AOE-II Boom Challenge #1

[MaSmOrRa]

Just wondering if it wouldn't make more sense to make the amount of collected resources the main comparison item?

For what I have seen so far, players are delaying a lot the economy upgrades in order to have a higher number of villagers sooner.

My guess is that if some guys would have done the economy upgrades sooner they could have a much bigger eco but with a lower number of villagers which in real games is actually more important, isn't it?
But since the number of villagers is the main comparison item, players only care about getting more villagers and not about making those villagers more efficient which in a real game situation would be more important I think?

Please correct me if I'm wrong...I may very well be totally mistaken!

 

^ you are right. Since this whole series is still new, it'll be flawed at the start. This is understandable, but atm, it's more about abusing rules rather than being good at booming.

Hopefully next time it'll be score or resourced based.

 

[Influenza]

lol some of you guys are kinda slow... just did 131 vills on fast speed with unexplored map :S

will give it a real go later and post...

 

[nC_Andorin]

PS: How people normally spend the time 'til Imp when playing this stuff?

Real michi players need to be imp by 27 min and full siege onagers upped by 30 min -31 min.

Your eco need to be flawless and well balanced. Also, can I had tc's while upping?

For a fast cut on michi most players get a 4tc 25 imp and cut before 30 mins

 

[madmatt180]

Here is my Boom

Imperial- 28:39
Villagers at 30:00 - 135

viewtopic.php?f=23&t=100649

 

[chilax]

145 vils + 1 sc 27:36 imp

Great comet....145 figure is really good

 

[_Greenwolf]

missed this post since it was posted in custom scenario

 

[Brainless]

Just wondering if it wouldn't make more sense to make the amount of collected resources the main comparison item?

For what I have seen so far, players are delaying a lot the economy upgrades in order to have a higher number of villagers sooner.

My guess is that if some guys would have done the economy upgrades sooner they could have a much bigger eco but with a lower number of villagers which in real games is actually more important, isn't it?
But since the number of villagers is the main comparison item, players only care about getting more villagers and not about making those villagers more efficient which in a real game situation would be more important I think?

Please correct me if I'm wrong...I may very well be totally mistaken!

True. I would not bother taking more then 300 stone for this challenge, while in real game i would continue mining. Same with gold.

Btw my score was 124 vill about 28:50 imp. Maybe the best i can do. However played far from flawless, i think unflawlessness defines my style...

 

[pokerface]

138 vils

imp: 28:30
with all upgrades

had many times idle, need another try and other tactic

 

[Gentle]

Updated the leaderboard. CometNET is king for now!

I see some people think about scoring on economy. The problem is that it can vary so much for two people at time X.
you can have two players do exactly the same boom and then not have the same resources collected at, let's say 25 minutes, just because of some random resource dropoff moment :/ Not sure how to get around that ^^

I can agree however that this challenge is a bit basic, but we gotta start somewhere as jaraldo said. Next one should be a bit more interesting I reckon. :]

 

[MaSmOrRa]

What do you mean with "random drop off moment"? Villagers bumping into each other for example and delaying the drop off? Because that surely belongs to a skill which is also needed during boom: villager micro! Making sure you don't have 4 vills choping the same tree or gathering from the same bush, etc...

I don't really see the problem with the timing...When you are watching the rec, at 29:55 you go with your mouse to the options menu, when the clock hits 30:00 you click at the exact same time on the menu, which will pause the game, and you see how many resources were gathered...

Of course the player should be smart enough to ring the TC bell at, let's say 29:57, to make sure he gets more resources! But if everyone does that I don't see any big problem...

Or maybe just don't allow people to ring the bell, since I reckon that depends solely on luck: if the villagers who go inside the TC are the ones carrying the higher number of resources at that time...

 

[Gentle]

Let's say you do a boom and you have 5000 resource collected at 30:00 minutes. Next game u do the exact same boom but you have 4750 res at 30:00 but 5250 at 30:01. A third time you could have 5250 at 30:00.

It's kinda completely random as one second difference could potentially mean half of your vills dropping off resources or not dropping off. If all can agree that's it's semi accurate and are willing to continue with it then I'm fine with it though ^^

 

[Carlos Ferdinand]

I think villager number is fine. Resource collected doesn't necessarily show superiority either since it doesn't look at resource expenditure, apart from the reason you just mentioned.

 

[MaSmOrRa]

@Gentle

Well yes, but you having more or less resources at a certain time doesn't necessarily depend on luck, does it?

If you micro your villagers more and better, you will likely gain more resources in a smaller amount of time, even if you sent the exact number of villagers to the exact same resources at the exact same time...

I do reckon that the drop off times can be very random, but you can also avoid it being random by microing more your villagers and making sure the walking time is as short as possible.

 

[Carlos Ferdinand]

The problem is that at 30:00 90% of your vils may be carrying 19 resources while at 30:05 they'd have dropped off mostly.

 

[Gentle]

Probably best to go for 'try to make x, y and z' a fast a possible. One other possibility I'm very interested in doing a challenge where a lake with let's say 4 fish in it is available. I'd be interested in seeing a boom with that ^^

 

[MaSmOrRa]

@Carlos

That's indeed a problem, but maybe you could add an "error margin"?
I mean, if the difference between 2 players is only, lets say 200 gathered resources, then you would consider their boom technically the same and they would share the same place in the leader board.

The problem is, as it is right now, no one will actually learn how to boom by watching these recs... Take the current winner rec from Comet as an example: he researched Horse Colar at minute 20, I think that would never happen in a real game situation, would it?

 

[Sky95]

shouldnt i be before mars of god in the leaderboard?

 

[pedro]

if you go by the resources gathered you have another problem: how to compare different resources? its a lot easier/faster to collect wood then to collect food for example ...

i still think the best think would be to get an expensive army (like 50 fu palas) as fast as possible (maybe with a second goal to have at least 120 or 130 vills)

and for the next challenge maybe there should maybe be a rule considering gamespeed and the usage of pauses ...

 

[Gentle]

Fixed that sky! My bad ^^

As I said before and as Pedro said as well. A nice goal would be a combination of certain units.

50 FU pala and 150 vills sounds about a challenge? Think that would be somewhere around 35 minutes?

 

[Skittle]

if you go by the resources gathered you have another problem: how to compare different resources? its a lot easier/faster to collect wood then to collect food for example ...

+1, it would be totally useless to see 100 celt wood cutters xD

i still think the best think would be to get an expensive army (like 50 fu palas) as fast as possible (maybe with a second goal to have at least 120 or 130 vills).

+1, 120 vills and 40 FU pala sounds like a good target.
edit: or 120 vills 30 trade carts, 50 palas xD

and for the next challenge maybe there should maybe be a rule considering gamespeed and the usage of pauses ...

+1, normal speed should be set and 1 pause is enough (in case u really get disturbed)... how annoying and senseless is pausing every 3 sec and playing on slow speed?

 

[Carlos Ferdinand]

Better to just set it at 50 palas for example.

And there is no legit way of discovering how many pauses are used is there?

 

[Gentle]

I don't really want to check every single recorded game for pauses so that's why I omitted it from the rules. I personally play all my singleplayer games at fast speed but I know people have the patience for slow so that's why I didn't say anything about it.

 

[pedro]

Better to just set it at 50 palas for example.

And there is no legit way of discovering how many pauses are used is there?

you can't see if someone is pausing, but you can se if he does commands while he paused (e.g. droping food, microing lumberjacks, building farms/houses)

and since there is no money or anything involved i think that people would stick to a "no pausing rule" if there would be one

 

[Sky95]

hope it works this time...
also im against the pause rule, as everyone is able to do that, so it gives no special advantage.
Also: i used it often, like 20 times, just cause of things, like luring deer, while microing woodcutters, so i dont have to concentrate that much. :lol: