | gray (mountain) | 2 |
| Industrial | yellow | 3 |
| Commerical | dark green | 3 |
| Red Light | red | 4 |
[edit] Capital District
Whoever owns a Capital district is a "revolutionary" - a member of the government. Each capital district grants the owner a "personal militia", which is equivalent to a single unit of swordsmen (the base military type) at the beginning of each round. These are used and spent just like other military units, except that they may not be traded.
[edit] Agricultural District
An Agricultural district grants the owner the ability to produce food. The initial food technology can produce one unit of food per Agricultural district per round. Food is produced as an action during the action phase, and goes to the owner's hand (to distribute / trade freely).
[edit] Mining District
A Mining district grants the owner the ability to produce various raw materials necessary for manufacturing. Initially you may produce two units of steel per round, as well as other easily-accessible materials such as coal, wood, and stone. What can and cannot be produced based on your technology is decided by the GM.
[edit] Industrial District
An Insustrial district grants the owner the ability to produce goods directly, as well as to build research facilities and other structures. For example, an industrial district can convert one unit of steel into swords to arm one unit of (the implicit, infinite resource of) soldiers. The industrial district may also use resources to build buildings, including churches, research facilities, etc., the effects and costs of which are determined by the GM. Buildings may be built anywhere; in other players' territories if permission is given.
[edit] Commercial District
Commercial districts are trading posts, internally and overseas. They allow you to convert between resources at rates determined by the global economy (read: the GM). For each commercial district owned, you may make one trade: that is, either the number of items you paid or the number of items you received is equal to one. If you own four districts, for example, you may make four trades.
[edit] Red Light District
The Red Light District is an underground, las-vegas style district housing mobsters, thugs, prostitutes, etc. It allows the owner to produce most resources in small quantities, to employ criminally-experienced thugs, and to perform covert law-breaking. This is the way for you to do sneaky things, and what is possible is essentially up to the GM.
[edit] Laws and Cheating
Private discussion is allowed between players. It is not (initally) illegal to evesdrop on these discussions, except for private discussions with the game master. The necessary privacy of discussions with the game master may not be changed by any law.
Pieces on the board may not be moved without the GM's consent (except through a trade of ownership, where both parties agree). That is, no cheating on the board!
Goods markers (chips and cards) belong to whoever possesses them. Stealing people's untended game pieces, goods markers, etc., is against the rules. The "government" is not a separate entity and cannot (initally) own anything; all governmental assets simply belong to individual revolutionaries. For example, a law that says "all food goes to the government" is ill-formed at the beginning of the game, because "the government" cannot have food; instead it must be specified how it is divided among the revolutionaries. A law may be passed to make the government an entity which can have resources, however.
Laws may change any game dynamic in this rule book unless it is explicitly marked as unchangable. This rule book and the vocabulary in it should provide a good framework in which to state laws precisely (hopefully the game master will detect ambiguities in laws and ask for clarification).
Any laws that are in effect are considered hard-and-fast game rules (except when considering Red Light Districts, see below), and breaking them at any point causes the game master to rain his wrath upon you. I encourage the game master to simply undo the action where possible, however, to raise the tolerance for misunderstandings.
Laws should be considered reasonable for a government to be able to do; laws that, for example, create resources out of thin air are illegal (and will certainly be "vetoed" by the GM).
[edit] Political Uprising
During the action phase, several players may simultaneously come to the GM to perform an action together (it must be one of the players' turns). One of the things players may do together is to try to overturn the government. The number of players, their resources, the resources and actions of the government, and other factors are considered by the GM to give an odds of success. The players may choose to back down and do nothing or to continue the uprising. Dice are is rolled for each territory the players involved own. The dynamics of uprising, including initiation and consequences, may not be changed by any law.
An example of odds could be: "4 or better support, 2 or worse the territory is lost; you need 6 territories to support the uprising to succeed." If the uprising succeeds, lost territories by the roll are still lost. A player may die if he loses all his territories during an uprising (as well as any other time).
If the uprising succeeds, then all the current revolutionaries lose their captiol districts and all their military units. All laws in place are revoked. Three of the uprisers are randomly selected and are allowed to choose the capital districts (or resort to random if there is contention). The round immediately skips to the goals phase, where anyone including the uprisers may claim goals. Then the uprisers, the new revolutionaries, lose all their goal cards and begin the next round with the lawmaking phase without any goal cards. The game proceeds from there as normal.
If there are fewer than three uprisers, each upriser still only gets one capital district. The others become neutral, belonging to the next person to invade them.
[edit] Combat
Combat may be initiated against any territory adjacent to a territory the initiating player owns. It may also be initiated against nonadjacent territories if there is a path between one the intiating player owns and the target such that all the owners on the path allow passage of the army. Neutral territories never allow passage.
Each player independently chooses to commit a number of units to the battle. They are turned up, and then each player rolls a die. If the attacker's number is higher than the defender's, then the defender loses a unit. Otherwise (including in a case of tie) the attacker loses a unit. At any point, the attacker may retreat, in which case he does not take the territory but loses no more units; the defender may surrender, in which case he gives up the territory and loses no more units. A unit or unit stack may only be committed to one territory per round; so units may not be reused until the next round.
Combat against a neutral territory counts as combat of a single unit who always rolls the number indicated in the "land types" table above.
This is for the base swordsman type, and should be used as a template for other types, but the GM is free to vary the dynamics for other types of unit.
[edit] Death
If a player loses all of his territories, he loses all of his resources and current goals (which he has not yet completed). No points are lost. At the beginning of the next round, he may pick a neutral territory and claim it. He'll set new goals during the goal phase of the next round. If there are no neutral territories left, the revolutionaries unanimously choose a territory and annex it to him. If the government can not decide, then the GM chooses one.
