@Lord Pollax, who straw figured you as saying that PLS should be unlimited?
A few replies:
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- I’ve never said I’m “more right” because I’ve made “more arguments.” Nor am I “yelling louder.” What I have said is that I think I’m more right because I’m not seeing good reasons for PQ+Random. And I am offering arguments (that I take to be well-reasoned) for folks to discuss. I’ve also encouraged folks to engage those reasons. Chainan has above, and I’m responding. Tom has as well to an extent, but I’m not responding to him directly. (Sorry @Tom, you and I disagree about something prior to the issue. I just don't think it's bad that we end up with 500 SB's. We could chat about this another time I suppose. I figure the “best” position here can sot itself out when folks try to reason and engage in discussion in good faith.
To be clear: I’m not asking anyone here to just think that my preferences are the right ones. In fact, I don’t actually know what my preference would be…. because I’ve never played Pq+linear. But I think that the evidence of how the game works shows that PQ+linear would make for better game play. It would give us the best of the Classic queue with the best of the PQ. I might hate it - but right now, it stands to reason that it's better. I'll continue to offer argumentation that suggests it would be better. (Note: I'm open to being wrong about this. But not based on someone's "preference" or frustration with global ship limits. Show me why the random queue makes for better game play.)
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-This conversation isn’t one where I am arguing against PLS or in favor of the global limit. So I’m not sure that my (or DM’s for that matter) “experience” with PLS or unlimited games matters for this discussion. I feel like you want to have an argument about “PLS or Unlimited” that is tangential to this topic. I think that folks vote with their gaming hours, and PLS doesn’t draw much interest because folks aren’t into it -despite the vocal PLS supporters. But I’ll tell ya what, I’m happy to give it a try when I have more free time – hit me up when you are starting a new PLS sector and let me know. I'll see if I can add another game to my dance card.
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-I don’t agree with you about all the builds averaging out random vs linear. You are right that there are “Free builds” from others people combat, and that knowing where the builds will be does not magically make them near us. But… the planets we have and control are randomly distributed at the start of the game. So we've already randomized the build order for any given player... My *PRIMARY* point though isn't that linear will give me more builds. It's that knowing the build order lets me go out and FIGHT for those planets that are building soon. It lets me (using skill, tactics, diplomacy or strategy) improve my position. It gives me control, and thus gives me interesting choices about how to proceed.
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-You wrote to Mursu, “Can you take actions knowing exactly where a player is ABOUT TO build a ship? You bet! And that is fundamentally wrong”
I agree with Mursu's reply. It sounds amaizng to me that we can take actions. It gives me options for how to play the game – I can choose to try and fight there, or elsewhere, or avoid it, or... The bottom line: It opens up my decision-making. That allows for skill and interesting tactics to shine. It adds choices.
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-You also wrote to Mursu, “
Thinking that knowing where all future ship builds will be is a minor item is simply wrong, hence the big arguments of DM and J-Zan. “
Ooops, I’m not saying this is a “minor item” – I’m saying that the linear build would be a small tweak (random to linear) that makes for BIG IMPROVEMENTS in game play. It opens up choices, tactics, etc… It’s not “no big deal” – it’s a big deal – A good one!
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-Ship Slots.
I think you missed my point – but to address your concerns first. Yes, I’m well aware of the value of the ship slot, thanks. I argued aggressively about the value of those slots in the forums in the great “Merlin Build Control” debates that gave us PQ (and PLS).
I’m not sure that in our current PQ system that an "sdsf ship slot built in the back of my empire" is worth the same as the "2 PP and the x% chance of another build going to me." It might be, but the weight has changed here from the Classic queue because of the floating limit, and the added costs for building ships. Anyway, in the current PQ game I’m focusing on, I’m actually sticking to that wisdom. I have mostly queued tech-1 Eros’ everywhere I can’t put a sexy Rexy. But at any given time I find myself with about 10% of my bases with nothing queued. It sucks… but it is what it is. The point of my first post seems to have missed you though - the issue is that the random build control hands me "failure messages" that are not fully in my control. Let's try the argument again.
In PQ+Random, the ability to queue meaningful ships becomes “outside of my control.” Now, that’s obviously false in hindsight… I can always look backwards and say that a failure message is my fault – I didn’t queue something, and I should be. But stopping there is just falling into a hindsight bias - it's the wrong way to consider the problem.
What we want to consider is if I made a mistake in the turn, before the host runs, that yields the failure message. And we often have to make choices (build here or build there, move the ship here or there). We have limited ships, limited resources, and so we have to make choices each turn about where to set the builds. With the Random Queue, I can’t make an informed choice about what is best to do with those resource – the “best choice” is out of my control. I run the turn, and I find out that my decisions were the wrong ones. I didn't have the ability to make a good choice - it was just the throw of a die.
That's different for the linear queue. It puts the ability to make good choices about SB builds back into my control (and everyone else’s). It let’s us plot against each other, or with each other. It expands our options for what decisions we make.
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TLDR; PQ+linear isn't my "personal taste" opposed to someone else's personal taste for another variation. It looks like PQ+linear would be the option that promotes more options in game play, and for that reason is the better variation. |
Show Media Item - So let's talk about the random queue. The random queue has...
