League General Discussion Thread

[Arthur Bomber Harris]

@Stucifer I find it fascinating that we probably only have a decade before a good AI is developed for Axis and Allies, one that can consistently beat the top players. Even an AI that can identify all major weaknesses 3 turns ahead would be a massive tool to take gameplay to a much higher level. Moscow falling a turn earlier is a game changer.

Chess has mostly managed to keep their top ranks honest, but I don’t think we will be able to maintain the League for very much longer. We are counting down the days of top human players.

[gamerman01]

I agree. The one I use seems to now have learning mode on now. I talked A&A 6 months ago and it didn’t know much. Now it does. A lot.

[Stucifer]

Counterpoint:
AI might be able to make the “best moves”, but being a dice game and not chess, it cannot “always win”, unlike a chess supercomputer.

In chess, there is no unknown outcome. Taking a piece will always result in taking the piece. That is not true in Axis & Allies, and never will be.

One of my friends’ dads used to play chess with a guy that was ranked. The dad could only win when the other guy was drunk (which was frequently enough).

Chess is a game where the better player, if better enough, ALWAYS wins. A&A as this entire thread has been discussing, is thankfully not. I play A&A in part because I find games where I can lose to someone “worse” than me at the game and I can win against someone more skilled to be more enjoyable, personally.

[mikawagunichi]

And if the promised AI productivity boom actually materializes we should all have more free time and money to travel and reconstitute the league as an over the board league. Stucifer presciently already has the PTV board printed for us.

[crockett36]

@Stucifer said in Post League Game Results Here:

I will say if I was playing PtV low luck I can’t imagine Axis would get a bid. I would definitely want a bid to play Allies. I believe with a 0 bid you can be at 100% odds for Sealion on G3 with a naval buy G1 (CV, DD, tp) and 11-transport buy G2.

That’s with UK bringing the Gibraltar + Malta fighter back and building 18 infantry + a fighter for London.

This seems like a fairly damning assessment of ptv. Someone might want to think about a version 2.

[axis-dominion]

yep, in ptv SL is much easier, i got it 3 in a row and almost a 4th but stu decided it wasn’t worth it.

[mikawagunichi]

@crockett36 said in Post League Game Results Here:

@Stucifer said in Post League Game Results Here:

I will say if I was playing PtV low luck I can’t imagine Axis would get a bid. I would definitely want a bid to play Allies. I believe with a 0 bid you can be at 100% odds for Sealion on G3 with a naval buy G1 (CV, DD, tp) and 11-transport buy G2.

That’s with UK bringing the Gibraltar + Malta fighter back and building 18 infantry + a fighter for London.

This seems like a fairly damning assessment of ptv. Someone might want to think about a version 2.

More of a damning assessment of LL IMO. PTV is by far the most balanced and dynamic of the the 3 global variants.

[AndrewAAGamer]

@crockett36 said in Post League Game Results Here:

This seems like a fairly damning assessment of ptv. Someone might want to think about a version 2.

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing but did not want to comment as I have only played PTV once and it was a very early version of PTV. I know it changed dramatically after that.

If the game seems balanced as some are saying here, even with the fall of London, that is probably due to a strong Russia.

[axis-dominion]

@AndrewAAGamer said in Post League Game Results Here:

@crockett36 said in Post League Game Results Here:

This seems like a fairly damning assessment of ptv. Someone might want to think about a version 2.

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing but did not want to comment as I have only played PTV once and it was a very early version of PTV. I know it changed dramatically after that.

If the game seems balanced as some are saying here, even with the fall of London, that is probably due to a strong Russia.

in my experience so far with SL, and i might have more experience with it than anyone else so far lol, russia in OOB/BM makes significantly more progress against G than in ptv… seems like G is able to push the russians back out of europe at some point. maybe others have had different experiences and disagree, or maybe i’m doing something wrong, but that’s what i’m finding. i remember in most of my global sea lions my russia would just kick ass and become unstoppable

[mikawagunichi]

OOB and BM both have vastly higher bids in favor of Allies though. Apples to apples PTV is the most balanced and maybe there needs to be an adjustment to the bid but that’s an indictment of the players, not the game.

[gamerman01]

@mikawagunichi said in Post League Game Results Here:

OOB and BM both have vastly higher bids in favor of Allies though. Apples to apples PTV is the most balanced and maybe there needs to be an adjustment to the bid but that’s an indictment of the players, not the game.

Not a huge sample size and I’m not going to stand behind it, but this week as you probably know, I tallied the last 18 months of PTV in the league and the Allies are ROMPING.

Just because the players’ perception is the Axis need about 10 or 12 doesn’t mean it’s accurate. The actual results show that the Axis have won 42%, again, the past 18 months.

With my point being not that 42% is really very accurate, but my point being that the jury is very much out, on whether PtV is “the most balanced”

[mikawagunichi]

@gamerman01 How much would the average PTV bid need to change in order to exceed average BM bid? (In absolute value)

[gamerman01]

@mikawagunichi Only about 15, at the most

[axis-dominion]

as axis in ptv, i have found strong european naval presence, supporting italy to take gib and egypt, has been the most effective so far. i did this against adam in both games i played him so far and in both games i was winning. the first i ended up losing as my japanese play was on the weaker side and made some bad decisions and got punished by the dice, with adam taking advantage of these weaknesses and opportunities by swinging his european navy and spamming subs. in the second one it was very similar but i played a much stronger japan so i moved on to win that one.

[axis-dominion]

and btw in that first game i won several major battles on the europe side including smashing his entire atlantic navy at gib, and i thought for sure i would win, but allies in ptv are definitely more resilient.

[axis-dominion]

the third and most recent game between us i got sea lion’ed, but i ended up having a substaintial > 700 tuv lead and felt i had the advantage, but his axis was still strong and continued making gains… there were some blunders and we had some disagreements that we couldn’t settle so just ended up scrapping the game. but it was a fun one, but also very long one with no end in sight.

[crockett36]

I’m wondering if we examined the elo of the top 10, would we discover that they played and play the Axis plus 65 percent of the time.

[mikawagunichi]

Man I think PTV players would be tripping over themselves to play axis at +18. 3 TPs/subs

[gamerman01]

Path to Victory, right?

I just added up Ghostglider, Adam514, General Disarray, Axis Dominion, 666, Peirce, and ArtofWar. FOR THE PAST 18 MONTHS ONLY
In total they took Allies 39 times, Axis 31
General D wants the Allies and took them 6 times and Axis only 1
Peirce wants Axis and took them 6 times and Axis 0
So those two offset.

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About bids for PtV, and it being the most “balanced” because of small bids chosen:

We don’t have enough sample size, not even close, to make any conclusions about what a proper bid should be.

Most of the games completed over the past 18 months should be thrown out of consideration because the stronger player almost always wins. I’m seeing that no matter what side is taken by who, the stronger player wins - almost always.
The rest of the games, which are few, just don’t tell you anything about bids because there are waaaaay too many other variables.

[gamerman01]

The 42% Axis statistic I dropped last week, and the fancy colored bar graph in the statistics section of the ELO rating sheet?

Horribly misleading!

How much the Axis win is largely a function of who likes to take what side. Maybe that’s what @crockett36 was looking for. Top players took Allies 39 times to 31, and, guess what, the Allies have been rolling the past 18 months.

The fact that stronger players are winning more games is not a strong indication that PtV is “balanced” close to zero.
I’m convinced that rather, it’s a strong indicator that PTV is big enough and complex enough that the results are not very sensitive to a bid.
To be clearer, I doubt that we would have much different results between a -30 bid and a -8 bid. The skill of the players and the magnitude of the game overpower it.