Re-Organizing DSB

[Tembest]

Yeah just remember, kills don't matter, and number of flags don't matter. The flag values are based on numbers of players. So to maintain 2.5 for each sector you need a certain flag value since each sector has different number of players. Kills don't matter because in many a league game I've seen people in 2 vs 2 west out preform North and East players in kill count. The player amount in a sector has only a small effect on kills.

Yea but that's what I'm afraid we cannot do. According to Ent, we cannot have different kill value in different sectors unless we have 4 arenas.

[jim the chin]

1. I agree 2 is very low, and I consider it the absolute minimum because anyone can warp atop two flags. The only reason I'm suggesting 80 is because after that, the
higher we go, other sectors suffer. I would rather have 2-3 playable sectors than only 1.

Why are you talking about sacrificing a sector? They're all playable now! The scoring system isn't ideal, but when kills are worth too much, you don't get any stupidly lame tactics like laying ports and sitting in the tube, or flying from flag-pole to flag-pole without fighting until a special-burning kamikazi run in the last 5 seconds before the ding. You just get a bit less urgency in the flagging, but otherwise, you play normally. When flags are worth too much, you do get those kind of stupid tactics.

I clearly agree with you that we should improve the scoring system, but if we have to allow either kills or flags to be worth a bit extra in some of the sectors, we should always pick kills. Never flags. What you're talking about is making one sector unplayable in order to improve the scoring on the others. What I'm talking about is improving the scoring for all of the sectors as much as possible without totally fucking one of them up. I still want to play north some of the time.

[jim the chin]

Also it's a bit annoying listening to you talk about what's playable when you don't actually play here anymore. I quite happily play north and east as they are. I don't want one of them ruined because someone who only posts on the forum has decided that all kills must be worth between 2 and 2.5 bell flags. From what I can tell, 2 is stupidly low, and you haven't really countered my points about that yet. You've just said that other people have tried one of the example-tactics I talked about. Well I doubt they tried it with the points ratio you're proposing. A value of 2.5 is probably OK.

What I've discovered from actually playing in these pracs is that a value as stupidly high as 5 is playable too. Did you stop to think that maybe some people still enjoy playing pracs as they are? Yes, 5 is actually playable, and you know why? Because I play those pracs without thinking "that sucked, I won't be playing that again". So please, don't risk ruining a sector because you're unwilling to revise your theory. It's easy to be reckless when you don't have any real commitment to playing the end result. 2 seems low enough to ruin north. It's even on the lower boundary of your theory.

I disagree with your theory. It shouldn't be worthwhile to port onto 2 flags with 1 second to go, die instantly after the ding, and not lose any points at all. You should have to get at least 3 flags in my opinion. That requires a basic level of skill beyond just hitting your port button. If you get killed in exchange for claiming 3 flags, that seems like a fair trade off. Get all 4 flags on the pole and you've done well. Get just 2 and still die, and you've failed imo. I don't know why you think 2 is within an acceptable range. Perhaps you can explain that.

Making a kill worth 3 flags also happens to give us a 1:1 ratio between kill points and bell flag points in the scores. That's actually a very good indicator of what things should be worth on a point-by-point basis. The overall ratio between them is just the sum of everything that happens in the game.

[falconeer]

Tembest it's possible with ASSS to have four kill values in one arena.

Ent should focus on moving DSB to ASSS if he wants to make a lasting contribution that will benefit DSB for years to come. It's the best use of his time right now, because eventually on ASSS we would have more coders for the zone. Which is good for Ent, since he wont have to code everything. He just need to convert his bot to Python, or something, and make a module out of it. All we need is the practice bot. We can add everything else later.

[Tembest]

Also it's a bit annoying listening to you talk about what's playable when you don't actually play here anymore. I quite happily play north and east as they are. I don't want one of them ruined because someone who only posts on the forum has decided that all kills must be worth between 2 and 2.5 bell flags. From what I can tell, 2 is stupidly low, and you haven't really countered my points about that yet. You've just said that other people have tried one of the example-tactics I talked about. Well I doubt they tried it with the points ratio you're proposing. A value of 2.5 is probably OK.

What I've discovered from actually playing in these pracs is that a value as stupidly high as 5 is playable too. Did you stop to think that maybe some people still enjoy playing pracs as they are? Yes, 5 is actually playable, and you know why? Because I play those pracs without thinking "that sucked, I won't be playing that again". So please, don't risk ruining a sector because you're unwilling to revise your theory. It's easy to be reckless when you don't have any real commitment to playing the end result. 2 seems low enough to ruin north. It's even on the lower boundary of your theory.

I disagree with your theory. It shouldn't be worthwhile to port onto 2 flags with 1 second to go, die instantly after the ding, and not lose any points at all. You should have to get at least 3 flags in my opinion. That requires a basic level of skill beyond just hitting your port button. If you get killed in exchange for claiming 3 flags, that seems like a fair trade off. Get all 4 flags on the pole and you've done well. Get just 2 and still die, and you've failed imo. I don't know why you think 2 is within an acceptable range. Perhaps you can explain that.

Making a kill worth 3 flags also happens to give us a 1:1 ratio between kill points and bell flag points in the scores. That's actually a very good indicator of what things should be worth on a point-by-point basis. The overall ratio between them is just the sum of everything that happens in the game.

I used to prac when 150 appeared.. then I was inactive for almost a year because I didn't have a computer I could install SS on. All my arguments are
based on the time I actually played those horrible pracs, and the people who have during these years complained about the value.
So, for the one millionth time, unlike you, I am not just saying how I feel. I'm trying to share what I've been told by dozens of players.

Now I've been active for a few months again. Why don't I prac? Because currently prac gives me as much pleasure as playing pub. It's just a mindless
kill fest that would not even need flags.

"Well I doubt they tried it with the points ratio you're proposing."
You're correct, BELL FLAGS WERE WORTH EVEN MORE as I've been telling you all the time. Still the tactic wasn't successful! Crazy huh?

We have had only ONE league in DSB history where a kill has been worth more than 2 bell flags, the 6 vs 6 league.

Perhaps you feel 150 is ok, but it's not enough when dozens of players are not happy with it. It would be great if we could please everyone, but...

It's extremely funny how you realise that anything below 2.5 is UNPLAYABLE, considering the ratio has NEVER, EVER been higher than that, yet you have
played league. I'm sorry, but I'm done. I'll think about this when I have more time, and have a slightest clue when Ent is going to reset the standings,
or if we're going to move to ASSS or anything else is going to happen. A scoring system isn't worth anything unless we get a league running that uses it.
So, this neverending dialogue about the scoring system shall end from my part now until it makes any sense to continue it.

Edit: Basically what should be done is two set the value to 120 a week, 110 a week, 100 a week, etc. and enable !voting during those time where we ask
if the importance of bell flags should be increased. When the majority starts saying 'no', we'll stop reducing it.

Edit 2: I bothered to look up the old discussion. I proposed anything between 2-3. The 6vs6 system got most support. Then people agreed we should
switch it to 80 for now. ~roughly 2.5 was the aim people in general approved of. By no means can it be higher than 3 was said, and 2 is low.
I already forgot who all contributed but Beer, kemi, Eridu, Pater stayed in my head. There was not the slightest disagreement even from you.

No arguments, I just looked up what was said. Funny thing is that even you contributed to the discussion and had nothing bad to say about the proposals.

[falconeer]

[12:08:46 PM] Falc: no i mean if we have 4 sectors. I want kills to be worth 75 in east and 100 in north, simultaneously. So 2 practices happening at once in same arena. Bot can do that?
[12:28:57 PM] Ziv: ;/
[12:29:01 PM] Ziv: no
[12:29:05 PM] Ziv: well yes
[12:29:13 PM] Ziv: if it knows what player is practicing in which sector
[12:29:16 PM] Ziv: then yes
[12:29:19 PM] Ziv: bot can do that
[12:29:56 PM] Falc: so you mean you could have 1 practice after another
[12:30:06 PM] Falc: as long as bot records who is where
[12:30:13 PM] Falc: and you dont need asss for this
[12:30:24 PM] Falc: hmm
[1:03:22 PM] Ziv: no
[1:03:28 PM] Ziv: u can have in the same arena multiple pracs
[1:03:45 PM] Ziv: and different scores to a player as long as he is registered under a specific sector
[1:04:23 PM] Falc: meh
[1:18:27 PM] Ziv: what
[1:18:31 PM] Ziv: oh
[1:18:35 PM] Ziv: theres another way too
[1:18:45 PM] Ziv: u can map the ds into coordinates
[1:18:53 PM] Ziv: and then depending on where the player is
[1:18:59 PM] Ziv: the kill points are different
[1:19:29 PM] Ziv: if you want players to move from west to north while playing
[1:19:31 PM] Ziv: and have diff kill value there
[1:19:33 PM] Ziv: ;/

So no clue why Entropy said it's not possible. It's possible without ASSS according to snake.

[hello]

I clearly agree with you that we should improve the scoring system, but if we have to allow either kills or flags to be worth a bit extra in some of the sectors, we should always pick kills. Never flags.

This way of reasoning changes what was always the most fundamental aspect of dsb's gameplay. The whole point was to win flags, how anyone went about doing so was entirely up to them. Even the most extreme kill-oriented players had big dings in mind.

I'm not sure if "balance of strategies" is even a real thing. It doesn't compute to me because there has always been one superior way of playing which will get you a win against any team worse than you, no matter their playstyle, granted you have a complete skill-set. Whether players want to choose inferior strategies is based on their skill level, patience, attention span, personality... Internalized things... Rather than employing running/hiding strategies because the point system 'encourages' them to, they are simply doing the best to make use of their own ability. Either way, they lose vs guys who can really play, its just a little more annoying to deal with, and I dont see that as a bad thing.

Just to help you understand where I'm coming from... My mindset is, if you arent playing for complete domination (the intent of winning flags 100-0), you aren't playing optimally. This doesn't mean you can or will make that a reality every time. You might not get them all, but thinking in this way will get you doing things far greater than running around and never fighting. Players who do things such as run from flag pole to flag pole refusing to fight do not 'dominate' because they arent playing in an optimal fashion. They often barely scrape by, and lose every single time vs truly good players.

Winning flags vs any team with a complete set of skills involves winning meaningful fights. This wouldn't change even if kills were worth 0 points. You have to strip your opponent of all their specials before the ding and/or kill them. Flagging and killing aren't 2 separate games uninfluenced by the other. The best bell flagger is the best fighter. You want to dominate flags? You have no choice but to fight. Your opponent ideally has to be dead or have no port/rep when the ding comes.

The east tube-whoring tactic involving waiting until 5 seconds then porting into main.. Contrary to popular belief it is actually inferior strategy, just like the RN example. It is done by players who want to barely scrape by. It is desperation. In a real optimized play (if all 3 of you are in tube anyways) you port much earlier, and I mean enough time to possibly get all of the flags and possibly a lockout. Even when flags were worth the most, tubewhoring wasn't done because it was the best thing to do. Again, it was done because it was the best thing for certain players to do with their limited skill-set. Sorry but LEGO's east in L6 wasnt as good as many believed if they couldn't counter tubewhoring from "lesser skilled players". If they were really better they would have 1. killed sai force and/or defended main flags when sai force ported in or 2. not let sai force get in the tube and/or took the tube before sai force did.

I disagree with your theory. It shouldn't be worthwhile to port onto 2 flags with 1 second to go, die instantly after the ding, and not lose any points at all.

The first thing I thought when I read this is that the example is too incomplete/ too isolated. What happened prior to that event? Are those 2 flags the only bell flags this player acquired? If so, he didn't do his part for the team and if his teammates are playing as badly as he is then you can be sure they just lost the ding 6-14, or 6-18, or 8-24 (and thus lost points)... Now if he did get a bunch of other flags and just happened to port and suicide for 2 more, I dont see whats wrong with that. He did well, the fault is on the other team for not dealing with him sooner.

Anyhow, the more kills are worth, the more special conservation, timing and planning skills become pointless. Zone is at a point where no conscious thought is needed. I've been actually baffled by how bad everyone is now, but now I know its not just because of inactivity. The current point system probably contributed to it. I guess you fight even harder when its for the flags rather than simple kill points, that urgency feeling you speak of probably brought out the best in people. Right now dsb has no unique appeal to it besides ship settings. Might as well be star wars realm or something.

So if you cant tell by now, I think flags should be worth a bit more than kills in scoring. I dont even mind if theyre worth a lot more than kills since you need to fight to win flags, and killing at the right time has both a direct reward - points, and an indirect one - flags itself. I think the kill points based held on flags held system was pretty cool. Also I don't see whats wrong with sectors having different relative scoring. Thats how it has always been, it adds diversity.

Do what you want though.

[jim the chin]

Edit 2: I bothered to look up the old discussion. I proposed anything between 2-3. The 6vs6 system got most support. Then people agreed we should
switch it to 80 for now. ~roughly 2.5 was the aim people in general approved of. By no means can it be higher than 3 was said, and 2 is low.
I already forgot who all contributed but Beer, kemi, Eridu, Pater stayed in my head. There was not the slightest disagreement even from you.

No arguments, I just looked up what was said. Funny thing is that even you contributed to the discussion and had nothing bad to say about the proposals.

You keep trying to say my position is miles away from yours. I don't get it. I said in my previous post that 2.5 is OK, and 3 is ideal. Read it again if you need to. I said before that north should be 120, while east, south, and 3v3 west should all be 90. That's 1 kill for 3 flags. From what you've just said, that's pretty much in agreement with your silent majority.

I didn't say that "150 is ok". I said it's playable, and I said that because I play it and haven't decided to stop on account of the scoring system. Lots of other people play it too, including Pater, Eridu, and Beer, who you mentioned. I even explained why it's playable - Emphasizing kills doesn't create any unpleasant tactics; it just weakens the flagging tactics. Therefore it's not risky to allow over-powered kills in some sectors when you have to find a suitable value for all 4 sectors. The only real risk to the gameplay is to allow over-powered flagging in some sectors. It seems that even your silent majority thought 2 was low.

If I thought "150 is ok", I wouldn't be here asking for it to be changed would I? So again, why are you trying to put distance between what we're saying? Especially as all I've been trying to do is find a compromise between our two positions.

Despite my efforts to alter my position, you don't seem to budge an inch. So, what confuses me is if your silent majority thought somewhere between 2 and 3 was ok, why are you always talking about 2 and 2.5 as the limits? Why is 3 off the cards for you personally? It seems my suggestion is just as valid as yours.

You casually mention that "By no means can it be higher than 3 was said". It "was said" was it? Well, by who, by how many people, and for what reason? Is there something that happens at 3 that makes the arena blow up? Seems pretty important right now. Where can I find the previous discussion?

I said that 3 is ideal, but if we have to pick an average value, I suggested the kill points should be 100, giving us 2.5 in north, and 3.3 in the other sectors (if west is 3v3). Is that so terrible? Is it completely out of whack with everything that any sane person has ever said on the subject? I think not.

[falconeer]

I'm not sure if "balance of strategies" is even a real thing. It doesn't compute to me because there has always been one superior way of playing which will get you a win against any team worse than you, no matter their playstyle, granted you have a complete skill-set. Whether players want to choose inferior strategies is based on their skill level, patience, attention span, personality... Internalized things... Rather than employing running/hiding strategies because the point system 'encourages' them to, they are simply doing the best to make use of their own ability. Either way, they lose vs guys who can really play, its just a little more annoying to deal with, and I dont see that as a bad thing.

Just to help you understand where I'm coming from... My mindset is, if you arent playing for complete domination (the intent of winning flags 100-0), you aren't playing optimally. This doesn't mean you can or will make that a reality every time. You might not get them all, but thinking in this way will get you doing things far greater than running around and never fighting. Players who do things such as run from flag pole to flag pole refusing to fight do not 'dominate' because they arent playing in an optimal fashion. They often barely scrape by, and lose every single time vs truly good players.

Winning flags vs any team with a complete set of skills involves winning meaningful fights. This wouldn't change even if kills were worth 0 points. You have to strip your opponent of all their specials before the ding and/or kill them. Flagging and killing aren't 2 separate games uninfluenced by the other. The best bell flagger is the best fighter. You want to dominate flags? You have no choice but to fight. Your opponent ideally has to be dead or have no port/rep when the ding comes.

The east tube-whoring tactic involving waiting until 5 seconds then porting into main.. Contrary to popular belief it is actually inferior strategy, just like the RN example. It is done by players who want to barely scrape by. It is desperation. In a real optimized play (if all 3 of you are in tube anyways) you port much earlier, and I mean enough time to possibly get all of the flags and possibly a lockout. Even when flags were worth the most, tubewhoring wasn't done because it was the best thing to do. Again, it was done because it was the best thing for certain players to do with their limited skill-set. Sorry but LEGO's east in L6 wasnt as good as many believed if they couldn't counter tubewhoring from "lesser skilled players". If they were really better they would have 1. killed sai force and/or defended main flags when sai force ported in or 2. not let sai force get in the tube and/or took the tube before sai force did.

This +1, absolutely correct.

[jim the chin]

This way of reasoning changes what was always the most fundamental aspect of dsb's gameplay. The whole point was to win flags, how anyone went about doing so was entirely up to them. Even the most extreme kill-oriented players had big dings in mind.

I agree. I think you misunderstood what I was saying a bit. I'm saying that over-emphasizing flagging creates more harebrained strategies than over-emphasizing killing. If you over-emphasize flags, you get too much tube-whoring and people chasing flags all day without any real fighting apart from at the dings if their portals overlap. Right now kills are worth a stupid amount, but the game is still playable because you don't get any stupid, annoying, or boring strategies. The only thing it does is weaken the flagging game. Despite this, I want to strengthen the flagging game by reducing kill points by a third. I don't want to reduce it to the point of introducing strategies that would make the game less enjoyable though.

I'm not sure if "balance of strategies" is even a real thing.

Talk to Tembest about that one. He used the phrase first. I was replying to his use of it. Hopefully the above paragraph sheds some light on my understanding of what he meant.

Rather than employing running/hiding strategies because the point system 'encourages' them to, they are simply doing the best to make use of their own ability. Either way, they lose vs guys who can really play, its just a little more annoying to deal with, and I dont see that as a bad thing.

The game has to be fun. There's no point making a boring or annoying strategy the best way to win because people will eventually stop playing.

The east tube-whoring tactic involving waiting until 5 seconds then porting into main.. Contrary to popular belief it is actually inferior strategy, just like the RN example. It is done by players who want to barely scrape by. It is desperation. In a real optimized play (if all 3 of you are in tube anyways) you port much earlier, and I mean enough time to possibly get all of the flags and possibly a lockout.

I agree. But the more you devalue kills, the more you encourage tube-whoring (especially for the inferior teams you mention), and the more boring the game gets. Waiting 50 seconds for the other team to port out of tube is not my idea of fun.

I disagree with your theory. It shouldn't be worthwhile to port onto 2 flags with 1 second to go, die instantly after the ding, and not lose any points at all.

The first thing I thought when I read this is that the example is too incomplete/ too isolated.

I absolutely agree. It's what Tembest keeps citing as the most important example in this discussion. I have no idea why, and I only started talking about it today because he wouldn't shut up about it for the past week. So you should probably ask Tembest why this isolated scenario is so important.

Anyhow, the more kills are worth, the more special conservation, timing and planning skills become pointless. Zone is at a point where no conscious thought is needed. I've been actually baffled by how bad everyone is now, but now I know its not just because of inactivity. The current point system probably contributed to it. I guess you fight even harder when its for the flags rather than simple kill points, that urgency feeling you speak of probably brought out the best in people. Right now dsb has no unique appeal to it besides ship settings. Might as well be star wars realm or something.

I agree, we need to emphasize flagging more so that those skills are brought back into the game. Hopefully it won't be long before it's fixed.

I think the kill points based held on flags held system was pretty cool.

That still contributes to the scores a bit. About 20% of the points come from that. I like it too and have asked for it to stay as part of the scoring.

Also I don't see whats wrong with sectors having different relative scoring. Thats how it has always been, it adds diversity.

Yes, it would be better like that. Our bot coder seems to think that it can't be done in the same arena, though it might be possible. Doing separate arenas with our current population isn't a great idea though unfortunately.