Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Thanks for playing Wokeye. (He was playing Shinuyama, and has gone AI.)

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Man was played by Folket, who replaced Namad.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 33 is out.

Deadline is Thursday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time. However, we will have a flexible schedule this weekend. I have to travel for Xmas Eve and won't be back until late Xmas Day.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 35 is out.

Deadline is Thursday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 36 is out.

Deadline is Tuesday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 37 is out.

Deadline is Thursday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time.

Caelum is nearly dead and has gone AI. It was played by MscFish / BandC.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 38 is out.

Deadline is Sunday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 39 is out.

Deadline is Sunday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

so after an embarrassing showing in Land Rand, I'm out. I'll wait for the turn to host to announce my nation (or Pasha can do it when he does his next bump).

It was fun and I learned a ton, as always!

-Omnirizon

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Are you Omnirizon or lnk?- Or are you one and the same?

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Huh, turning AI while cap is still not taken? That's just not cool, everyone should stick till the end and try to put up a fight. He owes it to other players, fighting hard here.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

In interest of not divulging any information which may aid my beseigers, I won't reply with any details. But suffice it to say you don't really have much to worry about there, Zeldor.

-Omni

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

there are issues with the new .trn file. Someone failed to use the proper .trn file from last turn. Shame on him or her.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

That blows. I got two great events.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 40 is out. ***Be sure to use the correct .trn file. ***

Deadline is Friday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time due to the delay caused by the rehost.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Pythium has gone AI. It was played by Omnirizon.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

thanks for allowing me to play.

-Omni

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Thank you for playing!

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 41 is out.

Deadline is Sunday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Alpine Joe will be replacing QM. I am going to delay the hosting until Thursday night to give him time to play this turn.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Well the once rising nation of Vanheim is all but snuffed out. It was a privilege to play, and I hope to offer a better showing in the future.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 43 is out.

Deadline is Wednesday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time; (Wednesday instead of Tuesday due to the delayed hosting).

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 44 is out.

Deadline is Friday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Hello:

Turn 47 is out.

Deadline is Thursday at 9:00 p.m. Boston time.

Thanks.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

I must say that based on Land and other RAND games that format really does not work at all, except very limited situations. No diplo makes it pretty much impossible to take down leaders or organise anything, thus starting positions and nations you get are huge factor. And when there is difference in skill level there is almost no skill factor - there are few good players that can just easily annihilate all remaining players. And it's up to nation they get + skill of neighbours to determine who will get bigger and stronger.

I think that for RAND to work you need:
- small map with
- very balanced nation selection [that was a huge problem in last RAND]
- and players of same skill level
- that do not get subbed out by weaker players [here we should proably introduce rule to not talk about that game to anyone outside, so it does not kill the pool of potential good subs]

I like LAND and RAND games, but the more I play them, the more I think that normal games are better and more fair.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

I have a long experience with RAND games and I personally agree with you Zeldor. I've noticed that with no gem gens and small maps and diplo I'm having the most fun games. I also agree with your suggestions to improve the format.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

I think it might be better allowing players to choose there nations, those can still be awarded in secret. I got a nation in this game I really did not want to play, yet was stuck with. I have done a decent job but being, 'uninspired' I feel I have only played to 70-80% of my normal ability.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Sorry for little OT.
If I want to participate in the next RAND game, how do I get in?

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Sort of agree with Zeldor. I have noticed that most of the remaining players are longtime veterans (certainly excluding myself), so i definitely think there's a skill factor involved. But there is also a 'usual suspects' aspect to which nations are left, although some quite powerful nations are dead or dying at the moment.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

MB, this is an excellent idea. I share your sentiment re. getting a boring/weak/ nation or a nation that you down right don't like to play. Happened to me as well in this game, in the past RAND, and in the past past RAND :)

I sucked it up and did the best I can but I was anything but inspired.

Perhaps a semi random assignment system would work. Each player chooses 3 nations and conflicts are resolved by a die roll.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

In 'Art of War' I allowed players to repick a nation they get to another random one, but only once.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Actual RAND was best, as it was quite small and mostly skilled players. But map was totally unbalanced and so were nations, so it divided game into two leagues. Removing of gem-gens was surely a step forward. 8-12 may be best amount of players for RAND games and as community is generally more skilled now, it would be easier to get good selection of players. But I don't think we have any really balanced maps. And we'd need much more balanced version of CBM to eliminate randomness from nations [really, how can you have Sauro and Agartha compared].

But RAND game will still be a niche, fun if well made, but if someone wants more balanced and interesting game, simple ban on trading + semi-random is the way to go.

WingedDog:

I don't think Art of War is good example here. It had like hmm... 80% people sub out? +some people going AI wrecked the game +not wraparound map helped some people

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

I disagree, rand is great.

I think a lot of the vets like the RAND format precisely because it prevents crazy ganging. Artifacts was just a continual gang-bang of whichever player was doing the best, and that's a pretty frustrating mechanic. Eliminating diplo makes playskill matter more, not less, and in normal Dominions playskill is completely eclipsed by diplomacy, so it's nice to be able to get away from that mechanic if desired.

Granted, nations could be better balanced, but Dawn Rand has some pretty interesting contenders. Sauro is down and out, and the top 3 nations are Atlantis, Ermor and Kailasa...not exactly a usual suspects list. It's not like diplo helps out the crappy nations very much either, everyone knows you're just free territory. Nation-balancing is a mod discussion, not a format discussion, although some reroll capability on nation choice wouldn't be bad to keep out some of the really out-of-line nations.

What balance issues do you have with the Greece map? It's one of the best I've seen.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

1) It has nothing to do with repick proposal.
2) Just dug up game thread, 7 out of 17 original players including you were subed. A little less then 80% IMO.
3) Only two players turned to AI, and it was far beyond early game stage. As far as I remember first defeat (not AI turning) was on turn 37.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Even with Rand, a lot still comes down to ganging up on nations. I don't think any one-on-one wars remain that way for long in MP. In Dawn RAND as I recall, Atlantis and Sauro fought a bit back and forth until large Ermorian armies arrived on the Sauro border poised to invade – soon after Sauro went into free fall. Not to say Sauro wasn’t outplayed, but its pretty tough to escape the ganging up mechanic in MP. RAND format just makes it less structured and saves the hassle of diplomacy.

btw - whatever happened to Dawn RAND - talk about a game languishing...

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Right DC, but I'm not saying that multi-front wars are a diplo-only thing, but there's a big difference between what happened to Sauro in DR and what happened in artifacts.

Sauro was a victim of heavy poaching, and had a while to actually fight a somewhat fair war before Ermor became involved (Ermor didn't attack until Sauro's cap had been captured, in fact, IIRC), in Arti nations basically imploded in 3 turns as everyone launched simultaneous attacks on them.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Micah:

Try to imagine how would it look with really balanced nations. Doncorazon had not much time to play his nation, so he did not use his great nation and spot. Ermor has awesome spot on that map [see Warcry] and some nations had really extremely bad position [bad nation + weak spot] - Marverni, Ulm, C'tis and Agartha. You can try to come out of that position, but you are doomed from the start. Playing to achieve the most out of bad can be fun, but every player should have pretty much equal chance for winning. And Kailasa was probably one of the nominees for victory from the beginning on that map :)

I am not sure if what we have in LAND [big nations just eating small ones unable to organise anything to even put up a fight] is cool. Artifacts should be erased from our memores as an example of a game that should not exist. And now normal games without gem gens are much more appealing.

You also probably did not read my line about GreeceStain properly - I was complaining about Dawn map, Greece is probably the most balanced map around, but I don't think you can find 18 nations on similar level, unless making it multi-era RAND or giving vets weaker nations on purpose.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Zeldor - "But I don't think we have any really balanced maps." I don't see how this is referring specifically to Dawn, as it's pluralized. I can see how you meant to imply "any balanced maps for 8-12 players" but I think it was poorly contextualized, not poorly read. ;-)

I don't think the rest of the points have much difference compared to normal Dom. As you said, just look at Warcry for an example of that.

The solution to this isn't to ditch the rand concept, but to try to pare down the outliers and get some more modding solutions for balance.

Artifacts serves as an excellent example of what can go wrong in a game, and I think making light of the fact that it "shouldn't exist" is giving up a valuable milestone.

I agree with you on LAND, the map is too big and the player skill too divergent, but again, this is a problem with normal dom as well. The playskill question is also not magically solved with diplo, as weaker players often make incredibly BAD diplomatic plays.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

I think we agree on general idea :) RAND is not passe, it can work, but I think it should be played with 8-12 players, on very balanced map [like Greece, but well, smaller and maybe 2-3 more provs per player or more farmlands, as some nations need them] with carefully selected nations [all weak, all average or all strong]. And for that I hope that next CBM really focuses more on nation balance [yeah, we will have to poke QM a bit on that], so it's easier to get that.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Well, I am happy with all aspects of RAND games except getting a random nation that you might not want to play and agree with Wraithlord above. Sadly more work for Pasha would be the major drawback.

I am happy with the maps and personally don't want to see all nations becoming balanced vs each another. That would make the game really boring and I probably would not bother.

The exception to that is of course I would like to see weak nations like Machaka, Oceania, Agartha and Ulm made stronger so they have more of a chance. But thats a discussion for the main board/CBM thread. Note the way it is now, I would point blank refuse to play Machaka or EA/Ma Oceania in MP as they stand exactly no chance from turn 0, so whats the point?

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Micah, I agree with you - Artifacts was the worst example of endless dogpiling. Rand has been different, and as you say, there was a long-time-for-Dominions one-on-one war. But even before Sauro lost its cap, large armies were being moved up along its borders, so its demise felt inevitable even before Ermor became engaged (and a little DonCorazoncita was born) :).

Zeldor, I think its premature to judge. Its not like every game on that map is going to be won by Sauro just b/c of its position and nation. In fact, its just b/c of that perception that its likely to get ganged up on, even in a RAND environment. Not to mention there are peculiar circumstances to each game (e.g. lab burn down twice, once before a siege) that impact strategy (or lack thereof). In fact, I'd argue that Atlantis as the only UW nation and with recruitable SCs is well-positioned especially in a Rand setting. Seems most Rand games are won by nations with recruitable SCs.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

I never said it was destined to win. In DR there were few nations with good chances. Vanheim with extremely good starting spot. Atlantis being only uw nation + only nation with recruitable SCs. Kailasa with weak C'tis south of them [but Caelum was a threat and good position there too], Helheim, if played well could get a sweet Van's spot. Ermor got extremely rich provinces and was quite secure there, despite being in the middle [Ulm and Marv were really doomed up there, no threat to Ermor] and Sauro well... it's simply Sauro, so people expect a lot from it :)

There is certainly smth about SC nations dominating RAND games [Jotun here is good example].

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Ugh. I have to find another substitute. Need a player to replace shovah who had to drop out for understandable reasons. Let's see if we can find someone by this weekend so the game can end properly.

Pasha

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Forgive the eavesdropping, but as a participant in the Rand Dawn game I'd like to chime in.

RAND is a great concept, but diplo is really a huge part of the game. SC nations rule RAND games because SCs rule the base game...and the base game makes great use of human psychology to nerf SC nations with the tagteam bat.

But excessive tagteam sucks, as mentioned.

There has to be a balance somewhere in the middle, where diplo can be utilized as a necessary game element, but dogpiling is discouraged/mitigated.

Here's an un-thought-out suggestion: how about a "No NAP" game? Alliances are fine, but formal Non-Aggression pacts with the rediculous "no attacks for X turns" are strictly forbidden as a house rule. Why? Because more than once I've gone to war because I only had 1 vulnerable boarder, and that boarder was being eaten up from the opposite end. Eliminate the security, eliminate the dogpiling.

Thoughts?

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

It's been done, or similarly enough, with non-binding diplomacy games.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Nah, I mean NAPs are strictly forbidden. In non-binding diplo games, folks still want to have a good reputation in-game, so most NAPs are still honored.

I'm talking about a game where NAP-Xs simply don't exist.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

I like the idea of no NAPs.

Was also thinking of a game where everyone had a predetermined enemy, kind of like the NCAA brackets. Zeldor's map was kind of like that - I don't recall the name of the game, but where we started in valleys and had to duel at least our first enemy. Maybe a map with a series of closed valleys. Geography would force more one-on-one wars. Though now that I think about it, that's probably too formulaic for my tastes.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Getting stuck with crappy, significantly weaker, nation in a RAND game is not fun. You know from the starters the game holds 0 promise for you. It's not fun the first time it happens, less fun the 2nd and gets worse for me - having had a bad luck streak with RAND nation assignment. When skill level is homogeneous there's no way to compensate for a weak nation. The nation selection element needs to be addressed.

As for diplomacy leading to excessive dog piling why not attack the bad angle instead of diplo as a whole?- like, say, Prohibit more than 2 nations attacking a given nation at a time.

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

Or you just have fun with what you're dealt, do what you can, and when you die, you die happy.

I don't think this is going to work. What if three nations want to attack? They have a lottery? How do they even know they are all going to war that month? How do you even know when a war is starting? You'd have to declare all wars in advance. What if secretly allied nations collude to have a 'pretend' war, preventing themselves from being attacked? What if your only avenue of expansion is through a nation that is already at war with 2 other nations?

Re: Land Rand (pbem)
 

"Or you just have fun with what you're dealt, do what you can, and when you die, you die happy."

Hey, I've no problem with that but it's not fun. Fun in a TBS game is derived from ability to nurture your investment (nation, state, space colony etc) and see it evolve. It's ok to fight wars, it's ok to lose them but it's not ok to have significantly less chance to see your nation grow from the start. A RAND game played with a weak nation sees you getting pounded from early on and usually from many directions. The problem is not to die happy it's how you suffer all the way there. Usually I end up wishing my nation's death would come all the sooner since at that state my turns seem futile. I keep playing out of obligation for the other players not to create a power vacuum.

"
I don't think this is going to work. What if three nations want to attack? They have a lottery? How do they even know they are all going to war that month? How do you even know when a war is starting? You'd have to declare all wars in advance. What if secretly allied nations collude to have a 'pretend' war, preventing themselves from being attacked? What if your only avenue of expansion is through a nation that is already at war with 2 other nations?
"
Yeah, the idea is not good. However I still think that the direction for a remedy is not to totally ban diplo but rather find a way to limit it's abuse. I'll give it more thought, maybe I'll come up with a better suggestion.