What is the status of the game??

[Jamski]

I agree with you too. The bitterness has only to do with the people involved, nothing to do with the format of the game.

I AM against permapacting though. How many times did I try and end the Hive-Drone pact, only to be told "We have promised that blah blah blah..." ?

See, in a democracy game if everything is decided at the start, and then made permanant, there's no interest anymore. I think the next demogame should have a "basic constitution" for all the teams, who are then free to add more, but not to take away from some basic rights.

-Jam

[Trithemius]

Originally posted by Jamski
I agree with you too. The bitterness has only to do with the people involved, nothing to do with the format of the game.

Another one! Yay!

I AM against permapacting though. How many times did I try and end the Hive-Drone pact, only to be told "We have promised that blah blah blah..." ?

I'm not against long-term alliances (they are a feature of politics after all - Britain and the USA have been "permapacted" for most of the 20th century). When the considerations of victory overcome in-game politics though, I think that I agree with you. Ideally people should not be playing "to win" but rather to "sustain". Victory, in a total and longterm way, is not really a part of a political environment; there is always a tomorrow, and a next day, and a next day.

See, in a democracy game if everything is decided at the start, and then made permanant, there's no interest anymore. I think the next demogame should have a "basic constitution" for all the teams, who are then free to add more, but not to take away from some basic rights.

Maybe smaller teams with more precisely defined "positions" (and a group of voting* but "untitled" members who enjoy the roleplay or covet a position of their own?) would be better? That might promote intra-faction politics as was an inter-faction politics (e.g. maybe the "military minister" wants war, but the "science minister" and "foreign minister" won't let it happen?). I know that some teams did do this type of thing, but making it more universal and a little more concrete might be interesting.

* Voting does not neccessarily mean literally having an electoral poll. It could represent status or bargaining of cliques or lobbying in citizen's assemblies or -anything-; I find the idea of the Hive (for example) having an election to be a bit weird. )

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Trithemius
From what I understand (I am new to this particular game) there was a lot of disenchantment with the Consciousness after some kind of exploitation of the pre-acception mechanic. This probably explains, in some way, reticence about dealing with the Consciousness.

That accepting of Doc:Ini took place after previous deals had already soured CyCon attitude towards PEACE. So personally I'd be more interested to know what was the PEACE attitude towards CyCon before MY 2141. Did you honestly believe the deals you proposed were very and equally beneficial for both parties, or did you think, like CyCon, that you gained more out of your deal proposals than us?

Originally posted by Impaler[WrG]
Ofcorse they prevented that by being total Dictators over their Factions.

Let's keep such inflammatory roleplay terms out of this thread.

Originally posted by jtsisyoda
"Total dictators?" I'm getting tired of this attitude. It implies the other team members are mice. It's an attitude that can't be based on facts, unless obtained unethically (assuming such facts even existed).

Regarding having facts that the Drones would have been dictatorially led, I want to stress that before we took an action that might be considered unethical (such as accepting Doc:Ini etc), we always asked the Gods if it was allowed.

[Trithemius]

Originally posted by Maniac
That accepting of Doc:Ini took place after previous deals had already soured CyCon attitude towards PEACE. So personally I'd be more interested to know what was the PEACE attitude towards CyCon before MY 2141. Did you honestly believe the deals you proposed were very and equally beneficial for both parties, or did you think, like CyCon, that you gained more out of your deal proposals than us?

That was long long long before I became involved in this game. I expect that trying to extract more from a deal is a fairly normal reaction when you have a highly desired commodity and that plundering people (even if only through pricey trade) is a rather "piratical" thing to do. If your team did not like the deal (which seems to be the case) then they did not have to take it. I don't think this is really similar to taking advantage of pre-accepted deals; although I do see how that is acting "in character" for unethical semi-machines - it just has ramifications with respect to relations with the other faction. Personally though, despite any "in character" considerations, I don't think I would establish the precedent of making use of the pre-acception system for advantage - I tend to think about diplomacy a lot and goodwill is so easy to loose and so hard to get back. To paraphrase Machiavelli (I love this guy!) "Do no small ills; only large ones".

I'm flailing towards being off-topic now, what is this thread for again?

[GeneralTacticus]

Of course, the main reason he advises that is that you're supposed to do such a large ill that there will be no-one left to take revenge for it afterwards...

[Trithemius]

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus
Of course, the main reason he advises that is that you're supposed to do such a large ill that there will be no-one left to take revenge for it afterwards...

Precisely. If you are going to hurt someone, then crush them utterly. In the meantime, be friendly and don't rock the boat.

(I do have some familiarity with the fellow, I'm not just reading from a list of quotes here )

[Jamski]

How about making the AI factions so tough in the next game that the human teams HAVE to work together to make it even. That would be fun.

-Jam

[Trithemius]

Originally posted by Jamski
How about making the AI factions so tough in the next game that the human teams HAVE to work together to make it even. That would be fun.

Probably, it would likely shift all confrontation into the political realm for a while. I'm not entirely sure that it would be a good thing to remove conflict between human players entirely though. Military force is an important part of diplomacy (Clausewitz now, I really am justifying my education tonight! ).

[DeathByTheSword]

hmz if we are going to quote stuff hang on a second...first off...i hold no grudge to anyone in this game.

the drones and the hive played the game the best and will win. the drones by giving to information to wel atleast my faction we did not know anything of them. i find that this tactic worked very well for them.

the earthquake made for extreme changes in way the hive and the drones looked at each other.

I do think (my personel opinion) that the drones was the less demogame like faction.

and about next demogame i like the idea of multi factions.

and now to give a quote to the clausewitz quote:

The art of war is of VITAL importance to the state. It is a matter of life and death, a road either to safety or to ruin.
-sun Tzu-

[GeoModder]

Originally posted by Trithemius
Precisely. If you are going to hurt someone, then crush them utterly. In the meantime, be friendly and don't rock the boat.

(I do have some familiarity with the fellow, I'm not just reading from a list of quotes here )

Well, not much is left of PEACE ATM, I think you should appreciate then how willingly we followed the fellow's advice...

[Flubber]

Originally posted by Maniac


That accepting of Doc:Ini took place after previous deals had already soured CyCon attitude towards PEACE. So personally I'd be more interested to know what was the PEACE attitude towards CyCon before MY 2141. Did you honestly believe the deals you proposed were very and equally beneficial for both parties, or did you think, like CyCon, that you gained more out of your deal proposals than us?

You have to understand that I missed a lot of the bad blood between CYCON and PEACE as I was away during the infamous trades that got both factions to ind auto. I head about bad blood but all I knew when I came back was that there was a deal and that Cycon owed PEACE a tech. I thought PEACE being willing to accept future considerations showed a good deal of good will on our part ( this consideration was , after all, never paid).

However my feeling was that the Cycon was being a difficult ally. BUT my view was that the Hive-Drone threat was OBVIOUS and that we had to try to work together. However the CYCON never responded positively to queries about permapacting so gifting techs outright was not in the cards.

I don't think that PEACE did better out of the deals . .. The result of the deals if CYCON had honoured them was that PEACE would have been owed techs from having provided techs for future consideration. CYCON had already shown themselves to be untrustworthy, by researching things that PEACE already had , instead of a tech to return a tech owed, and I personally totally disbelieved explanations that this was an "error".

BUT, my thoughts were that if CYCON and PEACE did not work together, they would have no chance against the Hive-Drones alliance. So despite certain misgivings, PEACE was once again willing to send a tech for nothing (future considerations) in the hopes of good relations . .. I really saw no other option -- To me it was a lot like the Soviets and US teaming up in WWII . . they might not REALLY get along but they had no choice against a common threat. My view was that PEACE-CYCON-UNI had to try to work together since anything else would doom all three to defeat.

So prior to the backstab, I didn't trust you folks but figured that there was no way that anyone in the southern 3 would ever backstab any of the others since cooperation was so obviously needed.

If that backstab had not happened, the Hive-Drone alliance would be facing 3 empires with more tech and units than the two empires they now face . .. It probably would not be enough but it would absolutely have been stronger than the opposition they now face. The cycon backstab and war caused PEACE to trade several techs to HIVE-Drones IIRC allowing them to easily fill in any gaps in their tech tree and move to MMI more quickly and easily. Again an obvious result . . . an attacked party helpd out those that do not attack them.

AS for a permapact with the Hive, the CYCON must have been dreaming. The speed at which the Hive-Drone alliance went up the tech tree suggested complete cooperation and quite frankly they didn't need anyone else. As Maniac points out, the CYCON were behind in most categories and really none of the southern 3 could offer much to the Hive-Drones.

So my assessment is that the Cycon backstab was the turning point of the game and made Hive-Drone victory inevitable. Interestingly, while it made the Cycon stronger for a time, it pretty much killed all their chances to participate in any sort of win.

[Nubclear]

Originally posted by Jamski
I agree with you too. The bitterness has only to do with the people involved, nothing to do with the format of the game.

Which is more likely to cause bitterness:
5 teams playing against each other or
1 team cooperating with each other against the AI.

Hmm....

[GeoModder]

Originally posted by Comrade Tassadar
Which is more likely to cause bitterness:
5 teams playing against each other or
1 team cooperating with each other against the AI.

Hmm....

Infactional politics can be a cause as well, it's not said that 1 team will succeed in showing a homogenuous front against those AI's

[Jamski]

Would it be possible to disable both tech trading and pacts in the scenario editor? Then human factions could, at best, make a treaty for the commerce, but would not be able to share bases or technologies. It would make the game a lot less prone to "bullying" by which I mean the rich getting together to rob the poor.

-Jam

[Chaunk]

Whether or not playing as one team against the ai will actually mean less friction is surely a moot point. Most people prefer playing against another person. They think better, play better, and are much more interesting to interact with. Point in case the PEACE CyCon “back stab”. I personally was entirely against the move, hence I left the CyCon, (possibly actually saying to much to PEACE in the process. If so, then I apologise to the CyCon! It's not like it actually helped PEACE at all ). But it was certainly more interesting than attempting to get a tech out of an ai player!

I tend to agree with Flubber though. In a PBEM like this, an early war (i.e pre MMI), unless completely effective, swift and brutal does nothing to help either player. It might help one to get a few more bases, but the opportunity cost of such a move is shocking!Instead of building a 4-1-4 build a crawler, and soon you'll be able to build more crawlers, and hence be better able to win a quick decisive war, like it sounds like the drones and the hive have.

FWIW, I too was for a PEACE/CyCon perma pact*. The problem was that most of CyCon weren't

*I was actually against a pact at all unless we were gonna stand by it for the duration. I like to play like I am in RL, my word is my bond. If I lose a game or two because of that, then so be it.

But then, it's mostly water under the bridge now. Lets get cracking on the next one