Citystates Demogame revamp discussions.

GhengisFarb™ · July 16, 2003, 11:33

In the continuing saga of GhengisFarb's attempts to get this Citystates concept off the ground....

Recap and breakdown:
To have a PTW Demogame based on 3-4 Citystate Teams that work together and yet strive to one up and dominate the other three. Have the Citystates scheme and plot against one another in the open and in secret and allow participants to be able to freely switch allegiances from one to the another as the game plays out.

Challenges:
How to provide an adequate opponent for the Citystates.

Idea I had this morning was to have the "Barbarians" played by actual people. We could make Settlers unbuildible by the Citystates but start them out with four each. This would give each Citystate a citystate and three "colonies" and all further settlements would have to be captured from the Barbarians. Each Citystate would be able to build a Forum in the Citystate that acts as a Hospital (size 3) and makes 10 happy faces. Thus the citystates would have larger productive cities and the advantage of knowledge of their sister Citystates while the Barbarians would have the ability to expand and build settlements.

The Citystates would be Democracy teams and we would need voluteers to be the Barbarians.

I was thinking Egypt, Rome, Greece, and Carthage could be the Citystate teams while we have four people play the Barbarians of Mongols, Celts, Scandinavians, and Germans (the German Scientific trait would be replaced with the Religious trait - their barbarians and not upposed to be more civilized than the Citystates).

Any discussion?

Potential Barbarian Leaders:
GhengisFarb - the GhengisBarbs
redstar1 - the northern Builder Barbs
FrustratedPoet - the Barbarian Bards
ZargonX - the southern Builder Barbs

Potential Citystate Citizens
Egypt
UnOrthOdOx - Willing to run as leader

Rome
Sir Ralph aka Ralphius Ceasar

Greece

Carthage

Generic Citizens
Octavian X
Kloreep

Potential Rule Restraints:
1) Citystates play in concert, the four Citystates are allowed to actively discuss one anothers turns in the same forum and are allowed full knowledge of each others maps and what not.

2) The Barbarians are there to provide an outside opponent for the Democracy teams. They are not allowed to share maps outside the game (so they wouldn't have access to one another's maps until Mapmaking). They also have no forums are team they are simply Barbarian Despots.

UnOrthOdOx · July 16, 2003, 11:36

Interesting.

I volunteer to be a barbarian.

Question: Is trading between the barbarians allowed?

Panzer32 · July 16, 2003, 12:01

um... maybe we should start this once this one is done? We're stretched pretty far as it is.

GhengisFarb™ · July 16, 2003, 12:03

I plan to be a barbarian just to talk smack at all the Demo Teams. My opinion is that the Barbarians should not be allowed to trade techs amongst themselves but could interact with the Citystates.

I also think it would be neat to have a few of the Democracy members choose to be Historians. They would still be active members of the Citystate teams but would each have an exclusive thread where they would post their "History" as the game progressed in their own words. Sort of like Homer and Livy.

And of course the Barbarians can fight one another also. Perhaps the Forum could be available as a city improvement and buildable in all the Citystate cities.

redstar1 · July 16, 2003, 12:32

I also volunteer to take charge of a Barb civ...

GhengisFarb™ · July 16, 2003, 12:37

It would appear that everyone is tired of Democracy Games, they all want to be a Barbarian but no one wants to be apart of a Democracy.

UnOrthOdOx · July 16, 2003, 12:42

I'ld also run for head of the Religious sect...Egypt?

I honestly thought the Barbarians would be the harder position to fill.

FrustratedPoet · July 16, 2003, 13:51

I also volunteer to be a Barb. Yes, two demogames (and lurking in two more) is quite enough for me.
However, I'd be more than willing to play a Barb civ on my own to get this one off the ground.

If nobody wants to form teams why not have the CityStates played by one person too? If we can come up with some way to balance it out it might make an interesting game.

GhengisFarb™ · July 16, 2003, 21:26

Quote:

Originally posted by FrustratedPoet
If nobody wants to form teams why not have the CityStates played by one person too? If we can come up with some way to balance it out it might make an interesting game.

I fully agree, all we need is four people to play Barbs and four people to play the leaders of the Citystates and new members can take up residence in the Citystates at any time after that.

We do need a private forum for the four Citystates to share so they can discuss and post images without the Barbarians being able to see them.

Octavian X · July 16, 2003, 23:08

I'd go for being on one of the city states teams. Perhaps not a very active role, but I'd still join up...

Harovan · July 17, 2003, 05:59

I think I'm in, as one of the city states. The PBEMs I'm in are getting slow

and I need some new entertainment.

ZargonX · July 17, 2003, 10:57

I'd be interested in being one of the barb civs; don't really have time for another team, but a solo-thing I can handle. But, looks like you have your 4 leaders already...

Harovan · July 17, 2003, 11:11

If I'm asked, if I would run for the leader of a city state, I would agree as long as it's Rome.

Kloreep · July 17, 2003, 22:52

I'll sign on as a citizen.

redstar1 · July 18, 2003, 04:40

LOL Lego infiltrate the Barbarians

GhengisFarb™ · July 19, 2003, 22:07

If we started the Citystates and colonies on an island we could do the $MiniGame with this game also.

GhengisFarb™ · July 23, 2003, 14:01

If we can talk Octavian X and Kloreep to each take one of the two remaining civs we could get started and allow new people to join the Citystate that best suits them.

FrustratedPoet · July 23, 2003, 14:11

Kloreep · July 23, 2003, 14:46

The problem with me leading a citystate is that I will be gone for a while in about 3 weeks; after that, school starts up again and I don't know how much time I'll have for more DGs.

GhengisFarb™ · July 23, 2003, 15:31

Maybe someone else will join by then and they can take over the position. Another Consul (from one of the other Citystates) could take over for awhile, since the Citystates are supposed to be worked in unison. We could even make up a roleplay element that the two Citystates joined for a period under a union between the leading houses of the two cities in question.

HarryH · July 23, 2003, 15:48

Are there any other restrictions put on the barbarians other than can not trade techs with other barbarians and can not trade maps outside the game? The tech part will probably be the biggest disadvantage for the barbarians. It will ensure that the citystates are the tech leaders. With the extra settlers to start with the city states will also have the initial commerce and production advantage. Since the citystate cities can get large early without happiness problems they should be able to build the wonders much quicker than the barbarians can. The barbs will need GLs to get any wonders. Sounds like the barbs will have their work cut out for them.

GhengisFarb™ · July 23, 2003, 16:12

That's kinda the point HarryH. The Democracy game is all about the Citystates, the barbarians are just human AI to provide a better opponent that the game AI would.

FrustratedPoet · July 23, 2003, 16:36

But the idea is that the CityStates work towards a peaceful victory, yes? Or does anything go?

GhengisFarb™ · July 23, 2003, 16:42

Quote:

Originally posted by FrustratedPoet
But the idea is that the CityStates work towards a peaceful victory, yes? Or does anything go?

I was of the opinion that anything goes.

Only Barbarians will be able to build Settlers, each of the four Citystates starts with three settlers, but will be able to build a forum that allows city size three and generates happy faces so that the Citystates should be able to support a fairly large size state.

The Citystates share a forum and know of each other's existence and are free to work together or in competition. But the idea is that each Citystate is trying to outdo the other Citystates.

ManicStarSeed · July 23, 2003, 19:00

Again, I can do the mod. I started with one the first time around and can continue to do so. I will wait however; until we have the rules defined a little better...

Mss

HarryH · July 23, 2003, 20:02

Quote:

Originally posted by GhengisFarb
That's kinda the point HarryH. The Democracy game is all about the Citystates, the barbarians are just human AI to provide a better opponent that the game AI would.

I understand that, but if you strangle the human AI too much it will not provide a competitive opponent to make the citystates work for a victory.

Have you noticed what happens when you extract all the money from the AI? It severly reduces their trading ability. The civs that are in the tech lead will continue to trade with each other but the lagards will have nothing to trade with so they get further behind in tech. At several points in the ancient age there are a limited number of techs that can be researched. With the research advantage the citystates have from the start they will get into those techs first. Once they have all the first tier techs from the barbs the barbs will not have much to trade. The citystates will continue to advance in tech and leave the barbs behind. The citystates will be the leaders and trade with each other so they only have to do about a quarter of the techs. The barbs will get left behind and will need to research nearly every tech for themselves. Sounds like some games I have played where I use my cavalry to stomp on any tech leaders. Once that is done, by the time I get tanks the laggard AI civs are building musketmen for defense.

Will the citystates be able to combat each other too or will all the pressure be on the barbs?

It sounds like once the initial trading of starting techs and goody huts are gone, the most valuable assest the barbs will have is new cities. Cities the citystates deparately need. Although very valuable, losing too many cities via conquest or trading will negatively affect the barbs ability to compete.

You want the human AI to be a better opponent than the game AI but at least the game AI can trade techs with each other, and at higher difficulty levels the AI gets a research/production advantage that the barbs will not have. This may turn out to be a serious handicap for the barbs (or it may not turn out as I think it will). You might want to consider other things instead.

Ideas:

Remove the UU from the barbs and give them the regular unit instead. Why should a barb civ have a UU with extra abilities or have a golden age?

Give the citystate civs an extra trait, or remove traits from the barbs.

Give the citystate civs extra UUs (maybe one per age). The downside of this one is that it diminishes the UU differences between the citystates themselves (if there is much combat between the citystates).

Q: Will barbs be allowed to cooperate with each other (e.g., alliances, etc.) against the citystates? against each other?

GhengisFarb™ · July 23, 2003, 20:11

Quote:

Originally posted by ManicStarSeed
Again, I can do the mod. I started with one the first time around and can continue to do so. I will wait however; until we have the rules defined a little better...

Mss

I already have the mod made, but we could use someone to generate and tweak the map so that we don't see it.

FrustratedPoet · July 24, 2003, 04:51

Quote:

Originally posted by HarryH
Ideas:

Remove the UU from the barbs and give them the regular unit instead. Why should a barb civ have a UU with extra abilities or have a golden age?

Give the citystate civs an extra trait, or remove traits from the barbs.

Give the citystate civs extra UUs (maybe one per age). The downside of this one is that it diminishes the UU differences between the citystates themselves (if there is much combat between the citystates).

You wrote a nice long post detailing some good reasons why the Barbs might be far too weak to make this idea viable and then suggested three ways to make the City States much stronger? I'm confused....

GhengisFarb™ · July 24, 2003, 06:39

The Barbarians are called that because they are not the Citystates. Just like Rome called anyone not Roman "barbarian" it doesn't mean their the computer barbarians.

I don't see any need to mess with the UUs or giving extra traits to the Citystates, they have almost every one when you look at the four different ones.

redstar1 · July 24, 2003, 07:39

Yeah, I think it will be very interesting just as it is, much like the days of Rome as GhengisFarb suggested....