Ready to play!

Second attempt at PBEM game. Fun times ahead!

Wellllll here goes! Last time, I was afraid of making the map too large and apparently underestimated the amount of space that people expect for a game of FfH, so I'm glad it turned out to be fun anyway! This time ... I'm probably getting more than a little over-ambitious with these starts, to say nothing of other map concepts. You tell me....

[EDIT: All starts superseded, most with substantial changes! See below!]

I am creating a thread for thoughts on Remnants of the Precursors, as I play though my initial game. It seemed more polite than continuing to clutter up Dp101's thread with things not related to the showcase game Dp101 is very kindly reporting on. I have not been taking screenshots of my game, so this will not be a game report but just a collection of random thoughts as I encounter things. I may include some screenshots to illustrate specific points.

I am playing as the lizards, the Ssslauren in RotP naming. I drew a start at the far southwest edge of the galaxy, pretty isolated. I had two stars within range -- I love the easy visibility of what is in range (both regular and with reserve tanks), plus the ability to turn on distance markers on the map centered on any selected world. No more guessing if a system is going to be within range or not. Unfortunately both were parallel along the rim of the galaxy, rather than towards the center and more stars. I was clearly going to need more range tech early in this game.

Both were red stars, so it was a coin flip. I sent my colony ship south and sent my scouts north and east. I found a desert 35 for my second world -- not great. The other star was a poor minimal 50, though, so at least I got the better of the two. The usual factory building followed after I sent some pop, with plans for another col ship once the build time at Sssla was 6 turns or so.

Scouting revealed a large terran planet beyond the poor world, so maybe I did not get the better option for my second world. Oh well. I will just have to build another col ship immediately. The star to my east (towards the center of the galaxy) had a toxic world, so I would not be getting to the denser areas of the galaxy any time soon. At least I should not have to worry about neighbors for some time.

Pretty typical development of the second world and maxing of the homeworld followed, and I got the poor world and the very nice terran settled. A trickle of science was started to open fields, and I did not have range 4; this would slow me down. Some poor options elsewhere also hurt; no clean up, no terrforming. Oh well, I'll just have to deal. I did have controlled barren and there was a barren 50 that would be reachable.

The game lets you display the turn on the main map, either as turn number or year number. For some reason the year number is not based from 2300 like MOO, but is 978? No idea what is going on with that. Turn number works well enough, but it would be nice to be able to have the years based from 2300. At turn 50 I get a diplomatic intro screen for the bugs, the Kholdan Hive. (I like the naming of the races in the game, different for legal reasons but obvious who they are.) Weirdly, there is no sign of the bugs anywhere, and the races screen reports they are out of range and cannot be contacted or spied upon. So why was I notified of their existence? Maybe one of their ships passed within range of one of my scouts and then went back out of range? I am a bit confused by this. Unlike MOO, you can not tell who else is in the galaxy from the start. So this semi-contact is useful information. I just am not sure why it happened. Maybe the bugs have longer range tech than I do?

Anyway, the bugs are their usual xenophobic selves so I am sure they will be trouble in the future. The diplo system helpfully tells me (Civ4 style) that I have a very large negative modifier with them for first contact. Being hated just for existing is always such fun.

Hey RB, I'd like to propose a new pitboss, with a premade map based of a Medium&Small or archipelago script.
Navy Navy Navy
There are several active pitbosses so I don't expect this to take off immediately, maybe in late May or early June

Settings:
Monarch or Emperor
No barbs
No Events/Spies/TechTrading etc.

Mapmaker Guidance:
Room for ~13-15 decent cities per player with an even landgrab
Everyone can establish contact and trade pre astro
Some astro exclusive land, maybe 5-10% of total land tiles and resources? 

Bans:
FIN, ORG, Vikings, GLH, Colossus

Org could possibly be unbanned if the difficulty is lower, but it just feels like too much with the LH bonus. 
About civ bans maybe the Dutch, Portuguese and Chinese deserve attention, but they don't seem oppressive like Vikings and maybe deserve some time in the sun. Also their bonuses take longer to bloom

Prompted by RefSteel in the thread for the game, this is a report of a run with the intention of showcasing the game and its various improvements/changes over the original MoO. I'll be writing assuming knowledge of the original game, hopefully I won't wind up skimming over new changes in the process.

Anyways, as suggested I went with the following settings: We'll be playing as the Psilons Mentarans, a race with an entirely unique and legally distinct pair of bonuses for 75% of techs showing up in their trees and +50% research. Average map size for 6 opponents and 100 stars, "harder" (6 out of 7) difficulty (usually I play 1 below, but I also don't usually play the strongest race in the game), and "base" AI, which is still significantly smarter than the original's AI, but not as absurd as Modnar (flavourful + strong) or Xilmi (pure strength, AI flavour left by the wayside) can be. For the layout, Ellipse was picked, which comes with 2 suboptions, one that ranges from Circular to Eclipse 4 that determines how flattened vs round the map is, and Void, ranging from no void to 4, which controls the size of a, well, void in the centre of the galaxy, which helps to shape the map a bit more and make it feel less like a regular one with the corners shaved off. I went went with the default of Eclipse 2, and set void from the default none to 1, to try to get more of a shape going on without making it just a loop, but via fiddling with settings you can indeed get a pure ring to play on if you'd like:

For those unaware, Diablo 2 Resurrected stopped having any major patches after 2.6, and it looks like they are just doing the automated ladder releases. It's like they pulled the developers / team away from the project all of a sudden.

What this means for me is an interesting problem and question.

Decoy had a bug introduced in 2.6, which as of now is still in the game. The way it works is that the first 15-16 or I don't know how many I summon, everything works normally, it dies after a while, and needs a resummon. All is good, working as intended at slvl 1+6. After that, for at least 99 summons, it dies in a single hit. It's completely useless, but it's still worth summoning, because after said 99-128 summons are chewed up you get something even more crazy: immortal decoys who can last being chewed on by Andariel for their full duration. I don't know how many casts it lasts for, because I don't play very long sessions and it resets every time I S&E, so it's very rare that I get to use it for long.

I don't know what to think of this. Decoy is such a big part of the Amazon's gameplay arsenal for me even as a single-point investment, but I am playing hardcore too, and an unbreakable no-downsides tank feels like it's defeating the point, even if I have to do the equivalent of "human sacrifice to summon the devil" to gain access to that.

What's the next Pitboss and may I sign up for it? I have no preferences but really do need a lurker.
Apologies if this thread is redundant.

EitB PBEM LVI finished recently and I'm eager to start the next one! Some discussion was already held in discord, but better to cauge interest here.

Aurorarcher, Bing and I have shown interest to join a new PBEM, any others ready to jump in?

Discussion of map type, starting era etc. and suggestions are welcome. Also a map-maker is needed (RefSteel made an excellent map last game, Q showed some potential interest as well?).


EDIT3: Added summary of proposed game settings and other information below to find them more easily.

Confirmed players and play windows:

BING_XI_LAO:  01:00 to 15:00 GMT
xist10:  9:00 to 23:00 GMT
Aurorarcher:  16:00 GMT to 21:00 GMT but can often play earlier
coldrain:  16:00 to 21:00 GMT preferred
mackoti:  17:00 to 21:00  GMT (alternate morning window exists too but not consistently)
Ginger:  19:00 to 24:00 GMT.

Map-making guidelines (these have been locked)

• Minimum distance between starts: 15 tiles
  
• Land tiles per player: 200-300
  
• Map-script: Map-maker choice
  
• Continent + start distribution: All players on same land mass
  
• Amount of ocean/water: Map-maker choice
  
• Islands (amount and size): Map-maker choice
  
• Lushness: Not totally barren plains or desert hell, otherwise Map-maker choice.
  
• Blessing of Amatheon: Map-maker choice
  
• Unique features: Yes, but balanced
  
• Strategic resources: ensure copper, horses, iron, mithril, reagents, incence, and blasting powder in all starting areas (not necessarily in capital BFC)
  

• AI diplo
  
• Quick speed
  

• Emperor difficulty
  
• No tech trading
  
• No vassal states
  
• No espionage
  
• No Acheron
  
• No Orthus
  
• Wildlands
  
• Living world
  
• Tribal huts: no
  
• Lairs, barrows, graveyards, etc: yes
  
• Mana nodes: two guaranteed sources in starting area (previous game had one)
  
• Normal settler at start (no bonus vision or movement)
  

The latest DLC for Crusader Kings 3 came out on Monday, and so far I have been enjoying the extra realm management that Legends of the Dead gives for you.  The two main new features are plagues, from something as simple as a bad cough to the Black Death in the late game, and being able to promote legends - whether you are promoting your own status or creating a legend of your ancestors to further your claims in the realm today.  It's piqued me to want to try reporting another game here on Realms Beyond.

If that interests you, I have 4 starts in mind, all at the 867 starting date.  Vote for where you would like to see me play:


King Gartzia Enekez of Navarra




Count Smbat of Aran




Ghurshah Suri Muhammadzde of the Ghurid Shahdom




Farbas Bamari of Manding