[no players] Lurker Thread

[oledavy]

The thing is, I actually believe that Seven's outburst is related to his overbearing desire for complete and total fairness and honesty. I must say when he made the 12-year old comment at luddite my first thought was "And you sound like one as well, since only small children without siblings still think the world is completely fair." But I don't mean to insult Seven here, its his world-view and he's entitled to it. I'm not even one to say he's wrong in this instance though I must say I didn't think of it as a bug when luddicator posted that was what they had done in their thread.

The issue, and this comes up frequently for Seven, is one of tone. He can't seem to resist coming off as a complete ass when these issues crop up because he is so vehement in his head that he is right. Even if that's correct, you're not going to sell that to anyone else by taking a holier-than-thou tone. You act aggressively, you're going to find people get defensive - its the natural order of things. That's not conducive to finding solutions in a democracy, which a PBEM rules situation is. Might actually do better to have novice be the one to have these conversations, he's much better at empathy.

As far as the overall point - I hate to say this but the Spullla reaction in PB2 and Seven's here is what makes them the players they are. You'll find most of the absolute best players here cannot look at things the way you two or I - good, solid players who can win with some breaks going our way do. They cannot countenance maximizing every opportunity available to them - that is in fact what makes them such great players. Of course, if you're on the other end, to paraphrase Seven himself, you feel like its someone asking you why you're starving when you've been unable to find a job for 5 years.

Anyway, the interesting part of this game to lurk is over now so I'm not fussed either way if they end it.

Well said

fwiw, I'm glad I did not have to pass judgement on this. I didn't think that it was a bug when Luddicator posted in their thread, but I can see the merit to Seven's argument - that it could be exploited in future CTON games.

[Lewwyn]

Honestly, this a turn order thing. Mackoti's offer came first. If NS7's offer was first and then they accepted that and then accepted Mackoti's treaty giving him only four cities would NS7 make as big a fuss? Yeah right. As a bug its miniscule and I don't believe that Luddicator should have to be lawyers about their peace deals in a CTON.

Seven and novice's reaction has been pretty terrible IMO. I can not get over the stink of self-righteousness. Particularly Seven's comments about "oh it's a competitive game you can't expect me not to look at others threads." Really. You're comparing accepting a peace treaty in a game with reading someones spoiler thread?!

Spaceman's latest post is also full of self-righteousness. So Luddicator's only options are to either replay the turn, pay Seven and co, or be labeled cheaters and viewed by everyone with disdain? Sorry Spaceman, I look upon you with disdain for that.

Seriously... CTON. Get over yourselves.


Getting me all worked up and I'm not even playing. Feel like I have to say something though, and better here than elsewhere.

[Lewwyn]

For the record if I had been in Luddicator's shoes I would have done the same thing. Maybe that's why I'm upset.

[regoarrarr]

I think both teams are (understandably) too wrapped up in their own opinions and how it affects their in-game chances. I can see arguments on both sides

On the pro-NS7 side, most of the arguments I've seen from Luddicator are along the lines of "we already lost so much this turn and now you are just extorting another city from us" which doesn't seem right.

On the other side, this doesn't really "feel" right that NS7 should be bound by a peace offer that they didn't really offer.

But I kind of feel like this is kind of a (probably unintended) consequence of the "AI diplo" game.

[zakalwe]

Didn't you just list two pro-NS7 arguments, Rego?

What exactly is the pro-Luddicator argument, anyway, beyond "we already lost so much and you deserve to get shafted anyway?"

I think it's possible to make a case that this is just poor, thoughtless, game design, and not actually a bug. Luddicator aren't really making that case very convincingly though. It seems like the core of their argument is still the "you deserve it anyway" part.

I'd wager that if this scenario was brought up in a pre-game discussion, everybody would agree to treat it as a bug, even if it is possibly just a poorly designed part of the game mechanics.

NS7 could also have been gracious here and said "ok, we disagree on this so we'll let it slide this time, but in the future we want to treat this as a bug". But with Luddicator's spiteful and provocative responses I can understand that they didn't / probably won't.

[Mardoc]

What exactly is the pro-Luddicator argument, anyway, beyond "we already lost so much and you deserve to get shafted anyway?"

One devil's advocate position, coming up!

The core of the argument is intent. Noseven didn't intend to offer white peace, but it happened anyway.

But intent isn't an argument that holds water in any other context - what matters is what you actually did, as interpreted by the game engine. No one cares that you didn't intend to put your navy in a vulnerable position, or didn't intend to let the governor assign a spy specialist on a turn you rushed to play. Or if you misclicked and offered white peace, for that matter.

What matters is what you actually did. Especially in an 'AI diplo' game, where the idea was clearly to limit the influence of anything but the game engine itself. By this measure - NoSeven's proposal of a peace treaty simultaneous to mackoti's proposal is a simple mistake, or even simple piece of bad luck. But saying 'I wouldn't have done that if I'd known' can apply to my above examples just as easily.

For a secondary argument, along different lines - the consequences are on the same order of magnitude as luck, in any event. No one would be complaining if they'd gotten their 143 gp request and moved on with the game - but one bad turn with the RNG can cost you easily more than that in equivalent hammers. For that matter, one bad turn with the RNG can cost an empire, let alone a city. So even if you grant that intent should matter for 'AI diplomacy', they're making a mountain out of a molehill, creating a stink over a matter that would pass unnoticed if the same effect came from a different source.

Edit: I think, personally, that it's a bug - the game told NoSeven one thing, and Luddite something else. But I also think it's a small enough one that it should either be ignored or coinflipped, and move on. It's not worth this degree of argument. Especially when there's no way it could have been caused intentionally, this being a no diplo game.

[kjn]

Mardoc, the broken game design angle would work but for one thing:

Luddite and Pindicator were aware of ALL the peace offers - the first time they opened the save, they made screen shots of every offer, declined them, and checked the game situation. So they were quite clear that NS7 offered.

(Doing it like that had been discussed in the tech tread earlier.)

Then they decided on how to respond to the offers. Pindicator even surmised how the game engine would work here, and they deliberately avoided the given alternatives (cash for peace, or peace with NS7 and a counter-offer to Mackoti, or peace with Mackoti and a counter-offer to NS7).

[Mardoc]

Oh, well, I guess as a lurker I'm a bit of a vulture - didn't look in until after the controversy broke open. So I'm obviously a bit underinformed.

In any event, I'm not sure I believe that argument, but I can see it being made.

[SIZE="1"]When's the next werewolf going to start, anyway? That's a much better venue for making arguments whether or not you believe in them .[/SIZE]

[regoarrarr]

Luddite and Pindicator were aware of ALL the peace offers - the first time they opened the save, they made screen shots of every offer, declined them, and checked the game situation. So they were quite clear that NS7 offered.

Ah this contradicts what I was thinking about earlier today. I thought that they had no way to know what NS7 had offered (and I think that they even made mention to this effect in the tech thread?) - that NS7's first offer was just a white peace.

But this puts me in the NS7 camp I think. I certainly think that a reasonable house rule would be something like "no player may accept mutually conflicting peace deals" or something like that.

[Ceiliazul]

a reasonable house rule would be something like "no player may accept mutually conflicting peace deals" or something like that.

A more common broad and common sense idea: Dont accept any trade that you know isnt what the sender sent.