Okay, so my last suggestion (giving bonus armies to neutral territories when you turn in your cards) didn't go over so well. Still, I want to make neutral armies more of a threat, and possibly more dynamic. Here are some ideas....
These ideas are just for fun; I don't imagine they'll be implemented here, but it would be nice to see something similar but stripped down incorporated as a game option, even tho Ron hates options
NEUTRAL ARMY DEPLOYMENTS & REINFORCEMENTS
At the end of each player's turn (as soon as they select "end turn" or perform a chained fortification), each neutral territory has random chances of doing the following:
25% chance of adding one additional neutral army, increased by +5% for each neighboring neutral territory. (Possilbly change these to 33% & 3%, 50% & 10%, 10% & 1%, x% & y%?) (For fairness to the players, this neutral army deployment may have to happen AFTER any potential attacks are checked for; see below.)
If three or more neutral territories connect, they are considered to be a "robber barony", "pirate empire", "third world dictatorship" or somesuch. Each "robber barony" is sorta considered its own quasi-player with limitations (no cards, only attacking as ruled below, etc). "Robber baronys" take their "turns" as the game is incremented to a new round -- at this time, total territories are counted for armies (with continental bonuses) and deployed as evenly as possible throughout the entire robber-barrony (with the exception that "landlocked" neutral territories inside the neutral empire which adjoin only neutral territories are never reinforced, as their borders are protected -- or maybe not; I'm not a despot).
NEUTRAL AGGRESSION
If a neutral territory contains neutral armies that outnumber the player armies in a neighboring territory by at least two (three?) to one, and if there are at least 4 neutral armies in the neutral territory, the leader of that territory has a 25% chance of adopting an expansionist approach and invading the neighboring player-controlled country.
This chance is decreased by 1% per player-controlled army in the intented targed, and increased by 1% per neutral army in the attacking nation.
The invading neutral player will not waste their armies; they will only attack so long as they can attack with three dice, and they will retreat after loosing 50% of their total forces.
In the event that the neutral armies are successful in their invasion, the neutral armies will split their forces evenly between occupying the newly invaded country and defending the homeland. If there is an odd army left over, it stays on the originating country; the balance of fortification always favors the homeland.
Example: On World 2.0, Red has 5 Armies in China and 1 Army in Pakistan, while Blue has 1 Army in Iran and 2 in Iraq, and there are 9 Neutral Armies on Afghanistan.
Afghanistan's 9 armies is not greater than China's 5 x 2, which urges caution on the part of "Osama" there in the 'Ghan against sinoexpansionism, but the NPC Taliban have way more than double the armies of the sparsly defended Pakistan and Iran.
Afghanistan has a 25% -1% for Pakistan's one army +9% for Afghanistan's nine armies for a 33% chance to launch an invasion on Pakistan. For the sake of argument, Afghanistan attacks Pakistan, taking the territory from blue and loosing no armies in the process.
Neutral Bin Laden advances 4 of his 9 armies into newly claimed Pakistan, keeping ther remaining 5 on Afghanistan to defend the homeland (the remainder always remaining home).
Now, Afghanistan has a 25% -1% for Iran's one army + 5% for Afghanistan's five armies for a 29% chance to attack Iran. For the sake of argument, we will assume Afghanistan decides to invade again. This time, things don't go so well, and Afghanistan looses an army on its first sortie against Iran, then another on its second. Without enough Afghan armies to press a three-dice attack, Afghanistan retires from the field, retreating home with 3 Neutral Armies and leaving an exhultant Blue still in control of Iran.
The picture of the middle east has now changed....
