that comes a as bit of surprise to me. while clearly leaning towards the DS, the win ratio is nowhere near 2/3 as stated in another thread.
still, my personal opinion is that when two equally skilled teams play, the DS will win 2/3 of the games in 1650
in 2950, my theory that this scenario does even lead more to DS superiority than 1650 is supported, ironically while it was designed to do exactly the opposite. the FP characters are boosted, they have a curse arty from the start. but all that does not make up for the military and economic downgrade.
While I’ll eat a bit’o crow here, I’m a little confused - only 91 2/3 wk games? From whence is the start date, or is that actually all you guys have run? And with Bernd, I’m also surprised at the 2950 numbers.
Most comforting percentages: the only signifcant deviation from 50/50 is the curious difference between the 1 wk and the 2 wk games in 1650. Is the neutral distribution different in 1 wk than 2 wk?
Any win/loss ratios differences in 1650 are easily explained by sample size and random events. Essentially, the sides are even. All the years of howling about S & F ignored that they were intelligent, thoughtful and creative men.
While I’ll eat a bit’o crow here, I’m a little confused - only 91 2/3 wk games? From whence is the start date, or is that actually all you guys have run?
For normal games yes - since mid-2001. There’s a lot more Grudge and alternative games than there were before. Compared with 300 games for GSI in the 10 years before hand that’s about the same proportion.
MoS stuff - I prefer to keep to the last 5 years as I think it gives the best weighting (other stuff will clearly add to it but the most recent data is the most pertinent).
2950 was a surprise for me. I’ve got more data and will release that.
1650 games are actually won more quickly with DS than with FP wins which was also a surprise to me. (2950 is average win for FP on turn 23 and DS 27 for a win - 1650 FP win turns 29, DS win 24)
1wk games are quite clearly slanted in favour of DS.
Interesting 2950 fact - you have a 49% chance of winning playing a Neutral compared wtih 50% for any aligned nation… I’ll provide more info as time allows (still compiling some of the 2950 split of Neutral info and the 1650 although all the rest is now compiled).
I think that 1650 2wk is pretty balance - with only a 2% difference in win ratios for FP:DS then that’s balance IMO. For Grudge FP:DS 46:54 is interesting but by no means significant enough to (IMO) consider changes.
GB 2950 is the big shocker for me! 1000 is pretty much as expected although FP win ratio is bit of a shock.
You’re right about the sample size, its close to 25% chance that its random variation of a 50/50 distribution. With respect to the second part of your comment a question pops to mind: why do you so often glorify the creators of this game, even in cases where it has no relevance to the discussion at hand?
Think it’s a back-handed compliment from Ed… LOL :rolleyes:
Bernd’s comments: Grudge games seem to indicate that the game is roughly even as many teams play both sides 46/54 proportions of win there for example.
Clint,
thank you very much for publishing this data. It’s very useful and settles a lot of concerns that folks may have.
that said, have you yet formed an opinion on the “banker nation exploit?”
This exploit is just recently in widespread use and may or may not have an impact on the expected outcomes. While it takes away the FP’s ability to cause economic stress to the DS, it also allows the FP to make huge economies. I think the jury is out on it. I vascilate back and forth on whether it should be removed or not.
Given your published data on game outcome, I’d say leave it be for a while and see if FP teams work out appropriate counter strategies.
I’ve got an opinion on the gold situation for games. Personally I don’t think it a problem - I don’t agree with the concept that all the gold in one nation works - rather I’m a propent of lots of money in the market works to raise the market and that’s what impacts (based on my experience in a number of games now). I think I can back that up experimentally in our 2950 grudge game but as a GM I don’t want to (nor feel that there is a need to) investigate it personally as that will damage my ability to play the game (I would consider it if it were IMO a major problem though and I think the numbers show that it’s not).
Are there things that could be changed? - certainly, do we have any plans to do so? - not at present. I’m aiming to use KS as a testing board for such things and see how players receive those changes. Saying that I do feel that 2950 GB needs to be looked at and some ideas for changes to GB 2950 would be welcome.
Clearly games will go through different win/loss rates for DS vs FP as time moves on but I think the figures show that for 1650 at least it’s pretty balanced, and that for 2950 it’s the opposite of “standard opinions” - mine very much included in that btw for 2950. (1000 games where FP win more than expected was a slight shock as well).
I personally still feel that FP are stronger than DS in 1650 but this has brought home to me that it’s actually even more subtle play and team co-ordination for FP needed that even I originally thought so it’s well worth while having done this study (I’m aware that others differ with that opinion - but I feel that’s the beauty of the game that there are lots of different ways of playing and strategies to employ - if we all felt that there was one answer there’d be less point in playing the game wouldn’t it!!!). I’ll publish more detailed information in Bree at some time in the future btw so that you can check out some further details. There’s a fair bit of suprising data here…
I’ll bring out my suggested GB 1650 changes soon for perusal - I’ve got to finish off collating some more data (ratios of neutrals for 2950 and 1650 is something I want to look at - for example Rhun in 2950 has a 33% chance of winning on average!) before I get to that though - should get that done by the end of the week.
You can’t agree or disagree if you haven’t done it. Every game I’ve seen where a single nation has enough gold to buy out the 2 lowest priced commodities, the market adjust UPWARDS to “thwart” such a possibility. I’ve seen a neutral Harad do it on his own and game 16 the PoWeR game saw the DS do it from turn 1 as an Allegiance Strategy by sending all their starting gold to a single nation to pump the single nation reserves.
Try it and report back.
Meanwhile, as per Dave, I’m not even sure it’s a really big deal. The ploy sucks up DS orders and frees up FP orders while providing economic stability for the 2-5 FP who require it as well as the DS… I think I’d rather play the Woodmen or Cardolan in such a scenario than the Ice King or so…
I’ll provide more info as time allows (still compiling some of the 2950 split of Neutral info and the 1650 although all the rest is now compiled).