Talk:Settlers of Catan

Contents

1 copyright and fair use 2 game guide versus encyclopedia entry 3 official rules 4 strategic considerations 5 vote against deletion 6 Comments from Wikipedia:Featured article candidates 7 More discussion 8 The importance of luck

copyright and fair use

Discussion moved to /copyright and fair use.

game guide versus encyclopedia entry

Discussion moved to /game guide versus encylopedia entry.

official rules

Moved discussion to Talk:Settlers of Catan, Rules. --Fritzlein 01:53, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

strategic considerations

See discussion at Talk:Settlers of Catan, Strategic considerations.

vote against deletion

• Smack has listed the pages for all 21 sea maps on Wikipedia:Votes for deletion#December 16. Reason for deletion: he believes they are fan variants because he's never heard of the two seafarers expansion sets. RickK has voted for deletion, in line with his history of ignorance and lack of integrity from the copyright and fair use discussion. Please tell these two gentlemen to go home. ~ stardust 02:17, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • Please read the Wikipedia:Rules to consider that are called Wikipedia:No personal attacks and Wikipedia:Remove personal attacks. If your critics are wrong, it's sufficient to say so here, having previously argued your case. (No claim to be a paragon here, but as C. S. Lewis said, you can't argue effectively against a sin you're not tempted to!) Dandrake 06:28, Dec 19, 2003 (UTC)

• RickK and Gentgeen have also quietly posted the images up at Wikipedia:Possible copyright infringements#December 11, even after the subject was closed here. Please remember to vote against deletion there as well. ~ stardust 08:57, 16 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Comments from Wikipedia:Featured article candidates

• Settlers of Catan - good content, excellent graphics to guide the reader's eye, and an overall impressive overview of the game. --Chuck SMITH 02:30, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • Strongly object. The creator refuses to compromise on any issues regarding this subject, including its copyright status. RickK 02:31, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
    • I disagree. She has systematically stated all of her copyright arguments on her user page at User:Stardust. I may however decide not to argue here to eliminate my personal Wikistress. I just assumed that it was self-evident that it belonged here. --Chuck SMITH 02:38, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
      • She has stated them, and it's possible that the statement contains only one major error concerning copyright law, but that doesn't mean that the page's interpretations of law and fact are so indisputable as to show all objections to be baseless. A reliable source on copyright law would never say that "the copyrightable portions are not under copyright protection unless the registration process has been completed", because it's false: you must register before you can sue, but an infringement before it's registered is still an infringement. [1] (http://www.ucop.edu/ott/crbasics.html) Dandrake 03:22, Dec 24, 2003 (UTC)
  • Strongly question. Should an article that (apparently) is still violently controversial be even considered seriously? It's hard to see how anyone can expect a consensus, which is what we're supposed to have here, just yet. What harm is there in a delay till article contents and people's tempers settle down? Dandrake 08:24, Dec 22, 2003 (UTC)
  • Support. Still a little early but this is looking like an excellent example of how to do a thorough game guide, with good description and excellent, lawful, use of images. Certainly shouldn't be discounted just because RickK is making baseless copyright infringement claims about it. [User:Stardust]] seems to have an excellent understanding of copyright law as applied to games, reviews and commentary on them. Jamesday 09:53, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • Should really not have been listed here while still on VfD. Bmills 10:06, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
    • This particular article isn't on VfD, articles about rules variants to the game are. I object because this isn't an article about the game, but a guide for playing the game, as JamesDay states, which I believe should go to wikibooks. Additionally, the images are not from the game itself but from an un-offical java based program based on the game that is frowned upon by the game's copyright holder. Gentgeen 10:24, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
    • No, but if the merge suggestion on VfD is accepted, then this article will be significantly altered. I think it would have been better if the nomination had waited until after a consensus on the project was reached.Bmills 10:44, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • Oppose. This just doesn't look to me like a true "brilliant prose" candidate. It's not exactly an ad for the game, but to me it resembles a magazine article—in one of those hobby magazines in which all the articles are flattering articles about products that just happen to have big ads in the magazine. All that stuff about how many awards it's won, why it suitable for every level from family play to competition, how it "showcases the heights of adaptive analysis, which the human mind does best" (whatever that means... how is that different from bridge or poker?) The lead photo looks like a pitchman hawking his wares. It even tells you where to buy the game and associated game paraphernalia, (covering this with a fig leaf "This article in no way takes a position on whether people should or should not buy this game...") It says that "Settlers is perhaps the first German-style board game to reach any degree of popularity outside of Europe," but does not explain what a "German-style board game" is, give any examples of other "German-style board games," or compare it against its rivals. The article's point of view is clearly that of a Settlers of Catan fan. That's not terrible, but in my opinion it is not a good exemplar of an ideal Wikipedia article. Dpbsmith 13:05, 22 Dec 2003 (UTC)
  • Agree. It's well writtin, isn't it?
    • I didn't think that was supposed to be the only criterion. From the comments at the top of the page, I thought that Wikipedia:The perfect article was supposed to express the criteria, and it says the perfect article "is completely unbiased" and goes on to elaborate. If there's general agreement that an article can qualify as "brilliant prose" even if it is not a good example of a truly neutral point of view, then let me know and I'll withdraw my objection. Dpbsmith 17:38, 24 Dec 2003 (UTC)

More discussion

This article is really bloated right now. It would be much easier to read if the rules were moved to a separate article rather than piled onto the main page. Even without the many many images, the article is at least twice the size of chess. -Sean Curtin 21:29, 22 Jun 2004 (UTC)

It is funny how different people perceive "bloat". In the case of chess, some people considered the complete rules to be bloated, and removed the rules about piece movement to articles about each piece, and details of time limits to a separate article as well. Now some people consider the rules of chess article to be less useful because it is no longer comprehensive, and bit by bit the missing information is creeping back in.

In the main Settlers article the complete rules double to some extent as a description of the game. If the rules were removed to another page (as the strategy has been removed) what would remain? We would have only a fairly terse description. In all probability, that description would be expanded bit by bit to something more informative by adding, among other things, bits of the rules and game mechanics.

The main article on chess has had everything removed except links, a brief history, and some introductory paragraphs which frankly do a pretty poor job of summarising the game, although it is gradually getting better as information seeps back in. The truly excellent Wikipedia information about chess is mostly on pages other than the main chess article. One of these days I will try to gather the courage to overhaul the summary information for chess, knowing that it will partially duplicate information available on sub-pages, but trying to create something more coherent and more to the point than what is there at present.

I am sympathetic to the idea that the current Settlers article is bloated, but moving the rules to a separate page, if nothing else is done, will make the main article worse than it is now. If the detailed, comprehensive rules are moved, then something else must take its place, something that conveys some idea of how the game is played and what it is about.

Just my $0.02, --Fritzlein 05:42, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I agree that a section or paragraph overviewing the rules would be quite helpful - as it stands now, the rules aren't especially clear on, for example, what the goals of the game are or how one wins. -Sean Curtin 06:21, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I like the way the chess article is layed out, personally. I would venture that most people looking for an article on wikipedia about chess or Settlers (and most games) want an overview of the rules: a brief synopsis of how the game is put together and the kind of game it is. This article presently does not do a good job of fufilling that expectation. I think it would be much better if we moved the detailed description of the rules to a seperate article and added a paragraph giving a concise explaination of the basic game mechanics to the main article. I agree with Fritzlein that the chess article would be helped by having a similar paragraph, but let's fix both rather than having a bulky, hard to skim article here and a slim, hard to skim article there. --The demiurge 22:06, 24 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I agree. The detailed rules should still be present somewhere, perhaps further down the page, but I think this article strongly needs a summary at the top containing a brief outline of the rules. --AlexChurchill 23:05, Jun 26, 2004 (UTC)

OK, that's three votes (four if you count me), so I'll try for a game summary at the top and move the complete rules to a new article. --Fritzlein 00:18, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Excellent, I like your game summary. That was just the type of thing I was thinking of: a way to get people unacquanted with the game to get a quick feel for the type of play. Nice job. --The demiurge 04:37, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I'm glad you like it. I hope the changes are acceptable to Stardust, because she did some fantastic work which I don't mean to denigrate in any way. Hopefully the current layout can be both a good summary for those unfamiliar with the game, and a good resource for more serious players. --Fritzlein 06:36, 27 Jun 2004 (UTC)

The importance of luck

Luck plays an important role in Settlers, and the current article states rather poorly the relationship between luck and skill, as follows:

The importance of random dice as a game factor varies inversely with a player's progress in skill.
The best players worldwide have shown that they can win slightly more than half of their games,
 consistently over long periods of time.

It is true that, the more skilled a player is, the more often he will win at Settlers, in spite of luck. What happens, however, when four experts of equal skill play? They will presumably each have a 25% chance of winning, based on luck, exactly as would be the case if four beginners of equal skill played. Thus the importance of dice does not "vary inversely with skill" in this sense. On the contrary, luck is just as important to experts as it is to amateurs if everyone is equally skilled. The role of luck is diminished only when people of unequal skill play.

Similarly it is logically impossible for experts to consistently win more than half their games when they play against each other. The statement can only be meaningful if it is quantified by the strength of the opposition. Perhaps an expert can win 90% of the time against three home players, 55% of the time against three club players, and 25% of the time against three other experts.

The depth of chess is sometimes expressed in the number of "75% levels". That is to say, a player rated 2800 wins 75% of the time against a player rated 2600, and a player rated 2600 wins 75% of the time against a player rated 2400, etc. There are about ten or twelve levels of chess understanding by this measure. A similar yardstick for Settlers would be the number of "50% levels" in four-player games. Say a home player beats three beginners 50% of the time, and a club player beats three home players 50% of the time, etc. I don't know what the exact figures would be, but I would guess that there would be about four or five levels of understanding of Settlers by this measure.

But this measure doesn't say that Settlers is not as deep as chess by virtue of having fewer levels of play. It merely means that in Settlers the importance of human understanding only goes a certain distance relative to the importance of luck.

Peace, --Fritzlein 06:25, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC)

"The role of luck is diminished only when people of unequal skill play."

This is exactly what the case should be for a game that involves luck as a game element and where its role "varies inversely with a player's progress in skill".

"Similarly it is logically impossible for experts to consistently win more than half their games when they play against each other."

True, but I believe the intention was that experts can consistently win more than half their games overall when playing others with varying skill backgrounds. I suppose a clarity edit couldn't hurt.

- Korpios 06:55, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC)

I do think one should clarify the "more than half" claim. Heck, even I can win more than half of my games against the right opposition, and I'm not one of "the best players worldwide" by a long shot. If I had some tournament experience I might have a better sense of what the original author was trying to claim.

As for the other sentence, it may be clear to you what it means that the importance of luck "varies inversely with a player's progress in skill", but it seems to me to be literally not true. It implies that if all the players in a game progress in skill, then the importance of luck will diminish for all of them. I know from experience this is false, because if all the players are equally versed in the various ways of coping with bad luck, then the person who gets luckiest still wins.

I think we probably agree about the role of luck relative to the role of skill, but we disagree about how to express it. Rather than saying luck is less important to more skilled players (which is at least misleading, and probably false), say simply that skilled players have a much better chance of winning than unskilled players. Then if we want to precisely quantify the relationship between skill and luck, we need some data I don't have.

Peace, --Fritzlein 22:00, 23 Jun 2004 (UTC)