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RE: Do you have BtS?

jerm — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 14:18:22 GMT

That was a debate last time. The issues are, if it's at a high level, it might exclude some from being president if they are not at a higher level of play. So yeah, we've got a few who might do well at higher levels but it would make a smaller pool of potential presidents. I think we were on Prince in the Dgame and we only had one president. I think Noble is fine or even warlord.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Palpster — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 12:49:34 GMT

[quote][b]Scipio Africanus (8/26/2007)[/b][hr]Maybe the next game should be on Noble difficulty, eh?[/quote]

What difficulty did you try last time?

With all the experience gathered here it should be possible to run a game on a higher difficulty than noble, no?

RE: Do you have BtS?

tones — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 05:52:16 GMT

With an advanced start?:)

RE: Do you have BtS?

Scipio Africanus — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 18:07:25 GMT

It was a boring map wasn't it. Maybe the next game should be on Noble difficulty, eh?

RE: Do you have BtS?

Bismarck2990 — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 16:08:23 GMT

A good number of people, who are involved in this discussion to restart, were very hands-off in the Warlords game. After making that observation, I don't see how emulating the original map used in the Warlords game would satisfy our new player base more than just starting over. Personally, as I've said elsewhere, I was very disinterested with the DGame due to my lack of the Warlords expansion at the time (which limited what positions I could run for, etc)... not to mention, as zig mentioned, our own starting position made the game rather slow due to our isolated continent.

I'm in favor of starting over, as it would personally spark new interest for me. I also imagine the same interest would be generated for others (both new and old).

Start from scratch, imo.

RE: Do you have BtS?

tones — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 15:39:03 GMT

[quote]I think that just starting from scratch is the way to go. Tosk is right, there was no momentum to begin with.[/quote]

I agree with my learned friends, and if we did go down the road of a two team game this discussion is moot as well.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Zigeuner — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:43:52 GMT

[quote]Make sure Celts are on an isolated continent by themselves.[/quote]Ai, part of the problem was that the Celts were on an island all by themselv, um, OURselves. The calls for war would have been much more intriguing if neighbors had been within reach. To willfully recreate boring settings is... ill advised.

RE: Do you have BtS?

jerm — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 12:04:41 GMT

I think that just starting from scratch is the way to go. Tosk is right, there was no momentum to begin with.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Scipio Africanus — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 07:05:47 GMT

The thing that would take up a lot of time in 'recreating' our current game would be exactly replicating the map, and I don't think that is is necessary.

Instead, generate a new random map with same settings, and a start date that is Classical I suppose.

Make sure Celts are on an isolated continent by themselves. Make sure all the key resources that each tribe has access to are there, in their territories.

Give every civ the Techs, units, cities and buildings that it has. That's it.

It would still be quite laborious and tedious, and I don't have the time to do it myself, but it would not actually need to be as laborious and tedious as exactly replicating the map.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Palpster — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 06:14:07 GMT

You don't consider the AI never investing in tech a pretty big flaw in the system?

You could of course make this a bit fairer by not investing in tech yourself, but in the context of this thread that would mean everyone starts with the exact same techs....now I haven't been following the D-game all that much, but I'm pretty sure not every Civ is equal when it comes to techs, so this wouldn't be an accurate recreation of that game.

Advanced Starts as they are now seem more geared toward multiplayer. They get you started without the obligatory "press enter for next turn" at the start of the game.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Scipio Africanus — Sun, 26 Aug 2007 05:16:18 GMT

[quote][b]Palpster (8/25/2007)[/b][hr]Advanced starts won't do the trick, they only really work in multiplayer. Just to do some testing I started one against the AI with an insane amount of points. The AI just doesn't spend them....I start the game with about 750 points and they're at between 80 and 150. I'm fighting warriors and archers with curassiers. They ask me to give them fishing or sailing while I'm researching Astronomy. I think the only thing they had at game start was about 3 cities each, maybe with a worker, that's it.

The only thing to do would be for someone to recreate the game in World Builder, but that would probably take even longer than starting over from scratch.[/quote]

Hmmm. I'm skeptical that this is the case. In my (limited and anecdotal) experience, the AI DOES get the points, and it DOES use them. I might be wrong. It would be good to know this for certain. If it is working the way you suggest, then the Advance Start option is really just a way to give the human an advantage at the beginning, and something tells me that this is not what it is intended to be; but I might be wrong. I cannot imagine why they would have 7 or 10 difficulty levels AND an advance start option mechanism for giving even finer shades of differentiation between the difficulty levels; but I might be wrong :) Then again, it may be that this was something they added fairly late in development, and did not have enough time to test and see if the AI 'understood' it sufficiently to use it properly.

The one thing that might be throwing you off is that the AI does not seem to view the Advance Start Points the same way we humans do. For me, if I use advance start to get a nice balanced situation: 3 to 4 cities; a few military units, a few workers, a couple naval; some culture expansion, maybe one key Tech (depending on how many points I have to spend). I think the AI tends to blow his points on: (a) population; (b) tile improvements; (c) culture and/or (c) cheapo units.

Examples, I started up a random standard map on Noble diff industrial era start, just to see how it worked. I set it at about 45,000 start points. I immediately set a city and a worker, some tile improvements, another city, then I spent about 20,000 some odd points on a Tech or two, and this allowed me to place some INFANTRY. I wound up with about 5 cities in the 3 to 4 pop size range, a modest amount of tile improvements, two key techs ahead (Communism, and the one for infantry, forget what it is), about 3 infantry, 3 riflemen, a couple pirates, a couple caravels, a couple frigates, and one worker.

The AI whom I first contacted meanwhile had seemingly zero additional techs beyond those that come with Industrial start, but had all cities above 6 or 7 size, and had many more tile improvements. His best units were riflemen.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Tosk — Sat, 25 Aug 2007 20:42:36 GMT

[quote]But then restarting will eat up a lot of momentum.[/quote]

If there were any momentum to begin with this whole discussion would be moot.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Palpster — Sat, 25 Aug 2007 16:49:00 GMT

Advanced starts won't do the trick, they only really work in multiplayer. Just to do some testing I started one against the AI with an insane amount of points. The AI just doesn't spend them....I start the game with about 750 points and they're at between 80 and 150. I'm fighting warriors and archers with curassiers. They ask me to give them fishing or sailing while I'm researching Astronomy. I think the only thing they had at game start was about 3 cities each, maybe with a worker, that's it.

The only thing to do would be for someone to recreate the game in World Builder, but that would probably take even longer than starting over from scratch.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Scipio Africanus — Sat, 25 Aug 2007 15:11:05 GMT

Firaxis should be damned for not making their fricking expansion packs and patches backwards compatible even with the "Mod Assets Locked" setting activated . . .

I have BTS, and I am unlikely to ever play another Warlords game. IMO, since BTS is an expansion on Warlords, the ideal for any ongoing PBEMs, DGames etc. is if the old save in Warlords can be opened in BTS. But it sounds like in various instances that that is problematic at best.

Similar to Comedy Dave, my time is going to be limited in the future though. So I cannot really promise significant participation no matter what game is used. I suppose I'd be MORE likely to participate if it was a BTS game. But then restarting will eat up a lot of momentum.

The possible happy medium compromise: restart a BTS with similar settings, but have advanced start points sufficient to allow us to do about what we have done in the existing game. Someone would have to add that up.

RE: Do you have BtS?

psweetman1590 — Fri, 24 Aug 2007 21:01:51 GMT

*Starts munching popcorn, and waves two flags, one with "LC" emblazened in orange on blue, and the other with a single large white "T" on a black background*

Ooh, this might get good. :D

To make this post relevant, in some way, to the original topic, I do not have BTS, and will not have BTS for several months. Of course, I still hope to contribute as much as possible...

RE: Do you have BtS?

tones — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 10:57:51 GMT

[quote]WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT,[/quote]

Perhaps the eye and hand are working but the mind... alas, I fear the worst. Perhaps, as you maintain, that is not a pot upon your head, but bandages to cover the horrible wounds left by the brain-sucking beast of Gnaarlplop III. And don't tell me you don't remember visiting because you wouldn't, would you?:hehe:

RE: Do you have BtS?

Locus Coeruleus — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 19:23:16 GMT

[quote]For a man of science you seem remarkably ill-informed. The earth revolves upon its axis merely giving the impression the sun rises and sets; the colour of the sky is dependent upon the angle of incidence of light upon it and whether water is wet or not depends very much upon your size and, indeed, the ambient temperature.[/quote]

Yeah right, jackass. Who said anything about being informed!!?!?!! A central tenant of Science is OBSERVATION!!! A corollary to that is SENSATION!!!
I see with my eyes the sun rising in the east and setting in the west. I see with my eyes the sky, on clear days is blue, even on overcast days, it is still blue, once you get past the clouds. And finally, I feel with my hands that water is wet.

WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT, ***!!!!!!! :w00t:

RE: Do you have BtS?

tones — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 03:45:51 GMT

For a man of science you seem remarkably ill-informed. The earth revolves upon its axis merely giving the impression the sun rises and sets; the colour of the sky is dependent upon the angle of incidence of light upon it and whether water is wet or not depends very much upon your size and, indeed, the ambient temperature. But yeah, I still wanna be a baddie:w00t:

RE: Do you have BtS?

Locus Coeruleus — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 19:12:03 GMT

[quote]I wanna be a baddie.[/quote]

And in other news today, the sun rose in the east and set in the west, the sky is blue and water is wet! :w00t:

RE: Do you have BtS?

tones — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 14:21:06 GMT

jerm [quote]I must say that I do think the 2 team option is a good one [/quote]
Palpster[quote] I might be interested in joining...[/quote]
Mongoose [quote]If you want to start a BTS game (either single or multi), I'm cool with that also[/quote]

CD [quote]I'm cool if you guys wish to start a new game, with what we've learned here[/quote]

Bis [quote]I'm very interested in the idea of having a multi/single DGame started with BtS (multi in particular). [/quote]

...seems like a fair smattering of interest. Let's start picking teams now (that should be revealing:D) How about the Dark Side (rules of the jungle, to the victor the spoils, might is right) and the Light Side (one person one vote, together we stand divided we fall)? I wanna be a baddie.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Terminal_Civ-er — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 11:37:57 GMT

* The madman starts packing his bags.*

*Mumbles* Just when I'm getting ready to make a major breakthrough, too! I don't what the big deal is about the Big Time [Jumping] Satellite though. Others have been leaping around in time for eons. Of course, I can't figure out why they left out the J in BTS, either.

RE: Do you have BtS?

jerm — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 11:31:34 GMT

Now, there is one glaring question that keeps coming back to me and that is what if a new patch comes out right after we get things going? I guess we'll all have to fight the temptation to upgrade to it. I really hope this is it for a while, even if there are a few things I'd like to see "fixed".

RE: Do you have BtS?

Bismarck2990 — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 11:21:05 GMT

I'm very interested in the idea of having a multi/single DGame started with BtS (multi in particular). I'll also go ahead and say that I would probably be more inclined to contribute my time on such a game in contrast with the current. I've been limited in what positions I can run for with the current game due to not having Warlords, so this would allow myself for one, to pursue the other positions such as turn-player or even Princep (if we still used the same government setup that is).

Restarting with BtS seems the way to go if we want to get more people to participate. :)

RE: Do you have BtS?

Comedy Dave — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 05:59:18 GMT

I'm still on Warlords 2.08... ;)

But... my time is somewhat limited, so I don't know if I could devote time to a full presidential term any time soon... unless we carry on at the pace we are currently going... :P

I'm cool if you guys wish to start a new game, with what we've learned here... hey I'll have to run for Justice since the Princep will need Bts! :P

RE: Do you have BtS?

Locus Coeruleus — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 21:28:49 GMT

Modified Assets Locked is the devil! :w00t:

RE: Do you have BtS?

mongoose201 — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 21:24:22 GMT

I think it's time for a reality check.

To play the dgame save file you need to have version 2.08 of Warlords, not the latest version (2.13). Anyone who has BtS is automatically upgraded to 2.13 unless they do the Dual Install that I posted in the help section.

I'm willing to continue as President and playing the turns until the end of this term (20 more turns), but I didn't plan on being president forever. I wanted others to have the experience as well. I'm now on my third term as President when I initially envisioned only 2.

The problem comes now with finding someone with not only the ability to play the turns, but also the inclination and maturity to do so while keeping everyone "in the loop", so to speak.

Also, I'm not going to lie, I've been as distracted by BtS over the last couple of weeks, as most of the rest of you have been, and I don't know if we can sustain enough interest in a Warlords game especially taking into account both of the above factors.

This is my opinion only, not a judgement from "on high" or anything like that.

I'm open to whatever you guys want to do. If you want to close this out and turn this save into some kind of special GOTM, I'm cool.

If you want to start a BTS game (either single or multi), I'm cool with that also and will make sure we have all the forums set up properly. I can also set up some 1bcciv.com email addresses for the teams that will forward to the different team members if thats the direction we end up going.

Thoughts?

ADDED: The Warlords Dgame map cannot be opened in WorldBuilder. When you choose the "Modified Assets Locked" option, it prevents access to WB.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Palpster — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 17:11:17 GMT

I might be interested in joining...

RE: Do you have BtS?

jerm — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 12:32:48 GMT

I think I'd be against using the same map as well. It should just start fresh. The game rules and mechanics between Warlords and BtS are different enough that it would probably produce different results. As far as whether or not it would create more interest, that is the purpose of this poll. If hardly anyone had it, I'd think interest would be low. It does seem that there are enough people who have it, the question is if there are enough people who have it and will be active. That's a subject for another poll I suppose.

I must say that I do think the 2 team option is a good one if the mechanics can be ironed out.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Comedy Dave — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 05:34:20 GMT

I don't have BTS but will get it eventually.

Not sure if re-starting will improve or reduce interest in the game, though.

If we do restart, and cannot use the same map/game, then why not turn the rest of the game into a GotM (for those of us still with Warlords...) ;)

RE: Do you have BtS?

swordinthestorm — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 04:22:48 GMT

i do not have BTS yet, but i will get it. I dont have warlords but it doesn't stop me from participating. As for restarting the game we need to consider would it give us more interest or less. i think if we did one of those accelerated start ups where you have a coulpe of cities to begin with we wouldn't lose too much progress. Also can the map be saved in warlords world builder and used in bts? That would be great if it could.

just thought if we wait till we find the last nation and explore till we know all their capital locations we could and export the map to bts we could recreate the starting positions and follow our Executive reports up to the current date. It could work! How much different will the Ai do thing i wonder?

the only way id support the change over would be if it was seamless or would generate alot of interest and if it would get the game running again!!!!!

RE: Do you have BtS?

Zigeuner — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 10:38:56 GMT

I certainly did not mean to suggest just a team PBEM. I was thinking of having one side D-game, but make such changes as to enable one turn a day play. The other side might be a Dynasty game of sorts. Instead of sorting the faction members by site, they could be sorted by interest (give feedback on play vs play as overlord every now and then).

When I say "one side D-game" I'm thinking of perhaps 5 to 10 very active citizens setting one course of action; when I mention "a Dynasty game of sorts" I'm thinking of 3 to 5 active players that take a set of (10, 15) turns and do their own bidding without interference or feedback. Both ways of play have their drawbacks and strongpoints. I would certainly prefer to be on the Dynasty side of things (not sure if that's a drawback or strongpoint :P).

RE: Do you have BtS?

tones — Sun, 19 Aug 2007 06:48:59 GMT

It would be nice if it wasn't just a team PBEM but had some sort of existence in this or another forum. What I mean is that perhaps each team should post an update and map each "x" number of turns. Of course this means that members of the opposing team can see what their rivals are getting up to but is this necessarliy a bad thing? (screen shots don't tell the whole story, after all) It could give the thing a whole new slant.

It would also be fun for observers and could serve as an open platform for diplomacy and interaction between the teams (name-calling and sabre-rattling in other words) New recruits could be tempted in (y'all want to be on the winning side don't ya?) and non-players could add their comments.

I also think it should be a race to attain a certain number of points over and above the opposition and not a full slog to the end (as by then it's usually obvious who is going to win anyway)

RE: Do you have BtS?

jerm — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 22:57:48 GMT

[quote]Now see, the only problem I see here is that this might rule out folks like swordinthestorm, and grandgeneral, who have been two of the more active members in the flailing d-game. [/quote]

Yeah, that is an issue. Now that I think about it, Elite Warlord would rule out a lot of people. I think the post minimum shouldn't be high (50 posts?). Still, it would discourage new members but what's more important, keeping cheaters out or recruiting more members.

[quote]Better yet, the two teams can each create a team email on something like yahoo or hotmail, in which a common user name and password are known by all the team members. It's not that difficult to do these days.

A while back, some of us actually had a 3 team PBEM going that von had graciously set up a map for on the civ3. There were no AI involved in this game, and since there were only three teams involved we usually got in a save a day so the slowness issue was not a factor, and we even did manage to have a couple of power sessions too.

I can speak for my team, which, surprise surprise was Ness and I. The other teams eventually broke down to just one play each, which gave Ness and I an advantage (the more brains the better! ) and we split the turns up into 5 turns at a time- enough to set basic goals and not too much to keep the other out of the loop for too long. And we had a forum set up to discuss strategy and whatnot and keep track of basic information. And if someone was going to be on vacation for a while, ok, forget the five and five rule, one of would play until the other got back and then we'd even out the turns then.

It wasn't a "Democracy game" so to speak, but a team PBEM where each player on the team, theoretically has input and each team can establish their own team-dynamics however they wish.

IMO it was a nice spin on the basic game-style concept. [/quote]

Yeah, that does sound cool but would we need to scrap this game to do something like that? If you think about it, if you want a Dgame PBEM, you're gonna need a few more people to make it work. What you've explained, we could start one now while this is going on.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Locus Coeruleus — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 18:45:29 GMT

[quote](maybe limit it for elite warlords?.. but then we're not going to have an influx of new players; maybe a minimum amount of posts though to qualify for citizenship so we could spot red flags easier)[/quote]

Now see, the only problem I see here is that this might rule out folks like swordinthestorm, and grandgeneral, who have been two of the more active members in the flailing d-game. ;)

[quote]If the person who's supposed to play the turns doesn't send them back, the guy on the other team can just keep sending it to the next person in charge on the other team so that it won't get too backed up. [/quote]

Better yet, the two teams can each create a team email on something like yahoo or hotmail, in which a common user name and password are known by all the team members. It's not that difficult to do these days.

A while back, some of us actually had a 3 team PBEM going that von had graciously set up a map for on the civ3. There were no AI involved in this game, and since there were only three teams involved we usually got in a save a day so the slowness issue was not a factor, and we even did manage to have a couple of power sessions too.

I can speak for my team, which, surprise surprise was Ness and I. The other teams eventually broke down to just one play each, which gave Ness and I an advantage (the more brains the better! :D) and we split the turns up into 5 turns at a time- enough to set basic goals and not too much to keep the other out of the loop for too long. And we had a forum set up to discuss strategy and whatnot and keep track of basic information. And if someone was going to be on vacation for a while, ok, forget the five and five rule, one of would play until the other got back and then we'd even out the turns then.

It wasn't a "Democracy game" so to speak, but a team PBEM where each player on the team, theoretically has input and each team can establish their own team-dynamics however they wish.

IMO it was a nice spin on the basic game-style concept. :)

RE: Do you have BtS?

jerm — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 17:54:30 GMT

Whoa! I just realized I put this in the Executive Reports forum. Goose, if you want to move it to Town Square, please do. :blush:

RE: Do you have BtS?

jerm — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 17:49:23 GMT

As long as there are strict punishments for using double identities, I think it could work (maybe limit it for elite warlords?.. but then we're not going to have an influx of new players; maybe a minimum amount of posts though to qualify for citizenship so we could spot red flags easier). It may be complicated for the guy setting it all up. The teams wouldn't even have to be that big either. The biggest problem I see is that if it's a PBEM, it will be extremely slow going unless the two heads of state can agree to a time to have a good turn playing session of at least 10 turns. For that reason alone it should stick to two teams with really simple governments. Basically an elected first in command then second and so on and so forth. In the Mgame, if the "emperor" doesn't play the turns, there's a ranking of people to back the person above up and play the turns for them. If the person who's supposed to play the turns doesn't send them back, the guy on the other team can just keep sending it to the next person in charge on the other team so that it won't get too backed up. How that is figured out can be decided by the citizens of each government and they can go for a more democratic model or something more despotic as long as each team meets a bare minimum of criteria. Give a week (or whatever) per turn session for time to discuss what to do next but once it's time to play, you play.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Palpster — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 17:11:45 GMT

Should be possible...give each team a different forum part with access only by members of that team.

RE: Do you have BtS?

Locus Coeruleus — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 17:06:48 GMT

In other words you want to do a team PBEM?

RE: Do you have BtS?

tones — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 16:56:55 GMT

[quote]Perhaps it would be more entertaining if there were more than one faction represented in the game[/quote]

Now THAT is a bloody good idea. How about two teams? How would this work? Can it work? I dunno, but I like it!:)

RE: Do you have BtS?

Zigeuner — Sat, 18 Aug 2007 16:28:07 GMT

Perhaps it would be more entertaining if there were more than one faction represented in the game; a rival faction could perhaps be set up on Civilized, could even be as a dynasty game with "presidents" ruling for ten turns.

I must say that playing [url=http://1bcciv.com/Topic2238868-75-1.aspx]the M-game[/url] holds my attention far better, because I have my own lands to defend, my own deals to make, my own scores to settle. For long-term, high-quality fun you have to have something at stake, and nothing's at stake here...