Need help with multiplayer campaign - anyone had success with this?

[horsepyre]

Hi all,

I've been playing WOG for about six months now with several buddies of mine. Me and another friend each own quite large collections of planes, and we play each other the most, but we like to involve our other friends in larger games whenever we can get everyone together.

I know that the forum has run a number of successful solo campaigns, but I haven't seen much discussion of group campaigns.

Has anyone run a good multiplayer campaign? If so, what ruleset did you use? What worked and what didn't?

Ideally I'd like a system that will allow our group to get together semi-regularly and play games with persistent characters, while also accounting for the fact that not everyone will be able to play every week. Thoughts?

[tikkifriend]

Hi Austin .
Have a look at the OTT campaign sub forum thats been going for a good 2 yrs now . Basically we have followed our crew roster through from 1917, with losses naturaly, with each participant creating a scenario, (1 per month) for everyone to play and write up an AAR after. We only "meet" on site , but the possibility of re creating this format to a real situation is more than possible.

Feel free to pm me for a chat.

PS I did manage to get some games going via Skype with pilots in BC, Australia, Poland and the UK so anything is possible

[horsepyre]

I hadn't thought about adapting one of the solo campaigns, that's an interesting idea. I'll check those rules out, thanks!

Of course, I'm lazy (or busy...let's go with busy), so if anyone has a set of rules they've already adapted for group play and likes, feel free to chime in!

[flash]

Check out the OTT Final Months Campaign Rules here Austin.
You will need:
1) a spreadsheet or roster of the pilots that shows which missions they have done, their victories, crashes etc;
2) A way to resolve what happens to pilots when they crash or are wounded
3) List of Ace abilities you want to be used
4) List of aircraft types to be used / become available
5) How they are rewarded - ie what gongs they get
6) How to: Bomb, AAA, land/takeoff etc
7) House rules - altitude? morale, explosions, collisions etc

otherwise you play the game as normal !

[horsepyre]

Thanks for the link, Dave - I hadn't seen that thread yet.

Have you ever used the OTT rules with a gaming group? I'm sort of curious about what the experience would be like, what with certain players being able to fly a lot more missions (and correspondingly have more opportunity to "level up," though of course also greater opportunity to bite it!), etc.

This looks very helpful, though, thanks!

[fast.git]

My local group (only three of us regularly, but a couple others sporadically) uses the OTT rules, as well as some house rules shared by both Flash and Zoe Brain... they work great! We've not had any problems with variable levels of pilot experience... you fly when you can, and gain ace abilities for posting scores on the door! In some cases they come quickly, while in others they do not. Our first campaign saw one player fly 7 or 8 missions, never once scoring, and never once being shot down! By comparison, another pilot scored 5 times over the course of three missions... and was KIA while flying his fourth.

[horsepyre]

My local group (only three of us regularly, but a couple others sporadically) uses the OTT rules, as well as some house rules shared by both Flash and Zoe Brain... they work great! We've not had any problems with variable levels of pilot experience... you fly when you can, and gain ace abilities for posting scores on the door! In some cases they come quickly, while in others they do not. Our first campaign saw one player fly 7 or 8 missions, never once scoring, and never once being shot down! By comparison, another pilot scored 5 times over the course of three missions... and was KIA while flying his fourth.

So here's a question for you.

When there were only two or three of you available, did you fly one-on-ones or did you do bigger battles with the AI rules? I haven't looked into those at all, but it seems like they'd be necessary - if you ended up having the same players/pilots going head-to-head every week, there wouldn't be much opportunity to progress (and if one pilot ended up being successful, it would necessarily be because his opponent was getting killed/maimed every game!)...

I'm sure a lot of people have played with the AI rules - are they workable in games already involving two players, to build up a one on one into a full-fledged dogfight, or are they designed for solo players only? Are they easy to use?

Sorry to be a bother, but I have so many questions! Thanks for your post Christopher!

[MoonSylver]

They're very easy to use. And I know many people use them so that they can play multi-player, but all be on the same side (ie a team of 2 or more vs the AI).

[horsepyre]

They're very easy to use. And I know many people use them so that they can play multi-player, but all be on the same side (ie a team of 2 or more vs the AI).

Good to know, I'll definitely check them out!