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Tournament Terrain

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demdigs View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote demdigs Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 30 Apr 2022 at 01:24
I think that a simple fix would be that the terrain change every tourny, it would add some changes without seriously affecting the tourny integrity. At the very least it would allow other troops other than knights a chance to shine.
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Alred Reylynn View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Alred Reylynn Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Jun 2022 at 16:08
Originally posted by GM Stormcrow GM Stormcrow wrote:

Hi everyone,

As Tensmoor has indicated in his post above, buildings squares are indeed considered as spawn locations, and have been assigned in the past.

The server tournament square rotation assignment is from a Random Number Generator (RNG), with an exclusion list (eg not sov, not impassable, not a hub, not water, not a town etc).  

The fact is simply that there are a lot more plains squares on the map than any other type, so when the RNG runs, it's more likely that there will be plains squares than other types.

I *guess* we could put our hands on the scales of the RNG to get a more diverse square type selection, but the idea makes me a bit uneasy...  

Our RNG has always been independent of weighting influence, however it's possible that we could implement the idea of quotas (eg random assignment but roll until X Plains, Y Hills, Z Buildings etc).  Or we could say that "whatever the combat terrain type was last time (for this region), make it different this time".

I'd be interested to hear thoughts and/or alternative suggestions, though.  We certainly want to keep tournie combat interesting.

SC



GM Stormcrow [[ The fact is simply that there are a lot more plains squares on the map than any other type, so when the RNG runs, it's more likely that there will be plains squares than other types.
Our RNG has always been independent of weighting influence. ]]


I find the 2 statements above, rather at odds with one another. The RNG runs and picks plains because there are more plains squares, however the RNG is not weighted?? Of course it is weighted, and weighed exclusively by the terrain type, it appears.

I mostly use Cav. so this is more or less, shooting myself in the foot here, to argue for a different approach.

This approach works for most thing Illy, however for Tourneys, not so much. The game was designed with four races, and all four have the same 4 types of military available to them. Although each, has only one or two military types that are optimized for them.

I would suggest that assigning tourney squares based on the ratio of the military type of the cities in each region, instead of by the ratio of terrain types. A scan could be run just before a tourney of each city in a region, and then based on that ratio, run the RNG to first determine the tourney terrain of each region. Then another run of RNG to select the exact square. In selecting to settle a city, the ratio of terrains in a region is irrelevant. I do not know of anyone who selects where to settle by the ratio of an entire region, more likely the ratio of what's in the very near proximity. i.e. if a particular region had an allocation of 25% each; Spear, Infantry, Ranged, Cav cities in it, the RNG should be weighted evenly, for that region. If an imaginary region, had forests on one edge, connected to forest from the adjacent region, and similar situation for mountains on the other side, 25% forest, 25% mountains, 50% plains, and the forests & mountains due to proximity to the adjacent same terrains were heavily populated, with Non-Cav cities but for whatever reason the plains were mostly vacant, why would plains get the best chance of being selected, as with the current approach?? There's no cav there.

With this approach, a region where the RNG selection comes up for example: Infantry; the RNG would only be given Infantry favorable squares, in that region to select from, as the final process. Additionally, if Buildings would be part of that military type, Buildings might require a bit of modification to ensure, some were selected. Might be good to ensure at least 1 or 2 Buildings in the North, and same in Badlands, each tourney, was selected.

Additionally due to the relative speeds of each type of military unit type, Cav has a much easier time, going to an alternative tourney square, if the closest one in unfavorable.

With the current 8 valid terrain types, plains should not always be the majority of tourney squares every tourney. 8 as in hills=2, mountains=2, forest=2, plains, buildings.

Other Thoughts:

There's way to many Tourney squares within 5sq of cities, which leads to a huge advantage. Additionally, for those players who do not participate at all on tourneys, this is taking their prime hunting, herb/mineral spots. Many started sending spies with a military unit withing 4 sq viability range, and those are now considered targets. Therefore players with a tourney square this close would not want to risk getting their gathers destroyed due to someone assuming their collecting encampment is someone attempted to collect information on the tourney square.

If "non-ocean" water squares were also included, even with the current setup, this would water down "pun intended!!", the current high plains ratio. There's nothing preventing water combat? Assuming it's completely neutral stats, attack/defense/military type.

There was some comment in a later post, regarding the possibility of excluding plains. Don't see why that would be necessary. However another thought would be "if and only if" the previous tourney square was plains, then exclude plains, just for the current tourney, and for that region. Also it was suggested that would cause a full rotation of every terrain type, which should not be the case.




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Gry View Drop Down
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Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Gry Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 14 Jun 2022 at 19:35
Overabundance of plains is definitely still a problem in tourney, and I agree this is in effect weighted distribution of tourney tiles already. The main reason it is a problem is that plains are fought differently: they can't be defended and the cav advantage outweighs everything else. It's hard to defend anything, really, but that's what could make a more interesting tournament.

This is worth fixing because regular tourneys can be a driver of game economy. Millions of troops are spent, plus gear gets produced and redistributed. PvP doesn't have the same potential for diversity of materials consumed.

However, it's sort of iterative to address by troop types produced, as a lot of people hunt with cav, npcs land on plains, etc.. But I do think weighting regional differences is a good approach. I would suggest as an alternative filtering the tourney tile candidates with more restrictions, such as a hard cap on the number of plains tiles allowed in the final selection, e.g. 25% of the total regions. Regions containing the highest number of plains tiles could be assigned first, so substitution of a non-plains square would be more likely to affect regions that already have more diversity.

I'm not really bothered by proximity to towns, because it encourages participation (though I would really rather not defend a plains tile next to one of my infantry towns again), but this is another reasonable filter. In addition to the max cap on plains, providing a minimum representation for other terrain types could also help, especially buildings and large mountains, which offer the best chance to defend.
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