Can we retire the term "Whipping Boy"?

[Nuc_Temeron]

Somewhere along the line someone used the term Whipping Boy to refer to a defended frontline system. Can we please retire this term? It's completely bizarre.

Can we refer to them as Chokepoints, or some other sensible term, in AI War II? Really, anything but Whipping Boy.

[Captain Jack]

Unfortunately "chokepoint" is insufficiently descriptive. A whipping boy isn't just a defensive position, it's one that you actively invite trouble to the way a English princeling might.

Now that I think about it, wasn't there a movie called The Whipping Boy?

Anyway, that's on the community. Be convincing!

[Pumpkin]

I'm completely okay with no more using it, unfortunately, as Jack said, it's a word deep-routed into the community as it describes a specific strategy. Chokepoint sure could work but it imply more the narrowing of the frontier than the pile of hard-hitting stuff in it.

Maybe, as the community slowly expand (and it will, with AIW2) and the "old hardcore player-base" (which I'm only half part of) becomes more and more diluted, the terms like "whipping boy" might fade out.

But right now, changing the community will be hard.
However, your point is interesting. I'll try to avoid that indeed confusing term.

[Toranth]

I'm completely okay with no more using it, unfortunately, as Jack said, it's a word deep-routed into the community as it describes a specific strategy. Chokepoint sure could work but it imply more the narrowing of the frontier than the pile of hard-hitting stuff in it.

Maybe, as the community slowly expand (and it will, with AIW2) and the "old hardcore player-base" (which I'm only half part of) becomes more and more diluted, the terms like "whipping boy" might fade out.
snip

Yeah, I've noticed the term hasn't been showing up nearly as often as it did years ago.  I suspect a big part of that is that the strategy itself has changed, so it isn't as relevant to current discussion of the game.

In the olden days, your whipping boy system didn't have to be a chokepoint; it was just the system you tanked incoming waves on - usually by putting almost all of your turrets there..  Frequently, it WAS a chokepoint (easiest to solve multiple problems at once) but you could also put it on the default Exo path with just a little gate raiding.
These days, there are still stronghold systems (where Fortresses or HBCs might go) but since other systems can survive a wave or two occasionally, it isn't as essential to take all your abuse in one place anymore.
Hence, no need to use the term, because there's no need to use the strategy.

[chemical_art]

I haven't used the term myself. But the moment it is discouraged that will make it appealing to use again.

Best way to phase it out is to not mention it at all.

[Nuc_Temeron]

Fair enough. Mum's the word.

[Tridus]

Seems like this thread should be in the "main" forum, since it's about a community term rather than anything in the game itself.

[tadrinth]

'Scapegoat' is sort of similar in meaning, but is a more common term.  'Martyr' captures the self-sacrificing part of the idea.  They're both names of units, though. 

I think they're still a useful concept, and will remain so as long as waves and gate raiding stick around. 

[x4000]

I actually started using this phrase prior to the first version becoming public, so it's my bad on this one.

[BadgerBadger]

I somewhat capriciously suggest the term "hedgehog". To quote wikipedia, "The Hedgehog defence is a military tactic in which a defending army creates mutually supporting strong points in a defence in depth which is designed to sap the strength and break the momentum of an attacking army". It's not 100% accurate, but it's pretty close. So I'd say "The AI got through the outer hedgehog, but the final line of defense stopped the Exo"

[x4000]

Ooh!  Hedgehog is pretty awesome, partly because of this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Czech_hedgehog

[Kahuna]

I think something like "(main) battleground" would adequately describe the meaning of "whipping boy".

[x4000]

That was never really the point of the term when I introduced it, though.

- My main battleground would typically be off somewhere where I was the aggressor, or in enemy territory.
- My various fortifications and resource-producing planets were behind my whipping boy.
- My whipping boy was built to die, repeatedly, with as minimum expense to me as possible, and ideally as little fleet cap usage as possible.

So the whipping boy was a damage sponge, a distraction from my main (offensive) fleet), and a buffer for my most important defenses.

[Atepa]

I'm not sure I see what is so bizarre about the word, and considering it is a term that has been around since the early days, I don't really see a point to changing it. At least in AIWC whipping boys will always have a purpose, as Chris said, to soak up damage with as little expense to the player as possible. Will that be the case in AIW2 who knows, and if it isn't it most likely won't be used there. All sorts of games have vernacular that are specific to the game or game type the words stay relevant until they aren't needed anymore.

[WolfWhiteFire]

I think whipping boys (or whatever you want to call them) won't even be as useful in AI War 2 as your energy is planet based and not galaxy based, so you can only have so much energy to use in each system, which might cause you to balance out your defenses more. You might be able to build stuff to give you extra energy on certain planets, but only to an extent and you will be unable to just put all the defenses you have in a single place.