Some time ago players wrote about ZooSim-scores here and I wrote that I would look at that again.
Last saterday ZooSim was one of the games on the Dutch boardgameschampionship. 14 teams with 4 players, so 14 4-players-matches were played. With variation rule 2 (different season lengths), and with skilled players (I suppose).
I looked at matches/scores. 5 of the 14 match-statistics lost so I have the precise scores of 9 matches. I looked if the scores in the first round collerate with the endscores:
Player with highest first score has the highest total endscore: 1x
Player with highest first score has the lowest total endscore: 5x
Player with lowest first score has the lowest endscore: 3x
Player with lowest first score has the highest endscore: 4x
(Sometimes first score or endscore positions were shared by 2 players.)
So I don't see a correlation between first score and endscore (it looks more like negative correlation) in these matches. And the matches I saw had a good development. In one match the 2 players with the highest endscore had both 5 tiles (of 25 tiles in total).
In 6 of the 9 matches the player with the highest score after 3 seasons (of 5 seasons, so after 60% of a match) did win.
I know games where more changes in the last 40% of a match and I know games where less much changes at the end.
I tried a match with a fixed income for all players. But that doesn't change much, especially not with skilled players, because you calculate the later income in your bid. With 8 coins at the start and the standard rules you can't pay all the future income in your bids but that's how I like it.
With a fixed income the game feels less tense because you have more the feeling that if you miss some tiles you will get more tiles later.
But I like the game with equal income for all players too, it's not a big change.
In the next 2 Cwali-games the emphesis for the score is more at the end. (Maybe the reactions influenced the games. ;-) )
In the 2-players-game the values of your pawns which score the most points at the end are secret untill the end, so you can get an impression of the eventually scoring pawns by the behaviour of your opponent.
In the 2-5-players-game (a 'wirtschaftspiel') I had a winning 'mastermove' saturday in my last turn with 48,- profit, to end on 83,- (your money is your score at the end). Startmoney is 40,- , it's a game of investing and earning. In theory you can win with less money at the end than at the start (if no-one makes profit).
In Essen on the European championship Netzwerk will be played. I now finally have that game and I wrote here that I could answer questions more precise when I have the game self. I have it with the first sold version of the rules. The sales are blocked last 2 months to replace the rulebooks by new rulebooks. The sales with those rulebooks should start in ca. 1 week again. When I have that rulebook I will place the changes here precise, for who have the first version. Now I have the game I can already say that I like it self very much this way.
Groeten,
Corné
