RaNDom-0?

Welcome to what I hope will be a new Succession Game, rather than a thread that dies a slow, painful death. First off, let me explain something: For those of you who don't know me, I'm a strange one. In games, I like to experiment with the settings, often setting up bizarre scenarios or nearly no-win conditions just to see what happens. With that in mind . . . .

So, here's the plan: Why plan everything out? Let's take a roll of the dice and see what we get. Completely (or nearly completely) random settings are the name of this game: Random Civ, Random map (or Fractal or Shuffle, I'm not sure what the best script is in this regard), random climate, sea level, etc. Random Map Size is an option, although I'm not sure if that's a risk worth taking.

On second thought, the Fantasy map script might be more appropriate, because I recall that it creates a map with no regard to normal terrain/resource placement. I would favor this, but it's not for the faint of heart, methinks.

Additional settings will include Unrestricted Leaders (so that we may end up with just about anything) and Random AI Personalities (as well as Choose Religion). If there are any other appropriate settings, we'll consider that.

Lastly, to truly keep in the spirit of the game, I will roll up only one starting location. Difficulty will probably be at Monarch, though that's up for discussion. I've been told that the AI have trouble with Unrestricted Leaders, so perhaps we can play at a higher difficulty to make things more interesting. Actually, difficulty will also be considered based on what level of players are interested in this in the first place.

I envision the goal of this game as having fun more so than simply winning. Granted, many find winning to be fun and I would discourage anyone who plays to intentionally sabotage the game, but we will surely find ourselves in a strange land and eschewing with normal strategy seems like a perfectly fine idea. Take risks, take leaps, go crazy!

To quote Travis Touchdown: "Could kick ass. Could be dangerous. Could totally suck."

So, who will be the first to enter this mad, mad world?

Victims so far:

-Whost
-sturick
-Sengir
-Mighty Dwaarf
-OJimiJam
-Sweetacshon

I suggest you employ some of these superior tactics:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/search.php?searchid=935006

In the spirit of the game I shall decide whether or not to join by rolling a six-sided die.

If it comes up even I will play.
If it comes up odd then I will roll again.

And I roll a three...okay lets try this again...I roll a six this time.
Okay so my personal RNG says that I would like to join.
I think my decision algorithm could use a bit of work though.

I vote for emperor level to increase the challenge factor but I am flexible on that.

I'm going on a summer holiday, so....

Wait a minute, I'm not, so count me in. I'd vote for Emperor as well, though Monarch is fine with me as well (I don't think randomizing that is the best idea )

Pindrus said:

I suggest you employ some of these superior tactics:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/search.php?searchid=935006

Click to expand...

Umm, that's coming up as a blank for me. What search terms/game was that looking up?

@sturick and Sengir: Hey, glad to have you aboard! In no small part because it adds legitimacy to this enterprise . . . Emperor sounds fun. Perhaps we will be so lucky to have a crap start, too!

Oh, and sturick: I like the style of your decision-making process!

Sounds fun, but as I do go on holidays and am involved in a coupe more SGs, I should let this one pass I'm afraid. But if you suffer from drop-outs or can't fill the roster (which I doubt...) I won't mind filling in. Good luck!

Good luck on this guys. Whosit if you want a random map try using the RandomScriptMap. (of course if you judge it by the SAM01 game and its poor resources you might not want it ) i think it was included with the 3.17 patch so I'm assuming it will still be there with 3.19.

I'm not 100% that I've seen the RandomScriptMap in my game, but I'll look and mess around to see what may best suit our purposes. Actually, you bring up another point I meant to make.

Regarding patch 3.19, I don't really pay attention to things so I'm not sure why everyone's generally hesitant to convert (I know people who don't upgrade get locked out, but are those people unable to upgrade for some reason?). Are there bugs that have yet to be worked out? Either way, this game will be in 3.17 because I'm still in other games that haven't changed, but if that gets all worked out I'd be fine with upgrading mid-game. That might add another dash of unpredictability to the game.

Whosit said:

Umm, that's coming up as a blank for me. What search terms/game was that looking up?

Click to expand...

Ack! I tested the link, but it seems that search queries are cleared out after a few minutes or something like that.

I don't want to give away the search terms, so I will have to instead provide links to a few of the threads:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=276366
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=298218
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=300526
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=318539

I personally have both versions loaded on my puter so I play either one.

I believe Sengir is waiting for compatibility with some of the mods that he runs to bump up to 3.19

The only noticeable difference that I have found with 3.19 (I'm sure there are many unnoticed as well) is the ability to investigate a captured city before choosing to keep or raze. This eliminates the accidental razing of a city with 4 settled GGs for example.

Whosit I would be interested in this game seems to warrant just getting stuck in without hours of pre planning.
I am still in 3.17 purely for compatability with current GOTM comps which is likely to remain case for another month or so.

I like the idea though of being able to check wheter to raze or keep a city as many a time I've won a battle for cities before actually deciding which way to go.

OK, it sounds like you're interested, MD, so I'll stick you in the roster.

Being able to check out a city would be useful, though probably not critical just yet . . . Though I read that there was AI improvements and other things.

Im at home with not much to do this summer as well, and would gladly join if you'll have me. Im fine with monarch/emperor as well, and you might as well put choose religions on as well, just for that bit extra.

Welcome to the team, OJimiJam! And, yes, I meant to include Choose Religions as one of the game settings, thanks for reminding me!

One slot remaining. Who will dare ride this rollercoaster. That we are building. As we ride it.

Edit: While we're waiting for the final person, let's start voting on which map script to use. I think the main choices are between RandomMapScript and Fantasy-Realm. The RandomMapScript basically randomly chooses one of the normal map scripts (continents, Pangaea, archipelago, etc.) and creates it. So, you get a randomly-determined yet otherwise mundane map. Fantasy_Realm on the other hand seems to essentially choose each tile at random, creating nightmarish maps with no rhyme or reason and whose playability is Delightfully Dubious.

My personal vote is for the Fantasy maps because I think it truly exemplifies Randomness, but I'll give in to Democracy just this once.

Also, I will randomize the roster, so everyone should be ready in case they come up first.

OK, it's been a while since I did an SG, so I'll jump in. Fantasy is ridiculous, and so has my vote.

Alright, the Roster is full! I'll finalize settings tomorrow, and I'll create the start when all the votes are in. Currently:

2/6 Votes

RandomMapScript: 0
Fantasy_Realm: 2

Without much experience in either I'll abstain. Also this gives 5 votes so will have a majority.

Fantasy_Realm. RandomMapScript is not so random, especially not after the first turnset.

The reason that I started my SG in 3.17 was that I didn't want to exclude the (S)GOTM players. As soon as those games are updated to 3.19 (I think upon the next start), I will probably update my game to 3.19 as well (assuming we're not done by then). For modding, well, the mod is updated to 3.19 by now, so I have to make a dual installation this weekend anyway.

Never played Fantasy mapscript before...from what I'm hearing it sounds like crazyfun!
So my vote is for Fantasy.

Welcome aboard Mighty Dwaarf and Sweetachson...nice to meetcha!

Sounds like we have a majority for Fantasy_Realm with 5 of the 6 votes in. I'll roll up the start a few hours from now on Emperor Difficulty.

Oh, now may be as good a time as any to lay out a few ground rules.

First, I'd like to run this with a relatively strict 24/48 hour rule. After the save is posted, the next player in the roster has 24 hours to "claim" his turn, and another 48 hours after the claim to play and post his report. By "relatively strict," I mean that if 36 hours have elapsed after a save has been posted and the next player has not been heard from, I would encourage the player next in line to claim the game in order to keep things moving. Anyone who gets skipped (or needs to be skipped) will either take their turn when next able or simply return to their place in the roster, depending on the situation.

Secondly, I encourage turn-by-turn reports for the sake of clarity and making sure everyone has an idea about what's going on. I mean, if absolutely nothing happens on any particular turn, I suppose you don't have to write much, or anything, but I think even things like worker actions and some unit commands may be worth sharing. If you look at any of the reports that I've written, I think that they're a rather extreme example of detail as I almost always include detailed build-orders and moment-to-moment commentary on the action. I'm not claiming that it's better than a more terse form of reporting, but it just seems to be what I do. Oh, yes, and pictures are always welcome.

Um, if my atrocious memory is serving me correctly, I think that's actually about it. Otherwise, just be nice to everyone. Commentary and critique are welcome, at least, helpful and constructive critique. I'm definitely not an expert at Civ IV, so if someone notices an area that I can improve on, lemme know. Or, if you just want to point out something awesome that someone did. Everyone likes praise.