Dramatic SFB: New "Main" Campaign

Don Lavanty emeketos at gmail.com
Wed Jan 27 13:55:58 PST 2021 

my main issue is the sole use of economic points/ship value as a
determination as to who is the campaign winner.
If we can alter the victory condition to scenario wins or levels of victory
with adjustment for BPV difference it would be a much much better campaign.
This would require players to report their results though.


   1. Scenario  wins with you being the only participant  Value 0 points
   hey  you get your free economic points
   2. overwhelming forces should at a minimum be the ratio of the difference
   3. shots fired should also be a modifier (with internals scored)
   4. if a scenario has levels of victory those can alter the value to each
   player losing a scenario doesn't mean zero points
   5. end of the campaign a percentage fleet value can also be scored but
   this will at best be 20%-30% of the final value or something like this.


I honestly have no interest in a campaign where we just look at the fleet
score at the end it tells me nothing of the campaign.

there is a lot of adjustment that can be made here I am just throwing it
together as a framework

On Wed, Jan 27, 2021 at 3:54 PM Majead Farsi via SFBdrama <
sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:

> Matt when do you think the Campaign will be ready to start?
>
>
> On Tue, 26 Jan 2021 at 04:09, Wayne Power via SFBdrama <
> sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>
>>
>>  the Campaign is 8 years, then have just two turns a year in stead of 4
>> (makes the scenario/battles more important for the EP gains/loss).
>> On Tuesday, 26 January 2021, 11:40:08 am AEST, Brent Stanton via SFBdrama
>> <sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>>
>>
>> So the big questions as I understand it is how to get more battles out of
>> the campaign. Lots of good ideas have been suggested by a number of folks,
>> but we could talk hypotheticals until the heat-death of the universe. At
>> the risk of showing my youthful impetuousness, I think we need to come to
>> an agreement and decide, so we can all play and have fun.
>>
>> The proposed changes fall into two broad categories: Those that require
>> changes to the actual scenarios and their rewards (which means more work
>> for Matt), and those that aim to modify player behaviour (via
>> construction/deployment limits or limited deployment information sharing).
>>
>> In my opinion, the latter are the only options feasibly available to us.
>> Matt already does a lot of work behind the scenes for us and I'm not about
>> to ask him to do even more. Just encouraging the players who want more
>> battles to message their neighbors and give them an approximate force for a
>> sector is the easiest solution that I can think of. It can be applied as
>> much or as little as each player desires, and has the potential to yield
>> the best results for the least sacrifice of player agency.
>>
>> Respectfully,
>> Brent
>>
>>
>> On Mon, Jan 25, 2021, 16:32 Wayne Power <wdpower at yahoo.com.au> wrote:
>>
>> Majead,
>>
>> yes I found that a few empires are more powerful than others, I also
>> notice that as the YIS gets later, the battles become more about the
>> expendables (hoards of fast drones and hoards of fighters and PFs)
>>
>> On Monday, 25 January 2021, 07:40:18 pm AEST, Majead Farsi via SFBdrama <
>> sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>>
>>
>> I think it's up to each individual player how they wish to play their
>> campaign. If you want more battles then announce your fleet sizes and if
>> anyone is interested they will take it up. But sometimes the battles that
>> that person is willing to play has no benefit for the other players or they
>> need their fleets elsewhere. This will result in no takers unfortunately!
>> and no battles for the player that wants them.
>> On another point with regards to the start year. I found in the later
>> years, Hydrans were very difficult to match for BPV and fire power
>> advantage. Their fleet density is huge! Marcel may offer more on this, but
>> I think not many battles for the Hydrans once it was noticed how one sided
>> they all were! The only time I won anything vs them was when I had a much
>> superior fleet and or Marcel was not interested in that encounter. Did
>> anyone else feel this way?
>>
>>
>> On Mon, 25 Jan 2021 at 07:29, Brent Stanton via SFBdrama <
>> sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>>
>> I understand your frustration Don, 5 battles over 3 campaigns is
>> depressingly low. I like your idea of scaling the BPV reward based on the
>> fleet size(s), that seems like a really workable solution that doesn't take
>> any choices away from the players by limiting our deployments or removing
>> core mechanics. But I don't want to make even more work for Matt than he
>> already does for us.
>>
>> If not having enough battles is a big concern for everyone, and with
>> Matt's permission, would we all be willing to try the "Wayne method"? If
>> even just half the players share the move-cost of their bid for only one
>> sector a turn, then we're all going to get to fight a lot more battles.
>>
>> Respectfully,
>> Brent
>>
>> On Sun, Jan 24, 2021, 23:15 Don Lavanty <emeketos at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> Don't get me wrong I like/love the economic construction part of the game
>> but "winners are decided for the campaign solely on economic reasons who
>> has the biggest fleet. So the player who avoids the most fights while
>> increasing their borders the most wins. Generally, players will ally with 2
>> of their borders (in my experience and maximize income by either agreeing
>> on who gets what or how can we increase borders. This does nothing to
>> indicate who won the game on tactics or strategy just economic's hell the
>> player with the most allies PF game won clearly on this alone. Victory
>> shouldn't be scored just on economics but a level of victory  * your
>> BPV/opponent something that encourages activity, risk, and reward. .
>>
>> ideally, if you win overwhelming or no show opponents you get a minimum
>> economic or point value otherwise it's victory*(your bpv/opponent bpv) *
>> economic value of the scenario.  winning a fight with a bpv disadvantage
>> should be worth more while loosing should be worth less. Of course, this
>> could be abused like the border system is by players agreeing in advance
>> that the lower bpv player wins to max econ too.
>>
>> I am just pointing out this will continue unless something changes. I
>> don't know what the right solution is but I am hoping we can figure
>> something out going forward otherwise the economic side is literally
>> getting in the way of actual gameplay and that is unfortunate.
>>
>> last 3 campaigns start to finish I had less than 5 maybe 3 total over all
>> of them entirely if your experience is different than mine I am all ears.
>>
>>
>> On Sun, Jan 24, 2021 at 11:40 PM Brent Stanton <brentzkrieg39 at gmail.com>
>> wrote:
>>
>> I think the light economic and construction aspects of the campaign are
>> important because they add extra weight to the decisions of what ships to
>> commit to battle, and how fiercely one is willing to contest each battle.
>> Do I fight this one to the bitter end regardless of the damage I may
>> sustain, or do I make a fighting withdrawal; the economics add an extra
>> layer of consideration instead of every battle being a knock-down, drag-out
>> fight to the death.
>>
>> That said, I agree with you that the current situation does not create a
>> large number of battles each turn for any given player. I think scenario
>> alterations are out at this point as a solution, just because of the
>> complexity of doing that. That leaves us with rules modifications to drive
>> player behavior in a certain direction - in this case towards more frequent
>> and evenly matched battles. I have lots of ideas, but I just don't know how
>> to make that change real without compromising the core integrity of what
>> the Dramatic SFB campaign is built around. Requiring each player to send a
>> ship to every border before they can send more to any one border was a good
>> idea, but didn't result in more battles afaik, even if we all had the time
>> to play a dozen cruiser or frigate duels every week. A BPV cap for every
>> scenario wouldn't resolve it. Say we set it high enough we can field small
>> carrier or DN groups - that doesn't fix the war cruiser vs frigate
>> mis-match because the BPV is set too high to impact duels.
>>
>> The only solution to play more battles that I can think of is to steal
>> Wayne's idea from the last game, and message your neighbor with a little
>> force estimation, and trust that they will be sportsmanlike. For example he
>> would tell me he's bid a single or multiple vessels to a sector with a move
>> cost totalling X, and trust me to bid a roughly appropriate force. That
>> still preserves the secret bidding, and the integrity of the campaign with
>> all its mechanics as they are currently implemented. It doesn't guarantee
>> battles, but it does give us at least the opportunity to play more battles.
>> This wouldn't be strictly required, but perhaps strongly encouraged.
>>
>> Respectfully,
>> Brent
>>
>> On Sun, Jan 24, 2021 at 8:44 PM Don Lavanty <emeketos at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> I guess I am just coming to the conclusion the current format and style
>> of play strongly discourages any actual games except for the few die-hard
>> players.
>> honestly, I could do away with the entire economic and purchase system
>> and base scenarios purely on BPV, and the year campaign game winner is
>> determined by who has the most victory points per scenario won(levels of
>> victory etc). The fleet purchase and economic system are great for a
>> campaign with real borders and ship movement to deal with they can
>> sometimes detract from the whole reason I joined the game to begin with to
>> play scenarios. I know that wouldn't be the way Matt's system is set up to
>> do.
>>
>> unless there is something to change that is going to alter player
>> behavior or scenario constrictions I don't see this trend going to ever
>> change. Last 3 campaigns I can list on 1 hand the total number of battles I
>> actually fought.
>>
>> On Sun, Jan 24, 2021 at 9:29 PM Wayne Power via SFBdrama <
>> sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>>
>> perhaps limit the total number of borders that an empire can have
>> (perhaps 28,or less depending on player numbers, and have two-three size
>> class 4 ships for each size class 3 ship, so the fleets of CAs are not on
>> the field.
>>
>> On Monday, 25 January 2021, 12:04:24 pm AEST, Brent Stanton via SFBdrama <
>> sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>>
>>
>> I'm not 100% in agreement on the need for new rules to push everyone
>> towards a specific style of 'strategic level' play. I understand we need
>> some rules to make sure everyone has as much fun as possible, but not so
>> many that it begins to stifle the fun - and to make things more complicated
>> for the GM, that threshold is different for everyone.
>>
>> Let's take the ship assignments as an example. If I decide sector # is
>> the most valuable thing on my border and assign the biggest fleet I can
>> command to it, that's its own handicap everywhere else along my border
>> without even needing extra rules.
>>
>> Similarly if I notice my neighbor always assigns big fleets to sectors
>> with +10 income, I can choose to bid a big fleet against them in that
>> sector and play the battle or to take advantage of their weakness every
>> where else.
>>
>> Respectfully,
>> Brent
>>
>> On Sun, Jan 24, 2021, 15:11 <sfbdrama-request at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>>
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>> Today's Topics:
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>>    1. Re: New "Main" Campaign (Wayne Power)
>>
>>
>>
>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>> From: Wayne Power <wdpower at yahoo.com.au>
>> To: Peter DiMitri <pdimitri67 at outlook.com>, Majead Farsi <
>> majeadfarsi at googlemail.com>
>> Cc: "sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org" <sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org>, Brent
>> Stanton <brentzkrieg39 at gmail.com>
>> Bcc:
>> Date: Sun, 24 Jan 2021 19:59:33 +0000 (UTC)
>> Subject: Re: Dramatic SFB: New "Main" Campaign
>> Matt did say campaign set between Y166 and Y180.
>>
>> "So it's time to start up a new "Main" campaign:
>>
>> - This is open to anyone and everyone, with no limit on the number of
>> players
>>
>> - It will be set sometime between Y166 and Y180. Three turns to a year.
>>
>> - No conjectural ships (unbuilt variants, impossible builds, or other
>> non-historical designs.)
>>
>> - The game will go for 24 turns (8 game years). The winner will be the
>> player with the largest fleet BPV at the start of the 25th turn".
>>
>>
>>
>> On Monday, 25 January 2021, 03:24:19 am AEST, Majead Farsi via SFBdrama <
>> sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>>
>>
>> I'm easy with the year! But think we should go with the following choices
>> Y170, Y175 or Y180! From what I have read so far I would think Y175 to be a
>> good choice, but 178 is OK too !
>>
>> Majead
>>
>> On Sun, 24 Jan 2021 at 16:19, Peter DiMitri via SFBdrama <
>> sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org> wrote:
>>
>> I like 178 too.  In those 8 years you get the PF deployment and the last
>> "refits" and some x-tech.  It's a good transitional period.
>>
>> My only issue with starting 171 in and 8 year campaign is that it ends in
>> 179, where some races will have PFs and some races won't.  I'd rather a
>> timeline that allows the new technologies to be fully deployed across the
>> empires.  That could be solved by making it longer than 8 years, but I
>> guess 8 years and 24 turns is a long campaign!
>>
>> Peace,
>>
>> Peter S. DiMitri
>>
>> ------------------------------
>> *From:* SFBdrama <sfbdrama-bounces at lists.mattnet.org> on behalf of Brent
>> Stanton via SFBdrama <sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org>
>> *Sent:* Sunday, January 24, 2021 9:07 AM
>> *To:* sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org <sfbdrama at lists.mattnet.org>
>> *Subject:* Dramatic SFB: New "Main" Campaign
>>
>> Great news Matt! Thank you for the work that you do for us.
>>
>> Concerning the starting year, I'm easy. Perhaps Y178? That would give
>> everybody interceptors and a short lead up to full PFs and X-tech, and then
>> several turns to play with all the advanced designs as they become
>> available.
>>
>> No preference on Omega stuff, just about everything is new to me anyway
>> lol.
>>
>> Don, on getting into more battles: Last campaign Wayne had a neat idea.
>> He would send me the approximate strength of some of his fleets when he was
>> spoiling for a scrap, something like "You detect multiple vessels with a
>> warp signature of 1.5 in Sector ###". With that I was able to assign a
>> force of approximately the same strength and we could do some shooting. If
>> you've got a gentlemanly neighbor who won't take advantage of that
>> information to steamroll you, that could be a potential solution without
>> needed hard changes to the rules.
>>
>>
>> Brent
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