About to dip my toes in the water

Jason wrote:That's what I originally thought Stuart but trawling back through some old emails from Richard, I found one from about a year back advertising that there were three new positions in Scramble-the Mahdi, Grand Vizier of the Ottonian Empire and the Chinese Empire...

Interesting info but before our latest recuit drops the South Americans he probably should be warned:

1) The Mahdi is on everyone's hate list.......esp Lord Derby

2) The Cossack flunkies of the Czar seem to celebrate every victory with a vodka and a jolly sing song .........something about "Next Year in Jerusalem" and being on a mission from God.

3) As for the Chinese .........who cut the King of Sima Envoys head off?

If you want a hated character just take on France.

It's difficult to find info on what colonies (if any) a position might have. The Souther America's are a draw for me though. What's the word on the slave trade though? It looks like the CSA is doing ok so I'm assuming in this world the momentum towards abolition has slowed somewhat. Is there an equivalent of the Aberdeen Act in this game and is there any power to enforce it?

Good thing my spouse doesn't read over my shoulder. The Airborne Vampire Nuns would get her too!

Be careful Deacon then...

Well, I have a range to choose from...no Chinese...curses and naughty words...   

Nippon-interesting as (for work) have been doing research on late 19th Century Japan...

France-ahhh, the chance to be hated by everyone...

The Confederacy-strange, thought that one was taken...

Argentina-I suppose expanding into the West is the way to go...

Italy-perhaps a chance to use those Austrian airships for target practice?

Belgium-BELGIUM??????

Trade Company wise, there is the Tobacco, Western and Global on offer. As to Missionary Societies, Les Coquettes Fervents or Order Le Chaste are on offer...

Decisions, decisions...

Japan would be my pick. Kick off the Meiji restoration a bit early, and do Imperialst Ninjas!

Well, don't want to give too much away yet Deacon..but have sent Richard my choices...

Well, don't want to give too much away yet Deacon..but have sent Richard my choices...

Much too could be made of the French W(h)ine and Cheese Cabal.

If my economic situation changes I may have to drop in and try that.

Demantiae wrote:It's difficult to find info on what colonies (if any) a position might have. The Souther America's are a draw for me though. What's the word on the slave trade though? It looks like the CSA is doing ok so I'm assuming in this world the momentum towards abolition has slowed somewhat. Is there an equivalent of the Aberdeen Act in this game and is there any power to enforce it?

If a territory/city is already owned by a colonial or larger NPC power this is shown on the game maps. Which also show things like railways and telegraph lines.

Unmarked territory is still owned by local rulers who will have forces in place and will generally object to a take over but very very generally these are not as dangerous as the Regular troops of Major Powers.

Mind you some Natives on their own ground may be rather more deadly than the German Navy or the Austrian Airforce and some people have been really, really careless with batches of modern rifles.

What the game has shown to date is that while landing from the Sea is possible it can go badly wrong or at least be a major struggle so if you can land on your own or allied territory before starting a campaign its a lot easier.

Ref the Slave Trade....... Austria & the British have been very anti the Slave Trade in the game.....its the reason the Austrians are in Africa beating up the local Slave Traders (well thats the reason they have given!). The CSA was bribed and bullied by these two powers into ending its Slave Trade and paying ex black slaves to pick cotton.

Think how slavery ended in the British Empire plus a promise from the Brits to the CSA to support States Rights & their economy so they can stay free from the damn Northerners.

I grabbed the "generic maps" from drivethru rpg for the game which show the initial game (I'm assuming the game started using these same maps) but it's been running a while so it's difficult to know if Spain (or Portugal) has lost any colonies it had or how far the CSA, USA or Brits have expanded into the Wild West.

Well...am in...now to decide how much chaos to cause...

It does seem a much more 'light hearted' game than Glory and I do find the way of limiting military sizes interesting. This is going to be fun    Couple of quick questions...

1) Am I right in thinking that you can only have one "Arms Bureau" and not separate ones for army and navy developments?

2) For those who are doing crazy things, like trying to develop airships that don't crash every 30 seconds, how are these developed? Is it at an arms bureau? or is it possible to create an extra bureau for such things?

yes
don't know
you can get your hands on developments by other means than research

Thanks...

I'm just off to engage in a bit of knowledge transfer

Basileus wrote:yes
don't know
you can get your hands on developments by other means than research

Yes as well as using your own R & D arms bereau for research you can also pinch the blue prints from honest hard working traders like the HEIC!

If you are too honourable to steal from other players (or do not have any agents) you can also buy or trade developments. If you can find someone willing to trade.

For the real cutting edge mad science stuff like Airships this normally means one of your engineers is going to have to take a break from playing "Railway Rivals" to work on it.

Demantiae wrote:I grabbed the "generic maps" from drivethru rpg for the game which show the initial game (I'm assuming the game started using these same maps) but it's been running a while so it's difficult to know if Spain (or Portugal) has lost any colonies it had or how far the CSA, USA or Brits have expanded into the Wild West.

Spain and Portugal still have the same colonies as they started the game with.

Ref the other parties interested in "The Wild West" :

- The CSA has expanded in the Old South by mostly "diplomatic" means and now controls Virginia, Carolina & Georgia as well as its starting position. It also had a colony in Africa but lost badly to anti slave trade forces in this area. Not sure what the CSA wants or claims.

- The Union has added the Port of San Diego following a very dodgy election and Ohio has declared for the Union. But Ohio is now occupied by a Anglo-Canadian Army and is at best "disputed". The Union also attempted a Military take over of Mohox lands and got a kicking! The President has big claims to just about everything and wants to keep European Powers out of the Wild West.

- The British hold original colonies and are currently trying to take over Ohio. Lord Derby claims Canada inc Ohio

- Russians have not yet landed but are known to claim Alaska

Basically the Wild West, and China are still fairly free and open for a new power looking for a place in the Sun. The Orient & to a lesser extent Afrika are down right crowded. Indea is the odd map....on paper as open as the Wild West for colonial expansion. But this is the land of Black Tea, Cricket, Polo, Indian Princes & Princesses taking tiffin with Flashman. The "Jewel in the Crown" of Queen Vic where even the Czar and the Emperor of France feared to tread.

I would agree with Stuart. Indea as it is called in the game is just too dangerous to go anywhere near. As soon as anybodies character turns up in Indea it gets killed straight away.
The Wild West is still very open but becoming increasingly crowded. Especially if the Rossians do turn up in Alaska.
The Germanian Empire is even starting to cast glances towards the Wild West, as well as eventually making it to Ottonian territory.
I dont know who or where you are Jason but the French Empire might look a soft touch at the moment.

Thanks for the advice folks

Just working up my first turn. I am happy to reveal who I am, if that's normal for Scramble.

Basileus wrote:I would agree with Stuart. Indea as it is called in the game is just too dangerous to go anywhere near. As soon as anybodies character turns up in Indea it gets killed straight away.
The Wild West is still very open but becoming increasingly crowded. Especially if the Rossians do turn up in Alaska.
The Germanian Empire is even starting to cast glances towards the Wild West, as well as eventually making it to Ottonian territory.
I dont know who or where you are Jason but the French Empire might look a soft touch at the moment.

If your idea of a soft touch includes Vampire Nuns with Machine Guns   

As for Indea being very dangerous I think it should be pointed out no one has yet been gunned down on the Street by a Nun (unlike Berlin) or bombed or thrown into jail by revolting Bavarians.

Tricky to say which area is most dangerous for Characters, I think a lot depends on the character and what he is doing.  Indea seems hard on non British Traders and Agents, China seems hard on diplomats, The Wild West oddly seems to account for a lot of Admirals even though this seems to be a fluke and Generals seem to suffer in the Orient (no Generals killed but they aways seem to be getting wounded).  

My estimate is that the most dangerous occupations for a Character would be:

- A Christain Missionary in the Sudan
- A Non Russian Gereral trying to kick off the Crimean War.
- A diplomat trying to turn the Chin into clients.

As a Fan of the Flashman books and the Wild Bunch I look forward to "Jason and the Dragon" and the Opium Wars & the Mexican Revolution being played out in scrabble.  But if Jason wants to cause real chaos I think what we need is the Crimean War, the French Foreign Legion in Mexico or the Indean Mutiney.

I dont mind revealing who I am - Austria in game 7, Tatars in 8 and Sweden in 9, Germania obviously in Scramble and space ship Thoth in the new spacey game. But I think in the end most players work out who you are anyway, because most players carry over their styles from game to game (even if it was up that bloody hill piece meal in Waterloo, very sorry for that Stuart B).

I've just taken on Nippon in Scramble...going to be an interesting and fun role to play

Jason wrote:I've just taken on Nippon in Scramble...going to be an interesting and fun role to play

Hi Jason,

Welcome to the wacky world of Scramble.

Nippon was an active power in the early part of the game and the following background info may or may not be of use to how you play the game:

1) Japanese diplomat allied with Korea but when he tried to turn the King into client of the Emperor it lead to a palace coup and Japanese diplomat heading for Coast at high speed. Nothing has yet been done about this insult to the Emperor probably because:

2) The Nippon Navy had a disaster in a Typhoon.........clearly lack of offering's to the Sun Goddess.

3) Game started with Boxer's revolting in Nanking & Shanghai and attacking French Missionaries, Austrian Trade Mission etc. Oddly Western Powers were all too busy to do anything about the Boxer's and it ended up with the Imperial Nippon Army being the sole outside force trying to protect foreign interest's.

In brief the Japanese fought their way into Nanking and chased out the Boxers. Then the southern Chin Armies showed up and turned out to be a) Pro Boxer and B) Riddled with followers of the "Heavenly Way" (Taiping).........And the Japanese had to cut their way out of a siege and fight their way to the Coast holding off human wave attacks by outraged Boxers.

The Japanese have a) Their heroic dead to avenge and b) A possible grudge against Western Powers who may (?) have promised support
but then left the Japanese in the brown stuff. The Brits in particular got bashed in the press over this but not by the Japanese it was French Priests who got slaughtered so I am not sure why by the Brits got the most blame.

4) Perhaps because the local Chin officiers and various Traids & Hongs in the south are in deep with the British Opium Cartel......and have banned everyone else inc Nippon Merchants from trading with Canton.

It should be stressed that the Opium Cartel AKA the Alban Corporation, AKA The Times & Punch, AKA the Liberal Party is not the same as the British Govt and it is also not the same as all British Merchants.

5) Do not think Nippon has ever got mixed up with the Opium/Tea trade.......but its a dirty business which makes the African Slave Trade look clean.

6) Nippon has also avoided public involvement with Siam, Portugal, Russia and Germania which are the other powers in the Far East.

Thanks Stuart

That is extremely useful, it actually makes sense of the condition Nippon is in...as they say revenge is a dish best served with sushi...

Jason wrote:Thanks Stuart

That is extremely useful, it actually makes sense of the condition Nippon is in...as they say revenge is a dish best served with sushi...

    .......looks like the title of this thread to going to have to be changed to "THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK"

Actually the June 1856 edition of the Britannic Times has shown up and the above is not a bad bye line since:

1) In Tokyo the Emperor called in his Prime Minister, Generals and Admiral and gave them a little pep talk .......about Barbarians and may the force of Bushido be with you.

Meanwhile in Barbarian Lands far, far away :

2) The Czar's Prime Minister was setting out the Historic claims of Rossia to the Ukraine, Siberia, Alaska etc basically anywhere with good Salmon fishing apart from Scotland.........while his Cossack Lackies (In future to be known as Gamekeepers) dragged another Rebel (Poacher) out of his cave at gun point.

3) No doubt inspired by a vote of no confidence and free of the danger of any more air ships crashing on them the Empire of Osterreich anti slaver finally stormed the infamous slaver base of Kumasi............only to find it empty.

4) The slavers no doubt running off to join King Mongkut of Sima (most prestigious person in scrabble) who's men are busy trying to slaughter goat farmers so they can sale their children as slaves and take their women and goats for their pleasure.

The most prestigious list now reads a) A Royal Slaver, Triad and Opium Dealer b) More Opium dealers c) An anti-semitic, xenophobic extreme Rossian Nationalist who thinks he is on a mission from God d) a Yank e) A tuba playing Junker who thinks he is Frankie Howard

Meanwhile for some strange reason those fine upstanding chaps in her Majesties Govt and the HEIC seem to have dropped off the list  ..........Cricket, schools, £11,000,000 interim dividends what more to the public and the shareholders want?

Taking a leaf from the "most prestigious" the Brits finally spilt some blood and filled US Senator Gov Todd of Ohio and his Militia full of load.......truely a case of "THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK"

I too have recently joined scramble (swashbuckler wasn't for me). As such I now play Siam, and am currently only shooting goat herders as they wont let me have their land and so my map looks untidy. It doesn't have lots of nice S's all over it.   
I have replied to Nippons letter to King Mongkut., but new Government Policies (mine) may lead the nation in a different direction....

Wilderbeest wrote:I too have recently joined scramble (swashbuckler wasn't for me). As such I now play Siam, and am currently only shooting goat herders as they wont let me have their land and so my map looks untidy. It doesn't have lots of nice S's all over it.   
 I have replied to Nippons letter to King Mongkut., but new Government Policies (mine) may lead the nation in a different direction....

In Siam gives up the eastern slave trade, the opium trade and control of the white Lotus Triad etc I wonder:

a) Who will take over from Siam and challenge the Opium Cartel?

b) Does the new "respectable" King of Siam intend to shave his head and employ an English Governess for the Royal Children? First Frankie Howard now we are going to get "The King & I".......just be warned that Richard will probably write it up as the King of Siam keeps Harem of English/American & Austrian Slave Girls.