HOF Challenge Series II Ideas

[Sun Tzu Wu]

I figure the idea of each of the victory conditions + score is a good one.

So that's settled. What settings should we use for each victory condition?

Victory Condition: Conquest Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Tiny
Map Type: Any
Speed: Quick
Required: None
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Victory Condition: Cultural Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Large
Map Type: Any
Speed: Epic
Required: One City Challenge, Permanent Alliances
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Victory Condition: Diplomatic Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Standard
Map Type: Any
Speed: Marathon
Required: One City Challenge
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Victory Condition: Domination Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Large
Map Type: Any
Speed: Normal
Required: None
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Victory Condition: Religious Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Huge
Map Type: Any
Speed: Quick
Required: None
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Victory Condition: Score
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Huge
Map Type: Any
Speed: Quick
Required: One City Challenge
Must Not Be Checked: Permanent Alliances
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Victory Condition: Space Colony Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Huge
Map Type: Any
Speed: Epic
Required: One City Challenge
Must Not Be Checked: Permanent Alliances
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Victory Condition: Time Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Standard
Map Type: Any
Speed: Normal
Required: None
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Sorry, there are seven Victory Conditions (not counting Space Race) plus Score. That's a total of eight Games rather than seven.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Please lets have no Time victories

 

[kcd_swede]

Time victories are OK if you allow late era starts, otherwise very tedious.

HOF Challenge series: Accommodation for higher Difficulty level play:

1) When a Players' Game is ranked, the Difficulty level used will be ignored, except that it must be at least the minimum Difficulty level required.
2) Each Players' Game will be assigned a Rank Point value: 1st place = 10, 2nd place = 9, ..., 10th place = 1, and 11th place and higher = 0.5 points.
3) Each Players' Game will have a Difficulty value: it will be the Difficulty level played minus the minimum Difficulty level.
4) Difficulty Adjusted Rank points are the sum of the Rank Point value and the Difficulty Point value, capped at a maximum of 10.

I like this. As someone who would not go for very many deity level games, I'd see this as a way of ensuring that the most skilled players are actually handicapped in the competition by playing at a higher difficulty level as they see fits their level of play.

I might add an additional rule in the case of multiple submissions, the game at the highest difficulty submitted should always take precedence in a players challenge scoring for a given game (and only one submission per player per game is counted towards the challenge, as per present). Or some other way to decide beforehand how multiple submissions from a single player for a single game using different difficulties would be handled.

There is nothing wrong with arbitrary scoring systems, as long as they aren't so skewed as to make people think there is no point competing.

 

[Fluroscent]

Victory Condition: Conquest Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Tiny
Map Type: Any
Speed: Quick
Required: None
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Too simple, would just be a race with immortals and a "get the best RNG results" competition.

Victory Condition: Cultural Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Large
Map Type: Any
Speed: Epic
Required: One City Challenge, Permanent Alliances
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Too many AI like to go culture, just be allied with Mansa or someone and have all high peaceweights. Not too interesting

Victory Condition: Diplomatic Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Standard
Map Type: Any
Speed: Marathon
Required: One City Challenge
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Diplomatic OCC, might be interesting. Why, oh why marathon? Marathon speed should have a very good reason in my opinion. Again, free choice AI is not very interesting.

Victory Condition: Domination Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Large
Map Type: Any
Speed: Normal
Required: None
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

This is hard, surely out of sync with the general difficulty of the other suggestions. But my main issue with it is that domination on a large map is both tedious and CPU-crunching.

Victory Condition: Religious Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Huge
Map Type: Any
Speed: Quick
Required: None
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

No reason to play huge maps, this one just screams frustration, but can be way too easy with the right circumstances.

Victory Condition: Score
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Huge
Map Type: Any
Speed: Quick
Required: One City Challenge
Must Not Be Checked: Permanent Alliances
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003


I honestly don't get the point of this one.

Victory Condition: Space Colony Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Huge
Map Type: Any
Speed: Epic
Required: One City Challenge
Must Not Be Checked: Permanent Alliances
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Many people will have trouble with this. Again, why huge? it will just slow everything down.

Victory Condition: Time Victory
Difficulty: Deity
Starting Era: Ancient
Map Size: Standard
Map Type: Any
Speed: Normal
Required: None
Must Not Be Checked: None
Civ: Any
Opponents: Any
Version: 3.19.003

Time??? No, just no.

Sorry to be harsh, but I pretty much look for the opposite in games. Also, I hope Denniz goes ahead with the 7-game two division plan. Although I agree with some posters that Monarch/Emperor would be better than Prince/Monarch for the lower division.

 

[cabert]

why no time?
those are the hardest games, it seems quite right for a challenge

 

[ParadigmShifter]

It's so tedious though.

Basically you do an almost domination and then have to milk for however many hundred turns if you want a good score.

Time would be OK from a much later than ancient start, I agree.

 

[cabert]

It's so tedious though.

Basically you do an almost domination and then have to milk for however many hundred turns if you want a good score.

Time would be OK from a much later than ancient start, I agree.

let's state "any era", and let everyone go from where they can.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Hmm, still encourages people to play ancient though.

I think number of participants is a better metric than difficulty of the challenges myself, if the series is to progress.

 

[Denniz]

It is no less arbitrary that giving:

10 pts. for 1st place
09 pts. for 2nd place
...
01 pts for 10th place
.5 pts. for 11th place and beyond

This ranking system has no fairness regarding how close adjacent places are in turns or years. The rank difference of 1 point could be as little as one turn or as great as a hundred turns.

You are placing greater design demands on the Difficulty adjustment points than the original ranking point system. How can 1 point per Difficult level be less accurate than 1 ranking point = 1 to 100 turns (as pointed out in the previous paragraph)?

No one really cares too much about the Victory Condition variations. It's really an insoluble problem anyway, until one has five sets of expert Prince to Deity Players that specialize in just one Difficulty to provide the Data you want. In any case, no one can get higher than 10 points regardless of the Difficulty level played.

Personally, I never really bothered playing Prince level Games. They were too easy. I don't see getting an extra four points to compete at Deity against Prince level Players as being too much. They should easy crush any Deity Games I'm able to submit. I may end up with 4.5 points or nothing for my efforts.

Sun Tzu Wu

The score by finish position is arbitrary as well. But, it isn't about comparing games, just finish positions across the series. It is consistant. The arbitrary adjustment to a finish position score based on difficulty brings inconsistancy to the series scores. Anyone playing deity would get a minimum of 4 pts per game just for finishing. A better system would adjust the finish positions of the single game. (i.e. still only one #1 score yielding 10 points. one #2 with 9 pts, etc.)

If Prince is so easy, then why not play at that level and earn the points for first place?

 

[Dynamic]

If Prince is so easy, then why not play at that level and earn the points for first place?

But the best balanced level is Monarch. Prince allow ultra-early rush (with random), but Monarch not allow (except Inca).

 

[Aerinon]

My two cents:

I'd be in favor of a few lower level challenges. I was too intimidated by the Emperor+ games. I figured they were out of my league and that my time was better spent playing Prince games and making the jump to Monarch.

I liked the time-horizon of the first series, but 10 games is definitely too much. I typically struggle to complete a major gauntlet in time.

On the ranking, well, I'd mostly play just to learn from experts. I've been somewhat disappointed in the knowledge share from gauntlet threads lately, seems everyone already knows what to do. And while I do have some ideas on how to work it, the execution always seem to be my weak spot which is probably why I find Emperor games frustratingly difficult.

That just means I could care less if the best deity game got 4 extra points versus my "Best" prince games (I highly doubt that mine would be best). I figure that competition is the one of the best teachers and I'm here to learn.

 

[ParadigmShifter]

Don't be shy to ask questions in the gauntlet threads! Everyone is very helpful.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

The score by finish position is arbitrary as well. But, it isn't about comparing games, just finish positions across the series. It is consistant. The arbitrary adjustment to a finish position score based on difficulty brings inconsistancy to the series scores. Anyone playing deity would get a minimum of 4 pts per game just for finishing.

OK, I'm beginning to fully understand your concerns.

A better system would adjust the finish positions of the single game. (i.e. still only one #1 score yielding 10 points. one #2 with 9 pts, etc.)

The system you are suggesting does sound better, once the Difficulty adjustment is defined without ambiguity:

1) Compute an intermediate point value with 1st = 100, 2nd = 99, ..., assuming less than 100 Games. Starting with 100 is arbitrary; we just need a one point difference between each place including 11th and higher places.
2) Add the Difficulty difference value to this point value (For a Deity Game played with a Prince minimum Difficulty, the Difficulty difference value added here would be 4).
3) Examine each Game, starting with the highest intermediate point value and going down in decreasing order of intermediate point value. For each Game examined, assign the Difficulty adjusted places in order 1st, 2nd, 3rd, ... Ties are broken in favor of the higher Difficulty level. (In the case of same Difficulty, Civ4 adjusted Game Score will break the tie.)
4) Assign the final point values to 1st = 10, 2nd = 9, 3rd = 8, ..., 10th = 1, 11th and beyond = 0.5.

If Prince is so easy, then why not play at that level and earn the points for first place?

Prince level players would probably prefer that I didn't.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[Denniz]

The system you are suggesting does sound better, once the Difficulty adjustment is defined without ambiguity:

1) Compute an intermediate point value with 1st = 100, 2nd = 99, ..., assuming less than 100 Games. Starting with 100 is arbitrary; we just need a one point difference between each place including 11th and higher places.
2) Add the Difficulty difference value to this point value (For a Deity Game played with a Prince minimum Difficulty, the Difficulty difference value added here would be 4).
3) Examine each Game, starting with the highest intermediate point value and going down in decreasing order of intermediate point value. For each Game examined, assign the Difficulty adjusted places in order 1st, 2nd, 3rd, ... Ties are broken in favor of the higher Difficulty level. (In the case of same Difficulty, Civ4 adjusted Game Score will break the tie.)
4) Assign the final point values to 1st = 10, 2nd = 9, 3rd = 8, ..., 10th = 1, 11th and beyond = 0.5.

This somewhat better as multiple Deity games wouldn't all get the same bonus. It still doesn't really validate that one difficutly level is worth one finish level. Is it really uniform across all victory conditions? Score for example, Civ4 applies a multiplier for difficulty level. So a Settler level game would reward a Deity player 8 positions?

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

This somewhat better as multiple Deity games wouldn't all get the same bonus. It still doesn't really validate that one difficutly level is worth one finish level. Is it really uniform across all victory conditions? Score for example, Civ4 applies a multiplier for difficulty level. So a Settler level game would reward a Deity player 8 positions?

Why bring up Settler Difficulty level when the minimum being considered is Prince Difficulty level?

Can a Deity player really complete with experienced Settler Players, even with a 8 position advantage?

Can a Deity player really complete with experienced Prince Players, even with a 4 position advantage?

Some Victory Conditions will be relatively easier then others at certain Difficulty levels, but the HOF Tables is the best data we have, but the vast majority of slots have too few submitted Games and often these aren't even best efforts of the best players.

Don't like adding a 1 point per Difficulty level bonus? Try a multiplicative/ratio bonus as kcd_swede suggested much earlier in this thread.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[shulec]

Why bring up Settler Difficulty level when the minimum being considered is Prince Difficulty level?

Can a Deity player really complete with experienced Settler Players, even with a 8 position advantage?

Can a Deity player really complete with experienced Prince Players, even with a 4 position advantage?

Some Victory Conditions will be relatively easier then others at certain Difficulty levels, but the HOF Tables is the best data we have, but the vast majority of slots have too few submitted Games and often these aren't even best efforts of the best players.

Don't like adding a 1 point per Difficulty level bonus? Try a multiplicative/ratio bonus as kcd_swede suggested much earlier in this thread.

Sun Tzu Wu

I think that since we have Challenge II comparing different levels of the same game, we can apply several different scoring algorithms after a majority of the contest has been completed to find what may be the most reasonable or fair way to compare different levels. No weighted scoring system will be perfect, but until we have data to compare, we only have supposition.

 

[kcd_swede]

I think that since we have Challenge II comparing different levels of the same game, we can apply several different scoring algorithms after a majority of the contest has been completed to find what may be the most reasonable or fair way to compare different levels. No weighted scoring system will be perfect, but until we have data to compare, we only have supposition.

Cool... you could show results however you like... with the straight up, or additive bonus or multiplicative bonus or whatever. Like the xOTM global rankings...(score/speed/combined) just look at the one you like the best.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

This somewhat better as multiple Deity games wouldn't all get the same bonus. It still doesn't really validate that one difficutly level is worth one finish level. Is it really uniform across all victory conditions? Score for example, Civ4 applies a multiplier for difficulty level. So a Settler level game would reward a Deity player 8 positions?

Would it be acceptable with 0.5 points per Difficulty level? Just use the same scoring procedure I outlined in http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=9135153&postcount=73. In step #2 where it says add 1 point per Difficulty level , just replace the 1 with 0.5. The procedure will work correctly with any reasonable constant for Difficulty level.

Thanks for your patience. I hope this procedure is fit to use now.

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[LowtherCastle]

I started in March so I ran out of time. I liked it. Learned a lot. My first-ever cultural game. Same with Religious victory. But for me it was just passing time waiting for the next SGOTM. Doubt I'll do it again, so there's no point in me making any suggestions.

Good luck to all of you!

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

I started in March so I ran out of time. I liked it. Learned a lot. My first-ever cultural game. Same with Religious victory. But for me it was just passing time waiting for the next SGOTM. Doubt I'll do it again, so there's no point in me making any suggestions.

Good luck to all of you!

Glad you could join in the competition, even if just this one time.

Congratulations on a impressive string of #1 victories done in a very short amount of time for so many Games

Sun Tzu Wu