A new way to determine a Winner

Ming · April 8, 2003, 19:43

War4ever and I were chatting last night. For the "setting up IP games" group, we usually end up playing one nighters that last for only 4 to 6 hours. And neither of us really feel that the powergraph is the best way to determine who the "winner" was. It's usually just a good indication of who has the biggest population at that point in time, not the person who is in the best position to win the game...

So we were thinking... (always a dangerous thing)

Civ III MP at least has different types of victory conditions you can choose... like capture the flag.

Why can't we figure out some way to create different type of One Nighters to play, where specific victory conditions are used.

One thought would be to develop some type of point system that works better than the power graph... or come up with different types of games...

Just some examples and thought starters...

The Science race game... Set a time limit, and the winner of the game is the person with the most sciences...

The Distruction Game... The person who kills the most units wins...

Capture the Flag... The first person to TAKE two cities from another player wins...

Start playing the old Arena War games again... where you play two against two... there was never really any question at the end of one night who the victors really were...

The Trade Game... Who can establish the highest paying trade route wins...

Yeah, I know many of these are silly... But I want us to think "out of the box" and come up ways where there truely is a clear victory condition... or to come up with games that force you to play differently because what you need to do to win is different.

Thoughts... suggestions...

Caesar the Great · April 8, 2003, 20:04

wonder race? who can build the most wonders? (or conquer them)

highest population or most money by a certain date? (say 1 ad)

most units?

or you could just fiddle with the rules.txt and make all the good (modern) units available much earlier - with double production that shouldn't be a problem, stealth bombers in 500 BC

Ming · April 8, 2003, 20:10

Keep the ideas coming... hmmm... stealth bombers by 500 bc... Hmmmmm

War4ever · April 8, 2003, 20:20

We could preapprove victory conditions....and the host would draw them out for the players.... the only drawback is the host would know of everyones differnt objectives

but if we could agree on these ahead of time it would be a new twist

Ming · April 8, 2003, 20:30

It would be tough getting around somebody knowing them all... But not a bad idea. Just let everybody know what everybodies victory conditions are.

Or... create 5 different victory conditions...

Like first to 5 wonders...
First to take out somebodies capital...
First to invention...
First to take 4 opposition cities...
First to 20 cities...

And let the players race to whichever one makes the most sense based on their situation..

War4ever · April 8, 2003, 21:32

other ideas, first to a size 21 city? or is that too high....

the first to the true SSC..ie colossus, cops and newton, meaning you can't use HG as your colossus

this forces a player to make a choice on an early wonder

First to 2000g....which would be hard b/c we all blow our gold on expansion and caravans... again , another choice....this could be offset of course by early republic...then again, if you know what someones goals are, you may go all out to make sure they don't achieve these goals..

the person with the most land area uncovered...could mean a new look at naval uses?

DrSpike · April 9, 2003, 06:47

First off I would say you will never come up with an effective alternative points system.......lets face it the players involved know who the winner(s) is/are, and all a points system does is encourage people to take advantage of that structure, like the old 2x2x King powergraph games.

But I love the themed games idea.......that could really make the game different week to week, and force a variety of game styles on each player.

rah · April 9, 2003, 10:06

I like taking cities as a measure. But if we do that, there must be different points awarded based on terrain.

And a bonus for taking his cap. This coupled with units destroyed would be acceptable to this ole war monger.

oedo · April 9, 2003, 15:59

how about a scoring system for aiming defined goals and a bonus for aiming them first?
for example you can spread points for researching certain techs, establish a new goverment, building 5/10/20 cities, capture a city, being first winning a battle in a game, being first building a wonder in a game etc.
and how about this: a bonus for being the first reaching a goal must be claimed in the kings chat. no claim no points. so it´s up to you if you take the points or bluff your rivals. the latter could make sence if the scoring system is balanced out well.

War4ever · April 9, 2003, 16:13

good thoughts Oedo...keep them coming people, eventually there will be enough ideas to banter back and forth about

oedo · April 9, 2003, 17:47

let me have a try:

in the end of the game
each: scores

tech: 1pt
wonder, embassy: 3 pts
city 1-2: 5 pts
city 3-8: 10 pts
city 9-12: 20 pts
city >12: 40 pts
city >21: 100 pts

the following events can only be claimed, if no one claimed them before:

- first at researching: writing, poli, trade, invention, steam engine, whatever....
- first at 5/10/15/20 cities
- first ancient wonder unless it´s HG or GW/ first rennaissance/industrial/modern wonder (claims itself afa I remember

)
- first trireme or ship
- first at population 100.000 / 1.000.000 / 10.000.000 /(...)
- first established monarchy/republik/(...)

the number of points you get rise with the number of claims made before.

the following events score automatically:

- battle won/attack only: one point for each destroyed unit
- city conquered: 2*size after conquering
- city destroyed: 1 point
- foreign trade route: 1 point each
- attacking a rival´s capital: 1 point
- attacking a unit on a mountain top: 1 point/ winning scores 5+number of units

the following events automatically decrease your number of points by one:

- unit/city bribe
- tech steal

just a blind try. looks complicated at first sight and is open for any negotiation since I don´t play in your group anyway.

enjoy

Caesar the Great · April 9, 2003, 17:48

I'm personally a big fan of modern warefare (except spies of course)

A little tweaking to the rules.txt would make the game very different, air units, useful sea units and without spies (or even nukes) combat would be a lot more bloody, and so one person couldn't lose his entire empire in one turn

Max number of cities? No caravans?

Rationing the wonders before the game?

Or a cumulative point system based on who has the most 1st's on the democraphics every 10-20 turns?

I also like the idea of giving missions to people, and if the host knows about it, he can try to stop them from accomplishing it? Like say build or conquer a city on 3 of the following 5 squares (33,40) (3,21) etc. Could be interesting, like mission risk.

rah · April 9, 2003, 18:04

Good stuff Oedo. My only concern would be that at then end of a one night session, all of us would be so trashed that we still wouldn't know who won.

War4ever · April 9, 2003, 18:06

i like the mission risk concept, again, the host would know about all the possiblities....or, the other way to do is to have an independant person icq each person, wouldn't be hard, and tell them what they have to accomplish.....

ex..

caesar, decides that rah has to conquer wars capital, berz has to build 25 cities, war has to caputure any 5 cities on the map and ming has to (stop whining)

build leos and ASTF...... then the host wouldn't know..

i think i like the idea of missions over a set amoiunt of points..... building cities is too easy, and we dont want to only emphasize war strats.....

thats why having 1/2 war missions and half "peacefull/scientific/economic" missions would be best

Caesar the Great · April 9, 2003, 19:10

we would have to agree what relatively equal missions should be, and perhaps even offset some "host advantage" by giving the host a slightly harder mission?

if we could make a list of say 20-30 different missions which would be about equally difficult to accomplish, and have either the host or a non-participant decide who gets what missions.... could be a lot of fun

Ben Kenobi · April 9, 2003, 19:29

Why not have a non-player set up a scenario with event triggers?

That could account for most of your victory conditions.

Capture a specific barbarian city would be easy to do.

With the non-player doing the scenario, no one person would have an advantage.

We could stick all the good wonders in other barbarian cities as well.

Ming · April 9, 2003, 19:57

Nice thinking... but that would be a lot of work... we would need multiple new scenarios every week.

I like the "objective" approach... but still think it would be better to establish a list of 10 or so "equal" objectives, and let the people decide which one they will go for based on the situation they get dealt with.

Caesar the Great · April 9, 2003, 21:03

if you're willing to make half a dozen scenarios each week that would be great, but no one really has that additional much time to put into civ (after all i'd rather play a game for an hour than spend that time to make a scenario for someone else to play)

objectives idea sounds the best so far

deity · April 10, 2003, 02:24

Why don't you try something new and play proper civ right to the end to determine the winner

Ming · April 10, 2003, 02:55

That would be nice... however, that requires the same people to be available at the same time... on a regular basis. While you guys might be able to do that... there are nights when many of want to play where the past group isn't available. We just get tons of games with different people...

So we are looking for an idea that might make the 4 hour one nite stand more interesting.

Cobra · April 10, 2003, 06:07

In the past we tried this kind of game: winner is the player with the most costs of city improvements. Everyone has to decide, if he builds wonders or not, if he builds a strong army to conquer enemys cities or to be a scientist. It´s funny.
Most cities size 5 or bigger is better than only most cities.

DrSpike · April 10, 2003, 06:54

I think very simple themed games would be best. If you work out points for everything it would take many weeks to balance properly, and you'd spend half of each week working out who'd won.

I'd forget those complex points structures - a simple metric with a clear winner is more desirable. This thread should be redirected into finding those 'simple' conditions, albiet ones where the 'best' way to win is far from obvious.

deity · April 10, 2003, 07:52

What's wrong with using the Civ Score?

Ming · April 10, 2003, 10:17

The current system is frankly a joke. It really has nothing to do with who is actually winning the game.
Basically, if you are ahead in population, you win.

Since we are only playing a 4 to 6 hour game, we need a better way to determine a clear cut winner. The power graph doesn't really include many of the important factors.

rah · April 10, 2003, 10:54

BUT, (example) last weeks game, I had HG so I celebrated and kicked butt in the PG, but when I reviewed the game, everyone had about the same number of cities, techs, units, gold etc. I concluded that we all were very close and no one really won. Three way tie. It didn't take 20 minutes to calculate, I didn't have to compare goals. It was pretty obvious. In fact, if i didn't get math in the next couple of turns, you could have taken it to a couple of my cities in that river basin.

SO let's not overthink this.

Ming · April 10, 2003, 11:25

In terms of developing a point system... I would agree with you. A complicated point system isn't really answer. While it might prove to better than the current power graph... anything that requires tons of calculations at the end of the game isn't what I think War or I had in mind.

But what I do want to over think is various victory conditions that might be developed, and how to use them in a 4 to 6 hour game. So I would be agreement with Dr. Spikes last post.

Two real things I think we need to narrow down.

What are the various victory conditions that can be used

And how do we use those to create a balanced and fair game that can be played in 4 to 6 hours and actually bring our games to a solid ending with victory being a very clear cut outcome.

atawa · April 10, 2003, 12:12

If you want a game with a clear winner in 4-6 hours on your size maps just play 2x moves.

Caesar the Great · April 10, 2003, 12:16

stealth bombers, tanks and battleships...... therein lies your answer

War4ever · April 10, 2003, 12:18

The more i think about it, the more i don't like the point scoring system. Playing for points is completely different than playing for supremacy, which in reality is what this game is all about.

You can make the same arguement about predetermined victory conditions too..

i think the idea of missions as a way to win, is a great idea, but if you are clearly kicking butt, that should suffice too....

what we really need is a way not to have such unbalanced games after one session so people will be more apt to continue.

i am not really in favor of a point system.......i think adding specific victory conditions could add some spice to the game on top current conditions.

how to implement this is anyones guess

Caesar the Great · April 10, 2003, 12:46

counting the points would only make games longer and we don't want to have any recounts... determining the winner shouldn't take more than a couple of seconds

i think most people agree missions are a good idea, maybe we could start making suggestions what kind of missions would be equally difficult to accomplish?

like blue conquer yellow's and green's capital
or build newton's, shakespeare's and darwin's
grow any city to size 30