"Crichton's response was similar to mine, perhaps better. I still don't think that eliminates the time issue though. Some people will always have more time for gaming than others will."

i'm not sure if this got said, as skipped some posts due to proliferation of flaming and petty insults. regardless, here goes:

its a GAME. bear that in mind, people. its not worth ulcers or permanent psychological damage. just as in athletic competitions, those who invest more time typically rank higher. marathoners don't win the gold medal w/o running every day. weightlifters who can only bench 20 kilos will never gain renown. just as those of us who don't play for days on end will never keep up in this incarnation of the metaverse. do i personally think that's fair? no, not really.

this is not to say that i don't think those die-hard galciv marathoners shouldn't be rewarded. they deserve their accolades. (sniggers... for sitting on their asses for hours at a time. LOL ) however, since stardock has the capability to retrieve all sorts of data from our submissions, i would love to see some improvements made to the metaverse.

first, the fact that someone (e.g. technician) can play numerous games, none of which are even remotely difficult in their settings, and rank 48 out of thousands is the pristine example of what's wrong with this picture. its not technicians fault that there's a weakness in the scoring system that's easily exploitable. but its rather insulting to spend time and skill on a more challenging game level, only to find out you're ranked lower than many, many players who haven't played a single game as challenging as yours.

so here's my theory: we need to be able to set our own criteria for what's most important to us. i'm not saying scrap the system. just give us advanced search and sort capabilites. give us parameters like galaxy size, difficulty level, morality, economic prowess, overall influence, etc... to weight the scores by.

that's why we bought the game... that's why we should submit to the metaverse... not to pet the ego's of a select few, but so we can see what's important to us, and where we stand in those regards, in order to facilitate our own enjoyment and improvement.

"BTW, in 1.04, which is in beta now on Drengin.net, all 3 issues mentioned above are addressed.

difficulty levels matter more, size of map matters somewhat less (bigger maps still help though), and overall scores are higher."

Frogboy: I am very glad to hear that, and looking forward to the patch!

(To be totally honest, I thought you would in time address those things, but whining a little about one´s pet issues is often good strategy. )

(Technician:) "I would say though that if I played at smaller maps it would make much more sense to increase the difficulty level."

Technician, (sigh), you should occasionally play a more difficult map. Then you would realize that the smaller maps are (at same difficulty level) not easier. If anything, they are more unforgiving; on larger maps, you have more time to correct mistakes.

Smaller maps are definitely less forgiving, simply because there is less of everything: fewer good systems, fewer resources, and less space between you and your opponents. A little bad luck in the beginning can really put you into a deep hole on a small map.

I definitely agree with what is being said about the small maps. They are harder (note, I haven't gone above medium yet, but I've won all my games on medium map size handlily while I've lost -a lot- of the smaller map sizes at normal difficulty).

Technician, you should really try higher difficulty levels. Until you can win a game on masochistic, you have no room to criticize someone who has for playing on a small map. Remember, your credibility is only as high as your skill. Unless you demonstrate some of that skill, no one will listen to you. If I had to guess, you, like me, would get completely owned on the masochistic difficulty level no matter what the map size.

I definitely agree with what is being said about the small maps. They are harder (note, I haven't gone above medium yet, but I've won all my games on medium map size handlily while I've lost -a lot- of the smaller map sizes at normal difficulty).

Technician, you should really try higher difficulty levels. Until you can win a game on masochistic, you have no room to criticize someone who has for playing on a small map. Remember, your credibility is only as high as your skill. Unless you demonstrate some of that skill, no one will listen to you. If I had to guess, you, like me, would get completely owned on the masochistic difficulty level no matter what the map size.



Blue: How is one less skillful for knowing what gets high scores and doing it? And how is one's credibility on what makes the metaverse fun changed a bit merely because he chooses to milk a score. Perhaps that is fun for him? It isn't fun for me, but may be for him. And most know what generates the high scores. So if that's Technician's thing than more power to him. If it's not, then that's fine too. After all, this is only a game and it should be enjoyed.


I don't fluff my scores personally other than to play Gigantic. But others have a strategy of slightly smaller Galaxies. that generate almost the same scores but get twice the # of submissions out of it. Some can use that speed factor to get higher scores than me, some cannot. I don't really care where I rank. Oh sure I talk alot of smack, but only because I know it's totally meaningless in the grand scheme of things and nobody should really care all that much. Like I said, It's just a game. I'm not going to delay a victory even if it gets me more points. The only one I compete against is me. I up my difficulty as I go, (trying normal now) It seems fairly easy. Probably will bump up next game. But that's my choice and I do it knowing full well it might cost me some points.

It's one thing, to suggest changes that you'd like to see. And I'd like to see different size maps ranked differently. I'd also like to see medals given out for types of wins, difficulty, etc. as well as humorous Ghengis Khan awards for ruthlessness and such. I think that would be way cool. But It's quite another to lead with an inflammatory line like "XYZ IS A JOKE!!! like the original poster did regardless of the validity of the argument that followed. I don't think that's all that constructive. Inflammatory remarks usually invoke inflammatory remarks back.

But for you to suggest that someone has no credibility about the metaverse and whether it's fun or not merely because he hasn't played difficult is totally invalid logic.

That's like saying well you don't play chess challenger on Mega Human Death Level, therefore, you have no credibility on how a chess ladder should be organized.

Or you don't play NBA ball and therefore you don't have any credibility on what makes an enjoyable playoff format.

Just my opinion.

I completely agree with Crichton. I did even criticize metaverse for the same flaws in an earlier thread. It may be that I'm stating things that have been stated already, but it's my vote for change.

1. the scoring system is just plain stupid. Suggestion: PUBLIC SCORING FORMULA. That's the only way to make it even - anybody may know how to get the high scores, and its flaws could be discussed in detail at this forum.

2. the biggest flaw of the scoring system is that IT IS ADDITIVE. Yes, I know that it is per-square-root, but its derivative asymptotically converges to an additive system (quite fast). The metaverse is a WHO-SPENDS-MOST-TIME competition. Period. Frogboy, you stated that you chose a medium between adding scores together and taking a mean value. Yes, you chose a medium, but the medium was closer to the adding-together system than it might seem at first.

3. the comments stating that metaverse isn't a high-score system or that you shouldn't use it if you don't like it are not reasonable. This is a single-player game, and the metaverse is the only way to get glory for your skill. Why are you ranking players if not for high scores? People like to compete.

4. The best suggestion so far on this thread was to make it possible to sort the high score lists in many ways. There would be a best-single-game-list, a best-5-games-list, a divided-by-square-root-list, etc. and they could be viewed per-galaxy-size, per-difficulty-level and so on. This way anybody could choose a list and compete for it; for example I, who don't have HOURS of time to play every day, would like to compete for medium galaxy with maso diff.

The current who-spends-most-time system has been a game-killer for me for some time now. I see absolutely no point in spending huge amounts of time playing a gigantic galaxy. It gets dull quite fast from the start IMHO. Competing in smaller galaxies is a lot more fun IMHO again.

While the metaverse is additive...it is not that additive. The only time it is really additive is if you post something significantly above your average...otherwise, your additive is going to be between zero and half your score, which means you only get a quarter of your points. Someone constantly submitting 1000 scores are only going to see about a 30 to 40 point increase beyond say 50 games or so a 50 game total would yield 7071, where the 51st game would yield 7141, only a 70 point gain from submitting a 1000 pt game. It becomes 7745 amd 7810 (about a 75 point gain). So if you honestly think someone is going to vault up to number one in the metaverse submitting 1000 point scores...well that scenario won't happen.

From what I'm seeing, anyone that is going to nickel and dime it from the tiny maps would have to do so on the massachistic level and even then, I've seen scores vary wildly between 200 to maybe 1500... but that's tackling the toughest level, at which point they have every right to vault to the top. Someone doing simple isn't going to vault as high. If you look at the metaverse in its current rankings, you'll notice that the people near the top haven't submitted too many games relative to others. Steve on there submitted alot of scores. I almost dare say he should be ranked a little higher than what he was. His position is well deserved considering he's fired off a series of huge wins at the crippling level (2nd highest difficulty category) Ray Chua hasn't submitted too many games, but he's near the top because of the difficulty of games he plays. Each of the people you see near the top got there because they submitted a huge score.


The only reason some people are so high up is that they happened to submit scores during an earlier version of the product which was yielding higher scores at the time. My understanding are that those scores will be dialed back some.

I dont claim to be the best, but I've submitted about 10 games, generally favoring the larger galaxies and a wide range of difficulties...so far my biggest win being on crippling. I think I'm positioned about right compared to the top players because I've yet to beat a game on massachistic or the huge galaxies.

I'm still curious as to how people can submit so many wins on masachistic/gigantic because we're talking 512 sectors versus the 12x12 144 sector games I play (which can take me about 5 or 6 hours). So for the other you're looking at 40 hours. But if someone is able to take the time to play a gigantic/masachistic, then I think they should be awarded accordingly.

Finally to put the issue to rest... the issue with the time thing. I hate to say this but there's always going to be a gulf in the high scores between those who have time versus those you dont. You may be the greatest Diablo 2 player in the world. But if you dont have the time to reach level 99, why should you take any precedent over someone who gave the time to reach level 99 and the top of the D2 ladder? If you play a game of pacman...you may only have the time to play 30 minutes. You may be great, but should you get a higher score compared to someone who can play six hours and hit a perfect score? In Everquest, should you have the right to have the most powerful item in the game, even though you cant put in the time to obtain that item (which can take a LONG time in that game) I hope you see the counter point I'm making to your argument. I'm not doing this to dog you or anything, but was coming up with a reasonably intelligent response.

SeanB

OK, my last word on this (then I´ll stop to ride the dead horse ): The *VERY* best thing they could do is come up with something like the Elo rating in Chess. That´s the perfect system, from a Mathematical/Fairness viewpoint. This is what I would like to see (or at least an approximation).

Yes, I know this is somewhat different, because Chess is not Single Player, but Elo works if you play against a computer also. Chessmaster gives you an Elo score.

In principle I don´t see a reason why there can´t be a Galciv Elo.

Just a point on the additivity.

It is true that you get only 70 points from a 1000pt game when submitting your 51st. So, it's only a fraction of your 1000pts and as such it doesn't seem encouraging to collect your points by having zillions of 1000pt games.

But let us assume we have two competing players, both having 50 games and equal scores. Now it is (almost) the same, to play three 1000pt games or one 3000pt game. That's what I call additivity.

The matter of whether the no-lifers should be rewarded for sacrificing their lifes to GalCiv is a subjective matter. It is a question whether the game developers are willing to profile GalCiv as a game that requires intelligence or a game that requires time. Is this more like chess or who-can-stand-longest-without-moving competition?

Maybe I should have read the manual.

First I knew that there was a formula applied to the scores; guess I shouldnt have submitted those games that I lost LOL. Now I shall never be number one

Oh wait..this is a game

I like the metaverse as it is. Just click on someone to get an idea what kind of player he (women don't play galciv i suppose) is. Don't take it too seriously. I really think the scoringsystem for individual scores could be a lot fairer.

Beyond Human: Way too many points in comparison to cultural and military wins. It's absolutely the easiest and quickest (no micromanaging constructors and combat transports) way to win a game. Especially with the AI unable to win this way and the AI unable to kill you off when you're dead and buried.

Map size: I'd say gigantic maps are the easiest ones to win, although they take a bit longer (not too much though). It's easier to outstrategize the AI. Problem is CTRL-N. On small maps you can CTRL-N your heart out until you have an unfair advantage over the AI. Of course you can do this on gigantic maps also but it takes a bit longer to find out what your position is worth.

Starting position: I think to get a fairer score you need to build in a modifier for your starting position. Something like: For every planet with a PQ > 14 calculate to which race's starting planet it's closest. Then add all these PQ's. Each race then has a percentage of all available planets. Your final score then should be (100 - planetpercentage) * basescore.

You can definately put me on the list of people who think the smaller maps are harder. In fact the bigger the map, the better I do. My last game on a gigantic map with Painful opposition was completed with almost no incident and unfortunately no challenge.

On a small map, I wouldn't have a chance against Painful opposition. (I'm not that good yet)

I think it's because knowing where the yellow stars is a massive advantage on a small map, but nullified on larger ones, because they can't get to the planets anyway.

Small maps are the easiest to win because the human advantage in tactical combat can be magnified many times with a limited number of units and super survey ships. It's almost impossible to lose a game on small maps if you play aggressively and keep the AIs locked down.

A masochist gigantic map with scattered stars and abundant habitability is probably the hardest combination to beat in GalCiv, especially if you adjust the AI alignments so they don't fight amongst themselves as much. No amount of tactical maneuvering is going to save you from 200 Dreadnoughts in a bee line to Earth by 2190, if you survived the Frigate rush of 2185 that is. Scattered stars also make it difficult for human players to pick favorable starting positions with Ctrl+N, and abundant planets ensures the massive AI bonuses are fully utilized.

Hmm i was really interested how easy is to get 104 planets (forgot who said about that number in his AAR) on Gigantic . On first 2 starts (i also set Abudant) i was able to get ~40 planets, and after that all near planets was colonized already. I was with +speed. Maybe i'm somewhat inexperienced on scattered, but still i think that w/o many ctrl-n it's impossible to get that good starting location. At least respawn with ~50 planets on Gigantic/Abudant/Tight Clusters can be considered VERY good IMHO.

~SDC~

To Za H

But i'm still interested. How much planets you think you need to get during starting colonization phase to win on Gigantic/Abudant/Scattered? I just don't want to waste too much time to explore this by himself.

~SDC~

I think that 100 is too high (=easy), but say 50?

~SDC~

PontiusBruinPilot:

I'm sorry. You misunderstand me. What I'm saying is that one cannot make statements about how good or bad someone else is at the game without first having played on all the difficulty levels that that other person has played at. As you know, Technician had at the time of my posting (and probably at this time too) only played at beginner and simple difficulties on gigantic galaxies. The credibility I was referring to was his statement about playing on small galaxies on masochistic being easier or less deserving of a high score than what he does. In this sense, the credibility of his statement is severely compromised by the fact that he has not yet played on even normal difficulty (I suck, and I've still beaten normal).

As for all the statements about him being able to have fun, I agree with you one hundred percent. I think it's great that he thinks it's fun, and more power to him, as you said. However, I disagree that any more challenging game should get a lower score than any less challenging game, and it is my understanding that a small galaxy on masochistic is much more difficult than a gigantic on the simple (I for one would not know, because I would get beaten so badly on the masochistic that I would probably not be able to make any judgements on how hard it is). Technician's assertion was that a high score was not deserved on a small galaxy no matter what the difficulty. I disagree with that statement, because I believe that score should be given for demonstration of good technique, not long, easy to beat games.

That would be me, Ellestar

That was probably a freak start on a loose galaxy with the AIs starting quite far away. With speed+2, I was able to gobble up quite a number. Yes, with Ctl-N.

I recall another start way back last month on a smaller map where I had half the galaxy to myself with minors.
That made me to comment in a post that perhaps the majors should be evenly spaced but I do see the predictability of that scenario. On the other hand, I have played quite a few games where one AI had more than their fair share as well.

In my last two games though (w/o Ctl-N), I only managed 50+ colonies so that seems to be rather average for gigantic.

Blue Ocean:

I'm not sure of your point. You do get points based on difficulty as well size. So you will get a lot of points if you beat strong AI players on small maps. However, if the AI is equal, then you get more points if the map is bigger.

Now I understand because the way points are awarded, you could score some higher points on some larger maps even though your smaller maps had better AI. That's a matter of tinkering with the scoring system at Stardock's discretion.

I think the difficulty should perhaps be worth more than the size of the map alone. However, the size of the map does matter to. Certainly someone who spent 40 hours on the Gigantic Map deserves more points than the guy who played for 2 on the smaller map if the AI is similiar in difficulty. There is simply more difficulties to overcome over that length of a game than the smaller ones.

Although I say that, I'm one of the people who thinks the smaller maps are harder, but I think that's because of my style of play. Also, I just like the bigger maps better, so I rarely play small anymore.

To RayChua

Thanks. I'll try it next time. I choose economy way because it's easier to win first games this way (and i like it more anyway). Just some observations, a number of hours on startegic forum to know basic flow of the game and some good strategic ideas. Printing tech tree, reading everything that i can find about economy (and several tests), making a strategic plan - and comp even don't have chances to win. It's a "win before actual win". Nothing can save any AI than you can outproduce entire galaxy But playing tactical part of the game (combat etc.) needs actual expirience in this game with this ships, rules, how much effect you can achieve for which costs etc. So i think that time comes for me to play more combat-oriented style.

~SDC~

//Nothing can save any AI IF you can outproduce entire galaxy //

~SDC~

Personally, I'm not sure that publishing the scoring formula would be a good thing... it could lead to cheesy score-tuning tactics which would not only undermine the purpose of the table for us as players, but would also undermine the purpose of the metaverse for Stardock.

I do agree wholeheartedly though that there should be separate ranking tables for each galaxy size... I really can't see a way to make the scoring *not* heavily tied into the galaxy size, *and* fair for everyone. Personally, I love playing gigantic games and probably wouldn't play anything smaller more than once a month (if that) and I think it's a shame that for people who simply don't have the time or inclination to play on gigantic (i.e. they actually have a life ), the metaverse ranking is just something for Other People.


~SDC~

#59 by Citizen Coffeedragon - 5/12/2003 5:03:11 AM

OK, my last word on this (then I´ll stop to ride the dead horse ): The *VERY* best thing they could do is come up with something like the Elo rating in Chess. That´s the perfect system, from a Mathematical/Fairness viewpoint. This is what I would like to see (or at least an approximation).

Yes, I know this is somewhat different, because Chess is not Single Player, but Elo works if you play against a computer also. Chessmaster gives you an Elo score.

In principle I don´t see a reason why there can´t be a Galciv Elo.
____

Yeah less talkin coffee and more game posting baby....j/k

Chess is essentially a win/lose draw game between two people. Score doesn't matter. It's also a competition between two individuals. Elo wont work here since people aren't competing against each other with a win/lose/draw outcome.




#68 by Citizen Blue Ocean - 5/12/2003 12:01:24 PM

PontiusBruinPilot:

I'm sorry. You misunderstand me. What I'm saying is that one cannot make statements about how good or bad someone else is at the game without first having played on all the difficulty levels that that other person has played at. As you know, Technician had at the time of my posting (and probably at this time too) only played at beginner and simple difficulties on gigantic galaxies. The credibility I was referring to was his statement about playing on small galaxies on masochistic being easier or less deserving of a high score than what he does. In this sense, the credibility of his statement is severely compromised by the fact that he has not yet played on even normal difficulty (I suck, and I've still beaten normal).

As for all the statements about him being able to have fun, I agree with you one hundred percent. I think it's great that he thinks it's fun, and more power to him, as you said. However, I disagree that any more challenging game should get a lower score than any less challenging game, and it is my understanding that a small galaxy on masochistic is much more difficult than a gigantic on the simple (I for one would not know, because I would get beaten so badly on the masochistic that I would probably not be able to make any judgements on how hard it is). Technician's assertion was that a high score was not deserved on a small galaxy no matter what the difficulty. I disagree with that statement, because I believe that score should be given for demonstration of good technique, not long, easy to beat games.

Aha!! Thanks for the clarification. I too disagree that a small galaxy on masochist (given the current system) should be given such little point value. But in general, greater difficulty does get you more points. But it's hard to say. Personally, I found normal easier (not harder than beginner) But there also should be some reward for bigger galaxies as they take longer on average to play.

My personal opinion is that the smaller galaxies are entirely different games from the larger ones. I don't think there is any adjustment that would be completely fair to both camps. Small is much harder in some ways, easier in others. My strategy to win on one vs the other has to be totally different. I don't think it would be too tough to rank each size. It is noted in your games anyway. so the only extra data to be stored would be the summary data. Each person's raw data would remain unchanged. That wouldn't be too difficult or require all that much extra storage either.


Another compicating problem is one of the versions is allowing for mega scores. It had the one feature that was far too powerful. I don't have it. And the secrets out. Many are electing to keep that version. Even after Frogboy corrected for the population bomb, it still posts high scores. But that's life I suppose.

-- From #74, PontiusBruinPilot
My personal opinion is that the smaller galaxies are entirely different games from the larger ones.
--

I'll agree to that 100%, though I don't (yet) know from experience. I also agree that there should be a way to sort players based on galaxy size, etc.

-- From #70, Paguma
I'm not sure of your point. You do get points based on difficulty as well size.
--

No, I understand that. All I'm saying is that under no circumstance should it be possible for someone who hangs on in a masochistic game to get a lower score than someone who plays on simple or beginner difficulties, no matter what the galaxy size. I think the bonuses for difficulty should be given more weight.