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CYOF classic

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Post Tue Apr 11, 2006 12:47 pm

CYOF classic

The glory days of CYOF are about to make a return. For those of you not familliar with our little game, Controll Your Own Faction is a text game where you take controll of a freelancer faction and attempt to lead them to victory. The orginal CYOF appeared about 2 years ago and has since gone through a number of refinements and mutations. Due to a number of different causes, the two schools of thought on how the game should be drifted appart. For those who didn't want to bother with complex strategy and crunching numbers, athena's version of CYOF became the haven. WW2jacob and company set up a website that had several further strategic focused versions.

With the development of several important tools such as the battle calculator and the random number generator, It is finally time for the golden age of CYOF to rise from the ashes. I have taken the rules from version 5 and made changes to allow a number of new features that are now possible thanks to the rapid resolution of battles and other random controlled events. I have also brought back the 5 commodity economy from version 3.

I invite everyone to take a look at the links I have provided below and give me your feedback. If people are interested, I will try to get things up and running again.

Rules

Turn Calculator

Battle Calculator

Random Number Generator

Base list

Interactive map of the freelancer universe
Edited by - vorticaldwarf on 4/20/2006 4:51:53 PM



Edited by - vorticaldwarf on 4/26/2006 12:56:51 PM

Post Tue Apr 11, 2006 10:10 pm

I'd love to see CYOF come back again, but I have one question

In the Rules it states that to be a House you need three awards, a major faction needs two awards and a medium faction needs one award. Do you actually mean awards like the Diplomacy Award or ranks, like Veteran and Ace?

Post Wed Apr 12, 2006 4:20 am

To play larger factions you need to earn the awards like diplomacy. However, since every faction class will have 3 awards every round, as well as 3 overall winners, it won't take long to move people through the ranks. You are right however, that is a section I have to clarify a bit.

Also, in terms of the factions you can play, everyone will start at square 1 regardless of previous experience (the idea is to have people using some of the small factions that never get played). Previous CYOF experienced will still count though when it comes to applying for a leadership position like a rulemaster or judge.

I keep watching the thread, if I can get at least 5 or 6 interested people we can get a preliminary test round started.

Post Wed Apr 12, 2006 3:45 pm

Hey, it's GREAT to see you're willing to pick up CYOF again!

I like the new set of rules you made, and I think it will go well. Sadly, I just don't have the time to devote to this anymore, as I'm modding and running a server now. I'd be happy to take on an advisory role of some kind, but vorticaldwarf can take the admin position and run things.

Anyways, I really applaud you for making the calculator, and I wish you best of luck with this.

Post Thu Apr 13, 2006 4:29 am

Thanks. I know what you mean, I don't know if I will actually have time to play myself, so I will probably act as one of the game's non-playing admins.

Post Thu Apr 13, 2006 5:45 pm

Ok, thanks for clarifying. Should be an interesting game, since the Houses and big factions will be out of it

Post Fri Apr 14, 2006 5:02 pm

Count me in.

Post Sat Apr 15, 2006 1:52 am

Do I understand it correctly that everyone can for now choose only Minor Factions? And that are factions with only one starting base?

To be even more exact, only those factions:

Border World Exports (Bowex)
Bundschuh
Farmers Alliance
Gaians
Gateway Shipping
Golden Chrysanthemus (GC)
Hogosha
Landwirtsrechtbewegung (LWB )
Mollys
Synth Foods
Unioners
and Universal Shipping?

2nd, not to be rude or anything, but the rules seem *very* complicated even to me, it must be very hard to a starting player. The manual contradicts itself in some places, and some things are not really well explained. I hope at least the calculator doesn't have any errors in it. I liked the older and simpler rules of 5.0 and 6.0 more. I think that most of new players will drop after several first rounds because they won't understand it at all and all the veterans will be overwhelming them.

Regardless, I'll join in, faction to be decided later.

<edit> half of faction classes are missing in the calc, including Miners. Miner bonus isn't included at all.

Edited by - Lord Emperor on 4/15/2006 2:56:46 AM

Edited by - Lord Emperor on 4/15/2006 2:57:17 AM

Post Sat Apr 15, 2006 2:25 pm

Actually, Lord Emperor has raised a good point. How are we going to get a game of CYOF working well if we only have those factions, no houses and no pirates? Maybe we should revert to the old ranking system for one or two games, until we have a few people with awards.

Post Mon Apr 17, 2006 9:02 am

Actually, he answered his own question. The idea is that everyone starts out with a very small faction to minimize the level of difficulty. As the player master's the rules, they will be able to move on to the larger factions. Eventually, there will hopefully be a mix of old players in the large factions and new recruits learning the ropes in the smaller factions.

Also, please keep the feed-back constructive. I realize that there are still problems in the calculator and the rules. The purpose of this thread is to let prospective players look at everything so that I can correct any issues they find before the game gets underway.

So instead of complaining emporer, please give me specific locations in the rules where you found problems. As for the income calculator, It is not perfect yet. If there are bonuses that it does not cover, I will eventually have to fix it, for now players will have to do certain things maually.

Post Mon Apr 17, 2006 9:44 am

The claculator has been updated to include the miner bonus.

Post Mon Apr 17, 2006 1:46 pm

Sorry for the harsh words. I've gone through the whole document and pointed out the mistakes I found. My comments/edits are in red. If you have some questions, feel free to e-mail me or ask here.

cyof5rules_edited.doc

Edited by - Lord Emperor on 4/17/2006 2:47:20 PM

Post Mon Apr 17, 2006 4:47 pm

Wow. Any harsh words are more than made up for. This revision is excelent, I couldn't have asked for a better proofread.

What I think I will do is edit the minor issues and create a Q&A section at the end to adress rules that need to be clarified rather than revised. Once again, thank you for the editing.

Post Mon Apr 17, 2006 5:14 pm

Thanks. If you want, I can check the calculator too for any errors (well, I'll do that anyway, but it's always good to ask ;-) )

Also I've had an idea: maybe you (or I) could sum it all up for new players, leave out all the technical details, and write a second very simple 'how to' guide. For example, the section on secrecy could look like: (compare this to according section of the manual)


Secrecy is another action that may be used in this part of the turn. There are a number of secret bases in Sirius, or bases that are known by only a few people. These bases must be found before they can be attacked or blitzed. The bases are:

<bases list>

In order to find a secret base, you need to send some ships looking for it. You choose the fleet to search for the base, and the base to search. Your search can end in the following ways:
- Your entire fleet is lost in space and never heard from again.
- Your fleet doesn't find the base and returns safely home.
- Your fleet finds the base, and returns without any problems. The base's location is now known to you, you can attack or blitz it.
- Your fleet finds the base, but is enganged by enemy force. Now, multiple things can happen:
-> Your ships defeat the enemy force stationed there. You can try to capture or destroy the base and its location is now known to you.
-> Some of your ships retreat from the battle. You now know the location of the base.
-> Entire your fleet is wiped out by the enemy. The base remains hidden.


New players don't need to know all the details about chances, random numbers, or what is used to calculate what. All that is needed is 'how do I build a base?' or 'how can I defend myself against raids?' - just the simple things to understand what's going on.

Edited by - Lord Emperor on 4/17/2006 6:25:26 PM

Post Mon Apr 17, 2006 9:14 pm

I'd like to give it a shot....

bIleSmeh DaH DuDorjaj yo' qij Dujmey!

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