[LURKERS] Mr. Gradgrind's Review

[Ichabod]

Yeah, I brought this up with a "troll" mindset, I admit. Not trying to antagonize anyone, just have a bit of trolling fun. Probably should have let the issue rest. Sorry about that.

Just to give my 2 cents, I'd be opposed to give REM the disembark tip, if a lurker happened to catch it.

[Zalson]

Ichabod, I thought you were fine. I was actually quite amused.

[MJW (ya that one)]

Ooh, this horse is back from the dead!

It is easier to notice these mistakes when someone reports as thoroughly as scooter and Sullla report. REM didn't even give us lurkers a chance to help him in his quest for domination.

It's not just that--they have five dedlurkers or so while everyone else has at most one. There's no way to dig that out during the game so you are just giving odds.

Mardoc:
My point is not about fixing the imbalance--it's about if it's possible for the lurkers to intervene. There might be enough "that's so unfair!!!!1!" to justify lurker interference in the first place if it was scooter. Because that line has not been crossed there's no reason to talk about it.

[Rowain]

For one I'm all for as little lurker-influence as possible so not telling REM was the right thing.

For two the situation was different. sulla+scooter thought the Units would automatically unload/defend while REM left them on the boat on purpose.

Mostly annoyed as I could have not lost 3/4 of the units if I had just unloaded, and there wasn't really any reason to keep them in the transport, but I just felt I may forget to put them back in otherwise!

[GermanJoey]

I don't like Sullla's implication that PBEM's take 4 days for a turn to get around, that's not the case in my experience.

I agree with you here. 70% of pace is a question of finding players who can commit to PYFT, 20% is player count, 5% is turn complexity, and I'd only attribute maybe the last 5% to Pitboss vs. PBEM. I'm not honestly even sure that this game is moving any faster due to Pitboss, since it's been in one turn split or another for so very long.

i think PBEM turnpace depends more on just the players in it being willing to PYFT. of course, that's a huge part of whether any MP game succeeds, PBEM or PB, and my personal experience with them is that player engagement is closely correlated with turnpace.

however, I think PBEM's are more brittle. if someone misses their play window, or forgets to attach save after playing late at night (i.e. ME), the game can end up skipping a day even with an otherwise engaged crew. add in cases where one person is inconsistent about their play times, or even *two* people are inconsistent about their play times, and the game quickly degenerates to one turn every two days, soon becoming worse... causing player engagement to decrease and, in turn, causing the time-slip to "snowball"... you start getting saves every three days, then every four, and then... and again, that's not even considering cases where one guy no longer really wants to play.

the really nice thing about pitbosses is that individual play-windows become a lot more flexible. suddenly that guy who only has an hour a day to play, but might have that hour at a highly varying time of day, no longer causes a problem with the two other guys who have the same situation. (at least until one of them inevitably creates a 3-way turnsplit between the other two... )

[Gaspar]

From my experience PBEMs have been faster which is virtually entirely due to number of players. Its absurd to indicate Pitbosses are faster though, because we do screen for PYFT in many games and we do add players to Pitbosses to make them the grand scope games they've become. Particularly since you have turn split issues which can muck up the works which are a non-issue when the game is played sequentially as intended. If you have 12 players, of course Pitboss will be faster. If you have 4-5, I'd virtually guarantee they'd be nearly identical after the initial 20-30 turns, which can obviously be played much faster in a pitboss, though either can be mitigated by organizing Blitz sessions, as has been done in the past.

Now, if someone like Amelia or Kuro signs up for your game(no offense, just a pair of notoriously bad PYFTers), then Pitboss will be faster because you can just skip them when the timer inevitably runs out on them as opposed to waiting for them to play the save in 4 days when they remember to check the forum. That's easily mitigated though by not letting players with that sort of reputation join your game without a reliable dedlurker.

[WarriorKnight]

I think Sulla's comment about Pitboss vs PBEM was more directed at the fact that they are waiting for one civ endlessly (a situation far more likely to occur in PBEM than Pitboss), then an actual opinion that the turn pace in Pitboss is better than in a PBEM.

[The Black Sword]

i think PBEM turnpace depends more on just the players in it being willing to PYFT. of course, that's a huge part of whether any MP game succeeds, PBEM or PB, and my personal experience with them is that player engagement is closely correlated with turnpace.

Yeah, that's always going to be the biggest factor. And I'd agree that PBEMs are a bit more brittle, I just think that trade off is worth it.

[Mardoc]

I understand Scooter's nervousness, and desire to mix things up by perhaps attacking Pindicator. He's right, the current path is a path that leads to REM winning. Something significant needs to change for Scooter to have a chance of victory.

However, this time I agree with Sullla. Scooter's best choice at the moment is to build capabilities and wait for an opportunity. As a perfect example: Pindicator's recent city capture, wiping out a bunch of REM units and possibly forcing REM to raze the cities upon recapture. Could not have been predicted based on overall state of the game: overall state of the game says Pindicator is outmatched and bound to lose eventually. But, variance in war is huge, Pindicator maintained his capabilities, and eventually REM made a mistake Pindi could capitalize on. Scooter could do the same thing - but only if he maintains flexibility until REM's next mistake.

[MJW (ya that one)]

REM whines about this game not being sequential.

Unlike the planes issue this was well-known so he just has to suck it up.

Edit: It's the interaction with the planes...oh well. I would allow REM, and people like him, the first half of the turn by allowing a double-move from the other teams.

A non-feeding idea is to tell REM that sequential is not going to happen ever because it would no longer be a pitboss, and you agreed to pitboss, but there might be other options.

Edit 2: Here's his non-sequential idea:

A fudge would be to let me use air power after I roll the turn (as it is always me that is rolling it currently) but this is still not ideal.

Edit 3: It appears that the other players wanted their half anyway so my idea of allowing a double-move won't work...