SGOTM 09 - Maintenance Thread

[Lord Parkin]

Not true. As I said in my response to Gosha190 above, all you need to do is click on the rebase icon and it works just like usual. No fiddling with the mouse needed whatsoever.

Interesting. It's certainly not intuitive, because you kind of expect that blacked-out tiles are sealed off to you until you explore them. (The fact that so many people were surprised to hear of the exploit, and that it hasn't become common knowledge already, confirms that it's not at all obvious.)

After all - logically, you shouldn't be able to sail an airship halfway around the world when you don't know whether there's land or sea in a given tile, let alone a city that you can rebase in.

 

[Niklas]

Not true. As I said in my response to Gosha190 above, all you need to do is click on the rebase icon and it works just like usual. No fiddling with the mouse needed whatsoever.

I think your definition of what constitutes fiddling with the mouse is very different from mine. How is "move the mouse around at random in the fog until it lights up green" not fiddling? "As usual" for me would be that you click the rebase icon, and then click the city you rebase to, no steps between.

The discussion is obviously rather moot though, and won't lead to anything positive. I personally dislike it, for exactly the reasons Renata posted about removing strategic thinking (and whatever strategic thinking might be added by this isn't really comparable), and I would be happy to see it outlawed or mod-removed. But that clearly won't happen for this game.

 

[Frederiksberg]

I understand why Gosha posted this game mechanics information and I don't blame him. It's certainly a small thing and will have virtually no impact on the game.

I do, however, think that ShannonCT is right when he questions whether it should be left to individual players to decide what kind of spoiler information they can post here.

 

[kcd_swede]

(The fact that so many people were surprised to hear of the exploit, and that it hasn't become common knowledge already, confirms that it's not at all obvious.)

Unusual Suspects have enough on our hands trying to figure out what to do with the defogged tiles to be thinking of ways to exploit the black tiles.
This one is a suprise to us. Thanks Gosha for sharing.

 

[ShannonCT]

Are you seriously suggesting that saying "airships can be rebased into fogged tiles" is a spoiler? You really believe there is anyone playing who is so dim they wouldn't realize such a strategy would be useful in this (or nearly any) game?

The usefulness of this strategy depends entirely on the map. Revealing that this strategy has been employed by some teams reveals info about the map. In general, revealing a strategy in the maintenance thread is an acknowledgement that the strategy is useful to the particular game. That is why I'm suggesting that it be done through Alan, which apparently it was in this case.

 

[classical_hero]

Well normally we don't get airships this early in the game, so it is highly unlikely that the makers of this game would have though of such event, since normally they are only around when the map is widely known. While there are advantages of using this, there are also disadvantages of using this.

 

[Dynamic]

R-r-r... If we could know about this exploit earlier, we could choose other strategy...

 

[LowtherCastle]

Interesting. It's certainly not intuitive, because you kind of expect that blacked-out tiles are sealed off to you until you explore them. (The fact that so many people were surprised to hear of the exploit, and that it hasn't become common knowledge already, confirms that it's not at all obvious.)

After all - logically, you shouldn't be able to sail an airship halfway around the world when you don't know whether there's land or sea in a given tile, let alone a city that you can rebase in.

I agree that it's unintuitive, but don't exagerate the effects. You have to have open borders, hence, you have to have met the AI, hence he's not halfway around the world...

I think your definition of what constitutes fiddling with the mouse is very different from mine. How is "move the mouse around at random in the fog until it lights up green" not fiddling? "As usual" for me would be that you click the rebase icon, and then click the city you rebase to, no steps between.

...hence, it's not exactly mousing around "at random"--you know where you met the AI. Either open borders carries with it this feature, or the game designers didn't think of it, since players are likely to have traded maps by the time airships got built.

That said, I understand where you're coming from. One does wonder why the programmers would have intentionally made this feature available.

 

[Renata]

The point I'm trying to make (badly, I'd guess) is that once you *do* decide to go a-map-hopping, there is no longer any need to use any good judgment in where you search for cities, nor any risk of choosing wrong and wasting time -- you know where they are.

 

[Gosha190]

as computer peoples love to say relatively theirs software: described bug isn't bug - it's a feature!

The thing is happened. Is it good or is it bad? I don't know. I think there is no matter. Let's go ahead!

 

[Renata]

And I'm done with the discussion, too. It just depresses me.

 

[mabraham]

We've just had a random and non-informative post in Wonder Bumpkins' team thread by "liposuction" who's registered in the last day or so. (Link not provided for obvious reason!) It's possible this name is some real SGOTM player's alias. If they've posted anywhere else, someone should check on the IP records.

 

[BLubmuz]

IMHO, Gosha was very kind and fair to post about the "green flash" while an airship is rebasing.
It's not this trick itself, wich just saves few turns of exploration, it's the fact that many teams now know that an airship can have many uses in this particular game.
Maybe it was clear to all, maybe not before Gosha's post.

Anyway this can be a minor issue.

What bothers me is the ability to see the first rows of any post.
But this is not blockable, unfortunately.

 

[KaleLambiek]

What bothers me is the ability to see the first rows of any post.
But this is not blockable, unfortunately.

Perhaps making a semi manditory first header in each SGOTM post...
**
**
** This is SGOTM, go away if you are playing it too.
**
**

That would block the "see the first few lines" from beeing shown

 

[Ronnie1]

I have just read 2+ pages about this "feature". Whoever said "if it smells, it is rotten", got it exactly right IMHO. It is unfortunate that this was only revealed now, and that some teams are probably past the point where this could make a big impact on their decision making.

This was obviously caused by the unique parameters introduced in this game, and would only be relevant on advanced starts in other situations.

I would prefer not use this exploit, but I think we (Gypsy Kings) will probably decide that it is in our best interest to do so. I have not even opened our thread today, so I am strictly speaking my opinion at this point.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

IMO the potential outcome shift from airships scouting fog is minimal. I'm also not 100% convinced it wasn't intended. You gain knowledge of all cities the AI has just by opening a trade screen. With open borders, you gain access to trade with those cities (if someone has established the network). I don't see how this is anything particularly major regardless, the airship scout mission is such a rigged thing to have from turn 1 anyway.

I'm much more concerned about the "gold per turn for techs" bug. AFAIK, nobody's mentioned it here yet. I haven't been able to replicated it in test games, but other people have managed. I can say that Who Dat? has agreed not to make use of this, but my opinion on its use might change if it's better known than I thought.

IMO in a tech race game the ability to extract gpt for techs (which for any team remotely in the picture for laurels will be a lot of them with the lead) can make a material difference. I'm not sure how the guy was doing it, but at least two people on S&T have managed to trigger it. I want to hear other teams' thoughts on this. Can we agree to ban GPT for techs, assuming anyone's actually figured out how to do it?

 

[BLubmuz]

IMO the potential outcome shift from airships scouting fog is minimal. I'm also not 100% convinced it wasn't intended. You gain knowledge of all cities the AI has just by opening a trade screen. With open borders, you gain access to trade with those cities (if someone has established the network). I don't see how this is anything particularly major regardless, the airship scout mission is such a rigged thing to have from turn 1 anyway.

I'm much more concerned about the "gold per turn for techs" bug. AFAIK, nobody's mentioned it here yet. I haven't been able to replicated it in test games, but other people have managed. I can say that Who Dat? has agreed not to make use of this, but my opinion on its use might change if it's better known than I thought.

IMO in a tech race game the ability to extract gpt for techs (which for any team remotely in the picture for laurels will be a lot of them with the lead) can make a material difference. I'm not sure how the guy was doing it, but at least two people on S&T have managed to trigger it. I want to hear other teams' thoughts on this. Can we agree to ban GPT for techs, assuming anyone's actually figured out how to do it?

What's this thing of gpt for techs? first time i hear this, serious.
And the airship is not a minor issue, anyway. The green thing is, not the airship.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

What's this thing of gpt for techs? first time i hear this, serious.
And the airship is not a minor issue, anyway. The green thing is, not the airship.

Agreed on the airship thing, though I doubt we'd have too many teams unaware of their uses. I knew of ALL their uses (barring fog look) as a rookie long ago.

There was a post, fairly recently, over on strategy and tips that shows a player selling techs for GPT and resources. At first we thought he was just using a mod or something, but then another poster replicated it...both said they use the standard 3.17.

And yes, it is serious. I haven't gotten it to work yet, but the science rate in this kind of game and the ability to bleed GPT out of the AI in normal games can break the difficulty of the game. My team agreed not to use it, should anyone actually figure out how to manage it (IIRC you put the GPT box over a tech then click ok/the tech rapidly). However, it would seriously affect this competition if one team does it, so I want to make the existence (and possible legality or illegality) of this glitch clear.

 

[KaleLambiek]

Link?

I know of the gift gpt and get it back thing... (which I dispise) but what you describe seems to be something different

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Link?

I know of the gift gpt and get it back thing... (which I dispise) but what you describe seems to be something different

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=319764