Welcome to the Apolyton Multiplayer (MP) Arena! You have been playing single player all the time and want to find out what the fuss about this Multiplayer thing is all about? Then this is the place for you. Multiplayer is different to single player in a lot of ways. The most important one: You no longer play against an AI which may have its shortcomings in some areas and which acts predictably or not at all. Here you play against humans who develop their own strategies, who react differently to what you do, and who are able to really interact. Against the best players you will find a challenge that is not comparable to playing the AI on Deity level - simply because your opponent
thinks.
But how do you find and play those human opponents, and how do you make sure you'll have a great game experience? We have worked hard to create a league that can serve as an environment for that great game experience. Whether you want to play a spontaneous game casually once a week or be part of a clan participating in tournaments and working your way up the rankings all day long, whether you want to solely play OneCityChallenge or Earth games, whether you're interested in long-term Diplogames, PBeM or Pitboss - this is the section for you.
Here are just some of the features of the Apolyton MP Arena:
Self-Policing
In general we are fans of giving players autonomy over their games, having the ability to report rule violations and vote whether those occurred. There is always the possibility of appealing to an admin, but the vast majority of daily complaints should be covered easily and without interference of a person standing outside the game. We believe that it is hard for an outsider of a game to judge properly.
Rankings
One of the key developments of the Apolyton MP section is not visible right away. We've spent lots of time taking thousands of MP Civ games into account to create an algorithm that suits the needs of a Civ Ranking. 'CTON' / 'FFA' and 'Teamer' / Duel use different ways of calculating skill gain and loss of players after a match. Each game type is ranked separately and also counts for the Combined Ranking. There will be separate rankings for 'OCC', for Earth games and for anything else that is required. The system will display lots of information, for example on the maps or starting eras played in matches, also showing on each player's personal site which starting eras he tends to play for instance. There will be tournaments supported by a specific tournament software that allows for KO, Double-KO, group system etc. organization, we can display rankings based on Nationality - also planning for a Nations Cup...
The common ground of all those ways of playing the game in MP and at the same time main reason for this section is the fact that it's not possible to get a MP game in Civ by just hosting or joining a random game in the MP lobby, because the vast majority of people will quit once something doesn't go according to plan or they ran out of time. If you want to find out how the MP Arena can help you in making your game experience better, please take the
guided tour... We hope we will be able to see you playing in the MP Arena soon!
Your Apolyton Staff
