Conquer Club

I think you've got most of your bonus issues sorted out. The British ships I think you should keep at +2, it's a 4 territory bonus with 3 borders.

The only issue I see with the setup is the 2 player game. Starting points in a 2 player game will be evenly distributed, which gives a high probably of picking up a bonus on the drop, you'll get a lesser probability on 3 and 4 player games when each player gets 2 starting points.

As I'm reading through the starting position XML tutorial it's saying,

When the game begins these start positions will be split up amongst the players. If there is a remainder, the territories of those start positions are dealt out as normal territories.

Unless there is a way to set remainders to neutral and half of the starting positions in a 2 player game to neutral I don't know if the starting positions are going to be the way to go here.

The only alternative I can think of is have either the landing points or the ships start neutral, but then your starting with 7 territories as neutral, so that probably won't work either.

While this is true... I just started a 1v1 Peloponnesian War game which has starting positions and all the potential starting positions were not filled up by the two players. I don't know if this some sort of XML setting or if when starting a 1v1 game with starting positions not all starting positions are filled.

If anyone knows how this works, let m know. I'm gonna do some research and see what I can find myself.

In a 1v1 game, all regions are divided by 3, being the 3rd part occupied by neutral troops.

I’m not sure, but maybe those 8 SP will also be divided by 3...

Hmm... that seems about right Kab... If they weren't included in the divide up, then theoretically I should have received 4 starting points in the peloponnesian game. I think worrying about a player in 1v1 game dropping 4 of the starting points might not be a problem cause of the 1v1 rules.

If anyone can refute this let me know.

The problem you have to worry about here that is totally different than the Peloponnesian War map is that the starting positions are the only territories being distributed. Here the remainder will fall into the pool of remaining territories. So in a 2 player game the 8 starting positions will be 2 red, 2 green, 2 neutral, and 2 into the pool of remaining territories which if my math is right would make 30 territories available which will be divided equally between the 2 players and neutral. It would be a good chance that 1 player picks up another starting point, and an unlikely possibility of 1 player getting 2 extra starting positions or even 1 each.

Assuming of course I'm understanding the XML rules on start positions and territory distribution.

I see your point, though I partially suspect that those remaining 2 fixed positions will go to neutral as they have the special designation as starting points. I have nothing to back this up with though... gonna have to look through it.

Anyway, ran the number in the bonus probability calc. advertised in RedBaron's Japan thread.

For the two terr. bonuses in 1v1:
prob. of A player landing a bonus = 9.3%
prob. of any player receiving the bonus = 19%

For the two terr. bonus 1v1v1:
prob. of A player landing a bonus = 9.3%
prob. of any player receiving the bonus = 28.17%

Ok... the 1v1v1 game kind of worries me, nearly 1 in three games started will involve a player landing a bonus. However, there are five 2 terr. bonuses, is that going to balance things out at all?

Anyway, I'm terrible with numbers... I could be reading this all wrong. Comments?

I think you got it right, and those numbers are concerning. I think you may have to do both ships and landing points for a bonus.

Maybe not completely true RedBaron... Take a look at this thread:

http://www.conquerclub.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=127&t=68154&start=15

RedBaron0 wrote:--The only issue I see with the setup is the 2 player game. Starting points in a 2 player game will be evenly distributed, which gives a high probably of picking up a bonus on the drop, you'll get a lesser probability on 3 and 4 player games when each player gets 2 starting points.

As I'm reading through the starting position XML tutorial it's saying,

When the game begins these start positions will be split up amongst the players. If there is a remainder, the territories of those start positions are dealt out as normal territories.

Unless there is a way to set remainders to neutral and half of the starting positions in a 2 player game to neutral I don't know if the starting positions are going to be the way to go here.

The only alternative I can think of is have either the landing points or the ships start neutral, but then your starting with 7 territories as neutral, so that probably won't work either.

If you set those regions to start as neutral - they remainder (not distributed) will remain neutral.

I took a look at that thread and now am more confused than ever. Here's what I think I understand so far:

In a two player game, two starting positions will go to player 1, two starting positions to player 2, two starting positions to neutral, two starting positions which can be coded to fall neutral should they not be chosen as starting positions.

If this is true, then there should be no problem with a 1v1 game.

Well, I’m still not sure about 1v1 games….

I think that the 8 SP will be equally divided by the 2 without inference of that ‘3rd Neutral faction’, that will only be applied to the rest of the territories. In a 3 player game, those 8 will be divided by 3, making each player get 2 ters and the remaining 2 will start neutral (as long as all SP begin identified as neutral in the XML)

..anyway, I’ll ask Andrew to comment on this – maybe he could enlighten things up a bit…

That was my point using the peloponnesian war example... That map has 8 starting points but in a 1v1 game, you only start with 2, rather than 4. So I'm confused.

If andrew knows anything, that'd be awesome.

I'm gonna post in the not maps forum and see what I get.

8 starting positions

2 players
4 starting positions for each player

3 players
2 starting positions for each player
the 2 not assigned will be splitted randomly (as a normal regions) among the players


But, if you don't want that a player could have one of these unassigned positions, you can code them as starting neutral. In this way the starting position or is assigned or it will start as a starting neutral

thenobodies80 wrote:8 starting positions

2 players
4 starting positions for each player

3 players
2 starting positions for each player
the 2 not assigned will be splitted randomly (as a normal regions) among the players


But, if you don't want that a player could have one of these unassigned positions, you can code them as starting neutral. In this way the starting position or is assigned or it will start as a starting neutral

Ok, that solves the 3 player game problem then, I'll code it so that the unassigned will go neutral in a three player game.

Which leaves the 2 player game... is there any way that I could code that in a 2 player game only that some of the starting positions begin as neutral?

If you have 8 starting positions, in a 2 player game each player will start with 4 starting positions.

The starting positions are always splitted among the players, if there's a reminder it will be splitted as a normal territory,unless you have coded it as starting neutral.

E.g.

20 territories
9 starting positions
2 players

4 starting for each player and 1 reminder
if the reminder is coded as starting neutral it will start neutral (with x troops)
if the reminder isn't coded as starting neutral it will be added to the other 11 territories (20-9) and splitted randomly among the players

thenobodies80 wrote:If you have 8 starting positions, in a 2 player game each player will start with 4 starting positions.

The starting positions are always splitted among the players, if there's a reminder it will be splitted as a normal territory,unless you have coded it as starting neutral.

E.g.

20 territories
9 starting positions
2 players

4 starting for each player and 1 reminder
if the reminder is coded as starting neutral it will start neutral (with x troops)
if the reminder isn't coded as starting neutral it will be added to the other 11 territories (20-9) and splitted randomly among the players

Wrong. Take doodle earth for a simple example. 18 territories. According to you, they would be split, 9-9 +2 neutrals, but they are not. The amount of territories is the same as in a 3 player game: 6-6 +6 neutrals.

Take a look at feudal. In a two player game, it is not split 3-3, but as it would be in a 3 player game with 2 per person and 2 neutrals. Play a 2 player game on any of the AoR maps or Feudal.

THERE WILL BE 2 STARTING TERRITORIES IN A TWO PLAYER GAME!!! So don't worry about that part of the gameplay.

-Right now it looks like the idea of using starting positions is unfeasible. So, at the recommendation of Nobodies and iancanton, it looks like I might have to bump up the requirement of the French Fleet bonus. Ian suggested holding the ship, the landing point and a colonial capital.

- Well, the first problem is that Savannah was the state capital and both Williamsburg and Richmond (Jefferson moved the capital during the war) are in the present territory of Yorktown.

I like this idea because it gives Georgia a reasonably good position to fight over and gain to get a bonus of 2, shortly followed by the acquisition of any other colony to bring that to 4. That other colony could be a single terr. colony of Delaware, RI or Conn. or it could be a two terr. colony like Maryland. Not to mention that South Carolina is right next door and has only 3 more territories with one more additional defense point.

It aids Virginia significantly less, but the a player with heavy holdings in Virginia ought to be able to make a break for the Maryland/Delaware bonus or take the ships to get the Georgia bonus.

-A variation of this option is that the bonus for the French ship and colony gives only 1. I'm open to that suggestion as well.

-The third variation I am willing to consider is do away with the flags and go back to ships and have a ship plus its state give a bonus of 1 or 2. I'm hesitant with this idea because it will likely give Massachusetts a strong edge as it borders the single terr. colonies and New Hampshire, even at a bonus of just 1.

-As always, you're thoughts and criticisms are very much appreciated.

Comes from the Yeti himself:

viewtopic.php?p=1932159#p1932159

yeti_c wrote:

MrBenn wrote:So with 5 starting positions in a 1v1, 2 each would be allocated to players, with the third being added to the pot for distribution unless it was a designated neutral.

I think I've got it now

Correct.

C.

So if you mark them neutral, as well as starting positions, you will achieve the desired outcome.

thenobodies80 wrote:If you have 8 starting positions, in a 2 player game each player will start with 4 starting positions.

I have asked yeti_c to confirm or deny this statement.

thenobodies80 wrote:If you have 8 starting positions, in a 2 player game each player will start with 4 starting positions.

AndrewB wrote:I have asked yeti_c to confirm or deny this statement.

as I know in 2 players game starting position are diveided by 3 one for each player and one part neutral the rest is also neutral
so with 8 starting position you have 2 red / 2 green / 2 neutral and the rest 2 neutral

having 8 start positions won't solve much because our main issues are for 2-player and 3-player games.

if the french fleet bonus remains at one ship plus its landing point, then i propose one change to the map itself and coding only 2 sets of start positions, each consisting of 5 regions.

the change to the map is to add one region, fort pitt, to pennsylvania. this is located in the southern half of appalachia and will turn appalachia into an internal region. the extra region will reduce the number of 3-region states, therefore lessening the likelihood of one or more 3-region states being dropped by someone (currently about one-third) in 2-player and 3-player games.

http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/entry.php?rec=2768

the 2 sets of starting positions each have 5 regions: one region from each of new hampshire, new jersey and maryland plus one region from each of the french fleet bonuses. this ensures that, in 2-player games, no-one can start with either a french fleet bonus or a whole 2-region state.

in 1v1, each player will then start with 5 positions plus 8 random regions, with 3 fixed neutrals, 9 random neutrals and 2 killer neutrals.

in 1v1v1, the numbers are: no positions and 11 random regions per player, plus 3 fixed neutrals, 13 random neutrals and 2 killer neutrals.

in games with 3 or more players, start positions as coded above will have no effect.

ian.

Ok, what if we drop the premise of starting positions completely and go with the bonus of a ship, plus the colony it is connected with? I think going with the French ship, plus the colony it is connected with or a bonus of 1 will give the advantage to the south that it needs without having the risk of a 1v1 game drop of a bonus straight away.

Ian - If a player lands a 3 regions colony or a two region colony it won't matter because there is no bonus for a single colony. The best chance of having a lucky drop is to land 4 territories in either Maryland, New Jersey or New Hampshire. In which case, none have common borders and are extremely vulnerable to attack.

Though I like the idea of adding a territory to Penn., which I'm going to play around with and see what I can come up with.

That makes a lot of sense, figure a ship has troops and gains control of the region it's invading and is then it troops are then supported by the region itself. Also since each ship except Georgia would have to gain 4 territories, plus the ship to gain a bonus makes it a 5 territory bonus which should a relatively low probability of dropping it on the start. Georgia and the ship is just 4 territories and gives a bit of a shift in power to the South which should even out somewhat any Northern advantage.

Only extra suggestion to this I'll add is perhaps you should connect the Boston ship to Mass. Bay just so all of the territories in that bonus are connected.

Sorry about the whole confusion about the starting position thing, my bad for bringing it up. I totally agree that you should ditch the starting positions, it's not worth the headache.

Nah, don't apologize for suggesting it. It was worth looking into anyway, its just I think this idea is going to work the best.

As for connecting Boston to Mass. Bay, it's an idea... I don't want to increase the power of the North too much, but it does make some sense. If anyone has any input on this, let me know. In the mean time I will be considering it.

I don't think it's a good idea from a gameplay perspective. Sure, it would make sense, but it makes it far too easy to start with the Massachusetts bonus. Which seems bad, because from the massachusetts bonus, it is relatively easy to upgrade to a +6 bonus (one territory makes +4, one more for +5, two more for +6). Currently, Exeter is (effectively) part of Massachusets. This one extra territory before you get the first bonus seems just what is needed to keep the north in check.