Ranked 2v2 games Edition 1 Thread

Neptune's Pride
1

Update: Sign-ups will close on the 19th of April

There has been an expressed desire to have a competition for teams in Neptune’s Pride. I have decided to fulfil that desire. And so without further ado, let me introduce to you Edition One of Ranked 2v2 Games! (Title is a w.i.p.)

The goal of this is to provide a place for players to experiment with a rare or uncommonly played format of teams. In general, you may ally with another player in a 64-player game, but that alliance may not last until the end of the game, due to a player being eliminated, betrayed, or otherwise removed. As such, I plan to give this competition a format similar to Trucriot’s Legendary Level League, a casual, ongoing tournament where players may compete and bow out as they please.

In accordance with the above announcement, I am now opening sign-ups for the first round of this competition! Sign-ups will close on the 19th of April, and I will create the games shortly afterwards.

You may wonder what settings I will be using for this competition. Once again, they have been inspired by the LLL settings, with a few small changes. The settings may change after each edition/round of this competition based on feedback from the competitors. The settings for the games in round 1 are given below.

Match Settings

Game Settings

  • Stars for Victory: 50%
  • Formal Alliances: Enabled

Special Galaxy Settings

  • Warpgate Cost: Cheap
  • Random Gates: None
  • Dark Galaxy: Disabled

Galaxy Settings

  • Mirrored Stars: True
  • Stars per Player: 32
  • Starting Distance: Medium
  • Resources: Plentiful
  • Production Ticks: 24

Player Settings

  • Starting Stars: 1
  • Starting Cash: $1500
  • Starting Ships: 50
  • Starting Infrastructure: 10/10/2
  • Development Cost: Standard/Standard/Cheap
  • Trade Cost: Standard ($15/level)
  • Trade Scanning: Disabled

Technology Settings

  • Terraforming: level 1, 144 points/level
  • Experimentation: Disabled
  • Scanning: level 1, 144 points/level
  • Hyperspace range: level 1, 144 points/level
  • Manufacturing: level 1, 216 points/level
  • Banking: level 1, 72 points/level
  • Weapons: level 4, Research Disabled

Game Time Settings

  • Turn Based
  • Turn Jumps: 6 ticks
  • Turn Deadline: 48 hours

Some people have expressed a desire for manual teams, but the overall trend seems toward teams based on skill. In order to make teams as balanced as possible, I will be choosing teams based on skill, so that the average skill will be similar on each team. For details, see below.

Match-making Method

Ideally one would want to rank players based on some 2v2 or even team score, but we don’t have any such results. So for this first edition of the tournament, I will be using Trucriot’s ever-helpful 1v1 World Rankings. From there, I will be able to collate a back-log of 2v2 games from which to rate players’ skill.

But that is all distraction from the main question, how will I determine the match-ups, and even the teams? Well, once I have all signed-up players ranked based on some rating system, I will descend the list picking the first four to play in a game together, followed by the next four in a different game, and so on down the list until there aren’t enough players left to fill another game.

Once I have the players for each game, I will put them into teams. I won’t do 1-2 vs 3-4, since the team with 1-2 will have a clear advantage. Similarly, I won’t do 1-3 vs 2-4. Instead, I will put the highest and lowest ranked players in the match together, so that the average rating of both teams is similar. And once we have played an edition or two, the difference between the four players in a match should be fairly small, increasing the likelihood of an even match.

All that’s left for you to do is to sign up! And that’s rather simple, all you have to do is post a message in this thread, that indicates you wish to participate. But be warned, a match has four players, so if sign-ups close and we do not have a multiple of four players, then the last few to sign up may miss out. So be sure to invite three others to play when you sign up to ensure you don’t miss out!

Players Signed Up (12)
  • BelSon
  • plug
  • Macomber
  • sarcophagus
  • gaz123
  • iippabella
  • Kwhwwymwn
  • Skilly146
  • Solfyre
  • MalcolmReynolds
  • Satirael
  • Lex

A question has been raised as to whether formal alliances will be made mandatory within teams. I want to hear your opinion on this! Please put your preference into the poll below, and post your reason for your preference in the thread. Note, this poll is not majority-wins, but rather an opportunity for me to find out what you all want. So make your case convincing!

Should it be a requirement for teams to Formally Ally at the start of the game?
  • Yes, teams should be forced to FA at the start of the game
  • No, teams should have the option to FA at any stage they wish

0 voters

Games

Game 1: Neptune's Pride
Solfyre + Macomber (Blue + Cyan)
vs
plug + BelSon (Green + Yellow)

Game 2: Neptune's Pride
MalcolmReynolds + iippabella (Blue + Cyan)
vs
Lex + spymort (Green + Yellow)

Game 3: Neptune's Pride
sarcophagus + Kwhwwymwn (Blue + Green)
vs
gaz123 + Satirael (Cyan + Yellow)

Edit: Added list of signed-up players and poll on FA
Edit: Added sign-ups close date
Edit: Closed poll on FA, added game links

1 Like
2

I’m in

3

Thanks for setting this competition up @BelSon - I’m keen to take part please.

Will you have in the rules a requirement that team members must pay for and make a formal alliance at the start? That’s normally been the practice previously I think.

4

Sign me up!

5

I am inclined to leave it optional. A team may want to save that $150 to spend elsewhere, and I think that’s fair. The FA allows a team to share their scanning in-game, and also send ships on each other’s stars, but scanning could be shared via screenshots and there may be no need to send ships to each other’s fronts… until there is. And a team not having the cash to create an FA when needed could be an interesting dynamic.

However, I am not against making it compulsory. I would like to hear everyone’s thoughts, do you want it mandatory, or leave it optional, and why? In fact, I’ll add such a poll to the initial post.

6

I voted ‘yes’ in the poll, but I’m very happy either way - no problem.

My ‘yes’ is because it makes the game more enjoyable to see more of the map in a reliable and straightforward manner, and it kind of reflects better the political set-up of the game. Also, with a decent amount of cash to start with, $75 per player should be easy to do. But like I say, happy either way.

7

Great idea! Hope you’ll get more signed up, maybe I’ll join some future round too.

Given the format, how about 2v2 Tower? :yum:

8

Count me in, please.

9

Great to see we are starting to fill another game. I’m just curious where all that interest has gone from the expressions of interest thread…?

@sarcophagus you have been added to the list.

We are currently majority of voters (4/6) have requested that FA be mandatory. We’ve however had only four sign-ups (excluding me, but I didn’t vote in the poll), so where are those 2+ people who voted but haven’t signed up? :stuck_out_tongue:

I’ve decided that I will close sign-ups on the 19th of April, create games hopefully the same day, and have a week for players to join. I’ve updated the OP (can I call it that given I’m the Original Poster?) to reflect this update.

1 Like
10

Probably a good idea to ping the players who have expressed interest previously. Many probably don’t have a keen eye on the forums.

11

Probably the best idea, yeah. I’ve put a message into the other thread, and will ping everyone in this thread. Also like your name suggestion, but I may wait to see if there are any more before I choose one.

12

This is a ping to all those who expressed interest in @spymort EOI thread, to notify them that this thing is live!

@spymort @wfmcgillicuddy @Tanktress @FinrodFelagund @Kwhwwymwn @iippabella @kinghuang @gaz123 @Solfyre @Skilly146 @MalcolmReynolds @limemaster @2forjuan

I hope to see at least a few of you take this opportunity to play in this friendly competition!

13

Ok, great! Look forward to it starting!

14

Great to see you have shortened the sign-up time. The original 1 month sign-up time seemed too long and I was not able to comit at that point since things might be a lot different at the point the games were planed to begin. I noted to come and check the situation at the end of the month so thanks for the ping. With this timeline, count me in.

15

So just to confirm, you are signing up?

16

Yes definitely!

17

sign me up!

18

Just for clarifying, these games won’t be used for ranked matches, will they?

19

I intend to use these games to help inform rankings when I next set up a 2v2 round. However, I don’t think Trucriot will use them to inform the 1v1 ranking, if that’s what you are asking. 2v2 is not 1v1, after all.

20

count me in