Do you cheat? How?

[Morkonan]

I will only cheat if I make a slip, mis-click or am tired and make a grievous error I had already decided to correct.. Sometimes, clicking that "Next Turn" button gets to be a habit when you're tired or distracted.

I can probably count on my hands the number of times I've reloaded. Only once can I remember reloading because of a bad battle result and even then, I think it could be attributed to some mechanics changes that needed to be made anyway.

I have never used WorldBuilder to do any form of cheating.

 

[attackdrone]

I will open up world builder to improve horrible AI starting positions (I always check how the world looks on turn 1). If I make enough improvements to enough AI, and feel that my position is not very good either, I might make slight changes (move a resource one square over, extend a river one square, etc).

As for reloads I have taken to giving myself three of them to span the entire game. Once I use those three no more! I tend to waste the first two early on opening up dungeons and the like, and hold the third one for later. Though I've taken a liking to "Mithril Man" games lately, no reloads allowed.

 

[DemonMaster]

Since I like exploring the unknown I don't open WB to improve anything, but I make alot of starts so my starting position is "good" enough.

I don't re-load bad battles or dungeon explorings (anymore) except when my initial scout can "take out" one of those generating sites (lizardmen and skeleton) if they are nearby. A bad result so early and I'm dead and if I'm leaving it as it is so close to me, then I will have lizardmens or skeletons every now and then and I will be forced to take it out anyway.

 

[a_civilian]

I don't re-load bad battles or dungeon explorings (anymore) except when my initial scout can "take out" one of those generating sites (lizardmen and skeleton) if they are nearby. A bad result so early and I'm dead and if I'm leaving it as it is so close to me, then I will have lizardmens or skeletons every now and then and I will be forced to take it out anyway.

You can camp a unit on top of a lair so that it doesn't spawn barbarians. That's what I do when I don't have the military presence to risk exploring it.

 

[DemonMaster]

You can camp a unit on top of a lair so that it doesn't spawn barbarians. That's what I do when I don't have the military presence to risk exploring it.

Yeah, but that means that one of my few precious units must stand there doing nothing.

In the early game I usually explore such (monster generating) sites and I re-load if monsters appear. When I have a stable empire then I don't care to re-load anymore.

 

[saathei]

I will reload if my hero dies with 95+% combat odds.

I'll also reload if I lose units because the game never bothered to tell me they were in danger, or if the AI walked them into someplace stupid, or if I die because I'm trying to check the combat odds and the computer thinks I meant to actually attack. Sooooo frustrating, that last one - I wish there was a way to check odds without having to right click and risk mechanical error killing my mans!

Occasionally I'll open WB to try to locate something, like one of the four horsemen, or to see if there's a random awesome island I missed (usually in Wildmana, when I'm scouring the world for spellbooks ).

 

[mcwill123]

I wish there was a way to check odds without having to right click and risk mechanical error killing my mans!

Maybe this is what you mean, but you can click the "GO TO" button and hover the mouse over the unit that you want to attack to check the odds.

 

[Keeper_GFA]

I wish there was a way to check odds without having to right click and risk mechanical error

Maybe this is what you mean, but you can click the "GO TO" button and hover the mouse over the unit that you want to attack to check the odds.

You can also hold down ALT and hover over the target.

 

[tharg]

I don’t believe its possible to cheat in a one player game which only you know about. If you start bragging about your results without mentioning how you achieved them, then that might be considered cheating.

I often use the world builder at the start but then I consider I creating a scenario.

I also might redo a couple of hundred turns just to see what would have happened.

I have no qualms in using reloading as a replacement for a no info revealed undo button, for mistypes.

Currently in a high to low game, my final civilization is Rhoanna. She was trapped on an ice island, could see three sea squars, three ice mountains one with iron and three ice flatland. The port was complty blocked and while there was a way off the island it would mean building a city within two of Rhoanna’s current city, however I don’t know a way of relocating your only city two spaces. I suppose I should have cowboyed it out, and gone for an alter win, however instead I used the world builder to remove the ice blocking the harbor. Doing well now, feel confident of the win.

 

[tharg]

I suppose I should have cowboyed it out, and gone for an alter win, however instead I used the world builder to remove the ice blocking the harbor.

Of course idiot, no ones researching CoS so its easy. Rewound to try without the elect terraforming.

 

[Jabie]

In my most recent games I replaced a couple of Mountains with Hills so that each nation could interact with the others.

 

[Lutefisk Mafia]

For me the whole point of playing Civ is to enjoy myself and unwind for an hour or two after the kids are in bed. I do not want to get stressed by a game. So I routinely do the following:

1. Regenerate the map if the starting position is hopeless.

2. If not entirely hopeless, I will tweak terrain features, such as changing mountains to hills and moving a resource or two or adding a hill or two.

3. I allow myself unlimited WTH (What the F***) reloads. This is the stereotypical "a spearman killed my tank" sort of thing. I hate that crap, and totally wish that Civ had an option like the "low luck dice" in some Axis&Allies variants.

4. I allow myself about 10 BIFLI (Because I Feel Like It) reloads per game. This is for times like when I am hoping to pop a Great Prophet, but get a stupid Great Bard instead.

5. I allow myself about 10 WBM (Way Back Machine) reloads per game. This is for when I spend 30 turns building a Wonder, only to get it sniped out from underneath me by another civ when I had one turn left on the build. In these cases, I go back to the turn that I first initiated the project, and see if I can win the race by putting my city in "total production at all costs" mode.

6. I allow changes to the map if I make a sacrifice of some sort. Such as:

a. I can expend a Great Prophet to change a coast plot into a marsh. I call this a "Parting of the red seas" action.

b. A Great Prophet can also change mineral resource into a different mineral resource, but the unit must similarly be deleted.

c. A Great Prophet may change a volcano into a hill. The opens up new passages in erebus maps sometimes, and I absolutely love it!

d. A Great Merchant can move any resource that is plausably moveable. Most food resources and some luxury ones fit this category. I call this the "Opening New Markets" action. But the Great Merchant must travel to the plot that contains the resource, "pick it up," and then move to where I want to put it. The target plot must be appopriate (no dye in tundra), and then the unit is deleted after the resource is relocated. This usually means that the Great Merchant must be escorted, and makes for some fun adventures!

e. A Great Engineer can change a mountain into a hill, a marsh into grass, floodplains into grass, clear all jungle from a city working radius, or slightly alter the course of a river. This expends the unit, and I call it the "Great Public Works" action.

Anyway, that is how I cheat. Again, my whole reason for playing Civ is to have fun and I will happily cheat my way around buzz killers when needed. I respect the fact that other people play differently and have differing levels of tolerance for cheating. We all play differently, but we all play Civ!

 

[mcwill123]

The uses for great people sound like valid features that might be considered if there was a new version in the works. Probably hard to implement though.

 

[Cinnabar]

LM, #6 and sub-categories on your list sound so sensible that I may incorporate them into my games. (One of the things that irritates me about Civ in general is that you can't do anything about mountains, like build tunnels or roads once you're sufficiently advanced. In FfH, maybe a "move mountain" L3 spell, or high-level promotion?)

Moving movable resources sounds good too, but I don't know about changing mineral resources. I think that should cost a high-level magic worker, at least, since it's not "natural," like moving a plantation.

 

[Corlis]

If I get a unit with the crazed promotion from searching a lair, I sometimes remove it. I often justify it by trying to get the unit to the Pool of Tears and reasoning that Sirona's probably the mental healer of the world right now.

 

[dyx]

At the beginning of a game I enter the WB and take a look at the map. Then, because too much water sucks, is useless due to the AI hardly building ships and is just not so much fun, I start altering the map (tectonics 30% water, always). I look which oceans where I'd like to keep and those I don't like (near the poles or so) I usually fill up. Mountain ranges first, rest afterwards. I don't like the random look of maps, so I try to get large tundras, plains, jungles, and all that. I also take a look at the AI and give them suitable lands. If some civ starts out in unsuitable lands and I can't change it (Illian at jungle in the center) I move the city. I also move unique features, put the Guardian of pristin pass at some choke point and all such things I can think of.

Apart from that I often reload, because I simply hate chances. I don't want 95% win chance, I want to keep my heroes and named units. I especially don't want to lose a unit I nurtured the whole game just because the AI gets craploads of free xp. I also want to control which great person I get, so that's where I reload or use the WB. Of course I give the AI dead heroes back. Especially the AI, because they can't utilize them properly. And when reloading I usually give the AI something to even it out.
I also enter the WB in regular intervals to look how the AI is faring. Some civs have the tendency to only build improvements on resources, so I give them farms and all that via WB.

So yeah, I probably cheat a lot if you can call it that. But it's fun that way.

 

[TheGreatSteve]

I do a lot of "convenience" cheating but little else.

WB peaks in my core cities into hills instead. The actual difference from having a single additional workable tile, and one with no resource at that, is negligible. But unusable tiles bug me.

If I get a GP from a lair a distance from my territory, delete and WB one in the capital so I don't nursemaid him back.

I'll force peace with an AI if they only declared because they don't value power properly. (say, Khazad have 20 soldiers of Kilmorph and attack, only to be met by Mardero and the Eidolons)

WB out mana nodes if they're right at a perfect city site, but don't replace them. With Lanun sometimes move water resources if they're in the only spot I can place a cove.

I'll give myself a tech in only 2 situations.
a) I have a GS and KotE, but the wrong magic is bulbable.
b) I have a GP and the wrong religion is bulbable.

Reloading is only in those spearmen vs tank situations, and only with heroes. Also for extreme lair results very early, on either end. Str 8 baddies or a free GE at turn 10 ruin the game either way.

 

[Lutefisk Mafia]

The uses for great people sound like valid features that might be considered if there was a new version in the works. Probably hard to implement though.

These would just be new spells (which are just a new form of action basically) that use a python check to see if it is castable -- and be castable only by the appropriate kind of great person. For the resource moving ones, it could add a unitdata script to the unit that would enable the correct resource to be "dropped" later. For the terrain changers, it would be easiest to just do the targeted change to all tiles within 1 plot of the caster (this gets around the never-fun directional and single plot picking code problems). You would never likely get the AI to use these spells properly, so I'd just give them an AI weight of zero and call it a day.

So, if it is so easy, why haven't I already done it myself? Simple: I am lazy, and it is just as easy to do it with WB for the few times that I need to do it!

 

[PPQ_Purple]

What I am about to say might plague me for the rest of my life and mark me with a brand worse than the stigmata of the unborn but...


CIV is a game, much like Red Alert, Age of Empires or Medal of Honor.

If in any of these games you make a mistake that will cost you, your luck fails or you just don't like the situation you are in you load an earlier save game. This is not cheating, it is simply playing.

After all, why does the save game function exist if not to be used.

Hence, the only "cheating" I participate in is reloads. Unlimited, unrestricted reloads.

 

[Tlalynet]

TBH I've never seen much use in reloads in AoE, its not a luck based game, the only point in reloading in that is to change strategy. I think going back to try a different plan is valid in any case if you admit a loss in a certain situation. Just today I reloaded an AOE III game that was 1V2 Expert AI, to me that is a very had game. I saved about three quarters the way through and lost, I reloaded the last 9 minutes and changed plan and went for trade route victory and (just barely) won. I count that as one game on and one game lost.

The difference with reloading in civ is that you can do it to manipulate the RNG, I'll do it if I'm playing a casual game but if I want to play seriously I wont. It kind of is an exploit or cheat to manipulate your luck like that. I don't think people would look at it as a cheat if it was normally used just to try a new strat. Do people look at reloading a lost game from turn 1 as a cheat?

But I agree its all for fun, and I can see how using the save load function can add too fun, so good for you doing it.