Hmm ... for starters, do we want to put up a link to the last time we had this discussion (tier system proposals, [or was that tear?
], polls on tiers, IIRC) or would we prefer to just forget all of that?
No time just now to hunt that up ...
One thing that a brand new version gives us is the chance to revisit the awards structure, and perhaps some of the speed and score algorithms.
Here is one idea that has been bouncing around in my head ...
In some of the immortal or diety games, I frequently see early on that I don't have a path to victory. But I do have an opportunity to survive and even thirve, even if not #1 (or 2 or ... 6
). Our current system actually penalizes continued play in terms of points in the score globals (not winning is always a 0 in speed). So you get better points by resigning after some number of turns where the decay function really sets in.
What if we made the points you get if you don't win some function of base score, rather than Firaxis score? Or the better of the Firaxis score and some appropriate function of base score? This would give some incentive (at least to me) to continue a game where winning is out of reach, with the goal of making a civilization that is as rich and advanced as it can be (given it's neighbors, etc.).
Currently, we give medals to the best speed-adjusted scores (since Firaxis score includes a speed factor), awards to the fastest victories of particulary types regardless of score, and the cow to the largest winning base score. Anything here that we want to do differently?
Do the low awards still make sense?
Are there any other game milestones that we want to recognize or award?
dV