[SPOILERS]PB46: (In Search of) Fine Foreign Dining, by Hannibal of England

[Krill]

I don't quite know how to ask this, because on so many levels what I'm asking isn't reasonable, but I feel I have to ask it anyway:

I think TBW's move with the preats is so bad, so so incompetant and obviously wrong that I think it ought to be treated no differently than if he were trying to throw the game.

I think the turn should be reloaded and he should be replaced by a sub prior to making that move. That move destroys the integrity of this game in terms of a play test. Yes, players can make bad moves and mistakes, but that move goes beyond that point because it is no different than if he were trying to deliberately lose.

[mackoti]

I don't quite know how to ask this, because on so many levels what I'm asking isn't reasonable, but I feel I have to ask it anyway:

I think TBW's move with the preats is so bad, so so incompetant and obviously wrong that I think it ought to be treated no differently than if he were trying to throw the game.

I think the turn should be reloaded and he should be replaced by a sub prior to making that move. That move destroys the integrity of this game in terms of a play test. Yes, players can make bad moves and mistakes, but that move goes beyond that point because it is no different than if he were trying to deliberately lose.

Yeah i know this stuff can get alot of frustration and its very hard to deal with.And yes givin a huge advantage to a leader is again a very bad thing.I think you right he should somehow asked what he was thinking and maybe even replaced.I remember a game were someone died to scooter and he was still buldin forges not a single whip , no nada and i was ready to rage quit becasue of that. So i think you right but first someone must contact TBW to see the reason behind his moves.

[Krill]

I know that I can be frustrated, but I think we all accept that this can happen in these situations, and this isn't a reason for a reload: OH/Hitru made the right decicion to invade TBW, and he is defending poorly. That's not a reason to replace TBW at all.

I think the core argument for a reload is that TBWs reasons for his actions with the four preatorians on T139 are irrelevant: if he deleted those units it would have exactly the same outcome as if he moved them how he did. His reasons only matter in terms of "maliciousness", and that matters only if TBW is to be replaced.

I think the simplist explanation I could give is that I expect all players to follow 2 simple rules:

1. play to win, and
2. play to survive.

These rules imply that there is a minimum acceptable standard of play, and frankly I don't think anyone can argue against that because we do have forum/community expectations, and the existance of any rule that precludes certain behaviours/decisions inherently creates a minimum acceptable standard.

1) is simple: play in a manner that benefits your civ, rather than in a manner that overtly benefits another player over yourself. 2) is more complex because I know lots of players fail to know what to do when they are out of the running, but a simple definition is to play in a manner that aims for score victory. In this case that means not losing cities.

My assertion is that TBWs' move on T139 is a direct contravention of that second (self imposed) rule, because his move is no different to just deleting units. Now I could not say if his decision was due to maliciousness. I don't believe it is. I do believe that the Badgame group would not necessarily follow RB expectations of a minimum standard, but that's because of ignorance of such expecations rather than blatantly flouting them.

Now, if lurkers accepted my argument about the preat moves (and I somewhat expect lurkers not to but I do think TBW should be asked why he did it), then I'd argue that a reload and replay by a sub or lurker is the only reasonable outcome, even if TBW is not replaced but stays on as a team mate. And this is not new! In PB25 the game was reloaded after I, as a sub, played a turn and destroyed one of Donovan Zoi's stacks because players had missed a turn and it wasn't paused. The game was reloaded because a player had failed to make moves in an acceptable manner despite significant combat occuring. This situation is no different to that.

[Krill]

Another point that's worth making: In PB42, OT4E lost his entire stack against Gav because he mispositioned it and it got annihilated with no return, and OT4E subsequently lost everything rapidly and put Gav into pole position in that game. But PB42 wasn't reloaded? Why not, after such an "obvious" mistake?

In that game, OT4E mispositioned his stack, and yes it was a mistake, but he was still playing the game to try and defend what he had. So it was just that: a mistake, and he lost because of it. It wasn't incompetence, it wasn't him throwing the game, it was just a mistake. He had made a series of decisions to build a stack, to tech towards a relevant military tech (gunpowder as france), all of which were above any supposed minimum acceptable standard of play (all very competant actually), and was undone by that single screw up.

Now there is an argument that what TBW has done in this game is just a simple screw up: perhaps he hasn't considered that his units can be run down before they get anywhere. Perhaps he has got a strategy to just run away to an island. But all these decisions are in the context of ignoring the military build up of a neighbour, of a failure to build any military or to research relevant techs (and I've had full vision on his tech path so I can make that asssertion with proof), and of a failure in this last case to even defend his cities which would give him more resources with which to fight. This gives an example of a player operating much closer to that minimum standard of play, but I would only hold that his last decision regarding the preatorian movement is actually unacceptable and an act that would warrant replacement: everything else could easily be considered simply bad play, a series of unfortunate choices so to speak, but the decision to abandon his capital, defended by a single warrior and my scout when he had enough units to hold it, is beyond that line.

There is an argument that I have incomplete information, but the only way Rome fell was if there was a navy sitting right outside my vision that had another 6 or so units because I otherwise had vision on available avenues of approach to the city. In that case, yes, Rome could have fallen, but then that also means that TBWs' island cities are immediately threatened so the argument that he should retreat to islands is almost immediately debunked as flawed in that scenario anyway. Which brings it back around to it being better to defend in a 40% culture hill city that is about to get 3 longbows in if it holds for a turn (as he ought to whip one in a 9 pop city) because it gives him more turns to whip other cities...yet he isn't whipping.

[The Black Sword]

Unless TBW is deliberately trying to help OH then I find it hard to see the grounds for a reload. I think we've had many cases of people making mistakes and weird moves that benefited others in the past that weren't reloaded. 

I'm not sure I really agree with your rules. Play to win is fine to a certain extent. But there often comes a point in a game where a player can't win. And even before that point I think I often see people throw a position that is still potentially winnable to spite someone who has pissed in their cheerios. We never kick players for that. Play to survive is suspect too. Again people often play to hurt someone else rather than maximise their survival chances. There's also different interpretations of survive. The best way is arguably to give away your whole empire and hole up in one city with your entire army - that's not worth taking anymore. Yet we (thankfully) never see people do that.  

IMO, it's hard to justify a reload unless TBW is acting in bad faith.

[Krill]

Unless TBW is deliberately trying to help OH then I find it hard to see the grounds for a reload. I think we've had many cases of people making mistakes and weird moves that benefited others in the past that weren't reloaded.

On the whole I agree with this point.

I'm not sure I really agree with your rules. Play to win is fine to a certain extent. But there often comes a point in a game where a player can't win. And even before that point I think I often see people throw a position that is still potentially winnable to spite someone who has pissed in their cheerios. We never kick players for that. Play to survive is suspect too. Again people often play to hurt someone else rather than maximise their survival chances. There's also different interpretations of survive. The best way is arguably to give away your whole empire and hole up in one city with your entire army - that's not worth taking anymore. Yet we (thankfully) never see people do that.  

I don't really agree with those rules except in the most vaguest, ethereal of senses. But at the same time, we all have to be playing to win, don't we? If a single player joins a game with any other intent, does that not affect every other player present?

We've always had discussions about what to do when you can't win. And I agree that I've never seen a solid answer to that question, which is why I mention playing for score victory. I don't believe for one second that this is universally accepted as a rule though. The pissed in Cheerios point I whole heartedly empathize with, but then I can be a bastard.

None of this fits how TBW is playing though. Elkad, and currently OH/Hitru, are pissing in his cheerios. Trying to survive in one city doesn't fit either because all his units are being mown down and aren't being moved to that defensive city. I'd actually understand that idea though, and I'd agree that if that was the strategy it'd be perfectly valid. But again: he isn't whipping units, he isn't moving units to a defensive city, so I don't see how this could be his plan.

IMO, it's hard to justify a reload unless TBW is acting in bad faith.

I agree but it's the acting in bad faith part that I'm struggling with. Is it bad faith if his decision making is compromised by a combination of incompetence and intoxication, if the outcome of his decision is no different between an intentional attempt to throw the game and what that player chooses as his actions, if they serve no other identifiable purpose? Because that's what this boils down to: His actions appear to be completely ineffective at doing anything except getting his own units killed in situations where they ought to die. Not defending cities, not seeking a diplomatic surrender of some sort, his actions have the same outcome as if he just deleted his units. Is it bad faith for him to do this? Or is a sense of maliciousness integral to a community need to reload (which there is community evidence that this isn't the case).

And on a personal note, I have almost completely cut alcohol out of my life, but I still drink. But I ensure I never play a turn intoxicated, because I do believe that is unfair to all players. So in this murky, grey area what constitutes bad faith, I do not know, but I think I can ask you to look at.

[Juri]

if TBW plays his turns drunk its not something he talks about. that sounds more like Borsche's thing tbh

i don't think TBW would intentionally try to throw the game either

[The Black Sword]

I prompted TBW for an update and he still seems to be trying his best. I don't think there's enough evidence to continue holding the game up.

I'm sorry, I know it sucks when your competitor gets an unnaturally easy conquest.

[Krill]

I thought that would be the outcome.

So I feel that it is fair for me to make the following decision to not spend any more time on this game in the capacity I have been. It has no further value as a test game which is why I've been documenting so thoroughly. The password is hug. Someone else can have this Civ if they want. Oh, and the turn probably needs reloading because there is a diplomatic offer to OH which is probably not wanted by any sub. This might seem to be in reaction to this decision, but the reality is I needed a temporary sub in about 3 weeks anyway, for a period of up to 2 weeks and it's fairer to have a permanent sub. I'd like to suggest that TBW and I swap places, that way I can euthanize his Civ appropriately, and the sub for England doesn't get throw in the deep end.

Also, I'm done with RtR mod at this point, at least after I do a final update. There's no way to test the next level of changes without problems with map generation and relative player skill being solved and that's beyond me to fix.

[Juri]

What are/would be/would have been the next level of changes?