It is annoying to see 13 Antastic games currently being displayed on the queue.  Though you do have to be in the know, you can see other games by selecting the board filter drop-down box.

The board filter drop-down box only lists boards that currently have a game in the queue.  Even if the game doesn't show in the default list of 15 games, it will show upon selecting the board.

This won't be figured out by all players, so a fix would be nice.  Fixes are discussed in these threads:

http://www.wargear.net/forum/showthread/622/Seriously

http://www.wargear.net/forum/showthread/394

Was a new thread really necessary? I guess my thread title wasn't very descriptive, but...

Why another thread?
Isn't the big Red X intuitive that it should go away? Then the Board Filter seems to make sense as well IMO. I guess the Default List may not be too obvious if you don't visit your WarGear Settings, but eh.

I'm still not sure he is just attempting to "abuse" the system (he could start a lot more games if that was his intention). Seems quite easy to just hit the X as well for these (relatively) few number of games.

*edit* hehe Vataro beat me :P

A good feature would be the ability to select which maps show up on the list (rather than having all maps or the map filter which only shows one map) a la newegg's "Power Search" feature. This basically creates a way for users to automatically filter out some of the garbage maps that have somehow made it through review.

EnixNeo wrote: This basically creates a way for users to automatically filter out some of the garbage maps that have somehow made it through review.

Hehe, I'd be curious as to what those maps are :P

Yertle wrote:

EnixNeo wrote: This basically creates a way for users to automatically filter out some of the garbage maps that have somehow made it through review.

Hehe, I'd be curious as to what those maps are :P

As would I. I would hope our current set of reviewers (unless there are more than I realize) wouldn't pass a map that didn't deserve it... and I know most of us have fairly clear ideas about what makes a map worth passing.

Vataro wrote:

As would I. I would hope our current set of reviewers (unless there are more than I realize) wouldn't pass a map that didn't deserve it... and I know most of us have fairly clear ideas about what makes a map worth passing.

I won't name any names (more due to forgetfulness than any scruple on my part), but I have definitely seen boards pass that I wouldn't personally have cleared.

asm wrote:

Vataro wrote:

As would I. I would hope our current set of reviewers (unless there are more than I realize) wouldn't pass a map that didn't deserve it... and I know most of us have fairly clear ideas about what makes a map worth passing.

I won't name any names (more due to forgetfulness than any scruple on my part), but I have definitely seen boards pass that I wouldn't personally have cleared.

I'll name names!

I'll start with Steal the Bacon.  The only way this passes is because it's the first one, and only then because it's Bacon.  If Toaster hadn't picked such a delicious animal part for his gimmick board I would have shot it down faster than a Vice President's hunting buddy.  But OK, we have our 3 territory gimmick board and that's that =]

4Play should not have been promoted, as it *directly* violates : "Boards designed so that one starting position has an *obvious* advantage over the other starting positions will not be approved..."  I checked the board details and it is an identical port of the WF version including starting units and border modifiers.  I played this board on WF and lost the game WITHOUT EVER TAKING A TURN.  WF is currently down so I can't link to it, but I can assure you that there was no distribution of starting army placements that would have made a damn bit of difference in that outcome.  Since losing without ever taking a turn is an *obvious* disadvantage with regards to the other starting positions, it follows (ERGO QUID PRO SUM etc. etc.) that one of the other positions had an *obvious* starting advantage.

That's it.  There are a dozen boards that I just don't like the look of but looks are subjective.  To pick one out at random I'll choose Spy vs. Spy.  I haven't played the board but read the description and the reviews and can see the gameplay seems very strong, but the initial map impression is like...uhhhhh.  (Especially because I'm very literal minded, and a board titled Spy vs. Spy should have, you know, *both* Spys.)

IRoll11s wrote:

I'll name names!

 

I'll start with Steal the Bacon.  The only way this passes is because it's the first one, and only then because it's Bacon.  If Toaster hadn't picked such a delicious animal part for his gimmick board I would have shot it down faster than a Vice President's hunting buddy.  But OK, we have our 3 territory gimmick board and that's that =]

Whoa, harsh!

There's more to 'Bacon than people give it credit for.  Sure, people who play it one time will most likely walk away thinking, "That was stupid, I don't think I'll play that again" or "Pointless game, I think I'll leave a 1-star review because I'm now an expert after playing just one game on it."  Sure, it's a novelty board.  Sure, it's not built to contain epically vast strategies, but there's more to the board than just, "He who attacks first loses."  You have to weigh your options of how lucky you think you'll be and when to attack just to see what's going on at the bacon, and when to attack to own the bacon.  Does it take a lot of thought, planning, and strategy? no, but does it take some? yes it does.  Just because it's simple does not mean that it is stupid.  Sometimes you've just got to give things more than one chance.  Plus, the graphics look pretty cool with the hand effect and all; and the opening story-line is a sweet piece of writing, in my not so humble opinion.

As a reviewer, I follow three basic rules:

1. Does it look semi-professional?  As in, would I not be embarrassed to have this be a visual representation of the site if I owned WarGear.
2. Is it playable?  Borders and continents correct?  Is it reasonably intuitive, or has an appropriate description if not.
3. Does the theme work?  This is not, do I like the board personally? or would I play games on it? (I've passed a bunch of boards that I would rather not ever play another game on).  This is, "Did they accomplish what they were trying to accomplish?"

Steal the Bacon hits all three no problem; if it had been made by somebody else, I would have passed it as well.

Okay, that's enough of my knee-jerk reaction; we can go about our business again.

I disagree on both Bacon and 4Play.

Bacon, as Toast says, may not contain 'epically vast' strategies, but it's fun and exciting and certainly contains tactical elements.

As for 4Play, you must have had tragic luck to lose without even getting a turn. The starting setup is actually balanced pretty well to prevent that - all-out aggression is typically punished on that board.

11s: yes you have some semi-questionable make it thru (hell there's a good half dozen off the top of my head i prolly won't play too much). but then you also have 'good' boards that were pretty popular on the fish, made by respected members here that could have been shoo-ins, but (i think) the standard is just a bit higher here and I have seen, and personally failed boards that i think could have been better in one way or another.

I will have to say tho, Spy v. Spy is a damn impressive game once you play it (and it does have both spies). it may be 'simplistic' in its graphics, especially now that we have the dual layer, but fuck it can be one helluva fight when you're playin someone else that's good (try Ed Nygma or Mongrel)

It's interesting what happens when you play devil's advocate. Before I wrote this I looked at every single Board in the board list, and read the about/rules for about 1/2 of them.

The three I chose were the only ones I could really find anything concretely negative to weigh in on. One was just an artistic example, and as you can see above there are reasonable refutations of my protests for the other two.

I guess overall the community is doing a pretty good job of passing the right boards.

BTW the Spy vs. Spy thing is a laptop/gamma/board preview issue. On my laptop if I tilt the screen way forward or way back I can make out the other Spy, but *just* barely. At normal viewing angle all I see is the black spy.

As far as 4Play goes, let's just say if I had to pick one map out of all that were approved for demotion, that would be it. I didn't just play it the one time, and even won a couple times on it, but it never felt remotely fair in any of the games. The time I lost without even getting a turn was nothing special in terms of dice rolls. (+2 is a HUGE advantage!) And I know the WF community had some less than stellar reviewers, but mine was certainly not the only 1-star review left for that map.

4play is interesting, and probably worth being a live map, but honestly it's not that deep of a map. You either take a risk for an elimination or let someone else do it and spread themselves thin and then you take it. A little too straightforward I think.

As for the Spy v. Spy comment, I'm pretty sure the entire point of the graphics is that the spy in each box is filled in by the person who owns that box. Granted, I haven't played it, but it seems similar to some of the maps on the other site that do similar things, such as the tank battle.

IRoll11s wrote: The time I lost without even getting a turn was nothing special in terms of dice rolls. (+2 is a HUGE advantage!) And I know the WF community had some less than stellar reviewers, but mine was certainly not the only 1-star review left for that map.

I don't understand this comment. If you lost without getting a turn, I don't see how the dice modifiers could have possibly played a part. To lose without getting a turn on that board you have to A) draw the last chair, B) have ALL three of your opponents decide to attack you and only you for some reason against their own best interest, and C) they all get lucky to varying degrees (from 'very' to 'incredibly' - this would mean you'd have to be on the losing end of attacks at 9 vs 5, 9 vs 5, and 19 vs 5 + 5). None of these things involve attacking across the middle, which itself is damn near impossible on the first turn because you have to take 19 armies, beat 5 armies twice and then attack into 25 in the middle even WITH the attack bonus should leave you with few enough armies that attacking into another segment will be pointless. I have never seen anyone seriously attempt this.

I guess I just get sensitive because almost all the 1-star reviews on WF were of the "I lost so this board obviously sucks" variety or the "dice play too big a role" variety. Yes, the geographical elements of most boards have been stripped away. You basically get to make 1 decision per game. You can be foiled by terrible dice at the crucial moment. One other player behaving bizarrely or stupidly can screw your game. Okay. So let's nominate Vertigo for demotion too, right? Obviously not. I've played a lot of games on 4Play and on Vertigo, and all those things are true of both boards; I've also seen surprising and interesting results at all phases of the game on both boards.

During a game, one player suggested that 4play requires fog to be interesting. I haven't tried it enough to assess this, but I did like the one game I played with medium fog.

Without fog, there is enough variation in play for the game to be interesting, as long as you play more than one game. I currently prefer vertigo, but I would not like to see 4play demoted.

With enough fog 4play would become multiplayer Bacon. You wouldn't know when to attack. I'd turtle, no question.

Without fog turtling can be an option but you basically weigh your chances (total unit #) against others' and decide when the math becomes good enough to get ready to take a shot.