The Saga of the German Longbowman - a list of polls

[Provolution]

The Saga of the German Longbowman - a list of polls

The first and original "Kill the Longbowman Poll"

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=229779
Outcome: 12 for, 3 abstained

Should we immediately send the available full-strength keshik to kill the longbow outside Berlin?

Yes
No
Abstain

This poll will be open 3 days or until the next play session, whichever comes first.

Link to discussion thread.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=229779
Outcome: 12 for, 3 abstained

The Reversing the infamous longbowman polls - RETRACTED AFTER 3 HOURS

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=230215

This poll is made to reverse the forced move of keshiks on a suicide mission across the river near Berlin.

option 1. Move both keshiks northeast of Berlin, and block the longbowman from that direction (these would move onto gold hill if they survive)
option 2. Sustain the lone keshik assaulting the longbowman across the river
Abstain

Shall we attack the longbowman with our 2nd keshik should the 1st fail?

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=230194

Should we attack the longbowman across the river, near Berlin with our second Keshik in the event that the first keshik fails to kill the longbowman?

I'm sure you're all familiar with the issue of the longbowman hanging around Berlin and the recent controversy about how to deal with him. I hate to bring another poll to this already overdone issue, however I'm not sure that attacking with only the 1st keshik is in the spirit of what the citizens voted for in the first longbowman poll.

I'll provide a link to the thread where the short discussion about this issue has occurred. In summary the warlord believes we have a good enough chance with the single keshik and he wants the 2nd for scouting purposes, while I argue that should the first keshik fail we would be in a much worse situation than before we attacked, and if we can alleviate that with the second keshik we should take the opportunity.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=229922

In hopes to avoid controversy I'll provide 3 options:
attack with the 2nd keshik
attack with the 2nd keshik at DP's discretion by percent chance of victory
don't attack the longbowman with the 2nd keshik

For interpretation I would say that a majority in attack with the 2nd keshik would result in a required attack on the longbowman should the first keshik fail

Should don't attack the longbowman with the 2nd keshik have a majority an attack with the 2nd keshik should be illegal

And if the majority is divided between attack with the 2nd keshik and attack with the 2nd keshik at DP's discretion the longbowman should be attacked at the DP's discretion as people voting for the keshik to attack unconditionally will clearly prefer giving the DP authority to decide on the attack in contrast with outlawing such an attack all together.

I believe that covers all possible options.

This poll will close in 2 days so as to be ready for the next turnchat

Attack with 2nd keshik: 1 Vote
Attack with 2nd keshik if DP wants to: 7 votes
Don't attack with 2nd keshik: 3 votes

Longbow attack V2

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=230332

Should we attack the longbow with the full-strength Keshik, before end of turn, using a single attack move so as to get 67% odds, notwithstanding the results of any previous poll?

Yes
No
Abstain

2 days, public.

From the Constitution:

Inadvertent discovery of information shall not result in any penalty, provided no attempt is made to further disseminate the information or use it to advantage within the game.

I would appreciate it if the citizens respected the law and do not discuss any illegally obtained information.

Pending outcome:
Yes votes: 2
No votes: 2

Should Joe Harker's keshik move be made mandatory?

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=230328

Should Joe Harker's keshik move be made mandatory?

Yes
No
Other (such as I object to this poll)
Abstain

This is a private poll.

This poll will be open for two days.

Please see the judiciary thread for discussion.

It appears our DP opened the save and moved one of our units but did not then save the game. He posted information about it which has since been removed by a moderator. It is a matter of rule in the GOTMs and HoF games that this sort of thing is not allowed. It has also been an honorable tradition in the democracy games since their inception a few years ago. Methos asked the judicary to enforce the move:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Methos
I therefore bring it before the courts the request, that the move that Joe Harker made with the Keshik be made mandatory as his first move when playing his turnchat. This will make it so that any information we have already learned not contaminate the game any further, as it appears it already has.
But the judicary has opted not to do this since it would run counter to the now infamous kill the longbow poll. The judicary's reasoning is suspect but I can find no legal grounds to overturn their ruling. (The constitution is mute on this.)

So I am posting this poll in the hope that citizens will speak out and vote to do the honorable thing and live with our DP's keshik move.

PENDING OUTCOME
YES: 4 VOTES
NO : 3 VOTES
ABSTAIN: 1 VOTE

Citizen's initiative: Should the Longbow attack V2 poll be disregarded?

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=230349

Should the Longbow attack V2 poll be disregarded? link to poll in question

Yes
No
Other (for example: I object to this poll)
Abstain

Private poll.

Open for two days. See links (above) to other polls as well as judicial thread for discussion.

I posted a poll and not even two hours later DaveShack posts another that could very well be used to overturn the results of my poll. I can find no law against what he did though I find it a very low handed tactic. In an effort to ensure the citizenry can have their say between the two polls I am posting this poll which will either affirm or disavow the longbow attack v2 poll.

I am not happy that I feel I have to stoop to this level but I honestly see no alternative. It would be helpful if no one posted any more polls about this subject untill these three finish.

PENDING
YES VOTES: 1
NO VOTES: 2
ABSTAIN

 

[Provolution]

All rite, here we see the evolution of "The Longbowman Poll", aka "The Long Poll of the Bowing Man" (The bowing man being me, the warlord).

What is curious to see, is that all polls are more or less ill-conceived, barely researched and not taking into other decisions with the keshiks in an informative manner showing other options. These polls, my poll included, are all example of political agitation, as opposed to sound Civ4 strategy skills.

In the later part of this process, we got to know more information, calculated odds, nature of river penalty, the two tile bounce river penalty exploit and other variables. For the confused viewer, there are four subsets, or agendas pressing these polls forward:

Warlord Provolution: Intends to use the keshiks for scouting east of Berlin, in order to foresee counterattacks on the pyramid city.

Grant 2004: Firmly believes the longbowman will move into and occupy Berlin, to the detriment and risk of the campaign army. He intends to use both Keshiks to attack the Longbowman.

Daveshack: Discovered the two-tile no river penalty exploit , (which we later on realized was a sort of exploit, as the odds halved on tile next to the river.
Daveshack was the originator of the pioneer "Kill the Longbowman" poll, which became a real hit and won unanimously - as other options were omitted. Now there is put heavy prestige in this poll, leading to Daveshack stating the following:

I Will Continue Posting Longbow Polls Until The Next Decade If Necessary.

Donsig: Old time demogame veteran. Knows the forum-based strategy gaming universe intimately, and has firm principles on how to handle polls and procedures pertaining to demogames. He is adamant about that Joe Harkers move to the foodplain is irrevocable, and should be considered a move.

Joe Harker: The designated planner. A Londoner playing as designated player for his very first time. Being subject to an avalanche of instructions and directors from the new Warlord, Provolution, now has to be put somewhere between a rock and a hard place for his action in the demogame.
Joe Harker just wants to play the turnchat, and do things as good as possible, both for the demogame law-mongers and for the demogame war-mongers.

Dutchfire: Coming back from a one week vacation, the leader of Mongolia and formerly warlord, now observes that his realm has gone wild in his absence.
Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs is like a quiet Aquarium in comparison. He is taking more the analytical stance, waiting for more facts and a proper outcome.

Hyronymus: Another Dutchman and one of the grand old men of Mongolia, sees that this has gone too far, and wants the game to go on under more civic circumstances.

I could go on.

I also have added this link, for your entertainment. hehe.

 

[mike6426]

Wow, the first poll organizer, and all about only one subject. We shall look apon this situation and laugh when this game is finished.

 

[Provolution]

Quote from Bismarck himself

"The Balkans is not worth the bones of one German Grenadier."

Or he could interpret it

The Keshiks is not worth the bones of one German Longbowman

 

[ravensfire]

Hmm, and most of this is from one person not liking how the polls turned out.

How ... pathetic. No wonder I've lost much of my interest.

-- Ravensfire

 

[dutchfire]

I suggest we hold a toss about this issue, and all stop complaining about it. It's just one unit people, big deal. Nothing to go mad about and have flame wars and whatmore.

 

[Hyronymus]

I started with the movement of 1 unit but by now it has a much greater scope though. I'll get back to this later today.

 

[fed1943]

I pay homage to the longbowman and respectfully give him a name:

The tester.

Best regards,

 

[Provolution]

Hmm, and most of this is from one person not liking how the polls turned out.

How ... pathetic. No wonder I've lost much of my interest.

-- Ravensfire

First of all, I voted for killing the German longbowman with the information I had then, like everybody else. The matter was more or less settled when there came polls for second keshik and so on. It was friday that made it - then it took off. So I felt it proper to summarize this insane process, in order to give people perspective

I am ok with the polls, but not the pretext. What is really pathetic, now that I am out of this, is to see how the entire longbowman poll has been compounded in several other polls. This posting is just to give an overview on the process so far, to make people see enough is enough. If we lose the unit or not is beyond the point now. I am more than happy to see the keshiks dead now, to make the game go on. But as soon as this got to become "legal food", the situation has gone far out.

 

[Strider]

I've been meaning to get back "into" the game and might as well start here. First off, I see a couple of things wrong here.

Not a single one of the polls mentioned in the first post should have even been considered valid. They lack options, contain the posters agenda in the first post, lack links, run for to short of periods, and many other problems. Either the polling standards have become extremely lax since the time I've played or someone needs to start invalidating polls. A poll should always contain the following:

• Question
• Options
• Link to ALL relevant discussion threads. Not just ONE and don't just say "Well, look at this thread for the discussion".. link to it.
• Runtime and the date the poll closes. None of this "Or until the next turnchat" crap. Polls should always run for 3 or more days, regardless of when the next turnchat is. If there's not that much time.. then someone did their job wrong.

Second off, this is ONE longbowman. This should have been lucky to make it to a poll. The fact that it took 5+ polls to decide such a simple issue shows an extreme lack of efficiency. There is something seriously screwed up here.

Third, why so many polls by DIFFERANT people? It should be done by whatever elected official was assigned to that particular aspect of the game. Not to any random person who decides to cause mischief and mayhem. We elect these people for a reason.

 

[Falcon02]

Second off, this is ONE longbowman. This should have been lucky to make it to a poll. The fact that it took 5+ polls to decide such a simple issue shows an extreme lack of efficiency. There is something seriously screwed up here.

Third, why so many polls by DIFFERANT people? It should be done by whatever elected official was assigned to that particular aspect of the game. Not to any random person who decides to cause mischief and mayhem. We elect these people for a reason.

about sums up my feelings about the issue.

Citizens are given the right to post polls to provide a check/balance to the decisions Officials make, should an official make a decision that a citizen strongly disagrees with that citizen may post a poll. However, that poll should be well thought out and unbiased, matching the same sort of standards Strider mentioned. Once that poll goes through it should be the end of it. Polls designed to override an official should NOT be posted by a citizen lightly, as a long drawn out argument (like this one) may ensue. A citizen must ask themselves is it really worth it to override the decision.

Also, an official must be open minded and listen to the opinions of the citizens when making the types of decisions that are normally left to their disgression (ie. low level tactics). If an official finds through discussion that people disagree with his tactics that official must be conciderate to those who disagree with him. If you are positive that your way is the best, explain the benefit of your plan in light of the benefits of the other plan. If there is still a large number of people opposed, then it is that official's responcibility to go ahead and try to post a poll about it (again following Strider's standards, trying to be unbiased as possible). After that, the official should respect the result of that poll.

I feel like both sides in this case have made some mistakes when dealing with this controversy, and I hope that everyone can learn from it and move on.

 

[ravensfire]

Another post that serious bugged me:

I Will Continue Posting Longbow Polls Until The Next Decade If Necessary.

Another example of a truly terrible attitude. "I don't like this, so I'm going to keep stalling and keep trying to shove my view down everyone's throat!"

Wrong, DS, just wrong.

-- Ravensfire

 

[DaveShack]

Look at the votes in the polls.

When given a choice which is not tainted by illegal information, the people want to play the game using the best move available.

The stalling is coming from people who continue to use illegal information. Should I just CC everyone instead? Turn a blind eye while our rules are shredded by people who use that illegal information to make the wrong move, and overturn a totally valid poll?

Where's the outrage at having a veteran reappear and try to take over the whole game, issuing orders to the other officials and spouting full-page ads for dubious policies in an attempt to baffle them with bovine digestive end product? That's a pretty easy way to completely take over the game, if there is no guardian of the people's rights.

 

[Hyronymus]

Where's the outrage at having a veteran reappear and try to take over the whole game, issuing orders to the other officials and spouting full-page ads for dubious policies in an attempt to baffle them with bovine digestive end product? That's a pretty easy way to completely take over the game, if there is no guardian of the people's rights.

That is exactly what I wanted to come back today, Daveshack.

I don't care if someone joins the game later than others and if that person is experienced or inexperienced. I still see myself as inexperienced in the demogame branch when I read some very detailed analysis of the savegames.

What I do care about is when the new guy takes on an attitude as if it's only natural that he or she gives out orders to anyone. Modesty is often described as a virtue. Personally I find modesty a prerequisite for joining a demogame that's already on-going.
Each group of demogame players has a unique interaction. Adapt that interaction before trying to shape the interaction more to your liking (the uniqueness of interactions even holds true for groups that repeatedly consist of the same members btw).

As Strider correctly pointed out not all polls mentioned/produced by Provolution were valid. I find that the Yasutan Supreme Court has failed her taks here. Although citizens can explicitly ask the Supreme Court to investigate a poll the Supreme Court can, and in my opinion should, investigate polls without a citizens request.

Sadly, I cannot find a polling act on this forum part. I think we need one and that we should stress that it's not allowed to start a new poll covering the same subject before the previous poll has ended or has officially been declared invalid by the Supreme Court.

 

[Methos]

Not a single one of the polls mentioned in the first post should have even been considered valid. They lack options, contain the posters agenda in the first post, lack links, run for to short of periods, and many other problems.

I agree. On Friday at work I began work on an Act declaring what a binding poll is, or should be. One of the items I planned on including were that the first post (or poll thread) had to be neutral and unbiased. Basically, I believe the poll creator can in no way express their opinion or desire in the poll post. They must instead state their opinion and desire in the second post.

I never finished it (due to work), though I had intended to PM donsig for help, as I knew that was something he was interested in.

The stalling is coming from people who continue to use illegal information.

Not necessairly, my argument is based on reloading/replaying of turns, though I also don't believe I'm one of the ones you consider that is stalling.

Sadly, I cannot find a polling act on this forum part.

As I mentioned earlier, I did some work on it on Friday. Is this something we wish to proceed with? I can post my ideas in a thread and we can all further discuss them?

 

[Hyronymus]

Methos, you surely like your euphemisms . Now we reached this point I say we should capture the momentum and work on it.

 

[ravensfire]

Methos - good luck on that. It's needed, and been needed for some time.

-- Ravensfire

 

[ori]

As Strider correctly pointed out not all polls mentioned/produced by Provolution were valid. I find that the Yasutan Supreme Court has failed her taks here. Although citizens can explicitly ask the Supreme Court to investigate a poll the Supreme Court can, and in my opinion should, investigate polls without a citizens request.

We have had quite an active week

Sadly, I cannot find a polling act on this forum part. I think we need one and that we should stress that it's not allowed to start a new poll covering the same subject before the previous poll has ended or has officially been declared invalid by the Supreme Court.

Unfortunately that is one of the problems the court is struggling with: there is a procedure how to invalidate a bad poll but no rule what is a bad poll. I do know a good poll when I see one. And I definitely know a bad bad poll when I see one, but there is quite a lot in between...

I agree. On Friday at work I began work on an Act declaring what a binding poll is, or should be. One of the items I planned on including were that the first post (or poll thread) had to be neutral and unbiased. Basically, I believe the poll creator can in no way express their opinion or desire in the poll post. They must instead state their opinion and desire in the second post.

I'd be willing to lend a hand as well. Actually Hyronymus had quite a good attempt, but it went nowhere:
Polling Act of 4000 BC

 

[Provolution]

Look at the votes in the polls.

When given a choice which is not tainted by illegal information, the people want to play the game using the best move available.

The stalling is coming from people who continue to use illegal information. Should I just CC everyone instead? Turn a blind eye while our rules are shredded by people who use that illegal information to make the wrong move, and overturn a totally valid poll?

Where's the outrage at having a veteran reappear and try to take over the whole game, issuing orders to the other officials and spouting full-page ads for dubious policies in an attempt to baffle them with bovine digestive end product? That's a pretty easy way to completely take over the game, if there is no guardian of the people's rights.

Trying to take over the whole game? I came with some fresh views like putting the idle settler somewhere reasonable. I managed to structure the military somewhat following organizational neglect.

You even voted for the civics, in part we voted for the same civic, I would say the civic change was handled in a smooth.


And what did you come up with this entire week Daveshack, some talk about me being foul and some heavy work on the German Longbowman.
All I saw was some namecalling for me not listening to citizens and so on.

I did argue my convictions, and I listened and adopted as soon as I was brought forward some key evidence or some great idea. Referring to my proposals as "dubious policies" and "bovine end products"? Please specify what harm I have conducted to you personally, and the nation as such, excepting the inevitable "German Longbowman". I would like you to specify which particular policies that are a) dubious, b) "bovine end products and C) policies where you feel I have cheated you for political influence.
I would like to reiterate that the German Longbowman is just 2 % of what I did this week, if you take a hard look.


The rivercrossing penalty is part of the game rules, not to be considered as "illegal information". You should rather question the legality of omitting key information from polls. Yes, these polls were bent on using the keshiks, ideally both of them, and the odds were of secondary importance it seemed to me.

You have been overwhelmed by passion Daveshack, the very sudden "Kill the Longbowman" poll could have waited a day after some research, in place of leveraging that to teach me a lesson from the old demogame folks.

I just want to play a decent game of Civ4, and to poll the best ideas against each other head on head. I can't help that some of my ideas are good, and to make them more palatable I should probably find a proxy to sponsor them.

Now all that remains, is that you feel I have thread on your turf, "taking over the game". All I did was to fix up some things that were long overdue, and seek to build some common agreement for it. That was not a small feat, as I was constantly sabotaged by a minority.

I can lose polls and go on, this is just a game, a demogame, so we should take it for what it is, a game.

on a final note.

About the usage of the word "citizen" and citizens concern, the citizens should probably read something on the French terror and Robespierre, to see what dynamics that can take place if rampant disrepect for proposed ideas take place. I was given no quarter when I presented some ideas, and did not feel to bend over.

So Daveshack, please end this campaign against me and go on with the game.

 

[DaveShack]

So Daveshack, please end this campaign against me and go on with the game.

Sorry, just explaining to the people who only come here once a month, if even that, that I was acting in their interests, not mine.