
Three-sided Football - camillomiller
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three_sided_football
======
CamTin
Also note the historical, mind-bending three-way baseball game (Dodgers vs.
Giants vs. Yankees) to sell War Bonds just a couple weeks after D-Day in 1944:
[https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/just-because-
june-26-1944...](https://www.cbssports.com/mlb/news/just-because-june-26-1944
---dodgers-vs-yankees-vs-giants/)

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freditup
I wish the Wikipedia article would elaborate more on some of the strategies
and tactics that are unique to three-sided football instead of just recounting
previous tournament results. Perhaps a good opportunity to contribute to
Wikipedia for some HN reader who's knowledgable?

~~~
Shish2k
Same question but more specific - what stops two teams from ganging up on the
third? When I played 3SF with the "most goals wins" rule it quickly turned
into "the two stronger teams take turns beating the weaker one" \- I suspect
that "fewest goals conceded" might help with that issue, but I've not
considered it thoroughly enough to figure out if it solves it...

~~~
V-2
That's the problem with three-player chess, too. Once two players turn against
one, it's a beatdown.

~~~
ghayes
But wouldn’t the weaker of the allied teams decide to defect since it would
lose if the third team were fully vanquished? I don’t think the strategy is so
straight-forward.

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brownbat
We once wanted a quick timekilling card game for three players that had some
symmetry, but didn't knock one player out to sit around bored while the other
two dug in for some long war of attrition.

Enter "Lifeboat" Magic. Three players, player with the highest life total when
the first player is eliminated wins. Attack any direction so seat order
doesn't matter.

Strategic targets and alliances would shift basically every round. You'd try
to keep your opponents roughly balanced until you could suddenly knock out the
tougher one in one blow.

I know there are fancier CCGs, but MtG was simple and fast, so it worked as a
timekiller. The emergent strategies were honestly more interesting than the
cards themselves, probably could have worked with other games just as well.

~~~
Sniffnoy
This particular victory condition -- highest life/score when one player is
eliminated -- seems to have been reinvented a few times. Nexus Ops used it as
one possible way to win (although not the main way). Then David Sirlin used it
as the victory condition in [the multiplayer variants of] a few of his games,
apparently unaware of its earlier use in Nexus Ops. And now here's another
reinvention (quite possibly earlier than the two I mentioned :P ).
Interesting.

~~~
brownbat
Huh, neat. Pretty sure it was independent, but not sure about timing... I
think we used this when Ravnica first hit.

When was that... oof, Google says 2005? Seriously? Wow.

David Sirlin independently endorsing a method I also thought up is one of the
best compliments I can imagine. Thanks.

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feintruled
Interesting idea, but seems like it might have some latent flaws. Even regular
football needed a century of rule-tweaking to keep it relevant, would be a
marvel if something as tactically complex as this could spring into life fully
formed.

Another thing I've wondered about - regular two team football, but with more
than one ball ('MULTIBALLLL!') Would be hard to follow, but an intriguing
idea.

Also the idea of 'walking football' \- where running is forbidden.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walking_football](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walking_football)

~~~
sleavey

      '(MULTIBALLLL!)'
    

Reminds me of a Budweiser advert shown in the UK a long time ago:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjI-
qh37xf0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjI-qh37xf0)

~~~
crooked-v
Don't forget Blernsball, the true king of sports:
[https://vimeo.com/147674727](https://vimeo.com/147674727)

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Fnoord
> Unlike conventional football, where the winner is determined by the highest
> scoring of the two teams, in three-sided football the winning team is that
> which concedes the fewest goals.

You could say that in conventional football the winner is determined by the
team which concedes the fewest goals as well. It wouldn't make a difference on
1v1, but it does make a difference on 1v1v1, and that'd make the two more
compatible.

I've played football with 3 teams before as a kid & teen (and other sports,
such as softball), but not with the above rule. It generally turned into a
gank fest (2v1), and the above rule would solve that for a lot of games with 3
players though not something like MtG because the game is over after you
"scored" 20 times ie. there's no end time.

Also, as a general statement, there are a lot of fun variants on football
including ways to build equal teams. I've seen some of that some during gym,
playground on school, and after school on the streets (yeah, did things
besides playing computer back in the late 80s/early 90s). To name two simple
examples of variations on football: on the schoolyard playground we played
football with a tennis ball, and on football training we played football with
small goals though without keeper. Simple, minor modifications which allow for
a lot of variation and strategy.

~~~
dev_north_east
Ah you're taking me back. Another one was 'Last Man Back' which meant the
player nearest the goals could handle the ball and do goalie things (within
the box). A nice compromise when no-one wants to be in goals or you have only
a few players.

~~~
oneeyedpigeon
Yup, 'rush goalie' we called it.

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m4tthumphrey
Surely this is flawed as there is no motivation to try and score? All 3 teams
could just sit back and essentially do nothing all game. Goals are often
conceded on the counter attack in regular soccer so by going for, what is
essentially a futile, an attack on an opponents goal they have a much higher
risk of conceding.

~~~
dTal
I agree, that scoring system is flawed as it provides no motivation to attack
at all. For example, take a game where one team just defends heavily, and the
other two teams decide to ignore them and have a proper game between
themselves (and trade a few goals). The defensive team would be rewarding for
being boring.

A better system might be if a team's final score were determined by
subtracting their concessions from their goals. Or, if you want to tweak the
style of play between offensive and defensive, applying some coefficient
between goals and concessions (e.g. concessions subtract 2 while goals add 1).
In a way, this is already the system, except the 'goal coefficient' is zero
which is clearly unbalanced.

~~~
tomglynch
It wouldn't occur like you say - The two teams trading a few goals would
quickly realise they were both losing and attack the defensive team together.

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SeriousM
[https://youtu.be/EzbnKQKszm4](https://youtu.be/EzbnKQKszm4) Explanation from
FIFA itself

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dkuebric
A three-sided "cutthroat" game of pool is very similar (identical?) to this
concept.

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bluesmoon
Related is 3 sided chess, which is a little more complicated because it's hard
to figure out who wins and when the game is over:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-
player_chess](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-player_chess)

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kej
Only tangentially related, but it reminds me of the story _17776 - What
Football Will Look Like in the Future_.

[https://www.sbnation.com/a/17776-football](https://www.sbnation.com/a/17776-football)

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pjc50
I think people are taking this either far too seriously, given that it's
Situationist football, or not seriously enough, given that it's a tool for
changing one's modality of thought for which the kicking a ball about is only
a metaphor.

~~~
notahacker
All this talk of the philosophy of football just makes me think of this
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B97_TUyWygE](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B97_TUyWygE)

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todd8
Even the simplest three way games have perplexing strategies. Consider
splitting one dollar three ways by majority vote. The obvious strategy is for
player A and player B to agree to 50-50 and leave out C. Of course, C offers A
a better 60-40 split to ditch B. Then B offers A a 70-30 split. Etc.

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qubex
For comparison, several variations of three-player chess
([https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-
player_chess](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Three-player_chess)) exist.

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AlphaWeaver
Reminds me of Football X-7!

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p0pe_of_n0pe
Apparently the game was designed by a Marxist philosopher as a way to explain
his new theory of dialectics (triolectics?)

Decent history here:

[https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/vdx758/three-sided-
footba...](https://www.vice.com/en_uk/article/vdx758/three-sided-football-285)

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meggar
How would you decide if a player was offside?

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em3rgent0rdr
and the score is still 0-0-0

