July 2005

Introduction

Hello, and welcome to July! Where has the year gone? This month we have some great things to offer you, including Trax strategy by our resident expert dgb, Tessa's Twisters, GoldToken Olympic Update, and Red Arrow's joke contest among others!

We'd also like to announce the creation of a new account. GoldToken Support is an account that will be jointly shared by all members of management. The beauty of this is that you can send your problems to this account directly, and whichever member of management happens to be online will be able to address your concerns. This benefits the members because your problems will be addressed faster. Each one of us in management, upon signing into the site will then sign into the GoldToken Support account and be able to start working on your problems right away. No more worries about sending to one member of management when another came online first, or sending the same message to each management member hoping to get whichever one is on first. We hope you begin to use this account right away to jump right into getting your problems taken care of faster! We here at Goldtoken are always working on ways to improve your experience!

Kran




In this month's newsletter, we have:

  • Site News
  • Badger's Monthly Message
  • Kran's Tournament News
  • Tessa Twisters
  • Games Corner
  • Jesters ~n~ Jokers
  • D-CON's Bug Report
  • GoldToken Olympic Update
  • Newsletter Picture Hunt
  • Testamonial Of The Month



Site News

-- ROSE would like to wish a verrrry Happy Birthday to vanilla62 on July 2nd!
-- I BlueJeans, would like to wish my wonderful, caring husband NASCAR a Happy Birthday on July 13th!
-- I, Sara, wanted to wish my mom DrPepper a very Happy Birthday on July 17th!
-- ROSE would like to wish a verrrry Happy Birthday to Good Charlotte on July 18th!
-- Happy birthday to buttercups on July 27th!
-- Happy birthday wishes to Hoosierenvy on July 21st!
-- Happy birthday to Tessa on July 25th!


any birthdays, anniversaries, etc. coming up for next month, feel free to send Red Arrow a message and let her know so that we can give them a shout in next month's newsletter! Smiling

Monthly Message from Badger

Being a chess player, I am thrilled Mark007 introduced Metamorphosis Chess to GoldToken this past week. There is a GoldToken Coffee Mug waiting for the first player who can make ladder rung 5 in this game!!! Be sure to try it out and send your Thank You's to Mark007 for another great game (he likes chocolate too if you wish to take up a collection)!! I wonder what he has up his sleeve for July??!!?
We are pleased to announce the arrival of GoldToken Duffle Bags, and GoldToken Kan Koolers, many of which are offered in the latest round of tournaments.   The coolest part is, one of these exciting gifts will be your's for going or renewing Platinum for a year this month!!



A special Thank You goes to Kran for posting pictures of our cool items available for the [ GoldToken Wiki Store ].  And a Thank You also goes to the many contributers and editors helping to update of the rest of our [ Info ] pages.  Note: The player who can find the most typos and wording errors in the Info pages will WIN one of our new GoldToken Duffle Bags.  Contest winner will be announced in next months news.



The 2004 GoldToken Olympics are starting to wind down.  So be sure to read below for a special Olympic update written by our own Aphrodite, a very dedicated player who has spent hours upon hours helping out with this GoldToken special.   Stay tuned to the Tournaments DB and the GoldToken Monthly News to catch the outcome of the final games!!



We have a cool contest for the best Platinum Players Profile this month, with a GoldToken Kan Kooler going to the winner.  The entrants are:

So be sure to check out their profiles before voting in the poll Sunday, July 17th.  



--Badger








Tournament News by Kran





  • Check out our great combo tourneys.  In these tourneys, you will need to join more than one game type, and the highest average placer will win the prize!  In this case the prizes are great!  Duffle Bags, Koozies, Mugs, you won't want to miss these!




  • Goldtoken would also like to take the time to send a big congratulations out to all June Tournament winners!!! If your name is on this list, send Badger your mailing address and a link to the tournament for your prize!

2nd Mid August Backgammon- jamchug

Blackhole Four In a Row- grade1teacher

Checkers 2004- dama1

December Blackhole Reversi- Smaughster

December Fast Back- Manpower

December Giveaway Chess- rabbitoid

December Guest Go Moku- Rehnstedt

December Outbreak Attaxx- Gnahaha

December Quicksand- N_a_z

December Small Outbreak- Gnahaha

Double Trouble June 2004- MORRIS

February Giveaway Checkers- bubba duboise

February Zero G 4iar- Carter

January Fast Back- Tlingit

January Reversi- Cayey

Knights Vs. Bishops Chess- Birds of Prey

Late August Backgammon- Aphrodite

Los Alamos Chess- dama1

March Blackhole Reversi- Cayey

March Giveaway Checkers- bubba duboise

March Small Chess- AndrewB

March Trax- dgb

March Zero B 4iar- Carter

Mid August 4iar- N_a_z

Mid August Backgammon- Nukhulls

Mid August Chessgi- rabbitoid

Mid July Backgammon- Mike UK

Muggers Middle Men- nasher

October Quicksand 4iar- keops

Seans Backgammon Tournament- Ozzy

Septembers Giveaway 4iar- Mike UK

Septembers Nackgammon- nasher

Septembers Stealth Salvo- Knight Rider


















Tessa's Twisters




Hi everyone,

It's that time again!  If you are the first player to answer this riddle, Badger has a GT keychain pen for you! So what are you waiting for? Hurry on over to the poetry board!

See you there!

Tessa,



She use to be 2sweet2beat 

But that was long ago, 

But this is a famous name 

One that you should know! 



You may have heard an Eagle scream 

And a Freight Train too, 

Now she has a simple name 

And lots of work to do! 



I know this is an easy one 

So I will end this quiz, 

A GT pen to the first to post 

Who this person is! 



Please post your answers on the  DB. 






Games Corner by dgb


This month's feature: Trax




Greetings fellow Trax fans. I have been asked to provide a few insights into Trax, and Trax strategy.



One of the most common questions I am asked by players new to Trax is, "what should I be doing?" This is because Trax is unlike most other games you are likely to have played. The rules may be straight forward, but they don't actually tell you how to play.



The first thing to get used to is the forced play rule. Many people are at first confused by several tiles being played in a turn. In fact I have been asked on several occasions, "how did you get to play 2 turns?" Rest assured, you only get 1 turn, and for that turn you only get to choose (or more precisely, specify) 1 tile. The other tiles are forced, as a consequence of the tile that was played. Although the rules clearly describe how the forced tiles are played (you get no choice after you play the first tile) it usually takes at least 5 or 6 games to really come to terms with forced plays, and longer to really make use of them.



One of the first keys to playing Trax well is to think of all the tiles played in a turn as a unit, as a single more, rather than as a primary tile and forced tiles. The primary tile is just the tile you need to play to cause that whole unit to be played. While this may seem like semantics, it is important because until you reach that stage you will be restricted to playing a move in the current position only, and not begin to plan ahead. Having said that, there are a few tricks to help you visualise how the forced tiles work. 



First of all, on Gold Token you can actually check your move (including forced plays) before you actually submit it. This feature can be useful, particularly while you are learning forced plays, or if you are lazy. However if you are going to play well, it is important to learn to predict what forced plays are going to be made. 



Secondly, forced plays generally follow a pattern sometimes called the "ripple effect". A long string of forced plays can occur along an edge when the black and white paths alternate. This is described in more detail in an On Trax article: http://www.traxgame.com/community_ontrax.php?issue=4&article=ttforce so I will not go into any more detail here. In 2-sided hollows, forced plays are more complicated, and in 3-sided caves, even I have trouble visualising what happens all of the time.



So what is the importance of forced plays for Trax? Well without them Trax doesn't actually work as a game - it is too easy to create positions where tiles cannot be played (with 3 lines of the same colour entering a space). Forced plays are also the reason why a half loop is an attack - because a half loop can be closed in a single turn. Strategically though (or more technically, tactically) forced plays allow you to use your turn to do more than one thing at a time.



For example, in defending an attack, you do not necessarily have to play the primary tile to defend the attack. If forced plays allow, you can sometimes play the primary tile some distance from the attack, and allow the forced tiles to do the defending for you. With the primary tile you can work at extending your line, or make a counter-attack for yourself, or defend another threat your opponent has. In fact, one of the most common ways to win in Trax is to make 2 independent attacks in the same turn (using an L threat). If you are using your moves to do 2 or even 3 things at once, and your opponent is only doing 1 thing with their move, it doesn't take long for you to get an advantage.



Okay, that's forced plays, but I haven't really addressed the question of what should you be doing when you get your turn. Playing tiles randomly might work against someone who has never played before, but it won't win you any tournaments! The objective of the game is to make a loop or a line of your colour. So obviously the first thing to try is to make a loop since that is easier than a line. Unfortunately, as a strategy, this does not work very well. As soon as you make a loop attack (a half loop) your opponent can defend, and you are back to square one. All you have done is force your opponent to play in a particular place on the playing area (to defend your attack). Actually, most of the time you are worse off after your opponent defends.



To see why this is so, let us carefully consider what happens in making and defending an attack. I will work from the premise that being able to make a loop is a good thing, since that is what we are trying to do! You can consider the section of track before you attack to be a potential loop (that is why you considered making the attack). Such sections of track (they may consist of more than one tile!) are called corners and connectable pairs (see http://www.traxgame.com/about_strategy.php). They are good. When you make an attack you are using one of your corners, so your potential is reduced. You force your opponent to defend, and in many cases they can defend in such a way that you are unable to reform the attack later - you lose your corner. When they defend, often they can also do it in a way that increases their potential. So by making such an attack, you are actually weakening your own position, and forcing your opponent to strengthen their position. You lose potential, and they gain potential.



Therefore, counting corners (or potential attacks) is one way of estimating the value or strength of a position. The player with the most corners is usually in the better position. This is a little like counting pieces in checkers or a weighted count of pieces in chess. In Trax, it is the ability to attack that is important, not the actual attacking (unless of course, you can force a win!) There are a couple of reasons for this. First, threats (such as Ls, edges, and more complex multi-stage threats) consist of one or more corners placed in the right configuration. If you have lots of corners, this can restrict what your opponent can play because they may give you threats. Second, being able to attack is essential if you get into the unfortunate position where your opponent has multiple threats. Third, the presence of your corners may actually make some of your opponent’s threats less useful, because if you can make a counter-attack at a critical stage while they are using a multiple stage threat, you can wrest the initiative off them and then defend the threat.



While corner counting is important, it is not the only consideration. Not all corners are equal; some corners are more valuable than others. An L threat only requires 2 corners, and some threats only require a single corner. If you only have 2 corners in an L threat, it doesn't matter if your opponent has a dozen - if it is your turn you can win. Corner counting therefore only provides a first estimation of strength of a position. Other, more complex factors are also important (maybe the topic for a future column!)



So in answer to the original question, "what should I be doing?" in the absence of anything obvious (such as closing off a loop for yourself, or defending your opponent's attack, or threat) you should look at increasing your potential relative to your opponent. This usually means creating corners or setting up potential attacks for yourself (not actually making the attacks), or destroying your opponent’s corners. Often you can do both in a single turn. You need to be careful though that in so doing you do not actually create threats for your opponent, but that is another story...



Happy Traxing!

Donald Bailey










Jesters ~n~ Jokers by Red Arrow




Another new addition

To our monthly news,

It's called "Jesters ~n~ Jokers"

Cause a good laugh we could all use!





Do you have a joke thats funny?

Well let's put it to the test!

You'll get a GoldToken Coffee Mug,

If your jokes voted the best!



And if you are a runner up

You'll win something too!

A Black GoldToken Bic style pen

Will be on it's way to you!



And Before I say goodbye

I have one more thing to rhyme,

Your joke can't be on the joke db

We must be seeing if for the first time!





Entries to be sent to Red Arrow, by the 25th of the month

Look for the winners & runners up at the GoldToken Group site - http://groups.msn.com/Goldtoken-com/messages.msnw








Bug Report by The Old D-CON Account




I would like to report that the multi-nickname cleanup is getting better with time. There is a group of us working around the clock putting in many hours daily trying to make the site better for all. We do appreciate all the hard work this group has been doing.



I suggest you take a few minutes to read the Acceptable Use Policy as it has been updated and this policy is what we go by when making our decisions. We hope that our work has made your game playing more enjoyable. Happy 4th of July!



The Old D-CON Account










GoldToken Olympic Update




Our GoldToken Olympic games started in August of last year. With clubs entering from all over the world.



We knew the games would take a long time, as there were 31 game types at that time, all of which were entered into the Olympics. Some clubs entering 6 player teams in each game type.



The games are now reaching an exciting stage. With 14 games completed and 12 final rounds in progress.



The 3 top clubs currently stand at:


  • Europe 81.5

  • United Kingdom 73.5 points

  • North American Southwest coast 37.5 points



The 3 top players with most points currently stand at:



The games have been carried out in the true spirit of the Olympic ideal. Baron de Coubertin would have been very pleased with all our efforts.



The Olympic Tournament was a massive undertaking for the site. { Plsyer: Badger } and Kran must be complemented for their organization, guiding influence and neutrality.



We all wait with baited breath for the final medal table to be announced.



Anna 

Aphrodite








Newsletter Picture Hunt




June Wedding Logo winners were:

1) Honeybear (yes, she really is having to hide her GoldToken Coffee Mug from Goodtime politics lol)

2) tobalea

3) pepperbeach

4) RabidWolff of the Wolf Pack

5) Silkwood

6) Aphrodite  



This months treasure hunt is July holidays/vacations. Be among the first ten players to find all 12 GoldToken Holiday/Vacation Logos, each containing the Goldtoken Horse.  



The first treasure hunt player to find all 12 wins a Black GoldToken Kan Kooler!! The next nine players to correctly find the 12 logos will win one of the new GoldToken Squiggly Pens!!



Everyone can play! Guests included! Once you have found all 12, message Badger and the first 10 correct will win a prize! Good luck!!










The Locker-n-Rocker Room




Hi Everybody!

The Locker Room Crew invites you all to check { Board: The Locker-n-Rocker Room } Game Board. Trivia for Sports and Music Lovers! July is going to be an exciting month! The Crew has broken their piggy banks and pooled their pennies together to ADOPT A GUEST! Badger will open up the { Board: The Locker-n-Rocker Room }Game Board to all guests for the month of July and the guest that has the most points at the end of the month will win a SIX MONTH SILVER MEMBERSHIP!

You will be able to post for the first week in July and for the remainder of the month you will not be able to post, but you will be able to read the board. All answers are PMed to Locker Room Crew so you can play even if you can't post on the Game Board. 

Each month the player with the highest score receives a GOLDTOKEN MUG! And in August we will be having our Playoffs and the winner will receive a GOLDTOKEN DUFFLE BAG!

So what are you waiting for! Come join the fun! We look forward to seeing you there!



Locker Room Crew






Testamonials Of The Month




I love GT!!! I've been an online gamer since '97... when the games were just starting- I beta'd a whole slew of game sites that aren't nearly as good as this one. I love the interface - the ability to make interrelated communities - the DBs... ALL of it! Smiling This is what I've been looking for for the past 8 years! LOL



Leeeeeesa 





We want to take the time to say Thank you for this wonderful family game site you have given us to bring in to our home. GoldToken has brought us alot of enjoyment and new friends. We have been here many years now, watched the changes come and they have made GoldToken come along way from what it was when we first became members here. So many new boards, games, personal wiki's newsletter, and hey our own email. Now it can't get much better than that. We believe this gamesite is the best on the net! Can't wait to see what's next to come. Badger is a great lady and friend. One that I applaued for all her hard work and dedication. Would like to also thank her dedictaed staff. Our hats off to ALL of you!!



NASCAR and BlueJeans





Would you like to make your affection for GoldToken known? Please send your testamonials (or any other material submissions) to Red Arrow for possible inclusion in future editions -- thank you!






Wanted


  • If you are a guest and would be interested in earning your membership on a monthly basis, helping out with Joggle Jungle or Game Crew might be your ticket to do so!  You must have good language skills and spelling, the ability to have several windows open at once, and be a fast learner with a willingness to learn how to edit wikis.  If this sounds like it's a tailor made oppurtunity for you, send your application to Kran for consideration!




  • Goldtoken is still looking for an official pollster!  If you think you can come up with several topics to interest the site, and can research several different choices for polls, send your application for consideration to Kran

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