RE: [eia] Comparing things

["James Helle" <jhelle@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I personally believe the rules should state losers and winners in the
plural.  From what I've seen of the game it appears very rare that wars are
fought between two major powers alone.  We have a history of "world wars" in
our campaign that compel me to interpret the rules in the plural form so as
to include *all* victors and *all* losers in a battle.  For what it's worth,
that is my opinion.



-----Original Message-----
From: eia-bounces@xxxxxxxxx [mailto:eia-bounces@xxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of
Kyle H
Sent: Monday, February 23, 2004 2:18 PM
To: public list for an Empires in Arms game
Subject: Re: [eia] Comparing things


    I don't know...  I've seen D&D mistakes published in Dragon magazine,
and I've seen Blood Bowl mistakes published by Games Workshop.  In house
publishers are often more interested in selling magazines than in getting
things right.

    Here's the crux of the problem, as far as I'm concerned.  You say that
they were being sloppy on the back cover.  But that's exactly the problem:
exactly *where* were they being sloppy?  Or, more to the point, exactly
where does the sloppiness stop?  We all agree that a mistake was made
somewhere.  You say that we should reject as mere sloppiness the fact that
the back cover refers to only one victor and one loser in a battle.
Rejecting this wording (and only this wording) preserves the interpretation
that you share with the man who wrote the article in The General.
    For the record, I agree with you that we should reject the implication
that there is only one victor and one loser in a battle.  Similarly, I think
it was the *very same sloppiness* that caused the writer of the back cover
to say that the (singular) loser loses 1/2 of a PP for each of "his" corps.
If you think it was sloppy for the writer of the back cover to refer to only
one victor and one loser, then wouldn't it make sense that the reference to
each of "his" corps would be part of the same sloppiness?  After all, if you
are assuming that there is only one victor and one loser, it would be
perfectly natural to make reference to "his" corps.  It would not imply
anything additional.

    So, as I see it, you think that the sloppiness of the back cover extends
only far enough to protect your interpretation.  (We should reject the
singular victor and loser, but we should place emphasis on the word "his" in
the rule for losing PPs after a battle.)  I think the very same sloppiness
extends far enough to protect the interpretation we are currently using in
our game.  (If they were sloppy when they refer to a single victor and a
single loser, that same sloppiness explains why they used the word "his".)
In any case, we can each build our own interpretation depending on what we
wish to ignore as mere "sloppiness".  So basically, we are left with
inconsistent wording and only our own sense of what makes sense and what
doesn't as the final arbiter of how to play the game.  Appeals to authority
are interesting, but not decisive.
    BTW, EIH tries to uphold the view that there can only be one victor.
EIH has rules for determining which country is the sole "victor" in a
combined force, and it gives that country all the PPs for winning (and gives
none to the other contributors).  So, in that sense, EIH is more faithful to
the rules as they are written than any of us are willing to be.

    In the end, though, I will not stand in the way if others are convinced
that Joel is right.  Joel seems to have convinced Mike.  If others find
themselves equally persuaded, then I will concede on this issue.  (Of
course, it goes without saying that if we change how we assign political
points for field battles, then we should also change how we assign political
points for naval battles.)

kdh


> Because they were being sloppy, I expect. The fact that there was an
> article in The General which *advises* doing just that. In fact, here's
the
> article reprinted on the AH web site:
>
> http://www.avalonhill.com/default.asp?x=articles/strat/eia20030801
>
> Quoted here is the first item from the last section:
>
> Although Napoleon said, "I would rather fight an alliance than be part of
> one," the fact remains that allies do have one advantage in battle. If you
> contribute, for example, two corps to a battle against the French, the
most
> political points you will lose in a defeat is one, while you stand to gain
> as many as three. Your nation could lose three battles and win one and
> still come out even. True, the French would then have nine political
> points, but the important fact is that you would not lose nine.
>
>
> If what the back of the rulebook says is a mistake, then this whole
> paragraph is too. And it appeared in The General, which was the Avalon
Hill
> company magazine. I expect that someone at AH was involved in checking
> strategy articles so that they didn't openly conflict with the game rules.
> Moreover, the guy who wrote this article, Bruce Milligan, is listed in the
> credits on p. 46 as one of the playtesters for the game. Given all that, I
> have a hard time believing that he was wrong about the rules and no one
> caught it.
>
> --
> J.
>

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