Re: Colonize and Conquer

[President WIN]

(Obviously, the point of the DM is to facilitate Roleplay, rather than to hinder a player with rules. However, the DM must enforce rules to be fair to all players.

To that effect I shall now clarify the rules for voyages; this shall also be added to the first post eventually.

A player shall have two options for voyages.

They can either post the intent of their voyages and wait for DM confirmation (which I will either give, or introduce a challenge for the voyage to overcome)

or,

(particularly in the case of the DM not posting for an extended amount of time) a voyage can be adjudicated by a role of the dice.

Ten or Lower means a voyage lost at sea, destroyed by natives, etc.

A 11 or higher means a successful voyage, but one which ends up greatly off course

A 15 or higher gets you with a few hundred miles of where you were aiming.

A 20, of course means a bulls-eye, plus a few (game) weeks of uninterrupted build time if you plan to establish a colony there, or else friendly contact with the natives (your choice.)

Pursuant to these rules, Doomwing's second voyage is invalid, as he did neither of the above, as Mycrodeeth pointed out. (although it's not really his fault, because he didn't know because I hadn't clearly posted the rule yet)

As such, that entire party is killed by Iroquois Confederacy troops who assume them (incorrectly) to be troops from the Mezzo-American Trade Federation. It causes an international incident, which may be a blessing or a nightmare for new colonizing powers.

[President WIN]

Under Lord Kenneth Allbright, the finances of the British Second Voyage are cleaned up, and the expedition is ready to set out whenever it pleases his (her?) majesty. (i.e. You get to choose when it leaves, and where it lands, having overcome a challenge. Who is the Monarch at this time?)

(To answer Mycrodeeth's question, the Great European War ended with the landscape of Europe looking a lot like it did after the first World War, except that no power emerged on top. The other consequence of the war was that who ever you want to lead your country in this RP came to power in your country.

The war was settled by the treaty I have mentioned above, which imposed no terms on anyone, except to stop all hostilities and rebuild; which is what would have happened anyway, because the war was really ended because all the war-powers were reaching an end of their stocks of supplies, and the end of their people's enthusiasm for war.

To 16012112, go ahead. You won't actually get me to put a map up (I'm working on one for everyone's benefit) but your country will get in-game knowledge of the region where you landed, which you can look up for yourself online.)

[Flagmauth]

The British Second Voyage sets off and lands on a new continent. They land at [OTL Long Island], and immediately set up colonial shop there. Lord Allbright (assuming he's not completely under DM jurisdiction in which case the colonial governor does this) names the new city Victoriana in honor of the Queen.

The British continue down the African coastline from their outpost in [Morocco or Senegal, not sure exactly]. This voyage is "aimed" at OTL Gold Coast, Nigeria, and eventually (or with an insane amount of luck) the Congo.

[I say "aimed" because the British can't actually aim for a place they don't know exists. What I mean by that is they will discover said places by naturally following the coast. The British monarch is Queen Victoria as per OTL. In the meantime, as this appears to be the acceptable way of doing these things, I shall roll for army improvement (tanks aka battlewagons specifically), naval improvement and the invention of the aeroplane.]

[Doomwing]

(Hold on What technology levels are the natives at, because A: They had no Trade with china, or any of the technologically advanced civilizations. Therefore there is a massive gap in Technology caused by Isolation. Or are you Ignoring this. Also Small Pox, and that such, are we ignoring that having an effect on the natives Yes or No? Mostly because of the whole "Isolation" Factor which seems to be in effect here. Oh and there would be no Horses, or wild pigs in America at this time which will add even more fun to The RP. ooo and I thought of another Thing too. Chocolate, Crimson, Tobacco, and Coffee were native to only america, same with Corn, potatoes, and Bison. Ah so much stuff to discover. which is funny the whole grand age of Piracy was started because of these discoveries. Hurray for Pirate Nation!)

The Portuguese send ships back to Cuba following an Established route. They are using The somewhat newly invented Steam powered ships that have metal hulls. (More on account because at this time they had steam powered ships for a VERY long time they just got more of the modern style around the 1900s and)

Colonists on "Cuba", Name the island Esperança which means Hope. They name the Colony Capitol Tartaruga on account of a very large Turtle found there.

[President WIN]

Victoriana is successfully established by (your) Lord Allbright. They encounter natives from the Iroquois Confederacy. (See Poll, Above)

The British voyage down the African coast reaches OTL Sierra Leon, and stops briefly to contemplate their options; they can stop and found another outpost, or return with the maps they have to the first outpost.

(or they could travel down the coast further, found an outpost, live off the land, and hope the British don't just presume them lost at sea, but that seems a rather unlikely choice IRL, your call though; you could make the captain crazy...

Your outpost is in mid- to northern Senegal, Mycrodeeth, although you can issue your own 'spot' resolution as to exactly where.)

(To answer your question, Doom, The Native Americans, given an extra four hundred years of un-interrupted growth, (and the fact that technology, learning, and progress are not exclusive to Europe and China) have advanced to (late medieval/early renaissance) level technology, with their own 'natural' twists on some things. Assume iron swords, shields, basic siege engines, that sort of thing. They aren't going to act and fight exactly like Medieval Europeans, because they obviously have huge cultural differences but they will bear marked resemblances (i.e. nascent national identities, a thirst for learning and trade, etc.) which I think might have evolved, given this extra time, although I am clearly taking some liberties. Also, this IS a massive technological gap, considering that Europe is almost where it should be for the 1900's (the only reason your voyages might still be in wooden ships, is that they're still faster, and your economies all have to rebuild from the great war which just ended.

To your second question; no, we are not ignoring diseases; in fact, they are beginning to take their toll, although your colonists haven't noticed it yet (as IRL colonists did not at first recognize the wide spread impact of disease), however, the impact of disease will be reduced by the fact that the Natives are going to react quicker to isolate themselves from the sick (the beginnings of a widespread, if primitive, medical system) and will (after the initial ravages of the diseases) send those who have resisted the diseases to be their primary ambassadors to the Europeans. However, if the Europeans are not contained, if any sort of widespread warfare breaks out (and the Natives survive it), or the Europeans turn to directed biological warfare with their diseases, that will be another story...

As to the rest, yes, there is quite a lot to think about when changing history so radically; specifically, I'm really to going to have to learn some history to provide more detail to this RP! )

The Outpost/city of Tartaruga does well, with a bumper crop of food this season.

[Doomwing]

The Portuguese keep a steady stream of colonists and shipments back to the home country. They also send a small fleet of Four Steam ships to explore nearby islands.
(What do you want to do for Local Exploration. I rolled before, but deleted it until I find out what we are exactly doing for local voyages. Because they are so close would it effect much of anything?)

[Flagmauth]

The British found the colony of Freetown.

[Having colonists form their own, non-gov't approved colony could make an intriguing RP scenario, would it not? Especially if the country the colonists originally hailed from decides to take control.]

[President WIN]

The Portuguese Steam ships discover the nearby OTL islands of Haiti, the Bahamas, and Miami. (which is at first mistakenly assumed to be an island)

Also, Freetown flourishes in to existence in Africa. (This is a colony founded in OTL Sierra Leon, yes?)

(To Mycrodeeth, yes, yes it would.

To Doomwing:
Warning: The following is a CADD. (Completely Arbitrary DM Decision)

For local "voyages" (expeditions), please post where you are launching the expedition from, what the expedition is comprised of, and what the expedition is trying to find. The DM shall acknowledge the expedition and inform you of its outcome shortly thereafter.

Alternatively, you can adjudicate expeditions with a dice roll. Roll four d20s.
The first three are simple 50/50 chances of success. 1-10 is failure, 11-20 is success.
The first determines whether the voyage survives. If this roll is unsuccessful, none of the others matters.
The second determines whether the voyage is successful (in finding or accomplishing its objective.)
The third indicates whether or not there is native contact.
The fourth roll indicates the kind of native contact if roll three indicates a success; 1-5 is hostile, 6-15 is indifferent, 16-20 is friendly.

Hostile native contact imposes a -2 penalty on the first (survival) roll.
Indifferent contact is simply an RP-ing opportunity.
Friendly contact grants a +2 bonus on the second (objective) roll.

Please note, the DM is probably more likely to be lenient to player desire than are the dice, but a player may use whichever method they prefer.
Only one method may be used for any one voyage.

Also, as this is an RP, any time dice adjudication is used, the DM has the right to overrule any negative outcome, in favor of the player, if the player shows significant creative thinking and original RP-ing. The opposite is also true, but I make the foolish assumption that none of you are going to use creative thinking and good RP-ing to kill off your own expedition. I might be wrong, however.

[Doomwing]

The Portugese send a small scout ship to the Island of Haiti. They intend to set up a small farming colony.

Meanwhile on Cuba, the portuguese set up pig farms and cattle farms. They also start to chop down parts of the forest to make houses for the colonists. They set up Three other villages as the influx of new settlers is nearly constant.

[Flagmauth]

The member 'Doomwing' has done the following action : Roll dice

'd20' : 11, 4, 10, 4

[Flagmauth]

[Yes, Freetown was indeed an OTL colony.]

Britain constructs more at Victoriana for the purposes of obtaining local resources and using the town as a base for launching further exploratory missions.

In Africa, another exploratory missions is sent along the coast in search of further potential locations for colonies (aimed at OTL Ghana/Nigeria).

[Flagmauth]

[Double posting as Trey appears to be otherwise occupied. I can relate - back to school preparations are heating up at my house. Also changing the African Exploratory Mission Mark III to be dice-adjudicated for the same reason as double posting.]

The new British ship HMS Dreadnought enters the services of the Royal Navy. It represents a revolution in battleship design, featuring the all-big-gun turrets-along-the-center-line menacing-with-spikes-of-horse-leather configuration that advanced warships in our own timeline. Plus increased range, to account for the recently expanded domain of the British Empire.

[Rolling: R&D flying, R&D army, and the last four are for the AEM3, which I now deem is aimed at Ghana rather than Nigeria.]

[Flagmauth]

The member 'Mycrodeeth' has done the following action : Roll dice

'd20' : 19, 19, 5, 16, 19, 12

[Flagmauth]

[Wow, much research.]

The British make much headway in their research into heavier-than-air flight, with much insight gained as to the optimum construction of a flying vehicle [translation: they now know more or less how to build a Wright Glider]. First Lord of the Admiralty Theodore Roosevelt [yay historical parallels!] is much intrigued by the possibilities for this new development and lends his support to the project.

The Army concludes that as a result of the disastrous war that much of Europe has just concluded, a new device is required to break through the vast networks of fortifications that were employed by the powers on the Continent. Construction on a prototype begins promptly.

The AEM3 is lost at sea under unknown circumstances. The press chooses to gloss over this particular incident for the most part and British expansionist enthusiasm remains largely unscathed by the tragic loss. Work is begun on a second expedition along the same route, albeit with a much more experienced officer in charge.

The British send a few of their foremost linguistic experts to Victoriana in hopes of breaking the language barrier and establishing friendly relations with the natives there.

[Flagmauth]

[R&D flight, R&D armour, African Exploratory Mission 4, Northern Atlantean Mission 1]

[Flagmauth]

The member 'Mycrodeeth' has done the following action : Roll dice

'd20' : 18, 19, 1, 13, 11, 14, 10, 12, 5, 6

[Flagmauth]

The AEM4 and NAM1 both fail early on due to poor planning and lack of supplies. The lead ship of AEM4 summarily explodes in Freetown harbor, cause unknown.

A prototype heavier-than-air craft has been constructed by the British at an experimental center near Southampton. It neither flies nor glides very well but it is by far the best attempt the world has yet seen.

Testing of the prototype "tank" (so called for security reasons, the official story being that the vehicles are for transport of water and occasionally beer) has yielded excellent information and more widespread testing of a second updated prototype model has begun.

[President WIN]

Well. This is annoying. I actually wrote a post, but never posted it. Drat. Forgive my long absence. I will redo the post, and give you updates soon.

[Flagmauth]

[Planes, tanks, Gold Coast mission, Boston mission, Norfolk mission.]

[Flagmauth]

The member 'Mycrodeeth' has done the following action : Roll dice

'd20' : 18, 16, 18, 1, 18, 17, 19, 7, 10, 7, 4, 3, 15, 18

[Flagmauth]

The Southampton Glider undergoes rigorous testing and the engineers are now attempting to mount an engine on the craft. The men are quite excited and optimistic predictions are made to the media.

The development of the Tank Mk I is now nearing completion. The configuration of the vehicle is a rhomboid tank (essentially like IRL) with machine guns mounted in sponsons on either side and a large cannon mounted in a front sponson. A sort of turret is in the top of the tank for the purposes of increasing visibility.

The British missions down the African coast have improved slightly. While no new colonies are founded (and the expedition gets lost, and runs almost out of fuel and food) the ships meet several friendly groups of natives. When they do get back to Freetown (in one ship's case they have to go all the way back to Watertown) the maps they have are rather inaccurate as a result of their misadventure (-1 to all objective rolls for Gold Coast until the maps are corrected)

The mission north along the Atlantean coast misses its mark and gets supremely lost. They end up discovering the Danish colony at Newfoundland! (Void this if you want, but I figured the 19 survival plus them getting lost would get them there). They attempt to see if the Danes have any maps, but as very little of the crew speaks workable Danish this leads to some rather amusing acts of pantomime before working the language difficulties out (i.e. finding an English-speaker in Newfoundland).

The ships sent south from Victoria return sans about two-thirds the original flotilla on account of a large "cyclone."

[99luftballons]

The Danish in the colony are happy to supply the English with a few maps. Denmark starts sending explorers into Quebec, a land the Danish have decided to call Ny Jylland on their maps.

[cheesyme7]

I am Spain.

[Doomwing]

The Portuguese continue and set up other settlements along their island of Cuba, while pushing further into the unexplored island region.

[President WIN]

The Portuguese colonies go well and continue to grow. The new one on Haiti is blessed by relatively good weather, little contact with natives, and rich soil. It develops well.

Worried that the British are preparing for another intercontinental war, other European powers begin to speak out against their military advances, and their expansionist ways, while spies gather in London. That said, the British seem to be ahead in military matters for the moment.

Meanwhile, a rogue author within the empire notes the loss of the AEM3, and writes an inflammatory article accusing the British government of covering up the excesses of its expansionist policies. In the article, he names the officers lost, and describes their families. There is a small groundswell of popular anger. Meanwhile, the second

The British Language experts are, on the other hand, very succesful, breaking down language barriers enough to have simple communications skills. (think about 3rd year of a foreign language)

The Danish are highly successful in their exploration of Quebec, and stumble across good southern farming land. Their population is growing well, and the addition of experienced British explorers, who volunteer their services for a short while, in return for some assistance and the maps (hoping the Queen won't mind their short absence) give the Danes extra help in settling Ny Jylland.

In Cuba, the Portuguese make more native contact with the Mezzo-American Trade Federation. They are now able to identify each other, and knowledge of European explorers has now reached most major trade centers throughout North and South America because of it. The Cuban settlers discover tobacco and more fertile land.

Last but not least, back on the Continent, the Spanish, seeing how even the Danes are acquiring land and wealth, and wary of protestant Britain and the growth of its neighbor Portugal, begin to build ships and eye the rest of the world.

(Let me know if there's anything specific that I forgot to address; there was a lot to cover!)

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