Accused:
Unai
Lancelot Du Lac
The accused are suspected of:
Secret Diplomacy, Game Throwing and Other: Unai intentionally gifting tournament wins to Lancelot Du Lac and vice versa
Game number(s):
Game 20836486
Game 20836302
Comments: I am reporting that Unai intentionally played bad strategy in order to gift wins to Lancelot Du Lac and help him to grab the 3rd place medal in the tournament "2021 Quarterly Challenge #1":
https://www.conquerclub.com/public.php? ... ent_id=142
As you can see from the scoreboard, Lancelot Du Lac earned third place with score 37/43 (86%) in front on me who had score of 85%, therefore if only one of two games in question versus Unai were won by Unai then Lancelot Du Lac would have score 36/43 (84%) and I would have won the 3rd place medal.
Important to say is that Unai and Lancelot Du Lac are friends and clanmates who play many team games together, so it is natural to be suspicious that Unai was intentionally helping to Lancelot Du Lac to earn that medal. However, below I will provide the evidences from game logs to prove these suspicions.
Important to tell, Unai is not bad player on that map, he knows very well how to play it. In fact, just before playing these games vs Lancelot du Lac, he won the tournament on the same map with very similar settings beating me in finals, so I know very well that Unai is very skilled player on that map, therefore it is easy to prove when he intentionally played badly to gift the game to Lancelot Du Lac.
Below, I will compare how Unai played on the same map and similar settings (Poly-4, unlimited fort) vs me, when he indeed wanted to win and when he indeed won, with how did he played vs Lancelot Du Lac, when he did not want to win but he wanted to gift the win to Lancelot Du Lac. Differences in two strategic patterns are obvious.
1. Game versus me where Unai wanted to win:
Game 20805462
A) in 3 of 4 opening turns, Unai forted big stack to region next to his Tribe, which is good strategy and works both in offense and defense. For example, Unai could have forted 3,3,4,14 pinks to Kila Kila Wan (orange), as he did in games vs Lacelot du Lac, but instead he did smart move and forted them all to Kila Kila, because forting to orange works in offense only but self-forting to pink works both in offense and defense. I will also compare how Unai forted his Tribes stacks in games vs Lancelot Du Lac.
B) In four opening turns, Unai forted out 29, 39, 22 and 32 troops, respectively, total 122 troops in round 1, which shows enough that Unai knows very well that forting as much as possible and as much as you can is a good strategy on this map.
2. First Game versus Lacelot Du Lac which Unai gifted to him:
Game 20836486
A) Opening turn: Unai deployed on Kila Kila to take Sabama and Self-fort Iwan Tribe to Sabama. Now, compare this action with what he did in the game vs me, where he self-forted Tribes to adjacent region, to work both in offense and in defense. I do not know how taking Sabama and self-fort to Sabama is strategically better than do not take anything and just make self-fort to Kila Kila? Look then at second turn, Unai drop forts Atlas Steel and Chimbu Tribe to Baruni making easy way to Lancelot Du Lac to kill both Iwan Tribe and Chimbu Tribe, because they were protected by 1,1 while stacks were forted out so that Lancelot Du Lac can make easy kills.
Furthermore, Unai does not even attack Napa Napa Rot Wan from Atlas Steel which he could have done with 7v3 shot, but instead he forts 6 troops from Atlas Steel to Baruni. Later on, Lancelot Du Lac drops 3 troops on Napa Napa Rot Wan and easily kills Chimbu Tribe 6v1,1, which Unai gifted to him.
And logically, what happens next? Not surprisingly, in turn 3 Lacelot Du Lac easily killed both Iwan Tribe and Chimbu Tribe, which Unai left him to take for free on silver plate. Furthermore, this kill froze 17 orange on Samaba, which could also have easily been placed on Kila Kila, if Unai really wanted to play his best strategy.
B) In four opening turns, Unai forted out 24, 28, 22 and 14 troops, respectively, total 88 troops in round 1, which is significantly lower than 122 troops which he forted in game versus me, therefore he intentionally left many troops unused and unforted. you can see many frozen 3s east from Baruni which I guess could have been forted in Unai wanted to use them, but obviously he did not have motivation to use them.
3. Second Game versus Lacelot Du Lac which Unai gifted to him:
Game 20836302
A) Opening turn: Unai takes Baruni Rot to fort its leftovers and Chimbu Tribe to Gogodola viles, so that he opens way for 3 blues in Baruni to easily kill Chimbu Tribe 6v1,1. Note, Unai had chance to attack Barun 6v3 to prevent it from taking Chimbu Tribe but instead he did not use that attack but he forted 5 troops from Baruni Rot to Gogodola Viles. In second turn, orange takes Jacksons from Saraga quarry and forts all from Huli Tribe to Jacksons, gifting to Lacelot Du Lac silver plate to kill orange right after that, which Lancelot Du Lac indeed used and froze 17 oranges on Jacksons. If Unai really wanted to play his best strategy, as he has played in games vs me, then he would not intentionally put his stack on Jacksons but would put his stack on Saraga Quarry which also works well in defense. In third turn by silver, stack of 22+ troops on Gas Ples does not even try to kill any Tribe, which would be an expected move, but instead it goes in the middle of nowhere to Koki (???) just adding on to the argument that Unai did not want to win this game but instead intentionally gifted the win to Lancelot Du Lac.
B) In four opening turns, Unai forted out 27, 21 (other 21 were already included in the first fort of 27), 14 and 14 troops, respectively, total 76 troops in round 1, which is significantly lower than 122 troops which he forted in game versus me, therefore he intentionally left many troops unused and unforted. In fact, these 76 troops included 4*14 = 56 troops which Unai needed to fort out so that Lancelot Du Lac can easily kill him, so besides these 56 troops Unai only forted 20 other troops in total.
This game directly concerns me because Lancelot Du Lac's winning of them stole the Quarterly Challenge 1 medal which I honestly earned by my effort and good results. While all my games were public and everyone could join them (I did not use invitations), Lancelot Du Lac did not play his games vs anyone who wanted to join but instead he mostly used invitation system inviting his friends, so I guess his friends gifting him free wins was even more widespread than presented here, but I focused my investigation only to these two games "versus" (or with?) Unai.
* Additional evidence from June 14:
Furthermore, in the game vs me Unai sometimes fort 13 troops from his Tribe, leaving defensive 2 at the Tribe for case it will be under attack, which is known as a good strategy. In games vs Lancelot Du Lac, he NEVER forted out 13 but every time forted out all 14, no matter that only two regions from his tribe is opponent with 3 troops who will kill the tribe 6v1,1 when he comes to play the turn. Of course, because he wanted to give to Lancelot Du Lac easy route to kill his Tribes.
Lancelot Du Lac started this challenge with score of 1-6, followed by 36 wins in a row to have final score of 37/43. Doesnt it sounds fishy to score 36 wins in a row if his playing was honest? To put that in context, there was only one player (Iron Maid) who scored 20 wins in a row in the entire challenge and nobody else was even close, second one being Don with 18/20 score. How is then possible to score 36 wins in a row if you are playing honestly? Maybe because his friends were helping him to achieve these 36 wins in a row?
I found additional evidence what was the deal between Lancelot Du Lac and Unai. The deal was that Unai gifts to Lancelot Du Lac these two games for the Quarterly 1 challenge, whereas at the same time Lancelot Du Lac gifts to Unai two other games for the April monthly challenge, where Unai was fighting for third place:
https://www.conquerclub.com/public.php? ... ent_id=133
These games which Lancelot Du Lac gifted to Unai were:
Game 20842106
Game 20842107
These Classic cities: Madrid games started almost at the same time as two two Classic cities: Pot mosbi games reported above, so it is logically to conclude that Unai and Lancelot Du Lac exchanged these games on the way that Pot Mosbi wins go to Lancelot Du Lac while Madrid wins go to Unai.
Note, in game Game 20842106, which lasted for only 3 rounds, both players started with 30 troops, Unai deployed in total of 22 troops while Lancelot Du Lac deployed in total of 12 troops, so they have availability of 52 troops by Unai and 42 troops by Lancelot Du Lac, but at the end Unai ended the game with 36 troops compared to 0 troops by Lancelot Du Lac. What a miserable luck must have it been for Lancelot Du Lac if his 42 troops were killed while Unai only lost in total of 16 troops by killing it. This sounds almost impossible, unless if Lancelot Du Lac suicided his troops versus neutrals and versus his own color, which is explicitly proven below:
Game 20842106
in this game in opening turn, Lancelot du Lac deploys on yellow and suicides 3v3 (or 3v2) versus neutral on Los Sacramentin. Important to note is that yellow is on Parque whereas both Atocha and Los Sacramentin are neutral, so a good and reputable player as Lancelot Du Lac should know very well that of all options around the whole map, going with blue versus neutrals with 3v3 or 3v2 shots is really bad move. Needless to say, the turn later yellow from Parque did not even try to take that bonus where blue suicided versus neutrals.
Game 20842107
Suiciding by Lancelot Du Lac in this game is even more obvious and shameful. In the first turn, he deployed on Los Sacramentin. Situation on the board is that Lago is 3 blue, Pozuelo is 3 yellow, Fuente is 3 green, Zoo Aquarium is 3 green, and Casa de campo is 3 red. In such situation, Lacelot Du Lac attacked Puzelo (3 yellow) from Lago (3 blue) with 3v3 attack and he won that attack. Why would ever someone attack 3 yellow with 3 blue when at the same bonus there are another 3,3, greens and 3 red? Unless if he was intentionally gifting this game to Unai? Even if Lancelot Du Lac wanted to take yellow by blue for some unknown reason, he is enough good player to know that better way to do it is that yellow forts to blue and then blue takes yellow with 5v1 shot, not with 3v3 suiciding shot. Imagine how many other unsuccessful 3v3 attacks did Lancelot Du Lac did, but it is impossible to prove it from log because they were unsuccessful. However, this 3v3 attack from Lago was successful so it serves as proof here.
