Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

I agree.

I personally think this game has been a great success, and certainly the most competitive all-round I've ever played in. I split the credit for this between the game rules and WingedDog's great efforts to find subs. As without the latter we would have lost quite a few nations already by now.

But 37/38 turns without the AI appearing smashes my previous record on that front to pieces. This is even more impressive when you compare this to a game like Legends of Faerun, where about 1/4 of the players had been lost by turn 25. Although that's an unfair comparison, as you have to factor in the Baalz's +17 curse aura when talking about the drop-outs in Legends.


It will be very hard to get a game where all the players are evenly matched skill wise, as even amongst vets and noobs the skill levels vary quite a bit I think. And nation pick will be critical in this factor as well. The only way I can see it happening is in blitz games of 4-5 players, but they are less fun to play IMO. But apart from the recent Man incident, I don't think any war in this game has been won cheaply so far (indeed, most of the 'wins' haven't even been 'won' yet).

I personally think that any game, regardless of map or players, can be resonably balanced and hard fought as long as each player fights until the bitter end. And the end as in the 'proper' end, not just the point where a player decides they can no longer 'win' the game or war, so start flicking the 'Bail-Out' switch. As mentioned above by Agema, something like barricading yourself in your capital and summoning anything and everything to keep the walls up can have a dramatic effect on the game, and can sometimes add 10+ turns to a conquerors invasion timetable.


One of the most unbalancing things for games IMO is when a player takes a hopeless 'I'm going to lose, so may as well throw everything at them to try and break the siege' approach. Since that is effectively what the AI does nine times out of ten, and one of the main reasons AI's appearing unbalances games so much. The result of this action is mostly always that the sieging army captures the fort many turns quicker than is should have done, and probably for far less casualties as well.

But I think many players just see this convenient kamikaze option as the quickest way out of a game they are losing, since they can easily justify going AI if they've just had all their troops killed. Which is a decision they themselves, not their opponent, decided to take. Empty forts are pretty easy to capture by all acounts, and I don't recall the soldiers at Rorke's Drift (as one of many examples) charging out to meet their enemies when they appeared at the gates.

Going down in a 'Blaze of Glory' may appear to be a fun way to die, but it is never a good thing for game balance IMO. And it's pretty illogical to me that when your enemy asks "Please can you come out of your fort so we can kill you all?" you respond "Ok, I'll be right there".

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

I'd really like to prove you wrong, but can't. I'd have to go AI to write more :P

Anyway, Man didn't lose anything, looking on graphs. Just some provs to raiders, no armies lost, pretender still alive, gem income really bug, research going well... Anyway, just stating my opinion.

RAND is a really interesting game. Much much more interesting map [even with unbalanced positions], big tension, really interesting development.

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

That may be true, but the graphs show Man were still researching when Drager went AI, so there must have been access to both mages and labs. And mages and labs mean you can summon stuff, forge stuff, and maybe good stuff as well considering Man are riding high on the research graph. And as Agema pointed out, with Mother Oak and Gift Health up, Man could easily have pumped a load of Nature gems into stuffing their two forts full of summoned creatures. Serpents, Dryads, Lions, Animals Hordes etc. All would have slowed their foe(s) down a bit, if not a lot. Every little helps as they say.

I'd love to give Drager the benefit of the doubt, but at first sight it looks like an early bail to me. Also consider that Caelum were certainly in a worse positon by all accounts when the Caelum player bailed, but WingedDog worked his magic to find a sub for them. That was several turns ago now, and Caelum are still with us. And at this stage I'd put money on Caelum outlasting Man as well. No position is ever hopeless enough to give it to the AI IMO. As even scripting one mage to cast one useful spell means doing more than the AI ever would.

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

I look forward to hearing your views :) Although definitely once the game is over (Two AI's are two too many), or one of us has been eliminated.

Spot on.

Yes Pasha's RAND is getting interesting. One or two nations didn't seem to get out of the blocks properly though, so maybe not a good example of an evenly balanced game. And quite a bit of difference in nation strength as well IMO, so again maybe not the best of examples if talking about balance (although guessing you're not given your 'unbalanced positions' quote)

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

Heheh, I'm really enjoying this game, but I have several occasions where game events really, really called for some good trash talking/bragging/threatening/complaining/begging (being ambiguous to avoid being booted ;)). Ah well, guess you can't have it all at the same time. :)

But don't worry Zeldor, I'm coming for you next so you can talk all you want soon enough. Or maybe I'm already invading you, so hard to tell...

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

Nation/player list updated.
Turn 38 and only 3 nations dead, if I weren't in this game I'd say nobody is fighting however that couldn't be further from the truth.

One more thing, If you decide your situation is hopeless don't turn AI, at least inform the admin about it so a sub could be found.

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

Man should be able to fight back. They could retake provinces with armies to keep their castles and a few other provinces active for upkeep and recruitment. They may be limited for anti-thug thugging. They may be able to kit out mothers as just about adequate stealthy thugs against weak-moderate PD. They should have a ton of N3-capable mages and - with good research - access to Charm pretty quickly: pin the thugs down with troops or summoned chaff like swarm, and they'd fail an MR check eventually.

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

Calahan:

Hmm... dunno, true maybe for Agartha. Hard to say about Caelum, we have to wait till they are dead to know more. Some nations that theoretically had small chances of survival [Ulm, Marverni], are in not so bad shape. Some nations have unfair advantage for sure. Sauro and Vanheim mostly, both getting just 2 neighbours, while Marverni getting 3, Ulm 4, Ermor 4...

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

Ermor had 1 neighbor.
My birds see everything.

Re: New game - The Art of War, Fight!
 

Yes, hard to know exactly what is going on, or went on in Pasha's RAND, as each nation is sure to have it's own tale to tell. With each one being quite interesting to hear as well I'd imagine. Enjoying playing in the game, but also looking forward to it ending in some senses (although that's ages away) just to hear the players thoughts :)