This, by the way, is the new format for forecasts, a bit longer and more detailed but I felt it was silly to have people calculate this for themselves every time, so averages are included. I also wanted to talk about what can be done with this info. Which we'll do beneath it by section but obviously the first thing is that, with a couple of exception, all the info can be extrapolated from the first table, which is merely a sum of player info. The second table is merely the VP pot portion for each area (planets, income, etc) divided up by the totals of those things. Income and Wealth are merely flipped to be easier to use... your future R2P1 report will include your approximate VP total too, or to be more accurate, your Proportional VP.

Forecast Report
Players 7
VP Pot 2,400
Votes 72
Military 46
Planets 8
Assets 30
Stock 60
Income 39,900
Wealth 87,384

Victory Point Distribution
5.0 VP per Vote
7.8 VP per Legion
30.0 VP per Planet
8.0 VP Per Primary Asset
4.0 VP per Stock
166.3 MS Per VP
364.1 MS per VP

Averages
Avg Votes: 10.3
Avg Military: 6.6
Avg Planets: 1.1
Avg Assets: 4.3
Avg Stock: 8.6
Avg Income: 5,700
Avg Wealth: 12,483

Additional Info
Sum of Attrbiutes 56
Avg Attrib Score 2.7
Avg Combined Score 5.3
Locations in Play 55
Militia Units 10

VP requirements by Rank
Barony 343
Viscount 400
Count 457
Marquis 514
Duke 571
Archduke 629
Prince 686


First, the ranks, as mentioned the player's ultimate goal is to have as much VP as possible at the end of the game. These are broken between 7 ranks distributed between Baron and Prince, this is not a first through seventh place, five players could all score count. Getting a rank is effectively a reflection of how much of your personal goals and the VP Pot you achieved. There are currently 3100 VP in play - 1000 plus 300 per player. of that, 750 plus 150 per player, or 1800 VP, distribute proportionally, with a current average of 257 VP. If you stay average and achieve all your personal goals that would be 337, just a couple points shy of a barony and most players will receive at least a few VP. In other words, stay average and achieve your goals and you'll make Baron... which is a 'win'. If almost every single VP point in play is gained, and evenly distributed, it would be 442, well into Viscount territory - remember, 25% of the VP Pot goes to individual awards like having the most votes or legions or luxuries. If a player joins, or resigns, these numbers shift. Ranks are assigned between Baron and Prince, with Baron being simply the VP pot divided by number of players - in this case 343, and with Prince being double that, at 686, the five in-between ranks are evenly spread between them. This is covered in detail in Winning the Game

So effectively there are 3 prime ways to be victorious. First, that actual majority of votes to become Chancellor. Second, achieving any rank at all is a win, and third, obviously the higher your score, your rank, the better you did.

With that aside complete, let's talk about another new section, reprinted:

Additional Info
Sum of Attributes 56
Avg Attrib Score 2.7
Avg Combined Score 5.3
Locations in Play 55
Militia Units 10

Everyone has an 8 right now, but that will change, and player will know what the total is... this can be handy info since if you see the score is one less than it should be, based on sold schools, someone probably just jumped to a 5, you'll have to keep track of how many school slots sold on your own of course, this merely sums peoples abilities in their chunk of my spreadsheet. The next two are merely that divided by players, and then doubled, there for information purposes, that average should climb to 3 in the next few rounds.

Locations in play requires a note. Whereas Primary Assets keeps track of all the luxuries and standard assets owned by players and planets does the same, this actually lists all the current real locations, not including Katain and a couple NPC worlds that are 'building', it includes any place that can currently be attacked by a player - homeworlds, electors, etc but would not include auction items, it would include those 'unowned' luxuries and assets that got liquidated while they cycle around to return to play. After the extra raids end major NPC's come into play - Great houses or other large groups who aren't trying for Chancellor. We'll have more on this in round 3 and introduce the 'Grudge' rules then. These exist primarily to keep players from going on non-stop re-liquidation crusades or passing a few valuable assets around for 'liquidation farming', e.g. a couple players select two or three things with a high Liquid Value and share them by leaping conquest forces to one each round, liquidating it and leaping to the next while someone else lands on it and does the same, over and over, potential doing this every round, or even multiple times a round. Generally Locations in play will not exceed player owned locations by too much, but it will be greater. Currently, the players control roughly 40 locations - mixed between planets, electors, primary assets, etc.

Militia - much like locations this indicates militia units that are currently assigned somewhere, does not necessarily indicate how many the player's control but in fact, player's control exactly 10 militia at the moment. NPCs won't generally use militia unless the location has them, so if someone has liquidates a place with militia, the NPC owner will have them, though there is no rule preventing NPC originated locations from having militia, I don't expect some pirate base (poor planet for instance) to have militia, just legions.

So a few things for players to consider - and I think, probably to discuss. Nothing requires players to ever say a single thing in the thread besides a minimum "Here" once a round before phase 1 ends - though it is strategically wise in my opinion to start talking more to each other in the thread, and I should note that general activity is a factor in Prestige VP awards. Everyone is very active of course, I have received about 70~80 NB's thus far in the game and would expect that to be fairly normal for rounds, I would suggest trying to post at least as much text into the game as you NB me