Pitboss 18 IT and Tech Issues Thread

[Fintourist]

...

I appreciate Commodore your effort and chiming in + all the positive words. Of course you're slightly controversial to me though. You're kind of saying that the trade was not ok and if possible should be rolled back, but also saying that nothing should be done about it.

From my perspective it's of course not really understandable that someone is breaking the rules, but allowed to keep the benefits from it. Normally if someone is punished it's the player who broke the rules, but in this case for various reasons we are the ones getting screwed.

Well, let's see if sunrise and/or Sullla still have time to comment on this and then we either continue playing or this discussion ends. Overall it's already a lose-lose situation, even if the judgement would be according to my understanding of fairness, this game will merely be a fountain of negative feelings for me, I've completely lost the respect towards certain players and I've certainly raged here more than someone calling himself an adult should.

[Grimace]

I feel similarly about things like spite-whipping multiple units in queue and self-pillaging improvement for denial. The motivation makes sense, deny things to your enemy. It's entirely within the game mechanics. I don't blame people for doing it. It's not cheating. But I think we should make it cheating. They're too powerful of techniques with no effective counter, and I think their presence makes the game worse.

I understand why you feel this way, but I disagree completely. They're annoying, not powerful, and they are a traditional real form of defense (the "scorched earth" policy). Yes, it's frustrating for the invader, but you chose to attack, and your victim is not obligated to let you capture their entire empire intact.

[The Black Sword]

As I said earlier, I felt I was following the rules I had been playing by all game long when I made the offer to buy the artist. And I think it's clear a lot of other people, both players and lurkers, thought those were the rules too. According to plako my trade offer was illegal though. He wrote the rule, I'll take his word on what was meant.

So, first of all I'm sorry to FinHarry and others who were felt hard done by. Having someone gain an advantage illegally in a tight game is not a nice feeling.

I don't think this game really have admins but if you want to wait for Sulla/Sunrise/Comm to propose something, that's fine with me. I don't think it's an enviable task for them though, because it comes very close to actively choosing a winner. I'd prefer to come to an agreement ourselves and I have a suggestion;

Reload to turn 268, have someone send me the 3,250g and play from there.

T268 is the turn I rolled my last artist and I stopped really optimising Basilisk Caves and Elensefar in case it failed. IIRC, you hadn't really started hitting it yet with espionage. Additionally, I'd like to set the timer to 12 hours or less and just let everyone else's turn roll. Both of us ignore military stuff and just play quickly through the spies and gold part. I think it's fair to say that I'd need to make a pretty major mistake for military to matter at that stage. I think this would be a disadvantage to me for a variety of reasons, but I guess I'm the one who broke the rules.

BGN or others: Obviously speak up if you feel there was something you were going to do that wouldn't be taken into account.

EDIT: Crosspost with a few.

[The Black Sword]

Mardoc - totally agreed.

Dtay - also agreed, IMO a rule 'can only whip once per turn' would be beneficial.

Oh, and I feel a strange urge to point out I was in 14th place in food on T100.

[Fintourist]

I appreciate the offer TBS, your approach makes kind of sense, while at the same time it's not exactly the proper ending that this game would have deserved. Overall these events have been such a negative experience that I feel I'm done with civ. Therefore at this point I don't think that any alternative solutions from me have any relevance. It has really been a lose-lose discussion.

I think this is the moment when OH needs to jump in and give his opinion, because he would be the one playing the turns. How he feels about this is more relevant than my stance.

[dtay]

I understand why you feel this way, but I disagree completely. They're annoying, not powerful, and they are a traditional real form of defense (the "scorched earth" policy). Yes, it's frustrating for the invader, but you chose to attack, and your victim is not obligated to let you capture their entire empire intact.

Everything you say here is why i don't blame people in games here for using the tactic. It's not a banned mechanic, and it's effective, and of course you are out to screw the person invading you as much as possible. I merely submit that it would be better game design for that precise tactic to simply not exist, because it is too easy to deny rewards to people conquering you that way. Of course you want your opponent to benefit as little as possible, but I think the game would better if it were a bit harder for people being conquered to do that

I care not that much for realism. I do like stylized realism, realism that lets me think of the game as a story (which is why I agree with commodore re: toroidal v cylindrical even though it is def worse for balance), but having all historical military tactics available isn't necessary for that. But that's just my personal preference, I don't think people should particularly care about that.

And in this case, it's not even particularly realistic since the civ engaging in scorched earth defense need not deal with any of the normal fallout from that tactic (they're effective massacring thousands/millions of their own citizens by burning towns, but no one seems to care).

[Dreylin]

I understand why you feel this way, but I disagree completely. They're annoying, not powerful, and they are a traditional real form of defense (the "scorched earth" policy). Yes, it's frustrating for the invader, but you chose to attack, and your victim is not obligated to let you capture their entire empire intact.

Everything you say here is why i don't blame people in games here for using the tactic. It's not a banned mechanic, and it's effective, and of course you are out to screw the person invading you as much as possible. I merely submit that it would be better game design for that precise tactic to simply not exist, because it is too easy to deny rewards to people conquering you that way. Of course you want your opponent to benefit as little as possible, but I think the game would better if it were a bit harder for people being conquered to do that

I care not that much for realism. I do like stylized realism, realism that lets me think of the game as a story (which is why I agree with commodore re: toroidal v cylindrical even though it is def worse for balance), but having all historical military tactics available isn't necessary for that. But that's just my personal preference, I don't think people should particularly care about that.

And in this case, it's not even particularly realistic since the civ engaging in scorched earth defense need not deal with any of the normal fallout from that tactic (they're effective massacring thousands/millions of their own citizens by burning towns, but no one seems to care).

Well it seems that RtR 3.x is seeking to address this somewhat by making Villages and Town unpillagable ... even unreplaceable if I'm reading it right, so no changing your mind and repurposing to Workshops late game either.

[Krill]

The only reason I haven't enforced the one whip per turn effect is that the is a niche point where 2 whips one one turn makes sense.

[Old Harry]

That's an ingenious offer TBS, thanks. For full disclosure you're right, we were out of military options and through espionage I don't think we can slow you beyond t274 even without your new bags of cash, so I'd be aiming for a tie (or a coinflip, which I don't think is fair after this much effort) so I think you get to claim the win whatever happens from here, it's just that you might have to share.

Are you happy that I read the last couple of pages of your thread yesterday? I think the only thing I learned was that you knew where we were landing our spies. If so then we could perhaps even blitz through it tomorrow or Thursday evening with a ten minute turn timer and use of the pause key - I don't think five turns of spy logistics will require that long to run. I'm on rboldharry at the usual if you want to chat while we do it.

I think Mardoc wins post of the thread though - this was a random game where hut/neighbour/event/dice luck had a huge impact. So quibbling over this at the end does seem a bit petty, but damnit, have you seen how long I've put into this game .

[Commodore]

Overall it's already a lose-lose situation, even if the judgement would be according to my understanding of fairness, this game will merely be a fountain of negative feelings for me, I've completely lost the respect towards certain players and I've certainly raged here more than someone calling himself an adult should.

Good heavens, sir! Your politely worded, measured, impassioned, and mature objections are about as far from "raged here more than someone calling himself an adult should" as could be imagined. I'm sorry it's a bad business in every direction, but you've certainly not been anything less than reasonable.

Also, this:

That's an ingenious offer TBS, thanks. I think the only thing I learned was that you knew where we were landing our spies. If so then we could perhaps even blitz through it tomorrow or Thursday evening with a ten minute turn timer and use of the pause key - I don't think five turns of spy logistics will require that long to run. I'm on rboldharry at the usual if you want to chat while we do it.

I think Mardoc wins post of the thread though - this was a random game where hut/neighbour/event/dice luck had a huge impact. So quibbling over this at the end does seem a bit petty, but damnit, have you seen how long I've put into this game .

Quite a good one!