PBEM tournament, looking for players!

[Tau Ceti]

MichaeltheGreat: Zsozso has not made any specific rules either for or against having more than one of a faction in a game. However, in the games he has set up so far, there is no duplicating of factions. I will not do it in the games I set up; I leave the decision on whether to allow this or not to zsozso when he gets back.

Everyone: we could use more Crossfire players.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Since Fistandantilus is now in the SMACX tournament, I'll sign up for SMACX as well.

I haven't installed v2.0 yet, since I've learned to wait and see what the new bugs are when Firaxis codes something and EA QA's it.

[DinoDoc]

How many games edgecrusher, DinoDoc, Lord Maxwell, BustaMike, DilithiumDad, Grigger and hygum want to play concurrently;

I can play 2-3 concurrently.

Faction preferences for BustaMike and Grigger, and perhaps some favourites from DinoDoc and hygum too. 'Any' is ok, but then you run the risk of being set up as the Cult of Planet...

In that case, I will take any faction but the Cult of Planet or the Data Angels.

Zso or anyone that knows- What is delaying play in ACT002? I have not recieved my turn in quite a while.

[Lord Maxwell]

You could set me up for games with my two other fav factions, morgan and cyborgs whenever you get enough players. Got my spring schedule, and it will, apparently, be a breeze. So I can play three games concurrently. I play around 9pm GMT every night.

[korn469]

zsozso

for the next tournament i would recommend you not including unity pods, unless you can control what is in them, but idon't think you can. i think that unity pods unbalance the game, not to the point where a much worse player would beat a much better one, but in games that are as close as these are turning out to be unity pods could be the weak link. i mean blind research and random events are turned off, and i think that unity pods are much more random and much more unbalancing than random events. i feel this even though each player has the same number of pods, if two players uncover 8 pods and one gets 8 mind worms and one get 8 resupply pods @ 200 energy apeice the player finding the mindworms gets the shaft (especially if they kill units). i think in my current game that all three of us have been very fortunate, but i think that it is unbalancing...

one other concern, why does morgan get 400 energy? all of the other factions lose their advantage but morgan keeps his, why is this? maybe i am not thinking it out correctly but this seems an unfair advantage for morgan

korn469

[MichaeltheGreat]

Korn and others: In the Scenario Editor you can set some, but not all, of the outcome results of pod-popping. You can eliminate units resulting from a pod pop, and you can eliminate alien artifacts. Although it can be unbalancing, one of the key points of competition is the race for pods in all that neutral territory.

[zsozso]

First of all I would like to thank Tau Ceti for setting up new games while I was on vacation. He also helped to solve a problem caused by my mistake in the Morgan setup for ACT004.
Three cheers to Tau Ceti!

Multiple factions:
I would like to keep the games with different factions if possible. Multiple copies of same-looking faction can be confusing for the third player just like different faction properties from usual look. However, if some players insist to play against each other with the same faction, I can be convinced.

Scoring:
using different scores for different victory types would result in prolonged games to reach the highest scoring victory - which is rather boring for the losing players... That is why I'd rather use the hierarchical scoring system I described on the thread: http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum27/HTML/000100.html
Nevertheless, I am still open to suggestions on the scoring. It is not late until the first game completes (which will take several weeks at least).

Morgan starting with 400 energy:
In my opinion, the starting tech equalisation is a a self-contained issue, independent from other faction bonuses, like free network nodes for the University, free perimeter defense for the Hive, extra food in fungus squares for the Gaians etc. I think the extra starting energy for Morgan belongs to this list, so it is fair to keep it just like all these other bonuses are kept for the respective factions.

Player assigments:
So, far the first games have been assigned to players basicaly on a first came first served basis. This was OK, while only a few new players appeared each time, just enough to start up a new game. Later, however, we need some system to decide who to play whom. Decx has come up with a challenge-based idea, described in the following thread: http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum31/HTML/000168.html
I like the idea, though some details have to be worked out. What do you think about it ?

For now, there are the following players with unfilled game capacities:

SMAC:

• Tau Ceti - unlimited games
• Paul - 1 more game
• Zsozso - unlimited games
• Korn469 - 1 more game
• Pagan - 2 games
• MichaeltheGreat - unlimited games

SMAX:

• Tau Ceti - unlimited games
• Zsozso - unlimited games
• Lord Maxwell - 2 more games

If I missed somebody or listed incorrectly, please speak up! Tau Ceti indicated, that he would like to play in a game with me and I am happy to accept the challenge if somebody volunteers to CMN the game for us. We also need a third player to volunteer for the game. It could be either SMAC or SMAX.

I would also like to ask other players from the above list to indicate any opponent preferences, i.e. we could start the challenge system: let's see who wants to challenge whom from the above lists ?

Alternatively, we could throw up some random generator.

Zsozso
[This message has been edited by zsozso (edited January 25, 2000).]

[zsozso]

I forgot to address the unity pod question. Yes, it can be unbalancing that is true. On the other hand, it is a great speed-up on the otherwise slow PBEM game. I also aggree with MichaeltheGreat, that it is a contest to get the ones on neutral territory. Maybe the best compromise would have been to put them only on neutral territories and none on the starting islands...

Well, it is too late to change the scenario now, as many games have started already.

[Paul]

I think that we should all play at least once against every other player, so as long as there are still people you haven't played against you should play against those first. After that maybe you could go with the challenge idea. Anyway, I don't have any preference about opponents, so just put me in a game with any of the SMAC players you listed above.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Zsozso - I've CMN'd over 30 games at ACOL, so I can volunteer. I also have unlimited capacity for SMAC games, as long as I do not get stuck with Morgan, Believers or Spartans. Believers I might do against some factions, but not against the decent ones.

I'll drop from the SMACX games - I picked up a SMAC game with Fistandantilus, and he doesn't have time to do another game - playing him was my major reason for jumping into a SMACX game here.

[zsozso]

MichaeltheGreat, great (sorry, no pun intended) ! Thanks for volunteering.
I have modified the list above to reflect your SMAX -> SMAC change and game capacity.
Now, there are only 3 SMAX players on the waiting list, so that's easy.

MichaeltheGreat, please CMN a SMAX game for the 3 of us. I'm already playing a game as Cyborg, so give me Gaia, UoP, Sparta or Probes (in this preference order). To CMN it in equivalent conditions with the other games, please see the instructions at http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum27/HTML/000100.html#5
Tau Ceti and Lord Maxwell: which faction would you like to play in this SMAX game ?

For SMAC, how about these 2 combinations:
Tau Ceti - Korn469 - Pagan
Paul - Zsozso - MichaeltheGreat

We could also start up a further games, like:
Tau Ceti - Zsozso - Pagan
Tau Ceti - Zsozso - MichaeltheGreat
Although, these already duplicate some player pairs and we would need yet another CMN-volunteer for the last one.

Zsozso
[This message has been edited by zsozso (edited January 25, 2000).]
[This message has been edited by zsozso (edited January 25, 2000).]

[Lord Maxwell]

I'd take peacekeepers or morgan, in that order of preference. Could be persuaded to play consciousness, but that's a distant third. (Off course I prefer UoP, but I'm already playing em, so let me explore some alternatives.
I'll keep the peace, with any means necessary. (I must watch more speeches by american leaders to get the proper mindset for this. Bombs for peace

[Tau Ceti]

My revised SMACX faction preferences: Data Angels, Gaians, University, Cyborgs, Drones in that order.

If any more SMAC games are set up with me in them I would like Gaians, University, Peacekeepers or Morgan in that order - though preferably not the same faction in two or more games.

[MichaeltheGreat]

Lord Maxwell - that's why I rename them the Peacemakers

Zsozso - I can CMN your game, but can't launch it until Thursday, or maybe Friday.

For my other SMAC games, I'd like to rotate factions, taking PK and UoP, depending on the factions in play. Later or extra games, I'd take the Hive again.

[zsozso]

Thanks MtG!

Another player - Cedronian - signed up today, so the SMAC games to be started up soon (if nobody objects or wants a different combination):

ACT007: Tau Ceti - Korn469 - Pagan
ACT008: Paul - Zsozso - MichaeltheGreat
ACT009: Pagan - Cedronian - Zsozso
ACT010: Tau Ceti - Cedronian - MichaeltheGreat

Players of ACT007 and ACT010 may start bombarding me with specific faction preference for these games (otherwise I'll pick from their preference list avoiding the reuse of factions already played by them in other games).

Zsozso
[This message has been edited by zsozso (edited January 25, 2000).]