Players have until Monday night (their local time) to complete this event. Reports are due by the end of Tuesday night. Please post your game summary, or report, or a link to your report, in this thread. Reports or additional information to supplement game summaries are welcome any time, but at least a summary must be posted on time to be scored for this event. See the Imperium Two page for scoring details.

Let the comparisons and discussions begin!


- Sirian
Event Sponsor

If anyone else has wondered how much tech you need to put Reserve Tanks on a colony ship or an Ion Cannon on a small, I've put together a spreadsheet. Everything works under Gnumeric and should work with proprietary software (but I'd be happy for someone to find out for sure).

Ship design spreadsheet

Selentine

This story from todays news hase me horrified. I knew that our northern native communities faced some built in problems in health care due to their remote locations. But I just cannot imagine what series of events would conspire to let this happen.

I cannot imagine what that mother must be feeling right now, let alone when she received that box.


C B C . C A N e w s - F u l l S t o r y :
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Family wants answers after fetus returned in cardboard box
Last Updated Thu, 20 May 2004 7:07:55


THUNDER BAY, ONT. - A Northern Ontario First Nations community says it wants a full investigation into how a hospital allegedly mailed the remains of a miscarried fetus back to the family in a cardboard box.


"I was appalled and upset and disappointed of what had happened to this fetus," North Caribou Lake First Nation Chief Zeb Kenequanash told CBC News Online.

"The mother went hysterical after she found out the unborn child came through the mail."

Kenequanash is calling for a full police investigation and a coroner's inquest into the incident. The family, who live in North Caribou Lake, a remote community hundreds of kilometres northwest of Thunder Bay has also retained a lawyer.

In March, the woman was medevaced to Sioux Lookout hospital, said Kimberly Whetung a senior policy adviser with the Chiefs of Ontario, which represents 134 First Nations across Ontario.

The woman had completed her first trimester but miscarried at the hospital. Because the hospital did not have a pathologist on staff, the baby was sent to Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre, Whetung said.

The family requested the baby be returned to the community. The mother was told that the baby would be taken from the hospital to a funeral home.

Instead, the remains were sent by Purolator in a cardboard box to the wrong address – a post office in Pickle Lake, a community about 300 kilometres from North Caribou Lake. It was labelled "diagnostic specimen" and "room temperature."

Whetung said the box had been stamped with two addresses, the Pickle Lake address and the family address in North Caribou Lake. The box eventually made its way to the North Caribou Lake post office where it sat for six days.

On May 10, nearly 40 days after the miscarriage, the mother picked up the box.

The box was battered, partially opened and with only one piece of tape around it, Kenequanash said.

Kenequanash said the mother did not know what was in the box when she opened it. He said the fetus was wrapped in plastic in the box and badly decomposed.

Ontario's Health Minister George Smitherman pledged to investigate the incident.

"My immediate reaction was shock and dismay and disgust," Smitherman said.

Smitherman said it his understanding that this is the established protocol for transporting remains because of the transportation challenges in the remote area. But Smitherman said he did not condone the practice.

"I am not expressing confidence that those protocols are appropriate," he said.

Kenequanash said he had never heard of any similar incident like this before.


National Chief of the Assembly of First Nations, Phil Fontaine, said in a statement he was "appalled that such an inhumane action can take place in this day and age."

"I pray this will never happen again to any family, anywhere in Canada."

Late Wednesday night the Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre issued a news release offering its condolences to the family. It said that since the identity of the family has been released it will now be possible to investigate the situation.



Written by CBC News Online staff



Copyright © 2004 Canadian Broadcasting Corporation - All Rights Reserved

There was only enough listed interest for a single team, but if more people are interested we could start a second game. Speak up quickly though!

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=88378

Parameters:
Map size: Medium
Difficulty: Impossible
Race: Klackons

Roster:

Justus_II
Erick the Red
Patroclus
Selentine
JMB
Zed

Hello all,

Epic Forty-one: Balance of Power will open shortly, but we thought it would be helpful to post the rules ahead of time, so that we can make any necessary clarifications *before* the game is open. So, if you have any questions, please ask now, and try to use your best judgement after the game is open.

I'm way behind on the site (sorry!, and we don't have a completed map just yet for this one, so I won't put it up on the page until the map is ready. But, expect this Epic to open within the week.
**************************************
EDIT- THE RULES THAT FOLLOW ARE NOT THE CURRENT RULES! The current rules are available on the official Epic 41 Page. The original rules are kept here for reference.

Epic Forty-one: Balance of Power

Sponsor: Bihary
Duration: Four weeks (maybe 3.5 to 4.5, any preference?)

Civilization: English
Difficulty: Emperor
Map size: Standard
Opponents: Spain, Turkey (Ottomans), Italy (Rome), Prussia (Germany), Netherlands, Russia, France
Land: Pangaea, 30% land, temperate, average age, average humidity
Barbarians: Roaming
Victory: All enabled, diplomatic preferred
Version: Conquests 1.15
Cultural link and respawn off

Scenario concept: How much of the balance of power in Conquests is under player control? Let's find out! In this scenario, the player will try to maintain equilibrium between the competing civilizations, their own included, throughout the game. Success will come from helping the weak, and containing the strong; by continuous, careful use, and redistribution, rather than accumulation, of power and potential resources.

England's history is the prototype for seeking the balance of power in the old continent, securing a safe, and sometimes dominating, position in Europe.

1588 - Queen Elizabeth does not hesitate to ally with pirates to fend off her rival of the seas, the invincible Spanish Armada.

1805 - In the Battle of Trafalgar, the English admiral Horatio Nelson defeats the French-Spanish fleet. This victory shatters Napoleon's dreams of invading England and speeds up unified resistance against French domination in the continent.

1854 - To protect the warm seas from the Russian bear, England supports Turkey in the Crimean War.

1904 - The pact Entente Cordiale paves the way for Anglo-French diplomatic and military cooperation against the emerging power of Germany before and during World War I.

1915 - Italy, a former ally of Germany and Austria, is persuaded to join World War I on the side of England and France.

1941 - "If Hitler invaded hell I would make at least a favorable reference to the devil in the House of Commons," says Winston Churchill. He then comes pretty close to his word, making an alliance with the Soviet Union to contain and eventually defeat Germany in World War II.

1946 - "From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriatic an iron curtain has descended across the Continent," says the same Churchill, soliciting Pan-Atlantic cooperation against Soviet dominance in Europe.

Scoring: The base score is based upon the distance in game score between the leading and the trailing civilizations.

Each time you enter a new age (middle, industrial, and modern), and at the end of the game, you may earn scenario points. On the first turn of a new age, record the game score of the eight competing civilizations (your own included). Civilizations not yet contacted, and those that have been eliminated, are considered to have a score of zero. Take the average of the four highest scoring civilizations (yourself included if among the highest four), and the average of the four lowest scoring civilizations (yourself included if among the lowest four). Divide the low average by the high average, this is the balance ratio you achieved for the previous age. Multiply the balance ratio with 20 for the Ancient/ Middle Ages, and with 30 for the Industrial/ Modern Ages (rounding to the closest integer). The result is the number of scenario points you earned for the previous age.

Example: You just started the middle ages. The top four civs are Italy with 850, Turkey with 820, France with 780, and Netherlands with 750, for an average high score of 800. The four trailing civs are England with 500, Prussia with 600, Spain with 600, and Russia with 700, for an average low score of 600. 600/800=0.75. Multiply 0.75 by 20 for a total of 15 scenario points for the Ancient Age.

Repeat this process to determine scenario points at the beginning of the Industrial and Modern Ages, and at the end of the game. If your game ends before the Modern Age, use your final game score for the remaining age(s).
For verification purposes, keep a copy of your game's save file at the start of each new age and at the end of the game. Do not use the "interturn" score except for your game-end calculation, so that you will be able to save at the time you are calculating points.
At the end of the game, it is the unmodified raw score that should be taken into account, not the final score with the bonuses.

You can also earn bonus points, which are added to your total score.

Diplomatic victory: +20 points
Cultural victory: +15 points
Space victory: +5 points
Any defeat or retirement: -20 points (You do not earn scenario points for Ages you have not started, if losing. Losing control of the game gives the other powers, not England, the ability to control the balance of power!

Honorable game (no "dastardly" tactics): +10 points

Ties, if any, will be broken by fastest finish date.

Rules clarification: As long as you have RoP with another civ, you are welcome to build roads, protect resources, or conduct a "friendly blockade" in their territory (surrounding friendly cities or territory with military units to prevent an unfriendly power from capturing territory). However, keep the "Resource Piracy" exploit in mind! You may not keep a unit on a resource to prevent another civilization from connecting that resource, unless you're in neutral territory or at war with that civ! Feel free to connect any and all resources, though.

Good luck!

All day, I have been bored. I do not deal with boredom well, and, I am seldom bored. I can always find something to do. Today has been an exception, as it seemed that nothing I have done has held my interest very long.

Please forgive all spelling and grammatical errors. And broken out of place sentences like this one.

I am starting to believe that boredom is actually something more then a state of mind when one has nothing to do. After sitting here all day in horrible pain with nothing to do, I have started to evaluate my own processes of thought as I sit here, and tried to see where they lead.

I think that boredom, for some, like my self, is actually the manifestation of the apprehension of looking inward to bits of the yet unexamined self. Those dark corners where nobody likes to look, but, when nothing else is on the agenda, some part of the mind begs to have those cobwebs cleaned out. A manifestation of anxiety, self doubt, and possibly some short comings somewhere in the complicated armor of self esteem. No matter how confident, brash, or full of one's self, we all have weak spots in our esteem that we are loathe to confess to. During moments of extreme boredom, we have nowhere to look but within and some of us don't always like what we see or see stuff that we keep putting off for another day and dread the responsibility of dealing with it. That "Ants in the Pants" feeling is actually a type of coping mechanism I think that our mind creates to motivate us to hurry up and find something to do before we have to staring into the Abyss within and dealing with our inner demons.

I am probably sounding a lot more smartsy fartsy then I really am because I am high. This is probably the deluded ravings of a lunatic. I will most likely look back on this when the fog in my mind clears and laugh my fool head off for sounding like a tard. Go me.

Should this be the case, and for some people it is, perhaps that is why so many various types of sensory depravation experiences in so many cultures and religions exist. Monks and various types of mystics perhaps achieve what some consider to be spiritual enlightenment by reaching frightning levels of boredom that drive them half mad and they have no choice but to look into the Inner Abyss for entertainment. And they drag out every last of those Inner Demons and kick their asses for shits and giggles. If this be the case, well, in a few more days, I shall become the Eternally Enlightened Wally Llama. When I reach this plane of existence, my wordy pontifications shall become even more profound then Sirian's. (No offense my friend, I hope. Lemme know and I can edit this out)

How deep is the rabbit hole? I have asked this question all my life, since I was but a small boy and reading that story for the first of many times. I believe, upon reaching critical and possibly life threatening levels of boredom, that I will finally have my answer. Today, I have seen the edge of the Abyss, and it ain't pretty. There are many eyes looking back, and none of them friendly. In the terms of voting, "The Eyes have it." I shall have to uproot that democracy and become the despot of my own inner regions. Make all inner voices my own.

Or I need to quit taking pain killers and making bad puns. And find something to do.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,119673,00.html

What especially grates on my nerves are the lines where the Representative said the guy did not write the letter and probably could not spell all the words in said letter.

I guess he thinks we're all stupid sheep, eh? The nerve of this dumbass! If I were this national guard member I think I would have had to go down and 'educate' this rude idiot in person.

Somebody, not sure who, brought me a laptop to use in bed. Wonderful.

I am hooked up on oxygen and all sorts of tubes and wires. Any sort of movement involving my torso makes me see big blue-white spots in my vision.

Surgery went well, only died for about a minute or two. Nothing a big needle full of juice rammed into my heart can't fix, as well as a little voltage. Doctors say everything went much better then expected.

I might be able to breathe better after I heal. Doctors blasted some of the big hunks of scar tissue in my lungs with the laser to break them up and give my lungs more surface area to work with. If it heals right, I should be able to do well with what I have. If not, I will need something to help me breathe. Right now I am breathing from one lung. I have about 1/4 of the other lung left. It is filled with a little balloon like thing to make it stretch. If all goes as planned, I will have enough lung power to keep me running for a long time.

Got home last night. Was to doped up to try and do anything. Somebody needs to do something about pot holes on public roads. Ouch.

Feels good to communicate in some fashion. Can't really talk to well right now. No voice for the time being.

All of this is making me tired.

http://www.new-tradition.org

Check out that crazy site. I guess it takes all kinds of people to populate the world, but wow are some off base or what?

Been playing the occasional game with AnorXorcist-AMZ, did a 15-16 clear today. Jade and Laz both dropped Eaglehorn, Bloodlust dropped a Protector, and Gorash dropped a Messy. Jade only dropped some book (Stone Curse I think, she can't read much of anything anymore anyway). A while more of preparing then a huge quest-a-thon at 40. ~20-mil. to go.

- AnorXorcist
Amazon Queen
Stealth Huntress
Guardian
Destroyer of Nightshadows
(Hmm, was there anything else?)