Scoring System - Please vote if you ever play in tournaments

[philqw78]

Phil, no need to be negative...

I'm not sure is this more sarcasm. FFFFF is 1048575, hex

[timmy1]

Phil

I some computing systems FFFF or FFFFFF is binary representation of minus 1 (in what's called two's compliment). Sorry if I was trying to be too clever (well... I am not ever really sorry for being a 'smart alec' but I probably should be).

Regards
Tim

[philqw78]

Phil

I some computing systems FFFF or FFFFFF is binary representation of minus 1 (in what's called two's compliment). Sorry if I was trying to be too clever (well... I am not ever really sorry for being a 'smart alec' but I probably should be).

Regards
Tim

Don't be sorry Tim. I enjoy your sparkling repartee. Or was it the sequins? Or are we back to sarcasm? I'm sure there's a veiled insult somewhere.

[timmy1]

Phil, now you promised not to mention the sequins...

[philqw78]

..FFFF or FFFFFF is binary representation of minus 1

And today wasn't wasted as I learnt something new. Not that I'll ever find a use for it. Except on mailing lists and forums.

[kal5056]

You don't start with Attrition points and then lose them.

You start with BGs (which does not change) and you gain attrition points.

So the formula would be

score = 10 x (Own BG- own AP)/ own BG + 10 x (opponent AP/opponent BG) + 5 (if only opponent routed)

If you only collect and use the BG and AP, but print the formula on the sheet, players can work out their scores if they want to.

Victims of our modern mathematical education system can get a numerate friend to produce a lookup table for their army showing what

10*N/(own BG) is for N=1 to number of BG.

Are the 5 bonus points only added if one player routs?
If both players rout simultaneously do they both get the +5?


If you produce a table which does that for all army sizes then you will have the equivalent of the current table. If people understand where it comes from, they might be less prone to errors.

There is a guy at our club who has to use his fingers to add two dice, but he doesn't play FOG.

[philqw78]

Is there a question attached to the above Kal? I was enjoying this thread.

Bar if both break neither gets +5

[kal5056]

That was actually my question about Simultaneous break.
I have not seen it happen but hadn't realized that neither would get the bonus.

Just assumed both would. That clears it up.
Thank you
Gino
SMAC

[colton1237]

I think both with and without decimal places, the scoring system at present is overly complex. Not only that, I also agree with the original post, the scoring system is in itself broken. It's encouraged a relentless rise in the number of BGs in armies under the philosophy "you can't break me, and if I can't break you, we can swap BGs so I win on percentages". It's daft, and there seems to be more and more draws as a result.

--------------------------------------------------
Door Furniture
Door Handles

[timmy1]

Please provide evidence for these assertions. You may be right but I have not seen conclusive evidence.

[dave_r]

I think both with and without decimal places, the scoring system at present is overly complex. Not only that, I also agree with the original post, the scoring system is in itself broken. It's encouraged a relentless rise in the number of BGs in armies under the philosophy "you can't break me, and if I can't break you, we can swap BGs so I win on percentages". It's daft, and there seems to be more and more draws as a result.

This was proved at Britcon where only 8 of the 72 armies were above 15 BG's.

Clearly there is a huge problem with swarm armies and we need to fix it.....

[kevinj]

I agree. I think there was a feeling that swarm armies had an unfair advantage when they first appeared, but since then things have settled down and, whilst swarms have had some success in the hands of good players, most of us now work on the principle of picking an army to suit our own style of play and not trying to maximise the BG count.

I think that the modification that sets army break point based on the points value/50 will be sufficient to ensure that swarms will not be taken unless the player believes they have a winning plan and will also remove the attrition advantage they have in scoring.

[ironchemistryman]

I've a suggestion. Not that it is necessarily a good one. Why not go use the old 6th edition-type scoring system?

This works as:

Score = Points value of army + Opponents losses - Own losses

Count a broken army (broken as per the rules) as full points value (e.g. 650 in the forthcoming Stockport Pick'n'Mix). Short of that, count routed battlegroups as their full points value, fragmented or evaded off table as half value and a lost (or taken, depending) camp as 50 points. Don't worry about any lost bases, just whole battlegroups.

Presumably, everybody knows how many points they are playing with (!) and the cost of each battlegroup. Your maximum score is then twice the points value of the army that you are using and is achieved by breaking the enemy army without losing or having a single batlegroup fragmented. Your minimum is then, well, er, nul points. The total score should add up to twice the points value of each army (a useful check).

If you want to keep a 0-25 scoring system then divide each players score by the maximum achievable and mulitply by 25. Decimals then become a matter of personal taste.

The theory is that is that a major battlegroup of strike troops (say, King's bodyguard) is less readily replaced than are (say) two units of skirmishers ("plenty more where they came from"). The army that has lost two units of skirmishers would be behind on a battlegroups lost count but conceivably ahead on points and arguably also in military terms.

[dave_r]

I've a suggestion. Not that it is necessarily a good one. Why not go use the old 6th edition-type scoring system?

This works as:

Score = Points value of army + Opponents losses - Own losses

Count a broken army (broken as per the rules) as full points value (e.g. 650 in the forthcoming Stockport Pick'n'Mix). Short of that, count routed battlegroups as their full points value, fragmented or evaded off table as half value and a lost (or taken, depending) camp as 50 points. Don't worry about any lost bases, just whole battlegroups.

Presumably, everybody knows how many points they are playing with (!) and the cost of each battlegroup. Your maximum score is then twice the points value of the army that you are using and is achieved by breaking the enemy army without losing or having a single batlegroup fragmented. Your minimum is then, well, er, nul points. The total score should add up to twice the points value of each army (a useful check).

If you want to keep a 0-25 scoring system then divide each players score by the maximum achievable and mulitply by 25. Decimals then become a matter of personal taste.

The theory is that is that a major battlegroup of strike troops (say, King's bodyguard) is less readily replaced than are (say) two units of skirmishers ("plenty more where they came from"). The army that has lost two units of skirmishers would be behind on a battlegroups lost count but conceivably ahead on points and arguably also in military terms.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.

This then becomes an exercise in mathematics about two hours into the game whilst everybody works out the score..... We need a very simple scoring system so this sort of thing doesn't happen.

The other side of this is that everybody chucks their crap at the opponents best troops in the hopes of getting lucky. One of the major FoG design principles was that skirmishers mean as much as Knights if they break, simply to keep players honest so they don't use them as expendable rubbish. Even if they were historically.

[david53]

I agree. I think there was a feeling that swarm armies had an unfair advantage when they first appeared, but since then things have settled down and, whilst swarms have had some success in the hands of good players, most of us now work on the principle of picking an army to suit our own style of play and not trying to maximise the BG count.

I think that the modification that sets army break point based on the points value/50 will be sufficient to ensure that swarms will not be taken unless the player believes they have a winning plan and will also remove the attrition advantage they have in scoring.

I agree sadly I never take more than 13 BG in the last year I tried 16 BG BTH they were crap and got into more trouble than the extra break points were worth.

I now stick to a smallish army but sort of good troops.

[kevinj]

This is going to hurt. Dave is right.

[david53]

This is going to hurt. Dave is right.

Nooooooooooooooooooooooooo not you as well!

[kevinj]

OK. Dave may be wrong. But I agree with him. Is that better?

[david53]

OK. Dave may be wrong. But I agree with him. Is that better?

Much much better good grammer.......that!

BTW one can't use something that is then taken back(Dave R)

[ironchemistryman]

I've a suggestion. Not that it is necessarily a good one. Why not go use the old 6th edition-type scoring system?

This works as:

Score = Points value of army + Opponents losses - Own losses

Count a broken army (broken as per the rules) as full points value (e.g. 650 in the forthcoming Stockport Pick'n'Mix). Short of that, count routed battlegroups as their full points value, fragmented or evaded off table as half value and a lost (or taken, depending) camp as 50 points. Don't worry about any lost bases, just whole battlegroups.

Presumably, everybody knows how many points they are playing with (!) and the cost of each battlegroup. Your maximum score is then twice the points value of the army that you are using and is achieved by breaking the enemy army without losing or having a single batlegroup fragmented. Your minimum is then, well, er, nul points. The total score should add up to twice the points value of each army (a useful check).

If you want to keep a 0-25 scoring system then divide each players score by the maximum achievable and mulitply by 25. Decimals then become a matter of personal taste.

The theory is that is that a major battlegroup of strike troops (say, King's bodyguard) is less readily replaced than are (say) two units of skirmishers ("plenty more where they came from"). The army that has lost two units of skirmishers would be behind on a battlegroups lost count but conceivably ahead on points and arguably also in military terms.

Noooooooooooooooooooooooooooo.

This then becomes an exercise in mathematics about two hours into the game whilst everybody works out the score..... We need a very simple scoring system so this sort of thing doesn't happen.

The other side of this is that everybody chucks their crap at the opponents best troops in the hopes of getting lucky. One of the major FoG design principles was that skirmishers mean as much as Knights if they break, simply to keep players honest so they don't use them as expendable rubbish. Even if they were historically.

OK, I don't mind saying it, Dave is right. And for the reasons that he sets out . So, use 10 + opponents AP - own AP if you want a simple system. It also forces players to behave in what we might think of as a more 'historical' manner (or at least, troops to behave more like the pragmatic souls we expect them to be) in that skirmishers might reasonably take a dim view of being regarded and/or used as expendable rubbish.

On the other hand, if you want a system that gives decimal places for the purposes of tiebreaks, then you either have to go to something more complex (whatever that may be) or keep it simple and go with with whoever has inflicted (and lost) the larger number of AP. Basis; they have been more active. The systems that scare me are any that use "proportion of enemy army by battlegroup" as these would seem highly likely to favour swarms.

At the moment it would seem as though using a swarm means sacrificing durability to achive a better chance of engineering one or more flank attacks. Good luck to those who can make it work.