BRcade - Battle Royale Forum Game *Day 17* [VICTORY]

[jawafour]

Congrats, Drum, and well played, OR, for running the game so well. Everyone seemed to have a great time! (apart from getting shot, obvs).

[more heat than light]

Here's the 'betrayal' PM that Tragic sent me. I'll leave it to you guys to decide whether it was accidentally sent or not...

Wow. You guys definitely seem legit and well organised. So I'll be completely honest with you now.

MHTL and I have been working together since we both landed in the larger factory. That's larger, as in the drink, larger.

But, unless he's betrayed me, MHTL is in cell D3 with Super Dragon, while I am in cell E3.

But now comes a confession. Last night, I asked MHTL if he had been in contact with Super Dragon and his reply didn't answer that question at all. I took this as a clear sign that he was now plotting against me.

So, without thinking, I PMed an attack move, targeting MHTL with my sniper rifle.

I felt bad. Really bad. So later in the night, I encouraged MHTL to move back into E3 with me, in the hope that he leaves D3 before I'm able to fire a shot at him. If anyone else remains in D3, I'll have shot them this evening.

I have one sniper rifle left and one shotgun. So I'm happy to help you all. And hopefully MHTL can forgive me. I have shamed myself with my actions so I am willing to take any orders from yourselves. For what it's worth, I think it's an excellent idea for me to take a pot shot at the centre square, which I believe is possible from E3 if I shoot diagonally.

I was under the impression that we were working as a twosome, and protecting each other with our sniper rifles (we both had one, so we could technically cover each other as we inched around the map). It was working pretty well, although we hadn't bumped into anyone we certainly weren't in any danger. When that PM came through I made the decision to go lone wolf, I certainly couldn't trust anyone who had a target on me, no matter how remorseful they were afterwards.

[Rax]

Only requiring one PM per day from each player is a good rule that levels the playing field for less active forumites and those in different timezones. I would not change this. I would however consider splitting the day into two distinct phases - "action" and "movement". While ideally from a strategy perspective a player would be able to choose what to do in the movement phase based on the outcome of the action phase, this would double the playtime through requiring two days per full turn. Instead I would suggest players sending in both their action and movement (if any) at the same time, requiring a certain amount of prediction but keeping the pace of the game up.

The boardgame Colt Express uses a system like this, there is a turn order and everyone has a certain number of actions each turn but they are played face down and then theyre all resolved at the end of the turn. So I know who will do something before and after me but I dont know what they did so I need to plan my actions around that. If your action would do nothing, eg I punch when noone is beside me, then tough gooseberry fool, thats a wasted action. You could do something similar here, give people a couple of different possible actions, (loot, punch, move, shoot, get into cover, leave cover, climb on something, get down etc etc) they can then choose 3 or something and theyre all put into order and resolved at the end of the turn. So you might want to loot but by the time you do that action someone else already has and you come up empty, or you shoot the person in the square but they have moved away. But it can also work the other way, your original target might move but then someone else has moved into your space in the mean time so you shoot them instead, its a nice mox of strategy and random and hopefully Ive explained it well.

[Hexx]

Super Dragon 64 is a lying clunge hole!

[Drumstick]

My suggestions for future games:

-more varied items that can hurt/heal different amounts (i.e. herbs, first aid spray, cloaking device, proximity mines)
-Different map shape

That's all I got of the top of my head.

[OrangeRKN]

The boardgame Colt Express uses a system like this, there is a turn order and everyone has a certain number of actions each turn but they are played face down and then theyre all resolved at the end of the turn.

This is interesting to hear about, especially ideas about target automatically switching rather than simply failing if those around change.

cloaking device

I don't like the idea of someone being able to guarantee immunity from attack in any turn. What were you thinking a cloaking device item would do?

proximity mines

Mines or other map tile traps I'm unsure of as I feel like they might discourage movement and aggressive play. Why risk moving if you might kill yourself by doing so? Better in that case to stay put, even if there is no one around. I think there might be ways of making interesting trap items, but I'm wary of discouraging movement.

Different map shape

What shape(s) were you thinking? Related, the game might be interesting with hexes rather than square tiles - but I wouldn't be able to so easily draw it in libreoffice

heal different amounts

I'm not sure there is much scope for differing amounts of healing considering a first aid kit will either heal 1 or 2 health, but I like the idea of an additional health/armour hybrid item that heals 1 point of health and grants 1 point of armour.

[Nun]

Binoculars to look into an adjacent tile was an item I thought could be fun. I was juggling pistols by the end so a bit of extra variety with item pickups would be good if you do end up running again.

[Jenuall]

Really interesting reading other people's write ups of what was going on during the game. It was always going to be a game of team ups followed by eventual backstabbing and betrayal!

Myself and Minoru joined forces after both landing in B3 and our affiliation allowed us to play out a fairly safe game on the Northwest for quite a while until the shrinking forced us into the inevitable bloodbath!

We attempted to recruit others along the way but the nature of the game ensured that it was always difficult to know who to trust. Jezo and Tragic were amongst those we put feelers out for but it was clear that they had their own agendas - after TM sent the message quoted earlier it was obvious that we had stepped into the middle of something between TM and MHTL!

Our plan was to try and remain safe on the outskirts for as long as possible, taking pot shots at anyone we came across and hoping that TM could use the sniper rifle to whittle down the numbers in the centre before we were forced in. Based on the messages in the public thread we decided that Karl, as the most vocal member of DUALFORCE, was a threat and so he became one of our primary targets. I'm pleased that I managed to survive to see Karl removed, albeit I was then blasted by Oblomov straight after Minoru took the shot on Karl!

I think one of the mistakes I made was in not looting enough (and not reading the rules to see that named tiles contained more loot! ). I went through the game with just a pistol that I grabbed on day 1/2.

All in all a great game, thanks again for running it OR!

The only change that I thought about whilst playing it was whether there could be any kind of awareness communicated about other players locations, based on actions. For example if I'm in say B3 and the night action involves someone firing a shot in one of the adjacent tiles it might be good if my daily update then said something like: "You hear a pistol shot to the South" - that would give me some further information on which to base my actions? One of the challenges in the game was that other than what you were aware of in your own square you were playing blind.

[Moggy]

I’d like a baseball bat if we play again, just so I can smash it into Mini E’s face.

[Mini E]

I’d like a baseball bat if we play again, just so I can smash it into Mini E’s face.

Come at me, bitch.

[Moggy]

I’d like a baseball bat if we play again, just so I can smash it into Mini E’s face.

Come at me, bitch.

Oh I will cum at you alright.

[more heat than light]

I think the main thing I'd like to see is the map to shrink in a random location, just like it does in standard BR games. It would mean people would have to think on the fly a bit more, rather than knowing they were going to be moved inwards every three turns.

Also I'm not sure if this actually happened as I didn't request a landing spot, but there should be a possibility that you don't actually land exactly where you want. Would help to prevent team-ups from the off.

[OrangeRKN]

Binoculars to look into an adjacent tile was an item I thought could be fun

Yeah I thought about this but forgot, binoculars could be fun. I'd even be tempted to make them usable in the proposed "movement" phase, so if you pick up binoculars you have the choice of scouting somewhere rather than moving.

The thing to balance with adding more loot is making sure people still have a good chance of getting a weapon. It was a bit funny seeing how many repeat pistols you got as the actual loot odds were:

pistol (2/6), shotgun (1/6), sniper rifle (1/6), medkit (1/6), armour (1/6)

So really you were just as likely to get either a shotgun or sniper rifle as you were to get a pistol.

The only change that I thought about whilst playing it was whether there could be any kind of awareness communicated about other players locations, based on actions. For example if I'm in say B3 and the night action involves someone firing a shot in one of the adjacent tiles it might be good if my daily update then said something like: "You hear a pistol shot to the South" - that would give me some further information on which to base my actions? One of the challenges in the game was that other than what you were aware of in your own square you were playing blind.

I wanted to do this but it was just too time consuming! I'd definitely add it in a script for automating turn resolution.

I think the main thing I'd like to see is the map to shrink in a random location, just like it does in standard BR games. It would mean people would have to think on the fly a bit more, rather than knowing they were going to be moved inwards every three turns.

The problem with not shrinking centrally is that either it will become possible for the map to shrink more than one tile in a direction which could catch people out, or we have to make the map shrink more slowly to ensure it only moves in one tile at a time. Radially it works because although it shrinks in 2 tiles at once, that's only 1 tile from opposite directions.

I think that knowing it will shrink centrally gives more strategy to picking a drop location too.

[Jenuall]

The only change that I thought about whilst playing it was whether there could be any kind of awareness communicated about other players locations, based on actions. For example if I'm in say B3 and the night action involves someone firing a shot in one of the adjacent tiles it might be good if my daily update then said something like: "You hear a pistol shot to the South" - that would give me some further information on which to base my actions? One of the challenges in the game was that other than what you were aware of in your own square you were playing blind.

I wanted to do this but it was just too time consuming! I'd definitely add it in a script for automating turn resolution.

I did think that this may have been the case - there would be even more things for you to keep track of!

One enjoyable sideline I got from playing this was it made me think of ways in which I might implement some tools to automate things if I were running a similar game - it's always nice to have a problem to ponder!

[Karl_]

+1 for:
Hex map
Audio cues from adjacent tiles
Having a 'movement' and an 'action' every turn
More loot types
A Dual memorial location so that future generations never forget the horrors of Dual

-1 for:
Dual-wielding, it has "Dual" in the name

[Moggy]

I think the game should foster more goodwill between posters. The next game should have no player v player kills until Dual has been eliminated.

Nobody should suffer the indignity of dying before Dual.

Dual

[Dual]

Dual's idea for next game

- ban all teams dedicated to killing Dual
- leave Dual alone
- Dual starts with infinite ammo Sniper Rifle

[Jezo]

cloaking device

I don't like the idea of someone being able to guarantee immunity from attack in any turn. What were you thinking a cloaking device item would do?

I had a similar idea for a cloaking device. It wouldn't make you invincible, just invisible. Like maybe it'd last for 3 turns and you could walk around without being seen. If you attack someone the effects of it wear off. Technically, if you wanted, you could allow people to attack cloaked people if they suspect someone is there. If no one is there they just miss a turn, but if there is, they get attacked as normal. I suppose the semantics of it would be questionable, but as a rough idea perhaps it could spur other ideas?

[Nun]

It was a bit funny seeing how many repeat pistols you got as the actual loot odds were:

pistol (2/6), shotgun (1/6), sniper rifle (1/6), medkit (1/6), armour (1/6)

So really you were just as likely to get either a shotgun or sniper rifle as you were to get a pistol.

Pretty much sums up my run this game,

I started in Sonnum Ruins with 4 other people, everyone looted, I moved 4th so didn't get any loot.
I tried to leave Sonnum Ruins, I moved 4th so Vermillion was able to shoot me down to 1Hp before I could leave.
Then I spent the rest of the game moving around looting and managed to only pick up 4 pistols in a row.
Then I was forced to move into the centre by the incoming barrier as I had only ever had 1Hp, I moved in first and so was immediately sniped by Tragic Magic.

[OrangeRKN]

I was waiting for the Nun tale of woe

On the invisibility cloak idea, I think it'd need some kind of significant downside to balance it. Becoming visible if you attack is a good start, but I'd also suggest something like you take 1 damage every turn you're wearing it, or using it requires dropping all your loot. A genuine penalty that makes it a serious tradeoff to use.

I'm liking all these ideas anyway