Hello guys,

Wish to start up a chat place to exchange ideas and info on hosting any games in settings and maps as well as report for unpleasant players. (Some players don't break any rules on WL but just ruin some good games.)

Pls feel free to leave a message.

Cheers.

http://www.smartone.com/jsp/phone/tchinese/detail_v3.jsp?id=1733

a guy called Hansop.... trust many of my friends BL-ed him and warned me. I regret I didn't BL him instantly.... ruining my good games.

Yeap, definitely bastard. I bet it doesn't even cost those 5 000 $.
But why did you name it Hansop?

LOL sorry Denzy wrong link~~

correct link as following:

http://warlight.net/MultiPlayer.aspx?GameID=1613643

becoz this is the case last night. Myhand and the Ligther warned me he is on their B-list but I found no problem in the 1st game so I didn't BL him. Next game, when he went into opponent team, he did serial boot sharp at 5 mins at turn 0 on myhand and me :/

No violation against WL rules as long as there got a boot button there... but just ruining the game atmosphere I host.

Fortunately, other players on his team played good courtesy and sportsmanship refusing to go on the game and force him to vote to end finally. (Salute)

No blame, but I just put it here so other game host can note it, in case they don't like this kind of game manner as well.

Cheers.

BTW, would like to greet here for Ravenholm, Nicephorus and Jamez for great courtesy and sportsmanship for the game!

I'd like to start up the topic of optimal settings for Europe 3vs3 NC games. There has been a lot of discussion lately (in the context of potential 3vs3 ladder) about settings on Europe, that are dynamic (like the Europe map should be), but still are not clustered enough to be deprived of strategy. What do you think of my template (of course a reduced luck would be better):
http://warlight.net/MultiPlayer.aspx?TemplateID=118200

I think that template, along with standard warlords or random warlords should be the top contestants. I haven't played much on it (a week or so), but it proved to produce very good games (you can take a look into my favourites). What do you think?

szeweningen, What luck % would you like the game at? If you can find a few people I'd be more than happy to put together a few test games at the % to test.

My favorite 3 v 3s: random cities or random warlords, 4 starting spots

Too few starting spots and each army's importance is too high: an unlucky starting spot vis-a-vis the enemy would increase the importance of chance and decrease the importance of skill. Too many starting spots and it becomes messy.

With 3 starting spots: chance-skill balance is good but not great.
- warlords is slightly better than cities with 3 starting spots.

With 4 starting spots: chance-skill balance is best.
- cities: take 1 big spot, 2-3 smaller ones, or spread out and take 4
- warlords: 3 spots and you have little insurance against unlucky picks, 5 spots and it's too messy; 4 is just right.

With 5 starting spots:
- cities: chance-skill balance is fine.
- warlords: messy. luck/chance of pick order is too important; everyone knows 7-12 of the enemy's spots -- whoever knows the more important and closer spots tends to do better, all other things being equal. chance-skill balance of such a game is not optimal.

@ mkonyn

I'm happy with either 16% or 0% luck. I may prefer 16% luck, because 0% enables "kamikaze" type of taking bonuses (attacking 2vs2 is pretty effective), but that may be me moaning. 0% or 16% are both excellent

@ Philippe Auguste

Although I fully support what you said about warlords, I have to disagree in the cities distribution. I played with you a lot (on your 4-cities Europetemplate) and experience on that map suggests, that with 4 it's getting really crowded. With 24 spots taken altogether, most of the time those are from the same bonuses and the fight relies too much on tactics, less on strategy. What I mean is 4 starting territories require immediate action on the frontline with very limited troops to command. Imagine a 1vs1 game on Strategic 1vs1 where all the starting spots border with the enemys starting spots. I'd want to apply this reasoning to Europe map, with 4 territories players are forced to make critical decisions on where to deploy starting first turn, for example:
your starters:
1 in denmark, 1 in ireland, 1 in slovakia, 1 in austria
enemies are in ireland, slovakia and austria
What you can choose is:
a) finish denmark first hoping to survive
b) deploy everything to one of the above
c) deploy 2 to denmark (to try to finish) and 1 to each of the above
Of course you can mix it with running, or various other options, but this illustrates how it takes the strategy away. Of course in the end it'll come down to tactics, but the superior player should have the opportunity to outplay his opponents on the strategic level (even before encountering him directly i.e. choosing the optimal path of growth/attack). Here you are forced to make decisions that are most of the time based on wild guesses where would/would not your opponent deploy starting with 5 income... With that range of change in troops (+0 to +5) it becomes very risk like, especially considering low luck (attacking 10 troops with 9 and 4 is a good example). Of course 4 warlords don't have the similar problem (this applies only to cities).

Played with hansop once, he was on my team. Instantly blacklisted him. He was the most rude and un-teamly person I have had the misfortune of playing with. Hansop should be blacklisted by all :)

I would also like to hear what is the best settings or best map people prefer.

Such as manual/auto start, how many territories starting with, cities/all/warlords, luck ratio, move in random each turn or in sequences, boot time, random team or manual team.... etc.

My most favorite map is Europe for its good interactive and optimal size for playing.

Guys, please drop your opinion here.

Welcome and cheers~

Heh, the 'game host union' name was my suggestion. :D

Don't forget about mbohn2, guys.

WM Sz, that's true to some extent. But knowing where to deploy troops, what is worth sacrificing, where to stand strong, where to attack... This is of strategic importance and tactics (move order and manipulating move order) is how you put the TEAM strategy into play: micro-strategy (inside boxing) with an understanding of macro-strategy (balance on the board, setting up an opponent, improving your team's overall positioning, knowing what you do influences not only the enemy's next move but also the relative strength/weakness of your team and teammates). I noticed you like to pick excellent yet inside/safer/non-front-line bonuses. If one teammate picks inside/safe/non-front-line bonuses and two teammates face a 2 v 3 on the front line for a number of turns, then I agree, the game can be long and messy (if the bonuses picked are good) due to there being a crowd of troops in places that don't benefit the team's positioning or short and shitty (if the teammate's bonuses are bad inside/safe/non-front-line bonuses) because the teammate is useless. But this is only true when the opposing team is either better than your team or simply made better team picks.

Putting a 5 spot in Ireland and just letting the enemy take it also serves as a speed bump if your teammate is free to expand in Iceland, for instance. Here, crowding your enemy serves a purpose. Losing one spot is alright in such a game. You have teammates. And you have 3 other spots to focus on. With a strategic appreciation of the board, good team picks, and the right focus, being close to others is actually fun.

@ Philippe

I agree with what you said and it's true it's more of a judgement call, but still I believe that a game with a slower start may generate more strategic thinking in the early stages, while later it'll come down to tactical play and the decisions you mentioned, what to sacrifice and what to gain, will eventually come. Chess proves to be a great analogy, making the game more crowded is more-less like skipping the middle-game and going straight to the execution of attack. It is a lot of fun, but takes away a part that is most "luckproof". Also it's hard to debate it in theory, we have an extensive base of ladder multi-day games which can serve as a learning material, but we don't have the same for Europe 3vs3. Still I think that if the 3vs3 ladder is released someday (with a 4 cities format) it'd come down to every team picking islands, denmark, wc russia, norway, center and maybe portugal or bulgaria. I really believe the above combination gives you not only good start and spreadability, but most important attack possibilities. With that many picks, counterpicks become pretty much irrelevant since you're always starting nearby your opponent. Of course one can argue, that 3-4 picks in cities opens up the possibility of taking big bonuses, but it proved to be extremely risky and "less than optimal". My point is given that specific setup, 3 territories instead of 4 gives you many more options, with 4, you're pretty much bounded. Observe what happens when we play as a team. I pick sth, you pick sth and the third person is left with exactly 4 picks to go.
Still, there is an ongoing tourney (Warring States), maybe I'll change my mind while it is progressing.
Cheers

I like your thinking about the proper process of a game. It is for this reason that I don't really like the 1 v 1 and 2 v 2 Ladder settings. Too many games become standoffs at the start, and since the starting spots are too few (3 and 2), the beginning phase of many games is non-existent.

I'd prefer 4 starting spots in the 1 v 1 and 3 in the 2 v 2, as insurance against unlucky picks and for additional strategic options (for picking and when in a standoff). I just lost a 2 v 2 in which I was next to one enemy's 2 spots and all we could do was have a standoff and hope our teammates could do more. Very boring game, no strategy whatsoever. Give me another starting spot and it would've been more interesting.

Yeah Dariush, it is your idea. should have credited you for this :)

Philippe, am I misunderstanding you? Wouldn't you increase the probability of standoffs if you increased the number of starting spots?

3 starting spots: standoff involving 1-2 starting spots (33%-67% of total armies) --> fewer options.

4 starting spots: standoff of 1-2 starting spots (25%-50% of total armies) --> more options.

A former secretary of defense once said something like "The more strategic options you have, the more power you have."

With 4 starting spots, I'd suspect the most standard picking strategy would be:
- try to cover 3 areas
- try to counter at least in 1 area
- put 2 armies closer to each other to take a bonus quick

If everyone spread all 4 starting spots to cover 4 areas, it'd still be alright. Currently, if you lose one army/area early (33% of your intial forces), it has very significant effects on the outcome of the game. If you lose one army/area early, you can still depend on the other 3 starting spots to recover.

What I care about is the ability to recover from a less than ideal start. Championship boxers sometimes get hit hard or knocked down in the opening rounds but recover to win. To strategically sacrifice 1 starting army is not really much of an option in strategic 1 v 1s.

But the probability of having a standoff in the first place with 4 spots each is greater (in fact, probably much greater) than with 3 - the board's more crowded. On the other hand, if the map was proportionally bigger as well, that would eliminate that issue.
As an aside, I find that it's quite possible to win games despite losing one of your territories early - I've been on both ends of that.