Welcome Comrades to the 44th edition of the Dispatch!
*giggles*
*tears up* Oh my goodness, I can't believe this is happening! I'd first like the thank samuelc812, and the Academy, of course... *chuckles*
Yes, yes! It's my first publication of the Dispatch! And my fellow reporters and executives have graced this issue well with their magical typing fingers - jricart and his new tournamigo, Angola, takes over for a Tournament Players' Association Update, two maps share the spotlight for the awesomest* section, laughingcavalier and company provide the most jam-packed Platoon Report I've ever seen (including an
exclusive clan MVP article), and a fellow mafia goon joins me for a double dose of mafia goodness (or should I say, "goonness"
)! Oh, oh! And I lead the short bus charge in Georgerx7di's fantastical interview!
So, dear friends and foes, I hope you all enjoy Issue 44! Remember you can apply to be a reporter or send in your own articles! Just click on the link below, underneath "Recruitment", or PM the appropriate Dispatch Executive (see bottom of post).
Cheers and thanks for reading,
Victor Sullivan -
Newsletter Executive *Disclaimer: All sections are equally as awesome. Also, "awesomest" is not actually in the English Dictionary, contrary to popular belief. If you would like to apply to join the news team, please visit the thread below for more details!
Click here for Recruitment Details... This edition we have for you an expanded scum insider! Safariguy5 has joined forces with Victor to add some advance strategy tips for mafia and how to play. If you are interested in the game then head over to the mafia games forum and sign up to one of the open games! You'll be hooked very quickly. Elsewhere DoomYoshi shares with us another random game analysis. Find out more below! We also have an interrogation of Georgerx7di, one of CC's very own spanking monkeys! I'd like to also take a moment to thank Wacicha who has retired from the team for all the work he has done with the society of cooks. He has an
honour wall dedicated to him if you would like to add your own thoughts.
We also have an extra treat for you, the return of the Cook!
Click image to enlarge. nagerous -
Freestyle Executive Random Game Analysis by DoomYoshi show
Game 4038656 As far as a game goes, this one is fairly boring. What is noticeable is the aggression towards neutrals. Especially near the end, TidoFajito seemed to want a perfect victory. This, I understand as I used to do it while playing Risk 2. When I went to point out that he missed Sri Lanka in chat, I noticed I had also missed Sri Lanka before (my cookies have stored every game chat message I have ever stored). If this map is ever revamped (again) - MAKE SRI LANKA VISIBLE! I was unable to type that because game chat was locked. This would be the end of the game analysis if it weren't for game chat. Clearly Tido was sore about his first loss on World 2.1 and wanted to practice on his friend. Wait, why am I calling him Tido? Brent is clearly his name. Unless that happens to be a weird Americanism. Brent was actually a pretty talkative chatter. In his first game (feudal) he couldn't figure out how to begin his turn but he did successfully ask his opponent how to do it. In his second game, he started a conversation which ended up being rather rich with many players. That was also brsteelers74 's first game. Unfortunately, the excitement of chat was not enough to keep him interested. While he never missed a turn, he never made good on his claim that he is good at risk. Which brings me to the point about Conquer Club. We do attract all kinds, and we lose all kinds by the wayside. Shortly after brent decided our club was not for him, a user named TidoFajito posted this on UrbanDictionary.com (censor's warning):urbandictionary.com wrote: Brown-Hogan
An obscure sex act, thats sole purpose is to be a finishing move.
G: "Oh Timmy, last night was so great!"
B:" Yeah? Well Kudos to the Brown-Hogan bitch."
Perhaps we need to find our own Brown-Hogan to keep players like him interested. NEXT TIME: A surprise. Pm me if you have any comments on the analysis or if you have any points about the next game.
Scum Insider by Victor Sullivan and Safariguy5 show
The Scum Insider Newbie Help Want to get into the Mafia scene, but don't know how to play or even what it is? Consult these threads: Mafia Information , Mafia and You , and Rules and Terms of Mafia . Too much work? Too lazy to read through everything? No worries, you can always jump right into a game and ask for other players or the game runner to help guide you.What is "Mafia"? Mafia, for those of you that don't know, is a game that generally takes place in a town, where the townspeople have to determine who the mafia (or "scum") is and lynch them via a majority vote during the day and the mafia try to kill everyone at night and bluff their way out of getting killed by the town.Mafia News What's new? What's new?!? safariguy5 is now reporting for the Insider , that's what's new!! In other news, safariguy- wait - in somewhat related news, safariguy5 recently started a giant game of Pirates of the Carribean Mafia! And you're not just fighting for that stolen, cursed gold, or the heart of Davy Jones, you're playing for a chance to win 1 year of premium! So give our JOAT, safariguy, a round of applause and maybe a doc protect (or a swift kick in the keester, he's good for it). In addition, Mafia's own Pikachu (and Buizel) enthusiast, Fircoal, recently got a promotion, curtesy of the Discussions Team! Fircoal has been put in charge of the Mafia Forum and I have faith he'll be a thundershocking- no, thunderbolting - good mod for the forum! Thanks to whoever added Fircoal (clapper, maybe?) for recognizing our forum and its need for a Godfather, if you will Also, Commander9 and Mr. Squirrel bringing back the classics with their mafias, sticking to more the basics of mafia (at least as far as anyone knows with Commander - his mafia is called "UNKNOWN" Mafia). Mr. Squirrel's "Nostagia Mafia" is under way, and Commander's much larger game is currently taking sign-ups. Newbies, this is the game to join! Both games will include Vanilla Townies - town-aligned roles that have no abilities other than a single vote - something rather rare in these times, it seems.Mafia Callouts Calling all players interested! Some mafia games need some filling: Sign-ups: Seeking Replacements:CC Mafioso Section Here's this issue's segment as suggested by safariguy5 (what an Insider hog ):Click image to enlarge. The Donbot wrote: Their desire to keep living shows me no respect. Hey Blotto, roll down the window and start shooting.
Sully Note: You're welcome, Andy! Advance Mafia Roles and Strategy Hey everyone, safari here. Mafia games on CC are generally quite a bit more complex than the games most people have played with just the simple cop, doctor, mafia, and everyone else. To help our newer players become more familiar with the different roles and understand how to find scum, I'll spotlight 1 advanced role or 1 strategy an issue. Happy scum hunting!The Busdriver What is it? The busdriver is a manipulative role that can be any alignment although it is usually town . The person can choose any two people during the night phase (him or herself included) and "busdrive" them. This means that all actions done to one person are done to the other and vice versa.Example (1) Jack is the busdriver. During the night, he switches John and Julie. (2) The mafia target John for the kill. (3) The doctor protects Julie. (4) Due to Jack's busdriving, Julie is killed and John is protected instead. This can also apply to cop investigations. For instance, if Julie was a member of the mafia and John was a town member, the cop who investigated John would have gotten a guilty result.How to Play This Role Town As the town busdriver, using the ability on two random people every night is not a bad idea. If the action causes a guilty result that is announced in thread, you can reveal yourself and identify the correct mafia member. If a power role like the cop or doctor is claimed, you can use the busdrive to protect them from mafia night kills. Switching them with another player might even result in the mafia accidentally killing one of their own players! You can also play defensively and always switch yourself with somebody. This is less likely to interfere with investigations and may help you escape some night kills.Mafia A rarer role, mafia busdriver can be incredibly useful in the hands of a skilled player. Busdriving yourself with a town player can set them up for a guilty investigation. If you fear a town or third party nightkill on the Godfather, you can use the busdrive as protection for him. You can also use it on claimed cops to redirect doctor protections and make it easier for the mafia to kill the cop. So what are you waiting for? Join Some Games!
Clickable maps review by kaisermikeb show
Earlier this month Conquer Club released the new āClickable Mapsā feature. For those of us who are not in the habit of using BOB this brought about a huge interface change in how we play the game, and it brings an upgraded to the increasing number of net users who have chosen not to use Firefox. However with every new upgrade there comes controversy, new glitches, and transition pains. Even the bests of changes will bring debate, especially in this increasingly rhetoric driven world, so for the first newsletter since the update I will consolidate 17 forum pages of feedback to try and sum up public opinion. If you discounted people simply reporting bugs (but include people who reported bugs alongside rage) the numbers of positive responses and negative ones are about 50/50. Of course, one must consider that the masses quiet, and therefore tacitly supportive of the change. Initially there were a number of bugs that have been worked out, and a conflict with the existing clickable maps scripts that had been used as an add-on by many. These conflicts were responsible for the majority of the truly virulent responses to the change. Many felt that the new layout was cluttered, or had other issues with it. From my own personal perspective, as a guy who bounces between a full three-screened PC, and a nearly microscopic netbook, the clicking helps me take turns on the smaller screen without having to constantly page down and page up. On the larger computer I might use the clicking to select the correct territory, but I still prefer the existing drop downs for controlling my moves cautiously. The highlighting feature helps me double-check my moves on maps where the artist has wisely chose to use difficult to read fonts. The most despicable feature seems to be the hot keys. If you are not careful, you can accidentally affect the game with your keyboard. Some of them are relatively innocuous (increasing troop deployment, for example), however others are quite toxic. For instance, if one were to hit the center scroll wheel of his mouse(perhaps to look around the map on a low-resolution screen) while it was over the map, he would find himself moved to the next stage of his turn (ie., from the attack phase to the reinforcement phase). For those who have complained of the feature, the recommended solution was to turn off map notifications, which I find somewhat irresponsible, as turning off the indicator does not disable the feature, it simply makes it invisible. With complaints of lost games due to hotkey or clicking errors piling up, it seems like hiding the indicators from them will only worsen the trend. In short, the upgrades seem to do a lot for game play, and have widely (if quietly) been accepted. With much of the initial hate based around bugs, glitches, and conflicts with other scripts, I expect that it will soon move past much of its criticism. However, this update did not seem to have much testing done ahead of time, and was sprung on us full of bugs. Furthermore, there is no option out, and while some features must be universally applied for the sake of fair game play, this was certainly not one of them. I hope the next round of upgrades brings with it the control option to turn off clickable maps, but if it doesnāt letās hope that there is at least a little more QC in the future. For a list of hotkeys, check out the gameplay notes: http://www.conquerclub.com/public.php?m ... tructions6 I strongly recommend viewing them to avert tragedy!
show: Interrogation of Georgerx7di
Q. What attracted you to the site? I liked playing risk Q. What made you stay on the site? Lots of stuff. At one time it was rank, then it was friends. After a while it was medals, then a clan. Then I got interested in teaching now players in the spankademy, then the mcgill usergroup. It seems that there is always one thing or another to keep me here. Q. What is it you love most about being a spanking monkey? I think we're a pretty good clan, but we are also kind of humble. We don't talk a lot of shit, (I talk more than most), but we realize that it is just a silly game that we play for fun. It's fun to play in clan wars, and to have good teammates, but we try not to get too caught up in the hubbub (not sure on the spelling). Q. What is your favourite aspect of Conquer Club? That's tough too. All those things that I said made me stay. A lot of players, a lot of things to do. I wrote for the newsletter for a while, I joined a clan, I teach new players. There's always something new to try out, and you can have as much or as little of the site as you want. Q. What are your best settings? In team games its no spoils, chained, fog or sunny. In singles, its escalatings chained, sunny. I don't actually know how to play assasin, so any settings you pick I will still suck horribly at. Q.Which is your favourite map? If you asked me a year ago I would probably have said classic. I also would have said that I don't want to play 80% of the maps out there. Now I have played most, and I really like many of them. I can't give one, here are a few. Classic France ACW (American Civil War) Iraq Waterloo (this map has really grown on me) City mogul WWII Europe (For quads use only) Q.Who do you believe is the most overrated player on CC? Ok, well I won't answer this. I don't think it's very nice to call someone overrated, so instead, I will tell you who I think are some of the most underated players on the site. So you take someone like jalen45 , someone who most people don't know. Another clan player, who most haven't heard of. This guy is amazing, one of the best team players on this site. He doesn't seem to pay much attention to rank, so he's a major or colonel on any given day, but he could easily be a general if he made that his goal. I would play any map, any setting with him, just an outstanding player. Incan, from thota, is another one. Knows how to play just about every game that cc has to offer. Top notch player, but doesn't need to go out and make a big deal out of it. And there are lots of players out there like this, ranked from major to field marshal (and the Generals can play, make no mistake), who are great players, but few know who they are. A lot of monki's, no just jalen. But there are plenty of clans like nemesis, aoc, G1 and others who have a handful of outstanding players, its not just thota, tofu, low and so one. Many clans have at least a few elite players, and many of those players are very underated. Q.How many times have you seen Star Wars movies (each one)? I've probably seen episodes 4-6 at least 50 times, literally. Empire maybe over 100. I love those movies. Q. Who would win in a lightsaber duel, you or Bruceswar? Me, unless I was drinking. Q. If you could repeatedly stab any of the old-school RT gang, how many times would you stab scott? Haha. It depends, if he just blocked me from getting the first kill in an escalating game, probably 1,000. : ) Q. What's your favorite forum? This clan was invented at community college, although I still love the original (mcgill). Q.Who's your favorite poster? Wow, that's tough. Haggis mutton is awesome. I like a lot of your stuff trap. Jones is pretty good. A lot of the guys in mcgill/community college usergroups are great. I'm sure I'm forgetting a few. Q. Who is your favorite in-game teammate and opponent? In dubs I love playing with ender, lindax and jalen. In trips it depends on the map, ender, luckywar, skillful, sam, tisha. Quads I like Laddi, tisha, clapper, ender and lc, again depending on the map. Opponents, anyone good. I like clan wars, usually good competition, but sometimes you get good competition in public games. Q. If you had to choose between 6p escalating and 2v2, which would you pick? Wow, another tough one. It depends on my mood. I still feel like 6 player escalating is the grand dady of all games. All the best players should know how to play it. But dubs is fun, and not as nerve wracking, because you don't spend so many rounds just building. I think it depends on my mood. Lately I would rather play dubs though. 6 players escalating is kind of like that movie that I've already seen 100 times and now I know all the words; so it's not fun anymore. Q. What's one map that, if you had the power, you'd delete from the site?' Probably hive because I don't feel like trying out such a big map. Doodle is kind of useless, except it helped me get the ass medal on the cheap : P Q. Outside of Conquer Club, what are your interests? Golf, women, science. And probably in that order too. : ) Q. Favourite Book? Favourite Movie? Favourite Fast-food chain? Wow. Books: Favorite non-fiction History of the US Navy, Volumes I and II I think it was Robert W. Love Diary of a very bad year: Confessions of an annonimous hedge fund manager, written by "n + 1". For real, the auther is listed as n + 1. Favorite fiction: The hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, Douglas Adams. Movies: Star wars, 4-6 Cool runnings Remember the titans Tuskeegee airmen Q. What's your favorite calculator? Ti-83, no question Q. How many times are you going to pm wasted? Have I been doing that? I don't remember sending drunk pm's. Q. Why did CC wait until the 44th edition of the newsleter to interview you? Don't know. 44th time is the charm? Q. Why are you not one of Saxi's "Gang of Five"? I think I will be included in saxi's gang of forty-four. Q. VictorSullivan is trolling in your interrogation thread. Do you give AoG permission to beat him up? Yes Q. What dance do you do when you win a game? I usually celebrate by getting out some paper and a pencil and proving the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle. Q. What percent of the time you're on CC are you drunk? Well it used to be a lot, maybe like the returns you would get on the S&P 500 in a good year. Now a days I don't drink much, so its a lot more like a money market or savings account, in other words about 1%. Q. Are you gellin'? Yes Q. Which wave function best describes you? e^(kx-wt) That "w" is supposed to be an omego ofc. Q. You are filthy stinkin' rich. Whose avatar do you adorn the foyer with, and whose avatar to you put on the dish rags to mop up the booze off the floor? Pascalleke (not sure on the spelling) for the foyer. Whitestanz old avatar for the dish rags. Q. How many boards could the Mongols hoard if the Mongol's hordes got bored? 31 Q. How good are you with tongue-twisters like the above? 12 Q. Georgerx7di - WHAT EXACTLY GIVES YOU THE RIGHT? I got it at Walmart Q. Georgie, why did you kiss the girls and make them cry? No Q. One night stand with any member of TSM, no questions asked. Who do you choose? Ooh. It would have to be Kratos Q. Why is nagerous moody? Because he's an alcoholic. Q. Is there a lot of estrogen in the TSM forums? You have a lot of women in there. No, there are just orgies. Q.Why don't you get a new sig? That's like REALLY old. I think it came out in the 1920's or 30's. I could be worse and have F = MA, that's over 300 years old. Q. George what made you think that Comic Boy's decrepid old dad was a better player than him? Lol. Well early on I felt like froggy was way better than his son, but as time when on (especially when I was gone for a year), comic improved by leaps and bounds. Now I think comic may possibly have a slight edge because of all the team games he plays. You guys are both great players ofc, and good people. I miss the old rt's, (before speed was invented). Now it is time for Victor Sullivan questions! Haha, I like that victor's questions are seperated, like these ones come from the short bus or something : P Q. Is rx7di your maiden name? Lol, I used to drive a Mazda RX7. Q. If G wasn't actually the seventh letter of the alphabet, 1)would the world blow up? 2) would your name not be Georgerx7di? 3)or would you eat thousands of raw potatoes in an effort to support a breed of bacteria that feeds on starch and organic tissue? 12 Q. There were many Greek gods of many, many things. If you were a Greek god, what would you be the god of? Garbage. I would grow in strength as time went on. Maybe plastic would be even better. Q. In the history of the world, there have been many groundbreaking (in the literal and figurative senses) wars. Wars that have shaped both the map, and history. If you drank a magical potion, what would you turn into? This question makes a lot of sense. None the less, I'll answer what you might perhaps have hinted at. In Sir Edward S. Creasy's 15 Decissive Battles of the World, he puts Marathon as the first one. It's kind of odd though. Saying that because the greeks beat the persians 2,500 years ago, that we now have democracy and western civilization. Some might call that silly though, looking for things that long ago and suggesting that they are the cause of what we have today. There were tons of important wars in history. Lot's of individual battles too. In the west we always hear about Hastings (1,066) and the Spanish Armada (1,588), but there are other major battles that changed history; Manzikert (1,071) and Lepanto (1,571) that get little mention because they took place further east. Obviously the American revolution changed history. The Franko-Prussian war of 1870-1871 effectively molded Germany into a country, with that perhaps there would have been no WWI and WWII. So I guess it would be hard to nail down 1 war, or 1 battle that was most important. Q. You, nagerous, and Army of GOD are walking home from a bar on a Sunday night. Possibly the alcohol getting the best of you, you all decide to take a "shortcut" down a dark alleyway. *THOK CLUNK* Everything goes black. You all wake up bound and gagged, tied to wooden chairs. There is a dim light coming from a desk lamp across the room. A vaguely Korean man is asleep at the desk, a repetitive beeping sound coming from the computer, as he's using the keyboard for a pillow. Three men walk into the warehouse-like room from the blackness at the far end of the room. The man in the middle is tall and muscular, wearing a "Social Distortion" concert T-shirt with the sleeves torn off and some ripped up jeans. The man's two lackeys are much thinner, and are both wearing white wife-beaters, the left one with black jeans, the right with basketball shorts. All three are quite tan and look somewhat of an ethnicity you can't quite determine. The man in the middle, presumably the boss, nods to the guy on the right, who promptly walks over to and hits the sleeping man, waking up startled on contact. They both rush back over to the boss man. He clears his throat and says to you, "You fate and theirs lies in your hands. Two of you may leave here, but we must have one as a sacrifice." Who do you choose to be the sacrificial lamb and why? 14.2
Hi again amigos and welcome to your favorite part of the Newsletter, "War Games", where you can find information about CC Tournaments.
On this release of War Games, we have Dukasaur's
Meet the Tournament Winners article featuring interviews with Tripitaka and xman5151. Both of these members recently won tournaments both run by
Sniper . Dukasaur says, "
I chose these players to interview the way I usually do, by browsing the lists of completed tournaments, and I didn't realize at the time that both tournaments were Sniper's. I didn't want anyone to think that we were playing favourites, it happened by chance, but I think it shows just how hard Sniper has been working, running many tournaments at once. "
Angola , one of our new writers is taking over the "
TPA Update " in this issue, and
Soldierboy is giving us an update about new tournaments in his "
Join This? or Not! " release.
Thank you for taking the time to read this, and we hope you like our section.
jricart Tournament Executive Meet the Tournament Winners! by Dukasaur show: xman5151 Interview
xman5151 was the winner of Sniper's 1v1 Hong Kong Challenge , which ran from January 21st to February 23rd of 2011. It was Sniper's 32nd tournament, but for xman it was his first tournament trophy, and a big moment!Congrats on the tournament trophy! I'm one of the tournament reporters for the CC Dispatch Would you be willing to do an interview? Hey thanks for the congratulations, happy to finally win one . And yes I have read it once or twice, and I was thinking... I wonder when I'll win a tourney and have a chance to be in this. I wouldn't mind doing an interview at all!Excellent, thank you! Well, I have one standard question that I ask everybody: "What attracted you to this particular tournament?" Depending on your answer, we then go wherever the conversation takes us. Well I have been joining a lot of tournaments lately, and a lot in this standard format. This tournament was especially appealing because of the Hong Kong map though, I have liked that map and had some decent success on it.1v1 single elimination. You either love it or you hate it. So I guess you would be more in the "love it" category? Yeah I guess you could say "love it". I haven't been able to win one yet until now, I tend to get beat in the later rounds by top level players.Well, that seems to be the paradox with 1v1, isn't it? Any single-game 1v1 is so drop-dependent that it's anybody's game, but if you play enough of them the drops even out and the better players rise to the top. What other formats do you like? I also like 8 player escalating games, I like that the drop does not determine the outcome. And these games are the most thrilling when you go for that complete sweep of the board for the win! Oh God yes! Can't beat the rush of the escalating sweeps! You're in the British Isles Terminator also. Enjoying that one? Yes love the rush! Yeah I'm in the British Isles Terminator and am enjoying it, I think I have one board sweep so far, would like to get that up to 2 or 3 before the round ends, but escalating games on one of my favorite maps is a fun time for sure.You did very well in my first tournament, got through all the way to the final. I suppose I can be forgiven if I ask for your comments on that one, even if I'm a little biased... Yeah I was doing great, the first few rounds were awesome... got through somewhat easily, and then Arms Race! came and destroyed any hope. I'm not that great on the map, especially against people who know what they're doing. When I first signed up I was thinking should I really do this since Arms Race is the final, but I thought there's no way I make the final anyway. At least I won 1 of the 7 so far (maybe 2). What Im really looking forward to is your next tournament, it has a very good setup!Aw, shucks.... Honestly, though, I am very proud of it, and I'm glad you like it. So, how much of your average day does CC take up? Is it your major online hobby, or just one of many? Too much haha. I wake up and first thing I do is turn on the computer. It takes up at least 2 or 3 hours a day sometimes more. This is really one of two major online hobbies, the other is fantasy sports. I love fantasy football, and am gearing up for fantasy baseball right now. Between those 2 I keep myself plenty busy on the computer What kind of games did you play before CC? And, more-or-less on the same subject, what do you think is the main attraction of CC? Is it the game itself, or the community and social aspect? Before CC I guess I mainly played online arcade and strategy games like on Yahoo. The main attraction of CC for me has always been about the games. I love numbers, and figuring out where to attack and when. The strategy is a lot of fun and keeps me coming back. The social aspect has been growing on me though, playing team games and tournaments have helped that part a lot. Thanks for interviewing me, hope its a good one for the article lol Thank you for your time, and good luck with all your future CC endeavours!
show: Tripitaka interview
Tripitaka won Sniper's 1v1 France 1789 tournament -- a straightforward 16-player single elimination tournament -- which was first posted on November 8th 2010, and formally finished on January 4th 2011. This turned out to be one of the most interesting interviews that I've had so far.My standard first question is always, "What attracted you to this particular tournament?" and then depending on what you focus on in your answer, we see where it leads us. Mostly it was a combination of the settings and the map. The majority of tournaments I join are 1v1. It is by far my favourite game type, so when I see a 1v1 in the thread title, I always read on. Whether I join or not then depends on the settings. I prefer not to play freestyle, manual or nukes, so if it doesn't have any of those settings then it's down to the map, and here I have simple tastes -- straightforward maps that I can read at an instant without having to pore over a long legend, or count up bonus territories. Also I prefer maps that aren't heavy on giving bonuses on the drop, because it's just too hard to come back from them if you play second. So Sniper's tourney, had it all - Trippy friendly settings and a gimmick free map!I must agree that France 1789 map is really nice and clean, visually speaking. I've never played it but I looked at a couple of your games and I can see what you mean about reading it at a glance. Still, I don't imagine that someone like you with a gold cross-map medal is easily caught off-guard. Wouldn't the difficult maps give you more of an advantage? Maybe in a league type tournament, where you can choose your home map, but I doubt I would do so well in one with just a single map, known to attract its specialists. Besides, as nice as the tourney wins and medals are, if I dread my turns coming around or have to pour hours into mastering a particular map, it's just not worth it...and I'm far too lazy! Do you prefer to fly solo, or team games? Definitely the former though I'm not adverse to playing team games - especially doubles with my hubby!Well, I didn't even know you had a hubby. In fact, until now I didn't even realize that you're female... So, now that I've done a Game Finder for your doubles game, let me guess: your hubby is Serbia? Bingo! I'm smarter than the average bear... And I've even figured out that this explains why your location is listed as "Serbia" even though you have a U.S. flag... So, I think you're the first woman I've interviewed, and I hope you don't think this question is depressingly trite, but, does it make any difference? Do players ever treat you different because you're female? Not as far as game play. Like yourself, most people I've only played a few times just assume I'm a guy anyway. Those that do know me, might act differently in chat but otherwise there's no difference.Were you into playing the board game before you joined CC? Or how did you get involved? When I was a kid my Mum and her brothers and sister used to play every Sunday at my Gran's. I watched avidly and wanted to join in, but was always too scared - they made it look so intense! Then I grew up and realised that it's just my Uncles that are scary, but by that time no more big family get-togethers so I had to make do with either playing against my Mum or trying to have a five player game all by myself! Then one night when I was trying to avoid writing a dissertation, I happened to do a search for online risk and low and behold found this site. Joined four random games, one of which was created by my future husband and the rest as they say is history! Wow, so did you meet your husband on CC? That would be quite a story! I think you mean quite geeky! But yes, we met in that fateful game back in 2007, whilst I was studying in Edinburgh and Serbia was living in Detroit. A few trips back and forth across the pond and a whole lot of immigration forms later, I moved over last August and we were married the following month.No, not geeky at all. Like the commercials say, 20% of relationships nowadays start online. But I've never thought of CC as quite the place where one would do that. I think this is fantastic! Probably the most interesting personal story I've heard on CC. Is this only new to me because I'm new here? Was it much talked-about at the time? Serbia made a thread about it in GD just after we got hitched, but before that only a few people outside of our clan, Generation One, even knew we were an item.Found it. (here ) There were some really nice congratulatory messages, but overall it wasn't the kind of big news that I would have thought it would be. I guess people who are accustomed to losing 22 armies attacking 1 are so jaded that nothing amazes them any more.... The last word is yours. Do you have any closing comments for me? (As specific or as general as you want it -- you have the podium. Something you'd like to see more of/less of in tournaments or on CC in general? Someone you'd like to do a shoutout to? A solution to the Eurodollar problem?) I think the tournament system is working well at the moment. There is a good variety out there and a host of excellent organisers. I know some people think that there are too many small tournaments brought out at once by the same people, but I don't see a problem with this. There obviously is a demand for them, judging by how fast they fill up. If the only complaint is that they are easy wins for medals, then change the medal system for tournaments. Have different medals for both organisers and winners based on the complexity of the tournament and/or minimum number of games that have to be played to win. I'd also like to see tournament organisers being given the ability to choose who goes first in a best of series, with only the decider game being random as it is now. Obviously one player is always going to go first more than his/her opponent, but it would avoid those times when one player starts first in all games (or all but one in series greater than 3), thus being a fairer system and hopefully cutting down on the amount of whinging that goes on about play order. As far as CC in general, boy where do I start?! In some ways it's come along way since I joined almost 4 years ago. There are a lot of nice new features across the board and more opportunities than ever to get involved in the site. But sadly in others there's been no improvement and in some cases it seems that things have even gone backwards. Relations between the Admin/Moderators and the community at large appear to be at an all time low. The moderation of the off topics forum and live chat in particular has gotten out of hand. In short inconsistencies and unprofessionalism abound. I'd think it was just nostalgia talking, except I know a lot of people who'd agree that the boards have lost some of spark, not to mention some of the most interesting, witty posters CC has had the pleasure to come across. As for the Eurodollar, there is a far more pressing issue to address first, that of the great cookie debate! It gives me great pleasure to pronounce once and for all that coconut cookies beat peanut butter cookies hands down! Sorry Bones!Ok, thank you very much for your time, and best of luck in all your future endeavours! And thank you Dukasaur for putting up with me!
show: Get Your Own Interview
One concluding note: when I volunteered for this project, I offered to interview "all of the tournament winners." How naive I was! I had no idea what a staggering number of tournaments there really are. Now I know there is no way I will be able to get to everyone. I intend to publish two or three interviews in every edition of the Dispatch, but even so I will probably only get to talk to about 5 or 10 percent of all the winners. My approach will be partially random and partially targeted. Some will be chosen because of their fame or amazing stats, some will be chosen because I find the tournament they were in to be unusual or especially interesting, and many will be chosen completely at random. I will pay special attention to those that are winning a tournament for the very first time. If you are looking forward to telling the story of the exciting tournament that you were just in and want to be on my list, please feel free to PM me any time. Dukasaur .
TPA Update by Angola show: TPA Update
The TPA (Tournament Players Association ) has seen little movement atop the Scoreboard since the last issue. sonicsteve continues to lead with 23.06 points. Bones2484 is second with 18.52 and HighlanderAttack is third with 18.18. There was one tournament accepting signups when this was written. A terminator tournament titled "I Would Hate to be You" run by ralphcptc . Be sure to visit the Create/Join a Tournament area to sign up for future TPA events, which will be ending in the next two months. New tournaments are posted on Mondays.
Join this? or Not! by soldierboy show: JOIN THIS OR NOT
Welcome to this issue of Join this? or Not! To start it off we are doing shieldgenerator7 's tournament Golden Swords VS Golden Shield .This will be standard, freestyle, automatic, escalating, unlimited forts,sunny, and will be 1 vs 1. Needing 32 players that will be split in two groups. One being the Golden Swords and the other being the Golden Shield and the winner of each group will face off in a the best of three in the championship series. So if you are one of the freestyle players on the site then you might want to join this tournament to see how good you really are. The next tournament was organized by chapcrap . The tournament March Madness will be run just like the 2011 NCAA Men's tournament with 68 players to pick one of the 68 teams in the tournament. This will be 1 vs 1 you lose you're out tournament. The settings will be escalating, chained, sunny. Each region will have a different map. All the college basketball fans out there this tournament is for you. So go join it! The last tournament I picked was organized by alexcata . This wonderful tournament is for all you poker map lovers out there. Shuffle Up and Deal will be played on the poker club map with the settings: standard, sequential, automatic, no spoils, unlimited forts, and foggy. So if you think you're a poker player then jump on in this tournament! I hope you join these wonderful tournaments and if you don't like any of these then go to the Create/Join a Tournament or Tournaments Tab at the top and look at the other tournament that are waiting to be filled. This is soldierboy signing out!
BAM! Natty brought back the Cook, and now Map Spotlight - giving you two interviews for the price of one issue (free) to make up for last issue! Also, yours truly briefly interviewed a few older Foundry mapmakers/commenters/cartographers, so check-check it! And (after a bit of drama) the Foundry team has a new reporter - OliverFA! I couldn't be happier to have him on board, and I hope you're just as excited as I am to see what he has in store for us next issue!
Cheers,
Victor SullivanFoundry Executive Map Spotlight: Quad Cities and Research & Conquer by natty_dread show
Map Spotlight: Quad Cities ironsij0287 is a first time mapmaker, who is progressing well to get his first map up to play. The map, Quad Cities, is pretty standard fare when it comes to gameplay, although it is quite large, but all in all it is a well designed map, which will surely find players who will enjoy it. - Tell us a bit about yourself. Who are you, what do you do, how long have you been on conquer club... (you don't have to give any personal information you're not comfortable sharing).I was born and raised in Iowa, and no I didn't live on a farm (Let's just quash that stereotype right now). I work as a GIS Specialist in the government sector, mainly making maps for local and regional planning purposes. I just discovered CC last fall so I'm still very new to this place. - How did you get interested in the foundry and mapmaking?When I first joined I was absolutely amazed with the number of maps that were available to play. Once I realized they were all created by CC members I became intrigued and made my way over to the foundry. There I saw how the process works and I knew right away I wanted to start work on my own map for CC. I've always been fascinated with maps since I was very young and it led me to pursue a bachelors degree in geography in college. It was there that I got into GIS (Geographic Information Systems) and thus led to the career I'm in now. - Tell us about your map. What do you find most interesting about the area that your map features?Quad Cities really began as an idea about 5 years ago. At the time I was living and working in Rock Island, IL. A co-worker and I were looking at a Quad Cities region map when he mentioned that with all the individual cities it would make for a cool map for the board game Risk. After that we'd talk every now and then about how it would be laid out and such, mainly just as some crazy fantasy. Once I decided to create a map for CC, the Quad Cities was immediately first thing that jumped into my mind. I really like how fragmented the Quad Cities is with all its individual incorporated places and such with the Mississippi River acting as the great divider splitting it in half. All of the bridges crossing the Mississippi on my map are in fact the real life bridges used by autos. With only 5 real crossings between Iowa and Illinois the map flow is bottlenecked quite a bit between Iowa and Illinois. I think this illustrates quite well how the real life population in the area move about in their daily lives. Having lived there for 5 years I was always amazed with how many folks living on the Iowa side rarely ventured over to the Illinois side and vice versa. I think in CC the same sort of thing will happen with gameplay. Players building themselves up on one side or the other, fighting opponents on the same side of the river as them, with only a few trying to traverse to the other side, at least early on in a game that is. - So, the idea of the Quad Cities map was born way before you came to CC. How much has the gameplay of the map changed from the original idea? Yeah, the overall idea and concept were there but I never gave much thought to just how exactly the territories would be divided in each region or what bonus amounts I would have. My original plan was much more grandiose than the current draft, with a larger area and more regions. I quickly realized that was a little too ambitious and not real feasible given the size constraints. - What do you think of the foundry process so far? Have you found the foundry easy to work with?The foundry process has been quite the learning experience. Some of the folks there have been very helpful in offering direction with the map creation. I'll be the first to admit though I'm not the best when I receive negative criticism, and I can be a bit reactionary. My style may not jibe with some and I just need to understand that and move on. But overall the experience has been great, and I'm happy with how this map has evolved. - Do you think you will be making any other maps after this one?Yes, I definitely will be making another map after this one. I've had a couple ideas that I started but fizzled out. What I know for sure is that everything I've seen, discovered, and learned from making this first map (both positive and negative) will be taken into careful consideration on my next project. - Ok, that's about it. I was going to post more questions but your previous answers pretty much cover everything I can think of... Is there anything else you want to share about this map or your future plans?I'm not sure what my plans are for the next map but I may consider working with the new Supersize guidelines. - Thanks for the interview!No problem, thanks for interviewing me. Map Spotlight: Research & Conquer TacKtix and OliverFA have now been developing their map Research & Conquer for over two years. This is a long time for a map to be in development even by Foundry standards, and there have been numerous obstacles to the development of this map. Fortunately it now seems to be back on track and on it's way to live play. Research & Conquer features an unique gameplay, something that has never before seen on Conquer Club: a research tree, where players can "research" technologies to give them gameplay advantages, in addition to a conquest-type territory map. This 2-layer gameplay is the perfect example of innovative gameplay design and is probably a part of the reason why the map has been stuck in development for such a long time. But don't take my word for it - hear it from TacKtix himself, exclusively interviewed by the Newsletter!1. What is the story of your map? In a steampunk era, 6 nations are competing against each other, attempting to gain the upper hand against each other. To do this they plan to expand both scientifically and territorially. Each player takes the position of one of these nations, expanding and researching to defeat the rest.2. How did you come up with the idea of R&C? OliverFA had the original idea, and I do not know how he came up with it. For the map's graphics, I thought of possible areas of "history" where the map's namesake Research and Conquer would be most applicable. I came up with WWII and steampunk. Deciding steampunk would look cooler (you tell me), I went with that theme for how it looks. 3. What has so far been most difficult part in designing the gameplay of R&C? The uncertainty. Because of the nature of the map, there is very little way to know how balanced certain elements are until it's played through by people. There's so many variables, so many possible approaches to the map (far more than the average CC map), that there's no way I'm able to tell how balanced it truly is. It'll be a lot of Beta revisions and possibly some unhappy players, but that's just the nature of the map.4. Has the process of designing a map this complex ever felt frustrating? Not particularly, though my busy life/commitment schedule has always slowed up production on the map a very large amount. I suppose if I was at a higher tempo some of the minutia (like placing all of those neutral values and/or changing them) would bug me, but right now I'm more bugged that I've got too much real life going on to work on it. 5. These days, the foundry usually demands all maps to be playable for 8 players. Was it difficult to obtain permission to design a 6-player map? I don't know, I joined production on the map after it had already been cleared for 6p. However, as the graphic artist and current driver of the map I can tell you that this map WOULD NOT work for 8 players with the present map size requirements. There's too much information to stick on the map as it is, trying to shove 2 more players worth of homelands and researches on there would be bad juju.6. What is the current progress of the map? Done except for some XML checks. Due to a few of the researches said XML is over 3 times larger than the site's next-largest: King's Court. When that's checked off, I expect to be looking at a LOT of Beta balancing.7. What kind of feedback would you currently hope to receive from the community? Play the map and realize that things might not work right. Note if there's an uber-strategy that beats all others, or if there's a particular weakness. I know that between myself and Oliver we won't be able to play enough games to get a feel for balancing issues, we need CC at large to help us there.
Time Machine by Victor Sullivan show
Hey there, my fellow Foundry friends! We're going back in time - back when even our dear current Foreman, MrBenn, was just an assistant (or not even a Cartographer at all). Here are the.killing.44, RJBeals, oaktown, and the Former Foundry Foreman himself, as they reminisce about the "good ol' days":the.killing.44 wrote: I was a mapmaker and Foundry Assistant, basically a step below blue mod. I left due to stagnation & boredom stemming from it. Also, life & other projects.
RjBeals wrote: I was never a staff member, just an involved cartographer. I did work a little bit behind the scenes with lack and wids on the achievement medals, but wid did most of it. I still enjoy checking in every now and again with this site. There's some creative minds in the foundry and its fun to see whats going on. However, a handful of us old timers decided to move to a new site, another "risk" style gaming site. Only difference, mibi is the creator, and actually listens to and is involved with us. I don't plan on any more involvement with the foundry, besides making a few comments here and there. You all have a lot of patience, and we did once as well. After a few years, we just got burnt out.
oaktown wrote: I started as a humble mapmaker with no clue as to what I was doing... if you don't believe me, take a look at my first map (Chinese Checkers). But my understanding of gameplay, map design, and the dynamics of the site grew to the point that I was offered a CA position. Over the course of my three years here I made a bunch of maps, some of which I'm quite proud of. When I was CA the Foundry was experiencing a lot of growing pains. I think gimil, coleman, and I did a pretty good job of developing the current system of sub-forums, stamps, and division of labor, but we didn't get there without pissing some folks off. I left the CA position because it stopped being fun, and I got tired of fighting the battles I felt were necessary to maintain high standards. And it was easy to leave knowing that MrBenn was in charge. As for why I've stopped posting in the Foundry, there are a few reasons... for starters, I lost interest in CC's process. Good maps take too long to complete, while other maps should never be made in the first place. Second, my "generation" of Foundry regulars started losing interest - widowmakers, coleman, RjBeals, mibi, incandenza, yeti, etc - and it wasn't the same without them. And third, well, I'm involved with projects outside of CC that take up my time. Thanks for taking an interest. I wish nothing but the best for CC and the Foundry.
AndyDufresne wrote: I think I first wandered into the Foundry for two reasons probably: the idea of helping give feedback that could have a real impact on the way the game was played made me want to contribute; the other reason was that the Foundry just seemed like a good place to start---lots of welcoming faces, and I was unsure really what to post elsewhere in the forums! I had been participating in the Foundry for a couple of weeks/months at the time, and the process just seemed pretty out of whack. After a while, I started to think that most of the maps seemed to lack sufficient feedback---or the cartographers just weren't receptive to much feedback and hastily declared their maps 'done.' Most maps had may be 2 or 3 updates, and while most of the maps had functional gameplay, graphics were mostly unsightful. Lackattack seemed to give the maps a once over, and checked their XML to make sure gameplay was broken, but that was the extent of the review process. The original Indochina Map (before it was REVAMPed by Widowmakers) was what finally led me to send a message to Lackattack with some ideas on how the Foundry could be revamped and some sort of Foundry Feedback Process and Guidelines could be established, and that I'd be willing to give wrangling the Foundry a shot. A week or two later Twill, our first Community Manager, was appointed by Lackattack, and he sent me a message indicating that a few others suggested me for the job of 'Maps Coordinator' and that he'd like me to join the Volunteer Team he was forming. After some discussion with both Lackattack and Twill, I agreed to join the Volunteer Team and became 'Maps and Suggestions Coordinator' (yeah, Suggestions were a part of my original job title, haha). I couldn't stand the title, and as part of my maps process organization I decided to expand the 'Foundry' theme and went with the alliterative Foundry Foreman, in addition to expanding the theme by creating a 'Final Forge' and 'Quenching.' The rest is history! Many Volunteers helped me over the years manage the Foundry, and many continue today to help MrBenn and thenobodies80 manage it as well.
Clan news this issue? There's too much news - the active challenges forum has spilled on to a second page for the first time. Much of the activity is in the new competitions, the
Newcomers' Cup , where a host of new clans are establishing themselves and the
1on1 challenge which is pioneering exploration into new challenge formats. Our coverage focuses on:
The Clan League - Agents of Chaos and The Spanking Monkeys have upset many pundits by making it through to take on Knights of the Round Table and Immortal Assassins respectively in the playoff semi-finals which start this week. We celebrate the regular season's Most Valuable Players, announced exclusively here in the Dispatch.
The Conqueror's Cup - season 2 kicks off so we speak to organiser
Chuuuuck , and season 1 is within days of finishing: will it be KORT or THOTA who take the crown?
There's a lot of debate about how you rank clans - I don't understand it, but apparently
Leehar does - hopefully you will too after you've read his article.
But clans are not all about competition: they're about having fun with mates. One player who has made this happen is
Blackknight_6 . In the first of a series of articles he shares what he has done in The Fourth Crusade to spice up his clan.
If there's one thing all of us clan members do it is take ourselves too seriously. Warning - stop now guys. Else our new columnist
Master Fenrir will live up to his promise to get in your business, your faces, your grills, your Kool Aid, and your shizzle...
With special thanks to
bruceswar of KoRT for producing, at zero notice, the clan icons which fill out our coverage.
laughingcavalier , Clans Editor
Clan League: MVPs announced by laughingcavalier (TSM) show
What you've all been waiting for: Head Clan Director jpcloet has run the regular season results through his high-powered number cruncher and given us the Most Valuable Players of Clan League Season 3. First up come the divisional all-stars, the best players by game type in their division. No surprise to see some well-known names from division winning clans KORT, TOFU, Empire and IA, and strong performances from LoW, AoC and (no bias, guys) TSM. Special congrats to the players from clans who show up in these lists less often, notably Theldin of The Last Warriors and Gambler2120 of Angels of Death. Division MVPS: Who were the all-star teams across the divisions? These players pretty much all won at least 6 games in their position and scored an 80% win rate. Two players each for TOFU and IA, representatives of Empire and KORT. Specially good performances from relative newcomers - two FOED players danryan and Master Fenrir made it in, and Devil's Brigade are represented by Shaneback . But there can be only one player who takes the general achievement medal for best performance in the league. jpcloet wrote: The top player award started with all players above 70% and then I do a further data dive. I've been working on a Clan Rating (somewhat similar to QB ratings) and the criteria for the league was 5 components although the expectations for each category did vary based on the results in each group. I found myself consistently having to raise the bar as there were some really strong performances.
The 5 Categories were: Quads Win %, Triples Win %, Doubles Win %, Unique Maps %, and Kills Ratio %. Along with a minimum of 10 games.
Most of the top players had perfect scores in 3 or 4 of the categories. The Quads scores were very close as well. The biggest difference was kill score. There were some players who won a lot of games but were not active participants in some games. The best player for kill ratio in the top group was actually
4red and the 5 players mentioned below combined were an astounding 83-12 for 87.3% win rate. Another interesting note was that the top player did not qualify for a positional spot since he was 4-0, 4-0, and 4-0.
Big congratulations to all the winners, and especially to steve066 , CL3 MVP. These are the players we all want to beat if we can only figure out how to do it. And to help us figure that out, we asked a few of the contenders to give us their teamgame tips. This is what they said: dwilhelmi (Empire) wrote: It is important to be on the same page with the rest of your team, and that means constant communication. Even when everybody knows everybody else, and you all have a comfortable style, communication is still important. Even the most experienced players can miss something, but if you have three or four people looking at every move, you are a lot less likely to goof up. Along with that is keeping up on your chats, even when it isn't your turn. Asking for input doesn't do a lot of good if your teammates are not checking games when it isn't their turn.
danryan (FOED) wrote: My general tip would be that communication trumps skill for the larger team games. Although a plan may fall apart due to dice or opponents' play, if the team is communicating, formulating a new plan can bring the battle back with a good result. Knowledge of specialist maps is very helpful as well - there are a number of maps where standard gameplay will get you a loss in team games, including Feudal & Epic, Lunar War, Middle Ages, etc. My last tip is pick good teammates, inevitably they will raise the quality of your game as you don't want to let them down.
josko.ri (KORT) wrote: Clearing regions around a bonus is often more important than taking the bonus.
steve066 (KORT) wrote: I'd like to thank my agent, my director, my -oops wrong speech. lest there be any doubt my real skill is in picking genius teammates. among others ballen, josko and rodion
Conqueror's Cup Season 2 Preview by Leehar (Nemesis) show
Our feature article on the 2nd Annual Conquerors Cup starts with a discussion with the man working tirelessly behind the scenes to make the Cup one of the stand-outs features in the Clan scene. Everyone give a round of applause to Chuuuuck as he talks about the successful previous edition, his personal views on it with his respective clans, the new and large number of clans competing in the clan scene and other varied details:Chuuuuck wrote: The first Conqueror's Cup far exceeded my expectations. I think the views and posts involved in the tournament stand for themselves to show it has become the most popular event in the clan world on this site. As of right now, just between the main thread, finals, and semi finals the cup has drawn over 56,200 views and and 2,850 posts and that is not even including the quarter finals, round of 16 and play-in matchups. I wouldn't call it a blow last year when we went out of the cup, but I am a fiercely competitive person in anything I do and I can say I was definitely disappointed along with the rest of Empire when we got put out in the quarter finals. I can not be too hard on us though, we played a great clan in KoRT who has excellent players and they just played better than us and they deserved to win. I just recently came over to TOFU from Empire and I definitely expect a good run in the Cup this year. To be honest, I feel like anything less than winning the cup would be a disappointment to me. TOFU has great players over here and I am just hoping I can help make them even better and we can come out the winners of the 2nd Conqueror's Cup. I think all of the new clans is great. It speaks volumes to show what clans do to help improve this site in general. I feel like clans are quickly becoming one of the most popular things about this site and probably one of the biggest reasons for retention in premium members year after year. Every time I see a new clan I constantly hope they hang around. It is a lot of work to keep a clan organized and competitive. It seems we have had a solid 5-10 really competitive clans for a long time and I keep hoping that numbers quickly grows to 20 or so that can beat each other on any given day. I was really excited to see 29 clans sign up for the 2nd Conqueror's Cup. I thought it was amazing to get pretty much every clan in the top 15 plus a ton of the ones below that. Last year we had a handful of clans choose to sit it out and I think just by the participation we have gotten in the 2nd cup, it goes to show how successful the first one ended up being. There were only minor rule changes this year. I just tried to do my best to make it where game forfeiture wouldn't happen unless absolutely necessary because a clan is just being non-responsive. I want the tournament to be set up so that ultimately, the clan that moves on is the clan that proves themselves in game play and wins the most games. One hope I have is that with the new schedule I made this year the tournament will run a little more quickly and be over before the end of the year, but my one real hope for the cup this year is that we make it through without any major issues arising within the rules of the cup and that we have some fierce battles and ultimately decide an undisputed winner for the year!
And to continue with our coverage, here's what you can look forward to as the Cup progresses : Click image to enlarge. And a summary of Round of 32 matches as top seeds Thota, Tofu and Kort look on. Devil's Brigade vs. Bullet Proof Bandits - The 16th and 17th seeds face off in what could be the closest encounter of the first round. The Bandits will most likely be looking to have their revenge after a loss to DB in the clan league. The first set starts of with BPB's home games and they'll be looking to build a sizable lead.Imperial Dragoons vs. The Fantastic Four-skins - Another possibly close encounter where one of the oldest and most established clans take on opponents who started their competitive clan career with some brutal victories recently.De Veroveraars der Lage Landen vs. Agents of Chaos - One of the oldest clans delineated by national backgrounds takes on a top 10 clan still on the rise after a Clan League Quarterfinal win over Empire.Legends of War vs. One Step Ahead - The older sibling in the LoW/Tofu split take on an upcoming clan that hit the ground running when landing on clan turf early in 2011. Some fierce debate went on when LoW accused OSA of reneging their obligations and called for blood. It required a ruling from the big man Chuuuuck himself to calm raging tensions. The FoW debate (somewhat central to the mayhem) continues in the General Fog of War Poll .Grim Reapers vs. The Legion - The experienced Legion (with the most completed wars at 18 and joint-top wins with Thota, AoD and Empire at 11) have started off their war against the not-so-Grim Reapers with an early 12-2 lead and all games in play).Mythology vs. A Fistful of Sixes - 13th Mythology take on a perhaps poorly ranked Afos who just recently beat 14th seeds G1 in a tense encounter and are chock-full of established clan campaigners from clans like the now defunct Skyforce and Regulators.The 4th Crusade vs. The Spanking Monkeys - T4C who are still looking for their first clan win after still reeling from a defeat spirited Tofu take on the Mighty Monkeys who are on a high after defeating that self-same Tofu in their CL QF encounter. Dynasty vs. Generation One - An intriguing battle as Dyn and G1 lock horns in a clash where the winner has the honor of facing the RT Knights.Fraternal Order of Exceptional Drinkers vs. Legends of the Zone - Not much to say about this encounter except that if the acronyms are anything to go by, there'll be Lotz of folks being Foed . Lotz will actually be looking for retribution after losing this same encounter 10 months ago.Risk Attackers vs. Immortal Assassins - Established IA (Imitating Altair) will try to clinically dispatch an eager RA while facing Empire on the sidelines.Empire vs. Death by Comity - Empire still suffering from their League loss to AoC, will look to turn their wrath upon a DbC still looking to overturn a 5 war losing streak. If past indications of Empire carnage after losses are anything to go by, DbC have there work cut out for them.The Last Warriors vs. Nemesis - My very own Nemesis will be looking to cement their place in the top 10 clans against a defiant TLW. Bretheren of the Fat Mermaid vs. Memento Mori - An interesting encounter if for no other reason then that ex-members from each went on to form clans that had a bitter encounter in January this year (with The Pack led by Ex-MM overcoming KoA led by ex-BoFM). Expect a bitter encounter with these 2 just from defense of their protege's . BoFM even have the added incentive of having a rematch with Tofu in the next round if they prevail. There's also been some intriguing discussions in the main cup thread about the use of Manual and Nuclear settings in clan wars, starting with Georgerx7di 's question - it'll be interesting to have more debate on that issue sometime in the future. And that rounds up the summary of the 2nd CC - Round of 32 for now. We're all looking forward to an exciting 9 months ahead if the schedule stays to form.
Conqueror's Cup Season 1: The Finals by laughingcavalier (TSM) show
vrs KoRT stand on the brink of one of the biggest wins in clan history as the Conquerorās Cup finals reach their conclusion. THOTA are the comeback kings, and no-one should write them off till the last dice is rolled, but it will be their best comeback by a long way if they can pull this one back. With the score tied on 27-27 in decided games, THOTA need to salvage 3 wins from these games to force the tiebreak, 4 games to win outright: North America Game 8540685 sunny Fractured America Game 8540691 sunny New York City Game 8538216 foggy Charleston Game 8538213 sunny Hive Game 8538218 foggy Battle for Iraq! Game 8538219 foggy āProve what your clan is made of,ā declared Chuuuuck nearly a year ago when he launched the first annual Conquerorās Cup. And the Knights of the Round Table have certainly done that. They were new to the clan world when the competition began and their peers voted them no higher than 7th seeds. They were telling us they were better than that even as they dispatched Generation One in the first round. And soon they were beating no 3 seeds, Cup hosts Empire ā and making quite a noise about it in a trashtalk war. They really showed their will to win in the semifinals by voting to uphold the 20 game forfeit that cost TOFU victory. From the first, KORT told us to take them seriously and now they have proved we should. The Horsemen of the Apocalypse came to this competition with little to gain and much to lose. Long established as the top clan, they were favourites from day one and knew that a loss at any point would dent their reputation. But their path has not been easy. They had relatively comfortable wins over outsiders Left for Dead in the first round and clan league winners Legends of War in the semi-finals. But the ponies had to fight tooth and nail against Nemesis, who tied the quarter-final with an epic back-and-forth game on Benelux which was one of the highlights of the Cup. There was evident relief in the stables when the tie-breaker went THOTAās way. This final has not had the attention it deserves. But itās been a corker. KORT stormed into a lead, finishing the first set 23-17 up, silencing anyone who doubted their strength. But THOTA pulled it out for the second set, winning some games with ease and grinding down KORT in others to level the scores as the final set began. And this set has been close. Neither clan has pulled away and the scoreline looks tied at 27-27 with six open games. Whichever clan pulls this off it will be a heroic achievement - no-one has ever won a clan competition on this scale. And if the cows of KORT can do it, they will have made a double acheivement becoming the first clan to beat THOTA and re-writing the book on who is top clan.
My Clan's Better Than Yours - Rankings Explained by Leehar (Nemesis) show
There's been a lot of debate lately with all these different rankings systems coming out, so after Qwert released his provisionally named ELO ranking, I decided to go out and find out what each of the creators had to say about their own and some of the other ranking systems. We'll start by seeing what they had to say about the latest ranking system:Active Clan ELO ranking 2011 : - The Active Clan Elo (or ACE) is presumably loosely based on the ELO Ranking system from Chess fame. From my understanding, it's applying the CC method of scoring whereby clans are given average scores from the useful Clan Rank add-on, and thereafter scores are gained by winning and losing. Since it's a new ranking there are obviously quite a few niggles with it, so it may just be best to adopt a 'wait and see' approach with regards to it's suitability.Qwert wrote: I think that i find very accurate clan ranking ,based on score and calculate in results- so far,they show quite acurate,because in 95% of all finished clan chalenges, highest ranked clan defeate lowest ranked clan when you look on average clan point score. Ofcourse for full effect need to get more and more results,because these is only a begining of 2011 year.
Blitzaholic wrote: qwert's is the biggest joke by whoever has the best winning %, for example we barely beat your clan 21-20, and lets say the clan ranked 21st beats the clan ranked 40th like 50 to 10, does that mean the 21st clan is better thna nemesis and thota? NO, but, qwert would have you beleive yes, seriously, it is a disgrace and joke to anyone who knows anything.
jpcloet wrote: ELO - The first ladder I used was founded in ELO and the disadvantage is lack of data. This works well for very active clans and with gaming privs, the active clans essentially have their own ladder. This ELO fits better with the times than my original ELO.
Chuuuuck wrote: I think Qwert's ELO rankings are interesting. I see some value in having them just to look at but I feel they are impossible to actually look at and give any credit to them as an actual ranking of the clans. If credit was given to them and that is what clans used to prove themselves then there would be too many top clans just trying to take on smaller clans in order to run their win% up and move themselves up the rankings. Obviously this would not be a showing of how good a clan really is but instead just who can manipulate the points the best.
Perception of Top 10 Clans : - There has been some vigorous debate in the Perceptions thread lately about the suitability and application of the ranking, perhaps even some of the mudslinging between this and the Elo was spurred by my search for comments on the topic. It certainly has been informative with regards to historical data, but going forward we will need to see how it can adapt and ensure it has continuing purpose not supplemented by the Power RankingsBlitzaholic wrote: chuuuucks and mine are the most accurate as it involves the clans and clan leaders to vote and poll and opinion's based on clans experience with war agains teach other and overall competition and records
Chuuuuck wrote: I think Blitz's Perception of Top 10 clans is really a great tool for past years and showing the history of who has been good. I think today it needs to evolve a little. First, I think their is a misunderstanding through the community and the people who vote of what exactly the votes are supposed to represent. Are they a snapshot at the end of each year of how the true rankings of the clans is perceived or do they represent a list of how actual clans performed in that given year only not taking into account past years? If they are just a snapshot of the rankings then in that case I feel they are very similar to the Power Rankings and there may no longer be use to run both side by side. I feel Blitz did a great job of going back and putting together a list for past years because it is impossible to go back and ask the people of those times to vote, but I feel moving forward with new rankings coming out, there needs to be a more defined process of exactly what his ranking represents and a fair system of how it is calculated.
Qwert wrote: Well name say all-first page dont have any explanation on what parameters blitz decide who its second,third,fourt....(we know that no1 place are reserved for THOTA).These is totaly subjective formula for clan ranking.
Jpcloet wrote: This has been a limited pool of contributors, but at least has some of the history of clans.
Power Rankings : -An important compilation that seems to accurately gather clans based on Perceptions, perhaps it still has a ways to go before clans have accurate enough data to make informed decisions on clan strengths, but it's gone a long way in determining positioning in the clan structure.Chuuuuck wrote: As far as Power Rankings go, I feel they do a lot to satisfy the biggest question on everyone's mind. "Who does everyone think is the best?" By no means do I think they are the most accurate way to rank the clans, but I think they take the important step of at least letting you know how all of the clans are viewed by their peers. And I do think they do get fairly accurate of rating most clans in the area they probably are really in. I think the clans that are ranked the most inaccurately are the medium range clans who are pretty good but don't have a lot of presence in the forums and don't have any particularly popular players. I think this is largely just due to most people don't know who they are or take the time to look.
Blitzaholic wrote: chuuuucks and mine are the most accurate as it involves the clans and clan leaders to vote and poll and opinion's based on clans experience with war agains teach other and overall competition and records
Qwert wrote: Very good explane definicion of hes ranking,and its based on how other clan think who its in what place. Its not related on score and results,and its can be subjective ranking.
Jpcloet wrote: Also based on perception but is more inclusive and has a better structure. I would prefer data based ladders, however, this one is very close to the leap ladder I'm currently working on. I would love to automate this and I have very distant plans to do so.
Clan Wars Rankings Ladder - 2 Year Weighted RPI : -A mathematical ranking that seemed to get a lot of heat when it was established, tho largely sidelined lately and the data is now obviously pretty stagnant. A lot of effort went into the formulae and I'm sure it still holds appeal for those looking for a numerical benchmark.Jpcloet wrote: Factually based on results and is the best ladder out there but is not being updated as I'm currently trying to get a leap ladder in place.
Qwert wrote: Well i look on table and formula explanation,and i must say that i find myself very confusing to understand what its what. To long formula,and to much comlicated for me-one thing what comlicated even more its A and B clans, Also its based on 2 years, and i think that maybe its best to try to create board only from 2011 games,and will be interesting to see,if mine ranking are similar to these ranking.
Blitzaholic wrote: Jp's is flawed by idiotic math and he weighs 8 and 16 game challenges in small legues for clan seasons too heavy, it is too small a sample of games, the challenges should not count at all unless they are 40 games or more
Chuuuuck wrote: I think the RPI is good work and I give a lot of credit to jpcloet for all of the work he puts in. I think it is largely criticized because I system like that is just tough to run with such little data among most of the clans and such varying results that are interlocking between the clans. You can have a clan that has beat two great clans near the top of the rankings while another who has beat 2 mediocre clans in the middle but when running an RPI it can be very difficult to distinguish between these two clans when they don't have any common opponents. It is a tough problem to find a solution for and I am not sure I could do any better than jpcloet is already doing which is probably why I have never tried.
There are also rumors flying about the new leap ladder currently being discussed in the CLA, so some of our respondents had a bit to say on that as well:Jpcloet wrote: The model is built, however, it is currently in the CLA for discussion on how to make it work as it does require some foundations as to who can challenge and when and what format etc. I can see it being in place for the fall of 2011.
Chuuuuck wrote: I am more excited to see his next leap ladder he is going to come out with. Although I think there will be times of certain leaps that it will appear to be inaccurate, I think it will give each clan the most fair chance at moving themselves and will make it more exciting in the clan world to constantly try to improve your standing.
So there you have it, the word from the horses mouths themselves. Whats best is obviously largely up to debate, but hopefully we all have a deeper insight on the ranking systems available for our perusal. I'd also like everyone to give a round of applause to these fine, upstanding citizens who took time away from their busy schedules to give us their views. We all know Qwert as an established map maker, and perhaps play often on his numerous maps, Blitzaholic is obviously always involved in his various Conquering endeavors and the many stat threads in General Discussions , Chuuuuck while working on releasing the eagerly awaited Power Rankings also had to organise and ensure both editions of the Conqueror's Cup are progressing successfully, and then of course there's jpcloet our Head Clan Director who tirelessly works behind the scenes on all clan issues.
Spice Up Your Clan by Blackknight_6 (T4C) show
The 4th Crusade Clan is still a relatively new clan. We have not chalked up any great wins in the clan wars (erm, at the time of writing we had not won one single war actually) but what we have lacked in good dice and drops we make up for in spirit and pluck. And in creative ideas to keep our clan members happy. Which is what this section is about. I was originally elected clan leader for recruitment by TheSaxlad , the founder of our clan. After a few weeks I asked to be moved to another job. We called it Crusader Morale Leader. Trust me, after our ill-fated war against TOFU I have had my hands full keeping up morale. One of the first things we did was to organise an internal tournament. We have our clan leaders, but we decided to hold a quick and dirty 1 vs. 1 tourney to elect the King of the Crusaders. This is a new post at the head of our clan. The Kingās job is basically to lead us into battle, leave encouraging comments in our clan war games and have the satisfaction of knowing he (or she, if we have a Queen) is the toughest crusader in the clan ā for now! We plan on having a tournament every season so that the position of King changes. Our first King is hammer1967 , who won this mini tournament, and will be king for a season until we do another one. Calling himself King Hammer the First he has already organized a Royal Guard to accompany him into battles. OVER TO YOU ā If you like this idea, why not give it a try? Hereās how in four easy steps. 1) set up a discussion forum thread for you tourney and get your clan members to sign up 2) choose maps you want the clan members to get really good at 3) make it motivating for the winner. This could be a special title (e.g. King, or Champion, or Hardest Mofo of the Clan), a special signature that only the winner can use, clan war privileges (e.g. gets first choice of games) or responsibilities (e.g. has to cheer on the clan in wars, trash talk the enemy in the forums, help low ranking members improve their rank in doubles games etc). 4) make it a regular thing ā the winner gets to hold the position until the next tournament comes around. I already have several crusaders asking when they can get another shot at being King. In the next issue I look at ideas for internal clan organization, and clan squads! Does your clan do something similar? Would you like to share an idea for improving clan morale? PM BlackKnight_6 and Iāll include it in a future article!
HARDBALLS with Master Fenrir (FOED) show
Welcome to my inaugural column. I think itās important to set some ground rules, perhaps share our expectations of one another. I expect that my professional journalism and deep insight into the clan world will earn me so much of your trust and respect that you will eventually wish to date me, or wish that I date any female offspring that you may have. You can expect me to ask the tough questions and tackle the tough issues. You can expect me to pull no punches, push the envelope, andā¦fold the origami. Sorry. In college, I eventually had to resort to using pages from my book of idioms as napkins, so Iām a bit short on those. I will get in peopleās business, their faces, their grills, their Kool Aid, and their shizzle. I will travel to the dark, seedy alleys of the clan community to buy a few ounces of truth so that you, the reader, can better understand what makes clans tick. At this point, you must be thinking, āDamn, this guy is gonna play hardball.ā Nay. Hardball is for old people and children. I play Hardballs . Plural. Nervous yet? You should be. So for this inaugural column, what tough issue do I plan to cover? Where will I set the bar? Love. Clan love, to be specific. Conquer Club has recently hosted the Spread the Love Epidemic 2011 . Inside sources tell me that a cure is near completion, but will only be available in ointment form. No matter how much love the site manages to drum up or how far they try to spread it, the clan community remains uninfected. Research is currently being done as to whether or not bickering produces antibodies.Chuuuuck has recently released the latest results for the Power Rankings used to determine the seeding for the 2nd Annual Conquerorās Cup and already jabs are being made.reptile wrote: TSM must be happy considering they sat out all last year and still ended up #4 lol
Leehar wrote: I realize now why I was so amazed at ID being that high.
No offence to them, but I thought that since they've lost both wars they've played since July (against Bofm and Empire respectively), I really can't see any reason for them to have risen
Relationships between clans have been like this for some time now. In the past year, war threads have gotten so heated that theyāve actually been locked. However, within a thriving clan community, isnāt this āgang mentalityā to be expected and even encouraged? After all, when Iām rollinā down the streets of Chicago and I see people sportinā red and black, my first instinct is to pull out my 9 and start making mommas cry. Isnāt that what a loyal gang (clan) member would do? The love doesnāt stop just between clans, though. Within what appear to outsiders as unified clans, rifts exist. Clanmates squabble amongst each other, fighting over war games. Private messages are sent to clan leaders and war ministers asking not to play games with certain clanmates. Estate attorneys are consulted and beneficiaries are removed from wills. However, there is one player whose legendary love for his clan has been unquestionedā¦until now. I am referring, of course, to Blitzaholic . Blitz loves his clanmates in The Horsemen of the Apocalypse (THOTA) so much that he has created tournaments dedicated to them. He loves them so much that when a topic was posted in the General Discussions forum asking for the best players on the site, Blitz claimed they were all in THOTA . He loves them so much that he recently made a small change to an old tattoo of his: But is Blitzās seemingly unwavering devotion to his clanmates legit? Is it all an act for the sake of appearing as a unified front? To answer these questions, I decided to play Hardballs. I PMed Blitz giving him several either/or scenarios with THOTA being an option in every case. Here are his responses:Blitzaholic wrote: McDonalds or Thota? thota Coffee or Thota? thota A good steak or Thota? thota Adopting a highway or Thota? thota Free tolls for a year or Thota? thota Finding a $20 or Thota? thota A good nap or Thota? thota A nice pair of jeans or Thota? thota High speed internet or Thota? thota Verizon Wireless or Thota? thota A trip to Europe or Thota? thota Ferrari or Thota? ferrari George Clooney or Thota? thota Jessica Alba or Thota? jessica alba Barrack Obama or Thota? thota TOFU or Thota? thota Being in the Top 10 of everything or Thota? thota The birth of a child or Thota? the birth of a child Sex or Thota? sex Sex or sex with Thota? Sex
While I personally found those last few answers disappointing, one of his responses is indeed remarkable. āGeorge Clooney or Thota? thotaā What did I mean here? Did I mean George Clooneyās distinguished grey hair and boyish smile or Thota? Did I mean having George Clooney as his best friend or Thota? George Clooney as an indentured servant or Thota? Itās difficult to say. My questions are so deep and meaningful that even I donāt know what I mean most of the time. Whatever I meant, itās clear that Blitz preferring his own clanmates to the man voted by People magazine to be āthe Sexiest Man Aliveā in 1997 and again in 2006 indicates an undying love. I find this to be refreshing. Amidst a dark and dreary clan world, Blitzās love for his clanmates is a beacon of light. The clan community could use more people like Blitz. Perhaps another 9 so that we might rank the top 10 Blitzes. But letās make baby steps, people. The next time a clanmate fails to reinforce you or accidentally attacks you in a no spoils team game, ask yourself āWhat would Blitz do?ā
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