Attention All Diplogamers!

[LzPrst]

good session, the part where we played anyway. just to sum up what I'm fairly sure we agreed on... Install 1.61 and wait for next week

of course since extra patches may come out during the week it might be an idea to have an install of 1.00 lying around so we can patch quickly on friday before playing. losing 10 mins to patching is worth it compared to losing 2 hours to connection issues.

[LzPrst]

also. I fear I have some bad news. I have been invited to go to sweden for a week and following that I will go home for easter. thats 2 weeks I'll be gone if I choose to go, and I kinda feel like I need to get away a little.

where I'm going in sweden there is no computer and no internet. there might be an internet cafe in town, but I doubt I can find one that is open until 4 in the morning and I probably wouldnt be able to patch it anyway. so next friday I fear I'm out of the loop.

knowing how the AI has rearended me before, I would like to call for a substitute. perhaps omnitrout could take over, but if not I am officially asking for a sub. (I will of course give strict instructions in good german tradition )

at home I can probably convince my mother to let me install civ (she believes all computer games are evil, but I can be very persuasive) and might be able to play the week after next. of course the router back home may be crazy and I dont know if I can make it work. hopefully though there wont be any problems.

[OzzyKP]

Hopefully Omni will be able to sub for you.

[Robert]

America needs Germany!
It would be great if omni would sub!

have a great trip to Sweden! Been there 3 times on vacation, the country is beautifull!

[OmnipotentTrout]

Für das Deutches Volk!

Alles klar Reich Kanseller!

Unterofficer OmnipotentTrout can hold the German lines these two sessions you are gone.

"Einichkeit, Recht und Freiheit für das Deutches Vaterland"

[LzPrst]

btw omni. will you be going home for easter? I might be able to play that session myself.

also, I havent decided 100% yet whether I'm going to sweden. need to check plane\bus\train tickets and stuff...

oh, btw cyber, I'm half swedish so I've been there twice a year until I was 18, so I'm not exactly a tourist

[OzzyKP]

I probably won't be around for Easter either. My parents are coming to town on Good Friday. If we are gonna play on I'm sure I can arrange a sub.

[Robert]

We'll see who 'll be around for the eastern weekend. If there are too much people not available, I think it's a good weekend to skip.

I'll be there myself though, and as a good christian I'll tell you all the gospel of eastern while we are waiting for people to re-connect

[Robert]

For those who're interested, I got an 8+ (scale 1-10) for my presentation 8)

[OzzyKP]

Eastern? I'm not familiar with that holiday. Is it some Chinese religion?

Congrats on your presentation though!

btw, does anyone have a save from just before we quit? For some reason as soon as I load my save it advances a turn before I can get in control of it.

[The Capo]

Yeah, I don't think I got the right save either, so maybe we should collaborate here and make sure we all have it. We should also confirm everyone has the 1.61 patch, I can tell you now that I don't, so we know everything is in order as well. Plus another thing I've noticed in the forum, and I'm not trying to pick on LzPrst here at all, but I don't think our leaders should be able to "see" the top Five cities, in the sense that they know the ranking and openly challenge them. I mean, India didn't create that list, and you absolutely should not be able to go to India and kidnap someone, especially one of his characters, without his consent. Which I am sure you didn't get.

I mean, things like that go beyond in-game actions. They hardly explain anything, my only point here is that it could potentially screw up something Ozzy was trying to make happen, and leads to confusion. There was a situation in HOTW2 where this happened, the Israeli player (the infamous SunTzu) "killed" one of my leaders, which was not something I wanted to happen. It caused some issues; but generally I think it would be best if everyone handled only their own characters.

I await the backlash....

[NicodaMax]

Originally posted by OzzyKP
I probably won't be around for Easter either. My parents are coming to town on Good Friday. If we are gonna play on I'm sure I can arrange a sub.

"Good Friday"? Isn't that the day they crucified The Guy? Not being disrespectful or anything, but that's a weird name for that holiday. In spanish its called Holy Friday...

[OzzyKP]

As I noted in the story thread, he didn't actually kill me yet, he just sent his team into India. Lz sent me a PM hoping that I will work that into my story, so he is letting me decide the fate of their assassination mission.

I think that's entirely appropriate and indeed a good thing that should happen more often. People shouldn't be writing stories in isolation of everyone else in the game. The more interaction between our stories and our characters the more organic and real this game and story becomes.

Certainly you don't want to step on people's toes and kill off their characters without their permission, but what Lz did is definitely good.

I do see your point about commenting on the top 5 cities. I think he responds to them only half-serious, as kind of a semi-tounge-in-cheek aside to us players. I like it.

Sometimes I'll reference real world outside game stuff in my stories. But I'll do it subtly and so it'll make sense within the story. Like if someone is having connection issues I may explain in the story that a foreign King had a habit of taking many vacations and often wasn't available to discuss a certain matter.

[Robert]

Originally posted by NicodaMax


"Good Friday"? Isn't that the day they crucified The Guy? Not being disrespectful or anything, but that's a weird name for that holiday. In spanish its called Holy Friday...

Jesus was crusified on good friday indeed, and he died.
It's not so good for him, but it's good for us, that's why it's named good friday. Because it's good for us.

I'll quote Isaiah 53

3 He was despised and rejected by men,
a man of sorrows, and familiar with suffering.
Like one from whom men hide their faces
he was despised, and we esteemed him not.

4 Surely he took up our infirmities
and carried our sorrows,
yet we considered him stricken by God,
smitten by him, and afflicted.

5 But he was pierced for our transgressions,
he was crushed for our iniquities;
the punishment that brought us peace was upon him,
and by his wounds we are healed.

6 We all, like sheep, have gone astray,
each of us has turned to his own way;
and the LORD has laid on him
the iniquity of us all.

7 He was oppressed and afflicted,
yet he did not open his mouth;
he was led like a lamb to the slaughter,
and as a sheep before her shearers is silent,
so he did not open his mouth.

8 By oppression and judgment he was taken away.
And who can speak of his descendants?
For he was cut off from the land of the living;
for the transgression of my people he was stricken.

9 He was assigned a grave with the wicked,
and with the rich in his death,
though he had done no violence,
nor was any deceit in his mouth.

10 Yet it was the LORD's will to crush him and cause him to suffer,
and though the LORD makes his life a guilt offering,
he will see his offspring and prolong his days,
and the will of the LORD will prosper in his hand.

11 After the suffering of his soul,
he will see the light of life and be satisfied;
by his knowledge [f] my righteous servant will justify many,
and he will bear their iniquities.

12 Therefore I will give him a portion among the great,
and he will divide the spoils with the strong,
because he poured out his life unto death,
and was numbered with the transgressors.
For he bore the sin of many,
and made intercession for the transgressors.

[LzPrst]

About the top five cities list... not only has ozzy written about it (the germans that admire delhi, though more subtle)

but there is in game a list that pops up over the most powerful, most advanced, most cultural civs. I kinda assumed I could use the top 5 cities screen at the end of each session as such a ingame measurement of the greatest cities of the world (according to the ingame scholars and such).

and yes, its not an important part of my story line, I just like to toy with merely because Berlin is not on (top of) the list. its the classical urban envy syndrome for my megalomaniac leaders

demographics from the game shouldnt be barred from use ingame. as long as it can be put into some incharacter context. for example, "our spies report that India has a larger military than us... or at least we think it was India, the message got garbled during decoding... either that or it would seem that a pumpkin pie has a plan to take over India with the help of some pidgeons... the courier will of course be thouroughyl whipped mylord"

demographics and top 5 cities can be stuff that scribes play around with (and later monasteries and finally think thanks and intelligence agencies) and thus be used as a basis for some RP. of course using the numbers in a way that makes little sense or doesnt jive RP-wise is of course discouraged. I just feel that we can tap into the game for more stuff to write about the game.

just to make another example, in the demographics you can see if your army is the largest. that would be a good base for having your leader bragging about his superior military. or the player with the lowest gold output could use it to complain about the lack of trade in his empire. lot of stuff like that is great for RP'ing. IMHO of course.