Overlords - Game Thread. (playing)

[namad]

this is not a team game... you cannot ask for a team concession.


that's ludicrous.....

in any game i start i could start a cabal on turn20 and say that the first second and third place players are all now on the same team and demand a concession.... (when the reality is the only hope of all the other players for victory is that those top players squabble amongst themselves and take each other out... it sounds insane but it's what always happens)


any turn players could throw their weight behind either you or behind vanheim and i think it would make it quite easy for there to be a sole victor


honestly what you are asking for is just insane... you are asking for people to give you an insanely rare and impossible victory condition when there is another victory condition much much much much easier to satisfy....

right now looking at the game i'd say there's like a 54%chance vanheim wins 43% r'lyeh wins and 2% chance both win at the same time and 1% chance neither win


that doesn't mean that players have to call it a tie between vanheim and r'lyeh.... it means we can try to stop either player from winning so that the other player wins.... i am pretty sure if everyone turns on you that a vanheim victory could be setup and setup quickly... but hey maybe i'm wrong... i just haven't seen any in game evidence of me being wrong about that matter



and we all know you just made this up after you got bored because for the longest time vanheim was bragging about winning a solo victory and doing so alone... so it's not like you guys have been a secret unknown team all along or anything like you make it out to be....

it's obvious you've just bullied vanheim into this position via reputation because you either don't think you can stop him from winning alone or because you are too lazy to win a war against vanheim over the long haul... he was obviously about to win for ages but just never had any confidence in himself on the matter so doesn't care much?


i'd be willing to concede to baalz alone if he had a fairly successful war against vanheim, and i think it's possible vanheim could just flat out win with in the next 5-15turns... i mean i'm willing to admit that i can't win i just don't think the game is enough in hand for a concession...


a concession usually requires one player to control as much as all the others combined.... two players controlling as much as the other 4-5combined is rather a meaningless statistic....

[Lingchih]

Let's play a few more turns at least and see how things work out. I need to get my Ophanim and Chayots out into the field, since I've never actually used them in an MP game. I know it's getting boring, but it only requires a little work every three days, and I'd really like to see how my high end summons work against intelligent players. I'm not saying I could win... I'm way too far behind for that. I'm just saying that I would like to see some more gameplay, and ultimately, a clear-cut winner would be great to see.

[Mithras]

Just to say, I have nothing agaisnt the idea of you two getting a joint victory. Still you can come prise my one VP out of my cold dead lizard hands.

Regards.
C'tis.

[LupusFatalis]

Actually, since turn 2 or 3 I was working closely with Baalz. Furthermore, I never said I was winning solo, in fact I even hinted that my intention was not to win solo. I'm not sure what chip you've got on your shoulder Namad. A simple concede or not will do. Turning this into some sort of personal attack is a bit over the top.

Also next time you want to make some statement about our impossible chances, you'll probably want to make sure the numbers you pull out of your *** don't in fact give us 2:1 odds of winning jointly.

[namad]

the odds of jointly winning are only low because of the odds of one of you winning are so high....


in fact maybe they should have been lower..... no one ever goes for a tie... the odds that someone would backstab someone else in this case based on historical evidence... are something like 98% if not 99.999%


now sure maybe you two aren't planning to backstab eachother.... but that doesn't mean my method of determining the odds with which you are likely to do so are false




furthermore my odds were based on the fact you had not posted... and baalz is a known manipulator!!!! now that you HAVE posted ... and I've read your post.... I'd probably chance my odds to something like 50/50!! (you probably should've both posted in the first place... I mean how was anyone to know you had formed such an alliance going on baalz's word alone?)

[Lingchih]

Originally Posted by LupusFatalis

Actually, since turn 2 or 3 I was working closely with Baalz. Furthermore, I never said I was winning solo, in fact I even hinted that my intention was not to win solo. I'm not sure what chip you've got on your shoulder Namad. A simple concede or not will do. Turning this into some sort of personal attack is a bit over the top.

Also next time you want to make some statement about our impossible chances, you'll probably want to make sure the numbers you pull out of your *** don't in fact give us 2:1 odds of winning jointly.

How hard is it to beat a baby chimpanzee, anyway? I am re-invigorated.

[Hoplosternum]

Hmmm. Well this game has been dull for a long time. So on that basis I am OK with conceding I may be knocked out soon - although if forced to stick to the real victory conditions Vanheim has to hold off actually taking my Capital for a long time while Baalz catches up

But two less deserving winners I can hardly have the pleasure to have lost against. Alliances of this sort (where allowed - and I wish there was more of that) should be declared, not kept hidden, so that others can modify their play accordingly. Long term, effectively unbreakable, agreements are bordering on cheats when they are kept hidden. Especially in a game where diplomacy was declared to be none binding. The game settings and map position has ensured they have had an extremely easy ride. Now they seem to be just playing with the rest of us until they meet the joint victory conditions, though granted that's probably as much to do with the game win conditions as their design.

So while I would love to see Namad and Ling (or anyone else) stop them lets face it they aren't going to - just drag the game out a bit longer. We are not even going to get a crusade against them are we? Marignon appears to have gone into long term hibernation and he still seems to be the toughest of the rest. Lets just call this one so we can all free up time to join other games. Or even tinker with the settings (and hopefully have a wrap around map!) and have another Overlords game.

No criticism to Rdonj though and lots of thanks for him for organising this. I really liked the idea and I doubt anyone knew excatly what all the changes he made would do to the game balance. Not sure it has all worked as intended, especially the original Overlord restrictions, but there were some nice ideas.

[namad]

given the non-binding terms of their agreement....


all we'd have to do to is tip the balance of power such that one of them feels he can easily defeat the other.... I feel like vanheim is in a much better position to win than baalz but.... baalz is far more confident and less likely to admit anything....

the constant statement that their agreement is secure... is proof enough that it is insecure






but honestly i don't think anyone cares enough to perform any diplomacy of the sort required to force one of them to have a single player victory.... since most players aren't communicating at all and many just spend 5minutes on their turns...

if everyone else wants to forfeit i'd certainly do so... but if even one other player wants to keep going i intend to keep filing turns as long as anyone has any interest in doing so

[Baalz]

My goodness there's some bad attitudes in this thread. The constraints placed on overlords (before they were lifted) *strongly* encouraged developing a good relationship with a normal you could trust and to me seemed to work out into a dynamic team game so I can't believe its such a shock to be playing for a team victory. I very much assumed all the overlords were doing the same thing - I don't see how you could have any prayer of winning even a single war otherwise based on the original constraints. The non-binding, backstabbing encouraged diplomacy of this game means publicly declaring who you're working with would be beyond retarded as you go through the game trying to play each player off against one another. I had similar agreements with 3 different normals...and for all I know they were talking to other overlords! As the game progressed Vanheim emerged as the one I was actually going to go with and we entered a long period of wondering how much we could actually trust each other, but eventually came to a watershed moment when the backstabbing would happen if it was going to and came through it with a good mutual trust.

If you think there is any chance of stopping the both of us working together from eventually conquering the entire world (I disagree), then don't concede. This is Ling's position, but he seems to be alone in that.

If you're withholding the concession based on the hope that you could throw the game to one of us by slowing down the other....read to the words I'm typing. Vanheim and I are both in agreement that we want the game to end right now because there is no challenge in slowly and meticulously crushing everyone in lopsided fights. If there is no chance of stopping both of us, then one of us is without of doubt going to be in control of the map and in a position to dictate exactly when and how victory conditions are satisfied even if it takes an arbitrary amount of turns to set up. This would be tedious beyond endurance to actually have to do though.

As to your disparagement to my character Namad, use your head for just a second before you start talking. Do you honestly think there is the remotest chance that if I were lying about this that Lupus would not call me out himself? Obviously I discussed it with him before I posted, but even if you hold some absurd theory as to my complete untrustworthiness at least give me the tiniest amount of credit that I wouldn't so publicly lie in a manner guaranteed to immediately be shown false.

[namad]

i think the biggest problem is that baalz can't just try to win alone...

if the victory conditions were say... something like 6for all or +1for overlords instead of +4


but by this point in the game everyone is too disinterested to lift the last overlord restriction in an attempt to make the game fair and "endable"


it'd be a lot easier to drive a rift between the two of you because.... all i am hearing is this.... baalz, "I'm an overlord and I can't win any victory but a total domination because those are the dumbass rules... so I'll just win a team victory" and vanheim saying "I could win quickly by betraying baalz but somehow i'd take more pride in a team victory anyways and hey if i can get the team victory faster than the single victory why not....(even though it should be totally harder to get a team victory than a single victory due to the much higher requirements)"



but the problem is that the team victory is much much much harder to pull off as a result the concession should be much harder to win!!! i mean none of the rules of the game make any sense but generally... the less likely a victory the less likely the concession should be.... your claim is that since victory is so unlikely you'd like us to concede because the game is boring and stupid...

I'm just trying to defend the principle that games with lower victory point victory requirements are also games where concessions are given more liberally.... this case flies in the face of that logic... maybe that logic was flawed all along... maybe it is games with insanely too high victory conditions which beget the insanely quick concessions? whereas the super low victory conditions convince players to never concede? we probably should've just terminated the game months ago






BUT LIKE I ALREADY SAID if everyone but me forfeit's i'll forfeit (there's no point in convincing me to forfeit since I ALREADY AGREE) I just won't force anyone to forfeit who doesn't want to by forfeiting without their consent (one player alone can't continue if all the other players besides you just quit so i don't intend to abandon anyone thusly)


honestly I haven't really wanted to do my turns for like 10-20 turns... I don't really care at all for victory statistics.... it's just that if I were you and I wanted to enjoy my victory I'd have probably gone for a more substantial one.... i mean if all you care about is HoF stats... what does a two player tie for first place even count as? half a victory? it's not like it'd be a team victory it'd be more like a concurrent victory...


I mean I think the original rules had ... the goal in mind... being that the overlord would gain his ally underlings... and attempt to use them to destroy the other OVERLORDS not the other normal players.... and once the other overlords died... the manipulating lone overlord would just instantly satisfy the victory conditions due to the victory conditions suddenly being halved for him..... of course.... the rules designed to encourage this... did.... absolutely nothing to encourage it.... weren't overlords allowed to attack each other outside of dominion all game long? or was that only a suggestion for overlords2 ? I get the real rules and the proposed rules confused sometimes...