Game Discussion IV

[Krill]

Personally, I don't give a damn who wins. I care more how someone wins, how they lose, and how they play. That is why I agree with Aeson with regards to this point. If someone changes the rules half way through the game, how are you supposed to compare the strategies and tactics of teams if they are playing with different rules?

[bongo]

So you want only *one* victor is that it?

There isn't much difference between the shared-victory pact of ND/GoW and the standard "let's make sure we're the last two standing" alliance common in PBEMs.

[Aeson]

Shared victory means more than one winner. Alliance means one wins, the rest lose. That is a pretty big difference.

[Donegeal]

Okay, then we play this out to the vote.

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by Aeson
It's only a few more turns at most till the UN vote. Or a UN vote can be held here if all the remaining teams in the game are agreeable and don't want to play it out. This game was 2+ years of dedication from many people, why stop short of the finish line now?

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I agree completely

Now that GS is no more, here's my personal opinion about shared victory:

A game is about setting victory conditions, rules of play, and factions before the game starts, then having those factions compete within those rules to achieve victory. While the rules weren't defined in many cases and that lead to some problems, the teams and victory conditions were defined. We set victory conditions for this game before it started, shared victory wasn't one of them. We set teams for this game before it started, NGoWD wasn't one of them. One team, one victory. That's what the game is.

Personally, I will only view the team that achieves that victory as the winner. GoW and ND can't both win in my estimation.

Well, I respect your personal opinion but I frankly disagree. The rules were never changed, simply two teams decided to ally permanently. Nothing would have changed if ND and GoW simply had a normal alliance up to this point and then decided that we just didn't want to fight each other. Moreso I kinda note that some of you imply that this was ND and GoW's plan all along, which it wasn't, it was borne out of the necessesity of long-term cooperation against two teams we felt could eventually kick our ass individually. Thus, under our logic, a split victory was better than no victory.

Like I mentioned before, GS and Lego never thought of it this way because the historical context of the game never likely made you think that. Lego certainly thought they could win normally, and that thought must have also crossed GS's mind too. So please, don't blame us if the circumstances forced us to consider a decision which was not on your own minds.

Last and with all due respect, your personal decision on who won and who didn't is yours and yours alone. When one team wins the UN vote and you wish to consider that team the lone winner, so be it, I won't argue. What I can say is that no matter who wins technically, no member of GoW or ND will ever claim victory for their team alone, and the official position of both will be that we are both co-winners. Ultimately Trip has the final word on what is legal and what isn't and he's known about the shared victory since we signed it because we sent him a copy of the pact.

In conclusion, no-one will argue who your personal winner is, but in our view, we both won, and we won't change this because of what one person or one team thinks.

-MZ

[Krill]

Ah, MZ, could you do us a favour and define the term "To Win", in terms of victory conditions?

[Krill]

Or, rather, redefine the terms...

And you still don't think the stakes are huge?

It's all-or-nothing. There will be one winner.

I wonder who said that...

[Aeson]

Moreso I kinda note that some of you imply that this was ND and GoW's plan all along, which it wasn't, it was borne out of the necessesity of long-term cooperation against two teams we felt could eventually kick our ass individually.

You quoted my personal opinion. Address what I said if you are quoting it. Don't quote me and then respond to something else being said. Is that concept really that difficult to understand?

I figured GoW and ND had an agreement in place to be the last two teams in the game, from before the first Bobian war, but wasn't sure. I never thought GoW or ND would have accepted a "shared victory" though. Your announcement suprised me in that regard. I certainly didn't imply you signed a shared victory pact at any point in time before you announced you had signed a shared victory pact.

Last and with all due respect, your personal decision on who won and who didn't is yours and yours alone.

That means it is my personal opinion. Which is exactly how I qualified my comment, as my personal opinion. By that, could I possible have meant that it was my personal opinion? Are you trying to imply that I don't realize my personal opinion is my personal opinion?

You're the one confusing "personal" with "group" here, not I.

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by Krill
Ah, MZ, could you do us a favour and define the term "To Win", in terms of victory conditions?

Technically, "to win" = trigger an in-game victory condition.

Of course, "to win" can also be interpreted as destroying all of our enemies (something that was accomplished) leaving the teams that have no intention of fighting or competing anymore.

[Theseus]

BTW, a shared victory is in *no way* comparable to an alliance... the impact on military planning in the context of a potential backstab and/or impending showdown is huge.

But, of course, that's just my opinion.

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by Aeson
You quoted my personal opinion. Address what I said if you are quoting it. Don't quote me and then respond to something else being said. Is that concept really that difficult to understand?

I quoted your personal opinion and said that I felt some of you people (you, other GSers and Legolanders) thought that GoW and ND had been allied since god knows when. Moreso I am quite at liberty to mention whatever I want, whenever I want even if the base quote I'm refering to is yours yet not everything I want to say is a response to you.

I figured GoW and ND had an agreement in place to be the last two teams in the game, from before the first Bobian war, but wasn't sure. I never thought GoW or ND would have accepted a "shared victory" though. Your announcement suprised me in that regard. I certainly didn't imply you signed a shared victory pact at any point in time before you announced you had signed a shared victory pact.

Read carefully what I wrote: "I kinda note that some of you imply..." That is a personal perception that can be right or wrong. I felt you implied it, you say otherwise, so my perception was wrong.

That means it is my personal opinion. Which is exactly how I qualified my comment, as my personal opinion. By that, could I possible have meant that it was my personal opinion? Are you trying to imply that I don't realize my personal opinion is my personal opinion?

You're the one confusing "personal" with "group" here, not I.

What on earth does that have to do with what we're discussing? I am answering your post with my own interpretations of things, not with affirmations on the way you or your team thinks. If you want to clear up my erroneous assumptions or implications please do so but nowhere have I stated that your opinion is that of someone else's.

-MZ

[Rhothaerill]

The end of this game seems to be heading south quickly.

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by Theseus
BTW, a shared victory is in *no way* comparable to an alliance... the impact on military planning in the context of a potential backstab and/or impending showdown is huge.

But, of course, that's just my opinion.

Trust me, we thought more than once about getting potentially backstabbed even after signing the alliance, I'm sure the thought did not escape ND as well.

I really really truly doubt that when GoW got Space Flight and nukes ND might have not been thinking that we might use them along with a RoP rape and kill two birds in one stroke.

Teams have to take risks and that was one of the fundamental pieces of our strategic logic. When we attacked RP we knew we had to keep our homeland basically undefended since we couldn't spare troops, that in the face of a potential GS invasion. Likewise the Lego knights in our territory could have captured our core with ease, but it was a risk we also had to take.

Ultimately it would have been just so easy to nuclear backstab and RoP-rape ND (and vice versa) that it was utterly pointless to defend against it. Thus my reasoning that a shared-victory alliance and a regular alliance would not really altered what happened in the game.

-MZ

[Theseus]

Sorry, MZ, but I just don't buy that. Your joint war on GS would have been significantly different if you had been forced to fully defend your homelands against each other. Playing for joint versus sole victory did that for you both.

[Aeson]

I don't think the game would have been all that different as regards GS. Given how GoW and ND had operated before, it didn't seem to be much of a factor in the war to eliminate GS. They had nukes, we didn't, and that basically meant we were obsolete in any case.