Verisimilitude and Decision-Making

Last week IVX presented “Speed Mazer IVX” at the Waikato University Open Day 2016. The creation of Speed Mazer IVX was a good time to reflect on how verisimilitude forms perhaps the key criteria for our production decisions.

Verisimilitude is the appearance of being true or real. Verisimilitude is the seduction that teases the audience willingly into the world of the work. Things present or things-expected-but-missing will affect verisimilitude. Verisimilitude is the macro-clothing in which the work dresses. It is an overall sensory experience that emerges from the aesthetics of individual elements.

There are always pragmatic considerations when creating installation works. No concept proceeds cleanly from plan to execution intact. In fact, the sign of a great concept is that there are more ideas for how to improve the work then there are available resources to do them all. Why is that?

The obvious answer is that not all ideas are good ideas so having more ideas means that creators do not become wedded to bad ideas just because they are the only ideas. Comparing ideas against each other forces greater articulation of the desired verisimilitude.

Speed Mazer IVX is a player vs. player maze racer controlled by guitar hero instruments. The simplicity of the concept meant quick buy-in by the audience, a sense of competition and an element of mastery. Having randomly generated mazes meant that players could not develop muscle memory to complete the task.

Initially, we had cosmos inspired backgrounds. IVX loves cosmos pictures – indeed, our last year’s Open Day installation was “Write Your Name Among the Starts”. However, during testing, it was apparent that the cosmos background images distracted from the competitive feeling of racing through a maze. We went with black backgrounds to give an 8-bit arcade feel.

We tried to add sound – which always goes a long way to elevating verisimilitude. However, there were problems with the sound library that were going to take considerable time to resolve. We instead elected to put the time into visual aspects.

The maze is bumped when a player hits a wall. The bump reaction signals to the player that they have hit a wall. The maze feels more real because bumps behave with believable physics. The bump reactions happen in 3D, but the 3D renderer limited what we could do with the walls (without more work). The positive verisimilitude effect of the bumps in 3D was greater than the verisimilitude of nicer looking walls, so we kept the bump effects.

Particles are spat out opposite to the direction of player movement. Some of particles are added to the opposing player’s maze, and each player spits their colour. When players are concentrating on their own maze then still get feedback that the other player is nearby. Particles also help build up a visual intensity proportional to the speed at which the player moves through the maze. Getting the right feel to the particle fields were the subject of much experimentation.

Initially, we wanted to have the player’s represented by a shape that would change direction as the player traversed the maze. While this might have been a great idea, it was judged as having a lesser effect on the verisimilitude so was not attempted as the deadline approached. Other ideas; random maze wall art, generative backgrounds, power-ups, a cheat mode, and more visual prompts similarly prioritised.

The functional aspects - making a heads-up maze racer than one side could win - did not take long to program. However, the bulk (probably 75% or more) of the coding time went into making tuning the verisimilitude to create the right experience for the audience.

Reflecting on our decision-making process during the creation of Speed Mazer IVX made me realise the central role of verisimilitude is to our work. We dropped ideas that broke the verisimilitude and prioritised our features against our limited resources (time) according to verisimilitude. I look forward to advancing this thinking more in future IVX work.

IFCOMP2014: With Those We Love Alive

With Those We Love Alive written by Porpentine and scored by Brenda Neotenomie placed 5th in the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition IFCOMP2014. You can play online at ifdb. This series of blog posts are mini-reviews I wrote as a fellow author to document my impressions of other games.

Spoilers below

Porpentine is one of the few authors I know much about. I have played CyberQueen, Cry$tal Warrior Ke$ha and Howling Dogs. Those works, and Porpentine’s interviews and posts keep me thinking the relationships between the tools, the medium, the story and how these produce a final work. Hagiography over.

I particularly WTWLA for the rich symbolism invoked with small amounts of text. I like how this game looks like it could go well onto a small screen. I’m not sure if the "select my preference" purple links had an effect on the underlying game but that didn’t matter because it helped ME construct a coherent picture of the world and how the relationships within it worked.

The game invites you to draw symbols onto your skin. I did not do this but I see how it could enhance the game. It would further immerse the player into the world and fit well with the way that time passes in the game.

The game is technically well crafted as prior actions etch onto other parts of the environment. The recognition of my prior craft reinforced how much my character had supported the machine from which I wanted to escape. Going along to go on. The music and colour changes support the story well.

Overall I was interested in where the story was going and how it got there. There are some lovely symbolic moments that will mean different things to many. I particularly like the princess uprising. Beautiful.

Highly recommended.

IFCOMP2014: Laterna Magica review

Laterna Magica by Jens Byriel placed 42nd (last) in the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition IFCOMP2014. You can play online at ifdb. This series of blog posts are mini-reviews I wrote as a fellow author to document my impressions of other games.

Spoilers below

This work occupies an interesting place for me. I’m not sure it intends to be FICTION. I read this as a dialogue between yourself and yourself as a way of exploring / confronting your own thinking about new age spirituality. YMMV on subject matter like this... I found myself having to just buy-in to certain beliefs in order to continue. Ugh fine, it’s fiction.

As an IF-work: I like the idea of using IF in a dialogue manner; a form of education, a conversation a reader can have to learn about things. This is different to Wikipedia where knowledge is presented in chunked totality. This mode of education is an unfolding journey. I’d love to see work where the conversation changes based on what has come before – that would unlock great educational potential.

I initially couldn’t find an ending and went around in loops trying to explore as many answers as I could. I get this was the whole point; to come and go as I choose but there is no end to this quest/questioning. I’m going to admit to cheating and eventually reading the source code to make sure I got everything – ha! It turns it there is a proper ending - this is sort of a maze game afterall.

I don't recommend this game.

IFCOMP2014: ICEPUNK review

ICEPUNK by pageboy placed 31st in the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition IFCOMP2014. You can play online at ifdb. This series of blog posts are mini-reviews I wrote as a fellow author to document my impressions of other games.

Spoilers below

A neat post-apocalyptic loner back story and an interesting narrative where you go around slurping up data out of the landscape. The interface riffs on old text console games and features some retro ASCII art. The map is randomised. The map was a bit clunky and slow to navigate – probably a feature of my impatience and my older computer.

The task of slurping up data got a bit tedious. It became more score-keeping than a chance to revisit the items of culture the game presented as data for the taking. It became less an unfolding story than a chore to complete. I did encounter one potential show stopper bug that gave a totally blank screen. I got around this with some console tricks.

Booting up the computer gave a simple victory screen. About what you’d expect.

A story-line with the inhabitants of another bunker basically opting-out of the game wasn’t particularly well followed. Neither was the initial screens of gender selection.

I score this game well in technical merit. The back story was cool, but too much was exposed via exposition in the opening scenes rather than discovered as the story unfolded. I suspect the author had high ambitions but unfortunately ran out of time. I don’t want to sound at all discouraging, because this could be a great game story if polished and honed.

IFCOMP2014: Begscape review

Begscape by Porpentine placed 28th in the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition IFCOMP2014. You can play online at ifdb. This series of blog posts are mini-reviews I wrote as a fellow author to document my impressions of other games.

Spoilers below

I went for this game because of its simple aesthetic. It feels like the PeopleSoft style text games from the 1970s (e.g. Chris Gaylo’s Highnoon). Those games helped me learn to program! I have done some fairly faithful conversions of these old games to Twine and Arduino. This means I already have an affinity for the style of game.

The choices are brutal and limited; even by the standards of the 1970s games. But those limits are the story. Poverty is not only about money though that becomes the basic means of maintaining health. Poverty is about resources; health, mental, charisma, and connectedness. That this game doesn’t let PC me do a bunch of things RL me could do (borrow, ask a relative or friend, apply state benefits, work for food, etc) speaks exactly to that.

Perfectly sized and I love it.

IFCOMP2014: Hill 160 review

Hill 160 by Mike Gerwat placed 36th in the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition IFCOMP2014. You can play online at ifdb. This series of blog posts are mini-reviews I wrote as a fellow author to document my impressions of other games.

Spoilers below

This is the first parser game I've played in quite some time, so it took me a bit of getting used to things. 3 hours in and ... well I opened up the walkthru and realised I'm not even quarter of the way there. But I really want to finish this game - find out what is going on.

It's probably my noob-ness with modern parser that make things a bit slow. Getting killed happened often, but it was great I got instant retries. Some of the continuity got a bit patchy - ie I was able to put things back into a locked cabinet without opening it.

Research was generally great except that: Sargeant is a non-commissioned officer rank. The story-line assumes Grant is a junior officer. It might work better to change Grant to a Lieutenant and Grant's entry to the army as an officer cadet. I was able to overlook this slip though to enjoy what bit of the story time allowed me to play.

I get the feeling that CYOA might've suited the game better than parser because the narrative pacing could be better controlled. While parser gave the illusion of freedom, the "narrative rails" the game was on were on quite apparent. It wasn't like I had the agency to do much except what the story next required of me. Still, this is my first parser play in quite some time so take what I said with a grain of salt.

Big game. Very engaging. A bit more testing and polishing and it would be great.

IFCOMP2014: The Secret Vaults of Kas the Betrayer review

The Secret Vaults of Kas the Betrayer by A. E. Jackson placed 33rd in the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition IFCOMP2014. You can play online at ifdb. This series of blog posts are mini-reviews I wrote as a fellow author to document my impressions of other games.

Spoilers below

As I started to play I got the strong feeling of a Fighting Fantasy novel - nothing to do with the author's surname. Cool - I have boxes and boxes of FF books in my garage so count me as a genre fan.

There's an interesting enough back story with enough depth for a FF story. The room-with-options-that-you-return-to is common enough in FF stories but SVKB gives too much freedom to move backwards and forwards. FF generally made the PC move the narrative forward as a general rule with only the occasional looping room. The looping room having to repeat text is a limitation of dead-tree format. In SVKB looping text felt nostalgic at first but quickly became annoying. I like computer based IF because it frees me from too much looping text. I wanted a short-cut back to the poem from puzzles. Eventually I just opened the poem in another browser window.

The writing could do with edits. Coding generally well crafted. Parchment styled CSS was nice enough though the default Responsiv storyformat grey header/footer should've also been brought into theme.

I think basing the game on tightly built rooms with options made the game feel small. There are 66 Twine passages though the density of <<if>>s make comparison with a FF400 not exactly useful. However, Fighting Fantasy made the 400 paragraph limit feel like large world because the decisions had a mixture of actions that had large and small effects. FF covered a lot of ground in passages like: you walk for a few hours and ...." or "you pass through a village of nondescript buildings that look much like each other."

At times I was a bit confused which links would examine things and which would perform actions on those things. Typically an examination action does not change state (except time, or triggering something as you walk to the NOUN). FF made this clear by usage; usually clear verb phrases. I like the style where links embedded in text examine / think (don't change state) and links at the bottom of passages DO things (change state). There isn't a correct answer though; do something that makes sense!

I keep coming back to the genre thing. I wonder if a tightly woven room puzzler with freedom to move back and forth might have better suited Inform. As it stands emulating the rooms in Twine worked well enough.

I did enjoy myself. That FF nostalgia was too strong for me to resist.

IFCOMP2014: Arqon: A Criminal's Journey review

Arqon: A Criminal's Journey by H. J. Hoke placed 39th in the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition IFCOMP2014. You can play online at ifdb. This series of blog posts are mini-reviews I wrote as a fellow author to document my impressions of other games.

Spoilers below

You play the part of Arqon - a criminal basically forced to work as an assassin for the bureau of magic. It took me awhile to get used to which commands worked - probably my lack of familiarity with parser games. I encountered a few bugs:

In the room before meeting the hermit the description said I could go up, east and west but exits said I could only go west and up.

After killing the Hobgoblin and meeting the hermit:
*** Run-time problem P47 (at paragraph 663 in the source text): Phrase applied to an incompatible kind of value

I almost couldn't make the game work after that. #sadface And just as I was starting to have fun...

Ok, I managed to get past that bug and a misspelling of hermit as "hermet". Then the game was over. And just as I was starting to have fun.

A few things: a criminal recruited as an assassin ... yeah maybe. Your inventory being left intact after being imprisoned... nope. The mayor hanging out a few levels deeper than the dungeon... nope. If the placement issues were fixed then this could be enjoyable enough to play in a larger version.

The writing could do with some proof reading and edits. I didn't mind the combat, but I blanked over the combat text since it didn't seem to matter.

The verdict: skip this game unless there are major updates.

IFCOMP2014: The Black Lily Review

The Black Lily by Hannes Schüller placed 17th in the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition IFCOMP2014. You can play online at ifdb. This series of blog posts are mini-reviews I wrote as a fellow author to document my impressions of other games.

Spoilers below

At first I thought this was some story about a man reaching a point in his life where he was deciding to leave aside the passions of the flesh and settle for more stable relationships. This was some bookish withdrawn guy who lived a quiet but comfortable enough life. Then I met Lily. What the heck! So I go back and open up the safe. Oh. I'm a murderer. Heck. So I play again. I'm also maybe a woman. Well that shows how much I'm projecting into the story.

Yeah, my suspicions were raised by the title: The Black Lily being similar to the Black Dahlia (a murder victim). As I played I saw the recurring Black Lily motif as some kind of marker - a symbol that linked the encounters into something to be left behind. But then it became a great plot device to represent the urges of the player character without giving too much away.

At first I wondered why the shower scene was needed. Why not just go straight to the albums... but in the end it made sense. This was the time to discover the identity of the character and I missed it.

The commands were easy enough and the world richly described. I didn't get all the endings or much of a score. But Yep. I liked it. Play time is under an hour and you might want to play a few times.

IFCOMP14: The Entropy Cage Post-Mortem

The Entropy Cage (ifdb) was my entry to the 20th Interactive Fiction Competition (ifcomp2014). This post mortem is also posted in the Interactive Fiction Forums.

My thanks to all the players and reviewers. I’m overwhelmed; 14th was much higher than I expected. The reviewers (even the ones who disliked TEC) all gave me valuable feedback that help hone my craft.

Here are some random thoughts:

The feeling of the game was meant to capture how an out of their depth computer tech feels when there’s a major system meltdown. The boss is on their back being both helpful and accusatory (push-pull) while the tech bashes the keyboard hoping something will work. That feeling of awkwardness doesn’t make for a particularly fun experience so I shortened the game during testing to lessen the uncomfortable. The mechanic left no room for overtly showing progress or mastery so wasn’t a good choice of mechanic to base a game around and/or my execution was lacking.

I didn’t mention why the PC was on suspension. A few reviewers worked out that it was because the PC is actually out of their depth/incompetent. As the “first cyber-psychiatrist” there can’t have been a training course, industry accepted best practise or established performance indicators. There’s an underlying current of injustice because the PC feels they’ve been judged against invisible criteria. The PC has signed up for a job with a wizz-bang buzzword job description and the actual job has failed to deliver (psychiatry with that interface? are you kidding!) More than likely an overly-optimistic programmer (Jake) over-promised then underdelivered. The over-promises were then embellished by an HR person who glammed up the role to cover for a crappy salary with crappy T&Cs.

That does leave the question of why Jake gives the final big decision to you. Jake has no idea what to do! Rather than flipping a coin he gives the decision to you so that you can be scapegoated when it goes wrong. (Neither choice would 100% avoid negative consequences). The fore-shadowing to this are dialog choices where Jake mentions suing you and that Jake will insta-fire you if you threaten to bring in your lawyer.

Unfortunately the PC’s POV doesn’t give a particularly good lens into the religious war the subs are fighting. You only see the zombified subs (I’ve been bad, punish me) and the refugees. I will explore adding some “soldiers” into the mix to expose more of the battle story.

Starting with the alarm clock was noob. I’m cutting that whole scene. In terms of the game physics, it slightly alters how much your boss hates you and lets you choose a personality type that affects the game in only subtle ways. The scene is gone - and I get to remove a drug reference warning (the wake pills).

I want to write more in TEC universe.

True Random has interesting metaphysical implications relating to divine simplicity, tawhid and creation; a realisation I came to after reading Gregory Chaitin on Algorithmic Information Theory, the Omega Construct and Meta-biology. That’s pretty hard maths so I’ve tried to present some connotations of that via fiction.

Algorithmic governance and the related issue of big data are real world issues that have ethical dimensions we should probably discuss as a society rather than let things just happen. Driverless cars are the tip of the ice-berg.

And personhood; what rights do subsentients have? They are effectively our slaves. At what point do they become begin to the rights we accord our biological pets.

About that sub.punish() theme. Totally an accident. Sorry. It is going to be removed from the post-comp release. But, the ifcomp version will always live in the TEC cannon. The story would’ve been a very different one if I’d explored the sub/punish angle! I’m going to keep the term ‘sub’ (subsentient subroutine) but .punish() will become .reseed() to better fit with the theme. Those who enjoy innuendo still have an interesting angle with .reseed() but the terminology change provides a more solid clue to the overall theme of the work. Reseeding is a term used in pseudorandom number algorithms.

The science is pretty fleshed out in TEC: I’ll hope to reveal more of it in future works. But here’s a tidbit. Adding a bit to Base16 gives Base32, not Base17. TEC is consistent because the Forward Error Correcting codes cover a larger block of memory that contains more data than just the PID.
Why does changing error correction have anything to do with randomness? As a clue; Here’s some pseudocode that generates a truly random number:
> a = 000000000000000000000000000000000000
> b = 000000000000000000000000000000000000
> while a equals b, loop
> rand = number of the bit that is different between a and b?
The loop does exit because computers aren’t isolated from their environment.

And on construction:

I committed to the contest too late. I tried to enter last year but allowed IRL things to get in the way. This year I let IRL things slip in order to make IFCOMP. I’m glad I did because entering creatively re-energised me. I should’ve committed earlier so that I had more time to polish the game. The mainloop that controls the game pacing wasn’t written until the day before submission deadline. me.punish(): You may commence with the flagellation… hahaha actually no, really not my thing.

I considered not entering but decided that I NEEDED to. It’s been a rough several years and I’ve been creatively out of touch. My self-esteem needed to get an “achieve point” even if that was having participated into last place.

I suck at editing. No matter how many times I read and re-read, mistakes always slip through. I’ve put huge effort into improving but I’m not there yet. I’ll try to collab to get more testers and people with editing skill to help me; but I know collab will increase the lead-in time before I need to commit. I didn’t edit out all the universe specific jargon that added little to the game. Simu-sleeping, holosplays... ugh. Yeah, they paint the picture of the TEC universe but in the nugget sized TEC game they were distractions.

I intentionally aimed TEC towards the strengths of click-fics to give the pacing I wanted. TEC as a parser game would’ve been very different.

Thanks again to the reviewers for their feedback. I tried to personally thank you all, but it became too much to track.

The post-comp release of TEC will also be put into the Android Play Store. You’ll see me back next year and not necessarily with a story set in TEC universe. As much as I’d like to try enter more IntFic competitions, I still have IRL concerns. Whaddup PhD!

Play The Entropy Cage in your browser. Playtimes are about 15 minutes.

An Experience of Orcball

Orcball is a team sword sport similar to a touch version of Rugby League except with padded weapons. I can only find references to it at Waikato University. The day I joined was a training session. I intend to publish a more technical article for those with a background in sword sports.

The people are friendly and welcoming. The emphasis seems firmly on having fun and improving skills. Players can borrow weapons from the Orcball club. You can see play videos online here.

As a new comer I was asked to use a single long-sword. This is a sensible safety rule until they figure out that I’m not going to bash through the opposition while ignoring all hits. That did make my life a bit difficult because I was up against people with sword and shield and long/short sword dual wielders. Apparently the game itself has rules that reduce dual wielding and shields.

The boffer swords are heavy compared to foam swords and even to sport-fencing weapons. They are made from PVC pipes padded by dense foam and wrapped in duct tape. The construction also has “thrust-safe” tips. They were still light enough to thrust single handed.

The weapons are heavy enough that a hard swing still inflicts damage. The rules require a gentle touch and no strikes to the head. These are sensible safety rules given that nobody wears protection. Afterall, this is meant to be a casual game that almost anybody can join. Valid target areas are: above the knees excluding the hands and head.

Mutual strikes in Orcball are termed “Irish” and do not count as a hit but there seems to be a wide interpretation of this rule. Irish includes mutual hits when the swings are simultaneous (even when the strikes are not) and therefore excludes counter-attacks.

The no-head-hit rule did get a bit frustrating. Opponents often left their heads open and I couldn’t strike! But this is Orcball and them’s are the rules and for good (safe) reasons.

I’m about average height but I happened to be taller than the opposing team. I switched to a finger grip where the index finger goes over the cross-guard and around the front of the blade. This made lowering the blade angle easier and increased point control. I wouldn’t have done that if the fingers/hands were valid targets.

It also takes a reasonable amount of fitness to play well. I’m not fit and sat out more than once to rest. Also, Orcball’s play on grass and tons of lateral movement meant I ruined my ankles. Oh well.

Verdict: would play again.

Strategery "The Finger" for Border Games

Here is another strategy video for my favourite iOS game Strategery. This video if for breaking through static borders in the mid to late game. Use this technique in preference to just creeping the border forward to end the game quickly or when you must come from behind to win. I used the finger to win a game where I only had about one third of the regions to the other opponents two-thirds. A disadvantage to that extent is a near certain loss if you stick with a "border creep" strategy. So, give your enemies the finger!

The finger can also useful in non-border reinforcement games - though the specifics of the opportunity are less likely to occur. Those specifics are; strong border (both) with a weak hinterland reachable by a break through.

See my other article: Strategery review, hints, tips, guide for more general info about the game and tips on how to play other modes.

Strategery Starting Moves (Border, Attrition mode)

My favourite (by installed time and playtime) iOS game has to be Strategery. I have already written a general review and tips guide. This time I did a video that covers getting started in the Attrition casualties, Border reinforcement mode.

This mode makes for the fastest games and are therefore perfect for casual play. By the 4 or 5 turn you know whether or not you are winning the game. In this mode ten spots almost don't matter like they do in Winner Takes all / Random mode. Choke points are where you can have a single region that borders multiple enemy regions. The basic tip is to establish a strong border around a hinterland and then to creep that border forward. Try to increase the hinterland without increasing the border.

See my other article: Strategery review, hints, tips, guide for more general info about the game and tips on how to play other modes.

Strategery review, hints, tips, guide

The oldest game on my iPad that still gets regular playtime is Strategery (http://strategerygame.com). First I'll review the game then give a few hints, tips, guide advice. There is a Lite version but the app is only a couple of dollars. That equates to micro-cents per hour of play time.

Strategery is a Risk-alike with a couple of rule changes that make all the difference. This is skilled game design; realising when the product is good, removing dross and adding polish rather than unnecessary bling. Risk has its own version of Rule 34 - if you can think of a theme then there is a Risk clone for it. The App store is clogged with "Risk-like" games that are essentially the same game with a few extra maps and varying amounts of annoying fluff. Strip away that shallow theme and that's just annoying time wasting stuff that gets old fast. No thanks.

Risk is an excellent game to play with humans because of the psychological aspects and diplomacy, but Risk can be improved for the casual gamer. Strategery can be played both psychologically with humans and as a casual game. The polished interface, the random maps, dynamic flow and speed make for a better casual experience. Strategery has a simple interface that just makes sense. There are subtle animations: these are tastefully done to enhance your situation awareness. I like the moment of tension when your dice roll is mediocre and you see the first opposing dice settling on sixes. Even this is done at exactly the right speed - fast.

Yes, maps are randomly generated and regions generally have more adjacent regions than Risk. There are choke points but you must deduce these for every new map. A standard region supports a maximum of seven army dots and mega-regions max out at ten dots. Resupply is at the end of turn (not the start) and the amount is based upon the largest contiguous clump of regions controlled. Each dot represents a six sided dice that is rolled to battle. All attacking armies less one are moved into a conquered regions so no time is wasted in awkward troop transfers.

Strategery's limited dots per region reduces the "build up and overrun" effect of Risk's choke points and thus encourages a more dynamic flow. The resupply rule rewards maintaining territorial integrity and incremental expansion over lightning raids. Having said that, late game, you will goad an attack that exposes a weakness for you to exploit.

There are two game modifiers that change the play style; The casualty modes "Winner Takes All" and "Attrition" and the resupply placement types "Manual", "Border" and "Random". That's six variations that play differently. There are other modifiers but they have less of an impact on the game. Smaller maps mean there is no late game stages so I typically only play Epic. You can also choose if the map starts with all regions claimed or not.

The casualty modes select whether or not the winner of a battle takes casualties. Winner Takes All makes for a brutally fast early game but the late game is a grind. Attrition makes for a slower early game but a much faster late game. The resupply placements are manual placement which is slow and I think actually focuses you away from grand strategy into small conflicts. The border strategy resupplies regions that border an enemy region and this mode is good for faster games but does leave you prone to overruns. Random resupply replacements do the most to emphasize territorial integrity and incremental expansion.

The general strategy in the early game is to limit your border regions by taking choke points and building a contiguous territory. This limits attack vectors and gives time to build strength. Try to conquer new regions while minimising the number of new borders. Enemy will generally attack the weakest regions so think twice before taking a low-dot region that borders a high-dot enemy; you might be better to let the seven-dot attack first then clear up the weakened survivor.

The mid-early game is about containing opponents. While you continue to expand, prioritise expansion towards your most threatening opponent while encouraging the other players to attack each other. Do not come between your enemies while they are killing each other. Keep your choke points and limit your borders but do make an opportunistic grab for a mega-region if that does not risk your territorial integrity. You should be building towards a dominant number of territories.

The mid-game is about finishing off weaker opponents and establishing territorial superiority. Continue to harass the largest opponent while finishing off weaker players if you can. Sometimes you can attack a well-entrenched (a few territories with high dot counts) player by waiting for an opponent to attack them first then striking in for a winning blow. A "buffer state" player will attack towards their easiest to win battles so ensure that is another opponent and not you.

The late game is all about resupply. By this time you have territorial superiority so you are getting more resupply per turn. Take advantage of this by increasing the number of regions with enemy borders. If you can make a run to a map edge and split the enemy territory then you strike a huge blow to their resupply. The simple math is that if you inflict more casualties than the enemy can replace then you will win. If your dot count is increasing while the opponent's dot count is decreasing then you are winning.

Late in attrition games you will be attacking with every possible region (even a two-dot into a ten-dot) because you know that your two-dot region will be fully resupplied and you will inflict casualties that will not be replaced. Late in Winner Takes All games you will generally be attacking seven-dot versus seven-dot so conquer regions where you increase your number of seven-dot attack vectors onto further single enemy regions. In the late-late Winner Takes All games you will conquer regions where the enemy has more attack vectors onto your regions - because they will not be able to resupply fully.

My favourite game is Winner Takes All casualties with Random resupply but this can make for long games. In this game type you want a strong hinterland. These are regions that experience long-periods of peace so they eventually fill up and that focuses your resupply forward. When your border is overrun then you can "blow" one of your hinterland regions to retake lost territory. As you push into the opponent's hinterland expect them to "blow" their seven dots and overrun you in counter-attack. This is fine provided they are unable to fully resupply the hinterland. This ebb and flow is what makes Winner Take All / Random resupply an exciting game.

For shorter games try attrition with border resupply. That's enough writing - I'm off to play.