"Predator" Class Game Announcement

[Sirp]

Yes I must admit, it seems a little strange to me that you 'have' to win by conquest to qualify in the Predator division.

Anyone who wins by domination or culture could certainly have won by conquest if they wanted to.

I can understand diplomatic and spacerace being excluded though, as they are slightly easier options.

-Sirp.

 

[Moonsinger]

Originally posted by Skyfish
If you recall the ONLY Conquest victory in GOTM14 was from Sirian with Modern Armors in 1750.

If I remember correctly, there was at least one other player who reduced each of the two remaining AIs to just one city, then milked all the way to 2050AD. If that isn't "Conquest" victory than I don't know what else.

 

[Txurce]

I usually find conquest to be a pretty boring mopping-up of a domination victory, but I do see a difference on deity. Like almost all players, I won't seize control of a deity conquest game early on. Playing catch-up, my civ won't really come into its own militarily until well into armored warfare, sometime between 1600 and 1750. By then, I'll have to potentially alienate the powerful civs in short order by knocking out a few spaceships. Then I would have to take every city by 2050 from civs that probably still have big, powerful militaries, thanks to the deity production bonuses. It could be tight, whereas there is no time factor at any of the lower levels.

 

[cracker]

Originally posted by Sirp
Yes I must admit, it seems a little strange to me that you 'have' to win by conquest to qualify in the Predator division.

It may only seem strange if you allow yourself the luxury of lack of perspective.

The mapmaker get to choose the conditions and if a restricted victory condition in either the Predator or Conquest class makes sense then you will probably see these restrictions. You can still play the Predator class game and go for another victory condition, but this will not qualify you for recognition this month as the top Predator class game.

Some of these decisions are based on big picture issues of looking at the actual game itself plus the participations profiles of players that we believe will be potentail Predator class participants.

There is nothing really strange or wierd about the "conquest" victory designation for the Predator class game for Gotm20-SPain when you consider the traits of the civ, combined with the UU as implemented by Firaxis, and then even a minimal historic perspective of Historic Spain an her role in the Reconquista/Holy League/Conwuest of the New World/Holy Roman Empire/Armada .

Utimately it comes down to choosing what this game would be at the more intense game level for this given month. (don't be picky, just smack 'em).

 

[Skyfish]

If I remember correctly, there was at least one other player who reduced each of the two remaining AIs to just one city, then milked all the way to 2050AD. If that isn't "Conquest" victory than I don't know what else.

Aha...see if you had not milked your game maybe I would remember it
Winning in 2050 has *nothing* to do with a Conquest victory since you could as well win by Domination, Cultural or Space so sorry but you did not win by Conquest in my eyes.
This does not take anything away from your game of course.

 

[Bamspeedy]

Well, if the AI is down to 1 city, I highly doubt taking that very last city would all that difficult. It would be considered conquest in my mind, they just didn't go through the process of killing the last city that would have taken 2 seconds to accomplish.

There were actually 4 people who held off winning until 2050 A.D., and I'm sure most of them (if not all) kept the last remaining AI(s) down to 1 or 2 cities to prevent them from launching spaceships, etc.

 

[Ribannah]

Has anyone ever LOST in 2050 AD? It should be possible to arrange a domination/conquest/diplomacy multi-loss. Spaceship is a bit harder but not altogether impossible.

 

[DaveMcW]

Don't forget histographic!

 

[SirPleb]

Originally posted by Ribannah
Has anyone ever LOST in 2050 AD? It should be possible to arrange a domination/conquest/diplomacy multi-loss. Spaceship is a bit harder but not altogether impossible.

My GOTM18 final save is set up so that one of the options is a 2050 Diplomatic loss - build the UN and vote for Hannibal. That isn't a hard one to set up of course.

I've tried in the past to get a conquest loss in 2050 from a couple of my HOF games and it is surprisingly difficult. I gifted all cities but one to my rival, disbanded all troops, declared war, and let them take a shot. Even with railroads providing trivial access to come in and take me, they didn't do it. I tried once leaving just a settler as a sitting duck. They still didn't take the bait. Something about the overwhelming number of new cities seems to stop them from focusing on the final blow. So although I imagine there's a way to do it, the obvious approach isn't a sure thing.

A domination loss in 2050 would take a lot of work I think. Problem with this one is that giving away cities results in them losing their cultural expansion. An approach which I think ought to work would be a carefully established ICS where all territory remains held without any culture. Expand just short of Domination, then gift it all to an AI having set it up so that it remains the same size when gifted.

Space, culture 100K, and culture 20K - tough ones! I can't think of any way to control the timing on those for 2050...

 

[Bamspeedy]

I thought I remember Aeson one time donating all of his cities to France at 2050 AD. I think he had enough points to earn a medal or something, but he didn't get it since it was a loss (must be a victory to get the award). I can't remember if it was a GOTM, tournament game, or HoF submission, as it was a long time ago.

Diplomatic would be easiest, if you time the UN right, just vote for the other guy. Domination could be accomplished by donating all your cities. Conquest, abandon all cities, but leave 1 right next to the AI (and hope they have fast moving units). Spaceship and culture would be the hardest to lose by at exactly 2050 A.D.

 

[Bamspeedy]

A domination loss in 2050 would take a lot of work I think. Problem with this one is that giving away cities results in them losing their cultural expansion. An approach which I think ought to work would be a carefully established ICS where all territory remains held without any culture. Expand just short of Domination, then gift it all to an AI having set it up so that it remains the same size when gifted.

Or have extra settlers lying around like I did in GOTM18. At 2049 A.D. found all those new cities, then donate them all.

 

[Ribannah]

What I was thinking of is this: sign a ROP and move in your Workers. By irrigating and mining you can control the speed of the AI's production. It still has to start building those spaceship parts to begin with, of course.

20K culture is somewhat similar, you make sure the AI has sufficient wonders to build and then you sit back and hope. It'll be rare.

To get both would be miraculous!

 

[LKendter]

Originally posted by cracker

You also rest assured that all of the top players will not make the jump to the predator class games because that is not the designed intent. There will be no scoring incentive to make that jump and the game will generally require a much different intensity than the Open Class game that we design with you in mind.

I have no question that plenty of people will jump on conquest class.

However, I wonder how many will jump on predator class. I won't play a more difficult game without getting a bonus for it.

Playing this would simply lower my score in the competition.

 

[RufRydyr]

I was going to be a Predator in 20, but after more thought, sweaty palms, and reading posts I think I'll stay in the Open class for this one. I've only won a couple of diety games and adding raging barbs would be a nightmare!

 

[Borealis]

Open for me. I still need a solo deity victory, and I don't need to stress out my recovering health over Deity-plus.

 

[Renata]

Originally posted by LKendter



I have no question that plenty of people will jump on conquest class.

However, I wonder how many will jump on predator class. I won't play a more difficult game without getting a bonus for it.

Playing this would simply lower my score in the competition.

Depends why you're playing. I will *definitely* be doing predator class in future games at lower levels (Regent, Monarch, possibly emperor depending on what the conditions are). I get bored with a game fast if it gets too easy. So far I've been lucky, in that the GOTM levels have been increasing each month at a similar rate to my own skills. But I had been wondering how much fun it would be for me when the level went back down.

Renata

 

[cracker]

Renata,

This is definately one of the reasons for introducing the "Predator" Class game concept while we are at or near the top of the curve.

There will be a lot more "predators" when the difficulty of the open class game is lower, but the difference in intensity between the Open Class game and Predator Class game may be greater when the actual difficulty setting of the open class game will be lower.

 

[cracker]

Originally posted by LKendter
... I won't play a more difficult game without getting a bonus for it. ... Playing this would simply lower my score in the competition.

This may be one of the totally legitimate decision criteria that you may have to use to decide where the right intensity level will be for you to play. For many players, the increased challenge of the Predator class may not result in an overall decrease in their resulting score for the game because they will define ways to turn the increased difficulty elements into a bonus the benefits their chose strategic approach to play.

In some ways the Predator class is designed to just install an additional level of bragging rights that tries to move us further away from overfixating on "score" elements as opposed to stories of strategic events that are backed up with some numeric data. There is a slight difference here that I in particular am hoping we can comfortably emphasize.

 

[Skyfish]

Posted by cracker :

In some ways the Predator class is designed to just install an additional level of bragging rights that tries to move us further away from overfixating on "score" elements as opposed to stories of strategic events that are backed up with some numeric data. There is a slight difference here that I in particular am hoping we can comfortably emphasize.

...and I thank you very much for this cracker as the Predator class has strongly rekindled my interest in GOTM.
The Predator class is a great idea and a move in the right direction, I will do everyhting possible to support it, i.e. playing it in GOTM 20.
I am definitely not a score player, but because I like trying new stuff I went for a different style of play in GOTM18, enjoyed it pretty much and was greatly rewarded with an 11th place. Even though I believe I could get in the top10 one day, I am not too much interested in "playing for score".
With the advent of the Jason scoring system and this new development, I am guaranteed more exciting games in the future.

 

[ltcoljt]

Can somebody point me to instructions on how to display the swordsman icon, the ptw icon and the other stuff that Cracker wants, as well as site guidelines on posting screenshots. All of this stuff should be linked into the main GOTM web page but simple stuff like that which would be helpful is being overlooked, probably because of staff workload.