T-hawk Wrote:I am a bit confused as to why this topic suddenly needs to be a thread at Realms Beyond.
Probably one relevant factor is that, while I read a lot of boards, I am not really that experienced at writing or posting. So may well have made a mess-up on the etiquette, and I frequently makes maistakes of etiquette IRL [I suspect that I am somewhat Aspie...]. I stuck it on RB since the issues involved were ones central to its philosophy, since i don't often look at civfanatics, and since the MTDG boards are dead.
I delayed a lot also because I was pretty sure that there were no mal-intentions, and further thinking confirmed that - particularly since I very much intuited th Aspie mentality [I think that this has a lot to do with Krill's apparent rudeness sometimes - I simply don't think he realises. And maybe doesn't see the logic when people complain]. But I knew that many others weren't likely to see things in such a way. So I tried to think of a way to do things and explain. Oh, by the way, one thing I had in mind with the abstuse method of bringing it up - to provide an automatic temporary filter so that only those whe were likely to understand all of this stuff would find it - maybe prevent community uproar, flames, unproductive arguments. But it appears that I shot everyone in the foot there too [and am maybe currently just digging the hole deeper... I hope not].
Regarding the Aspie mentality [also some elements regarding the fact that K+M are both highly intelligent, mathematical etc.] and what happenned in the MTDG:
It reminded me so clearly of the time where I in complete innnocence accidentlally cheated on an A level class maths test:
We were told to sit at seperate desks I assumed that it was intended that we should use all of the information available in the textbooke we were provided with. We were not told not to look up the answers in the back of the textbooks. I was used to doing problems/tests where the emphasis is on using the correct methodology, showing your working and prviding elegant solutions, and where some of the numerical answers are included as part of the question. And whilst learning/practicing maths using textbooks, this was my regular approach toward using the answers in the backs of textbooks. So I assumed that a large part of the purpose of our A-level maths test was to provide elegant worked out solutions. Now as to how one can spend 3/4 of anhour making elegant solutions to simple problems in volving a, t, s, u & v? Well, lets just say that I wasted an awful lot of time at school not learning a great deal very efficiently. Since we were told to 'show our working' I would often write out too much working that I didn't really need. Sometimes I crossed out lines of working after re-considering and deciding that they were unnessecary and detracted from the elegance and efficiency of the working. And sometimes I changed my mind again, wrote notes that these lines should be uncrossed, or re-wrote them out... I checked all the answers in the back completely automatically, and never thought to conceal the fact [c.f. the argument in the MTDG - surely someone wouldn't do it in such an obvious manner if they were doing it deliberately?]. Then at the end, we were told to check our answers in the back, and give ourselves one mark for each correct one and to report this. I immediately thought Oh Shit. I mentioned it to a friend, and realised that my so-called explanation wasn't going to go down very well with anyone. So kept very very quiet about it all - I think that the past few weeks are the 1st time in more than 10 years I mentioned it to anyone.
Maybe one good strategy - somebody very important makes some kind of official declaration that all the issues have been examined, there have been studies of Memphus' battle simulator, and that he is in the clear. But due to XYZ, and mathematical and technical details, you can't explain anything further. It seems that Memphus has banished himself from the boards [at least last time I browsed civfanatics 2/3 weeks ago], so this could allow/encourage him to return [at the moment I think that there a lot of lingering suspicions, which people do not voice to avoid arguments].
And why so sudden and now - I gradually realised what was going on [it all started out as a fascination with statistics] over a few weeks, spent a couple of weeks thinking over moral/practical arguments about where to do anything, and finally took swift action.
Considering the IRL mood I was in the time [and a few analogies related to stuff going on in my workplace, but won't detail], it may well have been impulsive and misjudged.
I have to admit that while I still think that it was the right thing to to, it may not have been such a good idea.
Upon reconsideration, I don't think that there should be pressure on K+M do do anything at this stage or maybe ever in fact wrt MTDG - people who are sympathetic & understang the issues can discuss stuff behins the scenes if they decide that this is useful or productive. And decide if it's just going to create more problems than it solves. Maybe they will want to discuss what the community dynamics are at the moment and how to fix, in case fixes are possible.
Definitely one fix would be for the firaxis people to shore up this RNG exploit in their code [instead of spending their time on fancy expansion of game strategy/mechanics etc. - e,g, I noted that a lot of you think that the espionage system was a badly thought out addition to sell more copies of BtS. But stuff like Blakes AI is the right way to go, and appreciated by everyone and very elegant.] Maybe one useful thing out of this accident is that if Firaxis hears about stuff and what is going on in the communities, they might pay more attention to these kinds of matters. I suspect that there is a lot of this kinds of stuff going on in the online communities that they don't hear about, since people can't be bothered to report it - the just have an argumen, go off in a huss, join a different board, play with other players, or get together and swap strategies for how to use the exploits better in the new metagame.
Regarding the teams in the MTDG. I suspect that some but not all the people running all the battles/war-departments will understand the issues and not be so upset [some will of course]. Probably the diplo people will be most annoyed at what their war departments were doing behind their backs.
I'll type up the evidence [discussions on the SANCTA forums in coded language basically] when I've worked on making it more coherent.
