Spaceship comparison game

[Swiss Pauli]

Yeah, let's move in that direction. How's everyone getting along with 1.61? I don't the early game has changed too much for me, but thereafter I feel it pans out a bit differently, or maybe it's just the change in the dateline that's altered the feel.

[solo]

Okay, a new game using 1.61 sounds good. I like the "best shot" idea or would be happy to play as we have been doing it so far. Anyone have a start they would like to post?

[uberfish]

Let's go with Emperor, continents, normal, play up to 1AD and compare?

[mdbill]

The guy that wrote the map scripts is very proud of the Ice Age map. How about that for something different? I curious to see what the big deal is.

[uberfish]

Ice age just feels like flattened continents to me, but sure, why not? I think the best shot idea will really let us compare the merits of various strategies in detail.

[Swiss Pauli]

Originally posted by uberfish
Let's go with Emperor, continents, normal, play up to 1AD and compare?

With 1.52, I'd be happy to try Emperor for the first time ever, but with 1.61 I'd prefer Monarch. But if the majority want Emperor, I'll go with that.

My preferences: Monarch, Ice Age, normal, play up to 1AD. Random Leader.

[rjmatsleepers]

Originally posted by Swiss Pauli


With 1.52, I'd be happy to try Emperor for the first time ever, but with 1.61 I'd prefer Monarch. But if the majority want Emperor, I'll go with that.

My preferences: Monarch, Ice Age, normal, play up to 1AD. Random Leader.

I'll go along with the majority, but if we go to Emperor, I'd prefer continents or fractal. I'd like to be able to explore different leaders. Is there anyway that we can set up the same starting position with different leaders?

RJM at Sleeper's

[solo]

This would also be my first 1.61 game, so I'd also prefer to start out with Monarch. If this seems as easy as usual, we could move on to Emperor the next time.

RJM,

I believe Worldbuilder can be used to reuse the same start with different leaders, but have not tried this yet myself. You would be creating a bunch of scenarios using the same map.

[mdbill]

I usually play with "no cheating" or "Lock Assets" checked so there'd be no way to get different leaders, but we don't need that if we trust everyone.

I thought we steamrolled the AI on Monarch and would like to bump up the difficulty too. Don't forget we're playing Best Shot. A group of bad golfers playing best shot can compete with a Pro.

I don't think 1.61 has been made that much more difficult than 1.52.

[KerThud]

Wow, you guys made great progress during the time I was gone.

This was my first spaceship victory, and it showed. I finally launched in 1858, but after consolidating my 2-island empire around 1400, I failed utterly to micromanage properly. As an example, I was working on Future Tech 8 when I launched. And I had all the techs needed to build every spaceship part when I finally completed the Apollo Program.

At epic speed, and with my choice of a dominating empire, the game just took a bit too long for my taste. Great work to all, though. A very good exercise.

[rjmatsleepers]

Originally posted by solo

I believe Worldbuilder can be used to reuse the same start with different leaders, but have not tried this yet myself. You would be creating a bunch of scenarios using the same map.

I've been experimenting with Worldbuilder. I don't want to do something the hard way if there's an easier way, so I'll explain what I'm doing and wait for suggestions. (For convenience I'll call the original starting civ "original" and the new one "target".

Delete the original civ's starting units and add the normal starting units for the target civ at the original civ's starting location.

Delete the target civ's starting units and add the normal starting units for the original civ at the target civ's previous starting location. Add extra units for original civ. At Monarch I believe this is 1 warrior and 1 worker, based on a quick look at the XML.

At Monarch, remove Archery as a starting tech for target civ and add it as a tech for original civ.

Reset diplomacy and save as a scenario.

Are all these corrections for the AI level bonus necessary, or will the XML take care of them?

Of course by doing this you do get to see a lot of the map, but I can't see anyway round that. And I can only change to one of the leaders that was part of the initial game. Any idea how I can pick a leader that wasn't there? For example using the same civ, but a different leader.

All suggestions welcome.

RJM at Sleeper's

[solo]

I think your changes are necessary, to convert the human player into an AI one, since changes made under Worldbuilder are supposed to override the given defaults.

However, in one experiment, I deleted all of Louis's starting units from the setup of our last game, but when I tried to play the scenario as him, the game restored a settler and an archer for me to use.

If you are interested in just certain nations (or leaders), I think you have to start a new custom game where you pick the ones you want to see in your game(s) and then use Worldbuilder to set up your scenarios.

However, modders are experts in all of this and may have better advice for you in their own forum.

[rjmatsleepers]

Originally posted by solo

However, modders are experts in all of this and may have better advice for you in their own forum.

You're right, but I think what I did worked well enough for me to explore differences between leaders.

It certainly reminded me how much of this game is situation dependent - for example, with a creative leader there is much less benefit in building an obelisk in a newly established city. I'm tempted to play with random leaders for a while to try to get used to the benefits and drawbacks of different traits.

BTW, is anyone ready to post a new start for us yet?

RJM at Sleeper's

[solo]

Using the 1.61 patch, I picked the Ice Age option and left everything else random and came up with this start, where we can try our luck as the Spanish:

[rjmatsleepers]

I've downloaded the save and played through to AD1. I'll post the save when others have had a chance to play.

BTW, I have to change the capitalisation in order to load the save from the game. Is this a general thing or is it something about my set up?

RJM at Sleeper's