Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

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Great Britain I_HaRRiiSoN_I
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

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Post by I_HaRRiiSoN_I »

just have a tourny of pure blind picks, 100% even for both players ;) would be super interesting i reckon.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by WickedCossack »

Cometk wrote: Yeah, I had in mind your game vs GoodSpeed on Gran Chaco (India Mirror) and the one vs Samwise on Arkansas (Germany vs Dutch). I think I recall you not being too happy with the MU vs 'Wise, am I remembering correctly or is that just fantasy?
Yea we had a blind pick, I don't remember why though. I think I was just being extra careful cause it was EPL both times and didn't want to let the team down. I think the few 1v1 tournies I've done havn't been an issue because it's less important.

To the topic though I think aoe3 works quite well with lots of civ diversity and rules should promote that.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Cometk »

WickedCossack wrote:
Cometk wrote: Yeah, I had in mind your game vs GoodSpeed on Gran Chaco (India Mirror) and the one vs Samwise on Arkansas (Germany vs Dutch). I think I recall you not being too happy with the MU vs 'Wise, am I remembering correctly or is that just fantasy?
Yea we had a blind pick, I don't remember why though. I think I was just being extra careful cause it was EPL both times and didn't want to let the team down. I think the few 1v1 tournies I've done havn't been an issue because it's less important.

To the topic though I think aoe3 works quite well with lots of civ diversity and rules should promote that.
You made me curious, so I went back and checked. Apparently the enforced blind pick was at your suggestion! haha
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Timurid »

I am quite fond of GUA random pick format that ensures we get to see rare matchups and maps played. the new format should focus on having this diversity I think.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by chris1089 »

I_HaRRiiSoN_I wrote:just have a tourny of pure blind picks, 100% even for both players ;) would be super interesting i reckon.
Whilst I like the idea, you'd have to make series much longer in order to prevent them being decided by luck.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Astaroth »

Yes, just do blind pick, no repeat civs. That's the standard for aoe2 tournaments, which btw also has clear civ counters (eg goth vs mayans).
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Goodspeed »

AoE2 civ counters are much less clear. Late game goths might counter mayans but there is plenty of opportunity to win the game early. In AoE3, with the right match up, a major could beat a top player. That's not (even close to) the case in AoE2. In practice, AoE2 tournament games are very rarely decided by one player getting lucky and picking the "counter" to the other player's civ.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Mitoe »

I think that’s an exaggeration. There’s no way a major is going to beat a top player regardless of the matchup unless the top player simply cannot play the civ at all, and even then I think it’s very unlikely the major would win. Matchup is important between players at the same level, but otherwise it’s usually irrelevant for the better player.

I guess my problem with the current tournament rule set isn’t that I’m sick of counter-picking and matchups. It’s the fact that the variety of civs players have to play often means they are not able to play their best throughout 100% of a series, and it becomes difficult for us to push the boundaries of what AoE3 could be if players aren’t able to do this. Mono civ tournaments have shown that there is plenty of variety to many matchups, but in a “standard” tournament there are frequent occurrences of games that are just build order losses or knowledge gaps, and it’s just not fun to watch.

The best way to push the meta and—eventually—achieve better balance is less restrictions and more freedom.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by [Armag] diarouga »

Mitoe wrote:I think that’s an exaggeration. There’s no way a major is going to beat a top player regardless of the matchup unless the top player simply cannot play the civ at all, and even then I think it’s very unlikely the major would win. Matchup is important between players at the same level, but otherwise it’s usually irrelevant for the better player.

I guess my problem with the current tournament rule set isn’t that I’m sick of counter-picking and matchups. It’s the fact that the variety of civs players have to play often means they are not able to play their best throughout 100% of a series, and it becomes difficult for us to push the boundaries of what AoE3 could be if players aren’t able to do this. Mono civ tournaments have shown that there is plenty of variety to many matchups, but in a “standard” tournament there are frequent occurrences of games that are just build order losses or knowledge gaps, and it’s just not fun to watch.

The best way to push the meta and—eventually—achieve better balance is less restrictions and more freedom.
If you lose because of knowledge gaps, then it means your opponent was better, I don't see how it is unfair. Now, is it fun to watch ? It depends, if it's just a build order loss it's of course not, but honestly build order losses don't happen that often at high level. Most of the time, both players make mistakes, which leads to better games than flawless mirrors.

Anyway, aoe3 is a rather easy game, and pulling people out of their comfort zone makes it harder and more interesting.
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Netherlands Goodspeed
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Goodspeed »

Mitoe wrote:I think that’s an exaggeration. There’s no way a major is going to beat a top player regardless of the matchup unless the top player simply cannot play the civ at all, and even then I think it’s very unlikely the major would win. Matchup is important between players at the same level, but otherwise it’s usually irrelevant for the better player.
Sure, maybe majors aren't what they used to be or there aren't any unwinnable MUs like there used to be. Regardless, civ counters are a much bigger deal here than in AoE2.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Goodspeed »

Mitoe wrote:I guess my problem with the current tournament rule set isn’t that I’m sick of counter-picking and matchups. It’s the fact that the variety of civs players have to play often means they are not able to play their best throughout 100% of a series, and it becomes difficult for us to push the boundaries of what AoE3 could be if players aren’t able to do this. Mono civ tournaments have shown that there is plenty of variety to many matchups, but in a “standard” tournament there are frequent occurrences of games that are just build order losses or knowledge gaps, and it’s just not fun to watch.
Civ and MU diversity are such core features of this game though. With 14 unique civs it's arguably designed to encourage breadth of knowledge over depth.
You should try Go. There's only one match up there :P
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Mitoe »

Frankly I don’t really care about what it’s “designed” to be like; only what it’s is actually like. I think there is enough depth to most civilizations that excessive civilization restrictions does just as much to hinder gameplay diversity as lenient civ rules do. One rule set simply encourages you to know the most common “best” builds of a variety of civs, while the other encourages you to know a couple or a few civilizations inside and out.

Personally, the latter is more interesting to me because we get to see more individual expression and less copy paste, and are more likely to see people getting creative.


I’m not completely against civ rules, and I think they were important in getting the game to this point. But now with the game being more balanced than before and most players having more experience with multiple civs, I feel we should at least try an event with less restrictive civ rules. I really feel it would be more interesting, particularly as a viewer.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by [Armag] diarouga »

Mitoe wrote:Frankly I don’t really care about what it’s “designed” to be like; only what it’s is actually like. I think there is enough depth to most civilizations that excessive civilization restrictions does just as much to hinder gameplay diversity as lenient civ rules do. One rule set simply encourages you to know the most common “best” builds of a variety of civs, while the other encourages you to know a couple or a few civilizations inside and out.

Personally, the latter is more interesting to me because we get to see more individual expression and less copy paste, and are more likely to see people getting creative.


I’m not completely against civ rules, and I think they were important in getting the game to this point. But now with the game being more balanced than before and most players having more experience with multiple civs, I feel we should at least try an event with less restrictive civ rules. I really feel it would be more interesting, particularly as a viewer.
So what rule do you suggest ? No rules at all ? Or just free pick with civ rules ?
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

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Post by Mitoe »

Current counter-picking rules are probably fine (either winner picks or alternating), but I’d like to see a tournament where you can play any civ as much as you like. A weekend tournament would be the best place to try it, rather than a major
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Lukas_L99 »

Mitoe wrote:Current counter-picking rules are probably fine (either winner picks or alternating), but I’d like to see a tournament where you can play any civ as much as you like. A weekend tournament would be the best place to try it, rather than a major
I think it would lead to less civ diversity, but we could try it in a smaller tourney for sure.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Goodspeed »

Mitoe wrote:Frankly I don’t really care about what it’s “designed” to be like; only what it’s is actually like.
What I mean to say is that the game design encourages breadth of knowledge over depth. As in, that is what it's actually like. I agree that the designers' intent doesn't matter.

We have 105 unique MUs. In the mirror meta, you would see at most 10% of them.
Imagine a pro starcraft player switching to this game. Should they be winning tournaments by learning to play 5 match ups (i.e. copying 5 build orders) and letting their mechanics carry them to victory? I know that's oversimplified, but it's to illustrate the point that it would be a shame if players' (broad) knowledge of this game wasn't actually tested in tournaments. It comes down to a discussion about what makes someone good at AoE3, and how do we best test who is best? :chinese:
I think there is enough depth to most civilizations that excessive civilization restrictions does just as much to hinder gameplay diversity as lenient civ rules do. One rule set simply encourages you to know the most common “best” builds of a variety of civs, while the other encourages you to know a couple or a few civilizations inside and out.
But knowing how to play 1 match up is not knowing a civ "inside and out", and trust me that's the end result of free pick. Or are you arguing for being able to play civs more than once? That I take no issue with in principle. I just want to prevent another mirror meta.
Personally, the latter is more interesting to me because we get to see more individual expression and less copy paste, and are more likely to see people getting creative.
I'm going to assume you are arguing for being able to pick civs more than once, then, because that statement doesn't really make sense if you're arguing for free pick. Let me know if that assumption is wrong (and please elaborate on how you think that would lead to less copy paste and more creativity).

Btw maybe this quote will resonate with you:
Me in 2015 wrote:Also I want people to make an effort to figure out which civs counter which and what the civ balance is on this patch because then they are basically doing our job as FP testers ;)
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Goodspeed »

Mitoe wrote:Current counter-picking rules are probably fine (either winner picks or alternating), but I’d like to see a tournament where you can play any civ as much as you like. A weekend tournament would be the best place to try it, rather than a major
Assuming there is no clear best civ, this can work. Good balance is an absolute must though. I recall a certain ASFP tournament where almost 100% of the games were Iro mirrors.

I think it would work best right after a new patch release, at a point where people are unsure what the new best civ is.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Astaroth »

Goodspeed wrote:AoE2 civ counters are much less clear. Late game goths might counter mayans but there is plenty of opportunity to win the game early. In AoE3, with the right match up, a major could beat a top player. That's not (even close to) the case in AoE2. In practice, AoE2 tournament games are very rarely decided by one player getting lucky and picking the "counter" to the other player's civ.
On fortress maps, goths are a clear civ win against mayans, even midgame. Despite that, this MU still happens in aoe2. But many people pick Chinese instead of mayans for this reason, leading to interesting (blind) counter picks and mindgames, seeing that goths >> mayans > chinese >goths (and other civs being all better than goths, but often losing to mayans).

The same could happen with aoe3.

Also, even with the current counter picking system, most games are still reasonably close. If the civ counter system was really that strong in aoe3, most series between equal players would end like 4-3, with each player winning only the counter MUs aside from game 1. But that's not the case.

So how would a blind hidden pick, no repeat, really lead to more unfair games?

Not to mention that not all matchups are the same on each map. If eg Kaiser faces Mitoe, how likely is it that on a particular map, out of their respective civ pools, one of them picks a civ that is easily countered AND the opponent picks the exact counter?

You can also use the "no repeat" to avoid this. If you're eg using Ger in game1, then you can't use them to counter Russia in game2. And if match2 is on a 2 TP map and your opponent doesn't play otto at all, it's unlikely he will use them to counter you, either, etc.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

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Post by edeholland »

Astaroth wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:AoE2 civ counters are much less clear. Late game goths might counter mayans but there is plenty of opportunity to win the game early. In AoE3, with the right match up, a major could beat a top player. That's not (even close to) the case in AoE2. In practice, AoE2 tournament games are very rarely decided by one player getting lucky and picking the "counter" to the other player's civ.
On fortress maps, goths are a clear civ win against mayans, even midgame. Despite that, this MU still happens in aoe2. But many people pick Chinese instead of mayans for this reason, leading to interesting (blind) counter picks and mindgames, seeing that goths >> mayans > chinese >goths (and other civs being all better than goths, but often losing to mayans).
That doesn't sound interesting to me at all. I am not here to watch mindgames or gambling, but AoE3.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Riotcoke »

I don't think anyone is against trying a different ruleset for a smaller tourney.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Goodspeed »

Astaroth wrote:
Goodspeed wrote:AoE2 civ counters are much less clear. Late game goths might counter mayans but there is plenty of opportunity to win the game early. In AoE3, with the right match up, a major could beat a top player. That's not (even close to) the case in AoE2. In practice, AoE2 tournament games are very rarely decided by one player getting lucky and picking the "counter" to the other player's civ.
On fortress maps, goths are a clear civ win against mayans, even midgame. Despite that, this MU still happens in aoe2. But many people pick Chinese instead of mayans for this reason, leading to interesting (blind) counter picks and mindgames, seeing that goths >> mayans > chinese >goths (and other civs being all better than goths, but often losing to mayans).

The same could happen with aoe3.

Also, even with the current counter picking system, most games are still reasonably close. If the civ counter system was really that strong in aoe3, most series between equal players would end like 4-3, with each player winning only the counter MUs aside from game 1. But that's not the case.

So how would a blind hidden pick, no repeat, really lead to more unfair games?
I don't think it would necessarily lead to more unfair games, but it could lead to the worse player winning a series.

You mentioned that if match ups were such a big deal most series would be 4-3. That's true, and it's not thát big of a deal, but players do relatively frequently (compared to AoE2) win games due to the civ match up, and series are indeed longer because of it. An important difference between the current system and blind pick is that in the current system, both players get the same number of counter picks whereas in blind pick who gets the better match up is partly based on chance. Other than that I don't think there is effectively much difference between the current system and blind pick, which imo makes the current system strictly better.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Astaroth »

@Goodspeed but that's not true because in a blind pick system, there wouldn't necessarily be big civ advantages at all.

In the current system, essentially every single match aside from game1 is unfair, even if both players get the same amount of unfair advantages. In a blind system, it is quite possible that every game would be fair or almost fair.

Also, players aren't stupid. Not every civ has 10 strong counters on every map. And you can do a lot to prevent counter-picking. You can eg pick a safer civ in game1 which has almost no strong counters. Then in later matches you can pick the civs which your opponent doesn't have strong counters for anymore because he used them already.

This would lead to even more matchup diversity.

@edeholland : that was just an example to show that even Aoe2 has some unfair MUs and still does blind pick.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by dansil92 »

I think matchups are often overrated for gameplay. Yes a certain meta build for a certain civ might beat a meta build from another civ but its certainly never a point where the better player can't win. Only when players are incredibly evenly matched is it even really relevant and blaming the matchup is far too common. Apart from a few blatant examples (eg. Brits trying to hold heavy infantry rushes, japan losing every shrine to aztec), most civs have lots of options that are neglected. I've even seen japan beat azzy before so it's definitely not unwinnable.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by Goodspeed »

Astaroth wrote:@Goodspeed but that's not true because in a blind pick system, there wouldn't necessarily be big civ advantages at all.
I'm not sure what you're saying is "not true" based on this?
In the current system, essentially every single match aside from game1 is unfair, even if both players get the same amount of unfair advantages.
Correct, but as you mentioned they get the same amount, and that makes it fair in the end. Ultimately it's about who wins the series; it doesn't have to be a 4-0.
In a blind system, it is quite possible that every game would be fair or almost fair.
It's also possible that one player gets a disproportionate amount of unfair match ups to their advantage and wins the series because of it.
Also, players aren't stupid. Not every civ has 10 strong counters on every map. And you can do a lot to prevent counter-picking. You can eg pick a safer civ in game1 which has almost no strong counters. Then in later matches you can pick the civs which your opponent doesn't have strong counters for anymore because he used them already.

This would lead to even more matchup diversity.
I don't think it would necessarily lead to more diversity. I think we would end up with a good amount more mirrors where both players pick a safe civ for the map, and you would see people attempting to blind counter the generally accepted best civ on a map which would lead to many of the same match ups we are seeing in the current system. That's what I meant when I said I don't think there would be much difference in the MUs we would see. Just more mirrors perhaps, and higher odds of series being won by lucky picking.

I should mention that I don't think many series would be decided by lucky picking, but any increase in the odds of that happening should come with some significant upsides. I don't think BP has any significant upsides compared to the current system.
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Re: Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

Post by [Armag] diarouga »

dansil92 wrote:I think matchups are often overrated for gameplay. Yes a certain meta build for a certain civ might beat a meta build from another civ but its certainly never a point where the better player can't win. Only when players are incredibly evenly matched is it even really relevant and blaming the matchup is far too common. Apart from a few blatant examples (eg. Brits trying to hold heavy infantry rushes, japan losing every shrine to aztec), most civs have lots of options that are neglected. I've even seen japan beat azzy before so it's definitely not unwinnable.
I disagree with this. In the lower pr, MUs don't matter that much, because you can win if you play better, but at pr38+, MUs are almost 50% of what decides a series honestly.

It's ok, because game knowledge should be rewarded, but getting a good MU is much more important than having a slightly superior macro, or even getting a good MU.

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