Well I'll go against the grain it seems and say truthfully that after playing many games I really hate the new system.

I'll try labeling my reasons with numbers.

1) The new game is LESS strategic. How? Well you can only play one way, aggressively. Seriously if you try and play a defensive game you'll AS score will get raped and even if you finish 3rd or 2nd you'll lose points cause AS score seems more heavily weighted than the traditional positional score. While you could argue that you had to play defensively in the old game, I'd simply state that you was incorrect and that strategic attacking at the right time was key to the old game. I should know I'm a good player.

2) The game is MORE luck based. Well this comes from the fact that you have to attack more since joining your territories is even more important. And by attack more I guess what I'm saying is make more risky attacks. In the old game I would NEVER attack a territory with the same number of dice.(discounting 2vs2s) e.g. 4vs4. In this game you simply have to, hell sometimes you have to attack with less dice! Clearly this style of play is dependent more on luck than the safe style of the current game.

2.1) Again backing up point 2 is the undeniable fact that dice placement is more important. Most players who have played the new game would agree with this I would think. Obviously since dice placement is random (well mostly) this increases the amount of luck involved in the game. Again this is an offshoot of the more aggressive game.

3) Alliances are screwed. Its obvious to those that have been playing that alliances take place less often in the new game. Now I wouldn't say this is because of the new game, no this is merely a period of adapting due to the fact that the best alliances are different to the last game due to the AS score system. However... I've given much thought to this and I can now say with fair confidence that the 1900 tables are gonna be terrible. Its because when you really think about it, as the 1900+ players must, allying between the 2 biggest and most far apart players is always the best alliance. While this is bad you could argue that this has always been the situation and your kinda right. BUT when the two big guys ally together all the smaller guys usually ally and fight back. Again the AS system would greatly discourage this method, fighting among yourselves would likely end in a much better score for yourself or on the coin flip if the small guys did ally together and win your score still wouldn't be as good as it would the old system.

4) This point isn't so much against the new system as it is against the ill logic shown towards the old system when discussing the 8vs8 game. People are always saying the 8vs8 end games are terrible and luck based. Now honestly how many 8vs8 games where there has been a clear leader have you ever seen switch. A few maybe. But 90% of the time the guy who's got the most stacks wins. Who has the most stacks? The guy who played better. How is this lucky?

4.1) Oh and even though some think otherwise the 8vs8 end game is still alive and well in the new game so don't even bother trying to say theres less luck because it isn't there anymore. It is.


Ok, so I'm left thinking, what is better? Well away people do get screwed like they should and... no thats it. Thats the only thing I prefer in this game and that could have been implemented in a far less game changing fashion than this.

Now I'm left thinking why the game has been changed in this way at all. I mean the scoring although different isn't really "different". Do badly and you score badly, do well and you score well. Essentially the scoring is the same but the style of play has been changed completely. I'll leave you with a good piece of advice, "if it ain't broke, don't fix it".