Although he's got a cohesive proposal, I think he's missed a little bit of the
point - limit the number of interesting units. In the current scheme everyone
has got tons of units. I would bet a very large number of them are in stacks
containing at least one unit of just one man. So, although the plan does
add the concept of a trained labor pool, I don't think there's that much change
to the game.
The percieved problem in Olympia that I believe motivated the Brave New thread
is that things are too impersonal, with large factions and little need for much
player interaction, because if you want to do something, form the units and
do it. The COMPANIONS/HOARDS split that is evolving tries to solve this by
strongly limiting the number of interesting units there are. Each faction would
consist of <8 interesting units, with most factions at about 3-5, and each
interesting unit might have a bunch of men at his beck and call. What this
means is that no faction can do everything necessary to get ahead. If you
want to go dungeon-delving, you'll need a couple warriors, someone with good
OBSERVATION to see traps, someone with good STEALTH to swipe the gold from
the dragon, and a Mage to cure poison/heal. You're up to about 7 men, more than
any but the oldest factions, so you'll have to have friends to go spelunking.
Want to become a weaponsmith? Well, you'll need 1 man to train in
WEAPONSMITHING, another to train in MINING, 2 warriors as bodyguards, one
explorer to find and recruit GNOMES and DWARVES to help in the efforts. Again,
more than many factions.
Scott Hauck