Wow. Ok, so this game was a good surprise.

RTS is a total misnomer. This is Real Time Diplomacy. As in the board game. Yes, it is that impressive. Clearly intended for humans to play one another, as it has all sorts of great fuckery mechanics. You are SUPPOSED to feel overwhelmed. That will happen, and it will never stop happening. The real resource in here is attention, and you will never be able to pay enough attention to play perfectly, so don't worry.

The campaign sucks dick. Avoid it unless you give a shit about lore, and even then ignore it because it puts the worst face forward for this game. It's the tutorial in long form with less information, and totally worthless.

DO THE TUTORIAL! And pay attention! This is the first time I think I have ever suggested doing a tutorial, but this game is all about manipulating lots of tetchy mechanics, and you need to understand them or you will lose and won't know why.

Skirmish mode is the meat of the game. Yes, it has a Westeros map. No, I haven't played it yet. My brain will explode if I try, I think 7 opponents might be too much for me just yet.


The game has a big fucking bar up top. That bar isn't in the campaign and only one of the tutorials has it. It matters a lot because when you fill the bar, the game switches modes entirely and all the rules change. There are ways to unfill the bar.

There are two modes, Peace and War. Basically, in one you can do diplo stuff with agents, and in the other you do military stuff. It's all about how you flip the towns.

The game is really complicated, and everything relates to everything else.

The Rogue is used to bribe Mercs, bribe Agents (everyone except the Lady) and cause uprisings. Uprisings lock a town down and prevent people doing stuff with it. They also send out two rebels that can flip nearby towns into an uprising, which can seriously fuck your shit up. You have to kill the lead rebel with mercs, guards (I think) or an Assassin to end it. Bribes flip mercs to your side, and cause agents to become double agents who don't do their job or do it for you. So bribed envoys will create false alliances that look like real ones, but won't pay you money. Rogues have to pick up cash at the keep after every bribe.

Assassins can kill agents and end uprisings. You will use them a lot.

Guardsmen can arrest agents (except for the lady and the envoy), and drive away envoys from towns they are guarding. They also fight, but they suck at it, and protect Agents. You'll want to assassinate them with spy support so that you can get back to agent fucking stuff.

Envoys can visibly flip towns in Peace and add to the peace bar by walking to the other guy's keep. They are the only unit that can flip gold mines. During War they can't flip towns or castles but can still flip mines. An envoy can drive away another envoy at a friendly town by showing up while the enemy is doing his thing. This forces the enemy envoy to walk all the way back to the keep before he can go back to fucking with territory and generally annoying you. You can't kill an envoy with anything other than an assassin if he's hiding inside a town driving off your envoys.

Spies can invisibly flip towns and castles during Peace. Towns on your side invisibly grant you half income, and both towns and castles flip visibly to your side during War. Spies can't flip anything during war. They can also spot enemy agents with stealth (Lady, other Spies, Assassin, Rogue) and can infiltrate the enemy keep to cause the next agent of a specific type to be a double agent. They can also inspect friendly agents and centers (towns/mines/castles) to see if there is an invisible deal going on or if they're a double agent.

Ladies can seduce agents onto your side visibly, and can also be used to keep spies and envoys from being able to flip a town. They can be assassinated.

Peasants grow food in fields. One peasant per field. Food is what you pay for regular army soldiers with. Everything else is bought with gold, which comes from trade from towns and mines.

Merchants trade between towns/mines and the keep. They can be killed by assassins or mercenaries. When they get killed you have to rebuild them. They generate money.

Stealth is huge in this game. Stealthy units can only act while stealthed; if they get unstealthed during a mission they lose the ability to complete their action. Most actions cause them to become visible, and you have to return them to your territory (visible or invisible).

The last useful units during peace are the mercenaries. They can run around killing stuff while Peace is up, so think of them as visible assassins that can't be assassinated. They can also fight in war but they will get ass raped by regulars in a 1v1, so you mostly want the merc knights to use as roving bands killing peasants, merchants and agents, or as support for a regular army group. They're the trump card during Peace except against a prepared Rogue who will trump them, but can be trumped himself by assassins who can be beat by... getting the picture?

Peace is just a giant mindfuck where stealth and lies are everywhere. War is much simpler. During war, you can see who the fuck is with who and siege the fuck out of them to make them flip to your side. Double agents are still an issue, but at least you can't be mindfucked with double agent envoys telling you they've acquired a ton of turf only to find out from a spy that, actually, you don't have dick all territory. Yes, it has happened to me. Build more than one envoy or you will fucking regret it. Or double agent assassins who fake murders and let enemies escape. SO FUN.

Regular army soldiers are the important thing during war. They can't be touched by agents, so the only way to beat them is to have more, or to rock paper scissors them into oblivion. Or to choke an enemy to death by killing all the peasants with mercs and then spamming uprisings while peacehumping them back to blue bar so that you can get your shit back in order and not die. Basically, you have men at arms, horse, bows, knights, pikes and xbows. Also a commander, the only unit that can heal soldiers.

Oddly enough, the least interesting part of the game is the actual fighting. Competent, but wouldn't be out of place in your average modern CB. The Peace part of the game is brutal, paranoia filled madness and extremely rewarding.


Micro is kind of important, but units move fairly slowly so a better planner will beat someone with a higher APM. You will constantly have a dozen things you should really be doing simultaneously, but it's doubtful that anyone could juggle all that shit simultaneously. I've been halfway puttering and doing fine, so unless you just don't get it you won't get killed for being slow. Honestly? It doesn't matter how quick you are on the draw if your agent is a double; he'll just be lying to you anyway. So slow people should be ok. And it's very easy to come back from a bad position, so the game isn't over if you lose a bunch of towns all at once.

Camera is a little wonky, but the interface does the job. Some of the units in the giant unit tree on the left are doubled up with guys in a way that kind of confuses me, but the general concept is pretty clear (envoys and spies are together because they do a lot of the same stuff). Graphics are ok, but honestly I was too busy being paranoid to pay attention to them or the sounds.


I give this game a shocked happy face, and particularly recommend that people who enjoy a Paradox title (EU3 especially) dive in. Obviously a game designed for multiplay with friends and beer and crazed lying Diplomacy style alliances, so there's that.