I think the recent Othello and Scrabble submissions being rejected because "board games aren't vaultable" deserves some discussion.
Somehow that principle seems wrong. After all, the original purpose for the vault tier (or one of its original purposes) was the change in policy that "every game deserves a TAS, regardless of entertainment value". Rejecting board games by default seems to go contrary to this idea.
That's not to say I advocate blindly accepting board game TASes either, and that's where the dilemma comes into play.
The problem with board games is enemy AI, and difficulty levels. Playing on the easiest difficulty feels completely wrong and unbefitting of tool-assisted speedrunning, which ought to emulate a perfect player crushing a computer game at its best. A computer AI on the easiest difficulty presents no challenge at all, so TASing it seems rather pointless.
Naturally TASing truly shows its power only if the computer AI is playing at its best. We would get to see how a "perfect player" would crush the AI player even at its strongest. That's the spirit of TAsing. The problem here is, of course, that at the strongest difficulty level the AI can often take a very long time to make a move (even minutes, if we are talking about more complex board games). This is not very watchable...
Then of course there's the whole discussion about what exactly constitutes game completion. After all, the vault is for "any%" and "100%" runs only... These categories usually fit poorly into a board game. Unless you consider playing one single game against the computer "any% completion" (but that would probably be stretching the definition quite a bit). It could perhaps suit games where there's some kind of "campaign mode" or such, with an actual goal and ending (eg. becoming a tournament/world champion).
Maybe there could be a separate tier for board games, and other similar games, with its own rules of admission? (This could overlap, or be somewhat merged, with the proposed "demo" tier.)
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I'd like to see arguments about looking impressive and different from unassisted play, how valuable it is, how board games meet/ignore this requirement. The point is, TASes are for big and small crowds of people, but not for isolated exceptional individuals.
However, I saw a whole bunch of people loving the Othello TAS. I'd wish to see them all suggesting grounds justifying acceptance of board games. Because mere "liking" isn't a ground really. Some sane principle(s) is.
My own argument. Board games also allow different types of completion: fastest possible or somewhat complete. Abusing easy difficulty for the sake of time, abusing higher difficulty for the sake of impression/feel. Indeed Demo tier looks like a place for that. If the question was "should it be published by any cost?", the answer for Othello would be "we have to invent grounds", since that run feels like it's worth publishing.
Referring to my judging pseudocode from here:
http://tasvideos.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=394961#394961
Language: c
int JudgeMovie()
{
if (SubOptimal)
return Reject();
if (any% || 100%)
return Accept(Coins);
else
if (Boring || WildGoal)
if (ImpressiveAchievement)
return Accept(Demo);
else
return Reject();
else
return Accept(Moons);
}
However, the very Demo tier proposal considers that it must be hard to pass in. Does Othello/Scrabble TAS look like an "ImpressiveAchievement"? If not, what other criterion should we use?
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Well in chess even casual players find the fastest mate. And computers fall for it. The othello tas was a whole other story. A player would never tumble about that one. In any case playing against the easiest difficulty seems best in these games. Of cause one can beat the games at highest difficulty, but it would be really boring due to the long cpu moves. And every game would probably follow another path, so i wouldn't know why the game of published tas against hardest level would stand out.
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Posts: 6435
Location: The land down under.
Okay, lets see if we can get heavy RNG involved with Chess (Not 2 player with friends).
2 Move Checkmate, Black's Win:
1. f4 (or f3) | e6
2. g4 | Qh4#
3 Move Checkmate, White's Win:
1. e3 | f6 (or f5)
2. ** | g5
3. Qh5#
3 Move Checkmate, White's Win (FractalFusion):
1. e4 | e5
2. Qh5 | Ke7
3. Qxe5#
** A move that doesn't block Queen
If someone can win as Black with the AI doing these terrible moves (and not modifying the board), congrats.
WebNations/Sabih wrote:
+fsvgm777 never censoring anything.
Disables Comments and Ratings for the YouTube account.Something better for yourself and also others.
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Warp wrote:
Somehow that principle seems wrong. After all, the original purpose for the vault tier (or one of its original purposes) was the change in policy that "every game deserves a TAS, regardless of entertainment value". Rejecting board games by default seems to go contrary to this idea.
I'm a bit confused, because this seems to be your thesis, then you proceed to give a very thorough and convincing argument of why it doesn't make sense to put board games into the vault. The following is almost 100% the exact logic chain we went through when deciding upon the no board games rule back when the vault rules were written:
That's not to say I advocate blindly accepting board game TASes either, and that's where the dilemma comes into play.
The problem with board games is enemy AI, and difficulty levels. Playing on the easiest difficulty feels completely wrong and unbefitting of tool-assisted speedrunning, which ought to emulate a perfect player crushing a computer game at its best. A computer AI on the easiest difficulty presents no challenge at all, so TASing it seems rather pointless.
Naturally TASing truly shows its power only if the computer AI is playing at its best. We would get to see how a "perfect player" would crush the AI player even at its strongest. That's the spirit of TAsing. The problem here is, of course, that at the strongest difficulty level the AI can often take a very long time to make a move (even minutes, if we are talking about more complex board games). This is not very watchable...
Then of course there's the whole discussion about what exactly constitutes game completion. After all, the vault is for "any%" and "100%" runs only... These categories usually fit poorly into a board game. Unless you consider playing one single game against the computer "any% completion" (but that would probably be stretching the definition quite a bit). It could perhaps suit games where there's some kind of "campaign mode" or such, with an actual goal and ending (eg. becoming a tournament/world champion).
This is well written, and people should read it!
I would also add that board games introduce a level of subjectivity into a tier designed to minimize subjectivity as much as possible. The logic currently is simple, if there's something arguable, we just ask their be entertainment value (and thus moon tier).
And lastly, the vault is about "speed records", with the assumption those have value. Beating up on an AI that is intentionally poor (to be easy), and doing basic moves (that any player can recreate) only with more precision is really trivial. Ideally the vault rules minimize the ability to make an extremely trivial TAS and have an easy publication route. (The bar is really low, but these types of TASes fall even below that).
I think the no board games rule is correct. And I think the correct thinking is a tier dedicated to them, feel free to discuss that.
The only thing I would point out there, is that this is a tier for un-entertaining board games.
If you do something interesting enough, it is moon-worthy and not in need of this tier.
DOS Battle Chess would probably be the best option for a nonvault chess TAS, and even then it's iffy.
Games such as Othello and Scrabble have a higher chance of having an entertaining TAS made because (A) there's more visual variety to what's going on by their very nature, and (B) you don't have the four move victory that Chess has. The recent Scrabble TAS being an obvious exception to that, as most people playing Scrabble allow for first hand mulligans and nobody plays Scrabble with only two people.
With that said, dicey board games would also be interesting just from the sheer amount of luck manipulation that goes into it. Can you imagine a game of Risk being TASed? You wouldn't just want to manipulate yourself into getting only 6's, but you'd also need to manipulate the computer such that (1) they don't get 6's against you when you're attacking and (2) their actions end up weakening the CPU overall by combinations of costly victories and strategic failures. And of course you'd want to take Asia as soon as you can for that nice fat 7/turn bonus, if you're playing under the traditional rules you'd also be manipulating the cards to always have one country where you're going on the offensive when you turn in early sets.
The issue with board game games is that there's very little to optimize outside of the winning strategy. A raw strategy game like Chess can be beaten in four moves, so a vault TAS of even something like Battle Chess would be zero-effort. Checkers and Go have similar issues but it's easier to find an artistic way to win on the road to optimization. Scrabble would best be used as an examination and exhibition of flaws in how the game's dictionary is handled.
And then there's the campaign mode of SNES/Genesis Super Battleship.
Yes. Quite easily. Assuming you can control the die in any way, it'd be the exact same thing every single turn, which is extraordinarily boring, and the odds for favorable outcomes are pretty high to start with. You don't even need to always manipulate sixes for yourself, just beat their rolls. If you can't manipulate the rolls, then it wouldn't look that much different from a regular game of Risk.
And you wouldn't want to take Asia because you wouldn't want to have to place all those extra soldiers every single turn. In fact, it'd probably be better to let the CPU have 99% of Asia, just so it spends inordinate effort attacking the last spot over and over in an attempt to get the bonus while you grind your way through invading the rest.
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Posts: 11475
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Tangent wrote:
Pokota wrote:
Can you imagine a game of Risk being TASed?
Yes. Quite easily. Assuming you can control the die in any way, it'd be the exact same thing every single turn, which is extraordinarily boring, and the odds for favorable outcomes are pretty high to start with. You don't even need to always manipulate sixes for yourself, just beat their rolls. If you can't manipulate the rolls, then it wouldn't look that much different from a regular game of Risk.
And you wouldn't want to take Asia because you wouldn't want to have to place all those extra soldiers every single turn. In fact, it'd probably be better to let the CPU have 99% of Asia, just so it spends inordinate effort attacking the last spot over and over in an attempt to get the bonus while you grind your way through invading the rest.
I didn't undestand a single word from that, but it sounds like it's a task somewhat similar to nethack: you plan to death, then do a simple execution. Quite an achievement in my eyes.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
we already vaulted some board games, like clue so i don't see why board games should be treated differently than other games, if we set the "strict vault rules" like
- must be played on the hardest dificulty
- must get to the credits
- must aim for the fastest time
The vault was made specificaly when entertainement was not the main strong point of a TAS and the entertainement value of a TAS come partly from the knowledge of the game.
when seeing the monopoly 4 CPU TAS, all the entertainement come from the knowledge of what is AI manipulation, if you show the TAS to someone who doesn't know what it is, he will just say "cool story Bro, but there's nothing special"
to be honest, the scrable TAS surpised me and reminded me of the monopoly one, if it was done on the hardest difficulty and if the CPU played first (so he would lose faster), i would have voted yes...
I'm a bit confused, because this seems to be your thesis, then you proceed to give a very thorough and convincing argument of why it doesn't make sense to put board games into the vault. The following is almost 100% the exact logic chain we went through when deciding upon the no board games rule back when the vault rules were written:
My point is that since we want to be, in general, inclusive, having a principle of "board games are not publishable" seems wrong. We are dissing an entire genre simply because it doesn't "fit" into the vault tier.
I tried to give a reasoning of why it doesn't fit, and thus a reason for creating a new tier.
Pokota wrote:
A raw strategy game like Chess can be beaten in four moves
You assume that you can make the chess engine do whatever moves you want. I highly doubt that if the engine is even mildly competent, it's going to lose in four moves no matter what you do (at least if we are talking about the higher difficulty levels, which is the point).
A chess TAS against a competent chess engine at the highest difficulty would be a real challenge. Who can make the computer lose fastest?
Keep in mind that Clue was published before tiers existed, and was automatically (and incorrectly) sent to Vault during the split. It does not serve as a precedent of accepting board games to the Vault.
http://www.youtube.com/Noxxa
<dwangoAC> This is a TAS (...). Not suitable for all audiences. May cause undesirable side-effects. May contain emulator abuse. Emulator may be abusive. This product contains glitches known to the state of California to cause egg defects.
<Masterjun> I'm just a guy arranging bits in a sequence which could potentially amuse other people looking at these bits
<adelikat> In Oregon Trail, I sacrificed my own family to save time. In Star trek, I killed helpless comrades in escape pods to save time. Here, I kill my allies to save time. I think I need help.
Keep in mind that Clue was published before tiers existed, and was automatically (and incorrectly) sent to Vault during the split. It does not serve as a precedent of accepting board games to the Vault.
thanks for the correction. anyway, i'm still thinking that boards games, if they have an ending are still games and should not be "segregated" because they are different
I think it's overgeneralizing to forbid an entire genre from the Vault. Rather lean on the core tenets of "Must be clearly definable as a game which has achievable goals" and "Gameplay must stand out from non-assisted play" instead of just outright banning sports, game show and board games.
Sure, most game show and board games have a pretty trivial gameplay. But the optimist in me thinks there is always the possibility for a subversive glitchy element in games, turning regular rules upside down and making a normally trivial game worthwhile as a TAS.
When the day comes we find a technically proficient but a very boring "early game end" glitch in a board game, there will be no place for it at TASVideos under the current rules. Which is... well, a slight shame at least.
When the day comes we find a technically proficient but a very boring "early game end" glitch in a board game, there will be no place for it at TASVideos under the current rules. Which is... well, a slight shame at least.
i just wish for the day that we find something like "in SM64 every frame zoomed on mario's ass save a lag frame"
so we could get a 0 & 120 star improvements that would just zoom on his ass for the whole run, that would lead to the most hilarious and most mind destroying discutions....
When the day comes we find a technically proficient but a very boring "early game end" glitch in a board game, there will be no place for it at TASVideos under the current rules. Which is... well, a slight shame at least.
i just wish for the day that we find something like "in SM64 every frame zoomed on mario's ass save a lag frame"
so we could get a 0 & 120 star improvements that would just zoom on his ass for the whole run, that would lead to the most hilarious and most mind destroying discutions....
Well there's something similar; in Super Metroid, pausing as much as possible can make the ingame timer really low. While I'm aware it likely won't be accepted, it would somewhat hilarious to have that kind of submission.
Edit: It'll also win the reward in my signature. :P
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Posts: 2822
Location: Northern California
jlun2 wrote:
Edit: It'll also win the reward in my signature. :P
It may be a bit late for Worst Looking TAS of 2011...
If a new tier is going to be considered specifically for non-entertaining board games, couldn't we use that as an excuse to change the tiering system altogether? I could see non-entertaining board games being part of a new tier as long as there's more substance to it than just that, like the oft-proposed Demo tier, but having a tier dedicated specifically to just board game TASes makes absolutely no sense to me.
TASvideos Admin and acting Senior Judge 💙 Currently unable to dedicate a lot of time to the site, taking care of family.
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Samsara wrote:
If a new tier is going to be considered specifically for non-entertaining board games, couldn't we use that as an excuse to change the tiering system altogether? I could see non-entertaining board games being part of a new tier as long as there's more substance to it than just that, like the oft-proposed Demo tier, but having a tier dedicated specifically to just board game TASes makes absolutely no sense to me.
I agree with all of this.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
If a new tier is going to be considered specifically for non-entertaining board games, couldn't we use that as an excuse to change the tiering system altogether? I could see non-entertaining board games being part of a new tier as long as there's more substance to it than just that, like the oft-proposed Demo tier, but having a tier dedicated specifically to just board game TASes makes absolutely no sense to me.
I agree with all of this.
I also agree with that. This gives more support for the Demo category.
Frankly I don't see the point in adding more tiers. I can easily see how a board game run could be entertaining enough for Moon Tier, similar to the famous Family Feud run. But other than that I agree that "non-entertaining board games" don't belong in the Vault, and I don't see how it adds value to the site to create a new tier for non-entertaining board games.
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Posts: 11475
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Radiant wrote:
Frankly I don't see the point in adding more tiers. I can easily see how a board game run could be entertaining enough for Moon Tier, similar to the famous Family Feud run. But other than that I agree that "non-entertaining board games" don't belong in the Vault, and I don't see how it adds value to the site to create a new tier for non-entertaining board games.
Just read the discussions of Othello and Scrabble. I was personally very surprised to see so much positive reaction to such games and such runs (from myself too).
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
Just read the discussions of Othello and Scrabble. I was personally very surprised to see so much positive reaction to such games and such runs (from myself too).
Fair point. I just re-read those threads, and I find that the general opinion there is that these runs should be in the Vault.
Of course, only a small amount of users commented in those threads. So instead of creating a brand new tier, I suggest we put up a vote to allow board games in the vault (assuming, of course, they are optimized enough and meet the other vault criteria).
Currently the Vault criteria have a specific exception that says "no board games", and it is possible that many people oppose this exception. It strikes me as fair to find out.
While I disagree with the notion that board games inherently don't qualify for the vault, I don't see the point in adding an entire tier just for that either. And for those talking about the demo tier: even if that was introduced, these sort of TASes don't even come near qualifying for it. I don't see why we can't just accept TASes of board games (assuming good technical quality and the following of whatever rules we make about difficulty) in the vault.
But other than that I agree that "non-entertaining board games" don't belong in the Vault, and I don't see how it adds value to the site to create a new tier for non-entertaining board games.
It would add to the completeness of the site. Every game deserves a TAS, after all.
I don't disagree with the sentiment that the "purity" if the vault tier could be kept; it's intended for at most one "any%" and one "100%" TAS of any given game, and perhaps that should be kept so. The vault tier shouldn't become just a dump for "everything else (other than moons)".
In the tier redesign discussion thread it was proposed that the current "vault" tier could actually be elevated to this position more strictly. In other words, it would contain all "any%" and "100%" runs regardless of entertainment, and all other goals would go to other tiers. This would increase the clarity of the tiers, remove subjectivity, and help erase the bad rep that the vault tier has.
If this redesign is ever done, then creating some kind of new special kind of tier, where things like board games could fit, ought to be possible.
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Warp wrote:
In the tier redesign discussion thread it was proposed that the current "vault" tier could actually be elevated to this position more strictly. In other words, it would contain all "any%" and "100%" runs regardless of entertainment, and all other goals would go to other tiers. This would increase the clarity of the tiers, remove subjectivity, and help erase the bad rep that the vault tier has.
If this redesign is ever done, then creating some kind of new special kind of tier, where things like board games could fit, ought to be possible.
To repeat the original intent of tier redesign, judging system would remain exactly the same, entertainment borderlines would be judged on the same grounds, only the overall look would be different.
Warning: When making decisions, I try to collect as much data as possible before actually deciding. I try to abstract away and see the principles behind real world events and people's opinions. I try to generalize them and turn into something clear and reusable. I hate depending on unpredictable and having to make lottery guesses. Any problem can be solved by systems thinking and acting.
