One on One league

[Franses]

From my experience with CTP multiplaying I know it is difficult (not impossible, just difficult) to finish games with more than two players. The simple reason is that it is hard to find the dates and times to all get together for the number of sessions that are needed to finish a game. Often (almost always in fact) games with more than two players stalled before they finished. It is one of the reasons why I like one to one games a lot.

It is not always easy to find reliable (= willing to finish games, not cheating) opponents. Especially for PTW it is currently hard to find any opponents at all.

The lagginess of PTW makes it hard to play with many players. Players must be on the same continent, have cable etc.

Finally many of us like to have a feeling for their own skills compared to those of other players.

Because of the above reasons I suggest to start a one to one PTW league here on Apolyton. Since there are not to many players yet we should not make things to complicated in the beginning. So I suggest that participants play against eachother using the settings that they both agree upon. After finishing a game they post the winner here on Apolyton. A winner gets one point and we (I to start with) will keep score of the number of games played and the number of points of each player that participates. Definitly not the best scoring system one can think of but an easy one to start with.

This way we can find reliable opponents, finish games, deal with the lagginess of PTW and get an idea about the skills of ourselves.

Edit: The league has started. This post will be used to define the rules as well as the results of the finished games. We are always looking for new players. If you want to participate in the one to one league post your interest here and/or PM or e-mail me.

Rules
1. All rules defined in this post may be waved or changed if both players explicitly agree on it.

2. Games will use unmodded PTW with the latest patch (currently 1.14f).

3. Cheats are not allowed in the 1T1 league whether named below or not. If in doubt whether a certain action is regarded a cheat, ask your current opponent whether he regards it as such. If so, let one of you post the supposed cheat in this thread to suggest to make it a named cheat.
Named cheats are:
- Unloading armies
- Rush buying cheat (rush buy and then change the item build)

4. The settings below will be used in the 1T1 league unless both players agree upon changing the settings.
Timer: None
Mode: Simultaneous moves at the start but must be changed to Turn based if one of the players asks for it.
Barbarians: Sedentary
Map size: Small
AI players: None
Victory conditions: Default settings
Others: Random

Current playing scheme

Round 1...........................Status
Crousto - Rusty Nail...........Started
Coldark - Franses..............Started
Tom Red; Free

Round 2
Rusty Nail - Coldark
Tom Red - Franses.............Won by Franses
Crousto; Free

Round 3
Tom Red - Crousto
Rusty Nail - Franses..........Started
Coldark; Free

Round 4
Crousto - Franses
Coldark - Tom Red
Rusty Nail; Free

Round 5
Rusty Nail - Tom Red
Coldark - Crousto
Franses; Free

Game results.................date:January 12, 2003

Player.................Played...........Won
Franses..................1...............1
Crousto..................0...............0
Rusty Nail...............0...............0
Coldark..................0...............0
Tom Red..................1...............0

[Crousto]

I think that someone already created such a league, check this thread
By the way I signed up to this league and I'm looking for a first opponent During business days, I'm usually available from 20:00 to midnight (GMT+1).

[Franses]

Thanks, Crousto but from what I can see that also supports multi-player games and I want to limit this to one to one games.

You found your first opponent. It is me. Let us have a game together. Perhaps tonight (but I promised to help out Rusty so that probably will not work) but if not tonight, I have Wednesday evening free to play. Let me know if it suits you.

[Rusty Nail]

Count me in.This is a good idea.I also have a thread looking for players for one and one.

[Franses]

Well we got several games going now. Did not start the league yet. I suggest we need at least one more for that. That must be possible before the year ends.

[ColDark]

I've been playing Franses One on One, and he's invited me in the league. So I'll be available from now on.

[ColDark]

I would like to try with more players too, so I was wondering whether or not you guys would be willing to try a four way MP - I can host if required.

We're all in Europe, we can see how laggy it is. All we need to do is make sure we are all available at the same time (obviouse).

[Franses]

Great to have you here Coldark. It would certainly be nice to also have a four player game. My experience is that it is difficult to finish but if we all play in the same league and regularly meet, we might find the right times to play with the four of us. Count me in.

[Franses]

We finally are with four now. The minimum I think needed to start a league. Since there are hardly any posters in the multiplayer section yet (perhaps only after a new patch?) I do not expect to get many more members soon and therefore suggest to start the league. After that more people might become interested.

Being with only four I suggest we start a real league where we all play against eachother. Gives us something to look forward to for some time to come . I suggest the following playing scheme:

Round 1
Crousto - Rusty Nail
Coldark - Franses

Round 2
Rusty Nail - Coldark
Crousto - Franses

Round 3
Coldark - Crousto
Rusty Nail - Franses

Since we are not always available at the same time I also suggest to start multiple games (for those of us who want that and have the time. For example me ). That way we are optimally assured of an opponent if we have the time to play. We then just use a priority scheme: the game of round 1 has priority over the games of round 2 and 3. Games of round 2 have priority over games of round 3 and so on.

Edit: I suggested some standard rules in the first post. We may change/update that whenever we think it is necessary.
If you guys agree with the above playing scheme I will also add that to it.

[Rusty Nail]

Sounds good. I think a standard map is much too big for a one on one, and would suggest tiny as the standard. Even smaller than tiny can work. We don't want these games to last too long or we will get bogged down.

[Franses]

hm, you may be right, Rusty. I am not that sure about it. Of my current games the one on the standard map finished first and in the least playtime but a few games do not mean much yet.

Tiny maps will almost inevitably result in a lot of early wars. I would like to have some longer games myself. But I am not the only one here so what do the others think?
Perhaps a small map as a compromise? Remember, the two players can always deviate from the standard if they both wish to do so.

[Crousto]

A small map is OK for me. And I'd suggest adding at least one AI too, otherwise a player may easily end up without a critical resource... like horses... pretty annoying when you're playing the Arabs like me in my previous game with Franses (this is of course the only cause of my defeat... oh well yes maybe he played better than me too )

[Franses]

Well Crousto, you did get my hart beat a lot faster than the AI had ever done before. lol. I sure love the MP games I played thusfar.

OK, a small map will be the standard as two of us prefer a smaller map but are you sure about the AI? I mean, this may greatly unbalance the game. Besides we did have some serious lag problems already in some games (like in the last phase of our own game). Curious to know how the others feal about this.

[ColDark]

I'm not too keen on AI at all really, especially in a one on one game. But as I'm new to "online" multiplaying I'll pretty much go with the flow.

I would like to have a long game though. And I'm still waiting to hear whether or not we all are available to try 4 player.

[Franses]

After Coldark and I finished our first PTW game, we started our first official 1T1 game.

We played two sessions now and are in 400 AD. Not clear yet who has the better hand. I am quite a bit ahead in points but I had to endure several attacks by Coldark. I lost quite some ships already but was able to counterattack succesfully the land attacks which were no large attacks as of yet so I am preparing for a major attack by Coldark in the near future. Well, I am a builder by nature, so I should be able to handle such attacks. We will see. Perhaps I can even launch my own attack .