I'd like to choose C if I can be one of the captains :)

Strong preference for D, only issue would be agreeing on the team distribution (which iirc was part of the issue with getting started last time).

C is acceptable as a backup to mitigate the issue of determining teams beforehand; very strong preference for the draft process (or at least, the final result) to be public information.
I'd vote for 'highest ranking' as determinant of captains.

B is a last resort if it's the only way to get a game happening. I do *not* want to play with unknown teams, but will suck it up if *everything* is random for the chaos.

My vote: CDBAE.

C is what I came up with anyway, and the bidding system needs some more discussion to be informational equal. Also we need to determine how we choose the captains, since this method does not include fairness between captains and members.

D sounds like a Veil of Ignorance and I kinda love it, but we already have Xenon Radon who has stated their desire to be a captain in C.

B may be not fair but should be fun. A sounds like less fun, and E is something we're yet to find out.

And here I try to explain and fix C.

After (or before) the countries are assigned, the 9 captains get 3 tokens each to bid for teammates. A country is with the captain who paid the most tokens for them, or remains available if there's no one being the only one to pay the most. After each round of bidding, each captain is given tokens equal to teammates still missing, to use them in the next round, until everyone gets 3 teammates to play with.

During the whole process, everyone knows who the captains are, which countries are still available, which countries are already chosen by who and how every captain uses their tokens every round.

In a bid to further support D, I've run the countries through a random team generator and come up with this:

Group 1
Morocco
Burgundy
GreatHorde
England

Group 2
France
Sweden
TO
Saxony

Group 3
Papacy
Mamluks
Aragon
Switzerland

Group 4
Muscovy
Genoa
Castille
Bohemia

Group 5
Ottomans
Tlemcen
Brandenburg
Poland

Group 6
Portugal
Tunis
Bavaria
QQ

Group 7
LivonianOrder
Norway
Austria
Denmark

Group 8
Savoy
Milan
Lithuania
Novgorod

Group 9
Hungary
Scotland
Venice
Naples

Groups 7 and 8 are somewhat close to their teammates but are also very close to each other so it might cancel out.

2 and 7 seem to be basically eating each other.

Possibility for C: captains as highest rating, snake pick their allies once the game has started (so, publicly drafting both country and player), captains seeded on ascending rating order (ie. 8th ranked gets picks 1, 18, 19; top ranked gets picks 9, 10 and 27).

Saves the need for both fancy bidding mechanisms or arguing a 'balanced' layout beforehand.

I like D over C because I do like the random element but really up to everyone else, I could go for either. Also I feel like the whole obfuscating who’s on what team isn’t really that important

Mouse has the point. This really solves both two major problems of C at once. But actually it's the 9th ranked player who gets the 1st, 18th and 19th picks. Minor mistake.

Or we can allow the high ranking players to give up the right to pick allies and leave it to the 10th and so on.

Won't picking of allies just end up with people aiming to gather up the Muslim powers in the South or in some way monopolize some other advantageous corner/border position?

I think attempts to that end will probably be foiled because it’s detrimental to the performance of everyone else.

@gopher - Yes almost assuredly. Especially when one captain would have 2 picks in a row, you'd probably see a bloc of powers that work well together to establish almost unassailable positions. Imagine QQ/Mamluks/Ottomans or something like that from the start. They'd lock up so many good positions it would require extreme coordination to break it up given the 100% trust they could have.

My biggest concern though would be the known teams. I feel like this game would just lock up in the early mid-game as everyone rallies to stop 1 or 2 known groups from getting too big. Especially with how many stalemate lines are on the map, it's destined for failure if you have known teams IMO.

I like Drano's idea for a modified C in terms of information given and such! Makes sense to me. I think I'll start calling Drano's modified C "E" to differentiate it with the known draft/bidding (A and B were supposed to be unknown teams, C and D known teams).

For an actual draft (so, C) - I do not think snake draft would be a good idea; the double-pick for anybody is really, really strong. Especially so for the first captain - they will get the first pick of the lot, and then additionally a double pick! Massive advantage in my opinion. Maybe something where each round is a randomized order (re-shuffling if it results in a double pick), and generated at the beginning of each draft round, would be better if we chose C.

To Re-iterate:

A. Third party generates the teams mostly at random with rules attached. (unknown teams) This seems to be the least popular option at the moment.

B. True random. Not the most popular option, but I think it's also not anyone's last preference. (Unknown teams)

C. Draft/Bidding (Known teams) - most of our discussion seems centered around this, which is good! Several good ideas, which we will eventually need to narrow down.

D. We agree on 4 "fair" teams before hand (Known teams). Might be difficult to come up with something we all truly agree on, but I can make up something as a placeholder maybe.

E. Drano's Modified C where a third-party facilitates a limited-information bid for the 9 captains. (Unknown teams)


So far from a quick scroll, it seems to me that C and D are the most popular options, with E not having much of a chance to be voted on really since I am defining it now lol.


We...also need more players. Current list:

1. erikip107
2. MagicalSand
3. han-shahanshah
4. Xenon Radon
5. hakureimarisa
6. Lei Saarlainen
7. ingebot
8. drano019
9. MiraiNikkiSan
10. Orange
11. Mitomon
12. mouse (maybe)
13. Samj
14. DungDefender
15. halfasleep
16. gopher27 (commented but I don't think has explicitly said in?)
17. folie

Placeholder for option D (a bit more intentional than the random generated one posted by Mitomon)

1. Morocco, Scotland, Genoa, Bavaria
2. Tlemcen, England, Muscovy, Teutonic Order
3. Tunis, Novgorod, Austria, Brandenburg
4. Mamluks, Burgundy, Lithuania, Milan
5. QQ, France, Papacy, Saxony
6. Ottomans, Norway, Bohemia, Savoy
7. Portugal, Naples, Livnonian Order, Switzerland
8. Aragon, Denmark, Venice, Poland
9. Castille, Sweden, Hungary, Great Horde


Not perfect by any means, but I think it's reasonably ok (to be improved upon later if we decide to go with D)

Wait, D is 4 fair teams? I thought it was 9 teams of 4 hahaha. Anyways, yes, my random team assignment may or may not be the most balanced, but it allows for more flexibility and unique situations. What's not to say teams 2 and 7 decide to work together since they're so close?

Typo, whoops. 9 teams of 4

Mostly suggested snake pick for the simplicity (because over-complicating things just means we argue in circles for 6 months rather than getting a game started); however I would note that given the first double pick is 9th and the captains (and thus who they're knowing) are known at time of draft, preventing the double pick from being 'overpowered' would just be part of the draft process. And then in-game diplomacising afterwards, given a known good position can still be ganked by everyone else neighbouring them.

I am very strongly against unknown teams and would only consider joining an unknown teams game under scenario B, true random. (This is most of why I'm only down as a 'maybe')

and thus who they're playing*

Not to make this a choice between players or anything, but I'd likely bow out of any known teams game. I simply feel it'd end up a large draw that doesn't live up to it's potential.

I'd definitely say go with drano over me if it comes down to that :p

But, I actually feel the same way about unknown teams (that it'd end up in a large draw). From my recollection of the previous game (which was unknown teams), part of why it was called was because every team had lost multiple players so it wasn't really a 'team' game any more. Unknown teams *weakens* teams in the long run, because it makes it harder to save teammates diplomatically in the short run. While public teams is likely to have slower start than most games (as opportunistic ganks need to be balanced against retaliation against your teammates), I believe that it's more likely to result in several teams reaching the midgame with 3-4 people alive and this able to keep playing for a win *as a team*.

If the game was played on a different map (I suspect it may be difficult to reach 36 players anyhow), would your sentiment change on known versus unknown teams, mouse and drano?

TBH, I think drano's option E sounds best. We:

1. Get the option of bordering a teammate in the early game, which will probably make it more fun in my opinion. Keeping the whole team from starting in the same area might be a little tricky though.

2. Get more interesting diplomacy going since you get the chance to both conceal your teammates and declare it in diplomatic necessities like mouse described. Just a bunch of interesting mechanics that you don't get when you know who's on what team.

The smaller the map, the more critical unknown teams are IMO. There's less flexibility of map spaces and less opportunities to prevent teams from rushing stalemates on smaller maps.

My new vote: ECDBA.

So E works like this right? This is what I understand from Drano.

We choose the 9 captains(by rank or by election). After the game starts, all captains submit an ranked list of three picks to a third-party to decide what they get for the first round of bidding. If possible, they are all assigned their first choice. If not, multiple picks crash, they get second, or third. If someone end up with nothing then this round is redone. We do it for three times.

Each round, every captain only knows which countries are still available, while others know nothing. This way the captains all know who the other captains are, and in which round a country was picked, equally, while others all know everything their captain know, which is all the same, so all 36 players are informational equal.

And for D I get another teaming. You get a bloc to start from but everyone else does too. Compared to Mitomon's this is even more intentional. Everyone can have someone covering their back and it's easier to help your teammates. However it may sound like a game of 9 countries, each with four parliament members.

1 Genoa, Papacy, Naples, Ottomans.
2 Mamluk, Tunis, Tlemcen, Morocco.
3 Portugal, Castille, Scotland, England.
4 France, Burgundy, Aragon, Savoy.
5 Venice, Milan, Austria, Switzerland.
6 Bavaria, Bohemia, Hungary, Poland.
7 Brandenburg, Saxony, Denmark, Teutonic-Order.
8 Norway, Sweden, Novgorod, Livonian-Order.
9 Qara-Qoyunlu, Great-Horde, Muscovy, Lithuania.

Add me

I'm potentially keen, but I don't have the time to build a strong opinion about game type so I'll leave it to those thinking harder about it than I am.

Though perhaps drano and mouse should just play 1v1 to decide it.

BDECA. I like hakureimarisa's team scheme, but I think that edge coalitions such as #2 should be avoided.

@hakureimarisa

You've got the gist of it right. My ideal plan is as follows:

Anyone who wants to be a captain puts their name on a list. Ideally we have more than 9. An outside helper who is NOT playing then picks 9 people, PMs them that they are a captain, gives them their power (only the individual player knows what power they are assigned), and asks them to submit a list of 3 choices.

Then we do the 3 rounds as you noted.

After teams are set, the outside person PMs everyone playing the game what power they are.

That way, no one knows exactly who the captains are. They know it's 9 out of a list of players, but not exactly who. They also don't know what power the captains are, or what the teams are. Everyone is blind and the only information that's out there are the lists of what powers remain to be picked in rounds 1, 2, and 3, which can be shared by the captains to everyone on their team.

This way the game is also fair too, and with less information given there's more freedom as there's more that can be decided to share or hide.

@han-shahanshah, yeah you're right. I tried to break three corners: the southern 4, the southeastern 3 and the eastern 3. But I only succeeded with two. I do have another one but it may be even more unbalanced.

1 Genoa, Papacy, Naples, Ottomans.
2 Mamluk, Tunis, Tlemcen, Aragon.
3 Portugal, Castille, Scotland, Morocco. (This one may be too weak)
4 France, Burgundy, England, Savoy. (This one may be too strong)
5 Venice, Milan, Austria, Switzerland.
6 Bavaria, Bohemia, Hungary, Poland.
7 Brandenburg, Saxony, Denmark, Teutonic-Order.
8 Norway, Sweden, Novgorod, Livonian-Order.
9 Qara-Qoyunlu, Great-Horde, Muscovy, Lithuania.