NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/rec/games/board/12814

Text File | 1992-12-30 | 4.3 KB | 80 lines

Newsgroups: rec.games.board
Path: sparky!uunet!paladin.american.edu!gatech!enterpoop.mit.edu!micro-heart-of-gold.mit.edu!xn.ll.mit.edu!ll.mit.edu!shoham
From: [e-mail] (Daniel Shoham)
Subject: Re: Titan rules addenda/errata
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Sender: [e-mail]
Organization: MIT Lincoln Laboratory
References: <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]> <[e-mail]>
Date: Wed, 30 Dec 92 23:23:38 GMT
Lines: 68

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (T. Andy Frakes) writes:
>In article <[e-mail]>, [e-mail] (Bruno Wolff III) writes:
>|> From article <[e-mail]>, by [e-mail] (Chuck Krueger):
>|> ] In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] writes:
>|> ]>    Titan rules say that you can make deals in order to speed up the game.
>|> ]>You may agree to any result except a defender time-out (I don't know why
>|> ]>there is this exception.  These are normally the slowest battles.)
>|> ]
>|> ] Hmm... Seems to me that if my opponent and I want to agree to a time-out
>|> ] result we can just put our pieces on the battleboard, out of contact and do
>|> ] nothing.
>|> ]
>|>Remember when making deals that require putting pieces on the board that they
>|>are not binding so there is the possibility of a double cross.
>
>Right.  This shouldn't be much of a problem in friendly, leisurely games, but
>it would be something to watch for in a tournament.  I'm still not sure where
>the rules allow for a 'mutual,' though  I'm sure that the other players may
>object to such an event in cases where the the attacker and/or defender are
>sucking for stack markers and the result cannot be achieved reliably through
>normal play (as can deals with particular pieces or time losses).  Any help

A good point. In fact, a strategy I sometimes use when I find I attacked more
than I planed on (giving cooperative terrain), and giving away points is
very relevent, is to play for a time-out. I, the attacker, set up a defensive
formation to discourge combat and then allow the combat phases to pass,
perhaps exchanging a few rangestrikes. Then, on the 6th or 7th phase I send
one creature to a place where it cannot be engaged (or at least cannot be
killed) and everyone else to fight - and try and strip the defender's stack.
(I once summoned an angel in on the _7th_ phase to help finish off a Dragon)
While I lose a stack that I was going to lose anyhow, the defender never gets
any points AND loses some creatures.

This strategy could devestate an opponent who believes me if I were to say
"hey, just wait there and I will give you a time victory". He will get the
promissed time victory, but with a smaller stack than he thought. I can never
forget the face of an opponent - who never seen this play before - after his
7-stack (titan) set up defensively in the Swamp waiting for my (weaker)
attacking 6-stack to try to break his formation before he will get a Wyvern
for Wyvern on phase 4. When my stack set up defensively as well and sufficed
itself with rangestrikes (2 Rangers), he was sure of victory. By phase 4 he
was denied the recruit because his stack still had 7 creatures (he did not
want to sacrifice one and allow my Angel in, figuring he will get his recruit
after the battle). When I attacked all out on phase 6, and reduced his stack
to a mere Titan and two Rangers, he figured that at least he would get an
Angel and an Archangle (making for a rather nasty 5-stack teleporter). Well,
he was quite discussted when I pointed out that I still had a GARGOYLE (out
of reach) at the end of phase 7 - TIME LOSS, no points, no angle, no Archangel,
no teleportation. OUCH.


BTW, as for agreeing to a mutual: since players can agree on the losses that
will be incurred in a battle (instead of fighting it), simply agreeing that
ALL creatures would be lost constitutes a mutual.


Dan Shoham               [e-mail]
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