Saturday, August 9, 1997
Congratulations! You have completed your first round of the Tournament!
[ Well, most of you have, which is what counts! ]
As your empire expands and begins clashing with its neighbors, we will
slowly but surely introduce you to the new rules which you will need
to learn. Subsequent Tutorials will discuss the rules on heroes,
the tournament combat system, diplomacy, and so on. For now, however,
we will concentrate on the basic principles of the Tournament,
from which everything else is derived, and then skim over the
most important rules that everyone needs to learn by heart.
ALL ABOUT THE TEN COMMANDMENTS OF TOURNAMENT WARLORDS:
*** The Origin of the Ten Commandments ***
The Olympian's Oath: "In the name of all competitors I promise that
we will take part in these Games, respecting and abiding by the rules
which govern them, in the true spirit of sportsmanship, for the glory
of sport and the honor of our teams."
- Pierre de Coubertin, father of the modern Olympics
(In other words, play by the rules, play fair, and play to have fun!)
The Warlords II World Tournament was designed to select
"The Greatest Warlord" in the most enjoyable way possible.
In choosing the rules, we had five criteria:
1. Prevent the possibility of undiscoverable cheating.
2. Keep the game as much like traditional Warlords as possible.
3. Make the tournament as balanced and fair as possible.
4. Keep the rules/overhead as simple as possible.
5. Make the tournament as enjoyable as possible for as many
people as possible, within the above constraints.
Warlords is a complex game, and making a good tournament took a lot
of work. Much more than we expected, in fact. If we'd known when
we started that we'd need the Remailer and the WarBOT, we probably
would have given up! But we just kept building up ideas and running
into problems, because Warlords was not designed to support cheat-free
tournament play. As we identified and answered various problems,
the rules became long and complex. So upon the suggestion of
Martijn Dashorst (now Moderating P14 and P15), we created a simplified
version of the essential rules...
These, then, are the Ten Commandments of Tournament Warlords:
(annotated with the most essential rules related to each one)
1. Thou Shalt Play With Honor:
* Almost all of you will lose. Play to have fun, and don't worry
too much about winning! (You have only a 1 in 6 chance of winning
a prize, but you have about a 95% chance of having fun!)
* Finish any round that you start. Do not drop out after you
"confirm" that you're in a round; it ruins the game for everyone
else, and it can ruin the tournament too.
* Play for yourself, not for someone else.
* Respect your opponents as if they were your friends. (They often are!)
* Remember, there are hundreds of Warlords in this tournament.
If you do something dishonorable, many will never play with you again.
2. Peace is not an Option!
* Tournament games involve 4 players and last 20 turns.
* The object is to control as many cities as possible on Turn 20.
* Players are ranked against others playing the same color, with the
main ranking based on the fraction of remaining cities each player
holds at the end of Turn 20.
* In the tournament, everyone is generally at war with everyone else!
( As Bill Irwin (P08, P11, P12) said in playtesting:
"When you get to turn 19 and 20 there are no allies. It every man,
woman and child for himself!" )
* After the initial rounds only top players (about 1/4th) will advance.
* All the details will be explained in Tutorial #7.
3. Thou Shalt Use All Features of the Game:
* Anything you can do in Warlords is allowed, unless it is covered
in a specific rule. But you can only use Warlords and the WarBOT.
* Reverting is allowed (and sometimes required).
* Opening other players' gamefiles is allowed (and required).
* In case of doubt, ask a Moderator by sending a query to the Remailer.
4. Thou Shalt Not Cheat:
* Do not edit or change the Warlords application, the game
file, battle tools, or any scenario data. Just play the game!
* Do not change a previous player's turn or turn on the "enhanced"
option.
* Do not do anything prohibited by the rules!
* During Official rounds, you only get 3 mistakes - afterwards
we assume you're deliberately making mistakes to cheat.
* We will deal very harshly with anyone caught cheating. There will
be many more fun Warlords activites after the tournament.
Cheaters will not be allowed to participate in them.
* It is up to you to make sure the other players do not cheat!
Watch your enemies, check their moves, and recalculate their battles.
If you suspect cheating, contact your moderator immediately!
5. Thou Shalt Carefully Brew thy Mighty Battles:
* Preview all stacks beforehand, run the battle in WarBOT,
and then revert the battle as often as needed until you
get the "official WarBOT outcome."
* This will be explained in more detail in Tutorial #4, parts A and B
6. Thou Shalt Record thy Exploits for Posterity:
* Use the Turn Report Template carefully each turn.
* Report everything listed there. That's all you need to do!
* Of course, you can embellish and make your reports exciting too!
We recommend putting the fun role-playing at the top, and then
having a concise summary in "Report Template" style at the end.
* Remember, in each of the first 3 rounds, the best role-play
wins a prize, as does the most entertaining group game history!
(Sorry, no prizes in the Practice Round...)
7. Thou Shalt Limit Thy Heroes, Allies, and Gold:
* You can only have at most one hero at a time, except in
special variations, which we will explain before each round.
(Most rounds will probably have 2 or even 3 heroes.)
* There are important rules about visiting ruins, replacing
your heroes after they die, and other hero activities.
* You can only keep 1 ally from a ruin or 2 from a stronghold.
* You can only take 1800 gold from a ruin, 3600 from a stronghold.
* The ruin descriptions say what is inside and what you can keep.
* The Rules about Heroes will be explained in Tutorial #3, coming soon.
8. Thou Shalt Move Quickly:
* You have 2 days (48 hours) between the time the Remailer
sends you the gamefile, and the time you must get it back to the
Remailer.
* Substitutes are not allowed, but you do have "timeouts".
* Fortunately, the Remailer doesn't count Saturdays (1-day weekend).
* Games may only be suspended with prior authorization of the Moderator.
* The complete rules regarding game turnaround, timeouts, and player
absences will be explained in Tutorial #5.
9. Thou Shalt not Keep Secrets:
* All game email must go through the Remailer, no secret email.
* Do not try to impersonate another player or edit their words
to mean something they did not actually say.
* This rule and the other diplomacy rules will be explained
in Tutorial #6.
10. Thou Shalt be Aided by thy Moderators:
* In case of doubt, ask your moderator! (You already know this now!)
* If you have a question about a rule, possible cheating, or
a question about just about anything Tournament-related, just ask.
* You may send questions to the Moderator without using the Remailer,
but normally all questions should go through the Remailer.
* In case of a problem, the Moderators will consult with each other,
and then issue an official decision, which is final.
This overview should allow you to get into the spirit of the tournament,
and to make your next moves with confidence. As the games
evolve we will explain more and more of the appropriate rules,
and hopefully stay at least one step ahead of your needs!
Remember, the rules are available online, at the site where you
registered for the tournament: http://www.heeter.net/w2wt/index.html
-- Bob Heeter and Gary Best, Tournament Rules Gurus