Game: Supremacy

Thread: Re: Brief Review (Last Played in 1990)

urdinaran — 2008-11-28T01:31:25+00:00

Nice review!

One of the big drawbacks to the game, as has been touched on, is the fact that it takes sooooo long to play by the original rules (basically, last man standing). It's been a long time since I played it all the way through, but I remember all the above scenarios popping up.

Fixes -

Time Limit: Agree to end the game at a predetermined time or after a certain amount of turns. This should keep the game from dragging out too long and causing boredom/losing initiating a nuclear winter. This is similar to Risk 2210 AD, which I think is a great improvement over the original Risk.

Tournament Rules: IMHO, the best way to play AND enjoy this game would be to use the Mega Supremacy rulebook, specifically the Tournament rules. I like the "star" rating system; this helps penalize players who are too trigger happy with nukes and along with the time limit suggested above can lead to someone winning through a peaceful/economic strategy.

Market: I personally like the 3 unit limit (Player1: "I'll sell 3 Oil"; Player2: "OK, I'll sell 3 Mineral"; etc.). There are other market fixes posted on these forums, so take a look.

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

urdinaran — 2008-11-28T00:51:01+00:00

- I like the 3 unit limit on 1 resource at a time. Haven't tried it yet, but it doesn't sound like it will slow the game down too much. (probably try it this way if I ever get around to playing it again)

- I like Cedric's idea, but it sounds like it will slow the game down if your taking everybody's bids 1 unit at a time. What if you just have everyone secretly write down what they want to sell of each resource and assume all sales are simultaneous?

BTW: just played 4 turns with my kids to refresh; in the BIG rulebook you set the price of the resources by rolling 2d6 and move the marker from the left. Is that how everyone else is doing it? If I recall, the original rules had prices set at the beginning at something like 500 million.

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

GerryRailBaron — 2008-11-18T15:05:54+00:00

Harae wrote:
Interesting options also your Max.

I want to try the folowing:

You can still sell unlimited as in the basic game but for each resource point you sell the price wil drop so the second point of a particular resource will already pay out less.

I sill think however that the selling should be done simultaniously: All players can sell one pip of a particular resource and then the prices are adjusted accordingly.

We tried both of these. The first puts a throttle on the market place, but leaves a "luck factor" in place, still no tactic or strategy to help you there. It also limits the total amount of cash, no "strike it rich" bonuses. The second one of these totally eliminates luck, and levels the playing field. So much so that there is no competition in Sell/Buy at all! But still better than luck IMHO.

Your second suggestion also brings in a HUGE amount of money. Be ready for a very "rich" game. OTOH, maybe that'll be more fun as people can afford all the many toys (armies, navies, cards, satellites). It removes any competition in the markets, making it equal. It certainly removes the "high die roll wins, nothing but luck". A game as complicated as Supremacy shouldn't have two major phases decided by simple luck. Adversarial competition on the markets should be as intense as combat on sea and land (at this level of game). NOT "Snakes and Ladders" to see who gets there first!

Best wishes trying these out. I have NOT found something competitive that didn't slow the game down.

Gerry

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

Harae — 2008-11-18T14:34:45+00:00

Interesting options also your Max.

I want to try the folowing:

You can still sell unlimited as in the basic game but for each resource point you sell the price wil drop so the second point of a particular resource will already pay out less.

I sill think however that the selling should be done simultaniously: All players can sell one pip of a particular resource and then the prices are adjusted accordingly.

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

xam1239 — 2008-11-16T17:32:13+00:00

I had an idea (have not play tested this yet), you can only sell (on the market, you can still sell as much as you like to other players) up to or equal to number of resources on the most productive resource card you have. For example, at the start of the game, each player has 3 resource cards with 3 production each, there fore, on the market you could only sell 3 grain, 3 oil, 3 minerals per turn. if you get other resource cards with higher production value (for example the Oil card from Arabia with 5 oil production) you can sell more of that resource on the market. This prevents, what my gaming group calls "dumping"; selling all 12 of each resource to the market and getting too powerful waaaay to quickly.

Image

DrGrayrock — 2008-10-22T15:28:59+00:00

Brazilian version

Thread: Re: Oceans Question???

robsonwt — 2008-10-22T02:07:48+00:00

Complementing the answer that was posted before:

1. Since they have the same name, the North Pacific, Mid-Pacific and South Pacific in the left and right of the border are actually the same ocean. When a navy is in one of those seas, in the left, for instance, it's the same as if the navy is in the left side as well.

2. The top of the board, as you can verify in an actual map of the world is the Arctic Ocean. In the original design of the game, it's impossible to sail through this ocean. So, a nave in Barent Sea can only sail to North Sea. But there's a variant rule that allows navies to sell through Arctic Ocean, but the cost of doing so it's 2 oil per navy. If you use this rule, you could sail from Barent Sea to the Arctic Ocean and could go directly into North Atlantic or North Pacific.

The other extreme of the globe, in the bottom you have the Antarctic, that is a huge mass of land that is located in the south pole. The South Pacific, North Atlantic, Indian Ocean and Great Australian Blight all lead to that mass of land, so they are not actually connected. In the Supremacy map, however, this mass of land was not designed, so, you could create a house rule, saying that you could pass from Great Australian Blight to South Atlantic with one oil as if you sail through the coast of Antarctic.

Thread: Re: What is WRONG (if anything) with this game ?

robsonwt — 2008-10-22T00:59:13+00:00

I think the worst part of Supremacy is that its too slow.

I played last weekend in a 3 player game, and we took 6 hours to reach a point where one superpower was defeated and the superpower who possessed the Supply Center of the vanquished was considered the winner. But we didn't reach the actual end of the game.

I think the game can become tedious sometimes, especially in the part where you have to count your armies and companies and pay the salaries. I think if we came up with a way of skipping/abstracting this part the game will gain in flow and speed, and it would be more enjoyable.

I have also a lot of house rules to speed up the game:

- I use the stage order that is used in the online version (21.180 Commander) of the Supremacy. 1- Pay Salaries, 2 - Transfer units, 3- Sell, 4- Move and/or Attack, 5 - Build and Research, 6 - Buy and 7 - Acquire Companies.

- When drawing cards from the deck, we can draw *3* cards for 200 million, instead of drawing 1 card for 200 million. This makes research for Nukes less expensive, but accelerates the research of L-Stars as well. It's not that rewarding to have a huge Nuke arsenal, because it's likely that your enemies will have a lot of L-Stars as well. It will force you to go into a race to build more L-Stars and have a Conventional battle edge. L-Stars clashes happen more often with this house rule.

- I have inverted the rules for tributes. In our house rules, we tax 100 million for each home territory and 200 million for foreign territories. I think it makes more sense to squeeze out more money for your colonies than your metropolis. It encourages expansion and thus makes the risk of war more likely.

Thread: Re: Need Parts From An Older Edition

pete belli — 2008-10-17T22:23:24+00:00

What colors do you need?

I have a big pile of extra pieces.

Thread: Re: Need Parts From An Older Edition

robsonwt — 2008-10-17T22:16:06+00:00

Hi, I'm Brazillian and I own a Brazillian version of the game. This version is interesting because it has Pinkish pieces for USSR and Gold pieces for China. I'm not interested in selling those though. Actually I'm interesting in purchasing pieces to complete my game, because I lost some of the armies and navies.

Thread: Need Parts From An Older Edition

pete belli — 2008-10-17T02:12:16+00:00

The early editions of Supremacy included red (not a pinkish rose color) and gold (not a bright yellow) units. The older units are shown in the top row of this photograph:

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I'm looking for an older Supremacy game with the red and gold units. I'll pay for the stuff.

If you happen to own one of these, please zap me a private BGG e-mail.

Thanks!

EDIT: Mission Accomplished! Thanks.

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

GerryRailBaron — 2008-10-15T15:18:45+00:00

ced1106 wrote:
players should set the market price through some sort of auction mechanic, rather than any starting game die rolls. Such a mechanic might be more trouble than it's worth, though.

A loooong time ago I was a Field Marshal for Supremacy Games. And the idea I floated was a bidding system. Starting with the current spot price, each player involved in the phase bids the next (higher or lower) category of price until no one out-bids them. They then sell as many units as desired of that commodity, and the price falls that many units from it's spot price. That player no longer sells that commodity. Repeat until no one wants to sell.

Example. Selling. Grain is at $1 Billion. Players bid $900, $500, $250, $50. No one under bids the $50. The player sells 3 units, for a total of $150 million. The spot price drops 3 rows from 1 billion to , uh, about 600 million (I'm doing this from work without a board in front of me, and its been 20 years). Other players can continue to auction grain, but the new round starts at 600, and goes down from there.

If I was any good at the bgg thing, I'd link the previous Supremacy discussion where I listed the above with better, more exact examples.

In any case, Bob Simpson didn't like it. Two problems, "too long" being the most important one. So it didn't go anywhere. But it sure eliminates the lucky dice roll makes a bajillion dollars aspect.

Gerry

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

spleek — 2008-10-15T13:00:49+00:00

hmmmm you seem to be correct, I believe I read that as "One TYPE of resource..." WIth the maximum being sold at any given value limited by the # of players. That does sound interesting.... Thanks for helping to explain Daniel!

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

dkearns — 2008-10-14T22:22:46+00:00

spleek wrote:
sooooo....everyone could sell up to 12 of any given resource at a maxed out price of 1bil per unit? It would be an extreme example but this would seem allow everyone to make a killing off the market each turn for little risk.....

I thumbed your post Cedric, but the more I think about it the less I like the sound of it. How would access to massive amounts of capital by every player improve the game?

Glad to have active discussion about this game!!!

Not sure but I interpreted Cedric's suggestion as each player secretly selling one unit at a time and repeat until no one else wants to sell anymore.

To speed things up, you could just go around the table one at a time selling one unit each.

It still seems like a good idea to me.

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

spleek — 2008-10-14T21:11:23+00:00

sooooo....everyone could sell up to 12 of any given resource at a maxed out price of 1bil per unit? It would be an extreme example but this would seem allow everyone to make a killing off the market each turn for little risk.....

I thumbed your post Cedric, but the more I think about it the less I like the sound of it. How would access to massive amounts of capital by every player improve the game?

Glad to have active discussion about this game!!!

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

JohnnyD — 2008-10-14T19:54:45+00:00

ced1106 wrote:
Haven't tried this one, but I'd like a non-random mechanic:

Each player secretly determines which one resource he will sell. One resource is sold from each player at the current market price. Each resource's market indicator is slid the total number of its units sold by all players. Repeat until no player is interested in selling. Use the same mechanic during the buying phase.

The reality is that players should be able to buy and sell during the same phase. Likewise, players should set the market price through some sort of auction mechanic, rather than any starting game die rolls. Such a mechanic might be more trouble than it's worth, though.

Nice variant Cedric!!!! I am gong to give this one a try!!!!

Another small thought. Due to fluctuations in the market in the real world...I was thinking of being evil and encorporating 2 or 3 of these options during different rounds...that may shake things up!!!!!

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

manowarplayer — 2008-10-14T19:47:22+00:00

John,

THANKS so much for posting these. I've been wanting to try Supremacy out with my game group for a loooong time but was afraid the broken market would sour them to the game just as we were starting with it.

I'll be sure to incorporate one of these fixes into our first game!

Thread: Re: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

ced1106 — 2008-10-14T18:37:00+00:00

Haven't tried this one, but I'd like a non-random mechanic:

Each player secretly determines which one resource he will sell. One resource is sold from each player at the current market price. Each resource's market indicator is slid the total number of its units sold by all players. Repeat until no player is interested in selling. Use the same mechanic during the buying phase.

The reality is that players should be able to buy and sell during the same phase. Likewise, players should set the market price through some sort of auction mechanic, rather than any starting game die rolls. Such a mechanic might be more trouble than it's worth, though.

Thread: Re: Methods of contrling the Wacky Market!

spleek — 2008-10-14T13:36:29+00:00

The last time we played we used the LIMIT 3 option. It definatly helped to lessen the impact of going first in the sell phase, but limited the implementation of purchasing cartels. I believe that this helped to keep superpowers from getting too tight with each other and helped with the pacing of the game.

We are planning the next session early November, in which we will use the 3d6 variant. I will take notes this time for a detailed session report and we might be able to see how this variant changes the interaction of the players and the stability of the market.

Thread: Methods of controling the Wacky Market!

JohnnyD — 2008-10-14T13:23:39+00:00

Hey everyone!

Here are some ideas I have used in the past to control the broken market in the game.

1. Limit 3 Sell:A fixed sell of 3 of any one commodity (9 total if you sell 3 of each) per turn. NO limit on buying. This does tend to slow down the game a bit keeping player's hands tied in the market...but makes it a bit more possible for the latter players to not get far behind.

2. 5-3-1 Sell: Allows a player to sell 5 of one, 3 of the second and 1 of the third commodity of their choice. We have also scaled that down to 4-2-1 or even 3-2-1 which makes the game tougher on buyers because the market never comes down very fast allowing good bargains on commodities.

3. 2 Limit + Exchange Sell: Players are limited to the sale of 2 of each commodity and then must exchange an asset for each additional commodity sold. Dependng on what expansions you are using, this can be wide open for picking the asset. It can be an army/navy, spec ops card, one commodity for another, etc.

4. 1d6 Limit: As mentioned in a post below, you can roll a d6 and limit commodities sales to that roll. To clarify how I used this rule. The 1d6 roll allowed the sale of the indicated amount of EACH commodity. For example, a roll of 3 would allow you to sell 3 of EACh commodity.

5. 3d6 Limit: Using 3 different colored d6, the ammount of each commodity that can be sold is limited to it's specific die.

UPDATE!!: One worth exploring!

6. Scaled selling/buying(Credit to Cedric for posting this!): Each player secretly determines which one resource he will sell. One resource is sold from each player at the current market price. Each resource's market indicator is slid the total number of its units sold by all players. Repeat until no player is interested in selling. Use the same mechanic during the buying phase.

These are what I have tried in the past with game groups. As always....it depends on your group.

Thread: Any Value for Base Game Board?

andrews777 — 2008-09-13T23:14:36+00:00

I was going through some things today and came across the board for the game. It is some wear (mostly at the edges and along the seam), but is basically in good shape.

Edit: I found the "has parts" option just after posting this.

Brad

Image

Meat — 2008-09-03T04:16:41+00:00

Box Front - 3.0 Edition (1992)

Thread: Re: Random Events anyone?

Kobold Curry Chef — 2008-08-08T18:04:54+00:00

Neat idea. Let us know how it works. I suspect that your results will be a bit too "swingy," but actual play may show otherwise.

Thread: Random Events anyone?

Hammer_Sickle326 — 2008-08-08T07:29:44+00:00

So, according to most of what I've read on here; everyone says that to play a good game of Supremacy, you need the Fortuna Deck. Well, I'm broke and really don't feel like shelling out the money for it. So, I created my own random events table.
It's very simple. The Marshall rolls a d10 (10 sided die for those without tabletop RPG background), and follows the table. Recommendations, critiques, etc are very welcome. I'll be using this for the first time in about a week with my normal gaming group.

The "homemade deck" is really just a copy of the Resource Deck.

1-Solar Storms
2-Natural Disaster
3-Industrial Accident
4-No Event
5-Economic Downturn
6-Economic Upswing
7-Econnomic Boom
8-Friendly Natives
9-Warlord Uprising
10-Roll Again

Solar Storm- Each player rolls 1d6 per L-star they own. On a result of 1, an L-star is destroyed.

Natural Disaster- Each player rolls a die. High roller draws at random, a card from the "homemade deck". That territory is hit by a natural disaster. Any company's there are damaged (100 million to repair) and closed. 1/2 of all military units there are destroyed.

Industrial Accident- Each player rolls a die. High roller draws at random, a card from the "homemade deck." The company in that territory suffered an industrial accident. The company is damaged and closed.

Economic Downturn- Each player rolls a die. High roller, rolls 1d6. 1-2 Oil 3-4 Grain 5-6 Minerals Then, rolls another d6, this is how many units down the resource moves down.

Economic Upswing- Each player rolls a die. High roller, rolls 1d6. 1-2 Oil 3-4 Grain 5-6 Minerals. Then, rolls another d6, this is how many units up the resource moves up.

Economic Boom- Each player rolls a die. High roller, rolls 1d6. 1-2 Oil 3-4 Grain 5-6 Minerals. High roller gains 3 of the rolled resource.

Friendly Natives- Each player rolls a die. High roller draws at random, a card from the "homemade deck." The milita in that territory is friendly to the first Superpower that enters it. No combat is needed to take the province and the militia joins the Superpower's army, gaining 2 armies.

Warlord Uprising- Each player rolls a die. High roller draws at random, a card from the "homemade deck." A warlord has moved into that province. Now, the militia is represented by three opposing armies, instead of one.

Roll Again- Roll until a result arises.

Thread: Re: Piece count for main set and expansions

Semai99 — 2008-07-31T14:11:54+00:00

Cheers Johny,

That would be a big help

Having a good look at the two sets and in the boxes I seem to have the two basic sets plus two lots of the extra pieces (but one lot of the actual expansion boxes).

I have lots of colours which all include squares, discs and oblongs as well as mushroom clouds,

two resource decks (20 each oil, grain, mineral with the nukes and L-stars)

D2 deck (20 each oil, grain, mineral with the nukes and L-stars)

two lots of strategic forces decks (L-stars, neutrons etc 40 cards 5
levels 8 of each.)

One lot of conventional forces cards but 3 types of level only have 7 cards not 8 of each which wont make a difference unless playing an 8 player game

I just wish they would have listed whats in each set rather than 216 new pieces etc.

Regards

Pablo

Thread: Re: Piece count for main set and expansions

JohnnyD — 2008-07-30T17:16:42+00:00

Hey Pablo!

I will dig my Supremacy collection out whe I get home and give you a piece count for the game and expansions. Give me a couple of days....but I should have that done for you by Friday!!!

Peace!!!

Johnny

Thread: Piece count for main set and expansions

Semai99 — 2008-07-30T15:28:30+00:00

Hi All,

Does anyone have the piece counts for the main rules (I have seen the other post for the main rules)

But more importantly for each of the expansions an which colours should go into each box as I have acquired a full sets of 2nd & 3rd edition rules and 7 expansions with all the boxes (the field Marshalls guide is the only straight forward one ) but all the pieces were all mixed within the boxes so no idea what was in each box set, any help will be greatly appreciated.

regards

Pablo

Thread: Re: Expansions vs Basegame

ctalbot — 2008-07-17T12:27:56+00:00

The game has been out of print for over a decade (maybe even close to fifteen years now), so it's not surprising you haven't come across it. I'm surprised you've found a lot of the expansions; they tend to go for good money on eBay because they've been getting harder and harder to find.

Chris

Thread: Re: Expansions vs Basegame

mikoyan — 2008-07-17T02:48:19+00:00

I bought my copy a long time ago and I don't think they make it anymore. If I remember correctly, I used to see it just about everywhere. If I also remember correctly, some of the expansions were more common than others. I used to like this game but it just didn't seem to age well.

Thread: Expansions vs Basegame

sauceybugger — 2008-07-17T01:50:12+00:00

How many copies of the expansions vs copies of the base game of Supremacy did they print?

Here in Australia on my many travels around the country, I generally seek out any toy/game/jigsaw puzzle/comic/roleplay shop.

From the back of Bourke to Tasmania, over the years I have seen countless copies of expansions in some of the weirdiest places and yet never a base game.

Thread: Re: Please help with this "Shadows over Camelot (err... Supremacy)" variant.

spleek — 2008-07-04T14:48:04+00:00

I like the idea of a 'traitor to the world', though think that keeping it a secret would be more interesting. This could add some more drama to the negotiations and prevent players from nuking indescriminantly (and keeping those n00bs from going all in as quickly). Any time that a nuke is dropped that superpower would be considered more & more suspiciously. I think that 'blowing their cover' would not be enough, they would need to be eliminated by the other players. Ganging up on a player to wipe them out can be executed without much trouble, and a weak link might prop up the traitor government to keep themselves out of the crosshairs. A shrewd traitor could work towards framing other players to keep theirselves in the game. Only when a superpower is eliminated would they reveal if they were indeed the mad dictator....

In Shadows over Camelot how does the victory for outing the traitor work? Is it a shared victory, or does the game continue without the offending party? I am not sure how satisfying a shared victory would be, depending on the # of players....

Thread: Re: Please help with this "Shadows over Camelot (err... Supremacy)" variant.

docreason — 2008-06-30T02:30:48+00:00

ced1106 wrote:
Unfortunately, you don't even need a traitor. When I was playing Supremacy, you'd ALWAYS have a n00b who takes a 12 billion dollar loan and spends it on nukes, then blows up the world.

Ha. Ha.

But if you can create a variant which *prevents* nuclear winter, I'm all for it! Also, get those warlords to do something besides just sit there and buy arms...!

aka. Washu! ^O^

Well, maybe someone can work with this. The basic idea being that someone would have to make a decision a prior turn to be a traitor in order to win. If they don't, and they do that, they lose.

Something here as a possibility. I will let others ponder this.

Thread: Re: Please help with this "Shadows over Camelot (err... Supremacy)" variant.

ced1106 — 2008-06-29T19:51:01+00:00

Unfortunately, you don't even need a traitor. When I was playing Supremacy, you'd ALWAYS have a n00b who takes a 12 billion dollar loan and spends it on nukes, then blows up the world.

Ha. Ha.

But if you can create a variant which *prevents* nuclear winter, I'm all for it! Also, get those warlords to do something besides just sit there and buy arms...!

aka. Washu! ^O^

Thread: Re: AoS/SoE Wallacism fix for economics

docreason — 2008-06-29T19:31:15+00:00

Philip Thomas wrote:
Basic bug as I understand it (and I haven't played the game, so I'm probably won) was that blowing up the world with nuclear weapons meant all players lost, and was thus functionally equivalent to a draw.

In the 2 player Cold War based game Twilight Struggle, if a nuclear war starts on your turn, you lose the game, and your opponent wins. This makes nuclear war much less likely. Whether you could apply this fix to Supremacy I don't know (person responsible loses and you work out the winner from the remaining players by some method).

I am leaning towards an opposite idea:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/322946

Have the first player who decides to become a rogue dictator wins the game if the game ends in nuclear winter. You have it so nuclear winter is a way to win the game for ONE player. It would work a bit like "Shadows over Camelot" in this regard. I see it adding some intrigue to the game on who may go rogue. It does need work.

Thread: Re: Nuclear Winter fix

docreason — 2008-06-29T19:27:18+00:00

I am leaning towards a "Shadows over Camelot" possible solution here:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/322946

A player would declare themselves a "traitor to humanity" (either private, for intrigue, or publically) and if the world ends in Nuclear Winter, that player would win the game. Need to figure out a way to make sure it works. The player who declares has a chance of causing nuclear winter happening if everyone falls asleep at the wheel, but can be stopped also, if someone catches on.

Thread: Please help with this "Shadows over Camelot (err... Supremacy)" variant.

docreason — 2008-06-29T19:22:42+00:00

Reading the latest Merlin expansion for Shadows over Camelot, Supremacy popped into my mind. A big complaint about Supremacy (outside of the marketplace) is nuclear winter. On that note, I was wondering if perhaps, following the Shadows over Camelot idea, you could pattern Supremacy after Shadows over Camelot in regards to their being a traitor that attempts to win the game by ending the world. Call it "Mad Dictator" or "Axis of Evil" variant.

Maybe have the game set up so that you can someone declare themselves a "traitor to humanity" and if the game ends in nuclear winter, they win the game. A player would end up, either secret or announced, declare themselves a "traitor" and then work to nuking the ending the world in nuclear winter (the condition that costs everyone the game). Perhaps also you have it so that the game can also be won if you hunt this person down. Person who ends up going this route would end up not being able to win the game, unless the world ends in nuclear winter. They can lose the game, if they are possibly eliminated, or their cover is blown.

Anyone have any idea on how to make this work as a variant? Not sure the right way here. Having someone simply declare themselves the traitor out in the open might not work. If player declares secretly, then not sure that having you blow the person's cover would work either.

I think there is something here, that may actually address the nuclear winter option, while integrating it in the game. I am up for any other spin on this idea to make it work.

Thread: Re: Market and Nuclear Winter Fix

Talorien — 2008-06-03T22:54:12+00:00

Thanks for the tip, that's a handy rule to know

Kobold Curry Chef wrote:
If I remember correctly, the Field Marshal's Handbook had a similar optional rule for Nuclear Winter. Starting with the 12th mushroom cloud on the board, you would roll a d6. If the result was a 6, you got nuclear winter. You'd roll again for each additional nuke, adding one to the roll. So you were guaranteed nuclear winter at 18 nukes, with a chance between 12 and 17.

I liked that version, since it allowed some nuking to happen without compunction. You could easily tune the threshold number up or down to suit your tastes. For a game where nuclear winter happened far faster, you could start rolling after 6 nukes.

Thread: Re: Market and Nuclear Winter Fix

Kobold Curry Chef — 2008-05-31T19:44:06+00:00

If I remember correctly, the Field Marshal's Handbook had a similar optional rule for Nuclear Winter. Starting with the 12th mushroom cloud on the board, you would roll a d6. If the result was a 6, you got nuclear winter. You'd roll again for each additional nuke, adding one to the roll. So you were guaranteed nuclear winter at 18 nukes, with a chance between 12 and 17.

I liked that version, since it allowed some nuking to happen without compunction. You could easily tune the threshold number up or down to suit your tastes. For a game where nuclear winter happened far faster, you could start rolling after 6 nukes.

Thread: Re: Market and Nuclear Winter Fix

Talorien — 2008-05-23T01:33:03+00:00

Heh, thanks, appreciate the correction

On the other hand, the original wording would be a rather effective deterrent to launching nukes!

Thread: Re: Market and Nuclear Winter Fix

perfalbion — 2008-05-23T01:17:18+00:00

Talorien wrote:
After a new mushroom cloud is placed, the player who launched it rolls 1d20. If the roll equals or exceeds the number of mushroom clouds on the board (including the just-placed one), a nuclear winter occurs and that player loses. All other players count VPs to determine the winner.

I think you mean "is less than or equal to" rather than "equals or exceeds." Otherwise, the first player to launch a nuke automatically loses.

Thread: Market and Nuclear Winter Fix

Talorien — 2008-05-23T00:49:11+00:00

Since I have fond memories of this game and happen to own a set, I was wondering if the following fixes would work:

1. Nuclear Winter

After a new mushroom cloud is placed, the player who launched it rolls 1d20. If the roll ~~equals or exceeds~~ is less than or equal to the number of mushroom clouds on the board (including the just-placed one), a nuclear winter occurs and that player loses. All other players count VPs to determine the winner.

2. The Market

Play as per normal, but each player may only buy/sell 1d6 commodities before the option to buy/sell rotates to the next player (to prevent e.g. one player from bottoming out the market).

Thread: Re: Brief Review (Last Played in 1990)

Rastak — 2008-04-27T11:43:31+00:00

raenman wrote:
I'll take that off your hands!I'll trade you something if you see anything you like.Gm me.
Thanx,
Ray

Tell ya what, it's up in the attic. I may not have time today but I'll inventory it this week and if it's complete I'll take you up on the offer raenman.

Thread: Re: Brief Review (Last Played in 1990)

raenman — 2008-04-27T11:39:40+00:00

I'll take that off your hands!I'll trade you something if you see anything you like.Gm me.
Thanx,
Ray

Thread: Re: Where is Supremacy Now?

Kobold Curry Chef — 2008-04-20T23:56:30+00:00

Having played Rollout once, I completely understand your bogglement at that idea.....

Thread: Re: Where is Supremacy Now?

GerryRailBaron — 2008-04-20T00:50:26+00:00

Um, meaning no disrespect, nor any intent to break C.O.C, but I've been trying to sell my second edition Supremacy, (and matching Rollout), and autographed Field marshall's handbook on eBay. The games are mint unused, the handbook, well, it's been autographed. No one bit, so I've been wondering what to do next. Well, actually, I was gonna learn how the marketplace here works.

BUT, if you're interested, send me a PM. See, I already know THIS post shoulda been a PM, but well, this almost seems LESS spamy then sending you this in a PM.

Oh get this. THE fix for the market? (according to Bob!) Use Rollout to replace the marketplace in Supremacy. Money earned in Rollout is used in Supremacy. OH YEAH! And MY idea was slow?

Gerry

Thread: Re: Where is Supremacy Now?

Kobold Curry Chef — 2008-04-19T00:42:17+00:00

Makes perfect sense to me! Well, when I get my "new" copy of the game and get the gang over to play it, we'll try playing with something like your suggestion. Since the market is my single biggest problem with the game, I'm willing to trade off a bit of game speed to fix it.

Thanks again!

(As an aside, I recall that we tried some blind-bidding mechanic at some point in the early '90s to speed up something in the game. It wasn't the commodities market, but aside from that I don't recall what. It didn't dramatically alter the overall feeling of the game, at least for us.)

Thread: Re: Where is Supremacy Now?

GerryRailBaron — 2008-04-19T00:10:58+00:00

Kobold Curry Chef wrote:

I really like this idea. Did you ever try simultaneous blind bidding to speed it up? And how much did this really slow the game down, compared to how slowly it usually moves?

No. That might work. The game didn't have any mechanic like that, so I didn't introduce a new one, trying to keep the flavour/style the same.

ANY slowdown was detrimental to time played. Yet this one fix sure helped a LOT in terms of winning the lottery and thus the game.

Gerry

Thread: Re: Where is Supremacy Now?

Kobold Curry Chef — 2008-04-18T20:20:09+00:00

GerryRailBaron wrote:

As fas as the stock market manipulation went, well, he never found a way to fix it, and my STRONG suggestion for fixing it makes the game too long.

Here's the fix: during both stock market phases, each involved player (3 out of 5 phases right? oh gawd, I can do this by memory!) can bid on selling or buying. Each subsequent bid must change by a cost category on the market.

Example : Selling Grain for a $1 billion / unit. Player 1 is not selling. Player 2 bids 1 billion/unit. Player 3 bids to sell at 900 Million a unit. Player 4 (jump) bids to sell at 500 million a unit. etc. The theory is that you must COMPETE AND CONTEST the market, just like combat COMPETE and CONTESTS the battlefield (DUH!). In any case, the third party buy buys from the LOWEST BIDDER as many units as that seller will provide. Example continues: Player 4's bid of 500 million / unit is NOT undercut (bloody unlikely btw). Player 4 elects to sell 2 units, making 1 billion and driving the "spot price" down 2 slots from 1 billion to 800 million / unit. Player 4 cannot sell any more Grain. Bidding starts again with Player 2 at 800 Million / unit. Player 3 bids 700 / unit. Back to player 2 who bids 600. etc. It's slower, but it lowers the money and FIXES the "WIN THE STOCK GAME" on a "DIE ROLL" problem.

For what it's worth, Simpson's unwillingness to find a way to make the above idea faster and playable is half the reason I left.

I really like this idea. Did you ever try simultaneous blind bidding to speed it up? And how much did this really slow the game down, compared to how slowly it usually moves?

Thread: Re: Brief Review (Last Played in 1990)

Kobold Curry Chef — 2008-04-18T20:03:16+00:00

Heh. No doubt, someone else will take you up on that offer!

I got a good price on a copy in excellent shape, so no worries.

Thread: Re: Brief Review (Last Played in 1990)

Rastak — 2008-04-18T17:35:11+00:00

Kobold Curry Chef wrote:
Someone here on BGG posted an interesting fix to the stock market rules. I'll have to look them up, because God help me, reading this review drove my nostalgia over the cliff into sheer mania, and I just rebought this game (along with Resource Deck Two) on eBay. I am weak! WEAK!

Broken rules, yeah, but still one of the coolest games ever made.

Did I mention that I'm weak?

Damn, I would have given you mine for free....although it's in rough shape.

Thread: Re: Brief Review (Last Played in 1990)

Kobold Curry Chef — 2008-04-18T17:02:30+00:00

Someone here on BGG posted an interesting fix to the stock market rules. I'll have to look them up, because God help me, reading this review drove my nostalgia over the cliff into sheer mania, and I just rebought this game (along with Resource Deck Two) on eBay. I am weak! WEAK!

Broken rules, yeah, but still one of the coolest games ever made.

Did I mention that I'm weak?

Thread: Re: Brief Review (Last Played in 1990)

Rob Doupe — 2008-04-18T15:10:20+00:00

Jatta Pake wrote:
The game is a great study on player psychology but it lacks balance. One or two players will tend to dominate early through luck and then competitive psychology kicks in. The early dominators will be able to exploit their strengths without much chance for weaker players to even the odds. It ends up that weaker players chose to make everyone lose through nuclear winter rather than see a stronger player win the game. This aspect gives one pause when thinking about the real life nuclear arsenals sitting around the world.

Pretty much. But you forgot about the broken stock market mechanic, where wild swings in the prices of goods mean one player sells his grain for 5$ a unit and another sells his for $50 (or whatever it was). That, combined with the near-inevitability of nuclear winter made Supremacy a game that always started out with great enthusiasm, but ended in frustration and disappointed.

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Festivus — 2008-02-26T02:19:45+00:00

Close up of bankers tray (box insert)

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Festivus — 2008-02-25T03:40:45+00:00

Hail to the King, Baby!!!

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Festivus — 2008-02-25T02:53:57+00:00

Nukes and L-Star Resource Cards. The base deck contains 3 Nukes and 2 L-Stars.

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Festivus — 2008-02-25T02:44:21+00:00

Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Resource Cards (Mineral, Oil, Grain)

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Festivus — 2008-02-25T02:23:16+00:00

Confederacy of South America Resource Cards (Mineral, Oil, Grain)

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Festivus — 2008-02-25T02:17:05+00:00

League of European Nations Resource Cards (Mineral, Oil, Grain)

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Festivus — 2008-02-25T02:09:06+00:00

People's Republic of China Resource Cards (Mineral, Oil, Grain)

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Festivus — 2008-02-25T02:02:49+00:00

Africa Resource Cards (Mineral, Oil, Grain)