Customs

Forced Customs is a Risk Universalis game that invites players to diverge from history and create their own non-historical nations.

+ Rules

Rules Overview:

All Main risk rules apply unless they contradict any of the following rules:

Nations may not be named after real locations, cultures, or religions. This includes rivers and regions as well.
Custom nations may resemble any real-world nation, border-wise, if it makes geographic sense.
- - Players should aim to be as original as possible in border creation and refrain from imitating modern or historical borders.
Custom states of excessive size, known as hegemonies, require sufficient lore/reasoning to exist. The concept of excessive size should be based on historical precedent in a region.
- - The player of the hegemonic custom must roleplay the consequences of their nation’s size.
  - In other words, hegemonies are not banned. Instead, nations deemed as hegemonies by staff should have sufficient lore/reasoning for their nation’s significant size and influence.
Custom nations must have three major changes from the nations that existed in the area in the respective era.
A Custom nation is required to have textboxes to provide information of the nation and all customs are obligated to claim their nation using the UI feature.
Lores may only dictate what goes on in the player's custom, not others. They may not be alternate history timelines of real political entities, moreover, controversial lores can only be approved through a server vote.

+ Nation Setup

Textboxes

A custom nation is required to have text boxes (or the nation UI) that indicate the government, language (or culture), and religions. Furthermore, all players are obligated to claim their custom nations using the Country UI.

Nation Rules

Custom nations must differ significantly from the nations that existed in the area during the respective era in at least three of the following aspects: Language, culture, government, ethnicity, or religion.

A custom may not utilize any real people including generals and kings.
A custom's name can not be based on any real-life language, culture, location, or person. You are not allowed to name yourself after your username.
Using the language or culture local to the region you are playing in but disguising it under a unique name does not count as a custom aspect (e.g., playing as a custom in France and claiming your culture is Maissionan when in practice it’s just French).

Lore Guidelines

Lores cannot simply be alternate history timelines of real political entities or their successor states, though inspiration from real-life events is allowed.
Lores can only fundamentally dictate what goes on in the player's custom and not those of others.
- - This Rule is void if a server is being hosted.
  - Lores themselves, however, should make sense with the lores of nearby, pre-existing players. This can be done either by a Staff ruling or through compromise between players.

+ Hegemonies

There are several rules surrounding hegemonies. Firstly, a hegemony can be described as a nation of excessive size that is politically, economically, and militarily superior to its neighbors. The rules surrounding hegemonies are as follows:

A hegemony may not be excessively large to the point where it is discourteous to those who also wish to play in the area.
A hegemonic custom must provide a reasonable lore justifying its' size.
The player of the hegemonic custom must roleplay the consequences of their nation’s size.
A server vote must be conducted following staff approval of the hegemon's lore, this vote must reap an approval of 55% if the hegemon is to be allowed.

+ Bonuses

Bonuses can be utilized in Customs when you are deserving of an advantage, you may be deserving for a multitude of reasons. To understand the bonuses you must also understand the difference between (d12) and (d20); (d12) means you are rolling the dice out of 12 and (d20) means you are rolling the dice out of 20. The result of the dice is used to dictate the outcome of the event (e.g. a battle).

You may gain bonuses due to roleplayed tactics in customs this is limited to a maximum of +2 (d12) and a +3 (d20).
Cities may also have bonuses. Walled cities, either historically fortified or roleplayed, also have a maximum bonus of +2(d12) and +3 (d20)
General bonuses are allowed, if a General wins 7 battles they earn a +1 bonus (d12) or +2(d20), if win 21 battles a general can earn a bonus of +2 (d12) and +3 (d20)
Generals with a bonus can be killed through roleplay and rolling if their opponent defeats them 3/0 or 5/0.
Staff utilising gamemaster perms may automatically create generals in an impartial manner with pre-existing bonuses.
Staff utilising gamemaster permissions may also utilise events and "tide-of-war" (see gamemaster permissions section below) bonuses to manufacture bonuses during roleplay.
Senior Moderator+ may approve larger bonuses within reason than the ones stated here.

+ Clarifications

The following clarifications are additional rules that don't fit in any other section.

The only alternative eras besides alternative historical dates are Post-Apocalypse and Shattered World (including America Universalis). All other eras that require the existence of real nations or their successors such as Kaiserreich and Man in the High Castle are banned.
Votes to enact a scenario that greatly alters the entire history of the server can occur before a roleplay begins, but it must be realistic and have a defined timeline. If a scenario does not meet both requirements, then it cannot be put to the vote.
Retired Staff can, but aren’t obligated to moderate in FC, and may not overrule Moderators.
Holy Roman Empire customs in Germany are forbidden.
Staff members are allowed to use “Gamemaster Permissions”, granting the ability to create events for players to roleplay around (see Gamemaster permissions below for more information).

+ Gamemaster Permissions

Gamemaster perms include the ability to create events or bonuses to guide roleplay. In Customs, gamemaster perms can be utilized both to trigger and guide roleplay. This includes the creation of events such as forced crusades, world wars, and revolutions. They can also be used to create General-Bonuses (GB) or Tide-of-War (TOW) bonuses.

General Rules:

There must be a vote regarding the event/general in question.
- The vote must have a majority to pass.
- The vote must explicitly state what the event will be and, if needed, where.
- This vote must be logged in the Riskord.
If the event affects a specific nation (for example it is the target of a coalition or the origin of revolution) then the player must first give their consent.
The Gamemaster is not allowed to target any one player with a war.
- In the case of a crusade, the Gamemaster is allowed to target a non-Christian hegemon (e.g. a caliphate) with their consent.
- In the case of a coalition, the nation must be strong enough to defend itself and the gamemaster must guarantee the war is fair.
  - The player being attacked by the coalition may have General-Bonuses.
  - The player being attacked by the coalition must have player generals to assist them so that both sides have an equal/fair number of players.
  - The player may initially have a positive TOW bonus.
Gamemasters must be impartial when using gamemaster perms.
- The Gamemaster may not grant General-Bonuses to their friends.
- The Gamemaster may not use gamemaster perms to manufacture events that benefit yourself or a friend's nation.
- In the case of coalitions or crusades both sides must have an equal/fair number of players.
  - To even it out player-generals can be enlisted to assist the nations with a disadvantaged number of players.
All events must be made clear in an announcement.
- The Gamemaster must also add it to the “Additional Information” box (while the event is ongoing).

+ Tide Of War

The creation of bonuses, like in historical, to guide the war to being more fair and unpredictable. The Gamemaster can give bonuses based off of season, terrain, over-extension or home-advantage. Both sides will have time to have this bonus. For example in historical/public Germany has an initial bonus in world war 1, this would be an example of a TOW Bonus. They can only be positive bonuses. These bonuses do not require a server vote.

These bonuses must be distributed sparingly and impartially.
Misusing the bonus is falls under Admin Abuse and can be reported with similar ramifications.