You're right Chewyman there is no need to make this personal so I will, unlike you, refrain from calling people crybabies and A-holes. I am not here to dictate to you I am here to reason with you.
You want me to debate with you without any Ad Hominem arguments then ok, let me give it a crack.
Firstly we need to look at the reason(s) why we are here playing this game. We are here I presume because we enjoy the game of Risk or a game similar to it. For some that is were it begins and ends, collecting points and ranks are to them meaningless.
There is a second group who joined this site to play Risk AND collect Points/Ranks which I presume is the group you fall into. This group are effectively playing two games here, the game of Risk and the Scoreboard game.
I very much doubt there is a third group that only play for points and don't care about the game of Risk. If this group existed why would they play Risk when they could play tiddlywinks or a thousand other games that give out points and ranks for far less effort. I'm sure there are others who would add yet more reasons for playing here, Tournaments/maps/social interaction ect. What unites us all however is the game of Risk. So can we conclude from this that playing for points alone is not the be all and end all. We are all here to play a fun game of Risk too.
Do you agree with me so far?
Now all of these groups play together in harmony most of the time, as, most of the time, the scoreboard game and the Risk game are mutually compatible. You play to win and when you win, you pick up points, which is great for everyone. The problem begins however when players in the 2nd group, decide that they no longer have a realistic chance of winning the game of Risk. So therefore they decide to help the highest ranked player win by making suicidal attacks on a lower ranked player in the attempt to save points in the scoreboard game. Now you can see how the two groups clash.
So which group is right and which group is wrong? Does suiciding in a game of Risk spoil the game for everyone? If you accept that it does but don't care, then the rest of this post will be not worth reading. We have already established that the game of Risk is what unites us all and if you freely admit spoiling the game of Risk then you don't belong here. If however your of the view that suiciding does not spoil the game then please read on, maybe the rest of this post will help you change your mind.
You say we should play the game the way it was meant to be played. Then the way Risk is meant to be played is for all participants to play to win is this not correct?
Now lets say your a low ranked player in a FFA game. This game has been great fun to play, and you have played it well. You have used great strategy and tactics to increase your chances of winning and now your on the verge of victory. Then a high ranked player who wasn't even in the running decides to make a suicidal attack on you to effectively end your chances of winning. All your great play that led you to this point was for nothing and the game is effectively handed to another high ranked player who did not deserve to win. There is no strategy or tactic the low ranked player can employ to defend himself against the suicider, he is completely helpless. Now if this tactic were to become common place then all FFA games would come down to who suicided on who, no skill, just luck. The game would become a crapshoot and nothing more. You have effectively broken the game that unites us all for the sake of saving a few points!
Now you may say it is not against the rules to suicide on another player so alls fair and you would be partly right. The game we play here is based on the board game Risk which didn't hand out points and ranks so this situation never came up in the board game. The suiciding on players as a legitimate tactic is a recent phenomenon which is a by product of the scoreboard game. I'm sure Lackattack never realised this when making Ranks/Points so therefore never wrote any rules to stop it. As long as this practice doesn't become common place he probably never will but that doesn't make it right! Must we have this rule written down to stop you doing this?
Maybe Lack could make non ranked games and effectively separate us into two communities, is this what you want? Or maybe he could write the rule where suiciding is strictly forbidden. But what if sometimes a strategic move by one player to win the game is mistaken for a suicidal move? Escalation games in particular would suffer from this as often they have to risk everything in one almost suicidal move in order to eliminate another player and grab his cards, if they fall short would they be accused of suiciding? Do we really need to write rules to govern everything or can we just use our common sense!?
Let me give you another example of why it isn't right.
Imagine this Scenario. It is the last race of a Formula 1 Grand Prix season. Fernando Alonso is 9 points clear in the drivers championship Lewis Hamilton is 2nd and is the only one who can beat him. In order for Hamilton to win he has to pick up 10 points(win the race) and Alonso to finish outside the points. The race goes well for Hamilton. He drives superbly and is wining the race, in fact he is so far ahead that only a mechanical failure or an act of god can stop him from victory. Meanwhile Alonso is struggling. He has had an off day by his standards, making some costly errors which have left him trailing far behind and out of contention of even finishing in the points. Hamilton is so far ahead he is about to lap Alonso. Alonso sees him coming in his rear view mirror, he knows his chances of winning the drivers championship are slipping away so he decides to take matters into his own hands. He waits until Hamilton pulls alongside him then he deliberately crashes into the side of Hamiltons car taking both his and Hamilton's car out of the race thus securing the drivers championship. Now I ask you were Alonso's actions justified?
Sorry for the long post, I guess I had a lot to say
