Has anyone noticed that the predominant winning strategy in the 1x1 ladder is to use your first two picks to go for a 1st turn 4 (either E/W Africa, C/W Russia, CA/NA/SA and or Indo/India). The only exception is when there are 2 1st turn 3 bonuses available, then it's your 1nd and 3rd picks. Heyhey won 3 of his most recent victories that way. I've lost a few times lately having failed to recognize that my opp got a +4 ont he first turn.

The startegy that dominated this map initially was ported over fromt he big Earth 1x1 map -- spreading picks and using counterpicks. You can still win that way, but the fastest surest path to victory is to go for the +4 first move and then overwhelm your opp in another spot asap. Just start going through Heyhey's wins and see how many time's it's the same strategy. It's not just him of course, but he's beating opps that are good, but are not making picks based on this strategy. It's also remarkable how many times Heyhey won his 3 3x2 attacks.

To counter it, you have to first look for where the starting spots allow for the move. Then you have to overlap picks there or counterpick it. But it's tough to counter pick, because he's got 9 the next turn and the absolute best you can have is 8 (and if you have 8 you have only 2 or 3 next to the +4 bonus). Frankly I think you have to overlap picks. It's not just a -4 income disadvantage for one turn, because it's first turn, it magnifies the income differentials through the game (because you get your next bonus one turn sooner as well, and so on). It's the old problem with Scan being too powerful on the first map (with fixed start points).

Frankly I think this approach illustrates why this is a weak map for a 1x1. Picks and first move are decisive a majority of the time. It becomes overly formulaic.

But it's tough to counter pick, because he's got 9 the next turn and the absolute best you can have is 8 (and if you have 8 you have only 2 or 3 next to the +4 bonus).

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yeah, this depends on whether your counterpick can open up at least 2 and hopefully 3 of your opponent's bonus' territories. then you can put everything into the attack and threaten his bonus with about 12 armies available to attack on the second turn. an example is picking one of the chinas to counter a first-turn move on india.

This is a new twist on the same argument I was making a couple months ago, that the essence of winning a 1v1 (on any map, I believe) is in turn 0, rendering the game overly (for my tastes) algorithmic.

You know what would be cool would be a full random distro ladder. Yes, someone could get lucky in some way or another but the complexity of the possible games stemming from a full distro is pretty mind-boggling, so it might provide more variation...

It's a strategy, but I wouldn't call it "the predominant winning strategy."

I set out looking for a counter-example and found one on my second try: http://warlight.net/MultiPlayer.aspx?GameID=1405804. Zaeban used his 1 2 3 4 on both of the first-turn bonus areas, got one, and lost the game to someone who went after neither of them.

Also, I don't exactly follow the progression of your logic. You present a strategy, present how it's countered, then say "this illustrates why this is a weak map." The mere fact that a strategy exists makes the map weak? There's always going to be strategies - just because one exists doesn't make the map weak.

I meant that a very straightforward, very effective strategy that determines the outcome of game in the first two moves makes a map weak. This is a small sample size and of course all strategies can fail (especially if you anticipate them). But if this strategy is employed successfully, a less skilled player will beat a more skilled player often. The essence of a ranking system is to determine relative skill and this creates a distortion. Perhaps by raising the point and talking about it the distortion will be self-correcting as players identify and counter it - let's see.

I was struck by the fact that the #1 player on the ladder won 3 of his last 4 victories in the first eight moves using this strategy against very strong opps. That's what I meant by predominant -- not that most or a majority of players are using it. If you can dominate very strong players using a simple, effective strategy -- than is that a good map to determine relative rank? Obviously sometimes it won't work, but if you can win 75% of the time very quickly against good to great opps -- that's a dominant strategy.

Also I think this is a worthwhile topic for the ladders forum (one of the only worthwhile threads started on here in weeks). I would appreciate it if you didn't only criticize my word choices and quibble with details. I know you're somewhat sensitive about the ladder map choice issue and I folded that into a game strategy discussion. Please think about them as two separate, somewhat overlapping issues.

Devil -- I get that, but I accept that picks are pivital to deciding games. This strategy effectively automatically chooses your top 2-4 picks. That's what makes it a slightly different problem than just the problems inherent in a small map.

Also -- Zaeban did not use the strategy in your example. It doesn't work going from a 5 to a 3 (you've tied up two spots, only boosted income by +3 instead of +4 and made the 2nd bonus slower to pick up). It works best going from a 4 to a 4 as in all the examples I gave (albeit India/Indo and CA/SA are 3s to 4s, those are less effective than EC/Indo or WA/SA which are 4 to 4). The optimal ones seem to be WR/CR and EA/WA because they make picking up the 2nd +4 bonus quick and easy. WA/SA and Indo/EC are less effective because they only connect at one point and that delays using the armies from the first bonus to pick up the second.

Just look at Heyhey's recent games to see the examples I'm referring to.

i find europe to be a great counter pick to this when your available starting spot is the territory that touches WR and scan both, when there is a first turn bonus in the russias or scan I have beaten players i wouldnt usually beat doing this.

I want to know Ruthless' thinking on counter picks., i hate games against him because of it but man is it effective!

Also i have lost alot going for the first turn 4 because one counter pick messes up 2 of my picks and the other player was able to expand elsewhere faster than me. Obviously Hey is far better than me at doing this but players i feel i should have beat beat me with just the one counter pick. I dont think its that big of a problem as long as players think about this going in.

I close my eyes and touch the screen and whichever is the closest available spot I choose it.

The secret is doing it 6 times in a row so that I don't get a random spot.

Duke,

As always I appreciate your attention to detail and your willingness to speak out on matters you feel strongly about. I tend to agree with you, it is the predominant strategy used for those who try to win games within the first 8-12 turns, or as you stated "the fastest surest path to victory." I disagree, however, that your other most salient point of your argument: "Frankly... you have to overlap picks," in that this makes things stale.

I enjoy the showmanship of players who can identify the best strategy and either block each other from it (overlap picks) or defy them completely by employing less superior strategy and beating them through shrewdness and cunning.

Also, I must add that I do not think it is predominant to the point that it is a problem. It is a good strategy to use against me (and perhaps you) because I am always looking for the counter pick and its a tough strategy to counter when successful, as you pointed out. In other words, a 9 income on turn 1 completely shatters me when I place all my income to rush on turn 0 and now am left with a 5 deployment and no way to get a bonus in my other two spots.

- One solution is to let it be and try to grind out a spreading battle:
http://warlight.net/MultiPlayer.aspx?GameID=1408545

- This is one of my latest games where I was concerned about him getting West Africa in one but decided that I would win so long as I was first to Brazil (N.A had no wastelands so I had better spreadability and could have also blockaded Iran if I was left alone in Asia). Also, Lungren was fortunate that Africa had no wastelands. In cases where North or South Africa have one the position is even less dominant. And I know that you'll say that I only won because I also took Central in 1, but thats precisely why I tend to agree that Lungren's picks was still the predominant strategy but he still needs to be fortunate on turn 0 and play a near perfect game to win.

For sake of conversation I have a few ideas that would address Duke's concerns but I am willing to bet that he is dead set against most of, or all of them, thus the problem with trying to satisfy the preferences of ~ 120 ladder participants, no less one person.

1) Bump the luck percentage to as high as 20%. I know Duke prefers 0% luck which is why I found his argument to be rather ironic upon first read.

2) Force people to pick game-counts in increments of two: people preferring to play in two games will always have one auto-distribution and one manual distribution game going one (people choosing four would get two of each). This just addresses the mundane/predictability of always playing in games whereas one feels compelled to overlap picks to prevent against a lopsided game.

3) Do not play with random Warlords.

4) Have it announced prior to each game who will be getting the first pick selection. This would invariably change the way players make their first 3-4 selections.

5) change the base income to four per turn (or maybe just set it to 4 for turn 0). This disables any scenario where someone can get a set on turn 0 except for rare exceptions where a 3-sets can be had.

6) Start player territories with 4 armies each instead of 5. This is similar to BP's #5.

I don't think that having algorithmic strategies is unfair really, I just think that games that are practically predetermined by the way the picks go tend to be won by the people that are dedicated enough to sink a lot of time and thought into their picks given the pattern of wastelands. In other words, not me :)

There can be no right and wrong or fair and unfair when both sides are playing by the same rules, but I would like to see ladder settings at some point that promote a game that is won more by tactics after the game has started than strategy beforehand.

I'm not sure how #1 would help matters except to possible make the superior player lose due to a fluke of luck.. I agree with the 16% luck ratio for the reasons we argued about previously.

#2, this wouldn't adequately solve the problem.. as you can easily draw out a 10 turn game for a month.. and if you're dedicated you can survive 16-20 turns in a heavy loss situation.. that means you could draw out your full distro games while racking up wins on manual picks..

#3, removing random warlords "namely I imagine, by implementing the built-in Warlords starting locations" would only create built strategies that would work more regularly and would cause the problem to be more based on repetitive strategies and not less...

#4, this would massively change where people make their picks.. I had had a thought on it earlier, but It's currently escaping me...

hmm... I had no idea that would happen lol ↑

devilnis, I partially like the idea of a scenario ladder with relatively even starting locations.. the only real problem is that something with set locations would end up being determined by strategies that after the first month or two will not be highly modified anymore..

I agree that a lot of games are decided by picks and counter-picks and the inherent luck. I also agree that - despite my being relatively new to the ladder - the repetitiveness is tiresome, and in fact has already made me cut down my number of ladder games to 1 at a time for now (I admit, my going on vacation soon might also have something to do with it).
Right now I much more enjoy the 2v2 ladder, because picks and counter-picks are less predictable there.
The ladder system needs more fine tuning. What I'd really like to see is more diversity in maps. Why to restrict it to one single map eludes me. Fizzer should outline the parameters he deems appropriate for ladder maps, and I bet a lot of people would come up with new maps that meet these criteria (including me).

Ladder map parameters could be such as (brackets show values for medium earth):
min/max number of territories ( 131 )
min/max number of bonuses ( 27 )
min/max number of territories per bonus ( 3-7 )
min/max value of bonus ( 3-6 )
min/max bonus value per territory in a bonus ( 0.60 [East Africa, North Africa]-0.86 [West China] )
min/max total value of all bonuses combined ( 96 )
min/max connections per bonus ( 3 [South Africa]-13 [West China] )
min/max connections per territory ( 2-7 )

Further requirements to fine-tune such a map might include:
relation of bonus value to ..
- .. number of territories of a bonus that border other bonuses
- .. number of territories within the bonus that can be attacked from other bonuses
- .. min/max number of turns required to complete bonus
- ..

A set of say 5 different maps would bring much more variety to the ladder.
Some ideas for how to determine which map gets played:
Prior to each ladder game, players would get to vote on the maps they would like to play. Each player can have 2 votes and has to pick 2 of the 5 maps. You have to place 2 votes and you cannot put both votes on the same map.
If after the voting is done exactly one map gets 2 votes, that map is played.
If two maps get 2 votes, one of them gets chosen randomly.
If no map gets 2 votes, then the 5th map is played which got no vote at all.

</end of wishlist>

small correction:

*min/max connections per bonus ( 3 [South Africa]-13 [West China] )*

must be:

*min/max connections per bonus ( 4 [Greenland, Antarctica, Australia, South Africa]-19 [West China] )*

Perrin:

In response to your critique:

1) I for one do not mind the luck component in games. If a 1 takes a 1 and leads to victory I am frustrated but accept it when it happens against me, and I am over the moon (albeit feel a bit sheepish) when it goes my way. There should be no hard rule that says an infantry unit cannot kill a calvary (metaphorical, of course, of the shock most feel when a 1 takes out a 1). Its rare enough but I don't think players should micromanage to the point where these rare victories never happen. Again, as it applies to increasing the luck it just means that the person stretching himself thin, doing three 3 v 2 attacks on turn 0, absorbs more risk then the person doing the counter-picking.
- As for that point that luck takes less skill out of the game, I disagree wholeheartedly. I think it takes more skill, i.e. creating ways to think outside the box to get around this, such as attacking a 2 neutral with two separate 2s (something I never saw done until PapaSmurf and Ruthless starting doing it in team games back in the day; I know do a similar thing (attacking a 1 with to separate 2s in 75% games, as I find this rarely fails and so often a 2 v 1 attack fails). Anyway, a bit of a rant but I wanted to defend my viewpoint :)

2) Good point. It could be taken advantage of or manipulated rather easily (both ways). I just still carry fond memories of Eitz's random start tournaments. The cream usually rose to the top (so I don't think it is completely based on luck who wins) and they were a ton of fun to try and come up with a winning strategy based on what you were dealt and where your blind spots were.
- @Eitz: About time you started another one!!

3) Yeah I thought the same but there is no reason that different templates cannot be created where the Warlords are fixed yet where 9 income starts are prohibited. There must be a slew of potentials. And besides, the wastelands do freshen things up too.

4) If you end up remembering I'd appreciate reading how you think this will change the way people pick.

Haha, surprisingly you're not the first person to say that to me BP. I just find the fact rather disheartening that I've personally gone 0-4 in the last 2 double elim random tourneys I've made. To satiate the general public, I will get another one going in the near future here.

BP

In regards to auto distro starts.. I personally find them much more 'enjoyable' then manual selection, primarily because of the mass of importance that is put on territory selection... but you can easily gain a massive sway over a much better player with auto picks that neither of you can predict and he cannot manage to overcome..

example.

http://warlight.net/MultiPlayer.aspx?GameID=1398773

I know this is Poland Big and not Earth, but I had a massive advantage purely because of the auto picks...

I find I cannot reliably credit auto distribution games to bragging rights "in most cases" so find it unsuitable for the ladder, personally