billcarey

Also - as an aside (I am a Latin major, so forgive me for this) Ceterum censeo Cartaginem delendam esse... Congrats though on having a Latin signature! BTW - if you want a more immersive experience, only look at the battlefield in "view 1" it's quite terrifying. - Bill [This message has been edited by billcarey (edited 09-05-2000).]

BigAl (and Matt), I've been on infrequent lurk mode during the summer due to work and being out of town a lot (without a net connection) When I am back at school I should become more regular and involved again. BTW - you password is: cmlad - Bill

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> [Edit] Impressive, Mr. Carey. Why a Latin major, may I ask? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Why a Latin Major? Well - why not? I work as a java geek, and I can't learn that in school, so I figure I might as well study something else that's cool. Latin qualifies. How are you acquainted with our grandmother tongue? It's comforting to know I'm not the only one out there. Romanes eunt domus!? - Bill

forum, fori - a small furless rodent. 2nd Declension, Neuter noun. Plural is fora. - Bill (a Latin Major)

About the CMHQ Ladder, The glitch in calculations is my fault. Something crept into the code, and I've been really busy this summer and haven't gotten around to fixing it yet, and for that I apologize. What is going to happen is I am going to replace the algorithm with another one (that takes into account the same factors but dosen't have a bug in it ) and re-run through all the games, so everything will be happy and lovely. Sorry I've been out of circulation for a while. I've been out of town for a couple weeks, and working too. No one will have to re-enter games, and the ladder will be much more accurate. I should have that fixed in about a week to let me test the new formula I am going to use. It is: PlayerPoints is divided by 2.5 if he is the attacker. OpponnentPoints is divided by 2.5 if he is the attacker. Change in ladder rank = (PlayerScore - OpponnentScore) * (1 + (BalanceModifier / Throttle)) where BalanceModifier = ((OpponnentPoints - PlayerPoints) + (OpponnentRank - PlayerRank)) and Throttle is simply a constant to keep the ladder speend under controll. - Bill Carey

I'll test scenarios too, and I have one OP to release for testing soon too! - Bill

Sure. I'd love to test one. Also I will be releasing one for testing soon billcarey@virginia.edu

Not me - why are MMG Carriers so ridiculously cheap? - Bill

I just ran into a REALLY (imho) gamey tactic - a person who shall remain nameless bought about 40 MMG Carriers for 9/thing and a couple of Daimler ACs. He rushed the MMG Carriers around my Jpz IV and it killed them over and over, but while it was spinning in circles it was killed by the Daimler AC. To me this is gamey, to purchase crappy vehicles and sacrifice them to get one kill. Also - the MMG Carrier is one hell of a vehicle for 9 points... - Bill

Of course, CoolColJ is listed in the manual credits as an artwork dude, so he may have gotten a beta CD... just a thought... - Bill

Make an operation with no replacements for one side. Then you can see just how a "follow a group of guys" would work. The same men *didn't fight* for a long period of time - attrition is way too high. Operations are (in my opinion) just about the right size - though I have played one I am making in which I lost all my original forces by battle 4 of 12 and was running all on reserves. - Bill

All American tanks can run through bocage (slowly). No mine rollers (don't remember if they are on the list). No snorkels (or duplex drive for that matter). Yep - the Sherman Crocodile. Yep - any sherman with a "+" in it's name is uparmored. - Bill

I'm hotseating ShadowWraith and he rushed a 75 Pillbox with a nine man squad of engineers. They tossed a satchel charge into the bunker. The charge went off and took out the bunker causing one crew casualty. However, the charge also happened to completely wipe the squad of 9 remaining men off the face of the Earth!! Why would anyone blow themselves up unnecessarily???

I hate the post office here. - Bill

I want to see it? - Bill

- Bill

Also what range are you employing it at? It's a better standoff tank, as the allied guns bounce off at long range - Bill

Consider: A fairly large, quite fast moving piece of steel has just run smack into your tank, setting parts of it on fire and sending a couple of pieces of shrapnell flying around. Bear in mind that your tank is full of gasoline and high explosives, which may ignite at any time. Your options are: 1. Calmly unlatch and remove the SMG from it's storage. Then find the ammunition for it. Then get out of the tank and go shooting people. 2. Run like hell as fast as you can and get another tank. I would clearly choose 2... You cannot abandon crew served weapons - if they are abandoned it's because the crews are really not in a happy mood. Also - the reason the carbines etc.. aren't modeled for crew served weapons is that they are supposed to run their weapon, not run around as light infantry. You have light infantry men for that! - Bill

There's no difference between them - the scenarios out there will work on the mac too. - Bill

I found Fionn's original e-mail! This is the algorithm (except the points are modified to take force multipliers into account. This is what screwed it up. I will add this to the FAQ of the ladder.) I was thinking of using a couple of equations basically... They can be made into one large equation obviously but since I have three prime factors involved in the equations and each is calculated separately I think it makes sense to explain it as three equation PLUS I can't write squared etc etc using simple text and it'd be confusing otherwise. The first two are from chess... Rn = Ro + K(W-WEM) Rn is the new rating. Ro is the old (pre-event) rating. K is a constant (32 for 0-2099, 24 for 2100-2399, 16 for 2400 and above). W is the score in the event ( from 0 to 100... To fit the CM scores into the formula the score willhave to fit into the range 0 to 1 (in other words a score of 50 in-game will = 0.5 W ) WEM = Win Expectancy Modified WEM = ( 1-We) x ( ( attackers point value squared over 1000) divided by (defenders point value squared over 1000) ) ) divided by points factor constant determined by role in game e.g. if meeting engagement then points factor constant = 1.. If attacker than points factor constant = 2.5... If defender than points factor constat = 0.4 (reverse of 2.5) We is the expected score (Win Expectancy) from the following formula: We = 1/ (10 (dr/400) + 1) Where Dr = difference in ratings. This system would take into account the degree of the win, the ratio of forces committed and the inherent increase in difficulty due to being the attacker (and thus the fact that the attacker needs more points).. Without the WEM factor the attacker would ALWAYS be penalised for having more forces since the formula would assume that an attacker attacking with 2000 points has an equal chance of winning the game as the defender if the defender has 2000 points.. My testing has shown me that the attacker would need roughly 3200 points to have an equal chance of winning with an equal level of skill. It is a modification of the chess system to reflect the following: 1. Not ALL sides are equal. 2. Not all ROLES are equal. 3. Not all VICTORIES are equal. Comments? Fionn

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR> So what is a man to do? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Respond politely and with grace helping those who know less than you about computers but probably know lots more than you in many fields of knowledge figure out whatever they need help with. That or don't respond and let someone with more courtesy do it. - Bill

I don't have a copy of the algorithm as anything but code anymore... It is a product of Fionn's mind, not mine. I will see what I can do about distilling a version from what I have, but if Fionn still has it, more power to him! - Bill

Shrapnel thrown into the firing slit? That's all I can thing of... - Bill

Hmm... I have recieved numerous reports of the ladder calculating things in odd ways (read: completely wrong ) and I do know what the problem is. I added force multipliers at the very last minute at great expense because when I wrote the majority of ladder I only had the beta demo (with no force multipliers). Consequently all the scores submitted so far are wrong... Sorry, that's my fault. I have, oif course, sacked myself and hired 10 llamas to replace me coding the ladder. I am working through the algorithm to find what I screwed up (lesson: never add things to a program at the last minute. You will break something) and will likely have it correct before anyone gets the game I would ask that no one submit games for a day or two until I straighten this out. Then I will set all the scores back to 1000 and people can resubmit their games (or, if I can, I will do it automatically.) Thanks for your patience. - Bill