Proposed Game: Waterworld

[mmontgomery]

Is anyone interested in playing a game where the entire world is made of water; the map starts with no land, and no land is allowed to be raised? All players play the Pirates, with no AI players. This would obviously be a SMACX game.

I am thinking of a 4 or 6 player game. I would like each player to have a randomized starting position of some kind. I am not worried about balanced starting locations, because sea units are very mobile anyway, and can move a bit to find some good locations.

I would like people who have fast turnaround. I have been very impressed watching Quest for Glory, and would especially favor any players from that game, which have a proven track record for fast turns. I also have a proven track record for fast turns, in case anyone was worried that I might be the slow link.


I also wanted to bounce around some ideas for team rules and see what people think of them. I was thinking that as the first factions come into contact, they become teams. In a 4 player game, they would announce the turn that they have made contact, and the other two players would also pact. That way, all teams are formed on the same turn, so no team gets the advantage of being pacted 10 or 20 turns earlier than the other team.

On a 6 player game, when 2 players meet, they announce the team, but the others do not pact automatically. If a two player team meets an unteamed faction, they automatically join the team and announce, then the other factions form the other team for a 3 vs. 3 game. If all factions form into 2 player teams, then the game plays out as 2 vs 2 vs 2.

Once teams are formed, they are permanent for the game. Since the factions start at random locations, this would end up with random combinations for teams.


Other rules:
No copters. (I was thinking of the possibility of banning all air units. What do you think?)
No atrocities.
Maritime Control Center is banned.
Land cannot be raised out of the water (but water can be raised to make it more shallow).

Things to vote about (with my vote listed) but I could be overruled by the other player votes.
Pods: no
Tech stagnation: no
Air units: no
Alien life: Abundant
Random team formation (as discussed above, with suggestions from other players): yes

So, is anyone interested in an all Pirates game? And if so, what do you think of the team idea above?

[florin79c]

I also wanted to bounce around some ideas for team rules and see what people think of them. I was thinking that as the first factions come into contact, they become teams. In a 4 player game, they would announce the turn that they have made contact, and the other two players would also pact. That way, all teams are formed on the same turn, so no team gets the advantage of being pacted 10 or 20 turns earlier than the other team.

This idea looks nice

A no land game scares me so i wont be in, but we apriciate you wach on others games

[Darsnan]

Originally posted by mmontgomery
Is anyone interested in playing a game where the entire world is made of water; the map starts with no land, and no land is allowed to be raised? All players play the Pirates, with no AI players.

Hi mmontgomery,

I can set this up for you, if you like. Having played a lot on watermaps I can also add things like Sea Monoliths, and add landmarks such as underwater volcanoes.

I would also suggest adding some land to the game: small tidbits of land scattered across the map act as impassable terrain, thus invoking strategy on how to avoid/ utilize it to your advantage. Also, whenever I set up a game for Pirates, I always started them out in archapeligos, which here again assisted the defender on their home turf, as well as allowing the Pirate player to utilize the forest-n-forget approach.

Originally posted by mmontgomery
This would obviously be a SMACX game.

Note that in SMAC I could mimic everything except the Marine Detachment - FYI in case you decide to go that route.

Originally posted by mmontgomery
On a 6 player game, when 2 players meet, they announce the team, but the others do not pact automatically. If a two player team meets an unteamed faction, they automatically join the team and announce, then the other factions form the other team for a 3 vs. 3 game. If all factions form into 2 player teams, then the game plays out as 2 vs 2 vs 2.
Once teams are formed, they are permanent for the game. Since the factions start at random locations, this would end up with random combinations for teams.

From a CMN perspective that would be very difficult setting up, and ensuring all Factions have equal opportunities in regards to the perma-pacts.

Originally posted by mmontgomery
Other rules:
No copters. (I was thinking of the possibility of banning all air units. What do you think?)
No atrocities.
Maritime Control Center is banned.
Land cannot be raised out of the water (but water can be raised to make it more shallow).

Possible Units:

- Attack Submarine Mk1 (5/2/5) available at Superconductor. The sub ability could be reverse-engineered onto Probe Ships. Note that if you like I could make an Mk2 version higher on the tech chart.

- Aircraft Carrier Mk1 (6/3r/5, carry capacity of two) at Doc: AP. Note that if you like I could make an Mk2 version higher on the tech chart.


I played in two Pirates games in the past ("Clone Wars" and "Here there be Pirates"): fun stuff, and a great change of pace from your typical games! FYI for anyone who is considering joining this game.

D

[mmontgomery]

I am assuming a round world for this game. I think it is critical for a 6 player game to equalize the positions, and I prefer it for the 4 player as well.

It is true that one cannot have equal opportunity for the permapacts. That is why I thought of randomizing the starting positions (maybe the CMN throws dice to figure out who starts where). For a 4 person game, the situation would be as below:

          1                    2



          3                    4

where the distance between 1_2, 1_3, 4_3, and 4_2 are all the same. So everyone has an equal chance of pacting except the diagonals 1 and 4, and 2 and 3, who are unlikely to find each other first.

For a 6 player game in a round world, the situation would be:

          1                    2                    3




          4                    5                    6

The layout would be such that the wraparound distance from 1 to 3 is the same as the distance from 1 to 2, and the vertical spacing between factions equals the horizontal spacing. So each faction has an equal chance of pacting with the nearby faction. For example, faction 2 will most likely pact with 1, 3, or 5, but could still easily wind up in a 3 way pact with 4 or 6.

As for having some land, I guess that would be consistant with the theme. Even waterworld (the movie) had some land. However, I still would like to limit the use of land, such as no raising land (if global warming sinks some of the starting land, too bad), and no land bases. It would make some sense for some high volcanoes to stick out from the sea.

Part of the reason I had for having no land at all was to make the CMN job easier for player balance. But if a CMN wants to take some time to create a balanced water map with some land features, great!

[Kazik]

team idea is interesting, it would make the game more balanced as it would disable first meeting factions to fight and therefore give advantage to "not yet fighting" factions

but anyway i think this game would not have the balance between builder and momentum strategy (even on huge maps); pretty much just explore and attack

huge randomizing factor is that to build a sea base you have to spend more minerals than on land bases while conquering sea base is much easier than conquering land base ! (Because of faster units and no land issues) so the risk to build is much higher, so its better to just fight; so this game game would depend more on the luck than on the player

[mmontgomery]

Balancing momentum was one of the factors in the first contact = pact proposal. This is also why I don't like having pods for this map, since pods favor the momentum player.

I was thinking of a very large map, so that starting locations would be wide spaced, maybe distance 40 or more apart. So it would take 10 turns for a newly built unit to reach a position to attack. Meanwhile, a former could have made several improvements, and in 10 turns, the base could crank out several defenders.

I think each faction starting with an Armored (2 defense) Sea Former would be good idea, to help give builders a nudge, and which could also duck inside a city to provide 2 defense to a city that is threatened.

I agree that water is more difficult for defense. However, city defenders do get a 25% bonus to defense, and perimeter fences are effective as well.

Perhaps to even further improve defense, would it be possible for the CMN to make some sensors in the sea near the starting locations?

Finally, Darsnan's suggestion of adding a bit of land to restrict sea movement might do wonders for defense, depending on how the land is positioned.

[H0bbes]

I'm interested in playing. crocombej AT hbc DOT ac DOT za

[drow21]

hey this idea sounds realy cool count me in

[mmontgomery]

Darsnan,

Thanks for your offer to setup! I would appreciate that. Would you like to play also? If so, that would give us four players.

Do we want to wait for six? Is there anyone else wanting into this game?

[Darsnan]

Originally posted by mmontgomery
Darsnan,

Thanks for your offer to setup! I would appreciate that.

OK, if you give me the final dimensions and settings you'd like I can start on the map now. Also let me know if you want the subs or Aircraft Carriers, and I'll prep the alphax.txt accordingly.

Originally posted by mmontgomery
Would you like to play also? If so, that would give us four players.

I've committed to running a marathon next summer/ fall timeframe, so will be hanging up the computer gaming for a while (the two don't seem to mix very well, as I've gained 12lbs since last spring!).

Originally posted by mmontgomery
Do we want to wait for six? Is there anyone else wanting into this game?

I can set up the game for 3 relatively easily, with each of you taking a place in the middle of the map, equidistant from one another. I can then throw in landmarks at locations equidistant from each player as well, to include at the fringes of the map.


D

[mmontgomery]

(deleted)

[mmontgomery]

I think we should wait for at least 4 players, then vote on subs, carriers, and whether we want any kind of aircraft at all.

[Bodissey]

I would be happy to join, should you still require another player.

[Darsnan]

Originally posted by mmontgomery
I think we should wait for at least 4 players, then vote on subs, carriers, and whether we want any kind of aircraft at all.

Note that after this weekend I probably won't be able to get to this till around January 3rd.

D

[mmontgomery]

That's OK. With the holidays and all, I doubt we could get the game launched any soon.

I had a question about what is possible for a moderator. Would it be possible for all units (or at least all ships) to have AAA ability built in for no extra charge right from the beginning? If so, I think this would be a good idea for this scenario.

[Darsnan]

Originally posted by mmontgomery
I had a question about what is possible for a moderator. Would it be possible for all units (or at least all ships) to have AAA ability built in for no extra charge right from the beginning? If so, I think this would be a good idea for this scenario.

The answer is yes it could be built in via the faction editor such that once each faction discovers the prerequisite tech for AAA (Doc:AP), that all their units (land and sea) receive AAA. However there exists a conflict here in that you can only give each faction one free special ability, and for the Pirates (which everyone was going to be playing in this one) that is already used for the Marine Detachment special ability (i.e. so it would have to be one or the other in that case).
Otherwise the only way to do it would be by putting predesigned units in the alphax.txt.

[mmontgomery]

I think it would be OK to substitute AAA for Marine Detachment. Really, we don't want to increase the attacker's momentum by having them board ships anyway. If anyone really wants marine detachment, they can add it and pay for it.

I would like to make AAA available at Doc:Flexibility, so that all of the initial ships have it for free.

[Marky]

I am not sure about having the time to play, but it sound like an interesting idea.