Separate awards for early conquest and early landing?

[SideshowBob]

As I rarely am at a computer that allows me to post (no it's not a cookie problem I've checked) I thought I'd take advantage of this rare opportunity to throw in a question about GOTM awards.

I recently looked through all posted GOTM-scores. Less then one per nine of the green stars (fastest game) were space ship victories. Now this made me think, we could and should(?) have one award for earliest landing and one for earliest conquest.

The high score (blue star) is not affected in the same way by how you choose to finish your game. But unless restarts are on, it takes a h*ll of a game to land an SS earlier than you would have conquered. And an award for fastest SS-landing might be a little carrot for those who prefer early landings to conquest to participate and polish their skills...

Now the board is yours!
Cheers!

 

[Ali Ardavan]

Lovely idea. I second that.

 

[Peaster]

I only play for EC, but would certainly not object.

A similar idea would be to give a bonus of N turns to the spaceship players (and give only one green star, as always). Here N = the average difference between best EC date and best EL date, taken from a sample of previous GOTMs. Maybe we should use a different N when restarts are on/off. Maybe the OCC players could get an even bigger bonus. Probably adjust the bonuses after a few months of experience.

I'm just thinking the EL, EC and OCC players would be more interested in each other this way.

 

[SideshowBob]

I only play for EC, but would certainly not object.

I do quite the opposite. I never play for early conquest. The reasons are pretty much summed up by the fact that I'm not good enough (yet) and it's a kind of game that I find less fun. EC and EL are both challenging, but in completely different ways. And trying to develop my skills toward a far better EL doesn't pay off in a GOTM since the green star would always be miles away.

A similar idea would be to give a bonus of N turns to the spaceship players (and give only one green star, as always). Here N = the average difference between best EC date and best EL date, taken from a sample of previous GOTMs. Maybe we should use a different N when restarts are on/off. Maybe the OCC players could get an even bigger bonus. Probably adjust the bonuses after a few months of experience.
I'm just thinking the EL, EC and OCC players would be more interested in each other this way.

That sounds complicated, but like a really good idea. That would require people to really think what kind of game they want to play with the current GOTM-settings. After all there are many ways to finish a Civ2 game. And deciding what way to go about finishing should also be part of the challenge.