So yesterday, when Rockholm revolted, I sat in a sanctuaried room, and all of Magnagora (well, not really, but it certainly felt like it) tried to debate me. I beat every single one of them, and they were good debators too! Daevos, Alger, others whose names I can't remember... Seven or eight of them (I think), some of them twice. I felt so special, being so good at it. My trick? Because they weren't influencing, I thought I'd not attack, since winning wasn't really that good for me, but losing would be terrible, since I was influencing. Even with five or six chanters helping them, I won.

Today, during the massacre that was Estelbar, I decided to try something different, and actually debate others offensively. That's when I found out just why I won so much before. It's impossible. For those who don't know how it works (like I didn't until today), losing on the offence gets worse every time you do. The first time, it doesn't hit so hard. The second time, it's rather bad. The third time, it's about 2.5k to me. The fourth time, it's an instant loss, even with full ego.

Let's look at this data mathematically:
You have a 1/3 chance of winning on offense
You have a 1/3 chance of losing on offense.
Winning three times in a row will win you the debate (thereabouts)
Losing four times NOT in a row will lose you the debate (thereabouts)

Assuming your opponent is randomly changing his defence every time he is debated (which is what I was doing), you have a very, very large chance of losing after 12 attempts, assuming uniform distribution of results. In 15 attempts, you have a 50% or so chance of winning three times in a row. Also in 15 attempts, the probably that you will lose four times is nearly 100%. To look at it another way, in seven attempts, your chance of winning is about 18%, and your chance of losing is about 50%. This all assumes they don't have chanters, in which case you just lose, and it assumes it only takes three consecutive wins to win - it probably takes more like four, which lowers those chances of winning *significantly* to about 15% and 6%.

Offensive debating, as it stands, is silly and worthless. I can influence a denizen while someone is debating me with them having four or more chanters and I zero, and I will still win the debate and the influecning. And I've done it - ask Daevos. This should not be possible.

If this is intentional, then I suppose it's fine - I certainly know how to take advantage of it. However, I think it's really *really* dumb, and does not seem like it is intetional at all.

Oh, and why is this not in "Idiots!"? Because I think that ideas on how to make debating fair would be wonderful. I'm just not in the mood to come up with them myself >_>

I agree. You win far more debates by simply not answering, since their successful attacks do very little (and are easily covered by sipping or chanters), whereas hitting the wrong mindset does a TON of ego damage, usually instantly "killing" you. Not to mention, most people just walk out if you try to debate them, in to say, the safety of an enemy demesne. Hitting the wrong mindset should do less, a successful attack should do more, and fleeing an ego battle should count as a loss.

Fleeing should cause an ego drain, but an outright loss wouldn't be good.

Yeah because wouldn't it be possible to engage someone in an unwanted debate, forcing them to either debate or run and lose?

That's kinda the point of debating.

IS NOT!

I would be thinking more of debating people who are walking through. Especially if the person is invisible.

Person A walks in.

Person B immediately debates.

Person A continues without pause and walks out, but now is ego shattered.

Debating in Lusternia is just like debating on the internet. And debating on the internet is just like the Special Olympics: even if you win, you're still retarded.

hmm. I've only really debated 3 times or so (all against Laysus, I'm 3-0 ) so I don't know the answer to this for sure

uh, nevermind

Just did some testing with Tatine - first failed debate (on the offensive) hit me for 1500, the second about 2000, the third near 2500, and the fourth was an instant kill (I have 3126 ego). These are not failures in a row, but consecutive failures during the course of a single debate. I won plenty of times against her, but because I failed four times, I lost. This is a terrible system. If any of the Gods wish to debate me (assuming You don't have asurd egos...), I can show just how silly the system is. On the offensive, against an intelligent opponent, the offensive debator stands zero chance.

Actually you didnt beat me in Rockholm. Remeber i told them to stop since you're not playing and went to a different room but yeah this is the reason i stopped. Being on the offensive means you're going to lose save for 2 scenarios.

That could be eliminated by causing the insta-loss to only occur if you successfully debated them twice. If you debated them once, and they kept moving, they'd lose just a bit of ego. However, if you ran after them, and debated them once more before the debate "times out" and then they fled, their ego would be shattered.

Thats a pretty bad idea, Tuek, and you should stop advocating it. Change the scenario a bit, if I attacked you twice and you ran, should you die anyway?

Ok, I'm just a lil bit on the confused side as to this since I've only debated a few times, but I'll try to put in my two cents...

From what all of you've said up to this point, it seems that if the design of the system were shifted, to make it so if a defender lost it would have the same effect as if an attacker failed, and vise versa, it would shorten the debates, and would even the odds... Though it would make both sides have horribly harsh odds, and that could probably use a little changing besides...

If that made no sense, then I guess I was more confused than I thought and I appologize

How It Is: The best tactic for verbal combat is not to debate at all, but rather to just sit there sipping bromide and shuffling defenses until the debater inevitably loses to their silent target. This is ridiculous.

How It Should Be: Like other forms of combat, standing there doing nothing should not win the fight.

Solution: You can change mindsets freely outside of a debate. Within a debate, however, you may change your mindset only after making a debate attempt, and then only one time, until you make another debate attempt, after which you would be able to change it once again. Normal rules for having balance/equilibrium in order to change mindsets apply.

Here, if you debate someone who doesn't respond, you now know their mindset and can simply debate against their weakness until they finally respond or lose. Offense becomes favored, just like getting the drop on someone with an attack, because if they are slow on their response, you will be able to debate them a second time knowing their mindset before they recover and can change it. If they keep their wits about them and either move out of the room or jump right in to the debate, there will be neither advantage nor disadvantage to either side.

Yes, yes, if you lag during a debate, you might very well lose it, but that's not different from physical combat, either.

Please, post your thoughts! If good ideas come out of this thread, hopefully we can get this fixed.

I've been thinking about this... ever debate a person who refuses to acknlowedge your even in an argument?

Yes. Do you feel that they win that argument by doing so?

I don't but everyone else in the room seeing me get all flustered at thier blank stare and smug face thinks so.