[Apologies in advance if this has been commented on and discussed before]
When I was finishing GOTM #4, I noticed a considerable anomaly in the scoring rules for GOTM. The Rules and Download page says:
You'll need to finish the game in a valid way: by conquest, spaceship (yours or AI's), or retirement in 2020 AD. You may not retire on any other occasion.
My question is: do you think the same scoring rules should apply to both a "Your Spaceship" finish and an "AI Spaceship finish"? I don't, and I'll explain why using an example of my last GOTM...
My last GOTM wasn't very high scoring. I discovered later that I could have scored perhaps 80% higher. (If I'd discovered that for a high scoring game I'd have been upset about it!) The end of the game went like this...
The space race began and the Sioux were the first to start building. Everyone had nukes so I decided to keep the peace. As soon as I had all the tech to build a spaceship I began. However, the "choice of next tech" sequencing wouldn't give me Fusion Power as a research option, so I kept researching Espionage to give me something to trade for Fusion Power before launch. As soon as I had Espionage, I lowered the science rate to 0%, and put the tax rate at 70% with 30% luxuries.
You know how it's like when you're in the space race, one civ has got a head start and you're playing the AI with its production advantage at higher levels - you do <u>everything</u> to get that spaceship built. This time everything did get done. Most of you will have done this to rush build a spaceship. First you sell off the universities for extra cash, then the libraries, you disband stuff in cities to help with production. To win this race I had to do all of that, plus reduce the military to one unit only per city, sell off granaries, aqueducts and sewage systems AND all city walls in non-critical strategic points. The Sioux launched first by a few years but I got my trade for Fusion Power with the Egyptians and my own spaceship landed 2 years ahead of teh Sioux. I won... Yay!
But why did I do all that? Because it was the <u>honourable</u> thing to do of course! Because I couldn't feel as though I could hand in a game before 2020 which I hadn't won or been destroyed in. But I realised afterwards that if I'd switched to high luxuries instead, celebrated my cities to twice their sizes while the Sioux were busy messing around with spaceships - if I'd have ignored the space race myself altogether, I would have finished with a MUCH higher score and only a 2% penalty for finishing two years later.
Is this really what we want? I think not. My solution to this problem would be to say that a finish by the AI spaceship counts as a finish in 2020 so that the bonus factor is at its minumum. Otherwise, if I get in a similar position again, I shall do the dishonourable thing, let the AI do the work, keep the peace and grow while they land their spaceship.
How about making this part of the rules?
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<IMG SRC="http://www.anglo-saxon.demon.co.uk/stormerne/stormerne.gif" border=0>
When I was finishing GOTM #4, I noticed a considerable anomaly in the scoring rules for GOTM. The Rules and Download page says:
You'll need to finish the game in a valid way: by conquest, spaceship (yours or AI's), or retirement in 2020 AD. You may not retire on any other occasion.
My question is: do you think the same scoring rules should apply to both a "Your Spaceship" finish and an "AI Spaceship finish"? I don't, and I'll explain why using an example of my last GOTM...
My last GOTM wasn't very high scoring. I discovered later that I could have scored perhaps 80% higher. (If I'd discovered that for a high scoring game I'd have been upset about it!) The end of the game went like this...
The space race began and the Sioux were the first to start building. Everyone had nukes so I decided to keep the peace. As soon as I had all the tech to build a spaceship I began. However, the "choice of next tech" sequencing wouldn't give me Fusion Power as a research option, so I kept researching Espionage to give me something to trade for Fusion Power before launch. As soon as I had Espionage, I lowered the science rate to 0%, and put the tax rate at 70% with 30% luxuries.
You know how it's like when you're in the space race, one civ has got a head start and you're playing the AI with its production advantage at higher levels - you do <u>everything</u> to get that spaceship built. This time everything did get done. Most of you will have done this to rush build a spaceship. First you sell off the universities for extra cash, then the libraries, you disband stuff in cities to help with production. To win this race I had to do all of that, plus reduce the military to one unit only per city, sell off granaries, aqueducts and sewage systems AND all city walls in non-critical strategic points. The Sioux launched first by a few years but I got my trade for Fusion Power with the Egyptians and my own spaceship landed 2 years ahead of teh Sioux. I won... Yay!
But why did I do all that? Because it was the <u>honourable</u> thing to do of course! Because I couldn't feel as though I could hand in a game before 2020 which I hadn't won or been destroyed in. But I realised afterwards that if I'd switched to high luxuries instead, celebrated my cities to twice their sizes while the Sioux were busy messing around with spaceships - if I'd have ignored the space race myself altogether, I would have finished with a MUCH higher score and only a 2% penalty for finishing two years later.
Is this really what we want? I think not. My solution to this problem would be to say that a finish by the AI spaceship counts as a finish in 2020 so that the bonus factor is at its minumum. Otherwise, if I get in a similar position again, I shall do the dishonourable thing, let the AI do the work, keep the peace and grow while they land their spaceship.
How about making this part of the rules?
------------------
<IMG SRC="http://www.anglo-saxon.demon.co.uk/stormerne/stormerne.gif" border=0>