Weird thing between normalized score and score

My wife and I like to play Civ 4 together co-operatively. We usually play on one team so that we can work together. Well, we were finishing a game yesterday where we were really close in score, went back and forth, but she clipped me at the end when we achieved a Space Race victory, beat me by like 15 points when our scores were both over 3800. Now here's where it gets weird, when we get to the final screen, her normalized score was about 10 points LOWER than mine, even though her raw score was 15 points higher. I understand there's a lot of voodoo going on to normalize the scores, but i would have thought the raw scores from a single multiplayer game would have normalized exactly the same.

Anyone have an explanation of how this could happen?

Difficulty could be a factor?

Not entirely relevant, but...

sadly, the scoring system doesn't work too well in any case. To get the highest possible score, it usually helps to postpone a certain win and play with yourself for a while, building up your empire to epic proportions.

Most likely, you were playing on different difficulty levels or you swapped who was infront on the inter-turn before winning.

Population, win date, and difficulty are the biggest factors. That's why you see those huge domination wins in the early goings worth over 500k.

Iranon said:

...it usually helps to postpone a certain win and play with yourself for a while, building up your empire to epic proportions.

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Maybe it's just me, but this post sounds like it belongs on a very different type of message board.

I guess I wasn't alone when that came to mind, but I didn't know what others would think if I admitted it . Cathy "slaps" hard? No.

I'm not sure I agree with the tactic, in any context that involves civ 4 anyway...!

Sisiutil said:

Maybe it's just me, but this post sounds like it belongs on a very different type of message board.

Click to expand...

I wasn't expecting something that, and had a huge gulp of Diet Coke in my mouth when I read it - what a mess.

There is nothing accident-causingly funny about playing with yourself before shooting your rocket. And it feels exactly how it sounds.

Sisiutil - you made me spit out my hashbrowns. Perv.