Official Ladder Houserules

The intention is to keep the rules short and simple. Most of the experienced players know most of them already. But there are a lot of new players and they should be able to understand the rules very quickly. Also, our house rules should prevent discussions and skirmishes between players. The most important thing is to create a group of friendly, fair and active Aow-players, who enjoy this great game. Perhaps the rules will support this goal.

Settings rules:
Map settings should be made known to all players (map size, indies, cities, surrender off etc)
Players should decide which settings are used, not the host alone
Ladder games can be either FFA games, team games or free diplomacy games.
FFA (free for all > no peace, no alliances, no spell trading) is the usual choice.
Team games (alliances and spell trading is allowed, see rules for team games)
Free diplomacy games – we haven’t been able to formulate any rules for them yet, but haven’t seen any ladder free diplomacy games either!

Turn time limit normally 2 min, or 3 min if people agree on it.
Tactical Combat only between human players and auto combat only against computer[1]
Custom pictures should be kept under 50k in size, bigger custom pictures may create lag, especially at start-up and with high pings. Players can decide whether they want to allow custom pictures or not.
The ladder names of the players should be announced before the game starts, and players must use their BF names inside the game.
As standard, there is no 15 sec. rule, unless the players decide they want it[ii].

Starting rules:
A valid reason for restart is domain overlap between players, but try to discover this as soon as possible, not on turn 15![iii] Problems that are NOT valid reasons for restart includes bad start positions, loss of heroes, invasion of indies etc.
Slow internet connections (lag) kills the game, players should try to quickly reach an agreement about a new start or looking for a better host
Honourable players wish their opponents all the best for the game, it’s almost unworthy to mention it but some people forget about it
Before you start a ladder game, make sure you actually have time to finish it (often more than 3 hours in big games). If people don’t have time to finish a ladder game, the players must agree on a date and time to continue it, see the continue rules.

Battle rules: (these rules apply to tactical combat, not on the overland map)

Fliers on structures:
Fliers are NOT allowed on structures (trees, houses, rocks), but they are allowed on walls. This applies whether double gravity has been cast or not.
Fliers are allowed to pass structures (and walls), whether double gravity has been cast or not.

Running away in battle:
As a general rule, when a battle starts, units should stay and fight and not try to run away for 26 turns (exception: ground units against fliers; fliers may avoid melee combat if they want to). The rule here is a compromise: Level 0, level 1 and level 2 units are NOT allowed to run for 26 turns (EVEN if they are the only defenders of your capital), but must stay and fight; Wizards, heroes and level 3 and level 4 units ARE allowed to try to avoid combat by running for 26 turns. Follow link for more explanation.

These two rules are major changes, and comments regarding them from players are welcome.

Rules for restarting games if a player drops:
If the game is reloaded from the latest autosave (because a player drops during tactical combat, for instance), all players are required to make the same moves on the overland map as they did before the player dropped/the save was made. This also means, that if player A managed to catch player B's lone hero away from the army, or capture an unprotected town, wiz tower etc., player B will have to let him do it again. When the same tactical battles are repeated, however, players are NOT required to make the same moves within the tactical battle.

If a player disappears from the game (game crashed, lost connection), the players should give him the chance to reboot. Therefore, wait 10 min, after that continue without the player and replace him with AI. The missing player will be ranked last amongst those remaining in the game.[iv]

Continue rules:
A Ladder game which isn’t ended the same day it was started should be continued by fixing a date where all players are able to appear. The next session should be planned before ending the first act of playing. The deadline for continuing an unfinished ladder game should be 2 weeks later. After that time period, the council will find the winner of the game by checking the save game (3 veterans will find the ranks). Requirement: One player has to go to the council.

If a player doesn’t appear for the continue game, he will get the last rank of all the players who are left in the game, and will be replaced by AI. (Example: Player A, B and C play a ladder game, A died during the first part of the game, but B and C don’t finish the game and set a time to continue it. B doesn’t show up for the continue, so C wins the game, B is 2nd and A is 3rd).

Reporting games:
The winner reports the game as accurately as possible (right races of enemies etc.)
The save game must also be submitted along with the report (exception: 28/56k modems)
If a player leaves the game without a valid reason, he should be reported as a quitter[v].

Rules for team games:

Players vote whether to use fixed teams or teams by first met (or other criteria, for instance geographical position in the game)
Spell trading and other trading possibilities between allies are allowed as standard
If a team mate left the game for unknown reasons the players may decide whether to use a human substitute player (a sub), or setting the missing player as CPU. In deciding this, all players should show fairness and good sportsmanship.
In team games, 2 players who become allied (meet and can ally in the diplomacy screen) are not allowed to attack or defend together against players who are not yet allied. Therefore, the players must announce when they have actually met and are allied. Don’t abuse this situation - fairness and good sportsmanship is needed.

If one person in the team dies and the other still wants to continue against two allied players, they are allowed to attack and defend against him together.

Conflicts and disagreements:

If people have conflicts or disagreements in a game that they cannot solve themselves, complaints can be made to the ladder council.
If you played a game that was reported wrongly, it is possible to delete it on the ladder site, but don’t do this unless you have a really good reason. Most conflicts can be avoided if people are fair and friendly and try to see the other person’s point of view!

Codex: Try to avoid lame and infamous tactics! Be fair and tolerant in game and give your opponent a true chance. Don’t be a fool!

These rules are standard rules for use in ladder games. If people agree on a different set of rules, they can use those, of course, but if they don’t, these ladder rules apply as standard.

Game bugs and exploits that are forbidden:

The hall of enchantment bug
Catalyst bug: When you pick up a catalyst, you can use it for research or to boost the amount of casting points you get in a single turn. However, it is also possible to use these extra casting points for more than 1 turn, if you're either summoning a unit, which requires more mana for casting than you have available in one turn, or casting a spell, which costs more than what's available in one turn. Say you normally have 50 cps, and the catalyst added another 50 cps, giving you 100 cps total. This could be used to cast 10 stonings in a battle, but with the catalyst BUG, it can be used for casting a mastery spell
at 100 cps/turn for an UNLIMITED number of turns, or for summoning a black angel, again with 100 cps/turn. Further, if you do not cast the spell when it's ready, but wait until one turn after, you will still have 100 cps left for the next spell/summon and so on. It should be easy to see from this why the catalyst bug is a serious exploit, and why it's outlawed in the BF ladder rules.
So - the use of the catalyst bug to get more than your natural casting points for more than 1 turn is outlawed, whether you use it for summons or costly
global spells.

Wall hex bug - http://aow.heavengames.com/cgi-bin/forums/display.cgi?action=ct&f=31,4522,,all
Using the edges of the combat map to defend: Units in the combat screen should stay at least one hex away from the edges of the combat map; it is not
allowed to use the edges of the combat map for 'defense'.

Current members of the ladder council:
Markymark
Napoleon
Blackcat
Lord Kolusar
Tirasleen
Kraka-Tur
Lord-Ishandral
Frall
Gandalf_DK

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[i] Exception: People can agree to play ladder games where tactical combat is allowed against indies.
If a player exits (in agreement with the other players) and is taken over by AI, people may decide to allow tactical combat against the AI that took over the player.

[ii] 15 sec. rule: People must wait until 15 seconds of a turn has passed before they are allowed to attack a capital. The 15 sec. rule can apply to attacks on capitals only, or to all attacks, as the players agree. The reason for using this rule is that people with fast computers and fast connections are usually able to move faster at the beginning of a tun than those with a slow computer/connection, and this can be unfair.

[iii] As standard, if overlap is discovered within the first 3 rounds, it’s always a valid reason for restart, but if it’s discovered later, players must agree to accept a restart.

[iv] Players can also choose to continue the game at a later date, to give the missing player a chance to rejoin, or to wait a little longer.

[v] It really spoils games if people quit them, so please don’t do that. Most quittings in games are because people are unhappy about losing, so try to accept both wins and losses!

More about the battle rules:
The 'no running away' rule is made to avoid people running for 26 turns with fast, low level units to avoid combat and force a draw. This rule doesn't mean that you can't move level 0, 1 and 2 units in a battle, of course you can, but they are not allowed to run away for 26 turns to force a draw. The situation with fliers is different, because if they are attacked by ground units, who don't have ranged attack or entangle/strangle/web or taunt, then the ground units can't hurt the flier unless the flier attacks them, which is doesn't have to. On the other hand, if a level 1 or level 2 flier (for instance a zephyr bird or a goblin wyvern) is attacked by a ground unit with strangle or entangle (a pit guard or an abomination etc.), then the flier is NOT allowed to run for 26 turns, since this kind of ground units IS actually able to attack it.

Unit levels, using elves as example:
Level 0: Glade runner (any town can build it)
Level 1: Archer, swordsman (requires barracks)
Level 2: Nymph, scout (requires war hall)
Level 3: Iron maiden, druid, treeman (requires champion's guild or special race building)
Level 4: Fairy dragon (requires champion's guild, master's guild and sanctuary)

[This message has been edited by swolte (edited 01-14-2006 @ 11:28 PM).]