Worms: Forum Fatalities - A BRcade Game =We Have a Winner!=

[Preezy]

My thought process was basically: move, loot and shoot until I die. I tended to just jump into my actions without thinking too much about the consequences. I think it was pretty successful and definitely didn't think I'd last all the way to the endgame

[Dual]

Gg everyone

[DarkRula]

My thought process was basically: move, loot and shoot until I die. I tended to just jump into my actions without thinking too much about the consequences. I think it was pretty successful and definitely didn't think I'd last all the way to the endgame

Jumped into actions without thinking of the consequences...

I guess that's how you ended up dealing more damage than anyone else.

[OrangeRKN]

I just went back through all my PMs - here is how I did it!

Day 1 and I dropped at F1 - my thought was to land in the middle column so I could avoid wasting actions on movement and instead loot up for the endgame. My hope was that people would avoid the centre until near the end (as they had in BRcade 1.0) leaving my safe to loot, and I chose F1 rather than F2 or F3 because I thought if anywhere risked being randomly fired upon, it would be the central named tiles.

Immediately my plan was thrown off as Preezy started on the same tile as me. Ever the optimist however I immediately reached out with the offer of peace. True to my word, I looted twice, ignoring Preezy. He did not do the same.

The looting actually went really well on turn 1 and as it happens is what won me the game - I found both Invisibility and Freeze. Even at the time I thought this a huge stroke of luck, as I considered both of them (but freeze especially) to be the best items in the game. I immediately planned to hold onto them until endgame, with the hope that I could simply survive the inevitable crossfire to bring home the win. That's sort of what ended up happening - it was the 20 turns inbetween where things wobbled!

As I say, Preezy did not take me up on my offer of peace. I was immediately attacked by both Preezy (who had also moved off from my tile) and, from another tile, Rocsteady. If my looting had been a stroke of luck, this was the opposite - down to 140 health from turn 1.

Deciding not to panic, and given I was now alone on F1, I decided not to move - I thought me moving would probably be most expected given the damage I'd taken, so staying put would be safer. It wasn't. I looted twice (finding a bazooka and dynamite) but was damaged again by Preezy, knocking me down to 110 health.

At this point I did panic. In the first two turns I was almost down to half health, and everyone else in the game was barely scratched. I decided to move to G1 and activate invisibility. Unfortunately the set action order was not in my favour, as Preezy acted first and attacked me again before I had a chance to flee. Now I was invisible on another empty tile, but down to 80 health and with two players on surrounding tiles. I posted saltily in the thread about the fixed action order putting me at an inherent disadvantage against my now nemesis Preezy.

I was in full-on flight mode at this point, and spent my next turn moving twice, fleeing from the centre into I1. Still invisible, I found myself on another empty tile but still with two others somewhere in my surroundings. My logic now was to get to the corner tile with the advancing water to minimise the number of surrounding tiles, hopefully minimising my chances of being targeted.

I looted twice, finding teleport and a grenade, and otherwise stayed safe despite the two surrounding players. It appeared I had managed to escape Preezy's vendetta, but unfortunately I had now wasted my invisibility.

I looted once more (finding a bazooka), then moved into J1. Now I was in the corner of the map, and finally completely alone. If it wasn't for my health I was feeling pretty well set up with the weapons I had found.

My safety couldn't last however as I immediately had to move back to avoid the rising water, so I looted (finding a jetpack) and moved back into I1, knowing it to be empty. It was, as were now its surrounding tiles.

At this point I sent out a message to Qikz and LightWanderer, both of them now on lower HP:

Hello both! We're all lower health than the competition, which gives us some bad odds. I suggest we reverse those odds by teaming up. What do you say?

I have a load of weapons from looting, my problem is finding targets. Do either of you know where anyone is? I'm currently all on my own with no one around me but have weapons that can target further

Both responded, giving me valuable intel on people's locations. Qikz told me he was on F2 along with Ob Bob and Party Hat guy, with five others surrounding. He also told me he had a concrete donkey and was about to die - with that in mind, I decided not to tell him my own location in return, just in case he tried to donkey me just to get a kill before he went out! Sorry Qikz, I was not so trusting after Preezy!

I myself decided to grenade G1, as I wanted to "clear my path" back to the centre with the rising water behind me. There was no target to hit, but at least that told me G1 was currently empty.

Qikz had (as he predicted) died, leaving me LightWanderer as my only ally and source of intel. They really pulled through for me though (also predicting their death the coming turn), letting me know they were on F2 with Ob Bob with four others on surrounding tiles. With that in mind, I moved to H1 and threw another grenade, this time targeting F1 (one of LW's surrounding tiles). This time I got a hit, targeting Dual and damaging Party Hat guy too.

Being alone and with no one surrounding me, I let bloodlust get the better of me as I looted (finding an Uzi) then targeted F1 again, this time with a bazooka. Again I hit Dual, and again I damaged Party Hat.

With water rising, I moved into G1, then fired once more on F1 with another bazooka. For the third time I hit Dual and damaged Party Hat, but now I was no longer alone - Ironhide was on my tile, and we had four others surrounding us. I reached out for a truce:

Let's not shoot each other and here's my presentation on why:

- We are both (me by a larger margin) on lower health than our opponents, the best outcome is preserving our health while others shoot each other
- If I'm alive on the same tile as you, because I'm on lower health, people are more likely to shoot me than you. I'm basically a free shield!

Ironhide agreed, but still distrusting from my opening encounter and wary of the surroundings I decided to play it safe - I teleported across the map to E4. This landed me right next to Hexx and Ob Bob - which was funny, as I'd just messaged Hexx with my previous location after he asked the thread where everyone was at. My thought there had been to buy some goodwill while not actually endangering myself given I was teleporting away, so now I hoped my goodwill gesture would pay off!

It did. Hexx reached out to me and Ob Bob offering peace, which I gladly accepted, as did Ob Bob. My main plan now was to survive long enough to get some health back, and I wanted to save my remaining weapons for the endgame. I forgot to act, skipping turn 13, but not much was lost.

Now came the chance to heal, but I had a problem - Ob Bob was ahead of me in the action order, and if he looted twice there would be none left for me. I had to take a gamble and move before looting, so I moved to F4. Unfortunately it had already been picked clean, so despite being empty of other players there was no loot to be found and I missed my one chance to heal. With everyone else seemingly succeeding, this really looked like game over for me. I only hoped that being low health would make me a lower priority target in the coming finale!

With no loot to be had, I decided simply not to move. Come turn 16, Hexx and Ob Bob had joined me on F4 as the map narrowed to a single column, and the alliance of peace was reaffirmed, much to my agreement. True to my word, with the hope of buying more goodwill in our alliance, I fired an uzi at F3. Unfortunately whoever had been there moved first in the action order, and my attack missed.

I skipped another turn, and Ironhide joined us on F4. At this point I decided to get the jump on the others - I jet packed away to F1, dropping a dynamite as I left. My plan was to damage everyone there, but due to the action order and people moving I ended up only hurting Ob Bob. I desperately tried to cover for myself in PM saying I was meant to target Ironhide, but I think Ob Bob saw through my lies! More luckily, I found F1 empty, and from my empty surroundings knew F2 to be empty too.

The water was rising for a final time and so I moved to F2, firing an uzi at F3. This targeted Hexx, but unfortunately I was also damaged by Jenuall. I found myself once again on the same tile as Ironhide, and the forts were set - me and Ironhide in Pinkbeard Pass, with Preezy, Hexx and Ob Bob in Boggy B. Bunker. I was at 45 health, at a considerable disadvantage, but I had a plan. I still had Freeze.

I froze.

Before I could act, Ob Bob threw a holy hand grenade. An interesting note about the holy hand grenade - it detonates at the end of the turn. Between it landing and exploding was my action. I looted, finding a girder of all items, and then I used Freeze. The hand grenade exploded, but I was protected by my icy prison.

Another interesting note, and one I did not realise until it happened - freeze lasts a full "turn" from when you use it, which means it protects you in two turns. In the turn you use it, it protects you from all attacks after you in the turn order. In the next turn, it continues to protect you from all attacks before you in the turn order. Ob Bob was before me in the turn order, but the holy hand grenade had waited until the end of the turn to detonate, so I had been protected. Now Ob Bob attacked me again, but the damage landed before I acted - my protection still counted. Freeze saved me a second time. It also saved me from another attack by Preezy. Then, finally, the ice melted. I looted (finding a grenade) and I deployed my girder.

Finding the girder had been my second key stroke of luck. You all know what happened - Ob Bob attacked me again, but for a third time I was protected. I looted for what it was worth, finding an uzi, and then I grenaded Preezy, killing him. Finally, against all odds, vengeance was mine!

With Hexx also falling, that left myself and Ob Bob. I should have lost here - it would have taken two turns, but being ahead of me in the action order meant Ob Bob would have killed me if things had been left to play out. Luckily for me, Rula threw a curve ball with the final challenge. I decided to apply some maths and try to make the best estimate I could.

I worked back through both my PMs and the thread updates to gather some stats. Across the game I had looted 12 times and found 7 weapons. That was an average of 0.318 weapons per turn across my 22 turns. The average number of turns a player survived was 16 turns, and there were 14 players in total. Assuming I wasn't a complete outlier, I took my weapon finding average and applied to to the average player. That came out as the average player looting 5 weapons, or 71 weapons total for all 16 players. Subtracting from the 200 total Rula had given us, that left me with an estimate of 129 remaining weapons.

Based on the thread, however, I thought Ob Bob might go low. I also thought it quite likely I was a little below average for looting weapons given the time I spent moving around (read: fleeing) and given I had skipped a couple of turns. I therefore adjusted my estimate to a nice round 100, straight down the middle. Ob Bob guessed 42, the answer was 111, and against all odds I emerged victorious.

[Oblomov Boblomov]

Here's my story:

I mostly concentrated on throwing sexy dance moves and hanging out with my bros.

Every now and then I shot a gun. It felt good.

I tried to heal everyone and bring back worms from the dead, with my 2 million HP health crate I found while looting, but the evil DarkRula wouldn't let me I just wanted us all to live in sexy peace, then that psychopath Orange Rakoon went and blasted me to smithereens!!

[Moggy]

I don’t think I used any weapons. My strategy was to hang around the edges, gather loot, slowly move in and hope that in the end game I had lots of health and lots of firepower.

The confusion over the turns strawberry floated that though and so I drowned.

[DarkRula]

It is worth noting with Ob-Bob's story that I let it filter into other PM's on occasion. He was a Worm who didn't want to fight, but make the world a happy and sexy place. It was a simple note added to the end of one PM that started the entire story off, and one that was fairly innocent. After all, you can't stop Worms from dancing. And then he wanted to take all his clothes off and do strip teases and other things you'd find on cam sites. Well, I'd already started, so why stop now? Then it came to the final few turns, where I was going all out with it - even in that final showdown.

And that is how a Worm was robbed of his chance to become a world famous strippergram.

[Oblomov Boblomov]

It is worth noting with Ob-Bob's story that I let it filter into other PM's on occasion. He was a Worm who didn't want to fight, but make the world a happy and sexy place. It was a simple note added to the end of one PM that started the entire story off, and one that was fairly innocent. After all, you can't stop Worms from dancing. And then he wanted to take all his clothes off and do strip teases and other things you'd find on cam sites. Well, I'd already started, so why stop now? Then it came to the final few turns, where I was going all out with it - even in that final showdown.

And that is how a Worm was robbed of his chance to become a world famous strippergram.

It's a classic and beautiful, but ultimately tragic tale .

[McCoughlan]

In other words, OR played like the Italians. So scared of his own weakness he planned to win the war by entering into alliances.
One by one his allies fell while he remained to forge alliances with others.
Until one day there was nobody left to be his allies. So he abandoned his Italian gameplan, gained confidence in his own strength and went on to victory.

It's hauntingly poetic

[DarkRula]

Having got to the point in Jedi Outcast where I'm about to get a lightsaber, I'll pause it there to give the awards out. And first, the award for the winner.

...has won the Golden Worm for winning this second BRcade.

And now for some other awards based on various stats.

...has won the Weapon of Mass Destruction award for dealing the most damage (600), and the Successful Striker award for successfully landing the most attacks (10).

...has won the Mighty Mover award for moving the furthest distance (18 tiles).

...has won the Item Hoarder award for keeping a hold of the most items (15).

...has won the Wandering Trader award for having movement and looting figures being the same number (13).

...has won the You Missed! award for the most failed attacks (3).

...and, because I know he's waiting for me to give it...

...has won the Sauciest Worm award for being the naughtiest Worm around.

It's been a good game, everyone, and I'll be sure to give some final thoughts soon. If there's anything else you want to add, please feel free to do so.

[Oblomov Boblomov]

Happy with that — any worms looking for a good time just drop me a PM .

[OrangeRKN]

Jesus Christ Preezy

Thanks Rula! As I said, I've really enjoyed playing this, and it was great to have new mechanics in play.

When it comes to future changes, my biggest points would be:

- Action order should not be pre-determined and fixed! Even 1.0's approach of randomising the action order every turn was fairer. I'm still planning on running a new game using my "choosable hit-chance priority" system as has been discussed in the forum games planning thread, which I think could be better yet.

- Separate movement from attacks to avoid any situation where people can miss because their target has already moved. This has been an issue with both BRcade games so far, and while I think the double action approach here was an improvement, the fact that attacks came after movement was the wrong way round (even if in-keeping with Worms).

- Higher damage/lower health to decrease time to kill. This issue was compounded by the limited weapons - an infinite use default weapon would have been good too. The problem with such high health is in dissuading people from attacking - why attack if you know you can't get a kill? Weapons are too valuable a commodity to throw away, and I think hoarding should be discouraged - it's much more interesting to have a wide spread of deaths across the length of the game rather than everyone camping until the endgame. Being able to loot from dead players would help encourage combat too.

- Quicker shrinking map. This one you realised and corrected midway, so fair enough!

[Preezy]

...has won the Weapon of Mass Destruction award for dealing the most damage (600), and the Successful Striker award for successfully landing the most attacks (10).

I am become Death, the destroyer of worms...

[Vermilion]

...has won the You Missed! award for the most failed attacks (3).

My aim sucks.

[Drumstick]

...has won the You Missed! award for the most failed attacks (3).

My aim sucks.

Damn CoD updates.

[DarkRula]

When it comes to future changes, my biggest points would be:

- Action order should not be pre-determined and fixed! Even 1.0's approach of randomising the action order every turn was fairer. I'm still planning on running a new game using my "choosable hit-chance priority" system as has been discussed in the forum games planning thread, which I think could be better yet.

- Separate movement from attacks to avoid any situation where people can miss because their target has already moved. This has been an issue with both BRcade games so far, and while I think the double action approach here was an improvement, the fact that attacks came after movement was the wrong way round (even if in-keeping with Worms).

- Higher damage/lower health to decrease time to kill. This issue was compounded by the limited weapons - an infinite use default weapon would have been good too. The problem with such high health is in dissuading people from attacking - why attack if you know you can't get a kill? Weapons are too valuable a commodity to throw away, and I think hoarding should be discouraged - it's much more interesting to have a wide spread of deaths across the length of the game rather than everyone camping until the endgame. Being able to loot from dead players would help encourage combat too.

- Quicker shrinking map. This one you realised and corrected midway, so fair enough!

The fixed action order came mostly from Invisibilty and Freeze and making those fairer for use (even if I didn't advertise such within the rules). If someone who was last in the previous action order used one of the two, then was within the first few for the current turn, it would have counted those as a turn. Invisibilty wouldn't be affected much for that first turn after use, but certainly for the second. As for Freeze, you used it to great effect, but the same thing applies.

I do think it's impossible to avoid a situation where people can miss attacking unless you phased the action order to be a two-part turn, where the first is for looting and moving and the second purely for attacking, with action plans sent out at each phase. That would mean everyone has a chance to attack or defend at the same time. Might be worth considering for your next game. Such a phasing structure would also mean the reason for the fixed action order would be nullified.

The big one is definitely the items. Some just weren't needed, and the balancing was off massively with them. It's why I boosted the health to 200 in the first place, as I wanted the powerful weapons to cause maximum damage, but felt they would be wiping several people out in one turn and I refused to lower the damage output of them. Nearly all other weapons were 30 damage, and the entire system of items could have used a massive overhaul.

The Uzi could fill the role of infinite use, but also have the lowest damage output. Each extra weapon would then see an increase in 5 damage output, while also focusing more on special actions. The Shotgun being used to attack two people or one person twice, for example. Having a limited inventory would have also helped with hoarding, but I didn't place a restriction on it, being one of the things I had overlooked. The powerful weapons would see a change so rather than being powerful from overpowered damage output, the special actions would be what define them as powerful. I also think reducing the number of items would have helped, since 18 of them is a bit much.

The map was a large thing I had overlooked, especially when it came to restricting the area of play after a number of turns. I should really have stuck to the original plan of just seven columns instead of eleven. Things were more balanced like that, since it would have been a smaller area of play from the start while also allowing the events to play out more naturally.

In fact, let's roll out the original plan for those events.

Uzi Does It was still first at Turn 2, with seven columns reduced to five on Turn 4. You Missed! would have been before Sudden Death originally, as a way to force some powerful plays while everyone was crowded together.

Instead, Turn 6 would have seen an event called Destruction Donkey. I was planning to still use this one, until I changed it for Monsoon Madness, and it would probably have been viewed as unfair had it happened. It would have dropped a Concrete Donkey on four random tiles, which could have spelled an early end for some had their tile been chosen. The only thing that makes this event not as bad is the fact that had it been used on Turn 10, 1:7 odds is better than 1:5.

Once five columns had been reduced to three on Turn 8, Turn 10 would have seen Happy Healthiday take place, with the same idea behind it. Turn 12 would see just one column remain, with Turn 14 seeing You Missed! take place. Turn 16 would have been the start of Sudden Death, again with the same idea behind it.

The original plan would have seen a faster game, but then I was looking at the previous BRcade game, felt that my current map was a bit too small, added those extra columns onto it, then didn't apply the necessary rebalancing to keep the same speed.

As said before, though, running this has given me a much clearer idea of what needs to be done to make a cleaner game, as well as helping with ideas for that other game I've been crafting.

[OrangeRKN]

Interesting thoughts!

I do think it's impossible to avoid a situation where people can miss attacking unless you phased the action order to be a two-part turn, where the first is for looting and moving and the second purely for attacking, with action plans sent out at each phase.

Flip it around - the first part for attacking, and the second for movement. Then you still only need send out one action plan and players still only need to respond once per day - it's just in the resolution where the order changes. First work out the result of all the attacks, and then resolve the movement - with anyone who has died obviously discounted!

[DarkRula]

...the first part for attacking, and the second for movement...

Oh, yeah. That would be the better way. I'm still in the Worms mindset, I guess.

[OrangeRKN]

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