Challenge #5: Million Dollar Monty

[scherbchen]

good points on "arrested development" wolfigor. i guess that will eventually be the gist of that challenge and i can see the fun in it. i can just see one guy trumping it with warrios only

enjoy our nice german weather this week, in some years we will be able to pull off an indian summer!

 

[Shoot the Moon]

I happened upon this thread only a few days ago, so unfortunatley could not compete. But I found it very interesting.

Anyway, an idea I have had floating around in my head for a while is trying to get a peaceful domination through cultural means. Perhaps to make it a competition, it could be most land (# of tiles) controlled by a certain date with Always Peace checked. Obviously it would have to be a continuous landmass (having another continent with Always Peace would make that continent untouchable). Only prbolem with that is that an early land-grab will probably be the best strategy. Perhaps Raging Barbs could nerf the land grab. Just an idea.

 

[VoiceOfUnreason]

Anyway, an idea I have had floating around in my head for a while is trying to get a peaceful domination through cultural means. Perhaps to make it a competition, it could be most land (# of tiles) controlled by a certain date with Always Peace checked. Obviously it would have to be a continuous landmass (having another continent with Always Peace would make that continent untouchable). Only prbolem with that is that an early land-grab will probably be the best strategy. Perhaps Raging Barbs could nerf the land grab. Just an idea.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=4616032&postcount=30

 

[carl corey]

Ok guys, I see you've been good and didn't give me a lot to do today. I'll only have to look at lilnev's save and update the scoreboard accordingly tonight.

The "official competition" is over.

Morphy's Golden Rule : He who has the gold makes the rules. It looks like lilnev is the ruler for the next challenge. Good job and good luck.
If for any reason you can't post the new challenge let us know and we'll "volunteer" someone else to do it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I don't see why those who still want to try this challenge can't do it even now. I'll definitely try it myself and create a separate scoreboard in the second post of the thread to keep track of new saves.

Shoot the Moon, welcome to the challenges. You can also try the earlier ones if you'd like and if you have the time. They are all listed in the first post. Same offer goes to all of you.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In general I'd say it's ok to keep the 2 weeks period. There will always be people who won't be able to play on time for the "official" deadline. Unless they (we) are in a big majority, I'd rather see a new challenge so as not to keep those who have finished the previous one waiting. It's also a question of strategies: if only a couple of people finish the challenge there will likely be improvements still to be found. I think in this one we've managed to see all kinds of strategies, enough to say that nearly every aspect of the challenge is pretty much covered. So by all means, roll the next one.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And in case anyone wondered, real life is cool too. You should try it sometime, between challenges.

 

[cabert]

And in case anyone wondered, real life is cool too. You should try it sometime, between challenges.

I did, and now i didn't even start this challenge and I'm bruised on every inch of my skin .
Well, that's what you get with
- a job
- a wife
- 3 kids
- going for a karting race on sunday

 

[Dr Elmer Jiggle]

I did, and now i didn't even start this challenge and I'm bruised on every inch of my skin .
Well, that's what you get with
- a job
- a wife
- 3 kids
- going for a karting race on sunday

Do we dare ask which of those 4 (or 6 depending on how you count) things caused the most bruising?

 

[carl corey]

This reminds me of "Calvin & Hobbes": Calvin comes to his room all messed up and starts talking about how he hates riding a bike. You can fall, it can come over you, or after you (since in Calvin's world everything is alive) etc.

When Hobbes asks if that is why he's all bruised, Calvin answers that he actually fell on the stairs...

 

[cabert]

it's a bit off topic, but actually karting is somehow violent...

 

[lilnev]

Morphy's Golden Rule : He who has the gold makes the rules. It looks like lilnev is the ruler for the next challenge. Good job and good luck.
If for any reason you can't post the new challenge let us know and we'll "volunteer" someone else to do it.

I HAVE THE POWER!!!

And that means we're going with my idea: fastest AI victory. All victory conditions enabled. Two rules: No gifting cities. And your entry doesn't count if the winning AI conquered any cities from you (unless you've retaken them; this avoids a work-around to rule #1). I call it:

Challenge #6: Kingmaker

Does anyone see major problems with this e.g. degenerate tactics which need to be nerfed? My biggest concern is the UN. It might be easiest just to grow, build the UN, and vote for whoever's running against you. But I don't even know if the AI, once elected, would put itself up for a diplomatic victory vs. wasting time on other resolutions. Plus, domination (clear land for someone else to expand) or spaceship (the AIs natural inclination) might just be faster. And since I don't know, I'm inclined to not restrict the UN. How else will we find out? Anyway, thoughts?

Next, what difficulty/size/speed/map do people want? I tend to play large/epic in my SP games, but I recognize that that takes significantly longer to play, so we could stick with standard/normal. Should the map be something contiguous, as coaxing an AI to expand overseas might prove difficult? Then again, if you gift them Astronomy, a couple of galleons, and a map, maybe not. Prince or Monarch?

And yes, Monty will be in the game, for those who want to see him elected.

peace,
lilnev

p.s. I'll be out of town Wednesday afternoon through Sunday. I could post a starting save Wednesday morning; or we could establish the rules/settings, and someone else could volunteer to generate a start on Friday.

 

[Raiser]

Thanks Mr Corey for my fav challenge so far.

and


to Mr Lilnev.


---


My feeling is that a perfect challenge is one that is:
- Fun for all levels,
- Short enough to allow a couple of attempts,
- And most importantly, open enough to allow a variety of tactics.

This idea has variety. I think it needs to be prince difficulty max to keep it open to all. And standard or small pangaea map if it's going to allow most people time to experiment. (I'm not a fan of extending the deadline, in general.)

I have no idea if anything needs to be nerfed. I think I'd just play 'clear the land around my chosen buddy, gift him everything and hope he gets his act together'. Ok, so a small-prince map might turn into 'How quickly can you slaughter everyone, except your buddy' challenge.

Maybe almost completing the space race and sharing it all with your Chosen-One is the way to go on a larger map, but it does sound quite a long challenge and the biggest factor might be picking the right AI to 'go' with. So you need to get a map where we are surrounded by a variety of AI's.

Being sceptical the whole thing could turn out to be a bit random and the 'no gifting' cities rule is a bugger to check.


Good luck.



P.S.
I say, post it Wednesday to give everyone a bit of extra time on it.

Plus I say, go-karts are brutal.



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[Meatbuster]

Not really. If the UN were on, my strat in that challenge would be to keep me and someone else in the top 2. Vote for myself as UN chair, then vote my rival as superme ruler. That's not too hard to do and is faster than losing by space because I will beeline for the UN (and teching that way would be the only obstacle since any other well-liked AI can be the rival).

To improve relations between "rival" and other AI's, it's easy, just declare war on everyone right before the supreme ruler vote.

 

[Dr Elmer Jiggle]

And that means we're going with my idea: fastest AI victory. All victory conditions enabled. Two rules: No gifting cities. And your entry doesn't count if the winning AI conquered any cities from you (unless you've retaken them; this avoids a work-around to rule #1).

Sounds fun. I assume it's legal to attack a mutal enemy to the point where one of their cities is down to a single defender and 0% cultural defense and then you let your ally take the city.

Does anyone see major problems with this e.g. degenerate tactics which need to be nerfed? My biggest concern is the UN. It might be easiest just to grow, build the UN, and vote for whoever's running against you.

The UN does strike me as possibly the best strategy, but I don't think that means you should turn it off. Cultural and conquest victories are out of the question, so if you turn off diplomatic, you've severely restricted the choices.

But I don't even know if the AI, once elected, would put itself up for a diplomatic victory vs. wasting time on other resolutions.

They will call for a victory vote.

One way to make it more of a challenge and avoid the cheese tactics (like you dominate then vote for your AI opponent in a diplomatic win) would be to somehow predetermine the winner. That is, instead of making it fastest win for any AI, make it fastest win for some particular AI.

The question then is how do you decide who the victor should be? Some ideas:

• the first AI you meet (hard to verify but provides some strategic options on replays -- explore a different way so you meet someone else)
• somebody goes into the world builder and picks one of the available choices
• any of the AI's on your starting continent (makes it harder to dominate, since you need to keep at least one neighbor alive)
• any of the AI's not on your starting continent
• any AI below 3rd place in score (might turn out to be close to impossible)
• other?

This is probably going to be a long challenge to play, since you're going to need to play it far enough to win (unlike the previous ones). For that reason, I'd say go with a map no bigger than standard and speed no slower than normal.

 

[Dr Elmer Jiggle]

Do we need a tiebreaker? What if 2 people lose (since we're not trying to win ) on the same turn? Highest score?

 

[carl corey]

Dictator. Niiiice.

Some remarks:
- keep the world size standard or smaller. Not everybody has computers that can handle larger maps. And since it will go until victory (or rather, loss) it could strain some people's systems. Computer systems, that is...
- speed: normal. We want at least someone to finish this.
- difficulty: not above Prince, to be inclusive enough. Actually, Prince is perfect I think.
- map type: Don't chose anything out of the ordinary because some people might not know the specific strategies. Again, since this one goes to completion it probably won't allow many replays, so keeping a standard enough map is ok. Pangaea looks the best.
- edition: vanilla Civ, to be inclusive.
- restrictions: I'm not sure you can enforce the "no gifting" cities one. Is there any way to check it easily?

 

[cabert]

Cultural and conquest victories are out of the question, so if you turn off diplomatic, you've severely restricted the choices.

cultural is really possible : gifting loads of artists that you deliberately brought to a good target city is quite easy + building all those missionaries to spam religions in all cities around is easy. The bad part is that the AIs tend to go for GAs more than cultural bombing + they don't go for cultural.

conquest is possible too! you do all the conquest, then leave your cities undefended when barbs come by (don't let the AI get you, it's forbidden )

edit : I won't play it, so my opinion doesn't care much, but I don't like the kingmaker challenge. I liked the raze cities challenge a lot (it gave me my first and only conquest victory in vanilla cIV), I liked the concepts of others challenges too, because their was lots of game improving stregies involved, but here, I don't see
- replayabily
- game improving strategies
- fun

+ it really looks like the Big Brother thread in the SG forum

 

[carl corey]

Sheesh, already beaten by two people to the suggestions.

~~~~~~~

Raiser: You're welcome! I really didn't have time to give it a shot yet - project presentation last week and been out of town for the whole weekend. I've only played the start to see that getting Buddhism or Poly first are both possible, etc. But if you all had so much fun, I guess I'll have to finish it too.

Dr Elmer Jiggle: You're probably right about being more interesting to have a predetermined "winner" AI. Maybe the closest to us. Maybe simply Monty. Using highest score for a tie-break has its own problems. Someone who goes for "domination - gift diplo win" will have a higher score than someone who tries to really help our chosen friend. I'd say no tie-breaks as same-turn "losses" aren't very likely. Maybe each of the winners can post a challenge; or they can battle until there's only one and he posts the next challenge.

lilnev: Post it on Wednesday and keep the same "two weekends" deadline. Should be no problem. Have you thought what leader we will play with?

 

[Raiser]

How would the challenge change if we went with no 'not allowed to gift cities' rule at all? Will it give more routes to play this challenge or less?

In principle it's just about who can get a win fastest, not 'Damn! The buddy-AI I was going with got beat by a 3rd party AI'. I mean the fact that your chosen AI will be a guaranteed winner eventually isn't a handicap to the challenge pre se, because the aim is to find ways to reduce the time it takes. And in that department we are playing aginst each other, not the AI's.

Also:
'Gifting too many of your cities and so weaken yourself' + 'Making too many enemies protecting your baby' could = 'Big Danger'.

And 'Big Danger' = Fun.


---

 

[carl corey]

Updated scoreboard with final official standings. Congratulations again, lilnev!

 

[lilnev]

It sounds like we have a consensus for normal/standard/prince. Pangaea seems fine. Or we could go to a small map with a larger fraction of land tiles, something like inland sea.

Dictator. Niiiice.

I prefer the term 'First Citizen' (among equals, of course).

Sounds fun. I assume it's legal to attack a mutal enemy to the point where one of their cities is down to a single defender and 0% cultural defense and then you let your ally take the city.

Perfectly legal.

If the UN were on, my strat in that challenge would be to keep me and someone else in the top 2. Vote for myself as UN chair, then vote my rival as superme ruler.

Except I think the secretery general can only put himself forward for victory, if I'm not mistaken. (Someone correct me if I'm wrong, I've only gone diplomatic a few times). You'd have to elect your annointed figurehead and then trust that he has the sense to choose a victory vote.

Do we need a tiebreaker? What if 2 people lose (since we're not trying to win ) on the same turn?

In the event of a tie, the earlier submission wins.

- restrictions: I'm not sure you can enforce the "no gifting" cities one. Is there any way to check it easily?

Honor system. But if the winning AI has a bunch of cities with names off your list....

How would the challenge change if we went with no 'not allowed to gift cities' rule at all? Will it give more routes to play this challenge or less?

Without a 'no city-gifting' rule, I'm afraid the trivial strategy would be to go for a domination win, and at the last minute give all your cities to someone else so they win. That removes all the interaction and makes the challenge uninteresting.

You're probably right about being more interesting to have a predetermined "winner" AI. Maybe the closest to us. Maybe simply Monty.

I was thinking just any AI. But what do y'all think about this?

peace,
lilnev, First Citizen

 

[Dr Elmer Jiggle]

Except I think the secretery general can only put himself forward for victory, if I'm not mistaken. (Someone correct me if I'm wrong, I've only gone diplomatic a few times).

No, you get the normal voting dialog that lists both options. Of course, you normally wouldn't want to vote for anyone else, but it's there as a choice.

Without a 'no city-gifting' rule, I'm afraid the trivial strategy would be to go for a domination win, and at the last minute give all your cities to someone else so they win. That removes all the interaction and makes the challenge uninteresting.

We'll have to think about that. I'm not sure it would be so simple. Remember that the cultural borders would immediately shrink to the first level.

You still might be able to do an equally cheesy variant -- capture a bunch of cities, make sure they have religion, gift, repeat. The thing is, even with that approach, you need some things to come together properly.

a) your AI ally needs to be willing to accept the gifts. The AI won't just accept any old city.

b) you need to make sure that your AI ally won't get attacked and/or can adequately defend those cities. Or you need to be willing to help them out to make sure they retain the new territory. If somebody just captures everything back, you haven't accomplished anything.

So I don't know. I don't have a problem with outlawing gifting of cities, but it might not be necessary.