NorCal MOPs 2012 - post-tournament feedback

[cmgames]

I am starting a separate thread for discussing the NorCal MOPs tournament just held today Jan 28,2012. Please post feedback on the MOPs tournament concept and how well or poorly it worked. Discuss, and offer praise or criticism of the MOPs themselves and of the MOPs building rules and restrictions.

The floor is open!

~Z

MOPs & Armies

Spoiler Alert!

Typhon2222

Spoiler Alert!

Two identical MOPs (Fixed glyphs: Jalgard, Nilrend, Thorian, Wannock)


Army
Black Wyrmlings x 9
Deathreavers x 2
Iron Golem x 1

cmgames

Spoiler Alert!

Dragon Tower (Fixed glyphs: Ivor, Rannveig)



Platform (Fixed glyphs: Ivor, Rannveig)


Army
Omegacron
Omnicron Snipers x 2
Omnicron Repulsors x 2
Deathreavers x 1

[Killometer]

Based of the 60% of the tounament I was there for it seemed like the biggest key in our very open format was careful pairing of glyphs with amry choice.

When I played Carnival Man my ability to cancel his PKs' Stealth Flying, forcing them to try to fight through my WoA, was key, and in my game against you, cmgames, Thorian forced your Snipers to engage my elves, and doubled skulls don't mean much when all I need is 1 shield.

I know our champ Typhon2222 relied heavily on Nilrends on his MOPs to cripple his foes, and specifically brought an all common army so that it couldn't be used against him.

personwholives had a Thorian in the middle of a 7-hex pool of lava where his Moltenclaw could blast from safety, and a Lodin to boost his Firestorm (and I know it helped at least once ).

As far as MOPs specifically, I'm not sure I'm totally sold on them, but I think this might be a by-product of my army and glyph selection forcing all my matches into pretty much the same thing (WoA+Thorian=slow attrition). I think that they would benefit from more regulation concerning glyph selection and building parameters. It's good to allow people to be able to customize their own MOPs to their army, but they need to be kept from going too extreme.

[personwholives]

I agree with what killo said. As much as it benefitted me, I would make the following additional rules:

Specify a glyph pool, which removes some glyphs from play. Any or all of the glyphs in that pool would be allowed for use. It could have pretty much the whole glyph set, but there is a reason you don't see negation glyphs in play much. There may be a couple of other glyphs you'd want to exclude, but most of hem have some reasonable counter available.

No more than half of any mop may be of the same terrain type (for the purpose of this rule, lava field and molten lava are considered to be the same terrain type). This applies only to visible, usable hexes.

Possible: no zero height tiles in start zones. This prevents people from massively slowing the game down with lots of water in the start zones.


I really enjoyed the idea of his tournament, and even most of the matches, but some of the mops just led to very one sided games (mine included - I had one close game all tournament). Unfortunately, I think any set of mop rules that will lead to less extreme games will also be so extensive as to be unusable, due to complexity.

[cmgames]

I loved the MOPs concept and it worked well. In my games, the MOP selection/orientation barely impacted the playing time. Sometimes the MOPs themselves did, however. When I was forced into accepting a MOP with all-water start-zones, that really slowed down my game (I still finished within the hour, though).

After playing the format, I now have a better appreciation for the impact the glyphs can have. I definitely think very tight restrictions on glyphs is in order if anybody wants to try this in a tournament setting in the future.
My post-tournament thoughts on glyph rules:
1. No fixed glyphs allowed
2. Not more than one random power glyph per MOP
3. Glyphs must be placed such that a double-base figure can occupy it

Nobody included treasure glyphs, so I have no idea on their potential impact.

As to the terrain, my only beef was the impact of water in the start zones. However, I heard grumbles about personwholives' use of lava fields/molten lava. So my thoughts (so far) on terrain restrictions in regards to these would be:

1. Not more than 4 water tiles per start zone.
2. Not more than 6 lava field hexes per start zone.
3. Not more than 4 molten lava per MOP

As much as I enjoyed seeing all the extreme and wonderful MOP designs that came to the tournament*, I would suggest one further terrain restriction rule (idea planted by dok) that I think might help balance things a bit further:

1. The highest point on the MOP must be reachable and occupy-able by a double-space, five-move figure.

~Z

* I encourage everybody who was in the tournament to post their MOP designs (PDFs & pix) here in this thread. I will try to keep the OP updated with the links.

[Typhon2222]

I echo you folks down the line: limiting MOPs to no fixed glyphs, and not more than one random power glyph; glyphs must be placed such that a double-based figure can occupy it; the limitations on water, lava field, and molten lava; and following dok in requiring that double-spaced walkers be able to reach every space (or the highest points).

[Typhon2222]

My MOP (sheesh, what a cheesy thing)....

PDF Download



Army:
9x Black Wyrmlings
3x DeathReavers
Iron Golem

[Carnival Man]

Originally Posted by cmgames

As to the terrain, my only beef was the impact of water in the start zones. However, I heard grumbles about personwholives' use of lava fields/molten lava. So my thoughts (so far) on terrain restrictions in regards to these would be:

1. Not more than 4 water tiles per start zone.
2. Not more than 6 lava field hexes per start zone.
3. Not more than 4 molten lava per MOP

As much as I enjoyed seeing all the extreme and wonderful MOP designs that came to the tournament*, I would suggest one further terrain restriction rule (idea planted by dok) that I think might help balance things a bit further:

1. The highest point on the MOP must be reachable and occupy-able by a double-space, five-move figure.

~Z

* I encourage everybody who was in the tournament to post their MOP designs (PDFs & pix) here in this thread. I will try to keep the OP updated with the links.

I think pwl's 7 hexes of molten lava with Thorian should get the Evil Genius Award for this first MOP tournament! Pure logic there...

The old problem with the last new rule is that it, in turn, rules out castle terrain entirely?

[onibaku06]

Originally Posted by Carnival Man

I think pwl's 7 hexes of molten lava with Thorian should get the Evil Genius Award for this first MOP tournament! Pure logic there...

The old problem with the last new rule is that it, in turn, rules out castle terrain entirely?

I have to agree with Carnival Man, the last rule will take out the use of the Castle, and ladders in general, since double base figures can't use them. (Another new thing that I learned). With all the additional rules posted by CM, I think that the next MOPs tournament will be even better than this. I too enjoyed the extreme factor of the MOP's, and would like to encourage that when and if we have another MOP's tournament down the road.

One thing that surprised me was that only Ruckus and myself brought pieces outisde of Classic 'scape. With the option of having Marvel, along with all the SoV, C3V and C3G customs, I figured that there would be many other pieces outside the norm. (Seeing Typhons jaw drop as he read Darkseid's card, was hysterical....lot of good it did me though.) But, it came down to what was originally posted earlier; the placement of glyphs was key to this tournament.

[Typhon2222]

Originally Posted by onibaku06

I hope to have my "Fortress of Solitude" and "Apokolips" MOP's posted soon.

Much kudos to you for them too! Making MOPs which modelled buildings in Darkseid's own world was a stroke of brilliance. So thematic.

[dok]

Honestly, making it random glyphs only might be a good move. Otherwise nilrend and thorian really throw a wrench in the army choices.

Originally Posted by cmgames

I would suggest one further terrain restriction rule (idea planted by dok) that I think might help balance things a bit further:

1. The highest point on the MOP must be reachable and occupy-able by a double-space, five-move figure.

That's not exactly what I suggested. I suggested that any legally-placed figure should be able to be engaged by a double-spaced, height 4, move 5 figure. The highest point on the map can still be a single-spaced perch, as it is on many maps, as long as it's not a high tower.

Originally Posted by onibaku06

I have to agree with Carnival Man, the last rule will take out the use of the Castle, and ladders in general, since double base figures can't use them. (Another new thing that I learned).

Not at all! The castle terrain is very much still in play.

It's fairly easy to build castle terrain that complies with this rule. You just need to build stairs into your design that allow double-spaced figures to climb up. One double-spaced road at level 3, another at level 6, and another at level 9. See nyys's divided or my swamp helix for examples of standard 1v1 maps that use this concept.

[Killometer]

GaryLASQ already has a point system for MOPs to keep terrain use reined in. It might be easiest to try that limitation (combined with a limited/random glyph pool) before trying to come up with something new.

Originally Posted by onibaku06

One thing that surprised me was that only Ruckus and myself brought pieces outisde of Classic 'scape. With the option of having Marvel, along with all the SoV, C3V and C3G customs, I figured that there would be many other pieces outside the norm. (Seeing Typhons jaw drop as he read Darkseid's card, was hysterical....lot of good it did me though.)

cmgames had the C3V unit Omegacron leading his Omni army.

[personwholives]

Killo, I remember reading about the point system, but I don't remember where, so I can't check it again. (you should post a link or something, if you remember where)


An interesting tournament idea would be something like:
Prepare two MOPs - one is "yours" and one is "maybe yours".

The "maybe yours" follows some set of restrictions, and must have legal start zones on three sides (as in this past tournament, though probably with some additional limitations.

The "yours" has a designated 11 hex start zone along one edge, with no additional restrictions, except that glyphs may not be placed in the start zone and all spaces must be engagable by a walking move 5 single hex figure (you spend 600 points elevating a couple spots in your start zone severely, you still need ladders there).

The tournament has 1000 points, of which at most 600 may be spent on figures, and at most 600 may be spent on the "yours" MOP. (Points would need to be balanced to make this work). Find your balance point, and go crazy, but remember, your opponent may spend 100 points on a Thorian glyph on his MOP, so that your 100 point Ivor does you no good, or whatever.

At the start of each round, the "maybe yours" MOPs are drafted (d20 roll), and then the map is built (high roller places one of his MOPs as his left side, low places left, high right, low right. the "maybe yours" mops are oriented by your opponent).


Meh, who knows, maybe that's too crazy/confusing to work. I don't think the points I saw were quite balanced for that, either. But still, sounds interesting, right?