Scoring system? - calling all mathematicians

[DaveMcW]

I guess that if everyone understands that, then highest scores becomes another category like the Cow and the FF awards. It may be "the" premier status award but no one should be expecting all VCs to compete. I don't know whether a fair system for comparing different VCs can be created, but I think it would save endless "debate" if we don't say we are doing that right now.

The highest scores will be the Cow award. Playing to 2050AD is no longer needed.

Comparing VCs is simple.
Fastest spaceship = Fastest conquest = Highest Score
50% spaceship speed = 50% conquest speed = 50% score

The 50% is obtained by running the finish dates through function calculatePercentageScore(). I'm sure the exact nature of this function will evolve, but it may look like this:

function calculatePercentageScore(condition, date_or_score, best) {
if (condition == SCORE) return date_or_score / best;
if (condition == SPACESHIP) return (date_or_score - 250) / (best - 250);
if (condition == CONQUEST) return (date_or_score - 150) / (best - 150);
}

 

[Denniz]

The highest scores will be the Cow award. Playing to 2050AD is no longer needed.

I thought the cow award was highest "base" score.

The high score awards I was talking are the Gold, Silver and Bronse medals for highest scores. The problem is that I think only the domination and possibly conquest can compete.

Comparing VCs is simple.
Fastest spaceship = Fastest conquest = Highest Score
50% spaceship speed = 50% conquest speed = 50% score

I agree that will work. But what about a high score award for the other VCs as well as FF award?
Fastest spaceship = Fastest conquest = Highest Score Spaceship = Highest Score conquest = etc.

 

[DaveMcW]

Maybe cultural will take long enough that you start to face a dropping score, but other high-scoring VCs will finish around the same date and score.

I don't see a need to separate scoring awards by VC.

The cow award in Civ3 was for highest base score over every turn. This concept is not used in Civ4, and every 2050AD save looks the same. So Civ3-style cow is obsolete.

 

[Denniz]

Maybe cultural will take long enough that you start to face a dropping score, but other high-scoring VCs will finish around the same date and score.

I don't see a need to separate scoring awards by VC.

You seem pretty certain. Hopefully, you have more data about this than I do. If the fastest finishes always score the highest, then it would be pointless to have high score awards by VC. But, if people were able to score higher than the fast finish, what difference in score would be significant enough to merit recognition?

... and every 2050AD save looks the same. So Civ3-style cow is obsolete.

I am afraid this one doesn't make sense to me. How can everyone have exactly the same pop, wonders, land, and tech at 2050AD?

I think you are implying a very high and consistant level of play by a lot of people.

 

[Megalou]

Fast cultural victory will also have big fluctuations in doability. The proximity of stone would mean a great deal.

 

[A+ombomb]

I agree 110%, the algorithm for score benefits the warmonger far too much. Like you said, warring suits a dual purpose - you gain population AND earlier victory than any of the other forms. My suggestion would be to only include the scores of the top 3 cities in your civ. In this way, a probably underdeveloped warring civ may be able to claim an early domination or elimination victory, but this would be offset by less points in the top 3 cities. This would also be beneficial for a cultural victory, what I feel is the weakest form of victory point wise, as it requires so much effort for a small amount of bonus points.

The other option would be to simply give each form of victory its own bonus points on the GOTM score. For example, cultural and space victories would probably receive the highest bonus, followed by diplomatic and finally ending with the domination and elimination victories which probably don't need to have any bonus gotm points.

 

[MeteorPunch]

One thing that is good is that the emphasis is on population, which more benefits builders compared to territory. Either way we need a new scoring system.

 

[Shillen]

Territory and population are almost directly proportional. The scoring system encourages poor play. Expanding too quickly in civ4 is a bad thing, but you'll get a great score. Building all farms instead of cottages is also a bad thing, but once again you'll get a great score. Letting your cities grow well beyond their happiness cap is once again a bad thing, but will give you a great score. I very much dislike this scoring system.

 

[solenoozerec]

Most players will attempt to adopt the scoring system to their own playing style. I am absolutely sure that there will be no such a scoring system that could satisfy everyone. There were many people in 3OTM who were very unhappy with Jason score.

Personally, I’d prefer that the current system will not be modified for a simple reason: Right now I can check what my Firaxis score will be if I finish the game on a current turn. Thus I can check if my final score is increasing or decreasing. If score will be modified with some formula that contains a number of variables unknown to players, I will feel blind.

Expanding too quickly in civ4 is a bad thing, but you'll get a great score. Building all farms instead of cottages is also a bad thing, but once again you'll get a great score. Letting your cities grow well beyond their happiness cap is once again a bad thing, but will give you a great score.

The notions ‘good’ and ‘bad’ are subjective notions. GOTM is not an exception, what is good and what is bad depends on your goals. If you want to achieve a cultural victory, certain things will be bad, if you want to achieve a military victory the same things will be good. If you want to achieve high Firaxis score, such a goal will have its one combination of ‘bad’ and ‘good’.

 

[AlanH]

*If* we modify the scoring formula it can be set up so that you get the modified final score when you check what your final score would be, because it's calculated using a Python script, so we can supply a modified script.

 

[DaviddesJ]

Where I would think there might be some urgency would be in terms of the score-based medals and awards. A new system could change the results such that the winners would be different. What happens then?

Nothing. Who cares? It's not like we're giving out medals of real gold and we're going to have to send recovery teams to try to get them back.

 

[whb]

Nah! Olde Englishe pennies were much more sensible. 240 to the Pound. 240 divides by lots of numbers, so you can have many, many fractions of a pound in old pennies without rounding errors. Try dividing a Euro or a dollar into three or six or eight equal parts! :runs for cover:

Of course it did have the disadvantage of being called the LSD system

(For Americans out there, seriously those were the initials used for pounds, shillings, and pence: L, s, and d)

 

[AlanH]

You call that a disadvantage? It clearly also inspired the immortal song by the Beatles - 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds'.

 

[Ozyman8]

Having separate rankings {top score, fastest finish} for each victory condition would be great. If we must compare scores across victory conditions, a simple 0-100% ranking would be intuitive and effective.

As Dave says, the distribution function may need tuning:

fast_finish_%(vc) = (max_turns - your_turns) / (max_turns - best_turns) x 100.0
best_score_%(vc) = (your_score) / (best_score) x 100.0

We could also add 'fun' awards for "Biggest City", "Most Wonders", etc. That's my dos pesos anyway.