Humble request concerning the next Deity xOTM.

[Htadus]

One of my old girlfriend once told me that I play devils advocate so often, that I must be devil himself. So in that capacity allow me to suggest the following scenario for the next Deity game ;

Gengis or Toku in a low resource isolated continent with Monti, Toku or Gengis, Napolian, Issy, Cat and Jules in 2 or 3 other continents.

Aggressive AI's on with Raging Barbarian.

Contender: get nothing,
Adventure: couple of tanks and one more settler and 2 workers. (Give us some gold too please.)
And for
Challenger: no iron or horses on the continent

phew...that was tough just thinking about it. I have about 10 minutes before going to bed, so I will try it first.

But seriously, I think the current format makes good sense to me. The challenger class can provide LC and others the option to play a real Diety game while the modified contender will give people such as myself the chance to try to survive a challenging level.

LC and others would have to content themselves with the knowledge that they took a no compromise route and their achievments or failiures only reflect their own skill and RNG luck.

As for myself, if I win lol: oh I kill me) a compromised/reduced prestige game, I will know that I am (may be) ready for the normal game next time. ( I guess I should win an immortal game first as an appetizer)

 

[Lexad]

Pray tell me how do you plan to win in these settings?

 

[LowtherCastle]

Can you create criteria so sweet that no "randomly" (in quotes per recent discussions of die rolls, RNG and quantum mechanics ) generated civ map will meet it?

Seems that mapfinder would allow you to generate and idenfity some pretty far out there outlier starting positions, which then begs the question of whether that is still a DASMI (if it is so atypically favorable to the human player)?

I intended this neither as a Mapfinder thread nor a let's-tell-the-Admins-how-to-design-a-deity-GOTM thread. The Admins, collectively, have years of experience running the GOTM superlatively.

My original request was basically that the next deity game be run as a standard GOTM: the contender version is a standard deity-level game. In other words, not an 'adventurer-level' game posing as a contender game.​

The single and only reason motivating me to do this was the infrequency of deity games. If deity games occurred more frequently, I would NOT even consider inflecting on the Admins' decisions and creativity in making GOTM games.

@da_Vinci: With all due respect, please go to the HOF forum and use Search or ask a question about Mapfinder and I suspect they'll happily tell you all you want to know about it.

 

[LowtherCastle]

I think I was previously unsuccessful in making the argument I wished. Here's another attempt.

I see two possible requests, representing two possible scenarios:
Scenario 1. My request: The next deity GOTM be a standard GOTM with a standard deity contender version. (This is a one-time scenario based on the scarcity of deity games.)
Scenario 2. A request for more frequent deity GOTMs. (This is a multi-time scenario in which, no doubt, the Admins would sooner or later do #1. Preferably sooner, because standard generally precedes unusual).

I assert that anyone arguing in favor of the contender version having 'adventurer-level' bonuses, should not be arguing against #1 but rather in favor of #2.

I further assert that if there's only going to be one deity game every blue moon, then the primary focus of that GOTM should be on serving the needs and desires of the 'deity-level' competitors and wannabes (I'm in the latter group).

That said, I applaud ainwood for making the first CIV deity GOTM (GOTM15) more confrontable, since CIV was still fairly new to us all at the time. Now, I would hope that it's time for us to shed our panties, buckle our belts, and lace up our boots.

 

[azzaman333]

As long as some people would play with handicaps on Deity, I would support a standard deity contender version. Otherwise it's silly.

 

[Lexad]

+1

Deity has enough handicaps as it is (dunno about BtS Deity, at looks a bit tweaked from the stats). If you want to play standard Deity, do the Mutineer stance - pick Challenger and call everyone non-challenger a sissy

 

[da_Vinci]

I intended this neither as a Mapfinder thread nor a let's-tell-the-Admins-how-to-design-a-deity-GOTM thread. The Admins, collectively, have years of experience running the GOTM superlatively.

My original request was basically that the next deity game be run as a standard GOTM: the contender version is a standard deity-level game. In other words, not an 'adventurer-level' game posing as a contender game.​

The single and only reason motivating me to do this was the infrequency of deity games. If deity games occurred more frequently, I would NOT even consider inflecting on the Admins' decisions and creativity in making GOTM games.

Maybe the thing to do is to waive the adventurer restriction for the deity game ... anyone who wants to can play adventurer. Then contender can be standard, and challenger can incorporate handicaps.

Only drawback is that this does not permit a "double adventurer" save, which is what adventurer is if contender has bonuses ...

So if in fact no one wants to play challenger deity, then maybe the three saves should be double adventurer, adventurer, and contender (no challenger)? Maybe double adventurer has the usual adventurer restrictions, and a 30% penalty, adventurer can be played by all, 15% penalty, and we still have a contender save.

But if even one person wants a challenger save, then we should keep it.

dV

 

[MarkM]

I would imagine it's extraordinarily rare that a GOTM map hasn't been tweaked in some way

Thanks for the reply DS. Yeah, this is pretty much the conclusion I've come to, this must be the case. And I appreciate the twists & challenges ... usually ... and I understand you lot need to get your fun and/or take out your sadistic urges somehow but I can't help but feel that every once in a while it'd be nice to just have an "right out of the box" game. Just a thought.

 

[ainwood]

Maybe the thing to do is to waive the adventurer restriction for the deity game ... anyone who wants to can play adventurer. Then contender can be standard, and challenger can incorporate handicaps.

I'm quite relaxed about this - I have in fact expressly stated it before: If someone has never won a game at a given level before, they're welcome to play adventurer (and have the -15% and non-eligibility penalties that go with it)

 

[DaviddesJ]

I think I was previously unsuccessful in making the argument I wished.

I think you succeeded in making the argument. You've made the argument many times. It's just that you haven't really convinced anyone. Lots of people think that giving people the choice to play a straight deity game (challenger) or get some slight advantages (contender) makes sense. Your contrary position seems not to be convincing to anyone even if you keep repeating it.

 

[kcd_swede]

Hmmm... Deity level with adventurer, contender, and challenger classes...sounds like my only choices would be to die scratching and clawing my way to the gallows, or to go quietly with some dignity, or to go out in a blaze of glory.

In a deity game, I vow to take Challenger save no matter what. Why prolong the agony? ;-)

 

[LowtherCastle]

I think you succeeded in making the argument.

Thank you. I'm glad to hear that. I felt that way after my last post and had decided that I was done with the topic.

 

[Tosti11]

I would be all for more frequent diety games that had the contender save being DASMI. I don't know that i see the cycle going this way (Noble to Diety) in the next cycle (Noble - Immortal being the current cycle with Noble perhaps being MOnarch or Prince). With that being the case, and assuming a once in a blue moon diety game, i think the format should be similar to GOTM 15 with Challenger being DASMI.

I vote for LC's #2. It may just be the first Immortal victory talking, but i think its time to add diety to the difficulty cycle.

EDIT: i just read ainwood's comment in GOTM 30, and it looks like the cycle may be heading in the direction of LC's #2

 

[DaviddesJ]

I would be all for more frequent diety games that had the contender save being DASMI. I don't know that i see the cycle going this way (Noble to Diety) in the next cycle (Noble - Immortal being the current cycle with Noble perhaps being MOnarch or Prince). With that being the case, and assuming a once in a blue moon diety game, i think the format should be similar to GOTM 15 with Challenger being DASMI.

This seems backwards to me. If Deity games are very rare, then maybe it's not a big deal if the (standard) contender level is hopeless for almost everyone. If Deity games are more common, then it becomes that much more necessary (in my opinion) to make the contender game accessible to a decent fraction of the player pool.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Hmmm... Deity level with adventurer, contender, and challenger classes...sounds like my only choices would be to die scratching and clawing my way to the gallows, or to go quietly with some dignity, or to go out in a blaze of glory.

In a deity game, I vow to take Challenger save no matter what. Why prolong the agony? ;-)

Excellent! I'll make sure that when I eventually give you a deity BOTM, there's a suitable challenge to make you feel you've gone out with dignity.

How about....

Challenger Equalizer

• Plague. Your settler has just died of plague. Your only starting unit is the warrior.

 

[LowtherCastle]

+1

Deity has enough handicaps as it is (dunno about BtS Deity, at looks a bit tweaked from the stats). If you want to play standard Deity, do the Mutineer stance - pick Challenger and call everyone non-challenger a sissy

Haven't see him around lately, but speaking of Mutineer, I happened to run across this post of his today:

I hope that Challenger in this game is in resonable scale. Not like absolutly unplayeble in Wotm6 or resonably unfair in Gotm15

Food for thought?

 

[kcd_swede]

How about....

Challenger Equalizer

• Plague. Your settler has just died of plague. Your only starting unit is the warrior.

Bring it on!

 

[Lexad]

Food for thought?

Nope. Challenger was a regular Deity with Inca. You want to make it tougher?

 

[MarkM]

First let me apologize for taking this a little OT. I know this thread was about deity-only, but I feel the main points about "as sid meier intended" vs "tweaked" games applies to more than just that, and because I think my concerns are complementary to players getting an "un-nerfed" deity game, thought it'd be silly to have separate discussions.

Personally speaking, if I'd modified a map to an extent that was significantly uncharacteristic of the stated maptype, then I would be (almost, though not quite) certain to make sure there is some clue to that in the pre-game discussion announcement, either in the text or the starting screenshot - since I don't want the pre-game discussion to mislead people.

I suspect that's not as specific an answer as you'd like, but my concern would be that giving any more information away as a general rule would detract from the (hopefully, fun) challenge of coping with whatever unknown stuff the map throws at you.

OK, thanks for reply. I can accept that -- heck like I have a choice? I do recognize you did what you said in BOTM2+3, and as you recall I even defended what you did vs others because I felt you'd telegraphed that there was something afoot in those pregame/starting save posts. BOTM4 though ... obviously I can't talk about it here for spoiler reasons, but it looks like there is at least one thing you did that there was no hint about in pregame posts, maybe two. #1 wasn't something that would impact your strategy much until well after you realized it was an issue, but still ...

Perhaps there is a middle ground? Maybe there could be standard Y/N statements in a pregame post, e.g. "WB terrain modified Y/N", "WB player or AI starting location changed Y/N", "WB artificially created resource scarcity Y/N" (without specifying what resource), etc. Hopefuly those are vague enough that it would still "preserve the fun of coping" as you say. And then on the occasion we'd get the "as sid intended" game, or close to it, we could know.

 

[LowtherCastle]

Nope. Challenger was a regular Deity with Inca. You want to make it tougher?

Okay, let's look at this. Tougher in relation to what? Challenger is always tougher than Contender, by definition. When Mutineer says 'unfair,' I take that to mean in relation to the Contender version. So isn't he saying that he wants the disparity between the two versions to be 'fair' and that adding a worker and an archer to the Contender was 'unfair'?

The other part of his quote is saying that he wants the Challenger version to be playable (=winnable), as I understand it.

I would agree with Mutineer that the difference be 'fair' and the Challenger version be playable. For example, the Challenger version could have three of the six gold tiles removed...