New "Ancient Empires" PBEM created

[SlowThinker]

gifting cities and units

Originally posted by Kull
On the separate subject of gifting cities and units, here's my primary objection: Those are NOT features of the standard Civ2 engine,

I think unit giving is a feature of both SP (AI diplomacy) and MP (online play). Only difference is that SP unit gifting teleports units and so should be forbidden.
Giving cities - I don't remember if it is a feature in MP (?). With cities I see the problem I wrote sooner: a city given to a civ with Pyramids or Sun Tzu shoudn't be given back.

...and this scenario was not designed with such options in mind.

This is a serious reason. But can you explain how is this scenario different from others? Which problems can city and unit giving bring on especially in this scenario?

I agree that simplicity is good and we would have to add three (?) additional rules to city and unit gifting. But...

I see a problem with no city and no unit gifting: peripheral civs (like Babylonia, maybe Persia - I don't know the map) will stay confined in their area. And they won't be able to trade overseas. I don't say it only because it is disavantageous for me ... If you think that you balanced this disavantage by some other advantages then it is OK.
Another point is that city and unit giving rule supports fragmented civs. I consider a game with fragmented civs much more interesting than with only connected civs.

Originally posted by germanos
I rest my case

My english falls behind sometimes. What did you want to say?

---

(A sidenote: you play calmly 40 turns and then you find out that every player plays different rules )

[tanelorn]

Popularized juridicial jargon. It means "I have nothing more to say" more or less.

Where do I keep that copy of
"Slayer's guide to rules lawyers"????

[La Fayette]

Re: gifting cities and units

Originally posted by SlowThinker
I see a problem with no city and no unit gifting: peripheral civs (like Babylonia, maybe Persia - I don't know the map) will stay confined in their area. And they won't be able to trade overseas.

In fact Egypt is stuck in the South; Babs are stuck in the South-East; Persia is stuck in the East; Greece is stuck in the West; so are the Minoans (to a lesser degree).
Only the Assyrians and the Hittites have easy contact with 3 or 4 other civs in the early game. They are the 'center of the board', which is a great advantage when playing chess. My bet is that it will also prove such in this game.

[SlowThinker]

Originally posted by Kull
What if a player decides to quit the game, and - instead of allowing us to search for a replacement - gives almost every city and unit to another player?

Originally posted by tanelorn
Pah! City-gifting is easy. Just use CivCity. It's been done in other PBEMs. However city gifting by capture and unit gifting entail tech-leak aswell... Tricky.

I suppose (?) tanelorn wants to say the quitting player can anyway let his 'friend' to 'conquer' all his cities and to put all units in a 2-sized city and let it bribe.

Originally posted by La Fayette
In fact Egypt is stuck in the South; Babs are stuck in the South-East; Persia is stuck in the East; Greece is stuck in the West; so are the Minoans (to a lesser degree).

But Egypt, Greece and Minoans can get to other civs by ships. They can send caravans anywhere. But Babylonians (and Persians?) can't get caravans overseas (to Greece and Minoans). With city/unit gifting they could 'trade' a city or units at Mediterranean.

[tanelorn]

Historically speaking, they have to fight their way through the fertile crescent to the sea. Especially Babylon is blessed with the Arabian Desert, full of goody huts to the south. You must be light-years ahead in research, right? Even so, you can send settlers to establish seaside colonies, and let's not get started with the benefits of having one or two less borders to defend...

[germanos]

Originally posted by SlowThinker
Now I had no relocated workers...

There is some logic that the engine must recalculate Civs after F11 and so look in cities. But I don't understand why Minoan F11 spoils Babs and Babs F11 spoils Assyrians.

germanos, did you do testing at Imperialism 1870 game?

No, I didn't do much testing. Nobody seems to care . I do know that in most cases it was the Russian turn that came up wrong, so I thought it was a bug (game-cycle starts with Russia.)

[germanos]

(renamed many of my cities, hopefully they will be historically more correct now )

The Assyrian Empire has grown large, really large.
The King, Harhadu, has been thinking what to do with this wealth, and what the diversity of his subordinates meant for such an empire he commands. After carefull consults with his advisors he has come to the conclusion that diversity among he people should not be feared, but yet be rewarded, and possibly even encouraged.
Therefore, special projects have been commited to each city, and the first results have been are presented this decade.
The city of Ekallate has been rewarded for the excelent scolars it has brought to Nineveh: a School of Scribes has been build in the city to encourage students to attend classes by the many wise men in the city.
Nimrud has been blessed by a centre for Barter, and the many merchants traveling to the city will reap its rewards, and so will the treasury in the Royal Palace in Nineveh.
In Nineveh itself, Artisans from all over Assyria have been provided with their own quarter, and the interaction among them will boost Assyrian production.

Similar projects are in the works in many towns and cities.


My message to the Hatte has been posted earlier.

Egyptian forces have been met along the Jordan River and in the southern part of the vast central desert.

[Kull]

The emissaries of Pharoah have met with the Great King of the Hatti, and a Peace Treaty between our peoples has been established! Several of the learned from Merneptah's "Hall of Papyri" have met with their counterparts in Hattusas, and word is that the exchanges of knowledge have been extensive and fruitful!

Meanwhile reports from the Vast Deserts east of Petra speak of sand, scorpions, and Barbarian Horsemen of Evil Termperament who ride down from the hills and strike without warning! Woe betide all who enter this parched and burning land. Truly, none but Ra may wander here unscathed!

In Egypt itself, large Granaries have been established in Memphis and Dahshur, the better to speed the growth and prosperity of these burgeoning cities. Roads parallel the Nile and the builders are rapidly approaching the fortified Nubian city of Thebes in the distant south. Soon these rebel malcontents will feel the wrath of Pharoah's armies, and then the consolidation of Egypt will be complete!

[Stefan Härtel]

I wonder what ancient Persian rock music would sound like...

[SlowThinker]

I have tested the worker-relocating problem in my city with La Fayette. Also this occurence of relocation was caused by the F11 key.

[SlowThinker]

Unit and city giving

My opinion shifted in favor not to allow city giving (because we would have to add some restrictive rules due to wonders). City giving may be substituted by Farmer giving (it don't bring any side effects).
Now I prefer to allow unit giving, but my final opinion depends on Kull's original reasons he had in mind when created the scenario. So I remind my question for Kull:

Originally posted by Kull
...and this scenario was not designed with such options in mind.

This is a serious reason. But can you explain how is this scenario different from others? Which problems can city and unit giving bring on especially in this scenario?

[Steve Clark]

Got a Harbor built. Just staying well away from all of the rumoured excitement in the middle of the map.

[Kull]

Re: Unit and city giving

Originally posted by SlowThinker
My opinion shifted in favor not to allow city giving (because we would have to add some restrictive rules due to wonders). City giving may be substituted by Farmer giving (it don't bring any side effects).
Now I prefer to allow unit giving, but my final opinion depends on Kull's original reasons he had in mind when created the scenario. So I remind my question for Kull:

As a general rule, I think PBEM games should establish - BEFORE the game begins - whether they will prohibit certain features of the existing game engine or allow some of the special features provided by 3rd-party tools. That would clearly cover "city gifting", and that's one of the reasons I opposed it. Due to my extremely poor memory, I had forgotten that UNIT gifting is PART OF the basic game! Thus, by the the same logic that leads me to oppose the gifting of cities, I have to support that of units since we'd have had to ban it BEFORE the game began - and we did not.

Long story short, it looks like we're in complete agreement!

[Kull]

Re: Re: Unit and city giving

Originally posted by Kull
Long story short, it looks like we're in complete agreement!

However, I 'd like to talk a little more about the mechanics of unit gifting. In the basic game, gifted units are teleported into the capital city of the receiving civ, yes? So that should serve as the baseline. Any variation from that will need to be agreed upon beforehand.

For example, here's the kind of "exploit" I'd like to avoid: CivA has a war going badly on his southern front. He has plenty of troops on the north border, but it will take several turns to get them to the south to stem the invasion. CivA has a bright idea and gives all his northern armies to trusted ally CivB, who immediately teleports them and gives them all back - neatly positioned near the Southern border.

I've never used the 3rd party tool that controls unit gifting (and so this may not be possible), but I'd almost prefer a rule that says if you give a unit, it transfers ownership in the EXACT location it currently occupies (which would eliminate teleporting altogether)

[SlowThinker]

Originally posted by SlowThinker on page 22
Rules:
Description of allowed ways for implementing barters/gifts:
...
Units: online connection; Yaroslav is preparing unit exchange in new version of YaroTool; AI diplomacy is forbidden because units are teleported

A unit given by AI diplomacy (F3 key) is always moved from one city to another city. This forces teleporting - at least by 2 squares. So I think it should be forbidden.
So now only possible way is an online (MP) diplomacy. Yaroslav's utility will allow the unit giving in the next version only.

Another possible exploit are caravans, but the proposed rules count with the problem.