Lords of the Earth

Initially played by postal mail, the game featured mixed moderation—computer moderated with some human assistance.

Map features include varied terrain, religions, wealth, and ability to resist others using diplomacy or warfare.

A reviewer in the early 2000s noted positives and negatives about the game, observing that some players went to great lengths to win, even "using false identities or smear campaigns".

Turnaround time is how long a player has to prepare and submit "orders" (moves and changes to make in the game) and the company has to process them and send back turn results.

[5] The company processes the turns and returns the results to the player, who completes a subsequent order sheet.

[12] The initial choice of a PBM game requires consideration as there is a wide array of possible roles to play, from pirates to space characters to "previously unknown creatures".

[8][d] The earliest play-by-mail games developed as a way for geographically separated gamers to compete with each other using postal mail.

[11][e] For approximately five years, Flying Buffalo was the single dominant company in the US PBM industry until Schubel & Son entered the field in roughly 1976 with the human-moderated Tribes of Crane.

[11][f] Schubel & Son introduced fee structure innovations which allowed players to pay for additional options or special actions outside of the rules.

[11] Reviewer Jim Townsend asserted that it was "the most complex game system on Earth" with some large position turn results 1,000 pages in length.

[35] In 2002, Martin Helsdon asserted that the first campaign (LOTE01) might have been the "longest continuously running PBM" game after over twenty years of play.

[36] Campaign 1 included players from across North America, as well as Australia, France, and the United Kingdom.

[28] Map regions have varied terrain, religions, wealth and the ability to resist others using diplomacy or warfare.

[32] Combat ability progresses with tech levels around cavalry, infantry, warship, and Siege capabilities.

[43] According to Martin Helsdon, in the game players can "found universities, build cities, create trade routes, massacre populations, enforce religious conversions, engage in both overt and covert warfare, forge alliances, break treaties, and sometimes suffer the dread dynastic failure, when their nation implodes".

[32] Engaging in diplomacy and developing public works contributes to success, with the latter returning outsized dividends for new players.

[2] Andrew Barton reviewed the game in a 2000 issue of Flagship, noting positives and negatives about the rules.