RAH rules: Description and Origination of - Page 3

ColdWizard · April 22, 2002, 00:03

just two throw my two cents in, i like the no-city bribe rule. a few zone games i've played in have turned into bribe wars. interesting the first time it happened but it got boring fast (especially since i had less money

)

Ming · April 22, 2002, 00:22

Quote:

Originally posted by DrSpike
I guess the main bones of contention are the bribing rules, since there are several variations. Also do you get much tech stealing in your games? The person with the science wonders must have hell of a time diplo-proofing his empire. And you play no city bribing; was it found to be unbalancing for your games?

First... We found that tech stealing was far less of a problem than trading techs. We are all use to tech stealing from the beginning and it's just part of the game. Actually, it can really help a game, because if your early land doesn't have much trade, you can at least catch up some by going the stealing route. But the more you steal, the harder it gets. What is far more unbalancing is trading techs. The games ended up going down the same and boring path. The first two people that met would become partners... leap frog their way light years ahead of everybody else... game over. So we stopped playing formal alliances and tech trading, and the games are far more balanced. Alliances and tech trading are great in team games... but in individual games, it got boring really quick.

City bribes on the hand are a different story. Most of the people in our early group agreed that it sucked. Every time it happened to you, you got pissed. You finally get some settler and a supporting unit 20 squares away from your capital, drop a city in that prime location you have been waiting hundreds of years to get, and some sucker walks up and buys it for next to nothing. And then yes, it just turns into a bribe fest. The race was to democracy... and it got old real quick. We love stealing techs and units... but cities just made the early diplo way too strong. So it wasn't really as unbalancing as tech trade... but it was just as boring

rah · April 22, 2002, 09:17

Yeah tech trading became a problem quickly. The first two that met had a heck of an advantage. Especially if they met before anyone got to monarchy. Then one of them would build the great library, and there was no way the other two players could catch up.

City bribing unbalanced the games. If someone got an early king, that 150 gold was BIG.

RAH

rah · May 1, 2002, 14:31

UPDATE
Airbases, allowed only as real airbases. Not allowed in city radius.
Nor allowed to build a line of them to block air lanes.

RAH

SmartFart · May 3, 2002, 13:59

Airbases? I've seen a fighter once in a duel against Carnide.

rah · May 3, 2002, 14:11

Agreed. Not likely but just in case. We've seen them a couple of times, but not in a long time.

RAH

rah · May 7, 2002, 09:07

Another rules discussion.
The other night, during a border war, my opponent and I were busy destroying/capturing each other border cities. I had one city that was obviously doomed. It was only size three on a forest defended by two non-vet phalanxes and a one vet warrior. As the crusaders were coming down the river and attacking without taking any damage, I calmly said a prayer for the valiant but worthless defenders and preceded to sell the temple. The city was quickly destroyed but at least I recouped a few coins for my effort. While this isn't in the same class as disbanding units that are being bribed, it never dawned on me that people might not think this is Kosher.

1. Have you done this?

2. Does anyone think it shouldn't be allowed?

3. Or is this so common and I'm just being paranoid with all the accusations of cheating around here?

RAH

Epik · May 7, 2002, 09:33

As the attacker and ultimate loser in that border war, I thought I should give my opinion.

I do not think the sale of a building when you are about to lose a city is cheating. The game will only allow you sell one building per turn, so you will not get too much gold before your city is lost. It is little compensation for losing a city.

I have sold buildings during battle myself. In one game I sold the SDI in the city so, I could nuke it after it was captured and eliminate the conquering army.

DrSpike · May 7, 2002, 09:36

Selling improvements in a doomed city is clearly acceptable. The analogy with disbanding the bribed unit seems flawed. If you could sell improvements after the city had been conquered doing that would be wrong, as disbanding the bribed unit is wrong. Similarly, preemptively disbanding a unit you believe will soon be bribed would also be fine.

Ming · May 7, 2002, 09:47

I have no problem with that either... I've sold many of buildings when it looks like I'm going to lose a city.

And when it comes to temples, he isn't going to get it anyway when he takes the cities...

markusf · May 7, 2002, 11:57

Selling something like a wall, would be considered cheating?

ColdWizard · May 7, 2002, 12:02

i don't recall any particular instances where i've sold buildings, but i'm sure i have. i don't see anything wrong with selling an improvement (walls included)

rah · May 7, 2002, 12:06

OK, the concensus seems to be that it's not a problem in general.

Markus/epik brings up the only possible exceptions.

Walls and SDI's (like we ever get to SDI's

)

So let's just disucss Walls. While I don't have a problem with it, I can see Markus's point. I could go either way but lean towards it's ok to do. Other opinions?

RAH

Ming · May 7, 2002, 12:21

I vote - sell the best item you can. If you want it to be the walls or and SDI... why not

War4ever · May 7, 2002, 12:28

i agree with Ming...if your going to sell an item and you have two or more available.....sell anything but the temple.....the temple is always destroyed anyways...at least its never there when i get around to the city

not that i want some freaks religious temples in my city anyways

markusf · May 7, 2002, 17:08

Quote:

Originally posted by Ming
I vote - sell the best item you can. If you want it to be the walls or and SDI... why not

My problem is more with people sitting there waiting to see if you actually take the city.. Sometimes people sell improvements AFTER you take the city.. Because they sit there and leave the window open...

So is there a game tonight? warchicken, me makeo rah?

rah · May 7, 2002, 17:26

If it's done after the city is taken, no question in my mind that it's a cheat. If you do it before, you may jump the gun, and that's what makes it fun.

But it's usually so obvious that you seldom guess wrong.

I am 90% sure that I'm unavailable tonight.
During the week it's getting harder and harder to pry my chatty daughter off the machine. It may be time to consider an internet connection on the machine in her bedroom. But I'm not willing to give up what little parental control we have now, since we're usually in the room

Rich

Mr Bunny · May 12, 2002, 00:12

As far as the creation of non units-
I had no clue you could do it with that nifty quick-click rehoming thing.
An obvious"cheat".
My method, which might be considered less cheaty due to its dificulty, ( and danger factor in MP) was to build a city far, far away from me, immediately (or not) force-buy disband it, and voila, a non settler/eng. Note that this only works for settlers/eng (duh) and it is a pain in the ass.
And I have probably wasted tons of resources donig this but it's fun as hell to have droves of NON engineers transforming without a care in the world.
Anyhow I'm pissed to hear about the quickie cheat that does the same thing because this would have to be banned too, even if the concept was approved of it would allow the other type of cheating (at least with settlers) because, how would you know, right? Any thoughts on this?

rah · May 12, 2002, 13:11

A quick check of saves quickly exposes someone who does it. It's hard to hide. Maybe if you only did one or two, you'd get away with it, any more and it's real obvious.

Mr Bunny · May 12, 2002, 19:48

I remember a game, before i discovered the trick, where i ended up with 3 NON eng; the one from the beginning and two more from arctic huts. Man, I thought I was lucky. Plus you can get NON Mil units from huts. Plus, you can get NON units from bribing other civs far from your cities. So I guess there would have to be a decision made as far as how many NON's are allowed before someones "methods" are questioned. I wish there was a way to remove that re-homing cheat. My method is probably stupid in MP anyways.

rah · May 13, 2002, 09:06

Actually, since you have to do it in a city, so prior to railroad it's easy to spot looking at sequential saves, unlike some other cheats.

RAH

Straybow · May 13, 2002, 19:22

Quote:

Originally posted by rah
During the week it's getting harder and harder to pry my chatty daughter off the machine. It may be time to consider an internet connection on the machine in her bedroom. But I'm not willing to give up what little parental control we have now, since we're usually in the room

Hey, you've got broadband, right? That means you can configure your computer as a proxy server and set up a peer-to-peer lan. You can impose curfews and have a full history of her surfing. Some broadband ISP providers even provide help setting up the proxy server.

rah · May 13, 2002, 21:39

All well and good. But to me that's borderline spying. She's been good enough to have earned some trust, so I'm not ready to spy yet. (I'm afraid that day may come)

Being a father to a teenage daughter is tough. (I don't always handle it well

)
We will probably consider hooking up her machine eventually.

RAH

Deity Dude · May 13, 2002, 22:20

I know how you feel RAH - I got a 13 year daughter going on 21

rah · May 14, 2002, 08:47

I share the pain, mine's 14.
And she just made the Pom Pom squad for the high school she's entering next year. Pom Poms are boy magnets. I'm busy reviewing the gun ownership laws for Illinois.

RAH
No I am not handling it well at all.

DrSpike · May 14, 2002, 09:45

Quote:

Originally posted by rah

And she just made the Pom Pom squad for the high school she's entering next year. Pom Poms are boy magnets. I'm busy reviewing the gun ownership laws for Illinois.

Hehe, another set of RAH rules needed. I'm sure the good members of this forum will provide thoughtful and insightful suggestions.

Straybow · May 16, 2002, 15:57

They're just expanding your options, rah, it isn't spying until you use such features. Proxy server most likely doesn't have a way to snoop on chats, which I'm sure takes quite a bit of her time and has plenty of potential for trouble.

As for arms, I recommend a shotgun. They've got serious scare factor, with that big muzzle diameter, and you can always have the first shell loaded with rock salt.

rah · May 16, 2002, 16:32

Quote:

Originally posted by Straybow
As for arms, I recommend a shotgun. They've got serious scare factor, with that big muzzle diameter, and you can always have the first shell loaded with rock salt.

Thank you for providing a "thoughtful and insightful suggestion".

RAH

Any others?

DrSpike · May 16, 2002, 16:36

You know a web proxy wouldn't be a bad idea either way..........you could set up caching at the same time to convince yourself you weren't spying..........

Btw I'm sure getting IRC logs isn't tricky if you start becoming the suspicious type.

ColdWizard · May 16, 2002, 19:14

dirty rotten no-good threadjackers....

the shotgun is good, so's a machete