Adventure 51 - Hannibal's Own Medicine - CLOSING DAY

[Nicolae Carpathia]

The only thing I really miss from BUG (I turn off all the options I can) is the dotmapper. It's so easy and wonderful!

I've been missing the breakdowns of how many hammers/commerce within a city screen, and the super detailed F1 screens that actually tell you how much commerce is being generated per city.

Oh, and being able to tell at a glance how many universities/banks you have online.

[lymond]

end of the day the mod provides a lot of information that the base game does not .....and being able to extract that information and having the patience to do so is one of the skills that the adventures/epics intend to test.

Well, technically that is not really true. As you said, all the info BUG provides can be found somewhere or derived - it's actually part of the mod description. BUG is not about giving an unfair advantage, it is about convenience and and saving time in an already lengthy game. Really much of it is how CIV should have been released in the first place. The vanilla UI is downright horrible. It allows players to focus on playing the game, not squinting their eyes.

Civ can be made challenging in many different ways other than not using a mod that does even affect the gameplay.

There have been something like 80 Civ4 SP tournament ...... I don't really see any reason to start allowing them at this point.

Again, it's all about being stubborn and set in ways. What I've seen in my time lurking around RB, is almost complete focus on MP and very little participation or focus on SP games. It's almost an afterthought really. Games are infrequent and the apparent participation is very sparse. No one even updates the main page anymore. Honestly at one point after popping in over 3 years or so, I thought this forum was almost dead, not realizing everyone here plays MP and PBEM.

Maybe what is needed is to shake this thing up a little. Allow mods like BUG which may entice more players. Once an adventure is started post an announcement post over at CFC as well in S&T. There's obviously some cross-over here. We might get more players involved and likewise more mapmakers. That is...if anyone here cares

[Gaspar]

Well, technically that is not really true. As you said, all the info BUG provides can be found somewhere or derived - it's actually part of the mod description. BUG is not about giving an unfair advantage, it is about convenience and and saving time in an already lengthy game. Really much of it is how CIV should have been released in the first place. The vanilla UI is downright horrible. It allows players to focus on playing the game, not squinting their eyes.

There's a big difference between found somewhere and derived. There are parts of BUG that are nice and convenient - putting a GP/GG counter on the main screen, the dotmap utility. There are parts that are way to close to playing the game for you - such and such can be whipped for x pop with y hammers overflow. Also, while I don't think its stellar, I also disagree that the vanilla UI is downright horrible. I think it does what it needs to.

Anyway, don't look at me. I've finished like two SP games of BTS in the past year. Just trying to suggest why the games don't have mods available.

[Tatan]

There are some UI features I do think BUG really did right and which vanilla Civ should have had. At the same time, I agree with Gaspar--it gives you too much information to play the game completely on your own. It's like starting a game of Sudoku with several extra numbers revealed at the start.

Anyway, I will definitely be trying this adventure! Thanks, Ceilazul!

[T-hawk]

These are the tenets in play:

1. Everyone gets a level playing field.
2. You can play the original game; installing a mod is never required just to play.

We've been over the details of BUG, and the consensus is that the playing field is not level between a BUG user and an unmodded player. It's roughly equivalent to playing chess where only some of the participants get to consult more powerful resources like endgame tablebases or computer chess engines. We want to keep the barrier to entry low, that anyone can jump in with Civ 4 (BTS) right off the shelf and play the same game as everyone else.

We're not shooting down BUG out of spite or meanness. I have tried it myself on occasion, and yes, much of the extra information is convenient and timesaving. But ultimately, none of what it does is truly essential. We've managed fifty-plus multiplayer games without anyone lamenting its absence. If there's some small piece of functionality that you absolutely can't do without (like dotmapping), the right thing to do is extract it into a standalone mod that can be approved by the RB mod process. (We've been over the thought process of stripping down BUG to minimal acceptable components, which didn't work well, stuff always leaks through.)

If your fear is that not using BUG would make the game too lengthy thanks to calculating stuff manually, perhaps you're not in the right place. CFC is about the destination; we're about the journey.

[scooter]

What I've seen in my time lurking around RB, is almost complete focus on MP and very little participation or focus on SP games. It's almost an afterthought really.

FWIW, this is a new development. Check this page http://realmsbeyond.net/civ/civ4-tournam...elist.html and you'll see this used to be almost strictly a SP community. Generally speaking, I think we ran out of SP interest because there's only so much you can do... Then a publicly reported PBEM started and now we're basically a unique (in that we publicly report) MP community.

[sunrise089]

T-Hawk just gave the gospel on BUG, but I wanted to add...

BUG is not about giving an unfair advantage, it is about convenience and and saving time in an already lengthy game...It allows players to focus on playing the game, not squinting their eyes.

Though I'm quite out of practice, when I played random pickup MP games with RB folks who play primarily slow-timer/no-timer games I won almost all fast-moves. And yet I made use of no unique resources - enabling the right settings, using the numpad, and knowing the timing were skills available to all. Yet, a mod that made those things work perfectly for anyone would have a huge effect on player balance. I've go no issue with BUG, but you're dreaming if you think giving a quick+casual player the same sort of data analysis someone gets by checking every city every turn has no impact.

Maybe what is needed is to shake this thing up a little.

Thanks for your offer to fix our community. The fact that we have more active games than ever when Civ is 6 years old shows we're sure in need of it.

Look, it's one thing to be welcoming. I actually think RB is incredibly welcoming considering how small we are and how long some folks have been around. But please consider the possibility that it's rude to come in insisting you know just what we need to lead us to the civ promised land.

[Krill]

Look, it's one thing to be welcoming. I actually think RB is incredibly welcoming considering how small we are and how long some folks have been around. But please consider the possibility that it's rude to come in insisting you know just what we need to lead us to the civ promised land.

http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/showpost....tcount=170



So that's what I've been doing wrong all these years.

[mackoti]

So this BUG actualy teach you how to play the game?So someone with medium level could play Krill or Seven leven using this BUG?I realy dont get it...

[sunrise089]

So this BUG actualy teach you how to play the game?So someone with medium level could play Krill or Seven leven using this BUG?I realy dont get it...

Not exactly, but let's just take something simple like growing into unhappiness. A good play will know when they will happen and plan in advance. A "bad" player, perhaps purely through lack of time, will not bother to check that. Then their city will win up unhappy, and while they could slave or run a culture slider or just deal with it clearly they're at a possible disadvantage.

Mods like BUG will say "hey, you're going to go unhappy in X city next turn." Or tell you someone just got "enough on their hands." Or that someone will now trade X tech. You get the idea.

It's all info you could get in advance, but in a strategy game that's more or less everything. There's no special strategy I could use to defeat a top Halo or even Starcraft player. But if I can tap into Deep Blue's mind I can play chess a whole heck of a lot better even without any "new info."