Sgotm18

[Folket]

How about selecting team captains from the previous SG, after people have signed up, and then letting them pick their teammates, one by one in reverse order of finish from SG17. That ought to level the playing field.

I do not think this is such a great idea. How would that make the person being picked last feel?

 

[Trystero]

My (humble) opinion: I don't think team composition is really a problem that needs to be solved. I'm happy with the current format.

 

[Folket]

On the other hand I would not be upset if we ran one SGOTM with random teams. That would mix things up.

 

[Seraiel]

You make the persons chosen not feel bad by voting in secrecy.

Anyhow, like that we'd miss a whole lot of fun.

Just imagine for someone like me, that I never played any SGOTM, anyhow, people know that I'm a Deity player, but: Do they know how good I really am? Do they know how many maps I play to come up with my #1 entries? Which team would you think would choose me and on which place?

You know what I'm meaning, if team-caiptains may choose, everybody could see what people think of them, and actually nobody should feel bad here, as the players here already belong to the best.

 

[pepe26]

I would like Deity but I don't mind Immortal.

As for map features and characterists, I would like to stress map balance for early team choices. I really don't mean to cry or accuse with the next statement, it's merely suitable to make a point SGOTM 17 had one little flaw, in my humble opinion:
Teams deciding to push into the Hades Area early, allocating a lot of resources for this endeavor, were really set back by finding a second lock to pick and then nothing in the Undeworld area of Hades... The rewards did not make up for the investment and there was no way of knowing or even anticipating this. On the contrary, it seemed very likely, that there would be an AI in the Underworld, that should probably be attacked sooner rather than later or run the risk of leaving them unchecked for too long and then facing a huge number of cities, later.
Since this wasn't so, our team was really hopelessly left behind in the dust by teams deciding to bash on the Chinese/Khmer instead.

Again, I am not complaining, merely trying to give input as you have been asking for in the OP, KCD. I really enjoyed the map a lot! Great work! Thanks for keeping this challenging an fun.

 

[LowtherCastle]

SGOTM 17 had one little flaw, in my humble opinion:
Teams deciding to push into the Hades Area early, allocating a lot of resources for this endeavor, were really set back by finding a second lock to pick and then nothing in the Undeworld area of Hades... The rewards did not make up for the investment and there was no way of knowing or even anticipating this. On the contrary, it seemed very likely, that there would be an AI in the Underworld, that should probably be attacked sooner rather than later or run the risk of leaving them unchecked for too long and then facing a huge number of cities, later.
Since this wasn't so, our team was really hopelessly left behind in the dust by teams deciding to bash on the Chinese/Khmer instead.

This an interesting view and discussion. The main reason I complimented kcd on this scenario is precisely what you consider a flaw. More specifically, what I thought made this scenario one of the best is that exploration was given equal importance to other factors. You seem to think exploration was given too much importance, if I'm interpreting you correctly. In my opinion, most scenarios don't give exploration enough importance.

In other words, I don't think teams that attacked Sury and Qin first were the lucky ones. I think they were the ones that placed more value on exploration. KCd made it very difficult to even reach Sury and Qin, to say nothing of exploring their territory. At the same time, he made it obvious, by allowing us to see the unusual oceanic tiles with our wb to the west, that something was going on down there, thus piquing our exploring interest.

Full disclosure: My team attacked 1) Mansa, 2) Hades, 3) Sury. We put a lot of resources into capturing both Hades but failed on Hammar when they upgraded to LBMs 2 turns before our SoD was in position to attack. This undoubtedly set us back. I doubt it set us back 10 turns for Gold, but who knows? But, while we were attacking Hades Hammar, we were also sending a spy through Qin to Toku, so we continued to give exploration is due importance and were able to realize that Hades Hammar wasn't our best option. We also diverted our Sury SoD toward Qin to open up the central canal which we instantly settled for more exploration through that obviously open channel.

Why shouldn't a scenario require exploration of every last tile for victory? That's just a thought question.

The only way to overcome that is to cheat and see the map in advance. Any team that does that will obviously have an advantage. Otherwise, exploration is and always has been a central part of the Civ experience, and imo, one of the most exciting parts. I still remember my earliest days and getting a thrill when encountering a new resource on the map.

 

[pepe26]

I agree with everythinbg you say... It's just that you don't seem to mind that the allocation of resources necessary to reach the Underworld was pretty useful. A team deciding to go for the ocean jump and not attacking the Hades cities ignoring what lies behind has a significat advantage over the others.

 

[LowtherCastle]

I agree with everythinbg you say... It's just that you don't seem to mind that the allocation of resources necessary to reach the Underworld was pretty useful. A team deciding to go for the ocean jump and not attacking the Hades cities ignoring what lies behind has a significat advantage over the others.

Well, it's not that I don't mind. I'd rather we'd done better. I'll tell you what, though, in my compliment to kcd I also said I don't think any of us solved the mystery of this scenario. More specifically, I don't think galleons were the strongest move. I think this scenario should have been won by T140 eek and the essential requirement for doing that had nothing to do with Astro, but rather...exploration. That's precisely why Obormot and Balbes would have solved it, imo. They ALWAYS valued exploration properly. Astro was overkill and a waste of valuable GPs (imo).

 

[Seraiel]

Hard to find the right words for this, but without having followed the game, people could and should have guessed this from the name only imo. Hades is where the dead go, only one man went there freely and came back (losing his beloved one again) , he's known by the name of Orpheus, there's a saga in Greek Mythology about him.

 

[pepe26]

Yep, full ack. We never researched Astro but our finish date is pretty horrible comparetively. Proper city placement would have been sufficient to culture bridge and galley drop invaders.

I'm just realizing a super-typo:

to mind that the allocation of resources necessary to reach the Underworld was pretty wasteful.

 

[pepe26]

Hard to find the right words for this, but without having followed the game, people could and should have guessed this from the name only imo. Hades is where the dead go, only one man went there freely and came back (losing his beloved one again) , he's known by the name of Orpheus, there's a saga in Greek Mythology about him.

That's kinda true actually..... hard to argue with it. I even did a quick research on Hades to find out what you just told us. But try to convince a team to not go into that area just on a Greek Myth hunch... that's gonna be tough to pull off, especially when you aren't convinced 100% yourself

 

[LowtherCastle]

Hard to find the right words for this, but without having followed the game, people could and should have guessed this from the name only imo. Hades is where the dead go, only one man went there freely and came back (losing his beloved one again) , he's known by the name of Orpheus, there's a saga in Greek Mythology about him.

Fascinating. But then, never trust a mapmaker. These games are so intense and winning requires the comprehensive foresight to not be able to look back and say "We should have done this..." that one always wonders whether the mapmaker is tricking you or not, precisely with the logic you're presenting.

It's a lot of fun. I encourage you to join the SG next time!

 

[Doshin]

Ah, but what about Odysseus, Hercules, Theseus and Pirithous, Aeneas, even Aeschylus..? If Dante could make it out alive, then Burger King should as well.

 

[kcd_swede]

Interesting discussion. As for team composition, we have discussed that previously and decided that folks who choose to be together tend to work together better. Most (all, I think) existing teams welcome newcomers, and there is nothing stopping anyone from hopping teams if they want and their target team will have them. If you want to be "randomly" distributed to a team, sign up as unallocated... you will probably end up on the team that is most shorthanded.

As for a "Lurker's Thread" where lurkers (who are forbidden from posting in team threads) can discuss the game while it is on-going... I like that. Of course, anybody on a team roster would be forbidden from viewing that thread. I'll run this idea by the rest of the staff and see if there are some issues with doing so that I haven't thought about. Its definitely more important to secure the integrity of the game for the players than to improve the spectator aspects, but if we can do both, why not?

I thought everyone knew an Anvil was useless without a Hammer... but I guess not. Note, observant people may have guessed from the fact that 2 barb cities existed at the start, and that the culture growth of the barb city you could see might have been a warning that you aren't seeing everything. I can't guarantee that all options you get will give equivalent results, only that you will have choices. Enough said about that.

In SGOTM16 I had considered multiple deadlines, and cut it to just one intermediate deadline (which proved to be trivial). As for divulging info about other teams at that point... meh, I think the progress curves you already get should be enough. I think intermediate deadlines makes for more work for staff, so I doubt it will be a frequent addition.

 

[Sun Tzu Wu]

Many players do not like "Galleon Chains" and no doubt the vast majority don't like the tedium of running them, with the seemingly endless unloading and loading of the same units. I can't imagine the pain a Galley Chain would inflict (twice the pairs of unload/load operations for the same distance covered); several SGOTM-17 teams did use them.

Would be nice to have a scenario where there were no reason to create a "Galleon Chain". Maybe all bodies of water could be too short (3 plots) for a Galleon Chain and not bridgeable via forts (thus still too short for Galleon Chain).

Sun Tzu Wu

 

[pepe26]

I would like this, too, galley chains in our game were a real pain in the arse...

 

[pigswill]

Replace oceans with deserts and mountains?

 

[Fippy]

Another opinion against galleon chains here, for what it's worth.

 

[bcool]

Personally, I can't see how moving units across a vast desert could be any better than a galleon chain...

 

[LowtherCastle]

Again I'm compelled to defend kcd's scenario. This upset by a few posters about galley/eon chaining is misplaced, in my opinion.

Take another look at the defogged map and you'll see that chaining is virtually unnecessary, precisely because of kcd's careful design (I'm assuming it wasn't entirely an accident). The first detail to notice is the east-west railroad. With forts, it speeds up flow of units to the center of the map (a galley moves faster through forted railroads).

The next detail is that, with a city planted on the silver tile bridging the east-west halves of the map and a fort to the northwest within its BFC, the galley "chain" only goes from our homeland around the corner to the fort. From there, once again the units rapidly travel over land by the nearby railroad, with just a few roads added to access the railroad and to circumvent the mountains. From there you need a galley, but no chaining to get to Toku (or you can go by land and kcd provide a land shortcut to Kyoto so the land route was as fast as the sea route). Or you need a galley, but no chaining, to get to Peter.

From that same silver fort, you can also access Hades Hammar by railroad, if you so choose.

So, to kcd's credit, there was an opportunity for chaining for teams that wanted to invest in up to 51 galleys or 33 galleons. Or an opportunity to attack by land, except the need for a galley to cross over to Peter. Or an opportunity to invest in a small fleet of about 10 galleys for mini-chaining to Toku and Peter.

This scenario provided so many options for different paths to victory that it's hard to imagine there could be more. Frankly, I'd like to ask for a round of applause for kcd.

One last point on that. My prediction for an optimal T140 victory would involve the short galley chain combined with a land attack from Sury to Qin to Toku. Galleon chaining totally unnecessary and galley chaining kept to a bare minimum.

===

To ask for no galleon chaining is to ask for no continents, no archiplego, in short, nothing but lakes and/or land. Good grief.

Mapmakers one and all, I have a new uniform for you:

One size fits all...