Aye carumba, well I hope he has no complaints about his choices now...
Dr C, I answered you in that thread!
Dr C, I answered you in that thread!
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Genghis Machinates
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Quote:Map update: I've rolled several hundred maps, and filtered a bunch thru Joey's (neener neener can't read this) balancing thingie. I'm trying to thread the needle and come up with something natural that's still balanced. Quote:Ceil, I'd suggest picking some arbitrary maximum number(<100 btw) for the number of scripts you want to roll and just choose the best out of that number. Nothing further from Ceil yet, I guess he's busy during the week and maybe he'll have another chance over the weekend? Maybe we need to fill the time with useless speculation, like pre-game rankings ...
... such as:
1. TBSGJ - Hey, there's two of us and only one Mack!  2. Mack - who else? 3. Commodtay - Very tough choice between these guys and OH. In the end I put them ahead because I think dtay will be more involved than Fintourist. 4. Old Harry - Still a very scary player especially if he gets out of the opening in good shape. 5. Pindicooter - They're both a bit out of civ-practice compared to the top half of the field. But I'm still ranking them ahead of the semi-unproven-on-RB guys. I just put more weight on games I've actually seen. 6. OT4E - He has the best reputation of the last 3 and he's also got the smallest RB portfolio. Execution seems very good in PB30 but I don't like his macro. 7. REM - He won PBEM61 and is arguably in 2nd place in PB27. He has had some good fortune in both but you still have to take advantage of that and he did. 8. 2metra - His performances on RB have been pretty average I'm afraid. I hope he proves me wrong! It feels a bit cheap to put all the RB regulars first but the only games I watch are on RB so that's what I have to use.
January 22nd, 2016, 19:52
(This post was last modified: January 22nd, 2016, 20:32 by GermanJoey.)
sure, that sounds fun! my ranking is almost identical:
1.) Us. OBVIOUSLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  2.) Mack. Mr. Ranks-Himself-As-The-Only-Tier-1.  I like Mackoti a lot, although every time he complains that his neighbors have it too good/easy compared to themselves, in PB27, i want to roll my eyes out of their sockets. Well, he's out of that game now, we'll see if he posts in the lurker thread what he thinks of the map.3.) Com+Dtay. Ah, these damn guys. Personally, I hate Com and he hates me, but I like dtay, and he's always be cordial and conversational back. *shrugs* They teamed once before, in PB25, where they had a beautiful early and mid game in PB25 but then totally fizzled out. They still won in the end but I felt it was way closer than it had any reason to be. Both of them have played a million games and both seem to have a lot of strategic/macro trouble when the game gets later. Or, in other words, they get "stuck." dtay is a super-good micromanger but, partly because of that, has a tendency to under-build roads and monuments (see PB19 for the most extreme example of this); something maybe to remember for later, if we see him logging in a lot. 4.) Old Harry. I used to really like this guy, then PB25 happened, and then he started stalking me around, PMing me constantly wagging his finger every time I posted something he didn't like, and now we mutually hate each other, I guess. I ranked him really high before PB30 started, 10/10, but then both his approach to the start (and don't mean the whole viking disaster, which was mostly just bad luck, but the whole MIDS OR BUST BY T72 thing from T0 with such a slow combo) and his trait/wonder rankings I found really bizarre. I think Fintourist was a really integral part of that team's past successes, and I don't think he'll be around much this time. Otherwise, I would put them higher. 5.) OT4E. Haven't really interacted with OT4E much. My thinking is the same as yours, he seems to have steller execution and micro but he doesn't seem to think very long term. In PB22, I don't think he was in the driver's seat for long, only near the endgame where he was the one who tried to set up all those secret raids on dtay and I, so I don't have a good read on him from that. OTOH, in PB30, I'm pretty convinced that OT4E and 2metra were trying to metagame the rules setup for this game like they did with the ISDG. I was chatting w/ TBS the other day about this, and we both were thinking that what OT4E was saying about how map edits make the map balance worse makes absolutely no sense. And then there was asking if we could just dismiss the AI diplo vote despite there being a 3-3 tie at that point, and then finally asking to redo the picking method, after the picks were already posted. (and after OT4E himself had voted for the single-draft method that we ended up using!!!) Seems very suspicious to me, and his collaborator 2metra has been known to do this sorta jazz in the past (see the ISDG post-mortem, where he not only admitted to it, but said it was a core part of their strategy. I admit that was actually a reason I started posting in that thread at all, responding to OT4E's "balanced map" protests, because I suspected that they were trying to press on some settings to get others more to their liking. yes, I agree there's a very high probability that I'm just a psycho, paranoid mess... ).6.) Pindicooter. I wasn't sure whether to put these guys or OT4E 5th, but decided to bump the latter just because I haven't seen any OT4E solo play and both Haram and Mack (both players I respect a lot) have praised him in the highest regard. Pindicator, I don't dislike Pindicator but he does not like me. I've played 2 games with him and closely followed 3 other games of his, and wasn't super impressed with any. PBEM62, well that was just tragic; PBEM64, he was doing well, but then Commodore gave him a nervous breakdown. PB18 I played with him, and he did pretty well, got the ToA, which was a great wonder on that map, then crumpled. PB26 was SMEGMod, where he had a great start, but then apparently didn't read any of the changelog. He harassed me a bunch early game before I could get copper or horse hooked, then made fun of me in his thread for "chasing religions", but then woops, it turns out that wasn't what I was doing. Later, he ragequit, supposedly because I personally didn't pause for him when he asked me not to pause for him. Well, whatever, I think he just wasn't having fun with the game anymore. Finally, PB19, well, that sure was a game. I think you know all about that one better than me. Speaking of PB19, I'm still incredulous that Pind voted for a random map after having such bad map luck w/ PB19 and PBEM62 - you'd think he'd want to avoid misery like that again at all costs.Scooter was the guy I took over for in PB18. He was supposed to dedlurk me but basically never posted anything ever. I was a bit resentful of that, because he was one of my favorite posters when I still lurked here, and I tried hard to implement the plans he wanted when he left me the game. (e.g. the very early capital move) Alas. He had an awesome game w/ PB13 w/ Pindicator, but then their partnership blew up and then he stopped caring about the game, right before he was about to win. And, that was over 2 years ago. He played lots of games before that though, so maybe the rust will shake off quickly. Scooter's strength was always on the macro-game level, so I think he will help Pindicator a lot. 7.) REM. Very fearsome player, and a guy I like a lot. He's another one where he's shown some brilliant play and solid understanding of mechanics, but then doesn't think very long-term at all. And, even more so than Com/dtay and OT4E, he has a tendency to REALLY go all-in on something, often to the detriment of everything else. I think this makes him pretty easy to read. 8.) 2metra. A very widely disliked player here because of ISDG drama, which I couldn't care less about. Well, that's not true, I thought that whole ordeal was hilarious. In personal experiences, 2metra frustrated me to no end in PB22, first because he wouldn't ally with me against REM/Adrien for ages, despite my many attempts to court that team, and then declaring eternal blood feud against me after I attacked them (with a warning first, yet!) when they tried stealing some of REM/Adrien's land from me when I was finally able to break them by myself. I might blame myself more for this but 2metra did the same sort of thing in PB17 with his neighbors there, driving everyone in that game crazy too. My read is that he has a tendency to get obsessed with things, often things that he has misread about his opponents.
I don't think OT4e was trying to do anything malicious in the setup stage. He set out his stall for settings that he he felt would result in the most fun game. I disagree with him regarding those settings but there's nothing wrong with that. It's not the same as campaigning for settings that give you a better chance at winning.
Regarding OH, I suspect he's being modest when he gives Fintourist all the micro credit. But he arguably hasn't played a solo game with a great opening. IIRC in his first game he was mired in early war but fought his way back into a very bloody game. In the demogame he took over after the opening and managed a pretty spectacular comeback there. And then in PB13 and 18 he was obviously teamed with Fintourist. So maybe there is a question mark there. It also shows how good he is if he is still in contention in the mid-game though.
January 25th, 2016, 18:13
(This post was last modified: January 25th, 2016, 18:22 by GermanJoey.)
Well I don't think of what I said I thought OT4E doing as being malicious, just as playing the meta-metagame a little harder than I'd prefer. I guess game setup here just drives me a little bit bonkers. I wish there was just a few standard settings we could pick... imagine if game setup was as easy as posting: "Anyone up for a new 8 player PB game? I'm fine with RB Standard Settings B, C, or E. Vote for which option in your signup." ... *7 posts and 3 hours later* "Ok, looks like Setting C is the winner. I'll try contacting some mapmakers..." Maybe I'm just spoiled on years of Dota, where the game setup, game search, and snakepick generally took a grand total of 10 minutes? There's a lot of LoL players on this site, right? Y'all should still know what I mean. Alas...
 Regarding OH, I was sorta thinking that too. His strong point is more on the tactical-strategic side, in the sense of "How do I win with what I have in front of me?" More like an Erwin Rommel style commander, or a chess master or something like that, as compared to a logistics/production -strategically inclined player, like a George Marshall or Eisenhower - which is more of how I think of FT thinks of the game. The natural complement is what makes them so good together, IMHO. For example, I remember the end of their PB18 thread, where OH was pretty much in charge of figuring out how to take you down, while it was FT who was planning out their GPP generation timings 50+ turns in advance and their spaceship-production micro. (for the record, if they were together for this game and active, I would rank them above Mack!) I feel like I'm pretty heavily biased on basing my strategies on logistics/production as well, FWIW... along with a little of the ole' George Patton personality mixed in, I suppose...
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