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!
Just a suggestion - perhaps you should edit it to say:
No check marks: Disable Tech Trading = tech trading enabled
instead of No check marks: Tech trading
ah, thanks for that Davabled, good call. i'll be updating the OP for typeos and a few minor changes.
NOTICE: At mine and JustinSane's request, Silverbeacher has volunteered to move to team D.
2ND NOTICE: i want JustinSane to proof the OP, since the whole tech trading on/off thing can be a little confusing due to the terminology. when he posts in here that the settings are correct, consider it final.
Great, the summer break seems to be over!
Dont bother including General Etrius in the roster of Team D. He's never showed up at the team forum, nor ever submitted any game to the MVL. It's safe to assume he's not participating.
Very happy to have Silver on the team though!
Sentient species taste better...
I do realize things are a bit more complex this round. the settings for a single map should still be fairly straight-forward. however JustinSane and I believe teams will benefit this time around from more communication and team planning, which is something we want to encourage.
a couple suggestions to everyone:
-check in with your teams early and regularly.
-try more than one game type early on, if you can. getting a feel for your own strengths and weaknesses will help your team coordinate efforts a bit more.
-don't be afraid to ask JustinSane and I questions. we're both captains of teams A and B, but i think as Co-Commissioners we also owe it to captains to serve as at least impartial sound boards. if you're a little unsure of how to plan a team strategy to optimize your point scores, feel free to PM us for clarification or even a bit of advice. as always, the honor's system means trusting one another to do the right thing, and i know that JustinSane and I want to see everyone do the best they can.
-have fun!
and as always, i'm still around in my capactiy as Commissioner Emeritus and will be glad to help whoever, whenever.
and at KP, so this is the round where Team D actually wins right?
Just a quick question, since I didn't notice it in the listed settings: Is Blind Exploration on or off?
This round looks like a lot of fun, can't wait to get some games in!
We won Round 9, and tied for 10....but with you on the team Silver, I'm expecting to win every round with a commanding victory!
Cool lets get started then. but i may or may not do this becase of school.
good call! i've updated the OP to include Blind Exploration in each category. thanks!
Hello everyone! And thank you to Dystopic for putting together an excellent OP describing what are some complex round settings. Everything looks good except that I believe we had intended tech trading to be on rather than off in settings group one. More minors means more money from selling tech, so tech victory comes even faster . We hope this round is fun for everyone and that team strategy will now play an even more prominent role. As Dystopic said, if anyone has any questions, technical or strategic, please let either of us know and we'll be glad to offer whatever help we can.
Good hunting!
i've updated settings group 1 -- tech trading should be enabled.
Just poking my nose in to get this into 'my replies'.
ok ahh could some one from Team-C give me the pass to the privet Fhrome at the Core Forums i have forgot it.
good luck
another clarification for everyone, since it wasn't explicitly stated: individual bonus points will still be awarded as in other all-victory rounds. the highest score and lowest speed games in each category will receive a single BP, each, for a total fo 10 individual bonus points distributed.
so i am just asking do we all win three of the above Vic conditions and sumbmit all three or do the teams just post the three best wins of the above conditions?
Each player should only play one game, excepting teams with 3 players who wish to submit a fourth game (to increase their chances at the individual bonus points). If a team with 3 players wants to submit a fourth game, they've got to let Dystopic or me know, and we will randomly assign a player from that team to play two games rather than one. So for the team, you will need to submit at least 1 game from each of at least 3 different settings options out of the 5 available. The fourth game can either be a fourth settings option or a different game played on one of the three your team already has covered. Sorry, I know it's a bit complicated. Does that clear it up, or should I try to find a clearer explanation?
So if a 3-man team submits an influence, ascension and a military win, they have the option to submit a 4th game with ANY of the victory contions, even those already submitted by the team.
This doesn't detriment a 4-man team since the rules state that 3 different victory types must be submitted, so they are in the same boat as a 3-man.
yes. the idea of only requiring 3 different types, even from a 4-person team, is that the team has some flexibility in how it tries to earn bonus points. some of the maps will be higher scoring or faster winning, and teams may leverage their 4th game to secure more team BPs at the cost of potentially earning more indiv. BPs.
one of my personal hopes is that we'll see less formulaic team strategies. as a result of this. i don't think there's necessarily a best way to try and win the season, other than keeping in good communication with your teammates and of course trying your best.
First blood is drawn!
nice! surprised to see you use the terrans for this.
I wanted super-diplomat, and with ARC being prohibited, I figured I'd try a stock civ for once. I play custom civs almost exclusively.
Ah that was my guess...
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