Psychology Experiment w/CIII

[davestew]

Hi all,

I want to do a psychology experiment with a simulation game, and I am reasonably knowledgable about CIII.

However, I don't know if I can make it do what I want for the purposes of my experiment. I will discribe and hope that some of you may be able to assist. This is likely a scenario situation.

The purpose of the experiment is to test if subjects will choose alternative strategies when it becomes obvious that their existing strategies don't work. [metacognitive techniques, expert vs. novice cognitive processes]

In general, there are the six [admittedly generic] CIII strategies I am aware of: Expansionist, Militaristic, Commercial, Religious, Industrious, and Scientific.

What I would like to do is train people unaware of CIII about these main strategies, then change the conditions of the game such that the only way to survive/thrive/improve is by changing from their initially selected strategy. So, I would like to do something like introduce a huge barbarian horde or huge gains for trading civs or whatever, but only after an initial "seed-growth" time has passed in the game and their initial strategy succeeded to some extent. The change in the ground rules would need to occur in the same game-year across different participants in the experiment, and would possibly need to be different based on what initial strategy was selected.

Any idea about how to change the rules/unit placement or other similar things in mid-stream of a game (Especially without stopping the game play)? I don't think the editor is really set up to handle something like that, but I just don't really know.

One idea I had was to have an era change at a specific year, but I don't know if that can be done.

Thanks for any assistance ahead of time.

David

 

[Bilko]

It could be possible to do it with a modpack, but I doubt it could be done with just the scenario editor.

 

[daengle]

You want to change the possible paths to success and create scenarios that require radically different aproaches to victory from what people are used to after having gone through all the trouble to learn the game?

I think that mod's called "Conquests".

But seriously, the learning curve for CivIII is way to steep for the kind of experiment you're describing. It takes a couple hundred hours of playing the game just to realize that the different paths to victory really are different, and a couple hundred more to learn to play well enough to make a plan actually happen.

CivIII's like chess, its just not a game for the casual player.

 

[Illusion13]

yeah, the pathes are all very different... And, I really, REALLY, dont think that what you are talking about are the 6 strategies... I'll try to list the strategies...

Cultural Domination, Technological Domination, Military Domination, Wonder Domination, and Happiness Domination.

 

[Gengis Khan]

Wonder & Happiness domination?? You're going to have to explain those 2.

I think there's 3 strategies:
Peaceful
Opportunist
Warmonger

 

[Bilko]

No, I think these are:

• Dogpiling (making Rogue Nations out of your enemies, and having everyone declare war on them)
• Solo Conquest (Taking over the world on your own)
• Tech Race (Try to stay peaceful, make as much money as you can, and build the spaceship)
• Peaceful (Just keep relations good the whole game and get the UN vote)
• Cultural (Building every wonder you possibly can, and tons of improvements, only going to war with civs who have high culture or wonders that you want)
• Score (Keep your people as happy as possible, and just make sure you have the biggest territory)

 

[davestew]

To make this easier, I think I would make a Tiny world, keep it restricted on some of the strategies (such as removing the cultural strategy).

So, is there any way to have the game react to a selected strategy with a change to force a player who wants to succeed to change their initial strategy? Such as placing lots of goodie huts partway through the game, or by having massive barbarian uprisings at a midpoint of the game, or by making trade much more lucrative after a certain point, or whatever.

I am really most concerned with creating a mid-game rule change. If anyone has ideas on how to accomplish that, it would be great!

Thanks for the input - you all have better concepts on how to win than I do.

"It's not whether you win or lose - it's how you play the game."

Originally posted by Bilko
No, I think these are:

• Dogpiling (making Rogue Nations out of your enemies, and having everyone declare war on them)
• Solo Conquest (Taking over the world on your own)
• Tech Race (Try to stay peaceful, make as much money as you can, and build the spaceship)
• Peaceful (Just keep relations good the whole game and get the UN vote)
• Cultural (Building every wonder you possibly can, and tons of improvements, only going to war with civs who have high culture or wonders that you want)
• Score (Keep your people as happy as possible, and just make sure you have the biggest territory)

 

[Bilko]

Here are some suggestions:
Teach a player how to conquer the world on their own while ignoring most diplomacy on warlord or regent, then move them up to monarch or emperor

Same as last, but use a scenario which greatly increases the cultural value of certain improvements and wonders, and which encourages peacefulness and diplomacy (starting out landlocked, surrounded by other civs, for example)

Teach them how to get the UN vote, then give them a scenario where they're on an Island with the Zulu, Aztecs, Germans, and Japanese(very aggressive civs.)

Show them how to tech race on warlord or regent, then put them on monarch or emperor, so they are forced to trade for techs.

Teach them how to dogpile, then give them a scenario in which there are only civs that hate them.
and so on...

 

[binyo66]

Originally posted by daengle


CivIII's like chess, its just not a game for the casual player.

I disagree. From last polling most players doesnt like playing on the same map. On the other hand, chess always starts from the same map (board)
But I like chess

 

[Turner]

I think daengle's pretty much got it right. Chess is a game that you can pick up the moves in an hour of play. But to really learn how to play well, you need to devote a lot of time to it. My brother did exactly this, and after fifteen years he's still not at a master rating. (Or maybe he is, I haven't asked in a while.) Point being, that it requires quite a bit of time and energy to learn how to play chess well.

With Civ, it's a slightly different situation. While the casual player can pick up the game an learn the basics in a few hours, to play well requires a lot of time and energy. I am constantly learning new things about this game, and I've been playing for two years, and the Civ series in general since 1994.

But I do understand the point you were making.

 

[Frollo]

Davestew, you might want to consider trying a different game.
As many people have said, Civ is too difficult to learn in a short time, no matter how much editing you use to make it easier. You just can't change the core mechanics of the game.

Now what I'm going to advise here is rather daring, being on a Civ board and all, but I really think you should try Warcraft III for your plans.
The WCIII editor lets you change every aspect of the game, up to the point where you virtually have only the graphics engine left.
You can add and remove units in-game, change victory conditions in-game, even change terrain in-game.
Of course you can't re-create Civ in Warcraft, after all they are completely different games. You'll have to follow a different approach, but WCIII is a strategy game after all, so it may be useful for your purposes. At least WCIII's editor is far more versatile than CivIII's.
You may want to give it a try.

 

[davestew]

Originally posted by Frollo
Davestew, you might want to consider trying a different game.
As many people have said, Civ is too difficult to learn in a short time, no matter how much editing you use to make it easier. You just can't change the core mechanics of the game.

Now what I'm going to advise here is rather daring, being on a Civ board and all, but I really think you should try Warcraft III for your plans.
The WCIII editor lets you change every aspect of the game, up to the point where you virtually have only the graphics engine left.
You can add and remove units in-game, change victory conditions in-game, even change terrain in-game.
Of course you can't re-create Civ in Warcraft, after all they are completely different games. You'll have to follow a different approach, but WCIII is a strategy game after all, so it may be useful for your purposes. At least WCIII's editor is far more versatile than CivIII's.
You may want to give it a try.

Good points all -

Being somewhat hardheaded, and having thought about this some [but not really enough], I have realized that if the game is easy enough for the participants in the study to master quickly, there will be no need for overarching strategy. However, if it requires an overarching strategy, then it is likely too complicated to teach. It is a difficult balance to find a simple enough simulation to allow learners to pick it up with hard enough to require a strategy to win.

I think that the highest likelihood of success is a series of tiny world "scenarios" set up to require the use of different strategies outlined above by Bilko. I like the fact that each of the strategies are fundamentally different and require different tactics on the part of the player, as well as consistent application of the tactics in support of the strategy.

The problem with WC in general is that it is much more tactical in nature - you have to control all of the pieces in real time. New players would never have enough mental resources to rise beyond running around the board clicking on pieces to plan and execute a strategy similar to that of CIII [I think]. I have only played Warcraft a few times, though, so maybe there is something I am not understanding about it - but that is what I did when I played, so... I certainly understand the beginner POV.

Basically this is a test to see if beginners can quickly learn what experts do easily in their area of expertise - use metacognitive techniques such as evaluating strategies to see which will work best in a given scenario.

 

[rdomarat]

I don't know of a way to introduce a mid-game change, but here's my idea :

- Create a map with two continents (use a Tiny map to make things easier and quicker).
- Place about 8 ocean tiles between each continent.
- Place 3 civs on one continent and 1 civ on the other continent.
- Have your player start on the continent with 3 civs, but place them close to the ONLY iron resource on the continent. Also, place the only three luxury resources on the continent close to your player's starting location. Make the starting player the Persian Civ.
- Do not place any Horses, Saltpeter, Coal or Rubber on the continent with the Persians
- Place the other two civs on the continent in lousy locations with no luxury or strategic resources
- Meanwhile, on the other continent, set up a the garden of Eden. The starting location for the civ that will eventually control the whole continent will have tons of cows in the starting location, will have ALL the strategy and luxury resources available to them, make lots of rivers to increse trade, you get the idea. I'd make this civ Agricultural/Industrious (i.e. the Mayans) so that the AI can really take advantage of the killer start location.

The result :

Early in the game, your player should be able to crank out Immortals and beat the snot out of the two crippled Civs on the initial continent, but without Horses, Saltpeter, Coal or Rubber, will be stuck in the Stone Ages. The Mayans on the other hand, once they make contact with you (which will be a while because of the Ocean between the continents), should be the more dominant Civ, given the garden of Eden that they've grown up in and the fact that they should have ALL the modern strategic resources. The Persians will not be able to walk all over the Mayans at this point, and the player will have to shift focus to trying a peaceful, non-waring type of approach to the game. Trading and infrastructure building in your cities will become more important than cranking out offensive units to crush your enemies.

For your experiment, you just need to teach a Militaristic strategy, which will be be great early on, and then see how the players react when they realize that a militaristic strategy will be inneffective against the much more dominant civ.

PS : The level of this game should be at least Monarch, so as to not cripple the Mayan AI and allow it to dominate. The poor starting locations for the other two civs should be enough to ensure that you player can stomp them with little effort.

Just my two cents worth..

 

[Padma]

The basic question you asked:

Any idea about how to change the rules/unit placement or other similar things in mid-stream of a game (Especially without stopping the game play)? I don't think the editor is really set up to handle something like that, but I just don't really know.

The answer is : no. You cannot change the game once it has begun. There is no provision for this You *might* be able to use Gramphos' Civ3MutliTool ona a save midway through the game, and try to tweak some paramaters, but I don't know if even that would work.

Your later idea of using several Tiny world scenarios sounds good. So does rdomarat's idea.

 

[Frollo]

Originally posted by davestew
The problem with WC in general is that it is much more tactical in nature - you have to control all of the pieces in real time. New players would never have enough mental resources to rise beyond running around the board clicking on pieces to plan and execute a strategy similar to that of CIII.

Good point.
Yet, with the Warcraft editor, you can easily lower the speed of all units to snake-like. You could also give the AI and the human player different speeds.
In fact, I think it might even be possible to change it into a real turn based game. That may require some programming skills however.

But I understand you already made your mind up, and I respect that. You'll hear no more about Warcraft from me