Difference between revisions of "Super Melee rulesets"

Latest revision as of 17:27, 19 June 2018

Preface[edit]

The Ur-Quan Masters provides a networked Super Melee arena and point costs for all the ships, but no standardized rules. Thus, different groups of fans have developed different rule sets for putting together their fleets for battle. This page is an attempt to collect all such rule sets and describe them. If you've played using rules that aren't described here, by all means add them!

Standard Rules for #uqm-arena[edit]

Players may use only one ship of each type and build up to a maximum fleet size of 200 points. The Thraddash Torch is banned. No game modifications are used.

In a serious game or tournament you are expected to build your team before connecting so that you can't base your ship choices on knowledge of your opponent's team.

Point limits other than 200 can be used, although they are uncommon. The outcome of a lower point game is drastically affected by each player's fleet composition, while higher point games don't leave much room for choice in fleet selection.

The Thraddash Torch is banned because the ship has the potential to stall matches and upset game balance if played to its limit.

Stalemates are resolved by forcing the faster of the two ships in play to go on the offensive.

Game modifications have become quite prevalent recently, making the standard rule set less ubiquitous.

Fleet Setup Rules[edit]

No Duplicate Ships[edit]

No more than one of each ship type can appear in a player's fleet. This forces ship variety and prevents a player's fleet setup from having too much impact on the outcome of the melee match.

Duplicate Ships[edit]

The game can also be played simply with a point limit and no restriction on duplicate ships; this has fallen out of use since the result depends mostly on the teams used. Certain ship types tend to dominate most others. However, this ruleset has seen revival recently in games played with Shiver's Balance Mod, which handles duplicates better than vanilla UQM.

In order to reasonably allow more of the same ship, players can take turns picking ships rather than connecting to each other with predetermined fleets.

30pt ships can be limited or banned, to keep them from skewing the game heavily.

Crap Fleets[edit]

In order for some of the less commonly used ships to see use, some players like to play with each player designing the other player's fleet. The fleet point limit should be considered a minimum rather than a maximum. This can be played with various point totals or allowances for duplicate ships, although duplicates can lead to undesirable results such as a fleet full of Drones.

Random Teams[edit]

A random team can be more interesting, as you will often end up without such omnipresent mainstays as the Utwig Jugger. A good random team generator can be found here.

Auction[edit]

Players get a pool of points and ships are auctioned off to the highest bidder. The details of auction procedure are up to the players. Ideally, a separate person outside of the game should act as auctioneer. This format is best used with 4 or 6 players playing a tournament with their auction-bought ships and multiple copies of every ship type up for auction.

Fixed Number of Ships[edit]

Disregard point values and limit fleets by quantity. A "No Duplicates" rule is strongly recommended in conjunction with this. This places an emphasis on large, expensive craft or the opposite when combined with "Crap Fleets".

Alliance vs. Hierarchy[edit]

A match with the predetermined teams "Old Alliance Ships" against "Old Hierarchy Ships". It's an interesting match, since the creators of the game went to a great deal of effort to balance it in Star Control I. Unfortunately, it seems to favor the Alliance.

Other Rules[edit]

Random Ship Selection[edit]

Use the random select button whenever the game prompts you to choose which ship to send into the arena. Ideally, both players should immediately mash this button any time the ship selection screen comes up to remove any doubt of cheating. This format is not great for fair competition, but the unusual ship match-ups add a lot of variety to the game. Random Ship Selection is best combined with a ban on 30pt ships, which tend to heavily skew a match depending on what is drawn against them.

Battle victor chooses ship for loser[edit]

Requires communication between players when ships are selected. When playing by the usual rules, the player who has just lost a ship picks a ship to easily defeat the other player's current ship. However, under these rules, the player with the victorious ship makes this choice for the player who has just lost a ship.

Left-to-Right[edit]

Deploy ships in the order they are on your fleet list, starting from the upper-left ship slot and proceeding right.

Handicaps[edit]

Disable one of the turning keys.

Play with a controller that makes the game more difficult, such as a joystick or dance pad.

Play with only one hand.

Play drunk.

Play high.

Play drunk and high.

@@ Line 1: / Line 1: @@
-The Ur-Quan Masters provides a networked Super Melee arena and point costs for all the ships, but no standardized rules. Thus, different groups of fans have developed different rule sets for putting together their fleets for battle. This page is an attempt to collect all such rule sets and describe them. (If you've played using rules that aren't described here, by all means add them!)
+==Preface==
+The Ur-Quan Masters provides a networked Super Melee arena and point costs for all the ships, but no standardized rules. Thus, different groups of fans have developed different rule sets for putting together their fleets for battle. This page is an attempt to collect all such rule sets and describe them. If you've played using rules that aren't described here, by all means add them!
-===Rules that use point costs===
-*The standard rules on [http://uqm.stack.nl/wiki/Uqm-arena#Finding_someone_to_play_against #uqm-arena]: Only one ship of each type, to a maximum of 200 points. Commonly phrased "200 points no dupes".
-**In a serious game or tournament you are expected to build your team before connecting, so that you can't base your ship choices on what ships are on your opponent's team.
-**Some players and tournament hosts ban Thraddash, considering it unsportsmanly (the ship has the potential to stall matches and upset balance if played to its limit.)
-*Other point limits can be used, although it's less common, since too much fewer than 200 tends to lead to the outcome of the match being determined by the teams used, and too much more doesn't leave much room for choice in team design.
-*The game can also be played simply with a point limit and no restriction on duplicate ships; this has fallen out of use since the result depends mostly on the teams used, especially since certain anomalous teams (such as ones with many Chmmr) are very likely to maul a "well balanced" team. A limit of two ships of each type is occasionally played.
-*In order to reasonably allow more of the same ship, players can take turns picking ships rather than coming with predetermined fleets.
-**Picking one ship at a time creates the strange effect of picking cheap ships first in order to have more points left to counter. A probably better way is to pick a certain number of points worth. For instance, the first player could pick at 100 points worth of ships, then the second player design his entire fleet, then the first player pick the remainder of his fleet.
-**50-100-100-100-50 is also possible, and probably leaves less room for the first player to effectively counter the opponent's entire fleet.
-*In order for some of the less commonly used ships to see use, some players like to play with each player designing the other player's fleet (of course, to a minimum of 200 points rather than a maximum.)
-**This can be played with various point totals or allowances for duplicate ships, basically as a modification of any of the rulesets above.
-**Each player designing half of each team is also possible.
-*Another possible modification to any of these rules is to use [http://uqm.stack.nl/forum/index.php?topic=3816.0 alternate ship prices].
-===Other rulesets===
+==Standard Rules for #uqm-arena==
-*Alliance vs. Hierarchy: A match with the predetermined teams "Old Alliance Ships" and "Old Hierarchy Ships". It's an interesting match, since the creators of the game went to a great deal of effort to balance it in Star Control 1. On the other hand, it seems to favor the Alliance.
+Players may use only one ship of each type and build up to a maximum fleet size of 200 points. The Thraddash Torch is banned. No game modifications are used.
-*Auction: Each player gets a pool of "points" (It doesn't really matter how many; 200 and 213 have been used) and each ship except Thraddash is auctioned off to the highest bidder. Details of the auction vary.
-**The order the ships are auctioned in is arbitrary; it can be done in alphabetical order or ordered by original point cost, or in other ways.
+*In a serious game or tournament you are expected to build your team before connecting so that you can't base your ship choices on knowledge of your opponent's team.
-**What happens if the two players try to bid the same amount can be ambiguous. The cleanest solution is to have the players take turns bidding, the first player to make the high bid buy the ship, and the players also take turns making the first bid on each ship.
-**Sometimes a third player acts as auction master, but it isn't necessary if the rules are specified beforehand.
+*Point limits other than 200 can be used, although they are uncommon. The outcome of a lower point game is drastically affected by each player's fleet composition, while higher point games don't leave much room for choice in fleet selection.
-*14 ships no dupes: Essentially any team you can build, as long as it doesn't have two of the same ship on it. Of course, cheap ships will rarely be played, but costly, somewhat overcosted ships (such as Chenjesu and Orz) will see play. Combining this with the "design your opponent's fleet" rule could also be interesting.
+*The [[Thraddash]] [[Torch]] is banned because the ship has the potential to stall matches and upset game balance if played to its limit.
+*Stalemates are resolved by forcing the faster of the two ships in play to go on the offensive.
+*Game modifications have become quite prevalent recently, making the standard rule set less ubiquitous.
+==Fleet Setup Rules==
+====No Duplicate Ships====
+No more than one of each ship type can appear in a player's fleet. This forces ship variety and prevents a player's fleet setup from having too much impact on the outcome of the melee match.
+====Duplicate Ships====
+The game can also be played simply with a point limit and no restriction on duplicate ships; this has fallen out of use since the result depends mostly on the teams used. Certain ship types tend to dominate most others. However, this ruleset has seen revival recently in games played with [[User:Shiver/Balance Mod|Shiver's Balance Mod]], which handles duplicates better than vanilla UQM.
+*In order to reasonably allow more of the same ship, players can take turns picking ships rather than connecting to each other with predetermined fleets.
+*30pt ships can be limited or banned, to keep them from skewing the game heavily.
+====Crap Fleets====
+In order for some of the less commonly used ships to see use, some players like to play with each player designing the other player's fleet. The fleet point limit should be considered a minimum rather than a maximum. This can be played with various point totals or allowances for duplicate ships, although duplicates can lead to undesirable results such as a fleet full of [[Drone|Drones]].
+====Random Teams====
+A random team can be more interesting, as you will often end up without such omnipresent mainstays as the [[Utwig]] [[Jugger]]. A good random team generator can be found [https://bilious.alt.org/~paxed/uqmteam/ here].
+====Auction====
+Players get a pool of points and ships are auctioned off to the highest bidder. The details of auction procedure are up to the players. Ideally, a separate person outside of the game should act as auctioneer. This format is best used with 4 or 6 players playing a tournament with their auction-bought ships and multiple copies of every ship type up for auction.
+====Fixed Number of Ships====
+Disregard point values and limit fleets by quantity. A "No Duplicates" rule is strongly recommended in conjunction with this. This places an emphasis on large, expensive craft or the opposite when combined with "Crap Fleets".
+====Alliance vs. Hierarchy====
+A match with the predetermined teams "Old Alliance Ships" against "Old Hierarchy Ships". It's an interesting match, since the creators of the game went to a great deal of effort to balance it in Star Control I. Unfortunately, it seems to favor the Alliance.
+==Other Rules==
+====Random Ship Selection====
+Use the random select button whenever the game prompts you to choose which ship to send into the arena. Ideally, both players should immediately mash this button any time the ship selection screen comes up to remove any doubt of cheating. This format is not great for fair competition, but the unusual ship match-ups add a lot of variety to the game. Random Ship Selection is best combined with a ban on 30pt ships, which tend to heavily skew a match depending on what is drawn against them.
+====Battle victor chooses ship for loser====
+Requires communication between players when ships are selected. When playing by the usual rules, the player who has just lost a ship picks a ship to easily defeat the other player's current ship. However, under these rules, the player with the victorious ship makes this choice for the player who has just lost a ship.
+<!-- damn unfortunately my command of English is ... Zer: not sure what these meant: This makes game much more needle. In case of Scout making successful hit, -->
+====Left-to-Right====
+* Deploy ships in the order they are on your fleet list, starting from the upper-left ship slot and proceeding right.
+====Handicaps====
+* Disable one of the turning keys.
+* Play with a controller that makes the game more difficult, such as a joystick or dance pad.
+* Play with only one hand.
+* Play drunk.
+* Play high.
+* Play drunk and high.
+[[Category:Game_mechanics]]