Frequently Asked Questions - (FAQ)

[templar_x]

"Need" may be the wrong term, but actually i would not remember any table where it is *not* seen like that. just think of any table with sports results that are played in rounds. you would not compare the results in the table if half of the soccer teams have played 7 and the other half of Teams has played 8 games in a season. you would wait until all of them have played 8 games...

even if you would simply define the table as "summary of the last 10 best results in any XOTM, paired by GOTM and COTM respectively", at least my logic would tell that one way to pair the results should be the orthodox one.

which one i actually do not care. only that the "GOTM first because it existed first" appeared more logical to me.

the impact, in any way you would put it, is plannability towards a result. and for the sum-up the pairing means a huge influence! it starts with the games themselves you have to play to have score in any paired column, and goes to in which games you would have to emphasize score or speed (depending on which ranking method you aim for) so you get a high number in a certain paired column.

if for example tr1cky and myself would compete for #1 on the table, i would definitely wish that both of us would see the same week as the "right" one to look at it, otherwise the competition could result in each one becoming #1 every other week - and thus would become voided.

t_x

 

[AlanH]

You asked if there is a "correct" way to look at the table, and my response is "no". When we put together the system, it seemed to be reasonable to provide an update to the rankings after every game. But you are free choose only to look at the table after each COTM if you prefer.

I assume you are aware that you can choose any game as the "latest" in order to look at historical data, so you can always select the latest COTM to ignore a later GOTM.

 

[templar_x]

it is fine to me after 10+ years any way it is. also that this idea/question seems to never have been raised before. it came to my mind, and thus i mentioned it. if lots of the long-term players were interested, they would probably speak up. no run until now.
thanks for the information, Alan!
t_x

 

[Spoonwood]

The rules say that scout resource denial is illegal (though allowed in the HoF... this should not get interpreted as a criticism of these rules). If we use a military type unit instead of a scout does that count as scout resource denial or is that legal? What if we use an explorer to deny a resource to an AI?

 

[AlanH]

Military units can only be used for resource denial for a couple of turns. The AI will ask for them to be removed, and if they don't go then they will be auto-transported off the premises.

Non-military units include Scouts, Explorers, Settlers and Workers. They have no defence/attack points and will not be ejected by the AI, so it's illegal to use them for resource denial.

 

[Lanzelot]

I wonder: will a catapult be ejected by the AI? (I have no idea, as I very seldom build artillery type units in my games... I know that an unloaded galley will not be ejected, as long as there are no land units inside foreign borders anywhere else, so I would assume that a catapult will not be ejected either. In that case we would have to include artillery type units in that list.)

Oh, and another thought: what if we sign a RoP and then use a military unit to implement the resource denial... That sounds kind of exploitative as well...?!

 

[Spoonwood]

Military units can only be used for resource denial for a couple of turns. The AI will ask for them to be removed, and if they don't go then they will be auto-transported off the premises.

Non-military units include Scouts, Explorers, Settlers and Workers. They have no defence/attack points and will not be ejected by the AI, so it's illegal to use them for resource denial.

I've seen workers ejected by the AI before. Though, I might have had a military unit in there also.

But, neither type of unit will get ejected if you have an RoP as Lanzelot suggests. So, I'm still not clear. Is resource denial with a military unit legal in a XOTM competition?

 

[AlanH]

The RoP case would work to prevent the AI hooking up a resource, but if the resource is already connected, I don't think any of your units would deny access to it.

I wasn't responsible for the rules, and I am probably not a good judge of their detailed enforcement. However, it seems to me that the general principle underlying all these rules is to discourage actions that give the human player a disproportionate advantage over the AI relative to their cost. If that is the case, a scout is not a special case, and any resource denial action of this kind gives the same advantage as a 'scout resource denial', and therefore should not be used.

 

[Spoonwood]

However, it seems to me that the general principle underlying all these rules is to discourage actions that give the human player a disproportionate advantage over the AI relative to their cost.

I have to wonder what the cost is. On a higher level, you'll need to get those scouts out early to block the AI from accessing resources. You'll need to pay unit support for them potentially. And you'll have fewer units to block off the passage of the AI settling your territory. The scout makes for a good unit for that, because of it's extra movement.

They will also kick out scouts if you don't have an RoP. Maybe the probability lies lower.

That suggest to me that warrior denial goes against the spirit of the XOTM. Thanks AlanH.

 

[Più Freddo]

If the AI signs RoP with you, and you plant a unit on one of his unconnected resources, then that is part and parcel of having an RoP agreement. The AI must live with it. We even allow symmetric RoP attacks.

Only the kind of resource denial that relies on AI inability to oust non-combat units in the absence of an RoP agreement, apparently a design error, is disallowed. Assymetric attacks weren't part of the game designers imagination, just as they aren't part of the imagination IRL of people who don't play strategy games.

 

[Lanzelot]

I played a few test games:

Catapults are kicked out, if you don't have a RoP.
Workers, Curraghs, Galleys are not kicked out, but Dromons are. (Though not as quickly as land units?! They can stay for around 10 turns, before getting the boot, while land units usually get the boot on the second turn.)
Are you sure about Scouts getting kicked out?? That wouldn't make sense, and it would not explain, why this rule about "Scout resource denial" exists in the first place...

If Scouts are not kicked, we could conclude:
"Land units are not ejected, if they have an attack, defense and bombard value of 0. Ships are not ejected, if they have a bombard value of 0. (Or if they don't have lethal bombard?!) If some unit gets ejected, then all other units get ejected as well, even if they would be able to stay otherwise."

 

[Spoonwood]

Workers, Curraghs, Galleys are not kicked out, but Dromons are. (Though not as quickly as land units?! They can stay for around 10 turns, before getting the boot, while land units usually get the boot on the second turn.)

I believe I've had curraghs kicked. But, I could have had a warrior in their territory also, so I'm not sure. It might depend if they AI believes that you might attack one of their units. The AI's also seem more likely to kick your unit at certain spots and let you wander around certain other spots. I believe that the probability that they will kick you goes up if a luxury/resource lies nearby, but I'm not sure.

 

[tjs282]

I believe I've had curraghs kicked. But, I could have had a warrior in their territory also, so I'm not sure. It might depend if they AI believes that you might attack one of their units. The AI's also seem more likely to kick your unit at certain spots and let you wander around certain other spots. I believe that the probability that they will kick you goes up if a luxury/resource lies nearby, but I'm not sure.

It always seems to me that I'm less likely to get a boot-demand if I have an A>=1 (land) unit in an AI-town's outer-BFC tile, as opposed to the unit coming directly adjacent to the town itself, i.e. 'threatening' the town (even if the unit in question has little/no chance of capturing the town on its own).

 

[Lanzelot]

Not completely sure, but I think I also noticed the following: can it be that a non-combat unit gets kicked out, of you have a combat unit inside somebody else's territory?

BTW: an admin should probably move this discussion into a new thread in the Strategy Forum?! It has some interest in its own right. The resource denial rule can probably safely be modified to say "non-combat unit" instead of "scout".

 

[Lanzelot]

PS: just reviewing the forbidden exploits again: isn't "Worker dogpile" and "Black Hole of Calcutta" the same thing? (At least I don't see a way, how workers can be added to a city once it has run out of food, unless it is in riot?! Or can it be, that the "Worker dogpile" rule stems back from the days of unpatched Vanilla?)

 

[AlanH]

Not completely sure, but I think I also noticed the following: can it be that a non-combat unit gets kicked out, of you have a combat unit inside somebody else's territory?

As far as I recall, when one unit gets kicked out, all get ejected.

BTW: an admin should probably move this discussion into a new thread in the Strategy Forum?! It has some interest in its own right. The resource denial rule can probably safely be modified to say "non-combat unit" instead of "scout".

Are there still new strategy forum threads for this ancient game? And I'm not sure it's even worth editing xOTM rules now.

 

[Spoonwood]

Are there still new strategy forum threads for this ancient game?

Well, I don't claim originality, but yes.

 

[Zorrukk]

Is it possible to use graphics mod packs with the COTM?

Do I need to download the GOTM Mod pack or is that just for those few select old GOTM's?

Sidenote I did download the Barbarian fix.

 

[tjs282]

Is it possible to use graphics mod packs with the COTM?

Yes, absolutely. Graphics packs only change the way the game looks, not how it plays.

Do I need to download the GOTM Mod pack...

Not for the majority of the GotMs

... or is that just for those few select old GOTM's?

Yes. IIRC, that ModPack is for Vanilla, and dates back to the time when some GotM-players had installed the PtW expansion, while others were still using Vanilla (e.g. because PtW hadn't yet been released in their region). So it's really only applicable to the GotMs dating from about 2002-2003 (i.e. post-PtW, pre-Conquests).

Sidenote I did download the Barbarian fix.

Not that it's really important, but I'm puzzled by this note. What did you download?

The C3C-Barbs are easily 'fixed' (sort of*) by opening up your conquests.ini file with any text editor, and inserting a new line 'NoAIPatrol=0' at the end -- you shouldn't actually need to DL anything**, per se.

Spoiler Footnotes :

*The C3C-Barbs will still have their NW-SE tunnel-vision, so will still fortify if they can't detect any human- or AI-Civ units on that axis, but they'll move around more (and so will the AI-Civ units), so their tendency to fortify instead of chasing becomes a little less noticeable
**And you don't need to add the NoAIPatrol line to your PtW .ini, because the PtW .exe already defaults to the zero (=false) setting for this flag (and PtW-Barbs don't have tunnel-vision, either!)

 

[Zorrukk]

Not that it's really important, but I'm puzzled by this note. What did you download?

I found a download that was supposed to write in the .ini file for those of us that are not real computer savvy.