Draws in Ranked Games/Tournaments/etc.

[Weeksy]

Some wesnoth games just last forever. Think Knalgan v. Knalgan on Hamlets. Undead v. Loyalist when both players are playing defensive, moving up and down, back and forth, doing nothing. In casual play, players often will agree on a draw, especially if little to no units have died and the game has lasted a long time. I have been thinking about hosting a tournament, and I have been talking to ladder players, and the question has come up on occasion: how is the best way to deal with wesnothian draws?

[Blarumyrran]

Undead v. Loyalist when both players are playing defensive, moving up and down, back and forth, doing nothing.

impossible!

[Nebiros]

Some wesnoth games just last forever. Think Knalgan v. Knalgan on Hamlets. Undead v. Loyalist when both players are playing defensive, moving up and down, back and forth, doing nothing. In casual play, players often will agree on a draw, especially if little to no units have died and the game has lasted a long time. I have been thinking about hosting a tournament, and I have been talking to ladder players, and the question has come up on occasion: how is the best way to deal with wesnothian draws?

How does the game currently handle games that have a turn limit in place, when nobody has won before the turn limit? Does it impose a tiebreaker?

Maybe you should just mandate a turn limit on tournament/ladder games, and if the turn limit runs out with both leaders still alive, the game is a draw.

Or are you asking how to *score* draws for the next round of the tournament, ladder ratings etc.? Because if so, it's not a wesnoth-specific question and I believe there is a considerable body of material on that question already. (In order to avoid abuse of the system by collusive draws, the sum of the rating changes to both players from a draw should not exceed 0.)


If you want a tiebreaker and the game doesn't already provide one, I think most total gold cost of units alive + gold in hand at the end is probably the best I can come up with. Villages controlled on the last turn is too ToD dependent, and on some maps, is liable to tie anyway. Gold cost of surviving units is a bit tedious to calculate, but it is well defined and unlikely to result in an exact tie, and including the gold in bank means there's no advantage to recruiting every last gold piece on the last turn (in fact, there's a slight advantage to reducing your upkeep by *not* recruiting level 1+ in the last couple turns, but not if you lose units as a result).

[Weeksy]

I was thinking more about ways to rule a game as being a draw without a turn limit. Some games take forever but are obviously not a draw, as someone is slowly pressuring forwards, or it could just be a giant map. I was thinking of probably having two standards: a minimum passing point where the players can agree on a draw, and a point where a draw should be forced. The first, I think, would have no penalty for either player, while the second might use gold/units/kills or something to decide on the 'victor', or it might not. I'm not sure what would be the best way to decide the 'victor' in that case.

[Baufo]

In chess there is a rule that when there was no piece captured and no pawn moved for 50 turns the game is a draw.

Maybe you could use a rule like if there were not at least u units killed over a period of t turns then the game is a draw.

[Nebiros]

That could work.

If no attacks are made in one full day-night cycle (after a sufficient number of initial turns to make sure it isn't just a matter of being too far away; say, some time after all villages are owned), then neither player dares attack the other's positions or both are so intimidated by ToD that they retreat without any attempt to hold villages or other ground, which is a condition that will probably not change in the next day-night cycle, so you might as well call a draw. (I think this is very unlikely between players of any competence, though. Fast units can overtake retreaters, it's sometimes worth trying to hold a village an extra turn or attack at dawn/dusk, attempts to flank and steal villages will often result in some skirmishing, etc.)

If no unit dies in two full day-night cycles, then both players have sufficiently stable lines that they can shield all their wounded and... actually you still can't declare a draw in this situation, because units will eventually level and high-level units will break the stalemate. Fighting that looks inconclusive does actually have an effect. And if knalgans are involved, this is unlikely to happen in the first place because of ulfs.

If some units are dying, then others are gaining experience and will sooner or later gain levels, which will break the stalemate. Even if the players are very evenly matched, sooner or later one will probably get lucky enough to gain an advantage that the other, being no better, won't be able to recover from.

[Dave]

I was thinking more about ways to rule a game as being a draw without a turn limit. Some games take forever but are obviously not a draw, as someone is slowly pressuring forwards, or it could just be a giant map.

But even then, a turn limit can be interesting. i.e. one team is winning, but has to try to force things hard to win instead of it ending up as a draw. The player on the losing side can try to hold out for a draw.

David

[mihoshi]

If you want a tie breaker, there is already a Inflicted/Taken damage statistics in 's' menu. That can be not fair for an agressive player with a lot of regeneration/healers/villages, though. But then that's more reason for him to be more agressive or more caring for his people's pain:)

[Sapient]

There was a nice solution suggested for this already... impose a turn limit and then show the player with the most advantage at the end. See: http://www.wesnoth.org/wiki/NotSoEasyCoding

[Jami]

Neither side wins, play another map.

That's how I would handle it, especially in a tournament. If *all* players agree that a match is going nowhere then a draw would be declaired and neither side advances.

For ladder play (Assuming a 1500 point ladder where points are won and lost according to wins and losses.), count it as a draw and don't change the rankings of the players. In a ladder, it is the challengers (Lower ranked player) obligation to prove his is better than his opponent. If the game ends in a stalemate he should "lose" by default (by not advancing). In the event of a ladder where players do not lose points (I.E. you start with 0 points and get X amount for winning and Y amount for losing) both players would receive a number of points between the values for winning and losing.

[Vendanna]

But even then, a turn limit can be interesting. i.e. one team is winning, but has to try to force things hard to win instead of it ending up as a draw. The player on the losing side can try to hold out for a draw.

David

I do think that at least a way to measure who was the best player could be interesting because that way if the match should end for wathever reason, it can quickly generate the results so people can see who was winning.

It could speed a bit the multiplayer games, since even if nobody got killed after X turns, the game can tell the rest who won (instead of showing defeat to all players).

I tought along the lines of a statistic report that had a number (1,2,3,4) from rank of that player in each field. and summing the total of points determine the player who wins.

Example: 6 player game and the fields are

Military --> Units recruited - Unit lost (or damage taken/received) ranking from 1 to 6, 6 points to rank 1, 5 to dos, etc.

Economic --> Sum gold gathered minus gold spent. (if you are winning is because you have more villages, so you have more gold than your opponents, no?) same treatment.

Etc...

So this balances a bit some units, since recruiting a lot of lvl 0 units, increase your potential in military (you have brought more units) but they also are easy killed, so the result could end similar to someone that had a few powerful units that didn't die.

In the end, we sum the points on each field:

Red --> 2º in military --> 3º economic --> ... --> 5+4+... = 9+X Overall score.
Blue --> 1º military --> 2º economic --> ... --> 6+5+...= 11+X overall score.

Etc.

This could allow games of a determined number of turns/time and tell us the winner of the match if it didn't ended (hopefully increasing the amount of multiple player games) and hipotetically making the matchs of tournaments faster. (since both players could agree on it before total annihilation)

Idea worth considering?

[anakayub]

Neither side wins, play another map.

That's how I would handle it, especially in a tournament. If *all* players agree that a match is going nowhere then a draw would be declaired and neither side advances.

For ladder play (Assuming a 1500 point ladder where points are won and lost according to wins and losses.), count it as a draw and don't change the rankings of the players. In a ladder, it is the challengers (Lower ranked player) obligation to prove his is better than his opponent. If the game ends in a stalemate he should "lose" by default (by not advancing). In the event of a ladder where players do not lose points (I.E. you start with 0 points and get X amount for winning and Y amount for losing) both players would receive a number of points between the values for winning and losing.

^^ I support this. (Disclaimer: I don't play ladder games)

The thing with Wesnoth is that establishing a clear "winner" without killing the opponent leader is too subjective in my opinion. A small mistake may lead to a complete mess despite a so-called dominant/equal position, and gold/units at turn X is not a reliable indicator of winning/losing, as opponents may be saving gold, or cut off from keeps, at an (e.g. positional) advantage despite lower number of units, etc. This can make players skeptical of calculative methods of determining the winner. I hope I'm not being too "nit-picky" with this discussion, it's just something I think about as a frequent observer of ladder games.

Just call it a draw when both sides agree and think neither can gain a substantial advantage.