How about a single round of rock/paper/cisors , and the winner gets first pick? Luck is involved, but is there really a legal issue with it? how come online poker is legal?

Edited 4/3/2015 20:43:50

Just to remind!
1. It must be skill based and fair between the players.
2. It cannot use factors external to the game.

And as master of desaster pointed out: Teamgame Chat issue

About Fizzer Geographic Test. I think it would serve educational purpose, which I would favour therefore.

Also Richard Sharp calculation test is interesting. Helps for the new players understand the game mechanism faster. Just 60 seconds would surely mean a lot of players using calculator, not even hard to write the formula in excel and get the answer in 3 seconds.

Minigames: is the usual thing. As apollo pointed out snake game. I´ll add 30 second speed tetris, fast ping pong - may even be 1vs1 in-between players, geometric logic puzzle-solving.

Maybe we need to define the randomness, before looking forward. For example would that be random if in Geographic test every person gets different question (in-case to eliminate team-chat answer sharing). Variations I have in mind:

1) Name of the Country
2) Location of the Country
3) Name of the capital
4) Location of the capital

Everyone gets 4 fast questions! 1 point each. But randomness would determine the either if one gets the Question of where USA/UK/China is located while the player B gets the question of Swaziland, Lesotho, Andorra. Or if we our aim and definition to eliminate randomness lie here and we need to ask everyone the same question, then we place the randomness in our skill-knowledge base. Lets say question comes about Lesotho - who knows where this country is? Probably the person who is located/has knowledge about Africa. Or Andorra - most European people can verify its location. So I do not think it changes the randomness behind being faster in picking territories.

Here lies also another problem. When we discuss the speed one picks territories. Then do not forget 50% in many players case, even most maps we play we already know everything. Take the Rome map for instance. It is not about looking bonuses, choosing any more - most players have different positions they play worked out beforehand. Its either in 1vs1 real picking speed, not deciding, or in team-chat cooperation over who goes where? In first place our skill lies in speed, in second case in our cooperative decision. But after-all we cannot make assumption that everyone has base knowledge even in map as popular as Rome.

Also in minigames. Lets say Tetris. There is randomness of the blocks, but generally it is part of its game, yet despite ones skill. The blocks determine the possibility of best score in limited time period. So the particular game as to be identical. Just remains the question would a 30-second minigame feel frustrating and "splitting a hair" when we talk about who gets the first turn.

Only luck you have in chess is either you play white or black, if it is not swap-rank game = don´t know the real term for this.

Rock-Paper-Scissors has hardly anything to do with skill, unless you can see the person in real and analyse his approach. It is as random as gets to be. Picking speed has at least element of skill.

Gyver, not only is that a ridiculous proposal (what happens if all picks match?) but it doesn't even solve the problem at hand since who gets first turn still needs to be determined

Well, I was thinking about it for some time and I think I might have a new way for resolving this problem. Before I start I'd like to mention that the problem is even bigger than you issued as it not only concerns coin games - many players here use cellphones(smartphones) to play WL and it is obvious that (especially on big maps) the have much lower chances topick

pheir teritories quicker than their opponents that use computer mouse. So basically this highly straegic game cant relies on "who has the fastest mouse and reflex"


Ok. Idea:

I propose the auction system

for easier understanding lets assume that in situation when player has to pick "n" territories, the first "n" number of territories he has choosen are 1-st grade picks and any additional are 2nd grade picks (so if he was to choose 3 territories and he has choosen A B C D E F G , 1st grade picks are A B C and 2nd grade picks are D E F G )

When there is a situation when 2 or more players picked one territory there starts additional round of auction.

The player is informed that one of the territories he has choosen is picked by another player (or more) and now he must

bet on it. The player is informed which territory it is so that he can estimate its value.

Now betting. What to bet?
Initial income! (usually standard 5 per turn).
So player can bet a number ranging from 0 to n (where n is per turn income for this particular game).

Let's suppose he has choosen 3 and his opponent has chosen 2. This means that he has won and that this territory is his.

But this also means that on his first round he will not get this 3 income. So if the base income is 5 he will only get 2.

Of course his opponent doesnt have to pay anything.

When the player looses the auction he is given the first free territory from his 2nd picks list (or random territory if he

doesnt have any valid 2nd grade picks).

The auction is only resolved for a conflicts in 1st grade picks.

If player has more than one conflitct, he is bidding all of them in the same auction turn (so if he has conflict in territories A and B and is given 5 initial income, then if he bids 3 for A he can bid maxmally 2 for B as he has only 5 to spread beetwen them)


There may be two options for conflict of his 2nd grade picks


a) his new territory (2nd grade) was choosen by another player as his main territory (1st grade pick). In that situation he looses this conflict automatically and is given his next 2nd grade territory



Example

in game with 3 territories to pick

(1st grades) (2nd grades)
Palyer 1 picks territories : A B C D E F G
Player 2 picks territories : H I B P O U
Player 3 picks territories : W V D Y Z X

in that situation there is conflict between player 1 and player 2 for territory B
Lets assume that player 2 wins the auction. Now the player 1 is given a teritory from his 2-nd grade picks. D is first in

a row, but it turns out that there is another conflict because D was also choosen by player 3. In thet case D is given to player 3 because it was his 1st grade pick (for player D it was 2nd grade pick). Now the player 1 is given next territory from his 2nd grades which is E.


b) the new territory from 2nd grade picks was also given to another player that has lost auction as his 2nd grade pick. In that situation there is an autoamtic TIE and both of them are given their next 2nd grade picks.

Example

in game with 3 territories to pick

(1st grades) (2nd grades)
Palyer 1 picks territories : A B C D E F G
Player 2 picks territories : K I B P O U
Player 3 picks territories : S V W Y Z X
Player 4 picks territories : R T S D K J


in that situations there is conflict between player 1 and player 2 for territory B and between player 3 and player 4 for territory S Lets assume that players 2 and 3 win their auctions. Now the player 1 is given a first teritory from his 2-nd grade picks which is D and the player 4 is given the first teritorry form his 2nd grade picks which is also D. In that situtation none of them gets it so their are given : Player on E and Player 4 K.

Of course K was picked by player 2 as his 1st grade pick so Player 4 canat have it (situtation a) and is given another 2nd grade which is J. If player 4 didnt have J in his 2ng grade list, he would be given random territory





it may look complicated but it is quite easy. And most of it wil be resolved automaticaly - players will only have to bet.

Summing up.

• 1) player can bet on his conflict territories in auction turn. He is betting with his initial income.
  
  
• 2) if he wins he gets it but his income in first round is lowered by the sum that he has bet
  
  
• 3) if he looses he is given territory from his 2nd grade picks (according to their picking line) and he doesnt have to pay
  
  
• 4) in case of tie both(all) plyers loose that territory
  
  
• 5) if there is conflicts between 2nd and 1st grade pick the 1st grade pick wins
  
  
• 5) if there is conflict between 2nd grade picks all 2nd grade picks loose (tie)
  

*in situation where there is no base income, players could be alowed to bet from the amount of starting troops from particullar territory - eventually this could be a main auction option or they could be mixed (player can bet from the initial income + starting troops from that territory)

I think that this auction system may give even more entertainment to this game. It is also fair because in case of conflict player will need to pay for it to get that teritorry. And it is also strategis as he will have to estimate how much it is reasonable to pay.
The main disadvantage of this method is that it will require additinal turn, but personally I dont think that it would be a big problem. Eventually it may be an optional feature to use that auction system (unlocked on 60th level?).


Edit
@Richard Sharpe - the question of turn order is resolved in my next post on the 2nd page of this thread

Edited 4/3/2015 23:46:05

Whichever game is chosen I think the "winner" should have the option of deferring first move (thus getting two of their first three picks) and getting the first move the first actual turn.

There is no "luck" in rock-paper-scissors in the traditional sense as it is completely deterministic, but there's also no skill. Not sure if that would satisfy the legal requirements. Another issue would be ties, but those could be mostly avoided by choosing 10 "throws" at once or something.

After choosing your territories, ask players to "predict your opponent's picks". Whichever player gets closest, wins. This can be determined via an algorithm that takes the order of picks, geographic proximity, among possible other variables into account to determine who's prediction was the closest. In the event of a tie, you can fall back to play speed, but it's very unlikely to hit a tie in most situations.

One consideration on this is that you can easily botch your prediction on purpose in the event that you don't want first pick. This is already quite a bit better than the current strategy of purposely delaying your turn and possibly delaying a game's start unnecessarily. However, I suggest also allowing the player to choose which turn order he prefers for all players. This would avoid "purposely losing the pick" because you can simply choose that you prefer to get last pick - and you still ONLY get it if you predicted closest (or the player who won the prediction listed you as last anyway). Thus, even if there are 40 players in a game, the algorithm only needs to determine the player who scored highest on prediction. I think needs to be fleshed out more, though, so input is appreciated.

Other details should also be discussed, such as whether you try to predict all players picks or just one opponent's. My suggestion is that it could be nondiscriminatory in that you just choose the territories you think will be popular without specifying which opponent you think will claim those territories. This would help speed the process along.

The advantages of this system I can see:
1) Easy implementation because you don't really need to diverge from the present UI. Some cleverness may be involved for developing the algorithm, but even that shouldn't be too difficult.
2) You can play just as effectively on a mobile device because connection latency is not a factor.
3) It's not really an "extra activity" because you should be predicting your opponents' picks anyway. This just allows the game to collect that information to determine who deserves turn preference.

One side effect I foresee is that this DOES give extra information to the predicting player. If you get your turn preference, you do know your prediction was close (or at least closer than your opponent's), so you may send extra troops in that direction. I don't think I would list this as a negative though, because you can already get more precise information if you choose a territory that someone else claimed first. And perhaps you even deserve that information for predicting properly. Others will have their opinions on this though, so I think it worth mentioning.

Kain, how would your system determine who gets first turn to start the cycle?

Edited 4/3/2015 21:23:44

1. ask players? do they want to be first at picking stage or not?
2. if they want to be first they they play a rock paper scissor game.

other ideas to make picking stage funnier;
- give players 100 votes. they share them between their choices.
- give players 10 order priority and 10 delay cards. allow them to use them at picking stage.
- if they pick same territory as #1, nobody takes it.

EDIT: i didnt see 125ch209 wrote same thing. +1

Edited 4/3/2015 21:28:23

Honestly I'd much prefer if it was simply decided after joining a game (rock-paper-scissor or randomly)- like in chess. There's many creative ideas already, but different minigames is not the way to go. Especially if playing on the app is intended to be on equal footing.

If need be, you can also make each match consist of several games. If you play two games, with the same distribution, alternating who gets first pick, until a player is up by two games you've created a very fair system imo. (Though that might not work well for rt).

Personally I'd prefer the rock-paper-scissor idea, if that's acceptable legally. If not pick speed is, though not perfect, okey.

I really like the current system and believe that the the method must be a measure of skill at playing Warlight, not geography knowledge or mental arithmetic. However, it would be nice for a skill based method to come along that introduces a new strategy into the game.

I've only skimmed Kain's suggestion, but it sounds like this may have the potential to do this - although I think an income loss is a pretty heavy price to pay (maybe something like the initial armies on the board would be better).

I trust you will leave the current system in the game as an option, regardless of the outcome of this discussion, as it would be a loss.

Rock-Paper-Scissors has hardly anything to do with skill, unless you can see the person in real and analyse his approach. It is as random as gets to be.

there is nothing random about Rock-Paper-Scissors

@Richard Sharpe good point. In fact I was designing this system for picking territory purpose only. Wat about turn order - ill have to think about it but what gets on my mind now is:

In no luck cycle games the auction should work in a bit diffrent way. Players won't bid for territories now, instead they will auction the turn order. And after it is resolved then any territorial conflicts should be simply won by the player with the lowest turn order (meaning 1st player should win all the territory picking conflicts) the problem here would be with ties. I propose that in case of tie players should be allowed for a second turn of auction but this time they will be paying from their income from the second round. If this second turn of auctions doesn't bring the result, then the winner should be choosen randomly* and the looser should only pay his bid from the 1st round of auction.

Of course, as now the winner of this auction would win any territory picking conflicts, the players should be also informed which territories are under picking conflict so that they could estimate how much they want to bid.


What is more, it could be also possible to set the auction rules in the way that the players will have to bid in the territory picking turn (without knowing if there would be any territory conflicts) so that the additional turn of auction would be needed only in case of bidding ties.

@green - thx for the positive opinion. About income loss - this is balancing mechanism. You have to estimate how much you want to pay for particular territory and you have to estimate how much you think you opponent would. Of course if you pay too much you may loose the game. So there is skill in it. Almost no luck. And no external mechanism (like minigames riddles etc). A most of all it is fair - students of geography or mathematics re not favoured, players on phone application are not hampered, the winner wins the territory picks but he also pays for, so the looser gets the advantage of initial income (which is not random)




*theoretically this could be set to make as much auctions as needed (without random pick after 2nd tie). This will eradicate any luck factor. But then teiretically it could take forever to resolve that. Eventually you could implement our old speed rule here - after second (third?) tie the winner is the faster player.

Edited 4/4/2015 00:18:16

I don't like the idea of geography questions or math calculations, not all the people has the same knowledge in those areas and this system would be unfair. Same goes for the minigames skills, this is a strategy game, involving other skills is unfair. Is the same as deciding the color in a chess game playing tennis, totally unrelated.

For me the speed system it's fair.

It might be interesting if each starting territory had a randomly determined label/indication, as to which player would receive it if they were to both pick it 1st. Both players could view this at the picking stage.

This could add a bit more strategy to the picking stage and also another uniqueness to each board/distribution presented.

Luck is involved, but is there really a legal issue with it? how come online poker is legal?

Online poker is not legal where I live (and thus, where WarLight is incorporated).

If its a tie, neither player gets that territory and you move on down the line.

So for each tie, then each player gets one fewer territory? Otherwise you'd have to deal with what happens if there aren't enough picks.

We'd also have to handle the case where all picks are the same. Perhaps we just re-create a new map and start over. We'd still have to figure out who gets first move on the first turn, since today's NLC just seeds the cycle. So there is still a lot to figure out with this idea.

Honestly I'd much prefer if it was simply decided after joining a game (rock-paper-scissor or randomly)- like in chess.

From a game design perspective I agree with you. However, from a legal perspective, we can't use randomness.

Whichever game is chosen I think the "winner" should have the option of deferring first move (thus getting two of their first three picks) and getting the first move the first actual turn.

I agree. This is something that's lacking in the current implementation.

What to bet? Initial income! (usually standard 5 per turn).

That is interesting. You could bet your initial armies (like in S1v1, you start with 9 movable armies on the board). If you wanted to bet more than 9, we start taking it away from your income on each turn until you've paid back your bet.

Whoever bets the highest gets their choice of first or last pick.

What happens if you tie? It reverts back to who picked the fastest again?

Edited 4/4/2015 00:05:07

I prefer the current implementation. Picking quickly is a calculated risk.

@ fizzer Ties are resolved in my second post

Edited 4/4/2015 00:19:52

It might be interesting if each starting territory had a randomly determined label/indication, as to which player would receive it if they were to both pick it 1st. Both players could view this at the picking stage.

Or a variation of that:

Each pickable territory has a "picking speed". For example, Norway has +10 and South Pole has -5, etc. Each player makes 6 picks, and we sum all the numbers. Whoever has the highest total gets first pick.

You can also weight them based on which pick they were. Your #1 pick multiplies the number by 1000, your #2 pick multiplies it by 100, etc. So if both players pick the same territories in different orders, they won't tie.

We still have to handle ties though, especially if multiple players pick the exact same 1-6. We could go by fastest picker again, or instead re-randomize the map and start over.

Edited 4/4/2015 00:21:26

From a game design perspective I agree with you. However, from a legal perspective, we can't use randomness.

That's the thing though, Rock-Paper-Scissors has absolutely nothing random in it. I don't know what the law says where you live, but if the only thing illegal is randomness, then you are covered. usually randomness based games are illegal because it is impossible to program true randomness, and randomness is easily tampered with. you can't tamper with a rock-paper-scissors game because the issue of the game only depends on the players choices.

I think that the current implementation is the most correct one, but it might cause some awkward situations in scenarios where being the second to pick is better than being first (all the players waiting until the very last moment to commit).

So if I had to make something to perfect it, I would just add a dialog when the player commits his first turn, asking "Do you want to play FIRST or LAST?", so the fastest players get to choose their order in the turn.

Edited 4/4/2015 00:47:21