UberGruber

Yeah Bloodbowl's pretty good (but Goblins. . . ), though as you say, I think the grid helps and you don't really have terrain, etc complicating factors. Even there though you could say that some experience upgrades are far better than others (+1S is very, very useful, for instance).

The former is actually pretty true for a lot of wargames (Fields of Glory, for instance as a set of tabletop rules -- though there are others -- and heaps of hex based board wargames where victory conditions are generally factored to allow for historical imbalance). The latter is not true for any game, I think as even in games like chess a small bonus accrues to he who goes first (which admittedly is mitigated in multi-game matches with alternating sides). But it's certainly true that most wargames that try to inject 'personality' into units become necessarily imbalanced as there are just far too many variables to balance properly. You chase the chimera if you seek balance in a game like Malifaux or 40K where units differ wildly in abilities (and Malifaux more than 40K in this regard). You can achieve reasonable balance (ie one player may have an advantage but not overwhelmingly so) between armies (and actually GW appear to have managed this pretty well in 6th edition), but you can guarantee someone will cry 'broken' because not every unit is balanced. It's this latter that is sheer insanity to demand.

Well done, Mako; it's a worthy winner.

It may surprise you to learn that not everyone has a smartphone. is entirely the attitude I'm talking about. It stems from the viewpoint of the dedicated player. All well and good if you play similarly dedictated players. Not so great if you play someone who is keen on the game but not to the level they want to frequent its website on the offchance of updates. this is nothing to do with how seriously they play the game, but everything to do with how much time they want to spend chasing the latest 'fix'. I know several people who are havering about Mailfaux at the moment because they don't want to buy a game that is in mid-update and several who have invested but (while like me would not object to 'solid' fixes that lasted some years) are uncertain as to whether to continue. We play the game competitively in that we play to win. We'd like to stick with it. We're not inclined to see a game in semi-permanent flux where there's ever changing errata and FAQ.

This is something of a fallacy. As soon as you get a player who's 'up to date' with any online 'fixes' playing someone who is not, you have opened the door to an immediate bone of contention (though gratted this is usually more prevelant with 'Cuddling' a model than boosting it). I don't object in the least to the game becoming better balanced (so long as that is genuine balance and not merely 'fixing' a perceived problem like what level of randomness is acceptable, and so long as there are not continual and interminable updates as new 'fixes' lead different people to complain of imbalance), but I do object to the notion that only players who regularly look for updates should be catered for. It's astonishing, and a very insular view, that those who do not should be deemed not to care.

I think people should be able to submit any amount of text at any time and any amount of times between entries being opened and the deadline. That accomodates last-minuters, steady workers, erratic workers, fast workers and all combinations that I can see. And we might take no story as finished until the deadline and no story as complete (which is different) unless it says END at the end. Then people know if they're looking at part of a story or the whole thing. But as we'd allow full editing -- any amount of changes -- until the deadline, everyone would have to make sure that after the they re-read any stories they'd previously looked at just in case changes of significance had been introduced. In short, how one may post should be as inclusive as possible, I think with the only limits being the opening and closing of submissions. I do, however, think that if we are to have a 1500 word limit then that should actually be the limit. Given that different word-processers count differently, clearly there should be some leeway. But I've yet to see as much as a 5% difference in count between word-processors, so I think anything that comes out as 1550 words would in fact be too long. And presumably we have no minimum count (so a very short story would be acceptable if it managed to do everything required by the round).

I rather agree with shorter being easier all round. The flip side is that people often like to write longer stories and object to being 'unduly constrained' by low word count. Which I can see but I don't think it's actually very possible to run a competition like this -- ie over a prolongued period -- with word counts even as low as 3000. There are a few reasons for that but mainly it's because people just don't have time to be reading 30 000 words in a month in addition to their normal life's reading for relaxation, let alone writing 3000. Perhaps with an effort they can barely manage the latter so as to participate. Yet then they struggle to read everyone else's. 1500 words halves the problem -- in fact more than halves it because if you had 10 hours available and needed 20 hours to write, read and leave brief comments for 3000 words as a limit then you'd basically solve the problem entirely by dropping to 1500 words. The example's crude and the timings of course arbitrary, but the principle is correct. The only one of panda's examples I'd be chary of is the 'co-op' because a) what happens if my partner can't complete, and while two minds are sometimes better than one, they often take more than twice as long to produce a result. 1500 words would, I think allow monthly turnaround -- so everyone knows exactly what's what regarding timing. Example: 1st: competition opens for entries. 18th: entries close (if you can't find time for 1500 words in 18 days this month, maybe next month will be okay). 20th: voting opens. No more editing. Also next month's theme, iten and restrictions are posted though no stories may be submitted until the 1st. this would allow people to plan ahead and start writing -- so you have in fact nearly a month to think and write). 27th: voting closes. If Edonil and/or the poll doesn't have your vote by now, too late. 28th-31st: winner is announced (giving Edonil 1-4 days depending on the month to tally up and post who won. From the 1st to the 20th, as much editing in response to comments or just authorial whim is allowed as they like. Beyond that you are disqualified from winning but not from the warm glow of having tweaked your story.

I think in future there needs to be a definite cut-off point for votes to be in, be it a week, a fornight, or whatever after the voting opens. Obviously at any given time certain people will be too pressured to partipate in either writing or voting, that, I think, is natural and the people concerned will tend to vary anyway. Myself, I'm not suire what anothe Preliminary Round would be for. Are all rules to be set in stone for every round after the preliminaries are over? If not, why not just start with the first round? I do think we should establish a few things though. This isn't meant to single anyone out as being 'at fault', it's not like anything of real consequence is at stake, it's merely to establish what will and won't be eligible going forward. I don't mind what's decided, I just think it should be clear. 1) what happens if an author who's entered any given round doesn't vote in that round (for whatever reason)? Are they disqualified or does it not matter? 2) what happens if an author doesn't comment on all (or any) of the stories? 3) is word count an absolute limit or are longer stories going to be allowed at the judge's discretion

Sadly, only one model per unit may throw a genade.

Yeah, that's crazy talk. . . and everyone knows that fun needs 'cuddled' (as I belive the young people say nowadays when they mean downgraded or reduced).

I thought he wasn't (symbolically) trying to cut the tree down, rather to shake himself free from it -- to rid himself of the tree, if you like, rather than destroy it root and branch. For that reason I'd be uneasy with him hacking bits off the tree rather than, say, watching it at different times and seeing the leaves through summer and autumn into winter.

In which case is asking for formal feedback as part of the competition redundant?

At the moment I'm feeling that since submissions closed and voting was opened, the momentum has really been sucked out of this. Very few comments post-closure compared to before. I'm wondering if the requested 'critiques' of each story are simply too time consuming when taken as an aggregate. I understand everyone is busy, it's not a complaint, rather an observation. If this is to continue then the 'voting' period needs surely to be as productive as the writing period in terms of what both readers and authors get from it. None of us seem, in the past week, to be leaving comments. that's a big change. This isn't a request for everyone to list their reasons for not commenting thus far. I'm sure they're all good ones. So please don't do that. But does anyone else feel that the momentum has faltered? And if so what might be done in future to prevent that?

Quite. Furthermore even extensive testing across various metas is unlikely to get a blanace that even a majority of 'competitive' players are happy with. the essential problem is as you say, that you can have a character with a given combination of stats, abilities, etc and for them to be superficially fine when compared to another character with different stats at a 'soulstone to soulstone cost comparison level'. Yet Malifaux is in fact extraordinarily complicated. It has a greater wealth of units available to any faction than most wargames. There is a greater difference between units (because of the wealth of options a model may have) than most other wargames. there is a far greater number (and mix) of victory conditions -- Strategies, Schemes -- than most other games. In fact I think whilst it may not be the wargame with the most variety in each category, it almost certainly is the one that beats all others in any given category (and usually in two categories, quite often all three). The only simple thing about the game is that relatively few models are fielded. Then of course there's the fact that (models permitting) one can choose the force that best suits the overall objectives and terrain and, to an extent, likely opponent. And that's before you begin to consider the local 'meta'. Now I'm not saying one cannot achieve a better balance than at the moment where there are certainly some combinations available that are better than others in most circumstances and some models that are just poor in almost all circumstances. And then of course every time something new is introduced, the more combinations will be thrown up and anticicpating them all will be beyond practical playtesting prior to release. Errata is fine and to be expected. But it shouldn't be even a annual event.

Not sure I quite agree with that as an absolute statement but I do wholeheartedly agree that there are lots of ways to mitigate risk in Malifaux and that a significant factor in the game is in fact the very presence of random risks that one must strive to mitigate. In essence from the OP's statement that malifaux should: I'd agree with the second (but qute honestly if models are going to be reworked, do it once, get it right and then leave well alone. Constant retinkering satisfies only real die-hard players - and ironically is undertaken because they're not satidsfied . . .) I agree very much with the third. In fact I think overhauling schemes and strategies would actually mean tinkering with some of the models could be avoided. And yes, perhaps the odd rule could be changed. But as I say for the first, I utterly disagree. Wanting randomness reduced is not about balance, it's about control. There is a strong perception that control allows for more skill, randomness less, which is true at the extremes but not in the vast middle that Malifaux inhabits. Reducing chance in the game will not improve balance, nor will it make the game more competitive, nor will it really mean the more skilful player is likely to win, unless of course randomness is reduced very significantly, which isn't what's being asked.