CyberVASL X

pipiol

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Dear all,

The tenth edition of CyberVASL is now open for sign-up. If you are interested in joining this tournament, please send an email to CyberVASL {at} outlook {dot} com (please be sure that you include exactly "CyberVASL X" in the subject of the email), indicating your real name, your personal ID code in the AREA webpage (http://www.asl-area.org/), and email. By doing so, you accept that I will use this information and pass it to others for the exclusive purposes of running the tournament.

All rules are below, but here is a summary:

- This edition will be limited to 32 participants, and will consequently have 5 rounds.
- Currently, 21 participants have confirmed participation, so there are 11 free slots available.
- The tournament will start as soon as the 32 slots are filled. In case vacancies still exist by 30th September, the tournament will start with the available players by this date.
- All sign-ups must be done by email. Strict receiving time will determine participation in case the threshold of 32 players is reached.
- I will give some "badges" to participating players, for achieving some targets. The purpose is only to add some spice to the tournament, with no other intention or implication.
- IMPORTANT NEWS: After some complaints about the "good luck" of particular players, I decided to develop a tool capable of detecting cheating behavior, based on the logs of the game. Since it is not fully automated, each player will have some limited access to it, to ensure it is used with moderation. In particular, you can ask for an analysis of your current game, but if the tool fails in detecting cheats, then you will not be able to request it neither in this tournament nor the next one you are participating. Of course, if a player is detected cheating, he will be immediately expulsed from current and future tournaments. I hope this threat is enough to discourage all cheaters from participation, so hopefully I will not need to run the tool ever!


COMPLETE RULES:

- Each round, people will be paired, and only the winner of each game will continue in the tournament.
- Default method of play is VASL PBEM, no optional rules and VASL dicebot. Other methods, rules or dice are allowed upon agreement of both players.
- All games of a round must be completed no later than three months after the previous round finished. All games have to be running (i.e., both setups done, and turn 1 started) after one month from the start of the round.
- Deadlines are NOT flexible. At the end of a round a winner must be declared. Failure to this will imply a double loss to both players. Please only sign up if you can send at least one log per day most of the time, as speed is very important when playing PBEM.
- All pairings will be predetermined at the start of the tournament, and you will be allowed (and encouraged) to start your next round game as soon as you know who is your opponent. This will give you more time to complete the new game, as the three months period only starts once all games for the previous round are finished. I will try to regularly remind people about new games that can be started.
- Depending on the number of players (and previous forfeits), it is possible that some players are not paired in a given round. In that case, those players will automatically advance to the next round. I will design pairings to avoid this to happen in the last rounds.
- Pairings will be based on AREA ratings at the start of the tournament, and will be designed in a way that best players will tend to play between them only in latest rounds.
- If you feel that you are not going to have time to complete your game in time, please resign as soon as possible, to allow your opponent to start his new round game ASAP.
- If your game is not finished, (or the game has not started after the first month) then the player more responsible of the delay should politely declare his opponent as the winner, no matter how the game was going.
- All results (win/lose/forfeit) can be notified by either player, either by posting here or sending an email to CyberVASL {at} outlook {dot} com. In the latter case, please be sure that you include exactly "CyberVASL X" in the subject of the email. Please communicate in a similar way scenario and sides chosen, as well as the moment when you effectively started to play turn 1.
- All games (except those not started after the first month) will be reported to AREA.
- In case a rules dispute appears, please consult the rulebook and the rules forum in GameSquad. Only when this doesn't clarify the answer, you can ask me for a decision. Both players should explain their point of view, with specific references to rules. In this respect, I maybe request advice from experienced players, who will also be responsible of deciding when the dispute affects one game in which I am playing.
- Cheats: There is a tool capable of detecting several types of cheats in a given game, based on VASL logs. Any player can request its use for his current game, but if the tool fails to find cheating behavior, then the requesting player cannot use it neither for the rest of the tournament nor for the next one in which he participates. Detected cheating players will be immediately expulsed from all current and future CyberVASL tournaments.

Sign-up rules:

- The sign-up period will last until 30th September at most.
- The number of players in this tenth edition will be limited to 32. Once this limit is reached, sign-up will immediately end, and first round will start
- 21 participants have confirmed participation, so there are 11 free slots available.
- In case the limit is reached before 30th September, new participants will be selected exclusively by the date and time in which sign-up emails were received.

Specific suggestions for selecting scenario and sides:

- ANY scenario can be chosen. Please take into account time availability of you and your opponent, to ensure that the scenario is small enough to be played by the deadline.
- One of the purposes of the tournament is to encourage people to play against new opponents, in order to learn from them both in terms of rules and strategy.
- Therefore, to encourage less experienced people to join, it is suggested that (when the players have different experience levels) the less experienced player selects 3-4 scenarios, and pass them to his opponent, who in turn selects one of them and randomize sides. In this way, less experienced players can adjust the scenario selection to their rules knowledge.
- If both players have a similar experience level, then they can agree on any way they want.
- To facilitate this procedure, all players will have an associated experience level (based on the AREA seed that determined pairings), that will be communicated when the pairings are done.
- Please have a list of your 3-4 preferred scenarios prepared in advance, to avoid unnecessary delays.

Good luck to all!

Sergio


PD: List of current participants (up to 10th September):

Bruno Nitrosso
Will Fleming
Blake Ball
David Gillies
Alex Koestler
Sergio Puente
Martin Marquis
Jason Wert
Jeff Buser
Jeremy Busby
Martin Kristensen
Tom Arnold
Mike Johnston
Rick Carter
Roy Connelly
Gary Bartlett
Peter Rogneholt
Robert Mac Ginley
Steffen Knippel
Pierce Mason
Ivan Kent
 

Mister T

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- IMPORTANT NEWS: After some complaints about the "good luck" of particular players, I decided to develop a tool capable of detecting cheating behavior, based on the logs of the game. Since it is not fully automated, each player will have some limited access to it, to ensure it is used with moderation. In particular, you can ask for an analysis of your current game, but if the tool fails in detecting cheats, then you will not be able to request it neither in this tournament nor the next one you are participating. Of course, if a player is detected cheating, he will be immediately expulsed from current and future tournaments. I hope this threat is enough to discourage all cheaters from participation, so hopefully I will not need to run the tool ever!
Cheaters are the scourge of these type of remote competitive event. Not sure how cheating can be detected, but announcing that it can may act as deterrence. Or not.
 

ecz

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Algorithms exist for Chess, to verify no A.I. is used in internet/PBeM games among humans. I have no idea how such a tool could work in a game like ASL, but every effort must be attempted to discover and ban cheaters, everywhere everytime, so I strongly support this interesting improvement.
If it really works it should be developed in deep and made automatic and added as an option in a future VASL version.
 

andrea pagni

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Personally I have no faith at all in such a tool. Not counting my personal feelings, I greatly doubt it would be 100% accurate and so the risk of a false positive, with all its consequences, would simply be too much.
 

Mister T

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At the end of the day the organiser is in charge. He has to balance the need to ensure the integrity of his event with the risk of making a mistake. A difficult balancing act
 

Stewart

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Personally I have no faith at all in such a tool. Not counting my personal feelings, I greatly doubt it would be 100% accurate and so the risk of a false positive, with all its consequences, would simply be too much.
I know what the tool is and why its not automated.

For I've discovered the "secret of how players can cheat on VASL"
 

Mister T

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If deterrence works, we'll just match the list of participants of the current edition vs. the former one to see the likely culprits. :D
 

pipiol

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Only two seats remaining!

Updated list of participants:

Will Fleming
Bruno Nitrosso
David Gillies
Blake Ball
Pablo Garcia
Alex Koestler
Martin Marquis
Sergio Puente
Martin Kristensen
Stephen Stewart
Jeff Buser
Jason Wert
Tom Arnold
Jeremy Busby
Rick Carter
Steffen Knippel
Mike Johnston
Gary Bartlett
Ken Knott
Jason Burnette
Alexey Nikolov
Ángel González
Bob Eury
Robert Mac Ginley
Ivan Kent
Roy Connelly
Pierce Mason
Carles Ryhr
Peter Rogneholt
Ricardo García
 

pipiol

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Regarding the cheating issue, a couple of comments to clarify things:

I don't want to give much details, to avoid counter-engineering, but the tool is conservative enough to avoid false positives.

Complaints were several, but always concentrated on the same person. I tested the tool against a sample of 5 games of that person (some of them without previous complaints), with positive results (cheating) in all of them. Consequently, I expulsed that person. There is by no means an extensive cheating behavior in the league.

Of course, I'm open to collaborate with VASL developers to include some sort of the tool in the module.
 

Stewart

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Does "the same person" still actively play?
Maybe if they do, warn the rest of us? To save us/challenge "the same person" to a game?
 

pipiol

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Round 1 pairings:

Lionel Colin (Hero) -Ricardo García (2nd line)
Will Fleming (Hero) -Alexey Nikolov (2nd line)
Bruno Nitrosso (Leader) -Gary Bartlett (2nd line)
David Gillies (Leader) -Mike Johnston (2nd line)
Alex Koestler (Elite) -Rick Carter (2nd line)
Blake Ball (Elite) -Ivan Kent (2nd line)
Pablo Garcia (Elite) -Pierce Mason (2nd line)
Martin Marquis (Elite) -Peter Rogneholt (2nd line)
Jason Wert (1st line) -Ken Knott (2nd line)
Jeff Buser (1st line) -Robert Mac Ginley (2nd line)
Sergio Puente (1st line) -Jason Burnette (2nd line)
Tom Arnold (1st line) -Carles Ryhr (2nd line)
Stephen Stewart (1st line) -Ángel González (2nd line)
Jeremy Busby (1st line) -Steffen Knippel (2nd line)
Martin Kristensen (1st line) -Roy Connelly (2nd line)
Eduard Gonzalez (1st line) -Bob Eury (2nd line)
 

pipiol

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Contact details are in the email I sent to all participants, please tell me if you don't find it
 

Stewart

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Would it be best to post results here.
I think that would be helpful and in that case we'd need the GS ID of the players as well.

Thanks!
 

ASL1

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Morning
Pablo and I will butt heads playing FrF 89 "Red Tears Shed On Gray." .. Pablo's despicable
Russians will attack my humble Romanians.
Cheers ya'll!
 

PabloGS

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Hey Pierce, I'll be attacking alright, but with despicable Romanians against your humble Russians.:)
 

esprcorn

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Jason Wert will defend the heights in Italy with the Germans as I, Ken Knott, press my Canadians onward up the boot in "Drive the Canadians on Hard" from Lone Canucks CDN2 from Vol. I of Canadians in Italy.
 
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