I have adjudicated both, and you are 1-1. LOL. I hate playing good DE players, but you seem to be doing fine. Anyway, just posting to say that I'm on vacation next week, so if something odd should happen and the games should both finish next week with a 2-0 winner, your prizes will be a little delayed.
I just hate waiting 5 days between turns. I wish there were a compromise between the rate of 20 turns a day (way too fast for me) and 2 turns a week (too slow). The DE themselves, are definitely tough now when played well.
Yeah. I have never spent more than about 10-15 minutes on any move and have been as highly rated as #2 in the League. I dont keep track of what has been used either. Keep it fun; its not chess where you can look ahead 10 moves. (Although Drvumad just performed a 9 move look ahead in our team game against Robot's top player. Or tried to anyway.)
I did beat you and DrvUMad pretty easily. It could be that by playing a lot more games you've improved more than I have, but I think this is a game that rewards analysis more than experience. A big part of it is avoiding mistakes, you can spend several turns eking out a small advantage, but it's easy to lose it with one oversight. There are definitely times when looking at a position for an hour leads me to a better move than I would have made in five minutes. There are other times when I can decide in a few minutes, but the better the opponent, the less likely they are going to leave you with obvious good choices. There's also a difference in cognitive style between people who come up with better ideas when they think longer, and people who have good initial instincts but don't refine them by thinking longer. I'm a mathematician, primarily; my whole discipline is based on being able to think hard about a single question for a day or a week or a month or a year. There are some problems I've been working hard on for more than a decade. My main point was, even at 5 or 10 minutes per turn, I can't play two complete games in three days, as DrvUMad would want. But, even at an hour per turn, it would be nice to play more than a few turns per week....
You obviously can't look 9 turns ahead, except in weird cases. But just evaluating your opponent's likely responses to each of the moves you're considering, can easily take a lot more than 5 minutes. The situations that take the longest, for me, are when I have no good choices, and I'm looking for the "least bad" move.
David, you need to relax a little. I was just responding to your post and *agreeing* with you, and then you are going on about how you trounced me? What? I was agreeing with you that 5 days is excessive because spending hours and hours on a single HA move is unwarranted. Like I said, I do sometimes spend up to 15 minutes, and sometimes I split that over 2 days, if the position is tricky. If you want to spend 45 minutes, what do I care? I happen to think 5 days is excessive, just as you said, but each to their own. But since you seem to have thrown down a gauntlet, I'll say that when I played you, it was as a courtesy to a TA member that randomly asked me for a practice game - had no idea if you would be decent - and I somehow formed the impression in the first few moves your were a noob. I dont think it was anything you did per se. Rather, you commented that you didnt know the way something worked -- dont remember what -- and you commented that it took time to learn all the mechanics. By the time I realized you were good, I had made a bad mistake already and was P'O'd and it was a little late to start concentrating. Anyway, I lose games all the time -- all the top players do -- my record is around 50-20, give or take. In the early days, I actually lost to a TA member who now has a negative record in the League. The proof is in how you do overall.
I'm pretty relaxed, you seem more worked up than me. Anyway, your point that you can't judge that much from one game, especially since you might take any individual game more or less seriously, is completely valid.
Yeah, I don't think Narziss is continuously focusing on the game for five days, it's just that if you don't move right away then it becomes easy to put it off to think about it some more. I do that too, it just seems like it's getting a bit out of control.
Well, the original tourney rule that was announced was an average of one move a day. The only reason I dont care is because only the two of you are left and neither of you seem to care. So its fine with me, whatever pace you like. But if you want too, you could certainly talk to him about it. I imagine its hard to remember the game history at that pace. You guys would have gotten a kick out of participating in the League v. Robot team game I think, we are taking 2-3 days per move there and really talking/strategizing a lot. Its still going on, but we are kind of comitted to a crystal rush now and it may not be as interesting to join at the moment.
I wouldn't say I don't care. It seems silly to have to wait a week between turns. I don't have trouble remembering the position (since I'm not playing any other games), it's just annoying (especially since I'm not playing any other games while this is going on). I'm not sure what to do, though. I don't really want to "win" by default either. Maybe we should declare DrvUMad the winner, since he had the sense to drop out first. The problem of people losing interest in something that takes months to complete, even if they were enthusiastic at the beginning, is not a new one. I've been on both sides.
At this point, your basically playing for fun and pride only, since Robot offered 3 prizes. I'm pretty sure they dont care if all 3 are the same either. I understand the losing interest thing, and whatever you decide to do is fine by me. My attention is pretty focused on the League, which seems to be working out really well.
Neither pride nor prizes are an issue for me. It's interesting to see how players stack up, but I really don't care who's on top. I only care about playing some enjoyable games against good opponents. I guess I will wait it out for a bit more, although a turn a week is too slow to call "enjoyable", so at some point if things dont pick up I'll just call it a forfeit and move on.
Sorry for the delays, I had mentioned in a game chat to Daviddesj that I would be visiting U Chicago for a week. To be fair, we've both had our pauses (and I thought he mentioned that he would be away for a few days as well during that time), but I figured that would be okay since it was just the last 1v1. Nevertheless, I'll try to keep my plays more systematic. Now, I'm back and Berkeley, and though still busy with my semester, I'll be moving along in my games at a normal pace. I feel like Daviddesj is going to win these two games. I changed my playstyle after the update (since the Dwarves were released), and I actually don't think it is working well. I should go back to playing aggressively and runemetaling my necros instead of my monks.
Excellent! I have to admit I'd started thinking you were just going to resign. One move (in both games combined) in 13 days was not encouraging. But I'll try to pick up the pace if you will. I travel all the time (flying to Florida tomorrow) but it won't stop me from playing. I hope you're right that I'm winning. I did see that they nerfed the crystal bonus for spillover attacks, this helps the elves a little I think, although it hasn't been relevant yet in our games.
I am no DE expert, but I think the top League DE players usually runemetal VMs and Necros situationally, and the Wraith situationally as well. The new team is lots of fun, although I dont know whether they are currently balanced or not.
"Runemetal" is the swords? The Void Monks with swords seem pretty powerful, to me, but I haven't tried to actually win with them. It has been my turn to hold things up, I had some personal issues and distractions, but the ball is back in his court. At this rate, we'll finish by 2014, for sure.
Not looking good. 13 days with no moves from Narziss, I have not been the promptest but I fear he has totally lost interest. I guess soon the games will automatically forfeit unless he moves. :-(
really? this is still going one? really? its funny how some players need to travel to an tibetan monastery to meditate for every move they made.. like its an life altering moment.. hehe but then an auto forfeit win would be fitting for this "drag race" cheers
It's been so long between our moves that I seriously feel like I can't even remember how to play this game anymore. What happens if I concede?
