Variant PBEM Ideas

[Selrahc]

Could run the "Golden Age" mod from Mach Five. A game in permanent Golden Age would be an interesting but balanced variant.

[scooter]

Strange variant: crazy fast tech speed. Low difficulty, non toroidal wrap, everyone starts with a city planted with the GLH and connected trade groups to the other civs, OBs with everyone from turn zero, everyone has good land to REX into, always peace to turn 100, always war from T100 until there is only one team left. Super fast start followed by clubbing people to death. Would that be a fun game?

Problem would be teching would be so fast that no one would fight even after T100 - military would get out-dated so fast. I think the great person thing is good, so I'm going to write up an official proposal and signups will be officially open after that. I'm thinking everyone can start with 2 great people, and each great person can be chosen a maximum of 2 times. I was originally thinking anyone could just choose a GP, but I'd like to avoid a scenario where several people do something like pick a GE and a Myst civ so they can rush Henge T0 and have the deciding factor be who is first in the turn order.

[Krill]

GA, GE/GS. Settle up on an opponent, and culture bomb.

Yes, we all know I'm a jerk. Move along, nothing to see here...

[BRickAstley]

I think the great person thing is good, so I'm going to write up an official proposal and signups will be officially open after that. I'm thinking everyone can start with 2 great people, and each great person can be chosen a maximum of 2 times. I was originally thinking anyone could just choose a GP, but I'd like to avoid a scenario where several people do something like pick a GE and a Myst civ so they can rush Henge T0 and have the deciding factor be who is first in the turn order.

I like this man, and he's got a plan.


That sounds like it would be fun while still not tipping the balancing scales. Of course as said before, I probably can't sign up all on my own but participating as a non-primary-turnplayer would probably still fit in my schedule and be quite fun.

Could run the "Golden Age" mod from Mach Five. A game in permanent Golden Age would be an interesting but balanced variant.

That would also be very fun I would think. Balanced for everyone, but it would speed up the game even more than on quick speed. Maybe have that as an option for "Super-Quick" gameplay speed even?

[BRickAstley]

GA, GE/GS. Settle up on an opponent, and culture bomb.

Yes, we all know I'm a jerk. Move along, nothing to see here...

Brilliant. I call starting as far as humanly possible away from wherever Krill starts.

[Yell0w]

I was going more for wacky than balance, but that's pointless if there isn't enough people who feel the same as me (to sign up), so I've definitely shelved the tech idea and the wonder idea I don't know about. Great person would work pretty well I think and I would play that.

All of these ideas actually have been done in Adv/Epic style - which is where the inspiration came from. Seven's pre-placed tiles improvements in PBEM32 was even done in an adventure - though his trait setup was a new one.

HEY!
I'M CRAZY!
I SIGN UP!

[Krill]

Brilliant. I call starting as far as humanly possible away from wherever Krill starts.

Not a sign up. I'm just pointing that out because it could be a very short PBEM if people don't realise some of the choices.

[BRickAstley]

Not a sign up. I'm just pointing that out because it could be a very short PBEM if people don't realise some of the choices.

Not a sign up or assuming you would for sure either. I'm just pointing that out because it could be a very short PBEM if you exercise your storied wiles against us all.

I agree with your meaning though, it could still be very unfortunate for someone if they are behest by someone using these Great People aggressively against them. It would add an extra layer of strategy and trying to watch for the opponent's tactics and thwarting them before you're screwed, i. e. the early game culture bomb.

[scooter]

Alright, game setup. This will be a 5 player game in which each player will start with 2 Great People. Great Artists will be banned just because it's a bit TOO imbalancing for a variety of reasons. Some GP are certainly stronger than others, but I think those can be sufficiently handled by the game setup. This means that since there are 5 available great people, each one will be chosen exactly twice. This setup could probably be adapted for 4 people if need be, but I think 5 is best here.


Snake Pick

First, we'll need 5 players and the play order to be determined before we can set the pick. This is because there will be 2 2-round snake picks. The first pick will be the great people, the second will be leader/civ. So for players A, B, C, D, and E, it'll go like normal:

A-B-C-D-E-E-D-C-B-A

For the civ/leader pick, we'll reverse it though so it's:

E-D-C-B-A-A-B-C-D-E

Also, the in-game turn order will be E-D-C-B-A. So the person who gets last shot at a great person choice will get first shot at a civ/leader choice and first in turn order.

Once we figure out the real-world turn order, someone will generate a random number from 1-5, and whoever that lands on will be the "A" person in the pick and everyone will fill out from there.

Rules
1. Most of the usual bans apply. No war elephants, no huts/barbs/events. Diplomatic victory will not be permitted, but we will leave the option on so that the AP can still be built. No tech trading either.
2. Tech stealing espionage missions will be allowed. This is so that the Great Spy is a reasonable choice. No other spy missions will be allowed, but this obviously means spies can be built.
3. Unrestricted leaders, no civ/leader bans. Yes this will mean most of the usual suspects get taken, but this is okay given the unusual great person situation.
4. No talking to other players - AI-style diplo only. I'm open to changing this if other players would strongly prefer diplo on or always war, but this will be the default if there's no consensus. I'm pretty against full diplo (and most here are pretty tired of that I think), but I'm open on AW or AI-style diplo. Signups should probably state their preference on this.


Game Map

We need a volunteer to make the map. The map would need to be reasonably balanced (whether or not it's mirrored could be at the discretion of the map maker - I really don't care), but I'd mostly leave everything else up to the maker. Any takers?

Signups

There's been several mentions of interest, but since everything was so fuzzy, I'm going to assume we have 0 signups except for me and go from there.

1. scooter
2. <open>
3. <open>
4. <open>
5. <open>

Any takers?

[BRickAstley]

I'd very much like to participate, but I cannot commit the time to take full control of a slot currently. However, if anyone playing would like a teammate who would provide hopefully helpful advice and take a few turns when needed, I'll throw my hat into the ring for this.