Punished for choosing civ/leader.

[civfanchambers]

I know this will sound foolish, but is the game programmed to punish players for choosing which Civ or leader they play as. Over the years I have come to expect that if I select a specific civ, I receive a crappy start. When going random civ/leader I get a great start. The last few hours I have started several games with the intention of playing as the Mongols. I explore nearby, no horses, poor food, no copper or iron. I re-roll random maps, go so far as to restart entirely, and nothing but bad starts. Just a short while ago I randomly roll and get the Babylonians, and wouldn't you know it...great start right away. 2 goodie huts within sight of settler, 2 wet corn, stone, nearby gem and elephants,several forests, and soon enough discovered horses in bfc. Is it rng at work or programming?

 

[vorlon_mi]

I know this will sound foolish, but is the game programmed to punish players for choosing which Civ or leader they play as. Over the years I have come to expect that if I select a specific civ, I receive a crappy start. When going random civ/leader I get a great start. The last few hours I have started several games with the intention of playing as the Mongols. I explore nearby, no horses, poor food, no copper or iron. I re-roll random maps, go so far as to restart entirely, and nothing but bad starts. Just a short while ago I randomly roll and get the Babylonians, and wouldn't you know it...great start right away. 2 goodie huts within sight of settler, 2 wet corn, stone, nearby gem and elephants,several forests, and soon enough discovered horses in bfc. Is it rng at work or programming?

It is almost certainly the RNG. Many players have played all the Civs; many have rerolled their starts. I know of some players who always choose the same tribe, and they have reported both good and bad starts. Speaking for myself, I've had more good starts than bad, and I have never done the "random" option.

 

[s.bernbaum]

I've always played random starts, never selecting a leader or civilization, and I have had some really poor starts as well as some great ones and most in between. I think you are seeing a combination of the RNG starts and selective memory, whereby a person tends to remember the times that support a theory and forget all the ones that don't. (Not intentionally, it is just part of normal psychology.)

 

[6K Man]

I have always had a sneaking suspicion that the leader or nation I choose affects the latitude at which I start. So no jungle/gem starts as Vikings or English, but lots of those as Mali, India, or Aztec, for example.

I have no evidence to support this feeling, though.

 

[Seraiel]

I have always had a sneaking suspicion that the leader or nation I choose affects the latitude at which I start. So no jungle/gem starts as Vikings or English, but lots of those as Mali, India, or Aztec, for example.

I have no evidence to support this feeling, though.

I can garantuee you that the CIV you play has no influence on the latitude at which you start. I'm just generating maps for a Viking-HoF-game, and at least 1/4 is near the jungle.

 

[ringwraith18]

I can garantuee you that the CIV you play has no influence on the latitude at which you start. I'm just generating maps for a Viking-HoF-game, and at least 1/4 is near the jungle.

Your own anecdote is no more valid than his, of course.

I have noticed that certain civs are much more likely to spawn in certain places, though I rarely play vanilla.

 

[Seraiel]

Your own anecdote is no more valid than his, of course.

I have noticed that certain civs are much more likely to spawn in certain places, though I rarely play vanilla.

I've created over 100k of maps in my CIV-time already, all starts were possible for everybody, from Mali starting in Tundra to Vikings in the Jungle.

Once someone suspected that the starting position of the opponents is tied to which place they were when selected, that also proved wrong.

 

[ringwraith18]

I've created over 100k of maps in my CIV-time already, all starts were possible for everybody, from Mali starting in Tundra to Vikings in the Jungle.

Once someone suspected that the starting position of the opponents is tied to which place they were when selected, that also proved wrong.

Do you have any actual data to support this?

 

[bhavv]

Obviously you are very new around here to doubt Seraiel's map regeneration experience.

 

[Seraiel]

Do you have any actual data to support this?

As a HoFer, I have to regenerate very many maps because the start and the map is just so important to the success of a game. It's not the RNG which decides the outcome of the first battles, because one has a very "safe" playstyle, plays very slowly and only goes for risks as long as one cannot control them, so I use the tool "Mapfinder" which generates hundreds to thousands of maps over night for me, saving only those that meet certain criterias, like "2 Gold + Food" or "2 Gems + Food" or more general, "1 Commerce-resource, 1 Food-resource" and then either Marble / Stone or Ivory

So when I decide to play CIV, I ran that tool the last week non-stop and have hundreds of starts that meet that criterias, and I got a screenshot from the start which help me decide which games to play until Oracle. This means for 1 game in which I invest 50-100h to get a HoF-slot, I play 100 maps at least until 2000 BC, because then I can see if the game will be worth it and if it'll be good enough. If good 2nd and 3rd city sites are missing i. e., I can trow away the map, if I'm boxed in and have cannot get any Ivory, I don't need to comopete any further, because the war would be so costly that the game simply would take 200y longer.

-------------

Apart from that, I'm trying to become a "Deity Elite Quattromaster" . That's a HoF competition where one needs to play every leader, every map, needs to achieve every victory type and so on, so I've played with most Civs and for each and every one, I went through what I described above, generate 3k maps, play 100 of them 'til I can see the map, look at hundreds of screenshots to decide which rounds to play, select one game, get a #1.

I never thought that this would be of any use, but as it looks, I can really tell safely, that any start with any CIV is possible, and also know the criterias for when one gets which set of starts. Like play Inland Sea, good Rivers, usually good amount of Floodplains, more Golds then Gems and Silver, Marble or Stone usually only with Gold (and not with Gems i. e. ) unless on very rare occasions, or Terra, choose Arid for Floodplains, choose Temperate climate for Trees, choose Tropical Climate for more gems and Grassland.

I hope you understand better now.

Obviously you are very new around here to doubt Seraiel's map regeneration experience.

Thx for this .

 

[Ghpstage]

Aside from Seraiel's extensive map spamming experience.
If start biases existed in this game we would expect to see them in the code, but the spawn code has been looked at with no discoveries made, and the leader XML has no reference to a relevant tag either.

 

[georgjorge]

It's just too tempting to assume connections between land and civilization...for example, the English queens always seem to have multiple Gems in my games (when I don't play them) etc. But I guess it's just anecdotal and not very reliable evidence.

 

[God-Emperor]

Do you have any actual data to support this?

Do you have any actual data to support your claims?

The map scripts are written in Python and are readable. See if you can find anything in them that has to do with placement of a player based on the player's civilization or leader.

Note the the Fall from Heaven 2 mod has a map script (well, more than one is now available for that mod and/or its mod-mods) which does place civilizations in suitable terrain. That capability had to be added to the code specifically to do the selection. Why add that code? Because there was no way to do it with the built-in functionality.