Please Read: Welcome to the C-IV GOTM

[Khalid]

This seems like a lot of fun and a great learning tool. I'm looking forward to playing along.

I read through this entire thread and hopefully know what's what now. It is still a bit confusing though which threads are what. I'm sure it all makes perfect sense though once one is used to the naming conventions. GOTM must be Game of the Month but WOTM? Guessing the Warlords version?

Yes, WOTM is the warlords of the month, a game that must be played in warlords. GOTM must be played in vanilla civ4.

They all have numbers - not sure why but I'd have expected month names.

They are numbered from the beginning. So if now is played GOTM 15 that means that the GOTM for civ 4 started 15 months ago. It is just to distinguish different games.

I'm barely a noble level player so I am sure to lose gloriously (and early) for a long time but think that by losing and then reading the good players I can improve my game. Someday I'm going to grow up to be a Prince(ss) level player!

You can start with the adventure games. They will give you a starting bonus like some archers, worker and techs, which will help you early in the game. You can then discuss your strategies in the spoiler threads and learn from other players, while they will learn from you. Soon you will be empress
[/quote]

And welcome to GOTM

 

[hagen]

Hi All,

I have recently finished GOTM13. Now in the submission page i have problems with the first question already. (Have you played GOTM before?)

Actually I have submitted some GOTM, but it was sometime when Civ3 was new, so years ago. Does it count, or is the question just for Civ4?

I hope somebody can answer to this very serious problem. Sorry if it is already answered somewhere, but unfortunately I have little time to read the forums. And honestly I can't think that anyone else had came up with such a stupid question before.

Btw, it is great to see that CivFanatics is up and running after such a long time. And - since I had no high hopes with 3d so it was a surprise to me, but... CIV4 _is_ FANTASTIC, too! And I'm start to GOTM-ing again! Beware, mortals!

 

[AlanH]

Hi All,

I have recently finished GOTM13. Now in the submission page i have problems with the first question already. (Have you played GOTM before?)

Actually I have submitted some GOTM, but it was sometime when Civ3 was new, so years ago. Does it count, or is the question just for Civ4?

I hope somebody can answer to this very serious problem.

That question is only an attempt to provide a simple check that you know who you are If you answer it incorrectly you'll just get a prompt to check your spelling. It's no big deal.

You are a previous player. Civ3 ... Civ4 ... Conquests ... PtW ... vanilla ... Warlords ... it's all in the same database. If you've ever submitted a G/C/WOTM then you've played before. I have you down for GOTM 9 - 12, one loss, three victories, back in the day.

 

[wathombe]

Being new to the GotM fold, Alan, I am severely impressed with that level of recordkeeping over such a span of years.

 

[Abegweit]

As Alan says, he is a PHP monkey. Man, can he type!

 

[hagen]

Thanks Alan. It's very nice, that you still "take care" of those old results. I'll go and submit the fifth one!

 

[wathombe]

Stupid question:

I've never saved a game after it was over. Do I need to do anything special? Will I only be able to save it if I click "Just one more turn... (keep playing)," or does that not matter?

 

[Erkon]

Stupid question:

I've never saved a game after it was over. Do I need to do anything special? Will I only be able to save it if I click "Just one more turn... (keep playing)," or does that not matter?

Not so stupid question at all (I think the submit page is a little bit vague, at least for us "foreigners"). You should select "Just one more turn..." and then save at earliest opportunity. As a sanity check you can look at the year in the replay file name: it should match the year in the game save file name.

 

[wathombe]

Thanks kindly, Erkon. (Sadly, I think I'm not far from the end of my first attempt at one of these _otM.)

 

[AlanH]

Not so stupid question at all (I think the submit page is a little bit vague, at least for us "foreigners"). You should select "Just one more turn..." and then save at earliest opportunity. As a sanity check you can look at the year in the replay file name: it should match the year in the game save file name.

By all means, suggest a more explicit way to express this and I'll replace the instructions. I don't think I've changed the words much since they were first adapted from the Civ3 version.

 

[Jenarie]

This is a bit confusing to me as well. I won a game at the beginning of a turn - by selecting play one more turn I get put into the SAME turn in which I won. I saved there which made the most sense to me but from the instructions it seems we need to play an extra turn then save? Instructions say after but from above posts that doesn't seem correct - above seems to be what I'd intuitively do which is send same turn. I don't want to submit incorrectly so waiting to make sure. Hopefully the question makes sense it is a bit confusing.

If looking for another way to word it (assuming you DO want the same turn) what Erkon said "select "Just one more turn..." and then save at earliest opportunity" makes more sense to me. Maybe for different victory conditions it is different though? I'm not sure if all victories happen at start of turns.

Edit: The notes at the bottom of the page explain it well. It is just the word "after" in the initial instructions that is confusing I think.

 

[AlanH]

Sorry I've confused you. I guess I really ought to play this game through sometime and see what a victory looks like

It is entirely possible that different victories are declared at different points in the final turns. I *think* the key clue is that you have a Replay file for the game, since this is only created when you complete the game. The other obvious symptom of 'game over' is if you have seen the victory ceremony. There is no problem with submitting a *later* save, as the system will extract the correct date.

If you have a Replay file for the game then please submit the save you have. If the result in your feedback after the submission looks wrong, then send me a PM to tell me what it should have been and I'll investigate.

 

[Thrallia]

the victory is declared at the beginning of the turn after it is achieved, thus, when you click 'just one more turn' it will move to the turn that victory was declared. At that point, you save your game and submit that save

That's been my experience every time I've won, but take that with a grain of salt...I've only submitted 3 victories I'm aware of

dang...I thought I would submit GOTM13 in time I apparently just missed it...too bad, I retired 3 days ago and never had time to submit it

 

[Khalid]

This is a bit confusing to me as well. I won a game at the beginning of a turn - by selecting play one more turn I get put into the SAME turn in which I won. I saved there which made the most sense to me but from the instructions it seems we need to play an extra turn then save? Instructions say after but from above posts that doesn't seem correct - above seems to be what I'd intuitively do which is send same turn. I don't want to submit incorrectly so waiting to make sure. Hopefully the question makes sense it is a bit confusing.

If looking for another way to word it (assuming you DO want the same turn) what Erkon said "select "Just one more turn..." and then save at earliest opportunity" makes more sense to me. Maybe for different victory conditions it is different though? I'm not sure if all victories happen at start of turns.

Edit: The notes at the bottom of the page explain it well. It is just the word "after" in the initial instructions that is confusing I think.

The confusing thing is the way the victory happens:

1) you hit end of turn X.
2) you get production, beakers, culture for turn X, border pops and than the victory conditions are evaluated (Still in turn X)
3) You have won the game in turn X
4) You have to sellect "just one more turn" and save in turn X+1

So it seams that you have won in turn X+1, but you actually won in turn X.

 

[Jenarie]

Order must be different for different types of wins. The above 1-4 is not what happened in my game. I was paying a lot of attention to the final turns waiting for the win so I'm positive that culture/border pops etc happened at the beginning of the turn not the end of the turn. I have the last two turns saved - the one before and the one after I won. Once they won't be spoilers I can post them both as an example.

 

[AlanH]

So it seams that you have won in turn X+1, but you actually won in turn X.

We take the victory date from within the saved file. If the software does add an extra turn, it's the same for everyone.

 

[da_Vinci]

The confusing thing is the way the victory happens:

1) you hit end of turn X.
2) you get production, beakers, culture for turn X, border pops and than the victory conditions are evaluated (Still in turn X)
3) You have won the game in turn X
4) You have to sellect "just one more turn" and save in turn X+1

So it seams that you have won in turn X+1, but you actually won in turn X.

@ Jenarie: You said that 1-4 was not what happened in your game. Let me try a restatement of 1-4 and see if that fits.

1. For everything except a conquest loss by the human (so I am told, I have never suffered that fate) ... you or an AI meets the victory conditions during turn X (you during your play, or the AI during the interturn after your play, which is the AI's turn X).

2. You hit end turn to complete your part of turn X. The AI take their turns, the interturn events are executed, and victory conditions are evaluated. Let's say human wins. Technically, the win is in turn X

3. The screen advances to turn X+1. I think then that the victory movie automatically plays, you are taken to the replay screen, you are told if you were Augustus Caesar or Dan Quayle (or something between the two), I think then comes the statistics screen. After you move through all of that, you have the choice of exit or play on.

4. Selecting one more turn lets you into the X+1 turn that is displayed behind the dialogue box with the choice (continue or not). One more turn does not further advance the game, as it already advanced to X+1 before you get the choice. Then you save the X+1 turn. Then you exit, and the save on exit function in the HOF mod (if activated) makes a second save at turn X+1. (Edit: I got this wrong. The mod makes a final save at turn X+1 as soon as the victory is announced, which will be time stamped before the save you can make after the "just one more turn". Or at least it does that if save on exit feature is enabled. See my following post.).

Does that sound more familiar (hope I am remembering this right)? If not, we will all be interested in what happened in your case.

dV

 

[da_Vinci]

I just finished GOTM 14, and found one way to eliminate confusion about what save to submit.

With the HOF mod, I always enable save on exit.

Since my video card/driver sometimes makes trouble, I keep updating a file called "GOTM ?? Manual Save". Now the auto save saves start of turn. I save after I make my moves. Then I go city by city (video seems to like to freeze here). After that, I manual save (overwrite "Manual Save") and then hit end turn. I have had the game freeze during the AI turns as well, so this prevents replaying a turn if freeze is right before autosave.

So, with that as background, my last manual save was at turn X at 3:00 PM Then, someone had acheived victory conditions in turn X, so turn X+1 displayed that someone had won. It turns out that the save on exit feature, or maybe some other feature in HOF created a victory save in turn X+1 at 3:02 PM.

Then I played the replay, looked at the charts, got my ranking level, etc. got back to the screen, picked "just one more turn", and then made a manual save at 3:16 PM. Exited the game, but that exit did not make a later save on exit (I guess the 3:02 one is a "save on end". so no save on exit after is required. So part of my previous post was wrong.)

I have been submitting the end save that the mod makes automatically. Seems to work fine. It would appear that whether you get the "select one more turn, then save" right or not, that the mod already has made the proper final save for us (or is that only if save on exit is enabled?).

It would appear that using this feature would take all guesswork out of creating a final submission save.

dV

 

[Torvoni]

Civ4 GOTM

...
What are the rules?

The rules are fairly simple: Play fairly.
...
Reloading an earlier save-file and replaying turns in a different way. The only time you may reload a save file is to start a new play session, and you must use the save file from the end of your previous session.

Please note that some people believe that reloading (in particular) isn't serious cheating. We, however, consider it to be and have zero tolerance on it. Please also be aware that if you do it, we can detect it, and we will act on it.

This part made the game hardest for me.
The whole "not reloading" approach made the game very different. This is the first time I ever lost a missionary ... and I lost several of them. This makes the game a little bit more harsh, because you can't try out some ideas and then backtrack when they fail.

A few times I had to replay the last turn following a crash. I tried my best to do exactly the same moves in exactly the same order. By the end of the game I was saving at the end of every turn (right before clicking the little red circle to advance to the next turn). I also changed the autosave to go every turn.

The game is harder too because a lapse in attention becomes devastating. A few times one of the AI enemies beat me to a wonder by a turn or two, and beat my settler with their settler by a turn or two, and made an outrageous request which would have been better to just give them the free tech (instead of getting the permanent -1 for not helping).

- - - - - - - - -

The GAME OF THE MONTH is great.
Maybe next time I will play better.

 

[civ_steve]

I appreciate your observations, Torvoni. It's actually very natural for a player to want to reload when something bad happens in their game so this rule is somewhat contrary to human nature. However, if we allowed any form of reloading there would be no end to what a player might do in the form of reloading, and no way to compare game results. A game failure is the only possible accepted reason to reload, and the player must attempt to recreate the moves already performed that turn (highly recommended that the autosave frequency be set to 1.)

I also believe that not reloading leads a player to more inspection of their game position, more planning, and ultimately to better game decisions. And you are free to go back and try different strategies after you've completed and submitted your first, non-reloaded attempt. I'm sure that next time you'll play better.