March Madness!

[Jon Shafer]

Monarch works for me.

[sabrewolf]

monarch or emperor, just not below monarch... and not sid

[Jon Shafer]

In MP games the only things the difficulty level does is make people unhappy faster, increase corruption and the chances of getting barbs from huts. So for the most part, Sid = Emperor except for a bit more corruption and a bit antsier barbs.

[sabrewolf]

ah yes, we're playing without AI... my bad!

[marcuspeddle]

monarch please

[Paddy]

crank it up - Sid

[alexman]

IMHO Sid throws the game out of balance because it has crazy corruption on tiny maps, it takes forever to research anything, and huts are nasty to all but expansionists. There is no reason to eliminate options by playing Sid, since there is no AI. I vote for Emperor (the easiest level with one citizen born content).

Originally posted by Rommel2D
So: better to disallow city exchange entirely or only during peace?

Allow it only as part of a peace treaty to end an ongoing war. Since we don't allow cooperation between enemies at war, there should not be a problem with that.

By the way, do you need any help with compiling the list of rules, based on the discussion here, or are we all set?

[Rommel2D]

Originally posted by alexman
By the way, do you need any help with compiling the list of rules, based on the discussion here, or are we all set?

I should have the list compiled and posted sometime on Wednesday, with the games soon to follow...

[Moonbars]

Originally posted by Rommel2D
Does Monarch level for the first round sound good?

Monarch or Emp for me..

[Rommel2D]

I'd like to go with monarch for the first round, emperor for the championship. Monarch should make things develop a little faster.

Have all the PtW mechanical expliots been taken care of? I recall the whip-switch-whip, the infinite production bug and the mobilization bug off the top of my head (not sure if that last one was actullay an exploit).

[Rommel2D]

3.1 Fortifying a ship without any movement points left to obtain extra vision radius
A ship that fortifies sees an extra 1 tile in all directions at the beginning of the next turn. This can be accomplished by waking up the passengers of a ship (if there are any), and giving the Fortify All order.

Dom mentioned that the Fortify All exploit mentioned by Donegeal has been fixed- wouldn't that mean this exploit is no longer possible?

[alexman]

Originally posted by Rommel2D
Have all the PtW mechanical expliots been taken care of? I recall the whip-switch-whip, the infinite production bug and the mobilization bug off the top of my head (not sure if that last one was actullay an exploit).

Not sure what you mean by whip-switch-whip, but if it means rushing a cheap unit starting from an empty production box at double cost, and then rushing what you really want to build at normal cost, it's still there. However, it's not serious enough to be listed as an exploit IMHO. It's more like a quirk in the game mechanics.

The other two bugs associated with mobilization are fixed.

As for the fortify-all, if Dominae says it was fixed, I believe him, so yes, the exploit is no longer relevant.

[Rommel2D]

Exploits and Ettiquette

Here is a rough draft summarizing what has been worked out in discussion here. I changed the organization of exploits somewhat- let me know if it makes any sense this way, or if I missed anything.

Regular and bold words give the basic exploit information and rules to prevent them. Red, underlined words are the specific exploits covered. Royalblue, italicized words are etiquette points mostly, meant to add to the game if agreed to, but not necessary to avoid the most damaging exploits.



Preamble
It is understood that everyone participating is doing so to enhance their enjoyment of the game and share this enjoyment with others. These rules are not designed to prohibit someone who does not play with the spirit of sportsmanship from gaining undue advantage, only the vigilance of the community can hope to accomplish this. The aim of these rules are to present a common ground from which a fair challnge is presented to all, subject to the intended random elements of the game.

Reloading a turn to correct manual errors is Ok, as long as no unexplored or fog-of-war tiles are revealed and no combat has taken place. Any instance of reloading should be reported in the tracker thread.


Definitions
game turn= sequence begun when first player in order starts turn and ended when last player clicks 'save & exit'

production phase= part of the individual's turn immediately after loading, lasting until player is free to select and move units


1 Intertribal cooperation

1-1 Players shall not conspire to use irregularities of the game engine's turn sequence to gain extra use from units or resources. They shall not declare frivilous wars. Deals shall not be canceled on the same game turn as they are made unless due to a legitimate war. Resources intentionally removed from a trade network cannot be reconnected to that network on the same game turn.

1-1.1 Getting double-duty out of artillery and Workers
1-1.2 Sharing a Luxury or Strategic resource
1-1.3 Generating Leaders and Golden Ages by sacrificing cheap units
1-1.4 Declaring war for happiness
1-1.5 Accepting a Peace Treaty from a civ then immediately declaring war


1-2 Players shall not exchange graphic map information before Naivgation.
a) They shall not refer to specific distances or directions before Map Making.

1-2.1 Exchanging map/minimap information before Navigation.


1-3 Players shall not exchange in-game information until they are represented on each other's diplomacy screen.
a)They shall not make cooperative research, development, or combat plans until an embassy is established between them and an alliance formally declared.
b)They shall not make Mutual Protection Pacts or Trade Embargoes unless an embassy is in place and they have knowledge of Nationalism.


2. Intertribal conflicts

2-1 Players shall not rename units or cities to disguise the content of unit stacks or diplomatic offers.


2-2 Cities may only be offered diplomatically only as part of a peace treaty.

2-2.1 Teleporting units by abandoning or gifting cities


3. The individual turn

3-1 Players shall dismiss all pop-ups at the beginning of their turn until the production phase is complete.

3-1.1 Hitting F1 to change production
3-1.2 Using city screen's arrow keys to change production


3-2 Last player in turn sequence shall not use the GoTo command's double movement to gain strategic advantage over an opponent.

3-2.1 Using GoTo to get extra movement


4. Optional

4-1 Naval chains are allowed unless players agree otherwise in advance.

4-1.1 Chaining naval transports to quickly move land units across water

4-2 If players agree to it in advance, the offensive player in a battle must send a combat report listing the resulting details to the defender.

[Rommel2D]

Originally posted by alexman
Not sure what you mean by whip-switch-whip, but if it means rushing a cheap unit starting from an empty production box at double cost, and then rushing what you really want to build at normal cost, it's still there. However, it's not serious enough to be listed as an exploit IMHO. It's more like a quirk in the game mechanics.

I think the exploit part is that you are (or at least were at one point) not able to use more than half your population to rush anything. By doing it in increments, you can bypass this without paying any kind of increased cost...

[alexman]

Great job on the Exploits and Ettiquette!


(except maybe the choice of colors )