Planning cIV BTS MTDG III

And when you say "common sense judgment" please spell out what that means so we can discuss this honestly. I think what "common sense judgment" means is that RB is refusing new accounts, because you suspect them to be spies from other teams.

Is that right? If it is then just say so, let's drop the innuendo so we can truly address this issue.

RB is not one person. Everyone has their differing opinions. We do however have one spokesperson. (For clarity, it's not me).

Sommerswerd said:

<snip>
In competitive games, particularly MTDG games when a turnplayer gets accused of a DM he is shamed and embarrased in front of his whole team and there is a tendancy to get defensive... "I was just logging in to look around", "I didn't move any units", "You DMed me before and I didn't say anything!" and a litany of other excuses. Then the teammates of the Turnplayer rally behind him and start quitting in protest when the admin enforces the rule... Game ruined. This has happened now in BTS MTDG I AND II!!
<snip>

Click to expand...

The first BtS demogame was not ruined by a double move, it was ruined by accusations of cheating. Furthermore, double moves were impossible in that game because it was played with sequential turns. It was a completely different issue, and is not even remotely preventable by a mod.

I'm not too sure about the second BtS demogame, but from what I've read it seems like the double move issue occurred, it was addressed by the admin, and everyone (but the offending player) moved on with the game, so there was no need for an anti-DM mod.

I remember signing up for the last demo game; you had to request access to get into a team's forums. Why is it all of the sudden a big deal for this game?

I see Sommerswerd has already mentioned this somewhat above, and also that nabaxo has mentioned something about it in regards to team RB.

So, just so it's said. In this thread all my views represent just that: my views. They are not representative in any way for Team CFC's views. The official Team CFC views will be presented by our Team Captain when applicable.

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

azzaman333 said:

The first BtS demogame was not ruined by a double move, it was ruined by accusations of cheating. Furthermore, double moves were impossible in that game because it was played with sequential turns. It was a completely different issue, and is not even remotely preventable by a mod.

I'm not too sure about the second BtS demogame, but from what I've read it seems like the double move issue occurred, it was addressed by the admin, and everyone (but the offending player) moved on with the game, so there was no need for an anti-DM mod.

Click to expand...

Fair points all azza, so I will split hairs with you on this one

The first BTS MTDG was ruined because the accused Turnplayer refused to accept the administrator enforcement and quit in protest, then his whole Team quit, partially in solidarity, and partially because there was no willing Turnplayer left. It has since been determined that the particular issue in question is resolved by turning on "Random Seed on Reload", but that a seperate issue of course. The reason game I is relevant, is because administrator enforcement collapsed the game because accused players won't accept it. That's why the hard-coded solution of a Mod is desirable, to avoid the need for administrator enforcement.

The second BTS MTDG was ruined because the accused Turnplayer refused to accept the administrator enforcement over a Doublemove and quit in protest. At the time he was the only willing turnplayer and the game would have been over entirely, but there was one player remaining that was willing to take over ON THE CONDITION that we agree to pursue peaceful victory for the rest of the game. So the game continued to conclusion, but in a severly nerfed state because all the remaining civs were allied and War was essentially forbidden.

pindicator said:

I remember signing up for the last demo game; you had to request access to get into a team's forums. Why is it all of the sudden a big deal for this game?

Click to expand...

Because in the last game, teams accepted new accounts, even brand new accounts no problem. But in this game RB has decided to refuse new accounts because they think that new accounts are spies trying to sneak on their team from other sites.

The result is Krill told the RB players who were refused by RB to go join CFC. We responded by saying we were doing the same thing as RB. Krill argued forcefully with us against this. I suggested that he should convince RB to just take their own players.

Now LP is suggesting that the Spanish Mod is undesireable because it creates barriers to entry that will discourage new players from playing, and I am pointing out the irony in that given that RB first introduced this new policy of banning new players.

[tongue-in-cheek] And nabaxo is ranting nonsensical arguments to prove what a zealous devoted true-believer he is in the RB religion/belief system (For ex, "RB isn't one person" "I (nabaxo) am not the spokesman" Why even say that? It's just spam[/tongue-in-cheek]

Sommerswerd said:

So the game continued to conclusion, but in a severly nerfed state because all the remaining civs were allied and War was essentially forbidden.

Click to expand...

Oh my god! You are hilarious!

And I need to point out one thing though, this list: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=11520069&postcount=2
Notice how Krill is not on it.

Now Sommerswerd, can you please lay off the ad hominems against us and try to argue our points and not argue us?

Sommerswerd said:

Fair points all azza, so I will split hairs with you on this one

The first BTS MTDG was ruined because the accused Turnplayer refused to accept the administrator enforcement and quit in protest, then his whole Team quit, partially in solidarity, and partially because there was no willing Turnplayer left. It has since been determined that the particular issue in question is resolved by turning on "Random Seed on Reload", but that a seperate issue of course. The reason game I is relevant, is because administrator enforcement collapsed the game because accused players won't accept it. That's why the hard-coded solution of a Mod is desirable, to avoid the need for administrator enforcement.

Click to expand...

I'm not sure if you're genuinely misinformed, or deliberately misrepresenting the situation. Memphus quit because after the admins had decided that there was insufficient evidence to prove Memphus was cheating, slaze continued to publicly accuse Memphus of cheating. The problem was the public accusations of cheating, NOT the admin decision.

The second BTS MTDG was ruined because the accused Turnplayer refused to accept the administrator enforcement over a Doublemove and quit in protest. At the time he was the only willing turnplayer and the game would have been over entirely, but there was one player remaining that was willing to take over ON THE CONDITION that we agree to pursue peaceful victory for the rest of the game. So the game continued to conclusion, but in a severly nerfed state because all the remaining civs were allied and War was essentially forbidden.

So as you can see

Click to expand...

Again, you're attributing one factor of many as the sole cause of the problem. The admin decision was just the straw that broke the camels back. The bigger factor, IMO, was the fact that Sirius had effectively become Team Blubmuz with Alphashard occasionally giving advice. The drop off of players had happened well before that event. I can foresee the use of any mod for this game seriously hurting the interest levels of the average team member. If an admin ruling would be insufficient to deal with potential DM issues, then sequential turns (with a short turn timer) is a much simpler, and IMO superior option.

Well, i wasnt participating in the last ISDG so i cant and i wont judge about what happened. Long story short: The Double move mod would be great so that no one could even try to complain

Pucc said:

Well, i wasnt participating in the last ISDG so i cant and i wont judge about what happened. Long story short: The Double move mod would be great so that no one could even try to complain

Click to expand...

But what if there are some anticipated issues which cause the game at some stage to become unplayable? Not trying to fault the Spaniards here, but this is a mod that has only had usage on one site, and very little visibility. It is essentially untested by the community and there could be potentially serious issues with it, due to unfamiliarity, restrictions in availability for log-ins or even with the coding of the mod itself.

Far better for this game in my opinion, that we go with the tried and tested route of a clear double move ruleset with a strong admin (R_Rolo is that IMO) who will make decisions on any doubtful moves or accusuations and have them final.
We would be doing a far better service to the double-move mod if we set up a game specifically to test that and see where and how it could possibly be broken.

Nota Beni: This post is written solely as the opinion of me, Brian Shanahan, and has nothing to do with team Realms Beyond, of whom I a am a member. It may actually reflect Team RB consensus, but any such reflection is purely conincidental.

Is there any way just to log every single move made for admins? Assuming it is possible, it should be trivial to write a script cheking the logs few times per day notifying admins for any possible double moves. That way getting caught would be certain and undeniable. For additional transparency full log could even be published after the game.

@ nabaxo - More spam. Make a point and I will respond to it. I cant respond to your spam because there's nothing to respond to (And I can walk and chew gum at the same time ol Buddy as in I can mock your spam "ad hominem" while simultaneously responding to valid substantive points made by others)

@ azza - Again fair points/distinctions. On the second one it seems we agree, and we just differ on how important of a factor it was. But that's all subjective. We both agree it was a factor so I'll leave that alone.

As for your first point, again its a fair distinction (no need to accuse me of "intentional misrepresentation"). I think its important to note that in adition to finding that there was no way to prove misconduct, the admins ALSO suspended (or recommended suspension) of the Turnplayer from playing the turns. IMO that was the straw that broke the Camel's back and caused SANCTA's turnplayer to quit. It seems we disagree on that distinction. You feel strongly that it was righteous indignation over the accusations. I don't know that I can be persuaded that that is true, even by the player himself (who I have since sympathized with on that incident BTW, and even invited him to join AMAZON last game, which he accepted, don't know if you knew that, but just an FYI).

But even assuming that we take your feeling on the issue as correct, that it was the accusations rather than the admin action ie., the whole investigation/inquiry/suspension drama and all the shame and humiliation that went along with it, that induced him to quit. Even if you are right, we still come back to the reality, that if we have a hard-coded Anti-Doublemove Mod, then there won't be anymore Doublemove related accusations for people to quit over. There wont be anymore Turnorder related controversies for admins to conduct investigations, inquiries etc over. That is my point.

(Not @ azza)I would also like to say, that I find all the complaints that the Mod hasn't been tested enough a little bit disrespectful to the Civ community that has been using it all this time. I mean they have been really good sports about it, but those of you saying that its "untested" and similar things... "Untested" by who? You? The FEW Civ clergy that you happen to worship? To say that it's untested because "Oh those noobs over at Spanish community don't know how to properly test a Mod?" Is that what you mean? It's not truly tested unless the high and mighty all knowing english speaking sites test it first?

Maybe that's not what you mean, but that's how it sounds to me.

Concerning the spanish mod. It seems to me Manolo has been making changes all the time based on the wishes presented in this thread. This shows that he is really dedicated to the task, but it also means that we're already talking about a mod that hasn't been used in any game i.e. basically untested. If we continue forward and remove BUG and then incorporate NoScore2, we're getting pretty far from original that was used in several games and risk of game ruining bugs is evident. After all the changes the mod needs to be throughly tested or you're taking a serious risk.

This is not meant to be disrespectful. Anyone who has done software development knows how things can go wrong, no matter how trivial the task might seem beforehand.

Sommerswerd said:

@ nabaxo - More spam. Make a point and I will respond to it. I cant respond to your spam because there's nothing to respond to (And I can walk and chew gum at the same time ol Buddy as in I can mock your spam "ad hominem" while simultaneously responding to valid substantive points made by others)

Click to expand...

Ah yes, belittlement. It's great fun to point out all of the logical fallacies you make use of during a debate.

Sommerswerd said:

(Not @ azza)I would also like to say, that I find all the complaints that the Mod hasn't been tested enough a little bit disrespectful to the Civ community that has been using it all this time. I mean they have been really good sports about it, but those of you saying that its "untested" and similar things... "Untested" by who? You? The FEW Civ clergy that you happen to worship? To say that it's untested because "Oh those noobs over at Spanish community don't know how to properly test a Mod?" Is that what you mean? It's not truly tested unless the high and mighty all knowing english speaking sites test it first?

Maybe that's not what you mean, but that's how it sounds to me.

Click to expand...

And of course, how it sounds to you is completely wrong. What most mean is that the mod hasn't been tested by the community at large. Only one community has any experience with it.


Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

OK, finally a point. I can respond to that. You are wrong that "only one" community has any experience with the Mod. First of all the Spanish community is from Apolyton AFAIK and the Mod has been available and in use by others besides the Spanish community for some time. And even if you were right, that it has been tested by "only one" community... so what? Why is their years of experience running the Mod not enough? Its as if their experience is irrelevant... "This car is reliable I've been driving it for years and kept up the maintenance well" says your friend. You respond "Oh no we have to bring the car to MY mechanic and have him run a full diagnostic on it before I set foot in that thing!" WTF?!?

@ plako - Excellent point. I don't think I have any good response to that. I will think about it, and respond later if I can. I do think that running a testgame (which Caledorn is planning AFAIK) may help a little with that.

I can confirm that I intend to run a testgame with the mod as soon as the BUG part is stripped out, and the webinterface for the mod supports English language.

Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

If your friend wants to sell you his car, will you take his word for it that it runs just fine? Signing up for a 1-2 year game commitment is closer to buying an expensive car that's been used for a few years than taking a small trip in it. Exercising caution is in order.

Fair point Catwalk. Maybe borrowing your friend's expensive car to take an extended trip is a better way of putting it. Afterall youre not "buying" anything here, literally or figuratively. You are free to use other Mods or no Mod in other games you play. Its not like your having to use Only this Mod for the rest of the time you play civ. But anyway, going deeper into the woods with that illustration... if your friend is a mechanic and he tells you he has checked it out and it runs just fine, not to mention he has installed all sorts of custom features and modifications just for you based on your requests, its going to be a little insulting to the friend if you tell him you need to have some other mechanic look at it too.

Hey maybe you thank the friend, take the car and drive it to your mechanic to take a look at it. THEN after having actually given the car a look, you take it back to your friend and say thanks but no thanks. But you certainly dont say to the friends face that the Car hasn't been properly inspected so you aren't driving it, right?

well, if you're in a competitive race with a car, you might want to testdrive it first. =)