New Exploit?

[Krill]

I play often so that I go out and look for directions about the turn.
Sometimes I lost the connection, there is no danger for the server/host.

For the civstats there is no difference, why you lost the connection.
What you don't have to do is end the game to desk.

Don't worry, that scenario came from a misunderstanding of the sequence that the, heh, events, occured in.

 

[Sullla]

Well there is 3 paths I can see:

1. The first log in of the turn should be done by the turn plyaer and thus must "end" their turn.
==>I am not neccesarily for this as there can be instances that require team feedback (i.e. contact, counter offer to a trade, etc.), but that said we do have turn players for a reason, to make a judgement call based on the feeling of the team. No matter how much you plan life throws unexpected (excuse the pun) random events at us and we have to adapt.

2. We agree that there are no negatives events. As such if one pops up the player forces the game to quit, and then can log in without it.
==>This is the only way to ensure equality

3. We keep Random events and require a reload everytime one fires.
(Even positive ones have choices)

I would like to see if the five teams could agree on one of the options Memphus has proposed. It really doesn't matter how you choose to deal with events, so long as all five teams are on the same footing.

 

[Kaleb]

I can't see how any option other than option 2 is workable. Would this be applied to all negative events or just ones that require a choice?

Note for future: in MTDG games random events should be off!

 

[Krill]

I can't see how any option other than option 2 is workable. Would this be applied to all negative events or just ones that require a choice?

Note for future: in MTDG games random events should be off!

I think it depends; do we know for sure that we can ignore events that have no choices, ie barb uprising? I think so, but I'm not 100% certain. If we can ignore all events, then I think we should ignore all events. If we can't ignore negative events that have no choices, well, I don't think that is too bad, because as there is no choices, then there is nothing to discuss, and the turnplayer can just accept the event before they log out and post about it in the private forum. So if we can ignore all events, do so. If we cannot ignore events with no options, then accept them, and ignore the rest.

I think 2 is the way to go, it's definately the fairest, and the quickest.

 

[Earthling]

Speaking for myself, not my team (we haven't had enough discussion on this either btw, so if it comes to a vote Cav may be a while...) I would think that #1 is the best. Followed by #3, with 2 being one of the worst possibilities. I don't see as much of a problem with letting the turnplayer have to make the decision; I would trust whoever it is on my team. If you don't like #1, and think #3 takes too long with all the reloading, I would propose

4) Whenever any event whatsoever occurs, the player exits the game and does nothing. In effect, no team is allowed to have random events. Other teams can easily monitor this through the log.

The problem I have with 2 is that it just becomes imbalancing or unfair anyway. This is particularly so if some events couldn't be cancelled or reloading doesn't bring up another event. Also, events that help one team can often hurt another - what do we do if a team gets, say, espionage on their neighbors, or the free golden age when at war (these are negative from another team's perspective...). In fact almost all events may be seen in this light (like free beakers towards tech) but some are certainly unfair. I never liked events in the first place but trying to only allow positive ones now seems to add unnecessary complication and luck.

However I think we need to learn a lot more about the actual mechanics behind this - does it only happen at end turn (and thus only for MS/Kaz)? Does reloading get a new event or none at all...? This would certainly help the overall decision-making process.

 

[Joshua368]

Well events suck for games like this, I didn't see why so many people wanted them. (stupid teammates )

 

[Memphus]

Speaking for myself, not my team (we haven't had enough discussion on this either btw, so if it comes to a vote Cav may be a while...) I would think that #1 is the best. Followed by #3,/QUOTE]

In both of these cases though there is no way to admin it properly.

Again let's say the game is very competitive as it is now but more likely will become: So the following happens:

1. For SANCTA I am currently the turn player.
2. New turn happens and 1889 opens the game. He sees a negative event (such as a forge being destroyed) and we have the "option" to let it be destroyed, or pay 50 gold.
3. Not wanting to do either (maybe we don't have the gold and losing a forge is killer) he tabs out of the game, kills the game, and never says anythign to anyone.
4. I log in not knowing, see no event and continue on with the game.

5. Next turn Team Kaz logs in is presented with the same situation, but they have a player who makes the choice.

So now they are at the disadvantage.

It is an all or nothing game. So to me option #2 is the only fair option. Whoever logs in and sees a random event gets the choice, to pick a path (or accept the event) or to go around the system and kill the game thus cancelling the event.

Does that mean that teams only gets positive (from thier perspective) events? yes it does. But so what? Over the course of the game if you get 5 positive and 5 negative events, the difference is now, you get to choose which of those 10 events you want. IMO we have "unrandomized" random events, as you now have the "choice" on if they happen or not.

 

[Krill]

Speaking for myself, not my team (we haven't had enough discussion on this either btw, so if it comes to a vote Cav may be a while...) I would think that #1 is the best. Followed by #3, with 2 being one of the worst possibilities. I don't see as much of a problem with letting the turnplayer have to make the decision; I would trust whoever it is on my team. If you don't like #1, and think #3 takes too long with all the reloading, I would propose

4) Whenever any event whatsoever occurs, the player exits the game and does nothing. In effect, no team is allowed to have random events. Other teams can easily monitor this through the log.

The problem I have with 2 is that it just becomes imbalancing or unfair anyway. This is particularly so if some events couldn't be cancelled or reloading doesn't bring up another event. Also, events that help one team can often hurt another - what do we do if a team gets, say, espionage on their neighbors, or the free golden age when at war (these are negative from another team's perspective...). In fact almost all events may be seen in this light (like free beakers towards tech) but some are certainly unfair. I never liked events in the first place but trying to only allow positive ones now seems to add unnecessary complication and luck.

Well, all the teams decided they wanted the game to be unbalanced by having events on in the first place, it is hypocritical to then say that other teams may benefit from a workaround of something that isn't balanced in the first place; any team can get that benefit. Whether another team gets a positive or negative event doesn't matter, it is still unbalanced either way; either that team gets pulled back relative to all of the others which isn't fair on them, or they get ahead of the other teams, which isn't fair on the rest. The latter just seems more unfair because it's four teams that are "disadvantaged" compared to one team in the former case, both scenario are not balanced.

However I think we need to learn a lot more about the actual mechanics behind this - does it only happen at end turn (and thus only for MS/Kaz)? Does reloading get a new event or none at all...? This would certainly help the overall decision-making process.

It would be good to see this, in a pitboss environment, but it might take a while to set up.

All events occur at the start of the new turn, so MS end turn, then the events occur to whichever team. If it was Kaz, Kaz would be able to log in then either exit via Esc->exit to main menu, thus deleting the event, and then log in again to play the turn.

 

[Indiansmoke]

I feel no1 is the best solution as well...the player who loggs in and gets the event should decide which option to take.

we should trust all player's sportsmaship to be fair in this issue and not use the exploit.

Otherwise no point in having events.


P.S I tried before patch 3.17 to see if reloding will make the event go away...and it is not clear...sometimes I would get the same event over and over in 10 consecutive reloads, other times it would just go..

 

[donsig]

Did we check to see if a reload would recreate the event in this case?

 

[DaveShack]

No, that has not been checked. The turn roll save should still be there. HUSch's autosave won't be. It might be a good idea to write a program to sit there and rename player autosaves with a time as soon as they appear.

 

[dutchfire]

I feel no1 is the best solution as well...the player who loggs in and gets the event should decide which option to take.

we should trust all player's sportsmaship to be fair in this issue and not use the exploit.

Otherwise no point in having events.


P.S I tried before patch 3.17 to see if reloding will make the event go away...and it is not clear...sometimes I would get the same event over and over in 10 consecutive reloads, other times it would just go..

Did you (do we) have the preserve random seed option checked?

 

[Indiansmoke]

Did you (do we) have the preserve random seed option checked?

there is no such option I think...the option to be checked is "new random seed on reload"..which makes no sense in turn based game anyway...I cannot see why that would be checked here....and no I did not have it checked in my tests

 

[DaveShack]

That option is not checked.

 

[Renata]

Much as my instincts are to agree with Earthling, I think it just isn't going to work for the worst events. If someone logs in and is confronted with a barbarian uprising message, the temptation is going to be overwhelming to just quietly quit the game with no one the wiser. And thus the teams with the most scrupulously honest players get the shaft compared to everyone else.

But I want to know more first. Does this only work for events that have a choice involved, or for all events? Is reloading even a possibility -- would it bring back MS's choice from last turn, for instance?

Also, does anyone have a link to the list of BTS events I could look at? Thanks.

 

[donsig]

No, that has not been checked. The turn roll save should still be there. HUSch's autosave won't be.

Well, then what does it take to ask for a reload? Does MS have to do that or can anyone ask for it? There's not much sense in debating what course to follow in general in these cases if we don't know all the options.

 

[dutchfire]

Also, does anyone have a link to the list of BTS events I could look at? Thanks.

Link

And that calls itself GOTM staff...

 

[Renata]

I'm the staff slacker, definitely.

 

[DaveShack]

I'll probably experiment with a reload tonight, unless my kids raise hell at bedtime. Given it was MS's turn, don't even need to schedule someone else to play it.

The way I plan to do it won't require taking the game down. If it does need to take the game down I would save the current game, perform the experiment, and restore the current.

 

[donsig]

Thanks DaveShack. Looking forward to hearing your results. (I hope the kids can stay quietly occupied!)