Is the prebuild an exploit?

[homeyg]

It all comes down to what you think 'exploit' actually means...

I think of exploits as "Hey, the AI gets many advantages over me, so I should be able to find ways to overcome those advantages."

Btw, If these 'exploits' aren't meant to be a part of the game, why weren't they fixed in a patch?

 

[~Corsair#01~]

Well, the ability to change production could hardly be called "an exploit".

 

[tigerden27]

The only pre-build I could consider an exploit is the Palace pre-build to build a Wonder. But this one ends up biting me often enough, because I forget to switch before the Palace is built, that I figure it's all good.

Can you tell I'm just a Monarch player?

 

[Dell19]

I thiink of exploits in terms of exploiting weaknesses so pretty much every tactic is an exploit but an allowable and completely acceptable exploit...

 

[KaNick]

I know of no contest that outlaws its use, so it must not be an exploit. Or if it is, not a serious offence. It is necessary to get some wonders on the higher levels, so it is more of an "equalizer" than an exploit I guess.

 

[kane77077]

Btw, If these 'exploits' aren't meant to be a part of the game, why weren't they fixed in a patch?

True...I had thought of that, too, but since it didn't support my point of view, I didn't bring it up.

Good point.

 

[daengle]

Well, I'm one of the two guys who voted "other"...

It seems to me that an "exploit" is using something that's broken in the way the game is built to beat the game. For example, the city scroll-through buttons that allow you to bypass the normal turn processing sequence, or the fact that cites on perfect rings used to have equal rank corruption.

Exploits are bugs, defects in the game that should be patched.

But not every difference between the way the human plays the game, and the way the AI plays the game is a defect. The ways the human player and the AI players approach diplomatic votes and treaty violations/reputations are very different; and that's OK. The game the AI barbarians are playing is very different indeed.

I'm not bothered by the fact that the human can pre-build and the AI never (intentionaly) does. Chosing to pre-build or not to pre-build is just one additional strategic planning decision the human player gets to make. And I don't think the game is improved by removing strategic choices from the human player.

 

[Khift]

The prebuild is not an exploit, but it should still be removed. You should not be able to switch production without at least losing some of your accumulation. This would make wonders much more difficult, fair, and would make you think twice about setting those cities to produce one - you could very well lose your hard work if you aren't careful.

How often do you see a brand new technology come into use immediately after it is researched, let alone before it is researched? The only times I can think of is when the technology is ordered into being, like military technology. To be able to start building something, like a granary, before you research pottery, is absurd, even when you think of production as an abstract accumulation of work - how could you start accumulating those shields before you even knew what you were going to finish?

 

[Theoden]

Considering how the AI cheats I think it's perfectly fine to use pre-build. The programmers would have fixed it if it was a bug.

Regarding the realism. Think of that when your develop pottery they are thinking "let's find a way to store our food, we probably have to build something to do it but we don't know exactly what" So they are collecting materials and when they know what to build with them they do it.

 

[homeyg]

Exploits are bugs, defects in the game that should be patched.

But not every difference between the way the human plays the game, and the way the AI plays the game is a defect. The ways the human player and the AI players approach diplomatic votes and treaty violations/reputations are very different; and that's OK. The game the AI barbarians are playing is very different indeed.

I'm not bothered by the fact that the human can pre-build and the AI never (intentionaly) does. Chosing to pre-build or not to pre-build is just one additional strategic planning decision the human player gets to make. And I don't think the game is improved by removing strategic choices from the human player.

Very nicely spoken!

 

[Dogmeat]

The AI uses this 'exploit' only from g.wonder to g.wonder and not from regular improvement to g.wonder right?

 

[Alone]

It's not exploit at all, and I use that often!

How about oposite example, when you are 5 turns to finish Gw (1) and in that turn pop up says that Ghengis Khan just finished before you, you switch to another G.W (2) and than it's just one turn left and you see on the screen that Joan just build it so you can only switch to "baracks" or simular...

 

[LLXerxes]

The AI uses in a sense if they don't win the race to one wonder and they change to build their next priority wonder.

Yes! Yes!
THat's exactly what it is. Very explotative!

 

[Smellincoffee]

Considering the massive bonuses the AI gets on higher levels, I'd say prebuilds make the playing field a little more level. I use prebuilds at my level (regent/monarch) because they're used so often in SGs, which I read a lot of.

 

[zerksees]

Not an exploit. Part of the game.

 

[Jason Fliegel]

Even though I still feel it's an exploit, I will admit that I just won COTM1 in part due to a UN prebuild. You guys have won me over to the dark side!

 

[LLXerxes]

AI always does prebuild.
It almost never works for me.

 

[general_kill]

If u ask most good players if this is an exploit or not, they were tell u no because it simply isn't that useful during a time when it is most needed(at high difficulty levels). If the AI can make a wonder in 10 turns, good for them, let them have a wonder instead of 10 swordsmen. For a human player, 30-40 turns is too valuable, instead with those turns, you can build a dozen military unit to take the wonder from the AI.