30% Iron Civer Tournament

[bongo]

Pretty sure. My opinion is based on other posts here at poly(and some over at CFC), haven't done any testing myself though.

[Rommel2D]

I can easily imagine Firaxis taking care of some PBEM problems but not others, depending on the difficulty of coding them. If anyone can test and verify bongo's suggestion, great. I have no free time right now.

Otherwise it is a game mechanics problem that should be addressed.

[bongo]

Finally found the thread with the discussion:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=121739

Here's another one at CFC about WW in general:

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?threadid=61628

Returning to the original question, if someone shows up in my territory heavily armed, war happiness is the least of my problems. Taking and defending territory is far more important than the care and well-being of your enemys population.

[McMeadows]

It seems that the iron civ final is approaching. What about starting a new qualification round, starting 1/1/2005 for a new season? It wouldn't be that much of a problem to have the 2004 final run parallel to the 2005 qualification. (Or would we have to call it 2005 final, 2006 qualification?).

Up untill january we could have an evaluation on improvements.

A HUGE thank you to Rommel2D for keeping an eye on the games so far. It works to my opinion.

[jshelr]

I think McMeadows just volunteered to set up a new tourney

[McMeadows]

I'n afraid I can't commit to what Rommel2D has been doing for the next year and furthermore I don't want to take over anything only he deserves credit for. I'm just eager to participate...

[bongo]

Should we discuss the tournament form btw? The winner of the final will still only be best of 16...

Does anyone know how to increase the number of players without increasing playing time too much?


Maybe add a pre-qualifier round? To compete in the semi-final you would have to win a qualifier game or be among the previous tournaments finalists?

[jshelr]

Iron b has decended into a slow-moving game with the outcome not in doubt

Bongo has been cautious, since he doesn't need to take any risks. And I've not been able to break out of our defensive positions, which are slowly narrowing in scope.

This might go on for awhile, although the Mongol's two AC armies can, with the impending help of bombardment from the mountain position shown, likely take down 3 pikes per turn, with a period of rest between turns. That seige will ultimately be enough to wear down the Russian numbers.

I don't think the near-term arrival of gunpowder will help. Muskets are pretty expensive and will be the first targets of the trebs.

So, we give up.

Well played and good luck to Bongo in the final.

[jshelr]

Originally posted by McMeadows
I'n afraid I can't commit to what Rommel2D has been doing for the next year and furthermore I don't want to take over anything only he deserves credit for. I'm just eager to participate...

can't blame you there.

Perhaps Rommel's 4-person structure for the first round can be followed by a game with as many winners as there are finished first-round games. (We already have a couple of stranded winners from the c3c tourney )

And in place of one person trying to do all the supporting work, we could nominate a small team of people to monitor games, jointly make key decisions, and also particpate in games.

[McMeadows]

5 games with 5 players would also be an option. Or 6 in 6. With some carefull play order planning (as well as dividing the players over the games), should make it possible to make 5 turns a week. Maybe along the lines of the time slots in the 2 a day games, like:

player 1 - GMT 02:00-06:00
player 2 - GMT 06:00-10:00
player 3 - GMT 10:00-14:00
player 4 - GMT 14:00-18:00
player 5 - GMT 18:00-22:00
player 6 - GMT 22:00-02:00

I would be a player 2 or 5. It allows for regular play as I know when to expect my turn and be ready for it. Turns played over the weekend are just a bonus.

Thinking a bit more over the issue, to guarantee progression of the game when someone sees it coming he'll miss out on a session players can be paired with players from another game as their fixed stand-in. Like players A1 and B1 are paired, as well as say E3 and F3.
It can even be taken to the level that player A1 sends the save to player A2 and B2. If the game hasn't been (posted as) played (on Apolyton) at the moment the end time passes, B2 can play the game and send it to A3, B3 (and A2 so he/she can see what has been moved). This takes a bit more effort and I hope we can go with the first thought and everyone that sees it coming that he/she can't make it playing, sends his/her sub a notice to sub that turn.
Next to this, if someone doesn't leave a notice about not being able to play(to his sub) he can get a warning. 5 warnings and you're out (or something like that).

[Aqualung71]

An unexpected and surprising capitulation.....congratulations to Bongo, and commiserations to jshelr on a game clearly well strategised and fought from a difficult takeover position

[McMeadows]

Congrats bongo. Can't say I'm suprised. There's been one crucial battle. The aftermath of that battle allready made me think the game was done. Moreover the point has been proven that a very early SoZ does justify a 3-way alliance in every way...
Without wanting to do injustice to your strong play, you've been very lucky at some points. Or maybe we should say LzPrst has been very lucky. At least it has been rather an easy take over position rather than difficult...

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by bongo
Should we discuss the tournament form btw? The winner of the final will still only be best of 16...

Does anyone know how to increase the number of players without increasing playing time too much?


Maybe add a pre-qualifier round? To compete in the semi-final you would have to win a qualifier game or be among the previous tournaments finalists?

I'm fairly sure there was a lot of discussion before the tournament about how to do it, and 16 was the final agreed upon amount ... but I think there's a good solution.

Have the qualifier be an Elim game. 6 players on a small map, elimination style. You could accomodate say 48 players (up to) in 8 games, and qualify the top 2 from each game ... or 24 in 4 games, and qualify top 4, or out of 6 games qualify the top 2 in each game plus 4 more based on score when they finish or year, or whatnot. Elim games go pretty fast (i'm fairly sure ICAA will be over in a few weeks) and ICAA only took this long because of a long absence. Qualifiers would take on the order of 2 months (at most, i'd think, on a small map); you could end it when it broke down to the number of qualifying people, even, so you don't have to finish it out.

The other way to have quick qualifiers, of course, is a scenario. Rome for example is generally done in 3-4 months; some are faster (Mesopotamia for example could be very fast in the right circumstances - right, Rhoth? )

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by McMeadows
5 games with 5 players would also be an option. Or 6 in 6. With some carefull play order planning (as well as dividing the players over the games), should make it possible to make 5 turns a week. Maybe along the lines of the time slots in the 2 a day games, like:

player 1 - GMT 02:00-06:00
player 2 - GMT 06:00-10:00
player 3 - GMT 10:00-14:00
player 4 - GMT 14:00-18:00
player 5 - GMT 18:00-22:00
player 6 - GMT 22:00-02:00

I would be a player 2 or 5. It allows for regular play as I know when to expect my turn and be ready for it. Turns played over the weekend are just a bonus.

I suggest not having that large of a window. Why? Because you're only getting 1 turn per day anyhow, which you don't need slots to get (2 a day needs slots to ensure 2 turns, but 1 a day is easy to set up regardless of when people play - just get the order right.)

The problem is that you lose the ability to have blitz weekends or whatnot if you go with slots - and for 1 a day, that's giving up more than you get. Madness! for example is a fast moving 6p2ad, but for the fact that we're never all on at the same time so it's never going MORE than 2 a day. 4 players - or perhaps 6 even - could, if set up right, all play a bunch of turns on saturdays occasionally.

[McMeadows]

Originally posted by snoopy369
The problem is that you lose the ability to have blitz weekends or whatnot if you go with slots - and for 1 a day, that's giving up more than you get. Madness! for example is a fast moving 6p2ad, but for the fact that we're never all on at the same time so it's never going MORE than 2 a day. 4 players - or perhaps 6 even - could, if set up right, all play a bunch of turns on saturdays occasionally.

You refer to a weekend twice... I stated that the weekend is a bonus anyway, therefore having a quick turn session over the weekend is more than welcome.

The reason I suggest time slots with 6 people is to have that 1 turn a day at least. Moreover it also allows for having people in the tournament that have but a bit of (regular) time available everyday.

For a 5 player game the night (2:00-6:00) could be left out and people from the same timezone could join a game, making it a bit more easy to arrange for a fast turn session.