Strat Forum PBEM: Game 4 - Thread II - Page 6

Harovan · May 13, 2003, 09:33

We have AIs in the "original" GS PBEM. They do no good. Whoring around techs and maps doesn't help to increase the fun, at the countrary.

alexman · May 13, 2003, 11:01

All of Sir Ralph's suggestions sound great. Even the no AU mod one. However, I wouldn't be against some other modifications to address some MP issues. For example:

Are we going to do anything about the reduced war weariness in MP? Perhaps an increase in unit support for Monarchy?
Can we weaken the industrious trait so people pick something else besides industrious civs? We could take advantage of worker turns being rounded up, or we could make industrious workers more expensive.
I would really like to see bombard units being used more against cities. With no AI, we could make it so such units are not only useful in the open. A nice solution would be to reduce the defensive strength of citizens and improvements, so that even Catapults have a good chance of doing some damage.
With no AI we can do other cool things like making tanks wheeled, AEGIS and subs carry missiles, and colisseums increase the effect of luxury spending.
There are some elements of the AU mod that I wouldn't mind keeping: Corruption-reducing building for Communism, increased infantry attack, zero-range bombard, ship upgrade chains and movement, and Longevity with Sanitation, for example.

Or I am fine with stock rules too.

Now we just have to get a 5th player and someone to make the map.

P.S. AP is not my cup of tea either, but DaveMcW has a mod that fixes everything except the slower movement of units compared to tech rate.

Dominae · May 13, 2003, 11:08

Let's start another one. Sir Ralphs' suggestions make sense to me too. We need a 5th (and maybe 6th).

Of the changes you mentioned, alexman, I like tinkering with the Industrious trait the most. How about making Industrious civs only start out with one tech? We take away Masonry from all of them, or pick and choose among the 2 possibilities just to add some flavor.

Dominae

jshelr · May 13, 2003, 12:53

Turn civ specific abilities off??

alexman · May 13, 2003, 13:28

Civ-specific abilities turns off the UU as well, doesn't it? And you get a GA with any Wonder?

I like Dominae's solution a lot, but it might not be enough. How about we also reduce the turns required for worker jobs as like this:

Mine: 12 to 9
Mining plains would be unchanged for industrious civs (3), but reduced from 6 to 5 for non-industrious. Mining hills would be reduced from 6 to 5 for industrious, and from 12 to 9 for non-industrious.

Irrigate: 8 to 6
Unchanged for industrious civs (2), but reduced from 4 to 3 for non-industrious.

Clear forest: 10 to 9
Unchanged for industrious civs (5), but reduced from 10 to 9 for non-industrious.

All the rest of the worker jobs unchanged.

Harovan · May 13, 2003, 14:30

I'm sorry, but I'm against distorting the game rules too much. As it stands, the traits are more or less balanced. PBEM games are a big investment in time and certainly not a playground for tests. Plus, everyone of us has his own algorithms and standard habits with workers. It would annoy the hell out of me, if my workers would behave differently, just because we changed the rules for this one game.

If we do anything at all, it should be fixing the expansionist trait. It's mostly about early settlers, meaning its advantage heavily depends on luck. You have luck (settler in the early 3000's), you be the king of the game. You don't have luck, you remain with a completely useless trait and thus have a disadvantage.

I like the other ideas, although I doubt that this game ever will see the late industrial age (tanks wheeled), not to talk about the modern (AEGIS, missile carying nuclear subs). The latter btw would be near to useless on a pangea, wouldn't they?

My vote goes towards an unmodded game.

alexman · May 13, 2003, 16:26

I think expansionist is fine as the gambler's trait. Industrious, OTOH is the opposite: a conservative trait that does well no matter what.

So my vote is now for unmodded, but with Dominae's suggestion of removing Masonry from Industrious civs.

Any ideas of who might want to make a map for us?

Dominae · May 13, 2003, 16:48

alexman's idea is a good one, but I agree that an unmodded game would probably be best.

The luck factor inherent in the Expansionist trait is fine, IMO; by picking Expansionist, you're gambling for a free Settler. Plus, it's not like the Expansionist trait is completely useless without this bonus (free techs for trading, better scouting, etc.). Anyway, this is leading to a trait debate, so let' just leave things unmodded.

Should we announce the game and ask for a volunteer, or should we approach players whom we know will play their turns regularly?

Dominae

Dominae · May 13, 2003, 16:52

I still like the idea of removing Masonry from Industrious civs, mind you...it would would remove the guilt I feel if I were to pick and Industrious civ this time around (which I made a point of not doing last time).

jshelr, Sir Ralph?

Dominae

Harovan · May 13, 2003, 16:57

Ok with me, although I will pick industrious this time, though. Last time I was rel/exp.

About the 5th or 6th player: What about approaching DaveMcW and Nor Me?

alexman · May 13, 2003, 17:16

Nor Me and DaveMcW are good choices.

I would say if one of them doesn't accept, let's leave it at five players, small/80% or tiny/60% map. If both of them accept, small/70% map.

I'm wondering if someone from GS would want to make the map for us. How about notyoueither?

Harovan · May 13, 2003, 18:27

Alex (or any of the others), would you be willing to replace GhengisFarb for 1-3 weeks in the Naval PBEM, beginning with May 19th? I'd like like to keep this game going in his absence, it's one of my favorites.

Volunteers apply here: http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...threadid=85705

alexman · May 13, 2003, 18:30

I can't, because I made the map, remember?

Sir Ralph, if you like that game, I see why you don't like the increased corruption of small maps and the AU-mod Republic.

Harovan · May 13, 2003, 18:37

Well, alex, it doesn't really matter that you made the map. We're around 2000BC, everyone should have explored his home island but nothing else yet. And Ghengis won't be away for long, anyway.

I don't have anything against the standard corruption on any map size. But I consider it high enough and don't consider it fun to hurt the means of fighting it (like playing around with the OCN or devaluating the Republic).

DaveMcW · May 15, 2003, 16:11

I'd be happy to join.

I'm leaning towards unmodded as well. AP would make the endgame more interesting, but it looks like you guys prefer to fight in the ancient age and call it quits when you reach industrial age.

Maybe you can increase the expansionist gamble by making barbs random.

alexman · May 15, 2003, 16:33

Great news!

I also PM'ed Nor Me. Perhaps he will join if we tell the map maker to place him as far as possible from DaveMcW!

Nor Me · May 15, 2003, 16:46

I'll join

.

A bit incestuous though isn't it?

I'm not sure that unmodded or any AU mod makes that much difference when you adjust. AP does and I don't know how to play with it. If the consensus is to slightly handicap Industrious civs, I'd go with that.

Quote:

Originally posted by alexman
Perhaps he will join if we tell the map maker to place him as far as possible from DaveMcW!

No, no, as close as possible to DaveMcW. At least if the rest of you want a better chance of winning

.

Harovan · May 15, 2003, 17:41

So we have 6 players together, excellent!

What about getting this thing started?

I would vote for these settings:

- Small map (80x80), Pangea, 70% water
- Normal humidity, temperate (to avoid extrema like large tundras or jungles)
- World age 4 billion years. 3 would favor industrious. May be we make it 5, devaluating industrious, and don't steal them Masonry? This makes for very detailed maps with many different tiles around the cities and without vast hills, mountain ranges and jungles (where industrious would shine)
- Raging barbarians (at least restless)
- Emperor difficulty, for happiness and barbarian combat

Harovan · May 15, 2003, 17:50

I just ran a test with the editor. Argh! In 75% of all cases I got continents, once even an archipelago, although the setting always was pangea. We surely need one to check the map for a true pangea and to balance it out, without making luxuries and resources too abundant like in the ex-game 4.

alexman · May 15, 2003, 17:56

Sir Ralph, I think they fixed the editor in 1.21f to *always* generate pangea if you want that setting. It's in the readme.

Either way, we really should find someone to balance the map though. I would say that the map should be 100% generated (but with the map maker allowed to generate as many as he wants until he finds a good one), but with all the resources manually and carefully placed.

As for Industrious, unless we take away Masonry *and* play at 5 billion, I wouldn't be inclined to choose anything besides an Industrious civ. And even then I would probably choose Industrious, actually.

Otherwise this game sounds great. I'm excited!

DaveMcW · May 15, 2003, 18:12

I'd like to echo the need for scarce luxuries. Please leave only one per player on the map - this will help balance Republic too.

I vote for 5 billion years and let industrious civs keep Masonry.

Harovan · May 15, 2003, 18:16

Well, we can't play 1.21f if Nor Me participates. Other than that, you're right, I just checked it with my dual installation.

alexman · May 15, 2003, 18:20

We can still generate the map with 1.21f. The BIC file format is the same, it's only the SAV that differs.

As for luxuries, perhaps we could place the 7th and 8th on small islands outside the pangea (an exeption to the generated map), just to make a navy a bit more tempting.

Harovan · May 15, 2003, 18:25

Quote:

Originally posted by alexman
As for luxuries, perhaps we could place the 7th and 8th on small islands outside the pangea (an exeption to the generated map), just to make a navy a bit more tempting.

Yea, we should artifically add a lot of small (2-3 tiles) islands around the pangea, for military bases and rapid reaction forces

.

Dominae · May 15, 2003, 19:21

This game looks like it's shaping up, but it is also getting a little contrived for my tastes: with 6 players and a map maker to ensure the starts are "balanced", I see no reason to start creating Luxury islands (because you just know it's going to snowball into Strategic resource distribution, etc.). Other than the settings offered by the game and the requirement that each player has a "fair chance", I think only the map maker should know anything about the map.

Also, pardon my ignorance, but why does AP make the end-game more interesting?

Dominae

DaveMcW · May 15, 2003, 19:53

Quote:

Originally posted by Dominae
Also, pardon my ignorance, but why does AP make the end-game more interesting?

Because you get within reach of space and culture victories twice as fast. Two players can research to the modern age in 150 turns. As players realize they can't win with the status quo, they are forced to end the staring contests.

The downside is you can't pull off a successful invasion without a good road network (no early rushes).

jshelr · May 16, 2003, 08:06

"The downside is you can't pull off a successful invasion without a good road network (no early rushes)."

I beg your pardon? The only AP game I ever played I started in a junk position, but upgraded to MWs who ate all of Spain for breakfast. It took so little time to create the small MW stack that its early arrival caught 'em by surprise. A little lucky hut popping on the tech front helped, as I recall. I would agree that you need at least horses for AP rushes.

jshelr · May 16, 2003, 08:58

By the way, it seems like it is virtually guaranteed that PBEM games will bomb sometime after the middle ages on the patch we were playing. The "help desk" tells me that the new patch out soon will fix the problem that one of our games bombed on last week. But even 1.21 is far from bug free. Can we set this up to move to the latest patch when it comes out?? Otherwise, it's a bit futile to expect to play to a conclusion.

Nor Me · May 16, 2003, 11:23

Quote:

Originally posted by jshelr
But even 1.21 is far from bug free. Can we set this up to move to the latest patch when it comes out?? Otherwise, it's a bit futile to expect to play to a conclusion.

I suspect it might be some time before I can use at least the official version of the next patch

.

alexman · May 16, 2003, 11:26

No worries. The good thing is that we are setting this game up to have lots of action before we get past the middle ages. 1.14f it is!

I just PM'ed Catt to see if we wants to make a map for us.