Round 11 of the Metaverse League is on! Welcome back to our continuing players, and a cylon salute to our new players!
Round 11 will ask for extra levels of team planning and coordination:
All Victory Types, Mixed Settings
In an effort to freshen up the gameplay experience, JustinSane and I have discussed a new take on an old favorite. Teams will fight for victory in at least 3 of the 5 available victory types on entirely different map settings. Below is a little more detail on how this will work; we're also introducing a new victory condition -ethical alignment- and making some tweeks to scoring. Please take the time to read more about these changes.
Mixed Settings RoundsA "mixed settings round" is where several different sets of map settings are offered, and teams must play at least some of them to properly secure their base points. In this round, each victory type will be assigned different map settings. Teams are required to submit victories of at least 3 different types to qualify for their base points. Teams with more than 3 players will be allowed to either repeat settings among two players or compete for individual points in one of the other two victory categories. For example, to qualify for their base points, Team X (The X-Men) submits a cultural victory, a technological victory, and a military victory. At that point, their 4th player (Storm) may submit another cultural, technological or military victory, or she may submit a political or ascention victory. How your team chooses to submit its potential 4th game is part of your team strategy. Teams with only 3 submissions may have an easier time securing team bonus points, but submitting a 4th game might allow a team to either improve its average team scores or compete for individual bonus points in another game category. As always, we will champion the honor's system.
3-player teams will be allowed to have a single player submit a second game, but there are conditions. First they must formally request this option in this thread from the Co-Commissioners, JustinSane and myself. Second, every team member must be willing to play a second game, since the player allowed to do this will be randomly assigned by either JustinSane or me (based on whoever replies in the thread first, should both reply without seeing each other's response). Finally, should a forth player be assigned to the team after a player as submitted a second game, the players second submission will be considered null and void. To clarify, not every member on such a team will be required to play a second game; only one player will, but because it's randomly assigned, the team should agree that they are each willing to do so should they be assigned the second game (though, this doesn't preclude teams from having their players attempt secondary games before requesting the option of a fourth game).
Ethical Alignment as a Victory ConditionRules in round 11 will now require players' victories to have certain reported ethical alignments. We will use the reported alignment on the metaverse to determine this. Note: this doesn't mean you cannot pick a race with a different alignment, nor does it require you to research Xeno Ethics. If you complete a game without researching Xeno Ethics, the metaverse will use 'what you're leaning towards' as your alignment. You can determine this through the Civilization Manager, Government and Ethics tab. There are seven possible alignment restrictions: any (no restriction), good, neutral, evil, good or neutral, good or evil, and neutral or evil. We hope this will not only mix up games, but also encourage players to explore Twilight of the Arnor a bit more, as evil is less appealing in TA, and good is in some cases more appealing.
Team Bonus PointsPoints awarded to teams for highest average score, fastest average game, and earliest average submission time are being raised to 3 points for first place and 2 points for second place. This will help bring the total number of points awarded this round more in line with what was available in previous rounds (due to the reduction of base points last round).
Victory Settings
(the thread will be updated soon with hyperlinks to screenshots of the map setup screen)
Victory Type 1: Technological Victorybasics: tiny map - abundant habitables - common planets - occasional stars - loose clustersmore basics: abundant anomalies - uncommon asteroids (DA/TA) - very fast research - 7 minor civs (DL: random)check marks on: all victory conditionsno check marks: super abilities (DA/TA) - mega events (DA/TA) - "disable tech trading" (TT enabled) - "disable tech stealing" (TS enabled in TA) - blind explorationopponents: one (1)valid ethical alignments: any(space reserved for hyperlinks to screenshots)notes: This one should be very easy and lead to very rapid game times (both game years and real time). We expect zero and one-year victories to be quite common.
Victory Type 2: Military Victorybasics: small map - abundant habitables - abundant planets - abundant stars - scattered planetsmore basics: abundant anomilies - abundant asteroids (DA/TA) - very fast research - no minorscheck marks on: all victory conditions - super abilities - mega events - "disable tech stealing" (TS disabled in TA) - blind explorationno check marks: "disable tech trading" (TT enabled)opponents: six (6)valid ethical alignments: any(space reserved for hyperlinks to screenshots)notes: This one may take the most real time due to the number of opponents and planets, but should offer the highest scoring potential due to the victory type and various settings. It may be more difficult than average.
Victory Type 3: Political (Alliance) Victorybasics: small map - common habitables - common planets - uncommon stars - tight clustersmore basics: occasional anomalies - rare asteroids (DA/TA) - very slow research - 1 minor civ (random in DL)check marks on: all victory conditions - super abilities - mega events - "disable tech trading" (TT disabled) - blind explorationno check marks: "disable tech stealing" (TS enabled in TA)opponents: four (4)valid ethical alignments: evil(space reserved for hyperlinks to screenshots)notes: This one should be rather difficult, quite slow in game years, and pretty low scoring, but it's likely to be less competitive and thus easier to get individual bonus points.
Victory Type 4: Cultural (Influence) Victorybasics: large map - occasional habitables - rare planets - rare stars - tight clustersmore basics: abundant anomalies - abundant asteroids (DA/TA) - fast research - 4 minors (random in DL)check marks on: all victory conditions - mega events (DA/TA) - super abilities (DA/TA)no check marks: "disable tech trading" - "disable tech stealing" (TT and TS enabled) - blind explorationopponents: five (5)valid ethical alignments: good or neutral(space reserved for hyperlinks to screenshots)notes: This should score fairly well and play fairly rapidly, and be fairly easy to play. No evil means Twilight is relatively more favorable.
Victory Type 5: Ascension Victory (TA only)basics: medium map - occasional habitables - occasional planets - occasional stars - tight clustersmore basics - occasional anomalies - occasional asteroids - normal tech - random minorscheck marks on: all victory conditions - meta events - super abilities - blind explorationno check marks: "disable tech trading" - "disable tech stealing" (TT and TS enabled)opponents: two (2)valid ethical alignments: any(space reserved for hyperlinks to screenshots)notes: These games should score decently, but will likely have long game times (in game years). It might offer good chances at individual bonus points since not everyone plays (or has) Twilight.
Team Rosters
Team A: Capt. dystopic; PlayJeff45; LoupdinourTeam B: Capt. JustinSane4; Ferrel; VegJed; LethrinTeam C: Capt. TheGreatEmperor; Davaled; Freeman43; e-stabTeam D: Capt. KzintiPatriarch; Ragnar1; SilverBeacherTeam E: Capt. DethAdder; Pndrev; RhetoricalSun; Galefury
players who haven't confirmed yet and new players will be added to teams with only 3 players. I will update the list as the round roster changes.
Round 11 ends on October 19 at 12:00 noon, Eastern time (12:00:00 reported forum time)
GOOD HUNTING!
What additional setting did you pick for your TA Beta game KushHaze? The brokering, extreeme planet and mega events?
Nice entrance KushHaze!
Things I liked about this round: The multiple victory conditions & ethical requirements, having two commissioners (seemed like having two made for less stress all around). Would have been less confusing if the game settings screenshots could have made it in though.
On a different note, could Team C's roster be updated to reflect all the changes we've had?
heh, sorry next round for sure.
good question. we never addressed 2.0 settings; unless a setting drastically changed the map, i don't think it should matter for this round. but for next round we'll be sure to specify the extra settings available in the 2.0 beta. have, players should all be aware that they use a beta at their own risk. i don't think we should allow for submission problems if you're using a beta, though since KushHaze got a game in successfully i wouldn't assume it'd be an issue.
Tech brokering=enabled, extreeme planet and mega events set to rare. I've posted a few games now using the 1.98 TA build and I havent had any problems yet, most of the bugs I've noticed are small and not game altering from my experiance.
My submission for Blade Runners
For the Eternal Villainy
geez, Mumble, if you still wanted to play, you didn't have to use DethAdder's character
lol, great game DA
Here is my submission for Team E
Character Name: RhetoricalSun
Lots of nice games, Good going.
Fantastic game DA . And great work all around!
On another note, Team D has decided to submit a fourth game. Ragnar1 has been randomly selected from among their team.
Thanks Guys
First, I'd like to give a big for everyone playing in the MVL. This has been a totally community driven project that despite some initial skeptism has succeeded and just keeps going. Great going ALL!!.
About the mixed settings/new layout. At first glance it seemed to look a little complex, but as the co-commissioners obviously knew, anyone smart enough to play the game would have no trouble with it. Personally I have had one of the most fun and memorable games I've played. Between Mega events hitting me and an Accidental ARCed Opponent making my game more difficult, I really had to slug it out somewhat against the suicidal AI. I am really an average player with some knowledgable friends and a lot of patience, so I don't often have a game this interesting. It only got boring when it got to the score building part, which in a game that went this crazy was only a small portion at the end of an otherwise great experience. I probably will be scaling back my time involved per game(you won't believe how many hours went into this one ) I still am always looking forward to the next round.
absolutely great game Ragnar
Glad to be on the Domination of Death
I know I just made a post above about my looking forward to further participating, but I am going to take a leave of absense until further notice. Hope to be back maybe next round.
KP has requested submission of a 4th game for his team. JustinSane assigned ragnar.
Well, I can sum up my emotions in one word right now: DOH!!!
After my high moment of completing my first suicidal victory, I quickly came on to the forums, which I haven't done (due to midterms) for the past 2-3 weeks, other than quick checks to reassure myself that a game wasn't required til the 19th. Upon reaching said forums, I did a quick review of this thread, seeing what I had missed, only to realize that Ferrel had posted a tech victory. Again, as I said, DOH!
At the moment, I actually find this amusing, no doubt because of the late hour. What factors led to this event? Well, the aforementioned midterms, the fact that the family apparently moved without me realizing it (I thought the ToE forums I was on were pretty quiet, now I know why), and the fact that I could've sworn that I had seen two games from Team B posted before my hiatus, neither of which were Tech wins (after looking throughout the thread, I see I was hallucinating at the time).
And now, of course, come the "if onlys." If only I had tried to get in contact with the team when I didn't see any discussion on the board; if only I had logged in when checking the forums, so I could've seen Justin's pm to me about the changing of ToE's website; if only I had checked more than the round's end date a few days ago, so I could've seen Ferrel's posted game; etc. Still, I'm in fairly good spirits right now; overtiredness tends to have that effect. Murpy's Law: Anything that can possibly go wrong, will go wrong. Not that I couldn't have avoided this by just trying to stay in contact with my team; it's totally my fault. However slogging through my first Suicidal game only to have it not count has a sort of fitting justice to it. Way to go, Veg.
Anywho, my first response at seeing the dire events that had transpired was "Quick! Get another game in!" but that's not going to happen, where I have my choice between the military win and the Diplo win (I still don't have TA). Not happening in less than 10 hours. However, even before I came to the forums, I was considering this being my last MVL game. Along the way, I stopped seeing the MVL as a fun distraction from life, and more as one of my college assignments, as evidenced by my looking online only to check the due date. This latest debacle on my part only reinforces that decision. Were I really into the spirit of the MVL at this point, I would've been sure to get in contact with my team, and these events would never have transpired.
I certainly gained a lot from the MVL, moving up from the tough difficulty setting all the way to Suicidal, and I'm thankful to all that I've learned from, but I'm just not in the MVL spirit at the moment.
First off, congratulations on your achievment! Crippling to suicidal is no small leap. Well done .
I'm sorry for the miscommunication regarding the change of forum locaction; that's on me since I should have let you known earlier than I did.
As captain of Team B (and NOT as co-commisioner) I would like to request an exception to the usual scoring rules, because I think following the letter of the rules in this instance goes against the spirit of the league. As far as Team B's round scoring goes, and if my reading of the rules thread is correct, there are two possibilities:
1. The status quo. The round ends with us having two victories submitted, mine and Ferrel's 1 year 12,035 tech win. Since we will have an un-announced non-submission (since under this scenario VegJed's game does not count and I doubt VegJed's above post reasonably can be taken as advance notice), all qualifying submissions that were not used have to be tallied. This next point is somewhat ambigous, but it looks as though preference is given in all victory rounds first to qualifying victories of the needed type, with victories with the wrong victory condition being used if none is available (maybe we could ask Mumblefratz to clarify the intent of the wording if it is an issue?). Team B has one such game. It is a 3 year, 47,600 military victory posted by Ferrel on the character Dionysus timestamp 9/19/2008 4:50:11 PM. This, being the only option, would be selected as the alternate game. So the three games scored for Team B this round would be mine and both of Ferrel's.
2. An exception is granted to withdraw Ferrel's first submission and submit his military victory instead (for submission purposes we can count this as the last game to be submitted). This way, VegJed's tech victory automatically becomes a qualifying win and is automatically selected for round scoring. The net effect from a scoring perspective for Team B is that Ferrel's military victory and my influence victory are counted either way, but we use VegJed's 3 year 7,750 tech victory (submitted under the character Evil Buggers) rather than Ferrel's 1 year 12,035 tech victory. While this is from a competitive standpoint a step back, as captain of the BladeRunners and as an MVL member, I feel it is much more important that each MVL member's efforts be counted than that the score be optimized. I also think granting this exception would more closely fit the intent of the MVL rules.
So this one is up to you Dystopic . The rules clearly grant the Commissioner the power to grant exceptions when appropriate (though this is to be used sparingly), and I've recused myself from considering this case in any capacity other than as captain of the Bladerunners and an MVL member. I think it'd be good, if this is going to be VegJed's last MVL submission for a while (I'm still hoping to change your mind on that VegJed btw ), that his first suicidal victory be counted. I also can't see any way it would negatively impact any other team, competitively or otherwise.
Hey batter batter batter! Hey batter batter!
Swing!
I also agree that VegJeds game be allowed to count. RL obviously got in the way.
in my opinion as commissioner emeritus, i would make a strong case for VegJed's game to be counted following the proposal that JS has made in point 2. but in the end, its up to you Dys
i believe this statements wins the appeal for exception, and i am granting it.
abiding strictly by the rules (if i'm remembering them accurately), VJ's game should be considered a submission that doesn't meet the proper criteria: no base points, but no penalty either, and it would still be eligable for individual BPs. however, i feel allowing the proposed change will offset any point advantage the exception might give them.
but more to the point, i think it's important to remember that rules are a tool, a means to an end. and i have to ask myself if applying them strictly to this case will serve that end. the rules of the MVL exist to help us approach the end of having a more enjoyable gaming experience that also helps us hone our skills as players. fun is the central question in this particular case, and i don't see how ruling against team B's request would help anyone have more fun. i doubt anyone on another team will feel this is unfair to them or their team, but if that is the case i'd simply ask they consider how they'd feel in different shoes. though i hope this particular problem doesn't come up again, i'd like to think i'd be even and fair with anyone else in a similar position.
if anyone does have any big objections to this ruling, please voice them now or forever get over it
No objections, I know how hard it can be finding time to play during work-crunchtime. An effort as this (on suicidal non less) should definitely be counted.
oh one other thing i meant to point out was that we introduced the mixed settings this round, and i'm sure that was a major contributor to this (i.e. a mitigating circumstance).
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