Is reloading cheating?

[kb2tvl]

some instances when I reload are:

I hit the wrong button on a trade deal which caused catastrophic results(a civ comes to frisk me down for my wealth which I can not defend at that time and I hit the no way button)

If im starting an attack and there are two units from two different countries side by side and I attack the wrong civ....

If I or the computer has razed a building and the whole game crashes.

If I fortify or activate an infantry or cavalary from within a city and the program locks up.

If a civ sneak attacks me which I will lose all my cities, in this case I try to reload and see what will happen if I did something different. Alternately, If I have played the game for a long duration and I dont want to start over, I might reload and do some allinace deals and beat that civ to the punch.... I guess this could be called cheating but I also want to see the game through to the end... sometimes. For gotm, I would restart the whole game If this happened.... Generally you will get better placement of cities. not sure if this is cheating per the rules BUT Im not officially registered yet.

 

[Mad Bomber]

Glad to hear it

But I can just picture the threads that will come rolling in when PTW hits the stands, "stand back boys there is a flame war a' goin on in that thread!":flamedevi

Just imagine playing on a huge map, w/ 16 PTW civ's & what's going to happen when someone loses 30 MI to a culture flip. Then the player "reloads", Oh yes, its going to be marvelous That will redefine the term "reputation hit".

or a civ is ethnic cleansed and they "reload" Yeah, people are going to Love that player!

I doubt you will even be able to reload w/o the other players agreement, but can you IMAGINE?:die:

 

[DaDoo]

It would certainly make world wars that involves more than 2 human players very interesting and worth watching. If only there is some sort of record-play back feature... we'd have lots of really good civ3 movies of MP WWs.

 

[Mad Bomber]

Replay/ record feature? Oh they could have made PTW $60 and it would still be worth it!

We won't be able to see the WW's but I guarantee we will hear of them (although they will probably be in another forum). complete w/ screenshots, graphics, & analysis to boot.

 

[WillJ]

Originally posted by Mad Bomber
Willj:

if I trade a tech, then I trade it to all the civ's unless I am using a civ as a vassal. Why not just get as much as you can for it & go on to the next civ? I do agree that more info should be available to you, esp if you have an embassy:Gold, gpt they are getting, tech they know & tech they are reasearching should all be availabe independent of diplomacy screen. Using a reload for this I would consider a minor cheat.

I do the reloading thing because there are often some civs that are really poor, too poor to be able to pay anything near what the item is worth. And if it's a tech I trade it to all the not-too-poor civs in order of their wealth, since that method gives you the most money, since the value of the tech goes down after more civs have it. Maybe it is a minor cheat, but I still do it anyway.

 

[Bamspeedy]

willj- I don't think the AI gets annoyed with you if you bring them to the negotiating table just to see what they will offer, so you don't need to reload. Just shop around to see who has the best deal, then sell to the richest civ first, like you do.

Reloading (in a NON-COMPETITIVE game) can be a valuable learning experience if used properly. And if they actually use the experience they learned! You can learn alot of cause and effect things about the game. "What if I do this?" "Ok, what if I had done this instead?"

Let's say some newbie player who doesn't know anything about combat values is playing a game and he wants to attack Greece with horseman. He sends a stack of say 8 horseman and tries to attack a Greek city from across a river and the city is built on a hill. He fails. So he reloads and builds up a stack of 12-15 horseman. He fails again or finally takes the city with only 1 or 2 horseman left. If he tells himself "Ok, horseman are hopeless against hoplites, don't ever try that again!", he learned a lesson there. If he says to himself "see with enough re-loading horseman can take hoplites", he learned nothing.

What was he supposed to do? Start a whole new game over again, and hope he starts next to Greece AND hope he has access to horses AND hopes that Greece has a city built on a hill AND built on a river?

There are alot of other things you can do to test to see what happens by re-loading without starting a whole game over again and HOPE the EXACT SAME situation comes up. After he grasps the basic concepts of the game and has a better understanding of combat values, etc. he can add the self-imposed restriction of no re-loads and start learning how to deal with setbacks, which would happen less often now that he is a better player.

 

[Mephisto]

i think it depends on the why you play the game. this question sounds like, is screwing whores immoral? well, it depends on how you see sex. if sex is just for pleasure, then no. but if one attaches deeper meaning to sex, then yes.

so it's obvious why we have all these arguments in this thread. many wierdos even think that jacking off is immoral. you go figure.

 

[MummyMan]

When i screw up a vital move especially early on, i'll reload. Mephisto, screwing whores? sex? jacking off? how is that related to civ3 or reloading? "you go figure"- Mephisto

 

[Mephisto]

i just meant to say that some people treat reloading like sin, some people think it's ok. so reloading is cheating is just analogous to screwing a whore is immoral. jacking off is just special effects that i added.

 

[SirJethro]

Originally posted by Mephisto
i just meant to say that some people treat reloading like sin, some people think it's ok. so reloading is cheating is just analogous to screwing a whore is immoral. jacking off is just special effects that i added.

Luckly there was no smilie available for Mephisto to illustrate his point more clearly.

 

[konigstiger]

Can someone please confirm for me:

If reloading is OK for spying purposes ? Because anyways the AI cheats on you by knowing your troop position anyways.

 

[SirJethro]

Originally posted by konigstiger
Can someone please confirm for me:

If reloading is OK for spying purposes ? Because anyways the AI cheats on you by knowing your troop position anyways.

Good lord, people....

There is only one way to answer this question: Get down on your knees and bow your head and post a thread on the forum of whatever-diety-or-idol-you-consider-the-ultimate-ethical-decision-maker-in-the-sky and wait for a reply.

It is only a game...do what is fun. Here is a good indicator though: if you need a Prozac after reloading, it may not be good for you.

 

[sappling]

As Jim Rome is found of saying, "If you are not cheating, you are not trying." Unfortunately the world is based on cheating and lying. I am against cheating but do what ever you morally think is right. It is just a game.

 

[Finvola]

I have played under the influence before, lol. I actually save two different versions just in case I really made a mess of things..The next day , I'll be like 'when the heck did that happen?' so I guess I have reloaded for playing while drunk..

On a few occasions I have reloaded because I may have gotten a phone call that really bothered me and I'm not concentrating and made a mistake, but I don't do it to change the results of the game really. If I make a complete mess of things I usually just start a new game all over again.

 

[konigstiger]

Originally posted by SirJethro


Good lord, people....

There is only one way to answer this question: Get down on your knees and bow your head and post a thread on the forum of whatever-diety-or-idol-you-consider-the-ultimate-ethical-decision-maker-in-the-sky and wait for a reply.

It is only a game...do what is fun. Here is a good indicator though: if you need a Prozac after reloading, it may not be good for you.

Hey chill out man.... I believe I've kinda heard that reloading of this kind is allowed on GOTM or HOF, and in that context I ask. Thank you.

 

[kingjoshi]

If you play a game of chess and you find out what the AI will do (not through foresight, or experience of previous games or learning from books or grandmasters) but by playing the game and undoing the moves, then obviously then there's an element of cheating. It doesn't matter whether the game designers allow you to do it. Many games allow you to cheat. Civ2 came with such an ability, but the designers saw them for what there were and called those features "cheats".

If you play chess with a friend, and you're "practicing" and everyone is giving take backs and just learning, then it wouldn't be considered cheating by most people. It all falls down to intent. In most cases, when people consider reloading, it's a cheat. That says nothing of the morality of it. As others have mentioned, you can learn from reloading and trying different things, even when something goes well!

In sports (and even chess) there are practices. No such thing for Civ3. So, if you're playing with a game and then come under unexpected circumtances and then "switch" to "practice mode" and then switch back to "game mode" it should be considered cheating.

Obviously, no one cares if you cheat and you enjoy the game and no one else is effected negatively. So there is no moral dilemma. However, it's still a cheat. Why do I fail to understand how this isn't a cheat? Maybe many of those that voted "no" are only considering certain situations or when they use "reloading" and not the most general types of situations when most people do consider using reloading, to cheat.

 

[Richard III]

It's definitely cheating.

The only time I've done it is on two or three occasions where I specifically told myself to do something and forgot to do it because of an interruption, e.g. moving a transport to safety. But that's it. Really.

R.III

 

[Mephisto]

richard iii, i guess that you are a veteran deity player, and probably have played many many more games than i have had. so it's understandable that you hold a higher standard for yourself than others. dude, why reload? i've planed everything 5 moves ahead. but imagine someone who just started playing. how difficult even the regent level could be for those guys. and i am sure that you reloaded before when you were just a beginner.

i am not saying this b/c i am a reloader, but i do admit that i won my first deity game reloading like crazy. but that's how i learned, and i think that's how most veteran players learned before they could consistantly beat the highest level. (add, w/o reloading)

given that one should not reload in competition, i think it's unfair to impose the same standard for all players, at all time.

 

[amadeus]

What's too bad is that you can't perform military exercises to see, hypothetically, if you could win.

Armies aren't just formed and march into countries without estimating the cost versus benefit.

 

[Mephisto]

i think i can forsee some crazy deity dudes shouting, no, i've never cheated! so i am gonna do some damage control....

kingjoshi, suppose some players do switching modes like you described, who are they cheating? exactly, themselves. even when i won my first deity game, i still 'knew' that i could not beat the deity. so even if there are people who are blind enough to cheat themselves, the only victim is only themselve, not us. in which case, i can't care less.

neh, i am not gonna venture to analyse more deeply, there are people cheating themselves everyday in the real life, and all the philosophers out there still could not reach agreements on pretty much anything. i'll stop here.