SGOTM 12 - Rules Discussion Thread

[AlanH]

And dangerous! I'm pretty sure Alan hates them!

"Hates" is too strong. I am nervous about them, as it's too easy to play the real live competition save, thinking you are on a test map.

 

[Erkon]

Erkon - I notice something in my recent test that I'm curious about. My test save included code you just provided.

I was able to make peace with a certain AI at some point. After the peace, I now had a -3 demerit with that AI for "you declared war on us". Is this the state of the scenario at the start that we have previously declared war on all the other civs?

There will be a -3 penalty against you due to the war declaration.

...Thanks for the info -- test games are very important.

Yes, they are. I've used them myself when I played in Team Murky Waters^TM. However, it's important for everyone to understand that optimizing the game play towards a test game may reduce your ability to adapt to the circumstances in the real game, especially, as indicated previously, the WB save does not contain all information available in the game save.

Please be very careful if you continue with test saves once the real save has been released. Please don't put me or Alan in an awkward position where we have to analyze the impact of players using the wrong save. We'd much rather spend our time on Civ5 GOTM planning.

These are general comments not directed at anyone specific.

Come on, real engineers use vi!

Yeah, I know, but I don't claim to be a "real" engineer Ok, enough spam, let's bring this thread back to order

 

[ruff_hi]

I am a total WB file noob, but I found it rather amusing that apparently each team has to be defined as being in contact with itself. What would happen if this was not done?

Nothing - the game would just create that little bit of knowledge all by itself. Just like removing all of the 'reveal map' information - the game just recreates it.

 

[neilmeister]

Can I make a suggestion regarding this SGOTM, and probably any SGOTM for that matter.

It might be best to not display any information/graphs on the progress page until every team has posted a save.

 

[AlanH]

How do others feel about this? The only issue I can see is that one team could take a loooong time getting started ...

 

[leif erikson]

It is a source of intelligence as we have used it to estimate the early actions of our fellow participants.

I do not think it has changed our course of action as we, generally, have made our decisions by then, or even started our initial turn set. It does provide interesting info to those who can read it well.

 

[LowtherCastle]

It is clearly something laggers could use to sway their decision on where to settle. I could vote against displaying them till all teams have settled.

It's also seriously spoilerish in terms of Oracle slingshots. There's no doubt laggers take a look at that. On tougher starts or starts at higher levels, one's never certain what a safe cut-off is for the slingshot.

 

[BLubmuz]

How do others feel about this? The only issue I can see is that one team could take a loooong time getting started ...

I don't think that see the graphs of the first TS can give much infos. If a team settle later than turn 0 and starts a worker, you can't see nothing, the score/power will remain flat.

In any case, at this point in the game every team has his strategy, good or bad it can be.

What often is duping is when, later in the game, a team upload a save and then another save 1 turn later. there're strange vertical lines in some cases.
But i don't think this is important.

 

[babybluepants]

I don't really care either way. Seeing whether a team settled on T0 or not doesn't tell you if they made a good move.

Oracle dates can be valuable, I guess, but they're also quite difficult to read - just look at all the guesswork last game.

 

[kossin]

It's part of the game. I agree, leave it be

 

[unclethrill]

It's part of the game. I agree, leave it be

I agree.

 

[AlanH]

Sounds as if the graphs will remain available. Is there any plot that is particularly spoiler-ish?

 

[kossin]

Culture graph mainly as it's a linear function early on.
For example in SGOTM11 it was easy to see that teams settled on turn 1 because after, say 25 turns, total culture was 48 and not 50.

 

[LowtherCastle]

The culture graph is also the spy for the Oracle slingshot.

 

[neilmeister]

Its not something that would aid the top teams at all, but it would allow other teams to know if the top teams settled on turn 0 or not. This is why I raised it.

 

[AlanH]

Well, I've disabled the Culture graph option for now. Let's see how long it takes for everyone to get started, then I can reinstate it.

 

[pocketbeetle]

Why stop there?

Let's disable all the graphs for the entire SGOTM.

 

[AlanH]

Because you are the first person to suggest it. I'm trying to respond to the majority preference, or to reach a compromise where there is no obvious choice.

Make your case and see if anyone else agrees.

 

[BLubmuz]

Why stop there?

Let's disable all the graphs for the entire SGOTM.

And lose a good part of the fun? No thanks!

 

[Gumbolt]

I must admit that you can guage a lot from the graphs.

In terms of the start. The culture would only show settle in place or a move. As Babybluepants points out it still doesn't mean that a team has made right move.

I think due to the time constraints of this game waiting 1 month or so to see if a team grabs the oracle seems a bit far fetched. We have coped with the graphs before. Why not now?