How to play when you have no chance of winning?

[Jowy]

Um how exactly was the PB2 map unbalanced?

Every other player had copper except me.
It was even noticed by someone who proof-checked the map before we started:
"I had a quick look at the final draft. The strategic resources seem very fair. (Everyone with horses 3 tiles from capital, everyone with copper on island, 9/10 civs with copper on donut radially towards centre, everyone with iron within a few tiles of their capital). But S3 (NW start) seems to be missing its copper radially towards the centre??"
I guess they forgot to fix it.

We are really off-railing the discussion though. PM me if you have more questions

[Brian Shanahan]

One of the greatest sources of acrimony in PBEM and pitboss games has been the behavior of players who, rightly or wrongly, perceived themselves as having no chance at winning the game. If several other players want to keep the game going, the "no-chance" player usually feels obligated to continue devoting a considerable amount of time and effort to the losing cause. There seem to be several options, none of which is really satisfactory:

1) Pick your worst enemy, do your best to make him lose. This tactic has probably caused the most bad feelings. The choice of worst enemy is often arbitrary.

2) Pick your best friend, do your best to make him win. Or, vassalize yourself. Again, the choice is likely to be arbitrary.

3) Defend your territory. Usually the least time-intensive option. Stack up units in your cities, make someone pay if they invade your territory. The problem with this approach is that the "no-chance" player is typically behind in tech, and it will be cheap and easy for someone with much more advanced units to gobble up his cities. Less hedgehog, more balloon. >pop<!

4) Resign to AI. This lets the game go on without forcing someone to keep participating in a game he has no interest in playing. Disadvantage: we're playing an MP game because the AI is predictable and easily exploited.

5) Virtual resignation. Strip your cities of units, allow yourself to be eliminated. Unfair because the geography will make it easier for one player to conquer the bulk of your territory.

Maybe part of the pre-game rules discussion should include this topic? I don't think there's an easy answer, but it might help if players knew at the start of the game what they were committing themselves to.

6) Keep playing as normal. You weren't devoting more than 5-10 minutes to every turn in the first place so there's not any great issue right?

7) go out in a blaze of glory, or in my case, suicide against a wall of skeletons and wraiths you didn't know were there.

[Twinkletoes89]

8) Play with Tech Trading on then noone can really become a huge, uncatchable runaway...?

[Serdoa]

No, but TT does bring in its own issues, like trading blocs, potential necessary diplomacy, etc. Though the first point probably is already the worst.

I think how to play is relatively easy though

1. Play as you would others want to play in this situation.
2. Don't act out of spite.
3. Don't help any other players just because.

Quite honestly, the issues we've seen most of the time were starting with someone screwing around instead of actually trying to win. And obviously playing against opponents you are actually not able to compete against. Though I think the later problem actually is much less of a concern than it was.

[Sullla]

Jowy, the quote you've pulled was a reference to starting the game with a worker build. Here's the post if anyone wants to look at it. The specific context was a reference to one of the players in that game (Mortius) losing his capital when an enemy warrior walked into it on Turn 10. Thus the "risk" aspect of that comment. If that constitutes a farmer's gambit, then 95% of the games on this website are a farmer's gambit. Pulling quotes out of context doesn't make an argument.

I don't want to take on another Pitboss game at the moment due to my involvement with the current Intersite project. I also suspect that in any full diplo game, I would soon find two or three teams knocking on my doorstep with their armies, which is not a particularly interesting or fun challenge. But if you want to play Always War on a duel map at some point or something like that, we could probably set that up.

[Gaspar]

No, but TT does bring in its own issues, like trading blocs, potential necessary diplomacy, etc. Though the first point probably is already the worst.

I think how to play is relatively easy though

1. Play as you would others want to play in this situation.
2. Don't act out of spite.
3. Don't help any other players just because.

Quite honestly, the issues we've seen most of the time were starting with someone screwing around instead of actually trying to win. And obviously playing against opponents you are actually not able to compete against. Though I think the later problem actually is much less of a concern than it was.

Pretty much 100% agree with this.

[Jowy]

I don't want to take on another Pitboss game at the moment due to my involvement with the current Intersite project. I also suspect that in any full diplo game, I would soon find two or three teams knocking on my doorstep with their armies, which is not a particularly interesting or fun challenge. But if you want to play Always War on a duel map at some point or something like that, we could probably set that up.

Ah yes, the intersite project.. Could I inquire whether the Realms Beyond group of players is big or not? If it is, which is what I kinda feared, it would definitely explain why sign ups for a new PB have been slow. We might have to wait until that is all over in order to start a new PB.

I don't believe that you'd get automatically teamed on in any game you enter. When starting PB2, I was, and still am, a fan of your work. The intention never was to go in and attack Sullla because he's a son of a bitch. If there ever was any bias, it'd probably be the opposite, I'd be less likely to go against you because of your reputation. The players involved legitimately believed that the best gameplay was to go for the dogpile, which in hindsight of course was silly and it might have felt to you that we did it because of your status. There are many good players here at RB who would be just as big of a threat as you, and I highly doubt there will ever be another PB2 type situation. I understand though, I am also wary whether my rivals from old games would automatically align against me in future games. But in the end of the day, we all play to win, and it would be silly to handicap yourself by keeping a grudge. If your old rival happens to end up on the other side in the game and you get to go at it again, cool, but that's just a bonus.

I'll have to decline the always war duel. It reminds me of the people yelling "1v1 me bro" after a League of Legends match. All it would prove is who's better under those conditions, not under real game conditions. We can play together in a proper game when the Intersite PB is done (if I am not busy with another game) If not, I at least hope to see you in some kind of a new PB game with the RB folks.

[spacetyrantxenu]

If you're waiting for the intersite democracy game to end before starting anything you'll be waiting a long time. The Mayans may reconquer Central America and get wiped out again before that game ends.

[Thoth]

I also suspect that in any full diplo game, I would soon find two or three teams knocking on my doorstep with their armies, which is not a particularly interesting or fun challenge.

+1.

Sulla, I understand where you are coming from on this.

And I agree with you.


It isn't a lot of fun to know that everyone in the game is gunning for you just because you've played a better opening than they have.

Or worse, knowing that everyone in the game is gunning for you because of past reputation.


RB has made some moves towards loosely sorting games as "Greens" or "Vets" and I think that's a step in the right direction.

I hate the notion of formal ranks or Win/Loss rankings as that tends to tip the atmosphere in the direction of "Win at any cost".

But I don't see a good solution to the problem of dogpiles right now.


The source of the problem is mismatched player skill levels. A game between players of roughly equal experience and skill shouldn't produce a runaway (assuming a no diplo game) easily.

If we can sort that out without acrimony ( ) and somehow arrange future games to be between players of roughly equal skill, then runaways shouldn't happen as frequently. And players could find a game suitable to their current ability.


And if someone can runaway with a game against players of similar skill levels, why not just concede the match to them and start up another game? If you're contemplating dogpiling someone, you've already acknowledged that you don't think you can beat that player on your own from your present position. So why waste everyone's time when you could be learning from your mistakes and trying again?


Damnfino how to do all that.

Suggestions are welcome.

[kjn]

Ah yes, the intersite project.. Could I inquire whether the Realms Beyond group of players is big or not? If it is, which is what I kinda feared, it would definitely explain why sign ups for a new PB have been slow. We might have to wait until that is all over in order to start a new PB.

Well, depends. The number of lurkers and commenters is great. The number of really active contributors is not that large - I'd currently peg it at five peop. I think it's more that the RB demogame soaked up a lot of players, but then experienced a large level of dropouts and so on. People have learned to ration their commitments.