Kiron Conqueror - Abuse or Legal play?

[jsnyder748]

The lawyer hurts my head ^^

[Seulessliathan]

Actually i did that, the reply was there for maybe half an hour, but then decided that i won´t argue with a lawyer in a language i don´t speak very well, so edited my post.
So, you don´t know the answer to your question when the rule was broken? I believe the answer is obvious, but if you don´t agree, then i won´t speak up here.

No, I do not know the answer. Is it because they know each other in real life? Is it because this specific Kiron-Xiang deal involved making other games? Is it because, back to my example, green refused to backstab red and kept his end of the deal?

You asked about timing, now you talk about them being friends? I don´t see the connection to your question about timing. You didn´t mention it in your "moment 1-10" theory.
Anyway, i thought the answer about timing and rule breaking would be obvious, but if you say you don´t know it, then perhaps i was wrong?

So, in your opinion there were no rules broken at any time?

[Rodion]

This person outside the group cannot react to it in time and/or stop all of them from aligning against them.

Actually, he can. He just needs to leave his turn to the final hour of the deadline. Waiting 23 hours to play your turn sucks, but freestyle is a bitch and if you want to stay competitive you gotta walk that extra mile. By being online at the final hour, he'll be able to participate in the chat and make counter-offers. At the very least, not playing your turn until the final moment means they can't make deals that don't include you. That's how you beat Kiron and Xiangwang.

http://www.conquerclub.com/game.php?game=9128711

2011-06-18 15:18:20 - Incrementing game to round 16
2011-06-19 15:18:15 - Rodion assaulted Antioch from Aleppo and conquered it from usernamer

Ultimately, if you have the patience to wait 23 hours, 59 minutes and 55 seconds before taking the objective, you can play Kiron and friends in an equal playing field.

[Rodion]

You asked about timing, now you talk about them being friends? I don´t see the connection to your question about timing. You didn´t mention it in your "moment 1-10" theory.
Anyway, i thought the answer about timing and rule breaking would be obvious, but if you say you don´t know it, then perhaps i was wrong?

So, in your opinion there were no rules broken at any time?

People seem to be discussing multiple things: the actual Kiron case and my abstract case. The former has the friendship; the latter doesn't.

In the abstract case, yes, my opinion is that there were no rules broken at any time.
In Kiron's case, my opinion is that they may have talked about the game (or games in general) through unproper channels (which would be a violation), but they may have not. The fact that they made outside games is meaningless in my opinion because it was just their choice for a RNG.

[Seulessliathan]

In the abstract case, yes, my opinion is that there were no rules broken at any time.

Interesting, i didn´t expect that you see it that way. I see rule breaking there. Let´s see if we get more responses.

[kentington]

You asked about timing, now you talk about them being friends? I don´t see the connection to your question about timing. You didn´t mention it in your "moment 1-10" theory.
Anyway, i thought the answer about timing and rule breaking would be obvious, but if you say you don´t know it, then perhaps i was wrong?

So, in your opinion there were no rules broken at any time?

People seem to be discussing multiple things: the actual Kiron case and my abstract case. The former has the friendship; the latter doesn't.

In the abstract case, yes, my opinion is that there were no rules broken at any time.
In Kiron's case, my opinion is that they may have talked about the game (or games in general) through unproper channels (which would be a violation), but they may have not. The fact that they made outside games is meaningless in my opinion because it was just their choice for a RNG.

Yes, thank you for making it confusing.
You say you use the play style in your 1-10 method. Did you post it in hopes that people would find your style of play agreeable?

[codeblue1018]

In the abstract case, yes, my opinion is that there were no rules broken at any time.

Interesting, i didn´t expect that you see it that way. I see rule breaking there. Let´s see if we get more responses.

I'm kind of surprised by this as well rodion. The evidence that Chariot presented is clear cut rules violation/cheating IMO. Josko saw this as well and it probably wouldn't have been uncovered if it weren't for him. The overwhelming majority feels the same also based on the poll, although that means nothing unless the mods ultimately deem the same. I don't believe for one minute that these two players/roommates don't discuss what they will do amongst themselves and discuss to each other how one of them can win or who is in best position to win. They could lose three games and net one win and still be positive on points. Seems like a win/win. They "thought" they were smart enough to utilize open chat to mimic a truce to prevent "secret alliances". Makes sense to me.

[Rodion]

Yes, thank you for making it confusing.
You say you use the play style in your 1-10 method. Did you post it in hopes that people would find your style of play agreeable?

Not really. I haven't played Third Crusade freestyle since mid-2011. I'm not looking for brownie points.

I'm kind of surprised by this as well rodion. The evidence that Chariot presented is clear cut rules violation/cheating IMO. Josko saw this as well and it probably wouldn't have been uncovered if it weren't for him. The overwhelming majority feels the same also based on the poll, although that means nothing unless the mods ultimately deem the same. I don't believe for one minute that these two players/roommates don't discuss what they will do amongst themselves and discuss to each other how one of them can win or who is in best position to win. They could lose three games and net one win and still be positive on points. Seems like a win/win. They "thought" they were smart enough to utilize open chat to mimic a truce to prevent "secret alliances". Makes sense to me.

This has nothing to do with Chariot. I'm talking about the one game that made Kiron conqueror and about a similar scenario. We're basically discussing "boundaries to a given deal", which, as far as I know, do not exist as long as the deal is fully disclosed over game chat ("no secret diplomacy").

Chariot's report is another thing. There are some fishy games in there that warrant a deeper look, yes, but others were added simply because Chariot doesn't understand the map well enough (like the one where Kiron took Malta, then Krak des Chevaliers and, before he could advance all to hit Antiochia, Xiangwang pressed "b" and won - Chariot mentioned something about harmlessly taking Malta and letting Xiangwang win). But this is not the goal of my discussion here, Codeblue.

[kentington]

Yes, thank you for making it confusing.
You say you use the play style in your 1-10 method. Did you post it in hopes that people would find your style of play agreeable?

Not really. I haven't played Third Crusade freestyle since mid-2011. I'm not looking for brownie points.

Ok cool. It is hard to tell the tone of things via text.

[Kiron]

Referring players by colours is the formal way to say it since that seems to be the norm. Of course in a game with new people, it's proper to be formal, that's like going a cocktail party with ur best friend, u don't refer to them by their first name, but by their surname for formality. It's only into the game once everyone is more comfortable do i refer by actual names. If people ask if we know each other, we tell them yes, just like u would at a party. It's not deceptive, it's being polite!

Anyways, can we lock this threat now? The mods have already determined what happened was illegal and i admit my mistake. It was just a misunderstanding of the rules on my part.

[DoomYoshi]

it's proper to be formal, that's like going a cocktail party with ur best friend, u don't refer to them by their first name, but by their surname for formality.

Really? What etiquette guide lists this as a suggested rule? I take it you don't wear white tie often.

[Kiron]

it's proper to be formal, that's like going a cocktail party with ur best friend, u don't refer to them by their first name, but by their surname for formality.

Really? What etiquette guide lists this as a suggested rule? I take it you don't wear white tie often.

Are you saying that it's wrong to suggest otherwise? If you cannot 100% disprove it then it is an accepted way. If i referred to my friend by surname, are you saying i would be deceitful at a cocktail party? Just like referring to ur friend by colour instead of name in a game is fine when u are playing with strangers. I view it as politeness, are u saying it's impolite?

[Chariot of Fire]

are u saying it's impolite

I think it's impolite to invite seven people round a dinner table and you don't let on to six of them that you're best friends with the other one. It's deceitful.

For a better analogy make it a poker table where two players are in cahoots - for CC is really not that different to Texas Hold'Em in that one winner takes all. You and xiangwang never bet against each other. On the contrary you assist each other's victories.

I'm fairly sure the six other players would not have sat at the table had they known in advance there were two players working together. When the game starts it's too late however to stand up and take one's chips away.

[xiangwang]

are u saying it's impolite

I think it's impolite to invite seven people round a dinner table and you don't let on to six of them that you're best friends with the other one. It's deceitful.

For a better analogy make it a poker table where two players are in cahoots - for CC is really not that different to Texas Hold'Em in that one winner takes all. You and xiangwang never bet against each other. On the contrary you assist each other's victories.

I'm fairly sure the six other players would not have sat at the table had they known in advance there were two players working together. When the game starts it's too late however to stand up and take one's chips away.

Slightly flawed analogy, if it's winner takes all then K and I MUST bet against each other. I think you tried this analogy already in another post awhile back and it failed because best friends do play poker with each other (never done poker night with ur best friend?), we both try to win, of course we bet against each other, there are many times i attacked him (only after making sure he CANNOT retaliate, and vice versa). It's pointless for either of us to make half hearted attacks bc it doesn't do anything but entrenches in some useless battle while other players get stronger, half hearted attacks may work on less experienced players who don't know how to recover, but against kiron is pointless unless i have allies that will help me.

Regarding the dinner example, it's not deceitful, you want to be formal at first, it's called being polite.

[DoomYoshi]

How would I go about disproving it?

I never attend formal gatherings but I am semi-formal black tie (tuxedo) events very often and I have never heard this mentioned as even a possibility. If I meet someone, they often introduce themselves with full names, and it is customary to refer to people by their first name, not only if they are my friend but in many cases if I just met them. I understand other cultures may be different, but this is how we do it in North America.

However, it is impossible to disprove a noun. Just like I can't disprove God or FSM, I can not disprove a rule. The onus of proof is on you. Where is there a rule written or unwritten that such is the formal behavior?

Which formal cocktail party have you been to where it was considered polite to refer to someone by their surname? What if it was your wife? How are you supposed to address her?

Keep in mind here: I am not asking you about how you should refer to players in game. I am specifically wondering where you came up with this cocktail party rule, as it seems made up.

[Chariot of Fire]

Chariot's report is another thing. There are some fishy games in there that warrant a deeper look, yes, but others were added simply because Chariot doesn't understand the map well enough (like the one where Kiron took Malta, then Krak des Chevaliers and, before he could advance all to hit Antiochia, Xiangwang pressed "b" and won - Chariot mentioned something about harmlessly taking Malta and letting Xiangwang win)

A rather belittling comment to say I don't understand the map well enough. Do you really think I could have compiled my report if this was was the case? You interpret my remark to mean Kiron only went to Malta and ended his turn. My inference was that he only got as far as Malta with his stack. This was always likely to happen as he opted to take his turn immediately after xiangwang had taken the objective. Now why would he do that, knowing xiangwang was still online? And if you care to look at the timestamps you'll see that he took 1" + 4" + 6" + 4" between each territory gain. Here's not a guy who studied the map prior to clicking Start and thought "Right, all on Vatican and get to Antioch asap via X, Y & Z" (a move that would take any freestyle specialist a matter of seconds) or "Red has the Objective, I am capable of breaking it and taking it for myself, but he has just played and is still online". Oh no, neither of those (logical) scenarios entered his head. Instead he starts his turn, takes his first territory in 1 second and then starts to slow down as he progresses.

"Hey Superwang, I'm almost at the door of Antioch. You'd better click Start soon!" is the line I would use if I was to write a screenplay based on the events and the evidence.

"Hey Superwang, get me a Molson from the fridge would ya?" is what I would write if I thought for one moment that Player K had every intention of breaking Player X.

[Chariot of Fire]

I am specifically wondering where you came up with this cocktail party rule, as it seems made up.

He has a time machine and is actually from the 1920s

[Kiron]

How would I go about disproving it?

I never attend formal gatherings but I am semi-formal black tie (tuxedo) events very often and I have never heard this mentioned as even a possibility. If I meet someone, they often introduce themselves with full names, and it is customary to refer to people by their first name, not only if they are my friend but in many cases if I just met them. I understand other cultures may be different, but this is how we do it in North America.

However, it is impossible to disprove a noun. Just like I can't disprove God or FSM, I can not disprove a rule. The onus of proof is on you. Where is there a rule written or unwritten that such is the formal behavior?

Which formal cocktail party have you been to where it was considered polite to refer to someone by their surname? What if it was your wife? How are you supposed to address her?

Keep in mind here: I am not asking you about how you should refer to players in game. I am specifically wondering where you came up with this cocktail party rule, as it seems made up.

At most business cocktail parties you address each other by surnames even though the full name is spelled out on ur name tag.

[Chariot of Fire]

are u saying it's impolite

I think it's impolite to invite seven people round a dinner table and you don't let on to six of them that you're best friends with the other one. It's deceitful.

For a better analogy make it a poker table where two players are in cahoots - for CC is really not that different to Texas Hold'Em in that one winner takes all. You and xiangwang never bet against each other. On the contrary you assist each other's victories.

I'm fairly sure the six other players would not have sat at the table had they known in advance there were two players working together. When the game starts it's too late however to stand up and take one's chips away.

Slightly flawed analogy, if it's winner takes all then K and I MUST bet against each other. I think you tried this analogy already in another post awhile back and it failed because best friends do play poker with each other (never done poker night with ur best friend?), we both try to win, of course we bet against each other, there are many times i attacked him (only after making sure he CANNOT retaliate, and vice versa). It's pointless for either of us to make half hearted attacks bc it doesn't do anything but entrenches in some useless battle while other players get stronger, half hearted attacks may work on less experienced players who don't know how to recover, but against kiron is pointless unless i have allies that will help me.

Regarding the dinner example, it's not deceitful, you want to be formal at first, it's called being polite.

Well duh! Of course you would bet against each other if you happen to be the last two players at the table. But prior to that....no. Eight players sit around the table, each putting up his or her stake (which on CC is the points they stand to lose). The two players with an unwritten alliance do not bet against each other. On the contrary they help each other, esp in the last round to be dealt when the player with the better hand (of the two protagonists) will take the pot. Net loss to Player 1 = 20pts. Net gain to Player 2 = 140pts. Do this long enough and systematically enough at different tables and the shared earnings could earn one the title King of Poker. Or in this case, Conqueror (cough cough)

[DoomYoshi]

How would I go about disproving it?

I never attend formal gatherings but I am semi-formal black tie (tuxedo) events very often and I have never heard this mentioned as even a possibility. If I meet someone, they often introduce themselves with full names, and it is customary to refer to people by their first name, not only if they are my friend but in many cases if I just met them. I understand other cultures may be different, but this is how we do it in North America.

However, it is impossible to disprove a noun. Just like I can't disprove God or FSM, I can not disprove a rule. The onus of proof is on you. Where is there a rule written or unwritten that such is the formal behavior?

Which formal cocktail party have you been to where it was considered polite to refer to someone by their surname? What if it was your wife? How are you supposed to address her?

Keep in mind here: I am not asking you about how you should refer to players in game. I am specifically wondering where you came up with this cocktail party rule, as it seems made up.

At most business cocktail parties you address each other by surnames even though the full name is spelled out on ur name tag.

Oh ok. I don't consider business formal by any means, but thanks for clarifying. Bay street is messed up.

[mc05025]

I'd like to propose a question regarding a similar case. The question, in advance, is "at which moment is the rule broken?"

The case

Moment 1 - 8-player standard freestyle flat rate Third Crusade game starts
Moment 2 - red and green get considerably weaker than the others
Moment 3 - in a given turn, red and green are the only two players left to make their moves
Moment 4 - they both conclude their individual odds of winning the game is about 5%
Moment 5 - they realize that, should one of them take the objective this very turn and not have it broken by the other, they will win regardless of how strong the other 6 players are
Moment 6 - red proposes the following deal: he will roll a 30v33 (50.5% roughly) attack against Antiochia (owned by, say, blue). Should red win, he will take the objectives and green will promise not to break it. Should red lose, green will take the objectives and red will promise not to break it. Red makes the offer because 50.5% is better than 5%.
Moment 7 - green accepts the offer because 49.5% is better than 5%.
Moment 8 - the 30v33 is rolled and red wins. Red takes all objectives. Red ends the turn.
Moment 9 - green, who could probably take Antiochia and keep the game alive, prefers to honour his word and ends the turn without attacking.
Moment 10 - red presses "b" and wins the game.

*Moment 6 has a difference regarding the actual case. Instead of taking the 50/50 odds to an outside "tiebreaker" game, the deal never has to "leave" that particular game (for the record, Xiangwang originally offered exactly that with his "taking Granada" bet, but that changed to the 3 outside games deal)

In order to answer that you should think what intentionaly throwing a game means.

This case is not completely clear as I have mentioned. There is a theory saying that in each individual game any player should do whatever possible in order to win. This is a very strict translation of the rule about 'throwing a game' and it is not used in general because this a gaming site that in general people do not play that competitive.

So if you consider throwing a game any strategy that does not have just one purpose, to maximize the posibilities of winning the game, but have other purposes (including punishing a player because he left you no real chanses to win, maintain a name of a trustfull player that doesn't backstab people) then step 9 is were the rules are broken.

But in this theory, any A player that have an alliance with B player, if player B is about to win then player A is forced to backstab him if he wants to play according to the rules.

In general I do not like this theory and so I do not beleive that this case is against the rules at any point. I beleive that it is funny to consider the other players feelings (for example I always leave at least a really small chance to any player to win because I am afraid that they will be desperate and attack me just to punish me) and play like robots with the only purpose to win the game. In addition in a site like that there can not be a rule so strict because people will just not going to follow it.

[mc05025]

Sadly many posts are offtopic. So I will answer two quentions

1) Is it possible for other players to win Kiron and Xiang?

Yes it is but they have to play really well. For example playing early in any critical round is like suiciding. See game
http://www.conquerclub.com/game.php?game=12056017
On round 16 xiang who was the strongest by far played early. After 24 hours and several pages of deplomacy and after we blackmailed pink we made a coordinate attack and elliminate him at this very round. His final comment (he was there trying to convinse us otherwise)
2012-12-27 00:36:12 - xiangwang: waah, you guys are so mean!!

So if you do not know how to play, yes your chances are really close to 0%

2) Is their win rate logical?

yes it is. I am sure I can have even better actually. This type of games gives almost 0 chances to weak players. It is the same like 8 players escalating freestyle (in which some players has more than 50% win rate) were there is no diplomacy and so all players are completelly clear. So the win rate saws absolutely nothing

[Bernoulli]

Dirty, dishonorable play, but unless these two players have a habit of doing it in many games together then I see no reason to bring them down for it.

[xiangwang]

Sadly many posts are offtopic. So I will answer two quentions

1) Is it possible for other players to win Kiron and Xiang?

Yes it is but they have to play really well. For example playing early in any critical round is like suiciding. See game
http://www.conquerclub.com/game.php?game=12056017
On round 16 xiang who was the strongest by far played early. After 24 hours and several pages of deplomacy and after we blackmailed pink we made a coordinate attack and elliminate him at this very round. His final comment (he was there trying to convinse us otherwise)
2012-12-27 00:36:12 - xiangwang: waah, you guys are so mean!!

So if you do not know how to play, yes your chances are really close to 0%

2) Is their win rate logical?

yes it is. I am sure I can have even better actually. This type of games gives almost 0 chances to weak players. It is the same like 8 players escalating freestyle (in which some players has more than 50% win rate) were there is no diplomacy and so all players are completelly clear. So the win rate saws absolutely nothing

Oh that was a fun game, yup, gave up my leverage that game, learned my lesson there. Yeah, strong players set up maps so that can win consistently, MC does have a better win rate than me i think. Than again, look at those 1v1 win rates in the top scoreboard, all 60%+

[xiangwang]

Dirty, dishonorable play, but unless these two players have a habit of doing it in many games together then I see no reason to bring them down for it.

I think the issue has already been resolved...it was a mistaken understanding of the rules. Enough with beating the dead horse already. This thread should be closed already, now it's just starting to flame.