Worldwide miniature football broadcast gaming

[the french guy]

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

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 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 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" ( ) 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 ?

[Coach Grim]

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.

[artlax]

an amazingly cool idea!

[the french guy]

I'm glad you find the idea interesting

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.

[the french guy]

Last thing for now

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

[eyeteeth]

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.

[the french guy]

Cool idea.

Why automatic kicks?

Automatic or not, no problem 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