Hi there! I'm Myqpalzm, your fellow beta tester of Subterfuge! I'm here to tell you a tale of my kingdom's descent to the depth of the sea to search for fame and glory. I'm sorry if this kind of thread doesn't belong to this subforum. I don't know where to put my story, and I really, REALLY want to share it to the world. If you don't care at all about this thread, don't post rude comments.

Now, let's begin. Hmm, where should I begin? Aha!

After downloading the game (version 401, I think) and solving half of the tactical puzzles, I immediately searched for a public game. There is one game that hold my attention. The name of the game is "It's a game. Join it." so I do like what the name told me to do.

I end up as the purple army. It's such a good color for my first game ever! Before the game started, I'm already in good terms with this nice guy called ckorta after our short conversation. A few hours passed, the game started, and I already were communicating with all of my neighbors. I started most of my conversation with my neighbors with something like "Halt! You're threatening my fine people. I will keep an eye on your next move." I also befriended Slenjamin by giving him a squad of my most bravest drillers. There's also a time when I noticed that a player named Phil haven't checked the game for a long time. I consulted with the game manual, and decided my best course of action: Sending a 40 drillers sub to the heart of Phil's defenses before 40 hours of his inactivity passed, and the heart is where his queen was located at. It was suprisingly effective, crippling his throne and ending his inactivity reign!

The early day in this game were really important for my game, because this is the time when I realized that I'm not alone in this fight. This time is filled with game changers and a bunch of drama that will affect the outcome of my first game. Ckorta made a communication to jvan and me to form an alliance for the time being. I though it's a pretty logical thing to do, considering that the three of use were in the middle of the ranking. Not long after that, ckorta and I attacked Slenjamin's outposts while many of Slenjamin's forces were distracted at conquering jvan's outposts. I felt really bad about the attack, because I supposed to be fighting with him, not against him. At the end, Slenjamin was defeated and the spoils of war were scattered all over the sea. The three of us slowly recovered from the Slenjamin War, while moving our subs towards Slenjamin's former outposts.

After that, a group of players invited me on their cause to defeat the current player in the 1st place called Kid-Bear. He had been building his army of drillers since the beginning of the game. He was currently feared at that time because of his insane amount of drillers and outposts that he had. I only participate in the Kid-Bear War for only a while, mocking an attack to his outposts. I felt really great about that, challenging the most feared player on the game. It's not too long until we declared cease fire. There is also a fun time, when everyone else has built at least one mine, while I still have no mine. All this time, I though mining an outpost would only give one neptunium. Boy, was I wrong! Jvan told me to build one right away, and I was wrong all this time! With a single mine, I struggled to keep up with other players!

My army was improved after the Slenjamin War and the Kid-Bear Skirmish, and I produced way more drillers than I ever imagined. It's funny, because at that time my driller and outpost number exceeds almost all of the other players', but I'm still stuck at the lower ranking because of my lack of information about how mining works. Also, at the time, I supplied Roadkielh's mine that was under attack by Kid-Bear with so many subs. Roadkielh was grateful for all my help, while Kid-Bear felt confused about my unpredictable move. Me and Kid-Bear talked a bit, but I forgot the outcome of the conversation.

Like I said before, I don't participate at the Kid-Bear War entirely because I have more important matters to attend to. Ckorta betrayed jvan and sent a lone sub to jvan's mine. The time is almost up for the game, and jvan is winning. I felt it's too early to end the game (oh, so selfish), so I decided to help ckorta on taking the mine. I tried to communicate with him about why he attacked jvan and why I helped him take the mine, but he didn't respond. Felling betrayed, jvan and I communicated, negotiated and debated. I also told him about my true purpose for helping ckorta. At the end, we declared the end of a war that haven't started yet.

At the very last day of the game, I was ranked at 4th place, with Roadkielh at 3rd place, ckorta at 2nd place, and jvan at 1st place. Phil and Slenjamin have been eliminated, while a player named Zxander was ranked at 5th/6th place and Kid-Bear at 5th/6th place. As a last move before the game end, I sent some subs filled with loads of drillers at ckorta's territories. It was very effective! The attack rewarded me with a 2nd place, while ckorta was bumped down into 4th place. It is the most satisfying attack that I have ever done, but it still makes me kind of sad because of the betraying.

At the last hour of the game, ckorta responded at last. He explained that real life was the cause for his inactivity. Many players gg'd at each other in the Public Chat, and the game was done.

So that's it! My very first game was done in over a week more! It's just sooo long! Now that the introduction was done, I will tell you my true purpose on writing this thread. It's about veteran and newbie players. At the first game, I noticed that most players are still new at the game. Phil, Slenjamin, ckorta, Zxander (kinda) and I were still a freshman. From what I can analyse from my first game and my later games, new players tend to communicate more with their neighbors and form a friendship (I still haven't found a player that RP (roleplay) at the chat yet). There are also some newbies that work alone without communicating. Some new player attack their neighbor alone. They have a lower chance at backstabbing their alliance early in the game. Obviously, they execute plans that are more likely to fail. That doesn't mean they are to be underestimated.

Now, for the so-called veterans. From all my games, they are more likely to backstab their newly-formed alliance. They can also make new players do their biddings, only to backstab them at the end. At one game, a veteran player told me that my forces are threatening his border. After I ordered my drillers to fall back, he immediately sent an all-out attack which consisted of loads of subs at half of my outposts. That attack eliminated me in just a few days. Also, many veterans (and many new players too, I think) will always attack at the first two/three day of the game. Don't they ever watch the trailer? No one attacks on the second day!! And then, most don't bother making an alliance (with me, anyway). Coupled with other veterans, they are a force to be reckoned with. There are also the good and friendly veterans, nonetheless. For example, jvan and Roadkielh at my first game are very very friendly and helpful. After what I have done to them, it's possible for them to attack my outposts, but they didn't.

After all my games, I'm not really that comfortable with playing in a game with full of veterans. I'm more comfortable playing with new players. No, that doesn't mean I can manipulate them and win more easily. I love this game, and I want others to feel the same. I don't want to give bad first impressions to the new players. Most veterans may only care about reputation (with friendship as a secondary goal), but we, the underdogs, care really much to our fellow players, even though it costed us reputation and fame.

But really, after what I did at my first game, players are unpredictable. Most of my information above are not really that accurate. Players react to their surroundings based on their starting position and their future goal. That is what makes the game fun, actually. Most new players (including me) won't understand this yet, however. So it's really better if new players are matched against someone with a similar skill.

I think that's it. I'm sorry if my first game story covered way too much of the thread! I hope my message can be read easily to you readers.

Tl;dr How can I complete the advanced "Against All Odds" tactical puzzle?

I feel like this post deserves a reply, except I dunno what to say except nicely put, I found it an entertaining read

I agree. One of my previous games had a number of highly ranked veterans and everyone sheepishly followed all of their orders and destroyed me, leaving a mass of allies and making for a snooze of a game.

1. Convince newbs to help neutralize all threats.
2. Mine and continue to climb/own the top of the leaderboard.

BORING. Kill the vets, people. Revolt!

This won't always be the case. There have been a number of players over the last year that have been testing the game for bugs and learning quite a bit; the so called veterans. You can see now that there are nearly 400 current players, most of them new that I can see and that most games won't be full of those veterans. Come launch time in 10 days or so, there may be so many players that you won't see the same person twice. That would be a success and I agree with your sentiment.

Nice read, I don't have much else to add other than have you since completed the 'against all odds' puzzle? I just started yesterday and it's the only puzzle I can't seem to figure out. I even solved 'a test of character'.

Thanks for the reply! Sorry if you can't add anything more to the discussion.

And yes, I have completed the Advanced 3 puzzle!