Working Rules for Launch Contest

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-04 02:42:30

These are the work-in-progress rules for the launch contest. You can comment below, and I will continue editing this post to tweak the rules based on comments.

At some point, I will also begin transitioning these rules into a more PERSUASIVE and IMPACTFUL style that best suits a CONTEST OF THIS MAGNITUDE.

Working Title: HERMETIC ORDER OF THE GOLDEN AMULET

36 metal amulets, each one-of-a-kind, are hand-wax-carved, hand cast, and hand polished by the game designer.

6 will contain a half ounce of 99.99% pure gold.

12 will contain a half ounce of 99.99% pure silver.

18 will contain a half ounce of the purest available copper.

The contest will run for one week.

The amulets will be represented in-game as unique icons that are each held by one player at a time. Throughout these rules, these icons are called "amulets."

Each player will have 36 scores, all starting at 0, one for each amulet. At the end of the contest, the player with the highest score for each amulet will receive the associated physical amulet. In the case of a tie, the last tied player to have held the amulet wins. Each player can receive at most one amulet, with the gold amulets handed out before silver, and silver handed out before copper, and all amulets handed out in numerical order from 1 to 36. Thus, a player who has won a gold amulet is out of the running for a silver amulet, even if they also had the highest score for a silver amulet.

Each amulet will be accompanied by a cash prize payed into the winner's game balance in the following amounts:

Gold (1 - 6): $305, $304, $303, $302, $301, $300
Silver (7 - 18): $111, $110, $109, ... , $101, $100
Copper (19 - 36): $67, $66, $65, ... , $51, $50

Definition: Last player standing
The last player in a Cordial Minuet match who still has coins. Leaving while your opponent still has coins means your opponent is the last player standing. To be the last player standing, don't leave the match until your opponent leaves first or has been reduced to 0 coins.

Definition: Amulet dropped into the player pool.
Let N be the number of live games that are currently in progress. A dropped amulet passes to the Nth player, system-wide, to be the last player standing in a non-amulet match and who does not currently hold an amulet and who has a balance of at least $3.00.

At the start of the contest, the 36 amulets will be dropped into the player pool. These will be dropped in order from gold to silver to copper.

Definition: Amulet match
A match for stakes of $3.00 or less where exactly one player holds an amulet. The amulet holder must have a balance of at least $3.00 and pick AMULET GAME from the game menu. A random, non-amulet-holding opponent will be chosen for them at stakes no greater than $3.00. The amulet holder will be shown the stakes at the start of the match. The non-amulet holder will not be aware of the amulet until the end of the match.

When a player holds an amulet

For each amulet match where they are the last player standing, they gain 200 points for that amulet.
If their opponent in an amulet match is the last player standing, they lose the amulet and their opponent gains the amulet, plus 200 points for that amulet
For each full minute that a player holds an amulet, they lose 1 point for that amulet.
Non-amulet matches can still be played, though they don't affect the amulet.
After a full two hours of no amulet match play, they drop the amulet into the player pool.

Two amulet holders can never play each other.

Last edited by jasonrohrer (2015-03-11 18:44:18)

Dan_Dan84 · 2015-03-04 12:10:41

Ooh, getting excited! (And with my luck, the contest will run the week I'm on holiday... Any indication yet of a release date?)

Questions:

1) So the amulet holder's score for the amulet currently held is reduced by one every hour. Like many on here, I find a game can take 30-60 minutes. It feels like, if I'm holding the amulet, I'll really be running on a treadmill to gain amulet points. If I win a game that takes an hour, my net gain will be zero (plus one for winning, minus one for taking an hour to do so). Have I understood the rules correctly?

2) Have you ditched the idea of the game being worth no money, with only the amulet (and/or amulet point) being awarded as a prize? If not, I guess that needs to be in the rules.

Looking forward to being PERSUADED to participate by rules written in an IMPACTFUL style.

jere · 2015-03-04 12:36:41

For each full hour that a player holds an amulet, they lose 1 point for that amulet.
After a full hour of no amulet match play, they drop the amulet into the player pool.

I'm not sure if this needs clarifying, but just to be clear: if I gain an amulet and then do nothing I end up with 0 points?

Another thing that is probably clear, but I want to double check: if I lose a game immediately after gaining an amulet I have 1 point? And if I win that same amulet back (exact same one), I now have 2 points? I'm very interested in the answer here.

It'd be nice to have another thread on the random delay stuff. Is there no limit to the number of games you can play per person? If not, well... it makes me tempted to buy up some visa gift cards.

.. · 2015-03-04 13:37:27

I haven't been reading the other thread because it's too long.

Th only part of this that 'worries' me is that you have a separate score for each of the 36 amulets. Are the amulets distinguishable in-game? Can you see how many points you have on each amulet, and which one you're holding? Can you see which amulet your opponent has? Can you even see whether they have an amulet when you're in game, or when you see the game in the lobby? Overall I don't see the point in having 36 separate scores; seems like it will confuse as well as hinder finding the best players (you're unlikely to find the same amulet back to accumulate more points)

Last edited by .. (2015-03-04 13:39:20)

cullman · 2015-03-04 13:44:04

jere wrote:

It'd be nice to have another thread on the random delay stuff. Is there no limit to the number of games you can play per person? If not, well... it makes me tempted to buy up some visa gift cards.

Jason, I still think you are going to have collusion problems, as it makes it very easy for me to see my game at $4.23 regardless of the random display time. If I make an alt that I create to lose games to my amulet holding main, and I always use the "losing alt" to create the games at some strange number like $4.23, I can almost guarantee that main will never join the wrong game and lose the amulet, and who cares if my "losing alt"'s $4.23 game is joined by some random legit player as soon as I see that it wasn't joined by my main the losing alt drops out and starts another game with a strange amount. I really think the only solution to this is, as I mentioned before, is having a few fixed levels of play for the amulets, like .25, $1, $2.5 and $5. Then I think someone who is trying to collude will at least occasionally join the "wrong game" with their amulet holding main.

Also, just my 2 cents I think a one hour expiration time in the amulet is too short.

Last edited by cullman (2015-03-04 13:47:43)

jere · 2015-03-04 13:52:24

cullman, I was saying the exact same thing on collusion, which is why I want more details. If it's set up the way I think it is, I might try to "collude" just to prove it.

.., it would probably be simpler and in some ways more fair to have a single score for each type. Simpler for many reasons but mainly because you can have 3 leaderboards instead of 36.

The pros of having individual scores?
-It makes each amulet feel more like a real object rather than a variable sitting on a server.
-It might convince new players they have a better shot. If I get a gold amulet, I don't have to beat the best 6 players in this game to win. Instead I just have to win on this amulet. The flip side is I could have the bad luck of gaining an amulet on which someone has already racked up the most points.

cullman · 2015-03-04 14:25:42

jere wrote:

cullman, I was saying the exact same thing on collusion, which is why I want more details. If it's set up the way I think it is, I might try to "collude" just to prove it.

Yup, I understood your comment to mean that, and I quoted you because I think it's concerning that even before the tournament is up and running it seems so obvious how to cheat. I mean even if "we" didn't do the tiered thing I think at least forcing amulet games to be in increments of 50 cents (and maybe have a 10 cent or 1 cent game too). At least it would cut down down on the ability to collude, but even that I think if I created a $3.50 or a $1.50 game, and my main could see it within a minute, those seem like relatively strange numbers to play at and I'm sure my 2 accounts could find each other especially at off peak hours. I understand why Jason doesn't want to do this, cause it diverts from how the game is played now, though, if someone is really dying to play a game for $4.23 instead of $5 they can still do so in my model, it just won't be an amulet game.

Personally, I think having 3 or 4 set prices for amulet play is not only the best way (and maybe only) to prevent collusion, but it will also actually help legit players find more amulet games, and probably find them quicker as well.

gnuborg · 2015-03-04 14:40:33

Throwing wins to yourself with alts is easier to prevent if as an amulet holder you can only start an amulet game by creating the game yourself and not by being allowed to joining a game set up by someone else. This is where the random time delay will help prevent you joining the amulet games with an alt immediately. It doesn't seem like a perfect measure though and it also depends on the traffic the game has during the amulet contest.

cullman · 2015-03-04 15:04:07

gnuborg wrote:

Throwing wins to yourself with alts is easier to prevent if as an amulet holder you can only start an amulet game by creating the game yourself and not by being allowed to joining a game set up by someone else.

While this isn't a bad idea, and it does sort of fix the no risk part for the main/amulet account, I think it has some other troublesome side effects. For one, by design (and I think it's a neat design) neither player knows if the other has an amulet until the game is over. In your proposed model, I would never create an amulet game, I would only join them, because I would have a much higher chance of getting an opponent with an amulet. In fact, if I created games I'd be certain to never play an opponent with an amulet. I assume this strategy would be adopted widely by all non-amulet holders and it would stunt the number of games being played, in my opinion.

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-04 20:23:08

Yeah, that's the reason I don't want amulet holders to only be able to create games. All non-amulet holders would be motivated to do nothing but join games...

Dan, the idea of playing amulet games for non-money stakes is gone.

I'll up those times to 2 hours.

Jere, yeah, the idea was that winning an amulet game as the non-amulet holder would give you one point for that amulet. If you timed out with it, you'd lose that point. But even if you never win after picking it up, you'd still get a point for each win-based pickup.

I'm pretty set on the idea of 36 unique objects with different scores. Yes, they would look different in game (I'd scan the actual amulets and make icons). Yes, your point count for the amulet you hold would be displayed. Yes, that means 36 leaderboards. No, you still wouldn't know you were in an amulet game, as a non-amulet holder, until it was over. You wouldn't see your opponent's amulet until the end.

Yes, you're right that proposing a game with the alt and looking for it with the amulet account would be a way to bypass the random delays without risking the amulet to a non-alt account.

Sheesh...

Okay, one thing to remember is that I DON'T care about changing the game experience for the amulet holders. There are only 36 of those people.

So, what about if amulet holders don't get to pick their own stakes? What if we pick a random stake for them that is no greater than 5% of their bankroll. 50% of the time, this could be in the form of joining a randomly-chosen existing game in the required range, if one exists. The other 50% of the time, we create a new game for them with a random stake no greater than 5% of their bankroll. Also no greater than $5 (so the amulet-holder can't simple deposit a lot and recognize the only high stake with their alt).

So, the amulet-holders would have a AMULET GAME button on their game list that would be separate from the normal games, but everyone else would just be playing as normal, creating and joining sub-$5 games, until they get an amulet.

No random delays necessary.

Updated above to reflect all of this.

In terms of timeline, once we determine that this will actually work, I'll have to make the amulets, which will take a few weeks.

LiteS · 2015-03-04 21:07:04

jasonrohrer wrote:

The other 50% of the time, we create a new game for them with a random stake no greater than 5% of their bankroll.

I think it would be important to weight the randomly generated stake with popular game stakes (.01, .25, 1.00, etc. I'm sure you have data on popular game stakes.). If you use an even distribution between $0.01-$5.00, it'd be pretty easy for non-amulet holders to peg the game that's $3.11 as a likely amulet game.

Also, don't forget to account for the case in which a player may have only $0.18 in their bankroll and managed to pick up an amulet.

Edit:
Interesting Anagrams for Golden Amulet:
Moulted Angel
Mounted Legal
Gunmetal Lode
Elegant Mould
Daemon Gullet

Last edited by LiteS (2015-03-04 21:16:42)

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-04 21:33:49

Daemon Gullet is pretty sweet... anagrams are a great idea!

How about:

Nu Metal Lodge

If a player only has 18 cents, then yeah, their amulet games would be capped at 1 cent. Fixing rules to handle this.

storeroom leaflet · 2015-03-05 00:13:20

jasonrohrer wrote:

For each full two hours that a player holds an amulet, they lose 1 point for that amulet.

I would advocate instead an amulet game being worth 60 points and players losing 1 point for every 2 minutes, otherwise your incentives start getting really weird around the 2 hour mark. This also has the benefit of making ties unlikely. If you didn't mind adding a little complexity I'd also suggest having it be 1 point for every 2 minutes (maybe even more minutes/point) in game, 2 points for every minute out of game (maybe even more points/minute) and no points lost between hitting start amulet game and the game starting. Also I think there needs to be an option of dropping an amulet voluntarily if you lose points while holding it.

jasonrohrer wrote:

Definition: Amulet dropped into the player pool.
An amulet passes to the next player, system-wide, who is the last player standing in a non-amulet match and who does not currently hold an amulet.

With 3 colluding accounts you can pass an amulet here fairly reliably by having the two non-amulet holding accounts start a game, then drop the amulet and have one player leave. You could keep feeding amulets to a main account this way. Limiting each account to only receiving one dropped amulet for the entire promotion would stop this, but it wouldn't stop someone who just needs a a couple more points colluding with others to get the relevant amulet. Giving to the next player who has never played a game for that amulet would fix that, though it wouldn't stop buying and selling of amulets. Buying and selling might not be such a concern though since you still have to earn points for them to be worth anything. But to avoid this altogether I'd recommend replacing next with last standing player in game n/2 to finish after the drop where n is the number of games in progress when the amulet is dropped.

Last edited by storeroom leaflet (2015-03-05 00:16:09)

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-05 03:17:57

Well, you can't control when you drop an amulet, right? I mean, most of the time, if you had it, you wouldn't WANT to drop it. If you only drop it after 2 hours of inactivity... it's not like that would be something you'd shoot for in order to drop it at a specific time.

If you lose a match, you don't drop it, but pass it to the person you lost to.

Are you suggesting that if your alt account gets it, you'd time out on purpose and try to pass it to your main account? But why would your alt ever get it? I can't imagine people using alts that way... actually playing loads of real games with them... might as well just play loads of games with your main account.

Unless you envision two friends, where A has racked up loads of points and B has not. If B gets the amulet, B may want to pass it to A by timing out and making sure A is the last player standing (against A's alt) before anyone else.

Any known, fixed number would just be beaten by a player using 2 times that number of alt accounts. For example, if we always pass it to the 10th player to be the last player standing, a player with 20 alts could ensure that they are the one picked.

Why not a random number? The Rth player to be the last player standing, where R is picked at random when the amulet is dropped? That feels too much like a lottery.

But n/2, where N is the current number of active games, is also a hidden value (players don't know how many games are active), so it's essentially just a random number, right? But it's not ACTUALLY a random number. We wouldn't use the word Random to describe it. Also, I think I would just use n, not n/2.

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-05 03:19:13

And you're right that better point granularity would help with a lot of things here. It just makes it seem more complicated, even if it's not. I'd just have you lose 1 point per minute, and gain 100 points every time you're the last player standing.

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-05 03:26:52

To drop the amulet voluntarily:

Join a 1-cent game and then leave immediately.

Cobblestone · 2015-03-05 06:29:24

I really really like the idea of the randomized stakes for amulet holders! So the Amulet Game button is how an amulet holder both creates and joins games? Can they still join normal games, and does that not put the amulet at risk? Just want to make sure I'm following!

.. · 2015-03-05 08:07:14

I also think the randomised stakes for amulet games is a great idea.

OK, with 36 completely distinguished amulets 36 separate scores makes far more sense. And as jere said, it gives worse players a better chance, which is the contrapositive of my complaint that it better players a worse chance.

But n/2, where N is the current number of active games, is also a hidden value (players don't know how many games are active), so it's essentially just a random number, right? But it's not ACTUALLY a random number.

Are you worried about gambling laws here? But all kinds of skill-based tournament have random seeding. OK I guess to want to take every available precaution though I would hope any judge would be competent enough to know there's no difference.

HappyWulf · 2015-03-05 14:31:08

So you will have logs of every match with an Amulet involved, right? I'm sure you can just check which players are gaming the system by seeing if they repeatedly win vs the same opponent in small-stakes matches. I'm sure if you put a disclaimer that you intend to monitor all Amulet matches for collusion, and will pass judgement on disqualification as you see fit, you will see more honest players.

You might also want to consider Amulet matches only qualify if they are being played in $1 stakes or higher matches.

Edit: also, hi!! first post! Haven't played in a while, but I've played a bit and have won double my buy-in so far. =3 I intend to play more this weekend.

Last edited by HappyWulf (2015-03-05 14:32:00)

LiteS · 2015-03-05 18:01:30

HappyWulf wrote:

So you will have logs of every match with an Amulet involved, right? I'm sure you can just check which players are gaming the system by seeing if they repeatedly win vs the same opponent in small-stakes matches. I'm sure if you put a disclaimer that you intend to monitor all Amulet matches for collusion, and will pass judgement on disqualification as you see fit, you will see more honest players.

I'd assume Jason's been avoiding executive privilege for multiple reasons, some of which might be legally related in hosting such a contest. I'd also argue any player able to "game the system" deserves an amulet, as long as what they're doing isn't toxic or external to the game itself (i.e., ddos'ing the game server near the contest end or something like that). Hopefully the final rules will be setup in a way to make gaming the system a tactic nearly as difficult as actually playing the game legitimately. I suspect that extending the length of the competition beyond just a weekend would avoid someone attempting to hold on to a specific amulet through timeout abuse a lot harder, since we all have to sleep sometime.

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-05 19:00:03

Cobblestone: they can still create/join normal games without risking the amulet, but the clock is ticking and they're losing amulet points.

HappyWulf: I've been there before and never want to go back. Combing through logs looking for patterns, and then finding "enough" evidence through those patterns to accuse someone of cheating. It's even worse when the person you accuse is NOT actually cheating. What if they deny it? Do you call them a liar? And when you look for patterns long enough, you start finding patterns. You start seeing "coincidences" that are clearly "not by accident." But random data sets are full of coincidences.

Gotta build a structure where I don't need to worry about doing that, because it's not possible to win the contest just by cheating. A small edge, okay. Just not, "I've never played before, but I used this one easy trick to win!"

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-06 21:59:34

As I'm moving to implement protocol and server changes for this, which I want to keep minimal because it's a one-time contest, I'm finding that allowing two amulet holders to play each other over-complicates things. We must wait for the winner to pick one to keep, which is an extra protocol message, and we must have a timeout on that server-side if that choice isn't made promptly, so that's extra cron-job flush code.

It's just much cleaner if one player can hold one amulet at most, at a time. Having amulet-holders play each other means that the winner effectively "holds" two amulets for a brief time.

So, if you're "stuck" with a copper amulet, you will have no shot at getting a gold amulet. If this bothers you, leave a game and drop your copper amulet. That's a reasonable choice for you to make.

This simplifies things tremendously, because amulets can just "ride" on the existing game protocol without any new amulet-specific player actions needing to be added.

AnoHito · 2015-03-06 23:08:06

Wouldn't it work better to make things so the winner got the keep the better amulet? For the sake of argument, you could say that the amulet they already had the most wins with would be the most desirable to keep, so you would always get to keep the amulet you were most likely to win unless you choose to intentionally drop it. This way, you could get your best amulet back from someone without having to drop the amulet you were already holding first.

joshwithguitar · 2015-03-07 00:11:09

I'm going to repost some ideas I put up on the "Thoughts" page because they seem to have been buried without any responses and I would be interested in peoples opinions. I think there are big problems with the way you are currently selecting amulet games and think my earlier proposed solution would fix it.
- One problem I see is that a player could intentionally have an account with a low overall bank balance in order to force all amulet games into 1c games. If their alts or fellow colluders always then start 1c games it will give them a decent chance of joining a game.
- Another problem with this system is that those who want to play amulet games will be rewarded by playing low stakes - as the stake goes up the chance of joining a game will become much smaller. So this could strongly affect player behavior (perhaps countering the above point because everyone could be playing 1c games. This is not something you want though).

So what I propose is to go back to assigning the amulet holder to a completely random game, stealing a player away from a game they are joining. This will ensure there is little impact on gameplay for non-amulet holders and allow for players of any stakes joining amulet games. My earlier idea was that by adding a small additional prize pool you could make sure the game stakes are still relevant to the game:

"One further possibility, if you don't mind increasing the prize pool a little, is to have a pool from which you compensate players who join amulet games until the pool runs out. So if you join a $20 game and get pulled into an amulet game and end up winning with 180 chips you will get $18 from the pool as well as the amulet so long as the pool has $18 remaining. You could also have it so that money wagered that would normally have been lost in an amulet game feeds back into the pool up to the starting pool value. This would create a slight intensive to play higher stakes games while the pool is full, but I don't see that as a problem. I would not be surprised if a $100 pool was never exhausted in a system like this, and so the nature of the game would not change very much for those who are brought into amulet games.

Further still, amulet holders could nominate a value whenever they start a game to set the maximum money they are willing to wager. If they end up being paired with a lower priced game, money transferal is treated like a standard game at the lower price with no money going in or out of the pool. If the amulet holder is paired with a higher value game then the payout for them is treated like a standard game based on the higher stake. Money would only then have to come from/enter the pool to make up for the gap in winnings for the other player. So, in this final system if you start a $20 game and you are matched with an amulet holder who is willing to wager up to $5, then if you end up with 180 chips and they have 0 at the end you will take $5 from the amulet holder and be given a further $13 from the pool. If you lose all the chips and your opponent ends up with 180 you will give them $4.50 to them and a further $15.50 to the pool."

jasonrohrer · 2015-03-07 03:50:54

Ano, if it worked that way, I'd be making assumptions about what amulet was "better" to you. Maybe you have the best chance at the copper you are holding, but you just played a game against gold and won. Should I assume you want to keep working on the copper, or that you'd rather drop it for the gold?

I'd really need to ask before making that kind of choice for you, but asking is messy.

If I never let you play another amulet holder while you hold an amulet, the question does not need to be asked.

Also, it seems kinda insular and weird for two amulet holders to play each other. There are likely hundreds of other players who would like a shot at an amulet, and we're going to let two amulet holders hog each other?

CORDIAL MINUET ENSEMBLE

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