Conquer Club

What's three neutral territories going to do to the territory count?

I am working on some calculations using MrBenn's Bonus Spreadsheet, but it is too late to finish and post them tonight. Probably inside of 24 hours.

I love this little map--might be too easy to get bonus, but it is a nice little 1v1 map for sure. I might make the bonus structure one less on each bonus region, but I might not change anything either. Great job--love it

Okay, here are some tables to help with the discussion about neutrals and starting positions. These were all produced using MrBenn's Bonus Probability Calculator spreadsheet.

First, the status quo:



As you can see, the probability of someone dropping a bonus are quite high.

Next, if we put a neutral into each 3-region bonus zone (Labrador, Newfoundland, and New Brunswick):



With this arrangement, we are no longer concerned with the probabilities of 3-region zones. Things are better, but the chance of dropping one of the 4-region bonus zones is still significant.

Now, if we put one neutral in each of those regions (Great North, Nova Scotia, and Est Du Québec):



Again this looks better, but we must consider the problem that the 3 non-neutral regions of one of those zones could be easily dropped on one player, who could then get that bonus easily in the first round. This is not strictly counter to foundry guidelines, but it might still make for poor gameplay. In fact, the 3-region zones with one neutral each could also be easily taken by a player dropping the two non-neutrals.

Now, using starting positions can ensure that small zones are well split up, so that they cannot be taken too easily on the first turn.

For example, Labrador, Newfoundland, and New Brunswick can be distributed among three starting positions:



In order to prevent two-player games from starting with 12 regions per player (which puts the second player at a disadvantage for his first deployment), these starting positions must use regions that are "underlying neutrals", that is, that start neutral if they are not distributed to a player, which happens with one of the three starting position sets when playing 1v1, and for all starting positions in games with 4 or more players.

We still have a significant chance of dropping Great North, Nova Scotia, and Est Du Québec. So let's throw them into the starting positions. Just taking one region from each zone can actually make things worse, by making the situation more like a 3-region zone, which is relatively easy to drop, combined with the 1/3 chance that the starting position matches and gives that player the whole bonus. Let's look at taking two out of each of those zones:



With this setup, we ensure that the 4-region zones are not dropped, but I believe we are making it quite likely that someone will have 3 out of 4 regions in one of these zones.

Also, the probability of someone dropping the 5-region zone, Duplessis, is now on the rise.

I have no more time to explore this tonight, but will present some more possibilities soon.

I used starting position in Austerlitz for all three territories bonus zone
it doesn't reduce the number of initial territories you get
it just force the repartition
so no one get two territories out of a three bonus zone
which is an even and elegant solution
in a 2 player game you have one red one green one neutral
as in such games territories are always splitted in 3

Code: Select all

<positions

<position><territory>Suchet</territory>
<territory>Pratzen</territory></position>

<position><territory>Kellerman</territory>
<territory>Skolnitz</territory></position>

<position><territory>Caffarelli</territory>
<territory>Telnitz</territory></position>

</positions>

i just started my first game on this map and i wasn't impressed.

the other player dropped a bonus, got most of the other bonus and i got neutrals between me and those bonuses. game over.

reading the last few posts this seems like it could be a regular thing. rare i could handle but this doesn't seem likely as is.

pamoa wrote:in a 2 player game you have one red one green one neutral
as in such games territories are always splitted in 3

Starting positions are divided by 2 in 2 player games, so using starting positions does change the drop for 2-player games.With 3 starting positions, each player gets 1 position and the 3rd position is distributed regularly with the other territories. With 34 territories on the map, this would mean that each would start with 12 territories in a 2-player game, so it won't work for 2-player games.

Sorry I'm clueless about gameplay. I am reading all this, just clueless as of how to fix it..

I am coming to the conclusion that MrBenn's Bonus Calculator can produce misleading values when starting positions become involved. I believe it does calculate the right number of territories in the pot, but somehow as I increase the number of territories in starting positions, the likelihood of dropping larger bonuses increases, which is counter-intuitive, since the number of territories in the pot is going down. Again, I have run out of time this evening, but I may try working around the quirks in the calculator and coming out with more rational numbers soon.

Tisha wrote:Sorry I'm clueless about gameplay. I am reading all this, just clueless as of how to fix it..

Tisha you have only to code 3 regions to start neutral, maybe Goose Bay, Saint John and Avalon Peninsula.
In this way you'll have 31 regions at the start, that is a good number, and a just a 2% that any player start with a 4 regions bonus.
Starting positions are not necessary in this case.

Tisha wrote:

thenobodies80 wrote:Blue numbers are a bit hard to see on Cape Breton, I suggest to move the coords few pixels down, where you have a lighter color.

http://h1.ripway.com/Tisha1276/Golfe.xml

better?

Yes much better.

thenobodies80 wrote:

Tisha wrote:Sorry I'm clueless about gameplay. I am reading all this, just clueless as of how to fix it..

Tisha you have only to code 3 regions to start neutral, maybe Goose Bay, Saint John and Avalon Peninsula.
In this way you'll have 31 regions at the start, that is a good number, and a just a 2% that any player start with a 4 regions bonus.
Starting positions are not necessary in this case.

Oh, I thought the guideline was to get the probability of a bonus on the drop down to 1%, but if 2% is okay, then yes, 3 neutrals is probably best.

I ran the math because I can't help myself. It seems with the 3 neutrals suggestion that the chance would be comprable to Classic which is the most worked on and optimized map of all time. Seems unreasonable IMO trying to hold you to a higher standard than that, plus this map looks really slick to me, I love 30ish territory maps.

coleman giving feedback on a map. after such a long time. is this a one time only occasion or are you back in the foundry?

DiM wrote:coleman giving feedback on a map. after such a long time. is this a one time only occasion or are you back in the foundry?

I don't want to derail the topic away from Tisha's amazing map but I am going to have a go at checking around from time to time again.

@Tisha, It looks like you have a solid XML person but it seems you may be aprehensive about the neutrals suggestion (or I am completely misreading the convo which is 1000% possible). If you need any help let me know.

Coleman wrote:
@Tisha, It looks like you have a solid XML person but it seems you may be aprehensive about the neutrals suggestion (or I am completely misreading the convo which is 1000% possible). If you need any help let me know.

it is nice to see you aroundColeman, (:

I'm my xml person. I really dislike neutrals on a map, but understand that the games on the map can be decided before you even get a first turn..

Tisha wrote:I really dislike neutrals on a map, but understand that the games on the map can be decided before you even get a first turn..

My game on this map was not so bad. It seems that the +2 bonus regions are so well connected to the surrounding areas that keeping them can be very difficult. Unfortunately this somewhat makes the whole map built around constantly breaking the small bonus regions which isn't the gameplay I expected/wanted. But even placing a neutral in each place wouldn't solve this 'problem' it would just delay it by a turn or so.

Starting positions work in such a way that if you did 9 single territory start positions the rest of the territories would be randomly distributed but this would lead to neutrals in 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 person games. It would guarantee nobody would start with a whole region 4 players and up and prevents the neutrals that do appear from always being in the same place.

The two problems with this.
1) Tisha doesn't want to do any of this. Which I completely understand. It almost seems unfair because I remember other maps where this could happen that we didn't stop. Balkan Peninsula comes to mind and the lucky drops on that map are even more defensible. Doodle Earth did enter a period of development hell over it but eventually released with the possibility still in play.
2) The +2 bonuses make up 9 of the total territories so this wouldn't solve for the occurrence in 2 and 3 player games. Although one could argue that those are never fair on most maps anyway, so meh.

Coleman wrote:It seems that the +2 bonus regions are so well connected to the surrounding areas that keeping them can be very difficult.

I agree. In addition I've looked again at the numbers, I don't think that 8,27% (3p -any player)or 5,51% (2p - any player) are so big values.

show

Probably the map is good as it is now.

out of my games, I have only had one where I can say the guy won it before I had even taken a turn.... which I have had on plenty different maps.

Very nice map!

New Brunswick - considering it's location + number of border terts + the terts that have to be defended just to hold it probably should be a +3.

Quench it already

jefjef wrote:Very nice map!

New Brunswick - considering it's location + number of border terts + the terts that have to be defended just to hold it probably should be a +3.

Tisha, what do you think about this?

I was going to quench this one, but I'd like to understand what's your opinion about the above before doing it.

thenobodies80 wrote:

jefjef wrote:Very nice map!

New Brunswick - considering it's location + number of border terts + the terts that have to be defended just to hold it probably should be a +3.

Tisha, what do you think about this?

I was going to quench this one, but I'd like to understand what's your opinion about the above before doing it.

I think I'd prefer it at three also.

Go with it then

Large:

Small:


xml: http://h1.ripway.com/Tisha1276/Golfe.xml

The files were sent to lackattack.