2001 Players Tourney, Round 1, Group D: HAWKHUNTER, BARBARIAN, BOANN, DEITY DUDE

[HawkHunter]

ahhh which day so i can send the barbarian a icq message to let him know

[HawkHunter]

OK people it's now Saturday afternoon and nothing has been said. about which day or time this weekend........ SSSOOOOOOO !!!!

[boann]

ok i talked with barb on icq this morning.
he says he can play around 8 est.
so ill be online around 6 mt

[Deity Dude]

anyone interested in finishing our game aug 16, 17, 18 or 19th

i am

[HawkHunter]

ahh 18th or 19th is good for me

[Deity Dude]

18th or 19th at nite works for me - ill yahoo message boann - hopefully barb and hawk read this

[Deity Dude]

no one's posted anything so i assume we are still on for saturday at 3 mountain/5 eastern time

[Deity Dude]

any idea if/when we are finishing our game

[boann]

cavebear says we are to continue from the 25 bc save
my computers been acting weird on me yesterday and today....it went down for a long while and i could not get it too boot up.
but since its up now , i will leave it running a while.
i can prob play today for a while...
is anyone available today?

i have another game set for this evening after 4pm
but i could prob play a couple of hours this morning
or early afternoon.

[Deity Dude]

cavebear asked me about the 50bc save - the 25bc save will put me in the same problem i was in with the AI taking my turn. i think if he said that he was under the impression that the 25bc save would be before my turn, not after the AI switched my government from republic to anarchy - along with other AI issues .

CAVEBEAR - I will accept whatever your ruling is i just want to make sure you understand your decision. Was it your intention that we take the save AFTER I got disconnected and the AI took a turn for me (25bc save) Or did u want the save closest to the point before the AI took my turn (closest save to 25bc prior to 25bc)

please answer this question in this forum and i will abide by your decision as I am sure everyone else will.

[cavebear]

Based on the files I have been sent to review, your game will continue at the current save.

I don't make this decision lightly. The host should have been saving each and every turn, players should have been allowing the autoserve to function, and the files should be available for review at every turn.

The saved files exist at 75 and 25 BC. At 75 BC, Deity Dude had 4 cities in revolt and that is sufficient to collapse the government. My best interpretation of this situation is that Deity Dude did not notice this impending problem, that anarchy occurred in 50 BC, and that he attempted to escape that problem then. Lacking a 50 BC file, I am forced to assume that the anarchy continued and Deity Dude retired in 25 BC in an attempt to get his position restarted at an earlier date tp avoid that collapse.

Further, the 25 BC save had not reached Deity Dude's turn, so the AI could not have become involved at that point. The other players clearly state the they saw Deity Dude's retirement (not absence) in that turn and saved the file before his turn.

In private discussions, Deity Dude inticated his willingness to continue the game at 25 BC. I accept that decision.

The game will continue at 25 BC.

[Deity Dude]

"The saved files exist at 75 and 25 BC. At 75 BC, Deity Dude had 4 cities in revolt and that is sufficient to collapse the government. My best interpretation of this situation is that Deity Dude did not notice this impending problem, that anarchy occurred in 50 BC, and that he attempted to escape that problem then. Lacking a 50 BC file, I am forced to assume that the anarchy continued and Deity Dude retired in 25 BC in an attempt to get his position restarted at an earlier date tp avoid that collapse"

I said I would abide by Cavebear's decision and I will but I would like to make the following points:

1) I check my cities every turn and take whatever action is necessary prior to my turn and was in a republic at the start of 25bc. To say I "didn't notice the impending problem" is absurd. Not only do I check but the game warns you. Its is not my fault that the host did not have the 50bc save that would prove me correct. Nor is it my fault I didn't; players were never instructed to have autosave on in order to prove thier innocence.

2) If you look closely at the 25bc save you will see I attempted to attack Hawk on a land bridge between our 2 civs but was overruled by my senate. Thus proving "your best interpretation of the situation" impossible. This was the last move I made before I was disconnected.

3) The 25bc save was after my turn, not before it.

4) (and most importantly) If you and everyone else believe the last part of your statement:

"Deity Dude retired in 25 BC in an attempt to get his position restarted at an earlier date tp avoid that collapse"

Why do you even want me in your tourney? From your perspective I tried to cheat. From my perspective the only thing worse than playing with a cheater is being called one when you are not.

Like I said, I will abide by your decision. But please do not consider me for any more tournaments. This is the first time I have ever been accused of anything like this and I intend to make it the last. In the future I will only play with people I know and trust (and who trust me). This is supposed to be fun after all, and lately it hasnt been.

Cavebear, I believe you called it the way you saw it and I can not fault you for that. The problem is your decision is incorrect and has left an unjust blackmark on my reputation. I guess if courts can send innocent people to death row I can accept this.

I do fault you, however, for looking at the files and making a decision in a vacuum without giving me (and everyone else for that matter) a chance to present a possible alterenative explanation to what you see as damning evidence. Perhaps what you found as inconsistancies should have been posted here to allow all to discuss. Perhaps the players should have discussed it at the time instead of breaking into a seperate discussion and "quitting for the evening" only to play other games.

AS YOU CAN SEE I AM VERY FRUSTRATED

So - when do we finish, it should be real interesting.

[cavebear]

Deity Dude - I understand your concerns. You have set your defense out forthrightly and clearly.

I am limited by what I can observe, and I *am* disappointed that all the game files are not available for review. It has not escaped my attention that the 50 AD file is coincidently unsaved by anyone. The host should be saving each round. Perhaps it was a fast turn or the heat of competition got in the way. Regardless, I have to go with what I can look at.

I have decided to ask a couple of people to review the available files, and I will consider their evaluations in my final decision. The final decision has to be mine, though, and I take full responsibility for its accuracy or inaccuracy.

[cavebear]

Let this be a lesson in the value of saving every game file in important games...
The unavailability of a 50 BC game file has made this very difficult to determine.

My conclusion is that the game should be replayed from the 75 BC file. The normal ways that a republic could have crashed in anarchy do not seem do have been in existance at this time. The tech rate seems normal for the Romans, and there were no stolen techs that I can find, or other problems.

I will reiterate that I still remain curious about how the Roman retirement/crash occured, but these things happen in inauspicious ways and I cannot find any evidence of intentional wrong-doing on anyone's part. Accidents happen, and we do not know every ramification of such events. Sometimes, honest players can find themselves in disagreement.

Let this be one of those situations.

Start the game again at 75 BC..

[markusf]

republic can not collaspe due to anarchy. I often leave some cities in anarchy for over 10 turns in a row so they can grow bigger.
ITs also not possible to crash and retire at all the same time... its either one or the other.. Control R is retire... if caps lock is on it over throws the government...

[boann]

we will continue at the 75 bc save as you wish.


on my turn, we all saw the retire screen , then hawk and i saved
at 25 bc without leaving from my turn.
thats all i know for sure.

there was tech stealing going on and some war.
nothing unusual, just a normal game

[Deity Dude]

Markus - I read your post a few times and am not sure how to interpret it as it relates to this. I was not even aware that Ctrl-r caused retirement and, if I read it correctly Ctrl-R causes revolt. I'm not sure if u are saying that because these 2 could not have happened simultaneously that it proves "I did it" or it proves "I couldn't have" or if it is some information that still leaves the situation inconclusive. I can say one thing, the point is moot because it does not apply to me. If I retire from a game I do it thru the menu as I do if I quit or anything else for that matter. The only time I use the keyboard is for moving pieces and the f# keys to check attitude, science advisor etc.

I can only say what happened on my end for certainty. It was 25bc, my turn and I was in republic. I had crashed 2 times already that evening and warned players that I was lagging bad. The last move I made was to land a crusader next to one of Hawk's cities. I then tried to attack and was overruled by my senate. I was then disconnected. When I came back my turn was over and was in Anarchy in 1ad.

I assumed the AI finished my turn and did something to put me into Anarchy.

I didn't have autosave on and have never even seen the save files except when they were briefly loaded during the confusion that day. So, I am now talking about something that happened over a week ago from memory while everyone else has had a chance to review the files. I feel comfortable doing this because I don't need to reveiw the files to make sure my story is in line with the evidence. That is why I thought the "inconsistancies" should be posted here and discussed openly, because I honestly believe that it is impossible to find that I did anything dishonest and would prefer my name to be "cleared" rather then left in doubt.

Cavebear, I appreciate you taking a second look at the situation after reading my point of view and having the guts to reverse your original decision. That's not always an easy thing to do. Also, I would like to apologize, to you and the players, for my comment about no more tournies. It was made out of anger.

To the players, (Boann, Hawk, Barb), I'm sorry for what happened but honestly feel that I did nothing wrong. I do want to remind everyone that the night that this occurred I told Hawk that I was willing to play from the 25bc or 1ad save and wait til the next Oedo year to go back to republic. I had only brought it to this point when others refused to discuss it with me and went straight to Cavebear, thus questioning my integrity in a public fashion. I guess I can understand that reaction, to a certain extent. I too have played my share of "shady players" and have probably jumped to an incorrect conclusion about an honest player because of it. On the bright side, I have a new ISP since then and havn't been getting disconnected as often.

At this point I am willing to let by gones be by gones and hope everyone else feels the same.

I suppose everyone is sick of this by now, I know I am, and I will post nothing more on the subject (unless I feel I need to respond to a possible future post that questions my integrity)

[DaveV]

Unsolicited (and maybe unwelcome ) comments:

It is standard practice for the AI to revolt out of republic when it comes into contact with a player it doesn't like (i.e., when you move adjacent to an enemy unit and one of those annoying pop-ups occur). I guess this is supposed to allow it to declare war without Senate interference.

As Markus said, there is no external trigger that will cause a revolt in a non-democratic government; you have to request the change (and then you must subsequently answer "yes" in a pop-up). AI takeovers are always a disaster for the victim; everyone should save on every turn to make restarting easier if someone is dropped.

[cavebear]

Markus and Dave (and everyone) - Thank you for the helpful explanations. It cleared up some confusion (on my part, at least). It is easy for things to go wrong in surprising ways. I know I have nearly caused a revolution by trying to build a railroad with the cap lock button accidently pressed, for example. I didn't even know about Control-R for revolt. It wouldn't seem so common an action to need a keyboard shortcut, but there it is (helpful programmers).

I do keep the autosave option on, and I usually save each turn individually aside from that. It doesn't take long. Autosave keeps the previous 2 turns, which is usually sufficient for crashes or disputes. If you use the same Leader name from game to game, you need to rename the 2 files or they get overwritten. I'm not pointing fingers at anyone (really!), but you can see how it would have helped.

I remain convinced that no intentional tricks were committed and that the best solution is to re-start the game at 75 BC.

As far as changing my mind about the restart year, I looked at the previous file, saw cities in revolt, and jumped to an inaccurate conclusion. Looking at the files later, I realized there were several possible explanations, most of them innocent ones.

I will also say that it was entirely appropriate for a player to ask me to look at the situation. That remains true for *any* reason at *any* time. I have sometimes done the same of other people in even the most casual game when I did not understand what had occurred. Asking a question is *not* the same as accusing someone of cheating, and I do not believe anyone in this game ever intended to suggest "cheating". I recognize we are all a bit sensitive on the subject, the known holes in the programming being what they are, so I treat any questions as merely requests for an explanation only available to some outside party free to look at all the players positions.

So, let the game proceed, and may no one harbor any ill-feelings or doubts...

[Deity Dude]

so when do we play- im available weeknites and weekends

[boann]

my home computer is down
have new motherboard on order and will be fixed
next week sometime.

[Deity Dude]

boann hows the motherboard coming. let us know when it is ready so we can finish.

[boann]

looks like my computer is up and running again.
so whens a good time to continue
im working all day today and not sure when ill be getting off.
when are you guys available?