Dominator - new gameplay variant - POLL !!

[cicero]

This suggestion post edited and revised 21 Apr 2008.
Edited again to add/revise the text in green 27 Apr 2008.
Edited again to add the text in blue 28 Apr 2008.

This suggestion was inspired by Onslaught - new gameplay variant. I like the core element of that suggestion - that all players team up against one player - but I think that the mechanics are poor.

Concise description:

• One player is assigned the "Dominator" and receives double bonus armies for territories held. The Dominator is initially assigned as the player due to play last in the round, but after the game starts the Dominator changes whenever one player holds more territories than every other player.

Specifics:

• A new game option "Dominator" to be added. [NB Not a game type; the "Dominator" option can be added to sequential, freestyle, terminator, standard or team games in the same way that FoW or card types can be added.]
• As at present, when the game is initialised, the player to start the game round is chosen randomly.
• The player due to play last in the game round is initially assigned as "Dominator". If there are any territories which have been unassigned due to being 'left over' these are not, as is usually the case, defined as neutral territories, but are assigned to the Dominator instead.
• At the beginning of their turn the Dominator receives double bonus armies for territories held. Note that the "minimum of 3" rule doesn't apply until after the doubling. So, for example, a player with 7 territories qualifies for 2 armies, doubled is 4. This will ensure that the initial Dominator does not gain an immediate overwhelming advantage. Note also no other bonuses for continents etc are doubled.
• At the beginning of a player's turn if that player has more territories than any other that player becomes the Dominator and begins receiving double armies on that turn. (NB Holding joint most territories is not enough to change the Dominator.)
• The win conditions are unchanged by the Dominator effect.

This will improve the following aspects of the site:

• It creates the conditions so that all players will team up on one player meaningfully, but does so in a way which will change dynamically as the game progresses ...
• It will be seen that, because the Dominator only changes when one player has most armies (not joint most), that there are many situations where the Dominator will not be the strongest player and potentially for an extended series of turns ...
• There will be more interesting gameplay effects, which I'm sure we'll think of as this suggestion is considered by more CC members ...

[Fag_Ash]

excuse me for being dumb... but how do you win? or is there no difference in that respect?

[cicero]

excuse me for being dumb... but how do you win? or is there no difference in that respect?

A fair point. I've updated the suggest specifics to answer the question

[greenoaks]

if the joint most territories players are not the dominator from the last round who would become 'it' ?

[lancehoch]

The way it reads, it would remain with the previous person. So say player 1 has 15 territories, player 2 has 14, player 3 has 14, and player 4 has 5:
if player 4 takes 1 territory from player 1, then player 1 remains dominator since three people are tied with 14 territories
if player 2 and player 3 each take 1 territory from player 1, they will each have 15, and player 1 will have 13, but player 1 will still remain the dominator

[cicero]

The way it reads, it would remain with the previous person.

lancehoch reads correctly ...

[cicero]

Actually I think that the Dominator bonus may not be as predicitable as the simplicity of the idea seems to suggest ...

Assume 6 players on Classic.

Consider the first round. Everyone has 7 territories and player 6, the last player, is the Dominator.
I guess at least one person will take a territory from P6, but it is likely that this will be done such that none of P1 to P5 have the most armies (not joint most) at the beginning of their turn and hence none of them will take over as Dominator. So on P6's turn he/she is likely to still be Dominator and receive double territory bonus armies ...

Second round is not so clear cut, but it wouldn't be too difficult for P6 as Dominator to hold the other players in check - ie make sure that whilst there may be players with more territories than P6 ensure that these are joint leaders and so not be in a position to take the Dominator bonus from P6 ...

Then again it might be better tactics to allow the Dominator bonus to pass to another player and build quietly before making a move to take the Dominator bonus back and make a play for the game.

The more I consider this the more I think that Dominator wouldn't be a game type, but would be better instead as a game option ... So you could play terminator, standard or assassin game types with the Dominator effect as a game option ... [SUGGESTION UPDATED]

[max is gr8]

I do however believe this is not good, as an idea it is flawed, it gives an advantage to a player already winning

[cicero]

I do however believe this is not good, as an idea it is flawed, it gives an advantage to a player already winning

It does mean that once a certain tipping point is reached then the game will be over more quickly ... but until that tipping point is reached I have to disagree. The other players will know who the Dominator is and adjust their tactics accordingly ... which is the intention of the idea.

It will only work with a minimum number of players though ... perhaps 4?

[greenoaks]

I do however believe this is not good, as an idea it is flawed, it gives an advantage to a player already winning

i don't see how getting double armies is an advantage when you know you will be targeted by 7 players during the round.

[gp24176281]

A very interesting idea.

Will be quite fun to try it in practice.

gp

[PLAYER57832]

I do however believe this is not good, as an idea it is flawed, it gives an advantage to a player already winning

i don't see how getting double armies is an advantage when you know you will be targeted by 7 players during the round.

First, not every game is 8 player and though it might be nice if everyone played reasonably and targeted the biggest ... that doesn't always happen, for a lot of reasons. Even if it did happen that way, your calculations are slightly off. The difference between winning and losing is often nothing more than a few armies and a little luck. Just look at the effect on everything from Pearl Harbor to Doodle to Age of Realms to even Duck Hunt. Even Classic Risk, which you used for your example, would be greatly distorted.

As it is, there is already a chance that one person can start with a whole continent or big bonuses, but that happens seldom enough to just provide a bit of "juice" now and then. In this case, you would almost always doom any but the first picked. The advantage of DOUBLE armies is just too big.

Definitely NO!

[cicero]

I do however believe this is not good, as an idea it is flawed, it gives an advantage to a player already winning

i don't see how getting double armies is an advantage when you know you will be targeted by 7 players during the round.

First, not every game is 8 player and though it might be nice if everyone played reasonably and targeted the biggest ... that doesn't always happen, for a lot of reasons. Even if it did happen that way, your calculations are slightly off. The difference between winning and losing is often nothing more than a few armies and a little luck. Just look at the effect on everything from Pearl Harbor to Doodle to Age of Realms to even Duck Hunt. Even Classic Risk, which you used for your example, would be greatly distorted.

As it is, there is already a chance that one person can start with a whole continent or big bonuses, but that happens seldom enough to just provide a bit of "juice" now and then. In this case, you would almost always doom any but the first picked. The advantage of DOUBLE armies is just too big.

Definitely NO!

You did notice that the first person assigned as Dominator plays last in the round ? Hence to suggest that 'any but the first picked is doomed' misunderstands the subtlety of the effect. All the players before the initially selected Dominator have the opportunity to keep them in check. Having said that I've tweaked the original post to make explicit the way the doubling works.

(By the way I'm in a game now where one player is getting 34 armies and that is 12 more than anyone else, but the others are keeping him in check. And in that game the player concerned also has a significant territorial advantage which won't be true for the initially assigned Dominator.)

Re player numbers I agree that more players is better, you'll see (obviously, because you've read the thread) that I have posted that there should perhaps be a lower limit on the number of players allowed in a Dominator game. Maybe 4?

To argue that not all players will appreciate the threat and not attack the Dominator as they should again misses the subtlety. Attacking the strongest player, whether we are talking about a Dominator game or a traditional one, is always generally necessary, but it is part of the strategy to avoid being the person doing the attacking when you can. Let someone else use their armies! But if enough of the other players get that decision wrong then they'll pay the price. Whether you are talking about a Dominator game or not bad strategy is bad strategy.

Note that polls now have an option whereby voters can change their minds. My poll uses this option. Feel free to see the error of your ways player#####

[dustn64]

I'm a little confused, but if it gets passed it might be interesting to try.

[Ditocoaf]

yes - why not- it's a good idea

I'd try this, might like it. Usually I stick to plain sequential, but this sounds fun. Keep it as another game type, because I don't think this would work very well at all with assassin or terminator.

[cicero]

I don't think this would work very well at all with assassin or terminator.

Why not?
(I'm not being argumentative, just curious to know your reasoning behind this thought.)

[PLAYER57832]

First, not every game is 8 player and  though it might be nice if everyone played reasonably and targeted the biggest ... that doesn't always happen, for a lot of reasons.  Even if it did happen that way, your calculations are slightly off.  The difference between winning and losing is often nothing more than a few armies and a little luck.  Just look at the effect on everything from Pearl Harbor to Doodle to Age of Realms to even Duck Hunt.   Even Classic Risk, which you used for your example, would be greatly distorted.     As it is, there is already a chance that one person can start with a whole continent or big bonuses, but that happens seldom enough to just provide a bit of "juice" now and then.   In this case, you would almost always doom any but the first picked.  The advantage of DOUBLE armies is just too big.Definitely NO!

You did notice that the first person assigned as Dominator plays last in the round ? Hence to suggest that 'any but the first picked is doomed' misunderstands the subtlety of the effect.

That might be why I said "first picked" instead of "first to play"....

Re player numbers I agree that more players is better, you'll see (obviously, because you've read the thread) that I have posted that there should perhaps be a lower limit on the number of players allowed in a Dominator game. Maybe 4?

Actually, I think it would ONLY work well for larger numbers of players and on the "middle of the road maps"  -- that is, neither the smallest, quickly decided maps (Doodle, Realms as examples) nor the more complicated ones with all kinds of bonuses (Pearl Harbor, D-Day, Waterloo, etc.).   This advantage would be a huge advantage to the Realms boards ... and Pearl Harbor can already be heavily weighted at its start if you happen to get the right bonuses.

All the players before the initially selected Dominator have the opportunity to keep them in check. Having said that I've tweaked the original post to make explicit the way the doubling works.(By the way I'm in a game now where one player is getting 34 armies and that is 12 more than anyone else, but the others are keeping him in check. And in that game the player concerned also has a significant territorial advantage which won't be true for the initially assigned Dominator.)To argue that not all players will appreciate the threat and not attack the Dominator as they should again misses the subtlety. Attacking the strongest player, whether we are talking about a Dominator game or a traditional one, is always generally necessary, but it is part of the strategy to avoid being the person doing the attacking when you can. Let someone else use their armies! But if enough of the other players get that decision wrong then they'll pay the price. Whether you are talking about a Dominator game or not bad strategy is bad strategy.Note that polls now have an option whereby voters can change their minds. My poll uses this option. Feel free to see the error of your ways player#####

I just disagree.  The number of games where it would work reasonably are far fewer than those where it wouldn't.   At some point, there just needs to be a limit on options.   A few people might enjoy this, but is the popularity widespread enough to warrant adding it?   I just don't think so, sorry.     I also think you would get far more complaints about the "bad luck" effect.   (and, in this case, I would tend to side with them ... though normally I just roll my eyes in disgust). 

Sorry, just my opinion, but that is how I feel.