April Fool's
Every April 1st, Tom has made an announcement to the mailing list. Usually, at least some people believe him...
For next year, please don't spoil the fun. If you don't fall for it, then don't tip of the others who do, ok?
Unfortunately, not all april fools mails have survived. If by some chance you are in posession of an older one, please add it.
Troops Update (2003)
[BM-Discuss] troops update Tom <tom@lemuria.org> Tue Apr 1 10:43:56 CEST 2003 The combat system is still very much unsatisfactory, so I have decided to implement a major change that I've been working on for quite a while now: * Infantry Grunts are not exactly known for their intelligence, a factor that desperately needs to be included in the game. Under the new system, all infantry units have a 10% chance per turn of getting lost during travel (20% in woodlands, 25% in cities with 3 or more bars). * Archers Everyone knows that archers really are wimps, too afraid to face the enemy in real combat. Archer units engaged in close combat have a random chance of doing either of the below: - fight - immediately surrender - attempt to bury a hole to hide in - offer themselves to the enemy as sex slaves if only they are spared (they will then act much like a baggage train) * Cavalry Horses really aren't well represented in the game. Cavalry units will get a random combatstrength increase to simulate horses kicking and biting, but they will eat twice as much food. However, large cavalry units will also create dung, which will increase harvest in a region. * Mixed Infantry Does anyone else think these guys are sissies? Trying to do both, doing neither well. Mixed infantry will be booed at when entering any city or townsland, which will immediately lower morale. However, they will get another orders option: "Find someone to beat up" which will restore morale if successful (there is a 25% chance that they will meet someone who has friends and get beaten up themselves, however). * Special Forces Every special force unit will automatically create a lobbyist back in the capital, who as a representative of the military-industrial complex can affect diplomacy and other ruler actions. Specifically, 5 lobbyists are capable of declaring war on a random enemy once per week with or without the rulers consent.
Combat Free Week (2004)
[BM-Discuss] Combat Free Week Tom <tom@lemuria.org> Thu Apr 1 14:56:54 CEST 2004 You may have noticed that the server had some slowdowns, and was even down for about 10 minutes earlier today. There is a serious problem with the combat script, that in some instances runs one battle forever (the others work fine, just one battle hangs, about every 3-4 turns). So far, it was manageable, but it is getting worse. Today, it consumed so many system resources, that I could not even remotely log in to the machine anymore and had to have it rebooted! Obviously, that is unacceptable. Until the bug is fixed, all combat is disabled. Repeat: There will be no combat until this bug is fixed. Since I am away over the weekend, this may well last until monday or tuesday. Sorry for that. Let's all use the time to do some great roleplaying instead. Oh, and if you believed any of the above, then you should seriously check your calender. April Fools! :))) (please, please! Don't post the above into the game. No need to have this run around as a rumour, ok? All in jest. No slowdowns exist. And the short downtime today was because I upgraded the Linux kernel, which requires a reboot.)
New Class (2005)
[Discuss] New Class Tom <tom@lemuria.org> Fri Apr 1 11:05:38 CEST 2005 For a long time, I've mentioned that internal politics and the occasional power-strife within a realm make the game more interesting. So I've worked on it, and created a new class: Courtier A courtier is a kind of merge between bureaucrat and infiltrator. He travels without a unit and at higher skill levels invisible. He can engage in intrigue and gossip. Gossip allows him to learn details about regions and troop leaders, many of which are unavailable to other classes. Through gossip, he can also "intercept" fragments of private messages anyone in the same region sends or receives. Intrigue gives him manipulative powers. They are not as disruptive as those of the infiltrator, but more difficult to spot. For example, he can spread rumours about troop leaders, impacting their honour and/or prestige values temporarily (they will recover over a span of one month). He can talk region stewards into handing him gold from the tax collection (very high skill levels required to do that in enemy regions). His most important intrigue power is the ability to manipulate elections. To give the courtiers some action, they can attend tournaments and they can fight the - requested before - duels. They can even force other troop leaders into duels by insulting their honour publicly, giving the victim the choice to fight the duel or lose tremendous amounts of honour. As a final step, there will be a realm-wide "intrigue level" large determined by the number of courtiers in the realm regions, regardless of which realm they actually belong to (courtiers can be used as a kind of ambassadors and live in other realms). At high intrigue levels, as in real life, only courtiers can survive the deadly politics and all government members are forced to either become courtiers themselves or step down from their positions. Should be in testing with the next update.
Death in BattleMaster (2006)
I have decided to reverse my stance on death in BattleMaster. Let me explain before you cry out in anguish:
One, there is too little overturn in the government position. In the real world, politics often change because someone new gets in charge. We don't have that in BattleMaster and it's a shame.
Two, the fact that you can't die makes roleplaying a lot less realistic. Characters in BM take chances no sane person ever would.
Three, actually *killing* the other guy is just a lot more rewarding.
Four, it allows an extension to the family system where you can now play consecutive generations.
So, without further ado, the changes that'll go online after the weekend are roughly as follows:
While serious wounds remain, there is now a considerable chance that you'll die because of them, either immediately or after a few days of suffering.
In addition, starvation in a region will cause famine which might affect nobles as well, but that is a minor risk only to add some flavour.
Duels to the death can not be refused anymore without a massive loss of honour/prestige, unless the challenger was below your status (i.e. not every pesky noble can challenge a king).
But, death is boring to those subject to it, so I've made a couple of changes there. When you die, it's not immediately game over. If you were a member of a religion, you'll stay around as a ghost for a little while. If a priest of your religion finds your corpse during those few days, you can not only talk to him, he can pray for your soul, recovering parts of your experience for your next character, i.e. your "son" will start with slightly better values and the loss isn't as serious for you. In addition, ghosts can interact with each other, so that we have a small afterlife. This is all very primitive right now, being a ghost is just a status like being wounded, except that you're gone from all messaging of the living and can only message other ghosts (and priests) yourself.
On the worlds where religion is not yet activated, the "a priest found you" thing is currently a simple random test.
That's it, in short. As usual, there's a plethora of nice details, hidden features, etc. - but you're invited to discover those yourself. I hope the afterlife won't get too crowded.