Tales of Random Events

[Lord Avalon]

Tamers have figured out how to domesticate the abundant supply of prairie dogs on the open range. They are now selling these as pets.

Prairie dogs? This is making us money? That's good, I suppose.

Prairie dog pets

So I got +1 on a plains tile, which also happened to have a sheep pasture on it.

...until the gods destroyed it in their wrath.

[Kekkonen]

I had a 'Tower shield' event, which gave all current and future melee units the Cover promotion. Too bad I wasn't the Holy Roman Empire -- Landsknechts with Cover would sound pretty good (although Crossbowmen should still make short work of them).

[Proteus_MST]

My axemakers developed a new form of axe handle, which turned the axes of my axemen into the finest axes ever made, giving them a Shock I promotion.

[CerberusIV]

I built enough stables for my horse trainers to learn that horse whispering thing. I had no use for a stack of free horse archers or sentry on the 3 I had at the time so took the option for all my stables to produce an extra food (either the citizens of the Chinese empire regard horsemeat as tasty or all that horseshit boosted crop yields).

The annoying thing is that after I overran the Celts the stables I could build in their cities didn't give any extra food.

[Thrak]

I've had fountain of youth (extra trade in an oasis), tin deposits (extra hammers on a mine), a couple of the breakthrough events.

And ants, forest fires, mine accidents, barbarian stacks...

[Adagio]

I've had barbarian stacks just form next to my borders... two turns after finishing the Great Wall of Ethiopia

[ayronis]

I had a hurricane knock down some city walls one turn before Shaka's invasion arrived at the city. Surprisingly, the city garrison was able to hold off the attack (from behind the debris?) so luck cuts both ways, it seems.

[Makahlua]

During a war with Saladin last night, I had an event where they actually 'showed mercy and compassion" and healed one of my wounded units in their territory I had the option to just ignore it, or try to contact them for peace with a +1 bonus to diplomacy. The actual wording of the event made me stop and think about signing one for a moment - good emotional blackmail there

But since they only had one city left ...

I've also had the forest fire in ym own territory,and got to pick between doing nothing, aiding the wounded (still burns down), or organizing a replanting effort. I took replanting since it was on a hill

[Thrak]

replanting is always worth it, if only for the chop

[Adagio]

During a war against Korea I got an event which gave me an option for peace. I ignored the event (as I was only a few tiles away from their city, signing peace treaty would only make it worse for me), but then the next turn I had to vote on peace with Korea (from the AP). This means that I was forced to sign a peace treaty, as Korea holds 99% of all votes and was the one deciding what to vote for
So far he has done this trick twice

[Tattila the Hun]

Eh, AP can be rather nasty thing. Like that Defensive Pact between the participants. I'm thinking, sure, if some heathen non-believer attacks any of us, we'll rush to defend him... Of course, the twerps decide to go to war with one another, and suddenly I'm at war with my 4 millenia long ally, my best friend. I'm wondering, when deciding on wars and the likes, does the AI ever consider, that their declaration will bring them into war with their best friend and trading partner, or merely, that that trading partner doesn't have a lot of troops against their border, because, you know, we're friends?

[Jvstin]

Originally posted by Tattila the Hun
Eh, AP can be rather nasty thing. Like that Defensive Pact between the participants. I'm thinking, sure, if some heathen non-believer attacks any of us, we'll rush to defend him... Of course, the twerps decide to go to war with one another, and suddenly I'm at war with my 4 millenia long ally, my best friend. I'm wondering, when deciding on wars and the likes, does the AI ever consider, that their declaration will bring them into war with their best friend and trading partner, or merely, that that trading partner doesn't have a lot of troops against their border, because, you know, we're friends?

I was having a splendid little war with Hannibal (he was Buddhist as was the Khmer and the Ethiopians, I was Christian). Neither of the other two took notice of my war until the Khmer built the AP and he was elected its head.

Although we had good relations before hand, because (I presume) he was now the head of the AP, the Khmer attacked me. Quite annoying.

And to check that it was that, I tried a reload, got peace from Hannibal the turn before the AP was built. The Khmer didn't attack me in that variation.

[Lord Avalon]

I had just settled a city early in the game when a stack of 4 barb archers appeared outside it. All I had was a warrior. Talk about your forlorn hope. It was a while before I took the city back.

I also had Tin appear in a plains hill mine. 6 babycakes! (I wonder if it ever appears in an untouched hill.)

I was going to attack a neighbor once, but the declare war option was not available. WTF?! Peace Treaty?! I didn't sign no stinkin' Peace Treaty!

Then I remembered that message about the wedding between our civs. I didn't know that came with a peace treaty.

Well, more time to build up my army....

[ZargonX]

I got an interesting quest to build a full carrier fleet, consisting of 2 battleships, 3 carriers, 4 destroyers, and 9 fighters. You would also get a bonus if you build the Manhattan Project during the same stretch. Unfortunately, I researched the tech for Missile Cruisers, and that took battleships off my build list, so I don't think I could complete it...

[Thedrin]

Lord Avalon:
I was going to attack a neighbor once, but the declare war option was not available. WTF?! Peace Treaty?! I didn't sign no stinkin' Peace Treaty!

In BtS, every time you agree a trade with an AI you sign a peace treaty. Trading world maps? A peace treaty goes with it.

[Adagio]

Originally posted by Thedrin
In BtS, every time you agree a trade with an AI you sign a peace treaty. Trading world maps? A peace treaty goes with it.

So that's why I sometimes see that the peace treaty with civ x has ended, even though I've never been at war with them

[Adagio]

Lol, just got an interesting event:
Some girl from the Arabian "empire" wants to marry some business tycoon, but apparently Arabia doesn't like the choice of religion
What makes this interesting is the timing of the event, I got this just after Aztec took over the last remaining Arabian cities -2 relation hit I get for this doesn't matter as they're all gone

[Lord Avalon]

Originally posted by Thedrin


In BtS, every time you agree a trade with an AI you sign a peace treaty. Trading world maps? A peace treaty goes with it.

So no trading for techs then stabbing them in the back?

[Blaupanzer]

I got truffles on a hill, (supposedly in a cave) adding one coin to that hill. Subsequently my people proclaimed our truffles the best in the world. China promptly attacked me for my arrogance, although we had been friendly prior to that. Maybe he thought his truffles were better?

[rah]

How long do those terrain or building plusses last.
I got one of those tin +1s on a normal plain hill mine but then later copper appeared. I don't know if the tin was added after it converted.

[Arrian]

The only random events I've seen so far have been negative. I had a horse pasture destroyed and had to pay (I forget how much) to save a well-developed cottage from getting zapped.

I think I'll probably play with them off. I get the "flavor" argument, but there are enough dicerolls already for me.

-Arrian

[Blaupanzer]

Unless the event says otherwise, they seem to last all game. My truffles hill turned out to have aluminum. I still got the extra coin from the truffles.

[onodera]

Originally posted by Lord Avalon So no trading for techs then stabbing them in the back?

You trade for techs and spend your 10 turns moving your army to his/her borders.

[Jaybe]

Originally posted by Arrian
The only random events I've seen so far have been negative. I had a horse pasture destroyed and had to pay (I forget how much) to save a well-developed cottage from getting zapped.

I think I'll probably play with them off. I get the "flavor" argument, but there are enough dicerolls already for me.

-Arrian

Oh, bad first impression of the RNGods and that's it, eh?

My first impressions were favorable (the bad stuff all happened to "the other guys"), and by the time anything bad happened to me, it was near end game & easily contained.

[nbarclay]

From my extremely limited experience thus far, there are two things that I find really annoying about events. First, a number of the bad events destroy things that players have to waste time replacing, and perhaps figuring out how to manage the loss of while they are being replaced. It is bad enough having something bad happen without having to waste time figuring out how to fix it. It would be a lot less hassle if pastures, farms, buildings, and such were put out of commission temporarily rather than being destroyed permanently.

And second, there is the need to maintain an unknown amount of gold in the treasury in case an event involves options that are only available if you can afford them. This could be addressed by allowing players to go into debt temporarily in order to respond to events, with a requirement to pay back the debt as quickly as possible (allowing for any cultural spending necessary to avoid happiness problems). But without the ability to borrow money to respond to events, the need to maintain an emergency fund to respond to possible events is annoying, and not knowing how big the fund needs to be at any given time makes the situation even more annoying. And that's not even considering what could happen if the AI is still up to its old tricks of not allowing players to maintain a gold reserve without demanding that players give them some of their gold.

Events do add flavor to the game. But some flavors leave a bad taste in my mouth.

[Proteus_MST]

I started a war oin Hammurabi yesterday.
The very next turn afterwards Rosevelt declared war on me.

As we all 3 are members of the Apostolic palace (with me as resident) the turn after Roosevelt declared war I got 3 options for resolutions to be voted for:
1. Stop the war against Hammurabi
2. Stop the war against Proteus
3. Stop the war against Roosevelt

As I wanted to continue my war against Hammurabi, but desired peace with Roosevelt I chose option 3 of course.
The funny thing is, that on this Resolution all members voted with yes. All members, i.e. including Roosevelt, who thus was forced to stop the war he had begun (without even having the opportunity to start a single atack on my forces)

[Kuciwalker]

I wish there was an option to make events much more frequent.q

[Jaybe]

Originally posted by Proteus_MST
The funny thing is, that on this Resolution all members voted with yes. All members, i.e. including Roosevelt, who thus was forced to stop the war he had begun (without even having the opportunity to start a single atack on my forces)

Roosevelt was probably bribed into the war declaration.
I'd wager that AP end-war resolutions are the only way to get out of such commitments. [edit]: Get out of such commitments so quickly. [/edit]

[Thedrin]

nbarclay:
And second, there is the need to maintain an unknown amount of gold in the treasury in case an event involves options that are only available if you can afford them. This could be addressed by allowing players to go into debt temporarily in order to respond to events, with a requirement to pay back the debt as quickly as possible (allowing for any cultural spending necessary to avoid happiness problems). But without the ability to borrow money to respond to events, the need to maintain an emergency fund to respond to possible events is annoying, and not knowing how big the fund needs to be at any given time makes the situation even more annoying. And that's not even considering what could happen if the AI is still up to its old tricks of not allowing players to maintain a gold reserve without demanding that players give them some of their gold.

Large scale alterations aside, that may be my favourite change to the game. Do I risk putting all of my economy into research/espionage or do I opt to keep a gold reserve? There's now a reason to keep a gold reserve for the entire game. I found, also, that the AIs weren't demanding gold as much as they used to, but I may have been lucky in that regard.

[LDiCesare]

the need to maintain an emergency fund to respond to possible events is annoying

As Thedrin does, I find this is a big positive. Of course, some events are really bad (what? A volcano here?) but there are good ones so overall I think it's quite balanced.