From: jecoleb@eos.ncsu.edu (have clue, will travel)
Subject: Re: misconceptions
Keywords: grrrr...  who turned on the burner?
Reply-To: jecoleb@eos.ncsu.edu
Organization: The Ghost Of Christmas Past Society
Date: Mon, 11 Jan 1993 03:47:56 GMT


hde+@cs.cmu.edu (Herbert Enderton) writes:
In article <1993Jan10.230814.28042@ncsu.edu> jecoleb@eos.ncsu.edu writes:
>>
>>hde+@cs.cmu.edu (Herbert Enderton) writes:
>>
>>>1) One kill isn't enough to start taking planets.  FALSE
>>AS Junkies unite!

>That's not what I meant, as much as I like AS's.  What I meant is that
>you can be extremely effective delivering 2 armies at a time in any
>kind of ship with a kill (except a SB).  Perhaps the real misconception
>is that you think you need to collect enough armies to actually take
>over a planet before delivering any of them.  Make several trips,
>perhaps reducing several different planets, just use the armies
>as quickly as you can.  An agri is a special case, of course.

Well, for the most part I agree with you here, and somehow I'm not surprised
the world's most infamous scout bomber supports carrying 2 at a time. :)

I didn't say that you should STOCKPILE with an AS or anything else until 
you've got enough to take, although if you can get away with it, it's most
effective. (I'm a believer in the school of Hard-Taking.)  With an AS, you can
carry 3 at a time, thus using MORE armies quickly (2 trips w/3 beats 3 trips 
w/2 in my book; although a warp 12 scout can do it just as fast, it's more
likely to become popcorn when opposed.  No, this isn't a ScoutSizeWar, just
my own observation.)

"moon" used to drive me NUTS in games on rwd4 by scout-dropping incessantly
in just that manner.  I do the same (albeit with an AS) in tight games. 

>> 1a)  Whenever you see an enemy planet with armies, bomb them.  FALSE

>While it's true that you kill an extra army if you use an AS to bomb
>a planet that's at 5, I consider this a minor point, and not particularly 
>relevant.
If you've got 3 armies and under a handful of planets to your team's name, and
a needed planet's at 5, castration is recommended for anyone who DOESN'T bomb 
it in an AS.  Same deal with the above point; I'd rather be assured of at
least neutralizing a planet with a quick-drop of 3.  Personal style.  If it's
a situation where both sides are stretched thin for armies, then that's a
different story, of course.

>>>4) Dying with armies is worse than not picking them up.  FALSE
>>This one should be tattooed on the back of the neck of anyone in a LPS or
>>core-planet situation.  If a planet being attacked has armies, PICK THEM UP.
>>That way, your planet is no worse off than 4, while leaving 'em there and
>>gambling on destroying the attacker FIRST can get you bombed all the way down
>>to 1. Bad karma.

>Also not what I meant.  What I meant is, don't be afraid to try, and I
>was thinking more of situations where you have lots of planets.  Better
>to try to take a planet, get hunted down by MUCUS PIG or somebody and
>die horribly with 6 armies, than not to try at all.  
As you rephrased it here, again agreed.  Maybe I enjoy playing LPSs too much.*

>I've seen a lot of players who don't have confidence in their ability to evade 
>an og or to take a planet under pressure, and so they don't even pick up 
>armies in the first place.  What's even worse is people who rag on their
>teammates for carrying too many armies or for getting killed carrying
>armies.  Armies that nobody picks up will usually get bombed anyway.
>Also if MUCUS PIG is off killing you with your armies, that means he
>isn't killing me with mine. 

Fair enough, although there is a theoretical limit to "too many armies."  I
try never to carry more than I need to hard-take 1 or 2 planets; i.e. 8 or so
is usually my maximum.  The chi-style 20-armies-in-an-AS is justifiable flamage
in my mind.  

Getting killed WITH armies isn't a sin; it happens to the best of us.  Leaving
armies alone and getting them bombed off hurts the team more, as it drops the
planets below 4 in many cases.

> The LPS-defense situation that jecoleb
>mentions is not a good example, because if your team really is short of
>armies then it often makes sense to leave them on the planet.  I guess
>I didn't word the original statement well.

Now, THIS I truly have to wonder about.  I look at it this way--no matter how
inspired the defense, unless all eight ships are in a tight formation around
the last planet SOMEONE'S going to creep in and bomb/drop eventually.  In such
a situation I'd rather see Bob with 3 armies and Earth with 4 than Earth with 7.

If Bob eats his 3 armies when rushed by MUCUS, Earth still has 4.  If MUCUS 
sneaks in and bombs Earth down to 1 or 2, the armies are still gone, AND you're
down even farther army-wise than you were in the first case. When I see an LPS
planet with armies sitting on it, the phrase "free beer!" springs to my mind.

>> 4a)  Running away while carrying armies is better than going for the
>> planet, trying to drop and dying.       FALSE

>As written I'd mark this as TRUE.  In the followup paragraph you
>say something about dropping an army before dying or having a
>chance at success, but those are different questions.

As the wise man said to Mussolini, "Huh?"  

There's nothing more disheartening than a player with 4-5 armies on board
heading for a planet, noting a defender nearby, saying "Uh-oh, I can't take
it under pressure, better wait for him to leave", and repeating this circle of
advance-retreat until someone gives up waiting and oggs him into New Jersey.

As you put it earlier:
 
>I've seen a lot of players who don't have confidence in their ability to evade 
>an og or to take a planet under pressure, and so they don't even pick up 
>armies in the first place.

But you don't consider picking up armies and wandering around aimlessly instead
of going for the planet and risking a productive death just as problematic?

>> 5)  You can be productive and effective without reading messages and acting
>> on them.     FALSE

>Wrong, this is TRUE, at least for me.  In fact I think I play slightly
>better with my message window turned off, and I've tried this on
>numerous occasions.  There's a wealth of information to be gleaned from
>the galactic map and the player list.  Messages are much clumsier way
>to communicate.  If you have to depend on messages to know who is
>carrying or where they're going, you're probably too asleep to do
>anything about it anyway.

Er, no.  That's not what *I* meant.  Just because YOU and I can draw what info
we need from the player list / galactic map doesn't mean that Ensign Schmoe or
Commander PlanetScum on your team is that alert.  

If your team is generally clueful (i.e. clue-games, INL play, etc.), this works
fine.  However, in a general pick-up game, if you expect any kind of teamwork
or help/escorts/coordination from your teammates, you'd better be ready to
send messages out the wazoo.  (I'm a speed-typist, and with the message-warp
key in the moo client I no longer have to move the mouse out of my tactical,
so being over-talkative doesn't bother me very much.)

Plus, if you DO decide to be talkative and send "x++, ogg x, x @ 5 armies" etc.
messages, you'll probably get more production out of those teammates who
ARE clueful enough to read.

If you want to play The Lone Cruiser and take planets, bomb, plan strategy,
etc. on your own, that's fine, too; I don't ask for escorts or help very often,
either.  However, sometimes you just gotta act as a team, and that involves
reading.  Ever tried to work as a team (ogging a base, mass escorting, whatever)
and had some nimrod who DIDN'T read screw things up by doing his own thing?

>Hm, how about
>5) That message (or post!)  must have been aimed at those other guys,
>because _I_ know how to play.    FALSE
> -- Red Shirt

If the shoe fits, wear it.  I don't claim to be the Netrek Guru (besides,
Mike's already grabbed that name); when I think I've honed my tactical or
strategic skills to their peak, I'll publish a book or something.  Don't
expect it any time soon, as I'm always learning something new about the game.
However, after three years of playing, I like to think that I've picked up
a few insights here and there about strategy.

Hm, how about
5a)  That message must have been meant to be rhetorical, because it was too
wise and oracular for anyone clueful to argue with or comment upon.  MAYBE

			---Lt. Cmdr. Poodle of Death, NCSU (hiya, Katya)
			---"Flamed by the man who taught me the fine art of
			      scout-bombing way back when... Oh, the HUMANITY!"

--
     jecoleb@eos.ncsu.edu      \\              To KLH:
 "I don't know where you took   --=--      Love ya, Katya!
 me, but I didn't want to leave."   \\  have clue, will travel.
       ---------------------------------------------------
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