>From my understanding of them.
AOO an acronym of Ancient Order of Olympia
There was an Olympia 0.
A free game that ran for a year (52 turns ) to test the game mechanics.
Many of the players in game 0 played in game 1.
They had an advantage in they already knew the rules very well, what was
important in the game, and each other. Some of the players in game 0
formed the AOO in game 1. It may have started simply as an infomation
trading alliance. But as with any group, within their ranks were a subgroup
that viewed Olympia as a wargame. And given they started with a huge lead in
understanding the game this subgroup quickly dominated the game.
I belive the faction population in game one peaked at about one year of game
play ( 52 turn ) This is an indication to me that by that time the game
had a reputation as being very hard for beginners to enter, Which
may translate that the AOO had a lock on the game by then.
By turn 180 when I left game 1. Olympia 1 Was supposedly controlled
by 4 factions of the AOO.
I belive in game 1 there were ways to get noble points from a
captured noble. This leads to an aggresive wargamer hunting newbies
to havest a few more noble points. Something I suspect at least 2 of the
final 4 did.
Pierre Pero pepper@ecn.purdue.edu