Should this exploit be allowed?

[Matrix]

Getting technologies very fast (100% science minus luxuries) because no money costs less (buildings/units) than you can rebuild in one turn.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=31702&perpage=20&display=&pagenumber=1

Do you think this exploit is big enough to disallow?

 

[thefrenchzulu]

A few things:
1. This exploit is impossible to police.
2. I often research techs in 4 turns. I will use reserves to finance deficits and rebuild them on the last turn.
3 In the era where I can afford to rebuild barracks in one turn, I'm anyway researching in 4 turns.
4. Not having any money, means you are losing on WallStreet, making this exploit not very advantageous in the late game.

 

[col]

Its not a gamebreaker but can be a useful short term ploy.

I've used it when I NEEDED a tech quickly. For example I had a prebuild for UN but needed to complete it before another civ or lose a million shields.

I didnt have enough cash to pay for a deficit budget at the time so I spent all my cash on improvements (why waste it), set my science to 100% and ran a deficit of several 100 GPT for three turns.
I lost 3 buildings and units that were rebuilt very quickly. I got fission in 4 turns and built Un a turn ahead of the other civ. Phew.

The downside of this strategy that makes it unsustainable in the longer term is that you always have no cash so you can NEVER upgrade any units! This is quite a powerful balance.

I vote leave it.

 

[pterrok]

I think it should be banned--if you use it to start on TOE and then get it and Hoover you've only done it once, but the game is then completely out of whack. However, I agree that you couldn't police it...

I just discovered this site last month...Until then I was blissfully playing games 'by the rules' and winning in various ways but without very high scores.

Come here and find all sorts of ways to 'game' the system, which is depressing. I'd like to play by email, but until Firaxis gets patches to make all the exploits that come up completely useless--like keep taking units and buildings from across your empire until your deficit is paid for, or making massively starving cities virtually useless to stop the worker dogpile--I could be playing against someone who IS doing those things.

 

[Kemal]

I also think that this should be banned. We might not be able to check it but the same thing goes for reloading, which is also banned.

Using this exploit means you are actually making money that doesn't excist, since the costs of all the units/buildings of your empire is paid with money that you do not have, but in the same time the commerce with which you could have paid these upkeep costs is used for science. Thus your research doesn't reflect the actual capability of tech research that your empire could support so that weak empires will have the same research capability as stronger (better managed/build) empires.

This in my opinion conflicts with the the whole idea of the gotm, namely comparing your skill in civ3 with other players.

 

[Ribannah]

Why even put this to the vote?
Of course such an exploit should not be allowed!

 

[Matrix]

Well Ribannah, I want to give people as much freedom in the game as possible. The only reason there are some exploits disallowed is that they are so effective you will only make use of that, thus narrowing your ways of playing, which makes it less fun.

So the question is: is this so effective that you have to use it, while it makes the game less fun? (I can imagine it's no fun playing without money.)

 

[civ_steve]

I've not tried this exploit so I can't say how effective it would or would not be. I have run a deficit before, but I had a built up treasury, and never actually went negative.

I voted to allow this exploit. This seems to me, without further examples, to be just a cruder form of building Wealth. If I understand it, random buildings and units disappear from lack of support, but production is so high that it's easy to rebuild them. Production is replacing support. This is the same as building Wealth, without the 1:4 loss in production and with the random effects.

 

[Hurricane]

I think col gave a perfect example of how this exploit can be used very effectively also for civs with a good income. That's why I say ban it.

 

[ProPain]

I consider this an exploit.

The effects will tremendous for a huge empire. A huge empire will have lots of units and improvements and thus increasing the chance you will only lose fairly expendable units and buildings. If the disbanding is random that is. When disbanding occurs according to some rules, big empires will even have better possiblities to get tremendous research rates at virtually no cost for a long time. Just think of running 1000+gpt deficits for just one building and unit a turn you can choose yourself! Looks very similar to the worker dogpile to me.

I'm no expert on milking but it will have an effect on scoring too. Effectively your trading money (and maybe happy faces) for (future) techs. As said, I can quantify this, but if it improves scoring this falls into Matrix' have to use category, meaning exploit.

I say ban it.

ProPain

 

[Kemal]

Originally posted by ProPain


I'm no expert on milking but it will have an effect on scoring too. Effectively your trading money (and maybe happy faces) for (future) techs. As said, I can quantify this, but if it improves scoring this falls into Matrix' have to use category, meaning exploit.

I hadn't thought of this yet.

Now there really should be no debate whether this should be banned, since you can also use it not to get points for future tech but getting a tremendous amount of extra points by setting luxuries at 100% (when necessary tech have already been researched) while running a large deficit. A large empire will get a tremendous amount of additional happy faces meaning that if you want to try and reach a high position on the results list you are forced to use this trick.

Indeed there is little difference with the worker dogpile trick then.

 

[ProPain]

mm. I should proofread before submitting a post to prevent the mistakes. In my previous post I meant to say I can't quantify it, but I'm sure some expert milkers can.

I hadn't even thought about the luxury variation. Probably more interesting than the science trick from a scoring point of view.

ProPain

 

[col]

Er - I've used the luxury trick too!

Back when I was concerned about getting high scores, I would routinely go to 100% luxury and run a deficit while I waited for domination or culture wins to kick in.

It just seemed so obvious I assumed everyone did this

 

[Kemal]

Originally posted by col
Er - I've used the luxury trick too!

And why shouldn't you have used it? If only I had thought of that back then...
Since it wasn't (isn't) forbidden you were just using a legitimate technique to increase your score. And you probably weren't the only one, I guess.

I also think there's nothing wrong with upping the luxury slider to 100%, as long as you have the gold to support your upkeep. Once you start paying your empire's upkeep by losing a building and unit a turn, then - IMO - intentionally running a deficit goes from a fair techique to an exploit like the worker dogpile.

 

[Sirian]

I just discovered this site last month...Until then I was blissfully playing games 'by the rules' and winning in various ways but without very high scores. Come here and find all sorts of ways to 'game' the system, which is depressing. - pterrok

Hi, pterrok. There are alternative multiplayer venues with less tolerance for and embracing of abusing the game. You say you'd like to play by Email. There's a better equivalent to that right here at CF, over in the Succession Games forum, under Stories. There's a wide variety of SG's being played, of all difficulty and many themes. You should check it out. Should be something there to your liking.

There are also other tournaments besides Matrix's GOTM. There's a second tourney at CF, which de-emphasizes "milking". I haven't tried that one, but some folks like it. Then there are the Realms Beyond, with a high difficulty, high variety tournament with several games per month. The RB events place a premium on No Spoilers, and the rules there embrace the integrity of the game, with no tolerance for "gaming the system". Sounds more like your speed. There's a link my sig if you want to take a look.


- Sirian

 

[Beam]

It is an exploit .... but very hard to police. In Tech races income usually is just high enough to to get some change or have a small deficit. It makes a hugh difference if you can move the slider form let's say 60% science to 100% science if the only consequence is loss of a unit and a barrack. One could even set up a building plan just to replenish these small losses. Poor implementation by F.

 

[Jove]

Arrrr, it's clearly an imbalance. Its different from, say, disbanding tanks for the shield yield to build things like marketplaces in the hinterlands because in that instance you still have to account for the full number of shields to get the improvement you're working toward. If this was really a fair technique, the game would sell off however many units and improvements were needed to cover the deficit, instead of just one apiece. (Am I right? I've never done it, does really only 1 building and one unit get disbanded? No matter what the deficit?!?) It amounts to free money. If you want to cannibalize your empire for some purpose, be my guest, but pay the bill. We don't allow the 'start with 10,000 gold' patch, so why allow this?

 

[col]

Originally posted by Jove
. (Am I right? I've never done it, does really only 1 building and one unit get disbanded? No matter what the deficit?!?)

Yup and thats why its an exploit.

The game should keep on disbanding buildings and units to 'pay' for your deficit but it doesnt.

I have tried to play a whole game without money but its not so easy!

 

[pterrok]

I have the perfect opportunity to do this in Tournament game 3_2--but I won't. If I DID do it, I would have a tech that the others did NOT have and could get some techs I'm missing AND recoup a lot of money by trading it around--thereby being able to rebuild the few buildings and units lost...

I'm surprised at the poll totals so far that want to allow this! To be clear:

Setting your sliders to make -100 gpt when you have 1000 gp in the bank is fine; setting your sliders to -1000 gpt when you have 100 gp in the bank would be disallowed!

I guess the one building and one unit limit came about when your civ falls into anarchy during a long war--if half of your buildings went away it would be very bad! But right-click on a building and see the price you can get for selling it and then tell me that limiting a huge deliberate loss to one building and a unit isn't an exploit!

Firaxis could make a quick fix by not allowing let you end a turn with your sliders set to generate a negative bank total within your current circumstances--so you could still fall negative if you lost a city during the AI turn, say.

But if they wanted to get tricky, ALLOW the negative total, but KEEP the negative balance from turn to turn. Then charge 10% interest on it per turn. You lose a building and a unit per turn for each turn that you're negative until you can get back to a positive balance. When your balance is negative, trading would be adversely affected in some manner--the AI would demand a LOT more or give a lot less. The max you could set either slider would be reduced by 10% for each 10% of your current income that your balance is negative.

Do something like that and you MIGHT push research to 100% to get a tech right away, but it'll be something you'd have to think about since you COULD get into a death spiral.


(Thanks, Sirian for the info on other places to go!)

 

[BoBtheBUILDER]

I'm surprised given the interest governements seem to have in deficit spending that they didn't handle this differently, applying interest penalties or something of the like once you go into deficit. Then you can have the Balanced Budget wonder that makes two content people happy but prohibits you from going into deficit spending.