TH4 - The Age of Sail - OPEN SG

A similar set-up, on deity, with a fixed rotation, would probably see better communication arise.

I'm not really up for running one just yet, but I can see the wheels turning for LotR7 or 8 ;)

I know I want to send this settler to this point, but how do I communicate that?

Well, there's the old standard of images with dotmaps. And another part of that problem in this game was it really didn't matter where any of the settlers more than 2 islands away from home ended up. None of those cities would be better than 1/1, so all they did was claim resources that we mostly already had and territory towards domination that we didn't achieve.

Communication was also definitely hurt by me organizing the game but not really functioning as a central strategy planner. That was very hard to do when I wasn't playing; I couldn't get into my usual flow of micromanagement instructions. I gave general ideas like where to build the FP, and which civs to attack when, which worked out okay, but the details did suffer.

Interesting discussion... This game definitely taught us a lot about the metagame of SGs.
 
I think this game has now officially garnered more discussion post-game than it did during the game! :D Seriously, I think the communication was actually pretty good during this game. Towards the end, there were just three or four of us playing and we handed it off to each other in good position to carry out our turns. The island hopping did make logistics a challenge, but I rather enjoyed it. I'm used to playing on pangaea or continents, not on small islands, so this was something new.

This game has led me to do some brainstorming to think of a fun open SG concept. What haven't you guys tried that you'd like to experiment with (apart from finding out what fried monkey tastes like, that is*)?

*Can anyone trace the origin of this obscure reference?
 
A question of etiquette: Having played one turn of this game, do I get to put it in my HoF? My turns were neither integral nor influential, taking place before MapMaking even was discovered (with a few turns after it was discovered?)! I did start our colonization project and without my decisions, perhaps we never would have left our original island. ;) So what do you think? Is one turn enough to claim participation? And don't go taking the easy way out, telling me if I think I deserve to put it in then I can. I'm a follower, not a leader! First voice will be the decision maker and I will accept his/her decision as final.:)

Happy Civing!
 
You can do whatever you want with your HoF on your own personal computer. Seek truth from your inner Tao, grasshopper. :o

That said, the game was started as a scenario from a .bix file, so it won't go into anyone's HoF unless you manually edit it into the file. :D

Reagan: No idea on the fried monkey, but there's always more interesting ideas to play. :) Fire up the editor and look around in the Custom Rules pages, and see if there's anything that tickles your fancy. One idea I've been kicking around is a game where Democracy replaces Despotism as the starting government...
 
Should I put this in my HOF since I downloaded a few of the games and tried to play them, and posted in this thread.;) Speaker, if you played, put it in. The early turns are alway the most influence anyway.:goodjob:

I did see a lot of renamed units in the last game I downloaded. I think that could have helped a bit. If I played this as a solo game, I would have set up a ferry system. Not because of the movement exploit but rather so I didn't have to have long gotos that when they ended I would have to try to remember where they were going. Renaming the ferrys with Route followed by number 1 through X makes it easy to remember which way they need to go to meet their next transfer. The movement exploit is a nice benefit but could easily be opted out of voluntarily.

An archipelago with coastal tiles connecting all the islands, normal civ techs/rules might be interesting since AI do prioritize MM but not astronomy.
 
Originally posted by T-hawk
One idea I've been kicking around is a game where Democracy replaces Despotism as the starting government...
Woah, intriguing. On one hand, growth will be much faster but on the other hand, unhappiness and unit support will be a definite problem. I would definitely play this game...
 
I started naming boats on my last turn. It really helps when you are loading units into ships and have a choice among multiple ships. It also helps, as you noted CF, to know where the boats are going once they are loaded.

T-hawk's early Democracy game sounds fun. I would definitely participate in that. It could be a challenge, especially in the early going, although skimming workers and settlers off the top of cities (as already happens in most games) would help with the unhappiness problems. I think the growth curve would be quite high. Let's do it!
 
They may not be able to handle it very well. The AI may not be able to deal with happiness issues as well as the human and could end up using even more specialists than usual because of the inability to use MPs. Also, the AI's decreased ability to improve its territory efficiently may keep it from being able to take full advantage of the increased commerce/production available under an early representative government.

With all that said, I think Speaker is right -- the AI will expand even quicker than usual, most likely.
 
It would eliminate the AI's problem of irrigating grass in despotism.;)

Also would improve AI attitudes since everyone would be in democracy and never anarchy.

So when you get printing press, what's next...research despotism?:lol:
 
/De-Lurk

That Democracy game sounds like a fascinating idea... I imagine war weariness could make things interesting... If it got to the point where it toppled the government, before any other forms were discovered, then a civ could get stuck in near permenant anarchy. That ought to dissaude any early warmongering.

Think the AI's free unit allowance would really help them get off to a good start.

Communism (Turbo Despotism!) could make for a scary starting government - would take a long while to get to the ideal city number, so corruption would be very low and all the benefits would apply - wonder if the AI could take advantage of that to spread out even further/faster?
 
Wow, didn't realize that such a simple suggestion would get such a response :) Speaker and Reagan are in, of course; TriviAl, are you interested?

I'll think up a good setup/scenario for the game, and start it within a day or two as a regular SG. I'm thinking Deity difficulty, civ America for the theme (and Industrious will be super-powerful). Speaker and Reagan are Realms Beyond guys; this could be the next number up in the RBP series.

I would leave Despotism available from the start as well, so that an AI that suffers war weariness won't be totally screwed. I would also reduce the tech cost for Republic so that it doesn't distract the AIs too much (they'll eventually research it no matter what I do) and for Democracy itself (that tech would have nothing attached to it, but what the hey.)


Naming boats - that's something I should have thought of, but didn't. Yeah, that's an excellent way to indicate instructions attached to a particular unit - and that loading-into-multiple-ships thing has been driving me nuts for some time. :crazyeye: Excellent thinking, Reagan! :goodjob:
 
"Just when I thought I was out, they pulled me back in."

I said, just one day ago, that I wasn't going to participate in any more structured SGs this summer and here I am getting drawn into one! :) I'll be happy to join y'all, if you'll have me.

By the way, the obscure monkey-eating reference that has long since been buried was inspired by the comic strip Get Fuzzy. The strip is really funny. If your paper doesn't carry it, call 'em up and demand that they get rid of Cathy or some other dorky strip and replace it with this one. It centers around a guy and his talking pet dog and cat. The cat is pure evil, but in a stupid way. One of the cat's fascinations is hoping to one day eat a monkey. I'll now return you to your regularly scheduled thread . . . .
 
I'm definitely interested.

However, I'm not sure that my skill levels are up to it. Just beginning to crack Deity at the moment - won my first game with GOTM-20 (conquest) and have a couple of practice games that have gotten out of the medieval times. :)

Been following this thread and it certainly was an entertaining one!
 
I like T-hawk's choice of America. Industrious would be a huge benefit. If we play on a large pangaea with sedentary barbs, the Expansionist trait would be of value too.
 
Well, IF there are any slots left, sign me up.

This one is to perverse to pass up.

Of course, fighting will be a major challenge!
 
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