PBEM 23 Organizing/Tech Thread

[SevenSpirits]

Please bear in mind that we just lost 5 cities in one turn, and basically threw away any chance we might have if winning. That really, really hurt. And you're coming here saying like "no that's not enough! You need to lose EVEN MORE!"

I'd be quite happy to concede the game at this point. But I guess we're expected to keep fighting it out until the bitter end, however long that takes.

I'm sorry, you're right that is not a fun situation to be in. I don't mean to complain that you're not being screwed enough. If it's any consolation, I'd be equally adamant and incensed if I was somehow having to convince you to take an additional city you erroneously hadn't gotten from us.

[novice]

The non-buggy behavior would be for the game not to show you our peace for a city offer after you accepted Mackoti's offer. It should still show you our peace for gold offer.

You're exploiting a bug by taking straight peace when we explicitly did not offer it. Your justification is that you had a bad turn and we're in the lead anyway.

How are we supposed to react to this?

[Lewwyn]

You're saying you don't think it's a bug?

EDIT: Are you saying you did that ON PURPPOSE?:?????????????????????

lawl

[spacemanmf]

Well now. You go to bed and this happens. Come on, PBEM23-ers, you're better than this. This isn't one of those other PBEMs or Pitbosses where everyone moans about foul play all the time.

I agree that it's a bug. Put simply, novice and Seven wouldn't have offered plain peace, but Luddite and pindicator have been able to obtain it because they had already gifted the requisite city elsewhere. That should really be rectified regardless of the state of play in the game. (Oh yeah, and just to remind everyone, it is just a game.)

There seems to be three options:

1. Luddite and pindicator replay the turn, rejecting the plain peace offer, and either accepting or rejecting the peace-with-gold-and-a-map offer. This seems the fairest way of doing it, although it's not without its hassle.

2. Luddite and pindicator agree to offer (or accept the request to donate) gold-and-a-map the following turn. This does not give Luddite and pindicator the option of staying at war if they do not wish to offer the gold so may be unpalatable for them.

3. Everyone carries on. Novice and Seven get nothing out of the deal and cannot declare war for 10 turns. Luddite and pindicator are viewed as people who are willing to exploit such a bug. A sour taste resides. Novice and Seven, I would guess, would keep an in-game vendetta against Luddite and pindicator.

Really, though, if Luddite and pindicator are convinced that the outcome of this game is in doubt, then they surely should be close to indifferent to which offer is chosen. Therefore would they not be prepared to go for the option that leaves them in the best light?

There should be no question of the game ending, if there indeed has been. Levelheadedness should prevail.

[pindicator]

I'm all for an amicable resolution, but from my end this is starting to feel like our lunch money did not appease the school bully. How does this city matter so much that you're holding up the game over it? Can we come to a different way of resolving this?

I'd also appreciate hearing from the other teams, or if they don't want to jump in then some kind of other third party. So far the conversation has been team Luddicator vs. team NoSpaceSeven, and I'm sure we all have our reasons for seeing it the way we do.

[spacemanmf]

I'm all for an amicable resolution, but from my end this is starting to feel like our lunch money did not appease the school bully. How does this city matter so much that you're holding up the game over it? Can we come to a different way of resolving this?

I'd also appreciate hearing from the other teams, or if they don't want to jump in then some kind of other third party. So far the conversation has been team Luddicator vs. team NoSpaceSeven, and I'm sure we all have our reasons for seeing it the way we do.

I would note that I'm not really part of their team. Whilst I am a ded-lurker (and therefore I can't say I'm entirely unbaised), I think I can reasonably say that it's more a question of principle than one of material.

At what point do you draw the line as to whether to replay the turn or not?

[luddite]

It's not easy to replay the turn, since it was a war turn and we actually fought a lot of battles against Fierce. Replaying it could lead to a very different outcome.

We can't just give you the gold either, since we already spent it.

How about a compromise... we'll give you our world map! I know you've been wanting that...

But yeah, I want to hear from the other teams on this. I'll follow whatever they want to do.

I really don't see how this is a bug, though. Mackoti had units right next to the city, about to capture it. The outcome is the same as if we had gifted you guys the city, and then he'd capture it. If anything, having peace treaties create an unbreakable 10-turn peace (not adjusted for game speed!) is a bug, that should only be in single player to help the AI diplo.

[yuris125]

I've actually been thinking about this since yesterday evening. While I feel this needs to be resolved between interested parties, and I don't have a clear solution to what definitely is an ugly situation, the way I see it is:

* The game's way of handling conflicting diplo proposals is to remove clauses which no longer can be fulfilled. Perhaps annulling such proposals and not displaying them would be a better way, but I don't think it's a bug
* NS7 clearly feel that a white peace deal should not be allowed to stand, as it's not something they offered or would've offered

It seems to me that the most fair way is for Luddite/Pindicator to offer some concessions to NS7 next turn (gold/world map/whatever). If they don't agree to do so, we have to accept that this is one of the quirks of no diplo games and move on. The game clearly assumes that in an MP game, players would discuss their deals out of the game, and the issue of conflicting offers shouldn't arise

Perhaps this is something we should think about for future no diplo games, because it's the 3rd time I know about in this game when absence of diplo caused problems, or at least doubts

[novice]

I really don't see how this is a bug, though. Mackoti had units right next to the city, about to capture it. The outcome is the same as if we had gifted you guys the city, and then he'd capture it.

We have unbreakable peace with Mackoti.

[luddite]

We have unbreakable peace with Mackoti.

Exactly. You would have been exploiting the unbreakable peace treaty bug to keep a city that should have gone to mackoti.