Re: [VANILLA-LIST:3149] Re: Continuous scoring

[Tom Holub <doosh@best.com>]

On Mon, May 08, 2000 at 03:22:38PM -0400, Dave Ahn wrote:
> On Mon, May 08, 2000 at 11:07:55AM -0700, Tom Holub wrote:
> > 
> > You also are assuming that we don't care about the effect on the 
> > predictability of games.  Your system makes game results more predictable;
> > the existing predictability is already too high.
> 
> Yes, I am.  But so do you.  Shortening the gametime to 60 minutes also
> makes the game results more predictable because irrelevant portions of
> the game are simply cut out.  Both ideas yield the same result: a more
> interesting game.

No, as I said in my initial message, shortening the gametime to 60 minutes
makes game results LESS predictable.  The greatest level of variability
is 5-10 minutes into the game; the lowest level is 90 minutes in.  
The shorter the game is, the higher the variability.

> > You have a fallacy in your thinking here.  A team that is behind 15-5 in
> > planets but has 25 armies is not behind by 5 planets in the same way that a
> > team with no armies is.
> 
> I intentionally said "successfully delivering 25 armies" as opposed to
> "being up by 25 armies" to avoid this misunderstanding.  Oh well.

It's not really possible to come back from 5 planets in 10 minutes if you
don't have a stash.  

> > Trading control of territory for consolidation of resources is not just
> > a netrek strategy, it's a war strategy, and often an effective one.
> 
> Yes, it is.  However, it is seems to be the _only_ effective strategy in
> use now between two reasonably equal Netrek teams.  If football had a
> strategy that consistently outperformed others like in Netrek, it would
> become a lot less interesting.

I didn't see any more hoarding this season than previously.  The only
game where we faced massive hoarding was against TGW, which could have
played us straight up but instead decided to sit in core.

Perhaps you should switch teams.

> > Again, with this kind of system the game is over 30 minutes before the
> > end.  Emprical evidence shows that 11-8-1 or closer is the expected
> > score between two reasonably equal teams in a 90-minute game.  If behind
> > behind 11-8-1 is now a winning condition, you've now given the team that's
> > AHEAD a great incentive to play passively and store armies; how are you
> > going to get a 12-7-1 advantage against a team that just controls their
> > front and never tries to drop armies in your space?
> 
> Given two equal teams, the advantage should be close or equal to zero, so
> your scenario wouldn't happen.

If the advantage is close or equal to zero, then your system is a no-op.

>  If one team dominates during opening, then
> the opposing team has the incentive to aggressively win the mid-game to
> negate the advantage.

The point is, it's nearly impossible to go up 12-7-1 against a team which
is trying to keep the game at 10-10 and no more.  They can hoard armies
and reinforce or retake planets in their own space; what are you going
to do against that? 
 -Tom