Worldwide miniature football broadcast gaming
 

Hi,

According to this topic :

http://www.miniaturefootball.com/for...ad.php?t=19233

I thought about a weird idea : playing miniature football worldwide, thru the internet :D

I explain : you all know these new websites of tv broadcast : veetle, ustream, etc...SOme of the members here already use it (Reginald Rutledge, for example). You know how it works : you have direct live video of the broadcaster. You have also a chatting room, when you can chat with him like on gmail chat, msn messenger and stuff like that.

ANother thing wich has been discussed on the solitaire forum : "play by mail" gaming. Like "proxy racing" in slot car world, for example.

Last thing, video camera angles : you certainly remember the discuss about the upside point of view, wich is (in my opinion) the best way to broadcast miniature football, and all other tabletop games.


With all these things in my head :D I thought about a new concept, taking togeter all these aspects in one new way to play miniature football : world wide direct live play by video miniature football.

I explained the way it could work in the solitaire topic, but here's another explanation :

You need 3 mfca members at least. 2 players/coaches, and 1 game operator.

Each coach has to prepare a team. Let's say a ironman 11+1 (if you use stationnary qb and/or safety) squad. Painted, trained, with tweaked bases. Each team is same weight.

As we spoke in the solitaire topic, why not making two weight limits : one for linemen and one for skills players. Why ? To add a little spice in the thing, simply as that. I'll explain more later.

the game operator needs a board :D His board, his rules. The only thing he has to tell is the gameboard size, surface, and gives us a short summary of his ruleset (or complete ruleset) so we can follow the action easier.


Each coach has to prepare a special "live playbook". Let's say (for the example), 10 offenses and 10 defenses formations. For that he will use a graphic set I'll share on MFCA.org (very simple, I'll make a tutorial also). See the example attached pic. Each formation is detailed with a scheme.

The coach has to add (with a pencil, for example) each matching figure's number on it, and name each formation with a secret name ("offense 1", "chuck norris power", "red flag dragon 32" or whatever).

IMPORTANT : He should choose at least 2 or 3 names for each formation to keep it secret. Not too much to make the game operator job easier.


***If coaches want to play fake kicks (FG, extra point, punt) they should add a page on their playbook using secret passwords for each situation, for example too. (part of the system wich has to be develloped later)

For pivots, depanding the ruleset, we can use a simple pivot ruler (graduated from left and right, 30° each segment).



Now, how it works ?

The 2 coaches send their squad + live playbook to the game operator.

The game operator (=commissioner, referee, tv broadcaster, tv presentator, and stadium owner) check for weight, and "legal" aspects of the squads and playbooks. Of course, the game operator will not share the live playbooks to other coaches.

the 3 guys agree on a date and hour they can play the game. Concerning timing, the 3 MFers should choose fast solutions : 2x25, or 2x30 minutes no clock stop 1 timeout, stuff like that.


Gameday : the game operator will start broadcasting the game 1 half hour before the start of the game, to check everything. He will use a upside camera angle, with a very good lighting (neon or fluorecent cold is the best) on it. He will check for sound, video quality, timers, etc...

Then, the game operator will operate the game. He will no interact in any way in the game choices.

For passing play, it's certainly better to use passing sticks (for pivtos, we can use the same pivto ruler on the attached picture, or -better- decide that the ball marker will be positioned in straight front of the intended receiver), so the game operator can't be involved (intentionaly or not) in passing success. But real throwing can be used to if the 3 coaches agree.

Kicks are automatic (until the coach choose to play another formation), punts also (20yard line). Once again, if the 3 coaches want to play diferent, why not !


How do the coaches interact in the game ?

Like a real coach, seeing the game. Or, even better matching, like a coordinator (offense and defense), watching the game in his room in the top of the stadium, seeing tiny people from top view and giving orders in his motorolla headset.

In the miniature football version, simply replace the coordinator room by a internet (veetle, ustream, etc...) video window, and replace the motorolla headset with the embedded chat room (we can also imagine a direct like microphone skype audio conference too).

Gaming situation example (using a typical "offense set first then defense set then pivots" style)

Dimitri is niners coach, Scott is cowboys coach. Reginald is the game operator.

Dimitri wins the (real made by Reginald !) coin toss, and choose to start offense

First and 10, on Niners 20yards. Dimitri calls (with microphone if it's possible, or chat room of the video website) "zulu power 21 red hat" (:D ) wich is a I formation with FB run (don't matter really, it just for the example)

Reginald, as the game operator, check the formation in dimitri live playbook, and put the figures exactly the way they are on the playbook on his gameboard.

Dimitri calls "set".

Scott calls (same technic, using microphone/headset or chatroom, or any chat application) "iron wall 4" (4-3 defense).

Reginald, as the game operator, check the formation in scott live playbook, and put the figures on the field.

Then pivots/audible phase (as I said, all depands the ruleset). Dimitri calls 2 pivots, #23 on 30°left, and #86 on °60right, then set.

Reginald, using the pivot ruler, make the pivots (keep the base back in place, pivto the front of base).

Scott decide to not do any pivots, and calls set.


At this stage, the 2 coaches are real football coaches. They have to guess the opponent strategy. They are ACTUALLY PLAYING MINIATURE FOOTBALL from NY, Texas and France !!!

Now, the game starts, like any miniature football game, depanding the ruleset. MF is like chess, you barely don't need any real board to play it. Strategy game.

Reginald turns on and off the board, and he's the referee and the game operator. We can't argue with him, and we have to respect him as an official.

Reginald is also the commentator of the game. He explains the game situation, give informations on score, down numbers, etc...




For more realism and accuracy, we can also imagine another way to give teams orders than using the ustream/veetle or whatever chatting room : we can use ICQ, MSN, etc..any chatting protocol software allowing multi sessions. With MSN for example, you can have two tabs or windows opened, and speak to multiple persons separatly and privatly.

So the game operator can receive the coaches formations orders and the other coach will not know even the name of it. Just have to open 2 chatting windows on his computer desk.

So if Dimitri (to return to example) calls any formation, Scott will just see the result on the board, and will not know anything else.

Dimitri can also choose to tell it on the public chat room, (for example, calling a "snake run 14", wich is a passing play, even if the name seems to indicate it's a running play) to fool the other coach, and try to impress him (=confident enough to call the games in public).


Plenty of ideas, and things to tweak and beta-test...But I believe it can be a great way of playing. No frontiers anymore. International schedule, and maybe tournaments and league. Etc, etc...



NOW...Do you see the potential of that system ?

I think this is an awesome idea. I would love to be able to basically play games from the house. Im in the DFW league but sometimes depending on another coaches schedule i might have to wait a couple weeks to play, this idea would satisfy the EF appetite in between games. Don't know how he feels about it but Reggie's setup would be perfect for this. I for one would love to participate.ltsplbll

What...
 

an amazingly cool idea!

thmbsp$ thmbsp$
ppls$ ppls$ ppls$

organization
 

I'm glad you find the idea interesting thmbsp$

the biggest difficulty will be organization. Sedning teams, finding game operators, etc...

I believe some system rules (not speaking of the game itself) will be necessary, things like to engage a team, you have to accept to be game operator at least 1 time each time your team is playing, that sort of thing.

Here's a little scheme of possible organization. the key is to never make games between a game operator and the coaches games he managed (to preserve the secret of playbooks). BUT, a coach can operate a 2nd game and manage a team of a guy he played BEFORE. The idea is to keep the sport interest in all that, and keep it sane and fair.

Of course, we can imagine rows, when the teams can obtain new athletes, or new playbooks (or at least, new formations names). Playbooks are easier to share than teams, because we can send pdf files of it.


edit : Last thing, for people who don't know upside view, I saw a picture on mgallery wich perfectly illustrate that idea. See the 2d attached pic. The game situation is crystal clear to understand. Just imgine than on the video, the point of view will be wider to include the entire gamefield. Now with wide screen and fast internet, we can imagine the coaches using fullscreen 16/10 (or 16/9) view on the field, on their computer.

Last thing for now :D

a little scheme to explain how the game could be view from the engaged coach point of view.

Upside camera angle, with complete field
messenger window, to call the formations

all on a wide screen computer

Cool idea.

Why automatic kicks?

There was a kicking system RavannaAl wrote about in one of the early Tweaks using dice that I've been using, and then adapted a version for punting. It's worked fairly well still tweaking a few parts to my liking.

Automatic or not, no problem thmbsp$ I spoke about automatic kicks to speed up the game.

With that system, I believe speed and timing is crucial. It's a kind of "passive" way of playing, so you need to keep it fast, in my opinion.

BUT as I said, if both 3 involved members (coaches and operator) agree for use that or that rule, why not ! Freedom thmbsp$

Aren't there are also the kicking cards that I think Chris LeMay developed way back when?

I swore I had a deck of those lying around, but can't remember where I put them.

Memory ... the second thing to go.

The first?

I don't remember.

Ed wnnrcgr shkthbx:

:rtfl:

More seriously, as I said, rulesets does not matter since the 3 members agree on it. Automatic kick, tdk, ttqb, cards, dices, or whatever.

new idea
 

I post it before I forget it :D

I was thinking of uniforms. I believe, since the best way is to play iron squad (at least to begin the system and see how it's working), the risk is to have teams with same (more or less) colors. Since we play on video, we NEED a method to easily see the 2 teams.

So I thought about a really easy way. Painting the plateform (grass or plain plastic) with diferent colors.

We just have to create a color chart (see example attached file) and each team engaged will have to paint the plateform to the color they depand.

With that, the game will be easy to follow on the video, if the light is good enough.

The major advantage of that technic : you can play any team you want. You can invent it, use college, pro, european, japanese, etc... we'll be able to see 4 teams of Niners, 2 teams of steelers, etc, etc... No problem of color, away or home usual stuff.

idea of the day
 

Before I 'll go to work, I was reading the last topics on mfca united rules...Perhaps we should stick to these rules in that new system. So every game, everyone will understand what is going on the field. And, perhaps later, these particular games will allow us to be endorsed on a mfca world ranking, allowing members from europe, australia, USA, or anywhere (soldiers or travelling working people) to be part of it, and not only people in one location and/or can afford (on the other topic, I readed about almost 300bucks for 1 tournament game :eek: huge even if I suppose it includes travel cost, hotel , food, etc... :eek: ) tournament tourneys travels.

For now, I see 3 mfca members + one non-member interested coaches. No offense (really), but for now I want to keep it (even if non mfca members can of course freely use these ideas for their own purposes) MFCA members only.

Why ? Because of the nature of this particular system, based on confidence : sending teams, neutrality of the game operator, etc...

We also can imagine, in the future, official MFCA game operators, endorsed for their broadcast quality, referee quality, and honorable neutrality in the game organization.


So, here's the plan for next step :

1. this week end (tommorow afternoon), I'll build a computer system (camera, light, sound, etc...) in my game room, and make the first testings.
   
2. I will also create graphic templates and easy to understand tutorial to build your own graphic live playbook.
   
3. I will also work on a system ruleset (not speaking of the game itself, but how to organize it).

Then, MFCA coaches who wants will be able to sign up for beta testing. Then, I'll build a team. THen, we 'll try and see if it works.

MFCA coaches can already tell me if they want to try, so I will not use all my spare time for something useless. thmbsp$


edit : we also can imagine two types of game :

friendly game : People will be able to play against another one without a third game operator. So each one will know the playbook of the other one, but, as the title shows, it's friendly :D . For the simple joy of scrimmaging with a friend.

The good thing is, if you're game operator on an official game, you 'll be able (since you'll have 2 "foreign" teams at home, and already know their playbooks) to play "unofficial" with them just for fun, to compare your own regular league teams or solitaire teams, for example.


league/tournament/official or whatever game : normal system (2 coaches +game operator).

So finally...Idea abandonned ? :rtfl: (I don't see any new answer)

Too bad. I thought it was a clever one, this time :D

bump
 

another chance for that concept :D

Let's simplify it, and allow 1vs1 gaming, friendship and confidence based.

Basically, it's very simple : a computer, a decent speed broadband internet access, a decent webcam (640x480 webcam cost around 30usd these days), a stand for it (custom build for upside view, costs nothing but a little work and bits of wood, plastic or metal), a microphone an a good bright light.

As usual when I propose things, I'll explain it and make tutorials on each aspect of the concept. No way a sort of elite kind of thing for computer freaks. I'll even explain how to build a solid tray to send your figures securely :D

To allow simple 1vs1 gaming, let's do one away playbook, one home playbook. Your home playbook will still secret. Your away playbook will be sent to other coaches you'll compete against on their home field. For fair play, that away playbook should not be revealed to other coaches (using "codenames" as I spoke about).

The games does not have to be public, we can broadcast it on private channels also.

i'll make a tutorial and give graphics kits to create your playbooks if needed.

26man roosters. 22 starting players (11o +11d) + 4 bench players clearly identified as "option players".


Pro teams play, real league with man to man confrontation, and competitive action, BUT with solitaire parts of gameplay, and spirit : fair, confidence, honor and fun. If you want to argue about each yard gain or tackle, it's not the league for you.


We can imagine a mini league in 2011, if we can join 4 or 5 coaches including me. Why not an UFL league, using the same rules and season format. Or fantasy teams, to represent your regional aera since it will be an international league. Everything is possible.


Simple league rolling : imagine 4 coaches engaged in the league.

example :
First "week" (week does not mean a real week, but just a way to count the "turns" in the league), French guy is the home field.

The 3 other coaches send him their teams and away playbooks. Dimitri will not share these playbooks with other engaged coaches.

With a common schedule, he operates and plays the 3 games at home, against each coach.

Once it's done, he sends a parcel with the 4 league coaches teams in it to the 2nd coach home stadium. He send his own away playbook to him.

That 2dn coach plays the 3 games the same way. Then, he sends to the 3rd coach. etc, etc...

At the end of the season, a championship game is played versus 1 and 2 of the league. New playbooks, maybe a "operator + 2 finalists" "super broadcast game"

I kinda like this idea. Very cool; interested in seeing how this may work out.

let's find 2 other coaches, and I 'll start to work on that thing. thmbsp$

great start to a great idea
 

with guys like you constantly innovating the hobby with continue to grow and expand. There are no limits in the end, and french guy just proved that. Imagine some of these ideas combined with some of the things discussed in the tweek future issue, combined with the miniature professional football rules concept.

I'm excited.

thanks !

I believe MF has a really big improvement curve for the future. On the modelling side of course, but also on the way it can be played. Even if it will certainly not please all the guys around !