EL MYTHICO does not use units of money as a basis for its economic system, but rather operates on an abstract conception of power equated to influence. This abstract concept is quantified in terms of activity points (APs). This means that a character may be powerful for a number of reasons, he/she may have a lot of money, he/she may be charismatic, he/she may be supported by powerful groups within society or abroad.
APs are VERY important at the start of a game. It is crucial that you build up your AP level as quickly as possible. The Transfer order should be considered carefully.
APs are a measure of power and influence. They are required to maintain and equip your army, carry out espionage missions and to expand and maintain your popular base amongst the population.
APs are obtained from three sources: population control, installations, Leaders and Special actions.
Population control - this is by far the most important source of APs. Players must try to expand their base of popular support among the people. Each population centre controlled in this way yields APs each turn.
Major Installations - these are an important supplement to population control. Players gain APs for either controlling them or through sabotage. No APs are received for destroying your own installations.
Leaders - if you Assassinate an opposing player's leader you receive APs dependent on the power of that player (his character income times his rank at that time). This applies only to Hits performed by your Agents, not as a result of Battle with Units.
Each Leader unit generates a number of APs each turn depending on type:
Underworld figure 3 AP.
Politician 4 AP.
Military Officer 3 AP.
Clergy 4 AP.
An Underworld Figure can generate extra AP income by using the Extort order. Extort can be used on an Urban Centre that the player controls (at the end of the turn). It has no detrimental effect on the Population control. The amount of AP generated depends on the player's level and the political Allegiance of the Pop Group that is being Extorted (see table in 5.5).
Investment - The Invest Money order can be used to attempt to generate extra income. See section 5.6
If your leader dies during a turn you will not receive the AP from the leader, also any Charisma, Congregate or Extort orders for that turn will also fail.
In addition you will lose 20 times your current level in Victory Points. Your current level will also drop by one rating (it may return to the same level next turn if you retained enough Victory Points and your level is less than 6). This allows other players to remove an incumbent level 6 player. The level 6 of that Vocation will be allocated to the player with the highest Victory Points (and eligible), but the dead player will not be eligible that turn.
Losing your leader does not eliminate you from the game. You may name a new leader on your next turn and he/she will appear at the site of your Training Base at the end of the that turn.
APs may be spent in the following areas: equipment purchase, unit maintenance, population control, economic activities and espionage. Details of costs entailed can be found in the relevant sections.
Transference
Players may transfer up to a total of 10% of their current APs to other players per turn, after turn 10 of each game. This is done by using the PAY order.
Population
Population Groups
The population of the country falls into five main groups: rich, middle-class, workers, peasants and the poor.
Rich - Each population point of Rich will yield 7APs per turn but no manpower.
Middle-class - Each population point of Middle class will yield 4 APs per turn and a small amount of manpower.
Workers - Each population point of Workers will yield 2APs per turn and some manpower.
Peasants - Each population point of Peasants will yield 2APs per turn and some manpower.
Poor - yield only 1AP per turn but lots of manpower.
There is a limit to the number of military units which may be raised at any given time in the game.
Man Power for all units is drawn from controlled population groups.
Any existing manpower points for a group are lost when a new player takes control. Only the controller of the population generating the manpower may ever use that manpower. Note however that if you control manpower at the start of the turn you may use it that turn regardless of any change in control during the turn.
Exception: Airfields which are not located in the same hex as a population centre provide one manpower point per turn for the purposes of raising an Air unit (only), this is not cumulative.
Total Game Limit: There is a maximum number of units which can be in existence at any one time (around 660). The total of existing units plus the total available manpower can never be more than this maximum number of units, called Maxunits. The size of units doesn't matter, 600 regiments is the same as 600 companies for this purpose - this is a system limitation. Available manpower will be reduced to accommodate this requirement.
Players are thus encouraged to form larger unit formations to allow for the creation of new manpower.
Urban Centre Limit: Each population centre can only have a maximum number of manpower points available on any one turn, this number is usually 2.
Manpower available at the start of the game: Taking into account the above, the amount of manpower available in urban centres at the start of the game is equal to Maxunits minus the total number of existing units. This includes those not controlled by players. In some games with high starting profiles it is therefore possible for some urban centres not to have any manpower available.
Players can alleviate the above in two ways, by destroying other units in combat and by amalgamating their units into larger formations, eg companies to battalions to regiments.
Bearing in mind the Maxunits limitation manpower is added to urban centres in the following order;
Each Disbanded unit of Guerilla players puts 1 manpower point back into the nominated village, see Guerilla special rules.
Clergy players' special ability is checked and manpower allocated accordingly. GM NOTE: Clergy special ability is to generate at least 1 manpower at owned centre.
All Population centres who don't already have their maximum allocation are checked in random order.
Manpower is also crucial to your success and relies on your controlling urban centres, which is achieved primarily via the Transfer order. We can not emphasise enough the importance of gaining control of urban centres and then having a unit there to retain your control.
All population resides in the urban centres. To control the population you must therefore control these urban centres. Urban centres are all towns and villages plus the city itself.
The city is made up of a number of city hexes. Each contains a distinct population group, either rich, middle-class, workers or poor. See your module rules for specifics.
Each province or state has a provincial capital which normally extends over a number of hexes. Each hex contains a distinct population group, normally rich, middle-class or workers. The provincial capital can be either a town or a city.
Towns make up the bulk of population centres in modules which are set in highly urbanised locations. They contain 1 population group each - normally consisting of 2 workers or middle class producing 2AP each.
Villages make up the bulk of population centres in modules which are set in rural or developing locations. Each Village has a Population of 2 peasants, producing 2 AP each.
Each village may only be controlled by a single player at any time.
There are two ways to gain or retain control of population; by military presence or by AP expenditure.
Stationing military units in an urban-centre restricts enemy activity and reassures the people of your ability to protect them. This effect is cumulative with other military units and AP expenditure.
Stationing a military unit in an urban centre gives you physical control of that urban centre.
A single military unit can also exert its influence over one village or one population group per turn. This is done by using a Garrison or Search order. This increases your economic control of the population group.
A Garrison order will increase your control value and reduce enemy income. A Search order does not increase your control value as greatly but severely reduces enemy income. Only land units exert influence in this fashion.
AP expenditure represents any of the following; terror, intimidation, indoctrination, goodwill visits, economic projects, education, health assistance etc. A player may spend any number of AP (that he/she has) in up to ten urban- centres within a turn by use of the Transfer order (because you only get 10 economic orders).
Reducing effectiveness: It is possible to overexert influence in one population centre in one turn. The more AP you spend (in one turn in one centre) the less effective this extra AP becomes. (First 10AP = 1:1, 11 - 20 AP = 3:2, 21+ AP = 2:1).
Example: 30AP = 10 + 6.66 + 5 = 21.66 AP
Stability Bonus: If you have both physical and economic control of a population group at the end of a turn you receive a bonus to your economic control of that centre. This bonus is equal to +1AP for turns 1 - 5, +2AP for turns 6 - 10, +3AP for turns 11 onwards.
In the Early stages of the game, AP Expenditure is the quickest way to gain control of Urban Centres, therefore increasing your income and available Man Power for creating new units.
Population control is assessed on a turn by turn basis at the end of each turn. There is no guarantee that you will control the same urban-centres that you did last turn if you do not make an effort to retain them.
Military influence is tallied to AP expenditure in each urban-centre and the player with the largest total gains control of that centre for the next turn. Influence is calculated in terms of the entire game to date and not just influence gained on the current turn.
Players are told which population centres they control, along with their current control percentage (of the total invested) and the total number of APs they have invested in that centre. Players will get population control reports of population groups they do not control, these will be shown in italics on your move sheet. Informers and agents can further reveal to what extent the player maintains superiority over rivals.
Eg: three players have 10,20 and 21 AP invested in a single village. The third player would control the village economically and have a value of 41% against that village on his move sheet report.
The controller of a population segment will receive a short report of any military presence in that centre.
A running total of all expenditure/influence on each population group is maintained for each player. These totals are converted to a percentage value of the total by the computer.
At the start of the game all centres not controlled by players will have an innate resistance to being controlled ie they are still under the control of the Previous Government.
To calculate the minimum amount of AP you need to spend to gain control at the start of a game: Multiply the Pop of the Urban Centre by the income for that Group. Divide by 2, add 1 and round down. E.g. to control the Rich in a Town: Pop 1 x Income 7 = 7 AP income, therefore need 4 AP to control it. To control a Village: Pop 2 x Income 2 = 4 AP income, therefore need 3 AP to control it.
It is possible that your control level may suffer attrition from natural or random forces once it reaches a certain level. Control of any population group is not static and is likely to fluctuate without apparent reason.
Military units on Garrison or Search orders exert their influence in terms of equivalent numbers of AP. The amount of AP equivalent depends on the Training level and Experience rating of the unit and on the current strength of a unit. The figures given below apply to a full strength (10) unit. Reduce the figures correspondingly for any units not at full strength. (e.g. a Strength 8 unit will have 80 % of the effect.)
The total of ratings in Training and Experience is used as a guide to the AP control value of a unit.
Initially a Green Recruit on garrison orders will be worth 1 AP. A proven regular unit (you start the game with 3 of these) will be worth 3 AP on garrison orders.
After turn 5 in the game, these values will be increase by 1AP across the board. After turn 15 they will be increased again by 1 AP across the board making a Green Recruit worth 3 AP at that time.
Leaders executing Garrisoning orders have an initial value of 1.5 AP equivalent.
The political leaning of a player's faction affects his influence with different population groups. The allegiance table in the respective module book gives the multiplier to be used against APs spent via the Transfer order (does not affect Military values)
All players may invest APs in the short term market by use of the Invest order. Returns vary between -100% (you lose all the money) and 300% depending on the vocation and vocational level of the player, and are received in the income phase at the end of the turn. You do not get any Victory Points from income generated from Investments.
Underworld players have the highest chance of success followed by politicians, clergy and then the military. Random events may also influence the result.
Note: Level 1 characters only have about a 50% chance of making a profit from investment.
There is a 5% chance per investment order that Interpol will interfere with your money making scheme. If this happens you lose the 5 AP from that order, and all subsequent orders will fail, but without lose of AP.
Installations offer an economic, political or psychological advantage to their owner and hence generate income. Income generated by installations fluctuates turn by turn. Major installations can be expected to produce 2 - 20 AP per turn, while minor installations produce 2 - 12 AP per turn. Other installations generate a small fixed amount of AP per turn (eg Border posts).
Control of an installation is held by the last player to have troops there. Control does not pass to your allies if they subsequently move troops into your installation while you have no units there. In order to give an installation to an ally you must use the GIVe order (**). Your ally does not need to have units present.
You need to control an Installation to be able to Repair it if it has been sabotaged. You also need to own it to be able to spend AP to increase its security level (with the 47 order). In the case of Installations that occupy more than one hex (eg an Oil Pipeline or ferry) you need to control both ends of the Installation to own it.
Networking: If you control a number of interdependent installations you receive bonus AP depending on the nature of the network. Details are contained in the relevant module.
Installations come in three levels: Public, Minor and Major.
Public installations are such things as bridges or mountain passes. They produce no income but allow a player to exert control over them and thus over the transport system that usually goes with them.
Minor Installations produce 2-12 APs each per turn they are controlled by a player.
Major Installations produce 2-20 APs each per turn they are controlled by a player.
Public Installations are friendly to all players if still controlled by the government. Minor and Major Installations are neutral and unusable to all players if still controlled by the government.
Transport links (TL) are important structures which link the various transportation systems of the nation and include;
Code
Type
a
Airfield/Airport
b
Bridge/Tunnel
f
Ferry terminus
p
Port/Harbour
r
Rail Terminus
The rules dealing with control of installations also apply to transport links. TLs do not generate any income.
Bridges are owned by the player controlling the hex with the White side of the symbol.