[GL] Game Log 2.0

[Datacup]

Concise description:

• Modify the game log to record assaults that don't conquer a territory and the number of troop lost on both sides.
• Also record how many troops are advanced after a successful assault.

Specifics/Details:

• Example: spiesr assaulted Cuba from Mexico and conquered it from jonty125 losing 2 troops, killing 3, and advancing 1
• Example of failed attack: spiesr assaulted Cuba from Mexico losing 5 troops and jonty125 defended losing 2
• The exact entry format is flexible, but this data needs to be included.

How this will benefit the site and/or other comments:

• Players will have full access to information about what happened in their games.
• It would be possible to glean this info already by sitting there constantly refreshing anyway so concerns about changing the game for the worst should be limited.
• It would allow for Game Replays, either as a site feature or with user created add-ons.

[spoiler]I noticed that, sometimes, some enemy territories just lose armies without a reason. So I realized that the reason were attacks that didn't achieved the expected result. Unfortunetly, the log just show attacks that have resulted in a conquered territory.

In a board game, it is very usefull to know wich were the movements of the other players, even if the result was not the expected by them. It helps us to figure out the strategy they are using and, of course, it is very cool to know that our army have crushed the attacker's hopes.

My suggestion is: when someone attack a territory but don't conquer it, the system should log nothing. So, the attacker can continue his assault without a flood of logs. Then...

- If the attacker conquers the territory, the system logs just like it does actually

- If the attacker end his attacks or attack another territory (or attack the same territory but from another place) the system logs a report of the battle, like: "Player1 attacked Brazil from Argentina (Player2) but failed on his assault - Brazil loses 1 and Argentina loses 3"

I'm sure that it would be very useful.

BTW, good work with the site! [/spoiler]

[ZawBanjito]

There's no way the system can work out when an attack has failed, is there? I attack Country X, with 5 armies, from Country Y with 8 armies. I get two unlucky roles, so now Country Y has only 4 armies. Uncertain, I reattack from Country Z with another 8 players and take Country X down to one, then move in again from Country Y. I do this kind of move constantly. How does the system work out if the first attack, Y to X, failed or succeeded? The report would be like:

A attacked X from Y but failed, X loses 0, Y loses 4.
A attacked X from Z but failed, X loses 4, Z loses 0.
A captured X from Y.

It seems fusty. You can't ask AI to make calls on player strategy. Take out the "fail" judgement. Literally log every attack made. It would make the logs long as hell but solve the problem.

[Twill]

Technically it might be easy. It doesn't need much AI at all.

if you roll your dice against a country, but then do not capture that country your attack failed.

system logic would need a "battle begun" flag (i.e. when you select 2 countries and attack), a "battle ended" flag (i.e. when you select a new country to attack to or from or turn ended)

Then if owner of the country changed you have a successful battle, if no owner change, then battle failed.

it's pretty simple.
If you attacked the same country from a different initial location then it would just count as a new battle.

I think anyway. I'm not a coder

Just a thought

Twill

[ZawBanjito]

Well, that's what he said. But my point's still the same - you can't code the AI to make calls on strategy. That's telepathy. So don't code something that makes calls on an attack "failing"... simply record each attack and the outcome of each. You wouldn't even need to display each attack; if a country is attacked sequentially you could aggregate the results. I'm agreeing with the basic premise.

Although now that I think about it, my original scenario might be solveable by putting an "under attack" flag, or whatever, on a defending country. The flag lasts the round, and you could then put up a report saying, "Country X resisted an attack from Y. X lost 1 and Y lost 3." And have one of those for each resisted attack. So the reporting isn't related to attacks made, which have a human element in them, but defenses, which are passive.

[EDIT] Blah, I'm making this too complicated. Look, all I'm saying is, under language currently proposed, in the example scenario I gave you would resolve two failed attacks and one capture, when what was actually happening was a single successful two-pronged attack. So you can't talk about "failure," only record the occurence of attacks and the armies won/lost.

Actually, the scenario is a bit flawed. Say Country Z lost some troops in the second prong of the attack. You could resolve the whole thing after the fact to a simple successful attack from Y to X, but then you wonder where the troops from Country Z went. As it stands now, you make an intelligent guess. The original proposal doesn't want that uncertainty, as I understand it. So you'd have to record each attack.

Another issue is that this version of Risk has occassionally a real-time element to it. The current language proposes reporting of halted attacks at the end of a turn, which would be fine if we were moving sequentially. But if two or more players are moving at once you'd get a log with a very muddled chronological line. You might be able to resolve this by time stamping events and logging them after the fact, but do you stamp the beginning of the attack or the end?

I still say better to log all attacks. The log would be longer but it would be simpler to understand.

[Datacup]

Man, I think you overpowered my suggestion hehehe. I didn't expected the computer to calculate the enemy strategy or something like that. Basically, my idea is the same of yours: to log every attack. But I said that sequential attacks from the same country to the same country should be put together to avoid a large log. And that is not a hard thing to code (yes, Im a coder ).

But you said an important thing: the game allow multiple players making their moves at the same time. If two guys attack one thirds territory, pehaps the system could make confusion. But this is a conquer club owner's issue

BTW, I really think that if someone is making his move, no one else should play until the he or she finish it.

[ZawBanjito]

I dunno, Datacup. I think the realtime thing is damn exciting. It hasn't happened to me but I watched a game where one player massed armies to attack another but was attacked in turn by a third player. He was wiped out. Was crazy.

Perhaps you could timecode the start and end of an attack? If sequential attacks are summarized, you could report the first and last attack. That could avoid confusion.

[lackattack]

I have to side with ZawBanjito on the simultaneous issue. Simultaneous turns should happen rarely in casual games, and if it happens it's quite exciting.

Realtime games, on the other hand, are not the focus of Conquer Club and there is the Sequential solution ZawBanjito mentioned.

[Zepy12]

First of all...I'm new to the site, but have really enjoyed it. I'm a refugee from MSN Zone, where I played a lot of RISK.

Two suggestions to the game: I would love to be able to see how many cards my enmies have...rather than have to scroll thru the log.

second, the log should include attack actions...even if they are not successful. that way, when one walks away from a game and comes back you know everything that has happened.

Just thoughts!

Thanks...
Zepy12

As the first part of this suggestion has been implemented, this suggestion has been merged into Game Log 2.0

[adam]

i would agree with both those sugestions. i would also like to add one of my own.... that being that the "previous games" list be inverted so that you dont have scroll all the way down to see the most recent game played as it is usualy the one that is of concern

[madeinchinain85]

Yes, I agree, those features would be extremely useful. However showing all of the attack options might be a bit cluttered, I feel the logs are pretty long as they are with just describing who conquered terretories.

[Pedronicus]

Concise description:

• Modify the game log to record assaults that don't conquer a territory and the number of troop lost on both sides.
• Also record how many troops are advanced after a successful assault.

Specifics/Details:

• Example: spiesr assaulted Cuba from Mexico and conquered it from jonty125 losing 2 troops, killing 3, and advancing 1
• Example of failed attack: spiesr assaulted Cuba from Mexico losing 5 troops and jonty125 defended losing 2
• The exact entry format is flexible, but this data needs to be included.

How this will benefit the site and/or other comments:

• Players will have full access to information about what happened in their games.
• It would be possible to glean this info already by sitting there constantly refreshing anyway so concerns about changing the game for the worst should be limited.
• It would allow for Game Replays, either as a site feature or with user created add-ons.

[oman]

I think that that is just way to much work than Lack needs, and it would be pointless

[ticalien]

Concise description:

• Modify the game log to record attacks that don't conquer a terrtiory and the number of troop lost on both sides.

Specifics/Details:

• Example: spiesr assaulted Cuba from Mexico and conquered it from jonty125 losing 2 troops and killing 3
• Example of failed attack: spiesr assaulted Cuba from Mexico losing 5 troops and jonty125 defended losing 2
• The exact entry format is flexible, but this data needs to be included.

How this will benefit the site and/or other comments:

• Players will have full access to information about what happened in their games.
• It would be possible to glean this info already by sitting there constantly refreshing anyway so concerns about changing the game for the worst should be limited.
• It would allow for Game Replays, either as a site feature or with user created add-ons.

[Darkfire001]

Doubt Lack will do it, the Logs would grow so fast and it would really hamper MySQL (Database software).

[Pedronicus]

it would read more like this:

Eastern US attacked Western US and lost 2 armies (4,3,4 to 5,6)
Eastern US attacked Western US and lost 2 armies (5,3,4 to 6,6)
Eastern US attacked Western US and lost 2 armies (1,3,4 to 6,4)
Eastern US attacked Western US and lost 2 armies (1,2,4 to 6,5)
Eastern US attacked Western US and lost 2 armies (1,1,1 to 2,2)
and so on

[PaperPlunger]

not necessarily putting it all into the same log, what if you had a combat log located below the cht box, where you could see color coded info, also having the names of countries attacking and defending color coded to owner? Would anyone like that, I think it would be good

[eddymush]

im not sure if any one else is interested in seeing how a battle is doing. meaning id like to watch battle in the game log you know have it say player 1 rolls a 655 player 2 a 34 player two looses 2. it would allow us as players to be able to see where pepole are attacking.


just a thought

[AndyDufresne]

Such a thing could clutter up the gamelog window. One way to see how people are attacking, is the obvious. Look at the countries being taken over. And for the few rolls where people attack, but do not attack enough to take over the country, look for the obvious decrease in troop amounts.

One thing I think could be appropriate to add to the game log would be 'Attempted Take Overs'. "Say 'Jimbob' attacked Iceland with Greenland and failed." But then again you run the problem with cluttering the gamelog, but I think that would keep the mess down to a moderate level, and you could still see where whoever's country interests lie.


--Andy

[eddymush]

that would be great. and really thats all id like to see.

[rocksolid]

Right now I use this absence of info strategically - I'll whittle someone down knowing that the next player along will finish the job before the attacked player will see the board, so that the follower will take any feud heat that may result - which makes me feel pretty devious. This sounds like it would be a bit of a pain to program without having every click of the attack button wind up in the game log - how do you register the first assault only and the successful conquest only, and not intermediate attacks? I wouldn't want to be the one to sort that out.

[qeee1]

I never even thought of that... that's really devious... I like it. Thanks for giving away your tactics Rock.

[lackattack]

Complete logs have been requested several times, so perhaps this is a good opportunity to reveal my secret plans...

Game Log 2.0
* will normally not include fortifications
* but click on "extended log" and you'll get fortifications and dice rolls
* log will be available in xml format so talented programmers (*cough* *cough* Tr0y *cough*) could create movie players and even bots
* logs will be deleted on old games to make room for all these dice rolls
* internally I'll store the log differently to make it possible to translate the entries into different languages far off into the future

[zorba_ca]

Sounds great.

[agarvin]

Complete logs have been requested several times, so perhaps this is a good opportunity to reveal my secret plans...

Game Log 2.0

* log will be available in xml format so talented programmers (*cough* *cough* Tr0y *cough*) could create movie players and even bots

That'll be cool. I've been working on a program to examine game logs of multiple games to try to determine the statistical advantage of each continent (which to try to take first, which is best in the middle-to-end game). It'd be nice if you included initial starting positions in the 'extended logs'. Right now, I've been pasting in the logs, starting at the end to find who won, and then searching backwards to resolve each conquered area, back to the beginning. I'd love to have data on how many armies attacking and how many lost. With all the dice info, I'd be able to throw in "luck" calculations.

XML, ugh... I guess it's standard but personally I'd rather work with a simple, raw, CSV input..

[itaish100]

1. a button for multiple attacks (2,3,4 or more)
would be good when u are attacking many armies with many armies (i.e. 50 armies vs. 50 armies )

2. creating a log with a map of all history moves and attacks (including unsuccesful attacks), it is very important to know these attack as well in an strategic game.

Thanks.
Itai