Whilst it's still fresh in my mind I'll try and get as much of what we discussed down in writing. Feel free to confirm/correct anything and/or add more. In no particular order:
1) Reduce the size of the map and remove the two independent cities.
2) We will randomly generate realms which in turn will randomly generate a starting treasury with which to buy army banners. Unspent points can be banked for later.
3) Banners will be a minimum size of 500 points and a maximum size of 1,000 points. They will comform to the army list building rules as laid out in the KoW rule book.
4) Each banner will be numbered and will contain a set army list, this cannot be changed until the banner retires to winter quarters at the end of the campaigning season. (I would suggest that two 500< point banners can merge during the campaign season).
5) Each player will start with a random allocation of baggage (the Mighty Empires rules state 2d6 but we can change this to 1d6+3 or even link it to what territories the realm consists of i.e capital city generates 3, cities 2, villages and castles 1).
6) If a banner cannot sustain itself by using baggage and is not in a tile that can sustain it (e.g a tile with a village can sustain one banner) then it must spend it's next turn foraging. Banners which are foraging can make no other actions other than to defend themselves if attacked.
7) When two opposing armies meet in the same hex a battle is fought. Each unit that is broken/routed during the tabletop battle is removed from the banner with half of their points value being credited to the owning player's treasury (this applies to both sides, winner and loser of the battle). In addition the losing army must retreat into an adjacent friendly hex (if there are no friendly hexes treat the banner as destroyed?)
8) Each player will be given a randomly assigned secret objective. This objective can only be achieved by that player. To achieve it he must be the only player at the end of any campaign season who fulfils the defined victory conditions (e.g be the only player to control 4 or more villages).
9) At the beginning of each campaign season a random public objective is chosen which all of players have the opportunity to achieve. However only one player may score the victory points for the objective, if two or more players fulfil the conditions then it remains in play until such a time as only one player does. It can only be achieved at the end of the campaign season.
10) Territory bonuses: Not sure where we ended up on this but something like:
i) If you control an entire river gain bonus income from the trade it brings.
ii) Tiles with a castle will contribute an additional 250 points to a defending force.
iii) Capital city will contribute 250 points to a defending force.
iv) In order to recruit a dragon you must first have occupied a dragon lair tile at the end of a campaign season. Once recruited you do not lose the dragon should you lose control on the tile.
Cheers,
Dave