Inaugral VESL 5-on-5 OFP Team Competition - 2003

(The BIA Cup)

Outline

An open competition, known as the BIA Cup, using the COTS (Commercial Off The Shelf) computer game Operation Flashpoint is being run by the Virtual Environments and Simulation Laboratory (VESL), in session 2, 2003. The competition is team based, with teams of 5-players (plus any reserves). Numbers permitting, the competition is open to all ADFA students and staff.

The competition will also be used as the basis for an experiment concerning naturalistic decision making (decision making in a complex and dynamic environment), and team-play.

The Competition

The competition will be played with a number of missions and game-types including CTF (Capture The Flag), CAH (Capture And Hold), CKOTH (Continuous King Of The Hill) and FB (Forcings Back).

Matches will take approximately 1-hour to play and be held approximately once per week, but at the discretion of the two teams as to exactly when it will be scheduled. A draw will be provided indicating which teams are scheduled to meet.

The winning team shall have its name inscribed on the perpetual competition trophy. The competition is sponsored by Bohemia Interactive Australia (BIA), a division of BIS ( Bohemia Interactive Studios - authors of Operation Flashpoint). BIA are authors of VBS1 (Virtual Battlefield System).

More complete information on the rules of the competition, scoring mechanisms, type of games, etc. are available below.

Experiments

An investigation of naturalistic decision making in a team environment is to be conducted as part of the competition.

Naturalistic decision making is a model for human decision making in an environment that possesses several features: the environment is highly dynamic; the person does not possess complete knowledge of the environment; the decision must be made under time pressures; the ‘cost’ of wrong decisions can be high.

Subject matter expert observation, prior and post testing, and surveys will be taken and correlated with team performance within the competition. The goals of the research include:

Determining if a COTS game is a useful environment for naturalistic decision making research
Identifying the key factors that influence team performance in the dynamic environments of the game

In particular the significance of intra-team communication and situational awareness

Determine if incidental learning occurs through play

In particular an increase in situational awareness within a virtual environment

Ascertain whether and what forms of game rules encourage and discourage aspects of team play

The overhead associated with the experiments has been designed to be minimal - not intrusive on game-play and enjoyment. After each game players will complete a questionnaire that takes less than 10-minutes to fill out. At the start of the competition, and again at its completion, players will be askedto fill out a questionnaire and play two short scenarios. This should take under 30-minutes.

Further Information

The following resources are available:

Rules and Instructions
- The rules of the competition.
- Set of player instructions - detailing how to connect to the server, selecting a character, etc.
- Descriptions of the game-types and missions use in the competition
- A description of the responsibilities of a team captain
- Instructions for captains on how to control a server (choose missions, scoring systems, etc.)
Room Availability
Draw and Team Standings
- The draw.
- The ladder of team standings.
- Completed Matches - a list of the completed matches and their results.
Current server status - the status of each of the three servers, such as who is on them.
VESL is doing other work with COTS computer games.