Some thoughts I’m having on the pros and cons to a time limit to get a bit of discussion on the idea so we can decide what to do for the next round and to help “sharpen the parameters” for this new style of 1vs1 tournament play.
I will start with the con…I like how @AnnanFay came from behind and pulled ahead on ship count and ship/hour production because he invested in economy/terra/banking early. That’s a new style of play that we haven’t seen before in a game. It’s the “long game” approach. However, if there is time limits in the game, then, imo, he won’t be able to play it again. I think he would eventually have won the game of him vs Hulk in the end no matter what, but it would take him another 4-5 cycles or so to take the planet lead. His ship count lead (due to his greater financially ability early that still persisted even now) would just keep building and be the deciding factor no matter what. I hate to to see this game strategy be made moot. It’s an interesting way of playing vs the more industry heavy approach I like that would favor a shorter game time.
The pros for a time limit…I looked and on May 23rd there is a message from Hulk of:
“@AnnanFay are two cycles into our game 6 and we just had our first very minor skirmish … but a mega-fleet just popped up on my scanners - D’OH! ”
That was 28 days ago. If it’s now at the top of the 10th cycle, that’s roughly only 22-23 moves that happened since then. My game with KarmaDrome went 19 cycles. At that rate this game could have taken another month or so. Somewhere a line needs to be drawn on when to end it time wise.
I will say this…if time limits are put into place, then it’s important they are decided before a game starts so both players take them into consideration. Perhaps we do them for the next round and next tournament and see how it plays out and can adjust them later if necessary. As we’ve seen even in this tournament, there is still tweaking needs to be done to really make this 1vs1 play really good. I like that it’s getting there
Maybe there could be two “types” of tournaments - one with rules such as “one month limit on games” … and then one with unlimited time. Note that even in the “one month limit”, you can still play a “long game” … but if turns are only happening every 24 hours, that limits you to 10 cycles. By contrast, I’m going to guess that @SuperDave versus @Karmadrome did that 19 cycles in under 2 weeks.
I think we want a reasonable framework/rules that allows games to get done in a reasonable time, but not encourage people to “game” the system … plus also respect their RL issues (ability to login/submit turns) plus their style of play. Note that I said if everyone else is done, you have one week to finish (AND 2 cycles) … this is to prevent players from doing the stall routine and waiting the entire 48 hours each turn. Personally, I think it is lame (in any sport/competition/game) to win by letting the clock run out.
I agree @SuperDave that the rules (expectations) need to be known in advance … and maybe some more emphasis on those will weed out those people that want to slow play (can select the “unlimited” tournament) and those willing to move the game along a bit quicker. Again, I just feel bad we have all the other players waiting on our game, so it was just “better” to concede to we can get things going again.
Ideally, the time limit never comes into play!
It would be great if the remaining 4 players (@nick.muzzio & @Grunter should chime in) could agree on the time-based rules (open for ideas to how to change) since as @SuperDave said, this is all a work in progress and I’d like to see how that plays out. I do think we have some pretty darn good parameters for some very exciting 1v1 matches.
FYI that I did I think doing a round-robin “pool play” … with winners advancing. But thought that would be too complicated.
@AnnanFay - I would totally be up for a rematch and since it’s outside the tournament, there would be no rush to finish as we couldn’t be holding up others. It really was a fun/challenging game with many twists - lotta respect for your bold incursion deep into my territory!
One interesting thing about future round robin tournaments is it can be set up so people play multiple games at the same time. The turn based nature of the game means this is possible.
For current rules, I think we should keep it the same as we have been doing. 48 hour deadlines, no overall time limit, same game configuration.
For future tournaments the only fair way I see to have a time limit is to set an in-game limit otherwise it can be manipulated.
Another possibility is for Jay to have a new game mode similar to timed chess: 1) no turn deadlines, 2) both players have a time allocation - say 1 weeks, 3) when 1 player has submitted the other player’s time pool decreases, 4) when a players time runs out they auto submit and get +8 hours.
From a vastly different standpoint, it’s possible to turn NP into an RTS style game. To quote myself from Discord:
Hmm, I think a fast paced 1v1 game mode could do really well. By fast paced I mean 1 hour games.
The UI would need to be streamlined.
Say games take 2 weeks, or ~336 ticks, compressed into an hour is about 1 tick every 10 seconds
Which is the tick rate of Offworld Shipping Company - an economy based RTS.
This would take a lot of work so it’s unlikely to happen. However it’s interesting to think about. There’s probably a significant portion of the current players who would not play this game mode but at the same time it might attract new players.
Oh, @HULK, in case Jay didn’t message you the Experimentation fix has been applied.
I’m letting the 4 remaining players decide about the time limits (if any) for wrap up this tournament.
I’ll fire up another tournament, but will definitely have time limits to move it along. As discussed, there certainly could be another tournament with unlimited time for those that would rather do that.
I would rather have people focus on a single game (and submit in a timely fashion) than have round-robin play with players in multiple games as that could slow things down more.
Thanks for the heads-up that Exp fix has been applied - I tried a test game and yea, looks good.
FYI that I’ve started the next tournament with 8 players - link here … and all have signed up in their respective games and @Karmadrome and I have already done a full cycle.
Happy to report that Dr. Bruce Banner did NOT research Weapons!
The game with Gunter is absolutely insane. I have a bit of a planet lead, but, other than that, we are very even. There are 2-5 battles every turn. Big planets fall. Warp gates are built and destroyed. Crazy attacks and daredevil defensive moves are won and lost. I get jittery every time I look to see what the results of the next move are.
EXP is working out well since I’ve hit on MFG three times and am now up to MFG 5. However, the game isn’t as close as it sounds. Dave is indeed Super and is slowly taking my stars. He’s a great player!
Yeah @Grunter, it’s pretty annoying watching @SuperDave systematically takes stars. I hope I can beat @AnnanFay and get another chance at the @SuperDave (payback for taking me out first round last tourney!)
Grunter and I just finished the 15th cycle. In all honesty, I couldn’t tell you for sure who’s winning. I thought I was for awhile, then I figured the tide had turned to him based on some very good moves he did, now perhaps I think it’s more even?? It is interesting, very enjoyable, and the game has a long ways to go for sure.
LOL that you guys are 360 ticks in - sounds like an EPIC battle.
Glad to hear the game format/parameters are playing out well (any suggestions?) and you are having fun with some good back-n-forth.
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