Scorched earth

[Baalz]

Yes, and to make things even clearer that this is an orthogonal discussion to putting up a good fight, my biggest frustration ever was an opponent giving up *before the first fight even happened* and turning all his efforts to destroying everything he had while I was waiting for the NAP to expire - I'm not talking about border provinces he thought he'd lose, he started pillaging his capital the turn I sent NAP notice. I'm talking about crippling yourself because you've decided your cause is lost and you are *solely* trying to reduce what the person who defeated you will gain after you're gone. Its really a matter of intent as obviously there is a lot of room for these type of actions as part of fighting to the last man. When you're saying "I'm doing this because you beat me and I therefore hope you lose". Pillaging the last of your population so you can giving large sums of gems/gold to the most likely opponent of your invader, inviting unrelated players to take your provinces while you leave them undefended, and razing your last castles are simply not part of fighting until the end as you are explicitly destroying yourself.

I do spot in this thread another justification, which is in the case that your invader is drastically more powerful than anybody else trying to bring him down a peg to make a more competitive game for everyone is really in everybody's best interest. That's a valid move, and I don't even really think anybody could be annoyed by that.

[Reverend Zombie]

Baalz said:
Pillaging the last of your population so you can giving large sums of gems/gold to the most likely opponent of your invader, inviting unrelated players to take your provinces while you leave them undefended, and razing your last castles are simply not part of fighting until the end as you are explicitly destroying yourself.

To put your position positively, then, you want the player who you have attacked who is about to go down to defeat to

• refrain from pillaging his provinces
• reserve undefended provinces for your armies
• leave all standing castles for you to take over

Is that an accurate statement of your position?

[Baalz]

Reverend Zombie said:

To put your position positively, then, you want the player who you have attacked who is about to go down to defeat to

• refrain from pillaging his provinces
• reserve undefended provinces for your armies
• leave all standing castles for you to take over

Is that an accurate statement of your position?

No, it's not. These are examples of symptoms of an attitude and it misrepresents my point on more than one level to list them like that as it's much more about the intent than the behavior. Being a poor sport can be as trivial as whining in the forums about how unfair your loss was, and I feel actions taken under the justification "you beat me, therefore I hope you lose" are weak sauce. Clearly, on your last turn sending all your gold/gems to someone you have no previous relationship falls into this category, as does begging other neighbors to invade you before player A gets all the spoils, and clearly plenty of people raze/pillage etc. for the same reason. Nobody is suggesting you can't pillage your own provinces, nobody is suggesting the invader is entitled to you reserving anything for them, and nobody is suggesting you make things easy on anybody when they're trying to beat you. I am suggesting you congratulate the guy who bested you and thank him for a good game rather than whatever petty things can be done to sabotage him. That's what sportsmanship is about.

And with that, I'm done beating this dead, dead horse.

[sum1lost]

Not scorching earth away isn't the same as not putting up a fight. For the record. I haven't "rolled over" in any battle, but I have refrained from burning down my own lands in ways that make it harder for me to survive.

[Reverend Zombie]

Baalz said:

No, it's not. These are examples of symptoms of an attitude and it misrepresents my point on more than one level to list them like that as it's much more about the intent than the behavior.

I'm not sure how you can determine intent, or police it.

[thejeff]

You can't. And I think that's a large part of the problem with this discussion.

You seem to be looking for a specific list of things that must always (or never) be done and wondering how to enforce it. I don't have such a list and I don't want to enforce anything. Do whatever you want. Some things I'll think are cheesy tactics and poor sportsmanship. Oh well, I'll deal with it.

When you kill me, I'll fight to the end, defend any castles I can to the last man and try to pull tricks out of my ... hat to surprise you, but you'll probably get most of my castles in the end, since I can hold out longer in them. I probably won't pillage my provinces much, since I'd rather throw my troops at you.
If I beat you, it'll be quicker but I'll get less out of it, since you'll have killed off your population and destroyed your castles. I think it's petty, but whatever works for you.

[DonCorazon]

I won't scorch the earth if there is nothing for my country to gain personally by it e.g. it is not part of an overall path to victory.

So feel free to attack me.

I respect those who beat me - there is no better teacher than defeat.

[duke_commando]

Part of me always hopes the guy who attacked me ends up losing...
that said, I try not to be bitter, and I do see scorched earth with the sole purpose of seeing the other guy lose with no benefit to yourself as pretty lame. Particularly, as in Baalz' example, when you haven't even been invaded yet, the other party just canceled the NAP.
There no way to enforce something against this, but that doesn't mean we can't encourage people not to do it.