Thanks @Trucriot - I think @Dr_Gaming and I have surged past our target turn, so we may need your adjudication on our game. Or we can carry on playing - it’s an excellent game!
Glad to hear it’s exciting. If both of you don’t mind a sudden death/decision scenario, you can play on until I get around to assess the result. Yesterday too busy after work unfortunately.
I’m happy for @Trucriot to call it whenever the moment hits, and I’ll not deliberately slow down any submits. Sadly the end of the game corresponded with my travelling back after an event (which I was also very busy at) so this was the least flying of my flying swiss games due to life 
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Sorry, took me a while to carve out some time for NP2.
Here are the remaining Round 3 results:
- @BelSon [AU-11] vs. @Kaine [AQ-13] 58-60 TIGHT WIN BelSon (-54) after 150 ticks
- @plug [GB-3] vs. @Dr_Gaming [RS-8] 67-53 TIGHT WIN plug (-79) after 168 ticks
BelSon and plug submitted significantly faster on average. They were given points on top of the relative in-game advantages shown in the brackets above because the tick goal was not reached, leading to tight wins in their favor instead of draws.
Swiss Table after Round 3
| # | Spieler | Won | BH₂ | BH₁ | Pkt |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Solfyre | 3 | 6.00 | 2.56 | 12 |
| 2 | Nat20 | 3 | 7.78 | 1.22 | 12 |
| 3 | BelSon | 3 | 7.55 | 2.45 | 10 |
| 4 | Kaine | 2 | 6.00 | 2.89 | 9 |
| 5 | Lex | 2 | 6.00 | 2.33 | 8 |
| 6 | Satirael | 2 | 7.12 | 1.89 | 8 |
| 7 | Kwhwwymwn | 2 | 6.45 | 1.78 | 8 |
| 8 | Jewish_Star_Empire | 2 | 6.34 | 1.78 | 8 |
| 9 | AllSkillNoPants | 2 | 6.23 | 1.67 | 8 |
| 10 | plug | 2 | 6.33 | 1.89 | 7 |
| 11 | tenerezu | 1 | 5.12 | 2.89 | 5 |
| 12 | Dr_Gaming | 1 | 5.67 | 1.67 | 5 |
| 13 | sarcophagus | 1 | 4.67 | 2.45 | 4 |
| 14 | olus2000 | 1 | 5.55 | 1.78 | 4 |
| 15 | Bio-M6 | 1 | 5.00 | 1.78 | 4 |
| 16 | BattleBorn | 1 | 6.77 | 1.45 | 4 |
| 17 | Prole_Matt | 0 | 4.56 | 2.45 | 2 |
| 18 | June | 0 | 6.56 | 1.56 | 2 |
| 19 | gaz123 | 0 | 5.11 | 2.11 | 0 |
| 20 | OneBlue | 0 | 5.23 | 1.44 | 0 |
Here are the table-based match-ups for Round 4 (countries and latest Top28 World Ranks in brackets).
- @Solfyre [US-1] vs. @BelSon [AU-12]
- @Kaine [AQ-14] vs. @Nat20 [15]
- @Lex [CA-4] vs. @Satirael [DK-18]
- @Kwhwwymwn [FR-21] vs. @Jewish_Star_Empire [IL]
- @plug [GB-3] vs. @AllSkillNoPants [CA]
- @Dr_Gaming [RS-8] vs. @tenerezu [MX]
- @sarcophagus [27] vs. @olus2000 [PL]
- @Bio-M6 [BE] vs. @Prole_Matt [NZ]
- @BattleBorn [US] vs. @June
- @gaz123 vs. @OneBlue [AM]
Use the according map link I provided for your game in @Dysp’s tournament tracking tool - press the hyperlink symbol to the right of the names:
https://np2stats.dysp.info/tournament.php?tournament=82
Password is 287 - please join your game with your forum name by August 15, otherwise it will be forfeited and your opponent automatically wins. Also be mindful to try and submit at least twice per day so we can get as many clear results by September 3 as possible. The next round will start after that day. If an inconclusive game did not reach 245 ((28+7)*7) ticks, the wait times will be part of the point assessment. I moved the deadline to account for the late start of Round 4.
Good luck and have fun everyone! When your game is finished, please post about it in this thread.
Looking forward to my match even if it is against @Lex just after they managed to beat Solfyre… Congrats on that by the way!
I won’t be home until Sunday evening my time, so I won’t be able to join my game before then, should be before the deadline, but I just wanted to put the information out there since it might be kind of close.
I managed to take the win off @Dr_Gaming in game 36 (previously adjudicated by @Trucriot for me) after they decided to quit with me needing just two more stars. It was a close game, and I lagged on tech throughout which left me uncomfortable. But I had a ships lead at just the right moment to make advances. I also took a Range advantage so I could launch attacks against my enemy’s home star, which hopefully disrupted their supply lines. Another great NP 1v1 galaxy!
Hi @AllSkillNoPants - still waiting for you to join our game (No.53), and looking forward to playing against you. I have my opening moves all set and ready… should be fun, and the map looks great!
I just conceded to @Solfyre. They bought more carriers than I on turn 1, which enabled them to find WG on the front line and take advantage of them, jumping to my WG before I even captured the stars. From there, they managed to take a 20 star lead, and while it cost them many ships to do so, there dominance on the WG meant I was not able to convert that ship lead to equalise star count again. So I have conceded rather than play and drag out an eventual loss.
What happened to you @BelSon is similar to my game against @DarkDragonwing … where I landed on a WG in the middle before he did … and was able to jump to the matching one on the other side while he was still en-route … nothing he could do about it … and made a HUGE difference in the game.
While I like the random warp gates to speed the game up and an additional element of fun/strategy, this is one of the downsides … a lucky opening can result in a huge advantage. Not taking anything away from @Solfyre (who is a fearsome foe), but just pointing how this one aspect can end up being a game-decider.
Maybe something to think about for parameters in future 1v1’s.
Another thing is in both this and the last game I played against @Solfyre (which was an LLL game), this is how @Solfyre took me down. I think this is more an argument that I should change my opening play than it is the settings should change!
No argument that @Solfyre has GREAT opening moves that we can all learn from.
There’s always some randomness in NP, especially the opening … but if by the luck of your initial moves that you are able to get BOTH Warp Gates on the border (that you had no way of knowing existed) at the very opening, that really tips the scales and as you saw (and I saw in my game against @DarkDragonwing), it’s almost impossible to recover from … so then it’s game-over in less than two cycles.
As I said, I like random warp gates - just pointing out a downside … but there are lots of tradeoffs.
@HULK and @BelSon The warp gates can be tricky and claiming one a turn before your opponent on a border star is a significant tactical advantage. Leaving it up to chance is really not an sound option. In more traditional games without warps enabled, just making sure you arrive ahead of your opponent to claim defender status is all that really mattered. Not the case here.
I claimed victory in my match against @Lex a very good fight, in which they fought bravely, but I managed to build a good lead and ultimately utilize a warp gate to claim their home star, upon which they conceded. Well fought!
Great win @Satirael !
I tried to do something I watched @Solfyre pull off with an early warp gate attack… I was missing the secret sauce and fell behind never to recover.
I agree @Solfyre leaving it up to chance is not a sound option … but given that there may be a dozen (or even more) stars on the mutual boarder, how do you KNOW which ones have Warp Gates … and send enough ships to those specific stars? You can’t do it to all of 'em.
If you guess wrong and your opponent is lucky enough to guess right, they get that big tactical advantage. In a non-warp game, you might still lose the star, but it’s not such a big swing.
I’m not trying to be a nay-sayer for Warp Gates - just pointing out the downside is that the random element of luck is increased a LOT in the opening moves … and it can be “game over” just after it has started.
I was the fortunate beneficiary of this in my game with @DarkDragonwing … but it just as easily could have gone the other way - I got lucky.
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Yeah, it can be tricky @HULK and can be stress inducing early on trying to decide how to position ships. But, if you plan for your carriers to arrive at those stars in question ASAP, then at least you won’t be at a potential disadvantage against your opponent. If somehow you are behind or want to play it safe, scheduling arrivals at increments of 6 ticks at least prevents your opponent from taking a big advantage from it as the warp is only functional for 1 tick(or maybe none? That’s a tricky order of events question I’m not even sure about.)
If an arrival at star in question happens to be 7 ticks, then you have a tough choice to decide whether to leave your ships there or press ahead. But, again, if you’ve chosen the shortest possible route, then your opponent has at most the exact same information as you. So are they making a really bold choice attacking from a star that they don’t know is warped and attacking blindly to another star that might or might not be warped? That’s too bold for even the likes of me!
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