Is this a cheat?

[Basil]

I was building a secret project in the early game and another faction completed it before I could. There were no other secret projects I could build, so I continued work on the completed SP, and then when I researched the tech for another secret project I switched work to it and completed it very quickly.

Would people consider this cheating in MP? I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere, and it has nice properties for play balance (it helps spread the early SP's around), but the messages imply that you shouldn't be continuing to build it.

[Nigel]

The question came up a little while ago in the Civ2 forum about wonders. It was unanimously thought to be OK. Firaxis could have easily done more than leave a message to stop it from happening. Besides, you run the risk of taking too long to get the right tech and loosing a lot more minerals.

[Misotu]

Seconded. In MP, it is common to switch SPs. Personally, I often build SPs that have already almost been completed - in fact, I start to build them *knowing* I won't get them - in order to switch to a new project later. Or sometimes just to mislead people about what I'm after. The game clearly permits it, and I have never seen anyone object.

Although I just know there's a purist out there somewhere who's going to haul me over the coals for saying this ....

But in general, my personal point of view is that if the game allows it, it should be permissible except where it is obviously ridiculous. For example, the game allows you to break hab limits by adding colony pods to cities of max size. In my opinion, this is fine. However ... apparently, there's some bug involving mind worms and patrol points where the mind worm for no apparent reason suddenly becomes a demon boil. This is an obvious bug, and should not be used. Again in my opinion.

So on SPs, absolutely no problem. The game permits you to switch freely between SPs. So use it!

[MariOne]

I read just now that adding colonist allows you to exceed hab limits.
I never imagined to try it because it's clearly stated that the game shouldn't work that way.
Otherwise, you should try for every forbidden move, or for every mechanism that is explained to work a different way, knowing that Firaxis liberally sprinkled their code with every sort of bug.

In my opinion, adding colonists to exceed hab limits can't be seen as a smart trick, it just shows that Firaxis FORGOT to add a validity check when you perform that operation.

OK, worms morale upgrading has nothing to do with patrolling, while adding colonists to a base is a normal operation, which just happens to ignore the restraints which were supposed to limit that operation, so the seriousness of the two bugs seems different.

I could even accept to use the colonists bug in a game, but only if it's agreed IN ADVANCE between the players. If a player starts using it without asking to the other player or to the eventual referee whether that's acceptable in that particular pbem, I would protest for Bug Exploitment.

About keeping production on a Project, there's even a specific Dialog asking you whether you want to zoom to base to change orders OR PROCEED, thus the option is *explicit* part of the game design! I'm surprised that someone could think it as a cheat in the first place! (not considering that directly accumulating minerals in a project instead of building crawlers in the meanwhile is a POOR gaming choice 99% of the times)

[Misotu]

Hi MariOne

I'm not sure where it's clearly stated that the game shouldn't work that way? All I've ever seen is information relating to pop *growth* limits, which is a different thing. Pop growth is free - building a colony pod costs time and minerals. And then more time to get it to the target base. In terms of turn advantage, it's a pretty heavy penalty.

Where is it clearly stated that using pods to break hab limits is against the rules?

[Provost Harrison]

I think it is one of those things that is left down the discretion of the players. But the reason you could consider a lot of these a cheat it that they are loopholes the AI is not equipped to utilise; they cannot add colony pods to bases, and once an SP is completed, the abandon it wholesale...but as I said, it is an issue of discretion...

[MariOne]

Misotu, are you a lawyer?

It is stated that you NEED a Hab Complex to grow beyond size 7 (factional/project mods apart).
Or rather, that "a Hab Complex ALLOWS a base to grow beyond size 7".

Now if adding a pod to a base is NOT growth, you're right.
But you can't deny that adding a pod makes the base grow.
Unless you say that "grow" and "increase in size" are NOT synonyms!

So, is "GROWTH"
- the process of increasing a base in size thru the accumulation of nutrients in the tanks
or
- *anything* that causes a base to increase in size?

Observe that a base increases in size when you fill the tanks with nutrients, but also when it booms. Both of these mechanisms respect the Hab limits.

I'll accept semantic lessons in english, which is not my first language.
More, I used to read the Hab rule reported above as if without a Hab facility you're then not allowed to grow beyond the related Hab limits.
I admit that striclty applying logic, just stating that A allows B does not deny that "something else" allows B too...


It boils down to whehter you found an undocumented "exception" to a game mechanism, or a coding loophole where a check omission makes the game ignore one of its internal rules.
"Discretion" is ok for me, if that means that the players of a game agree in advance.

It's also true that it's possible to have big bases without Hab Complexes, if you lose the facility after the growth (scrap, sabotage, conquest...).

(NOTE: pop growth requires time too, unless you boom, and the collection of a sufficient number of the appropriate resources, i.e. nutrients.
If you privilege nutrient collection at the expense of mineral collection your base will grow more and produce less, if you do the opposite your base will grow less and produce more.
So, growth and production both require the appropriate time and resources.)

[mark13]

I think we're in danger of an encycolpaedia war here

Let us consider the realistic logistics of this. I know this is in no way meant to be a totally realistic game, but we haven't managed to solve it any other way....

Hab Complex, short for Habitation Complex, what, exactly, would it do? It would allow citizens to live comfortably with more citizens in a more confined space. Therefore, common logic would suggest that a base would need a Hab Complex to support any population above seven citizens, regardless of how they achieved that population....

Well, that's my view, anyway....

[stuntman19]

I'm in a MP where one of my bases boomed to size 8 because of a reported pop boom at the children's creche I built there earlier. I don't have a hab complex yet so in this case the game allows growth beyond the hab limits. I'm not sure if this is helpful information, but it does show the hab rule is not specific to all cases.

[Provost Harrison]

I don't care what you say, this issue is still nothing more than discretionary, but I would err on the side of caution to avoid being accused of cheating on this one...

------------------
Provost (Harrison):

CivII and SMAC forum moderator at www.civgaming.net

Go there godammit!

[MariOne]

I am open to change my position when presented with convincing arguments.
Stuntman's was a significant contribution which I overlooked.
As I did tho, I guess that other players might (initially) perceive it as a bug. So, its use in a pbem, albeit not a cheat, can be a "delicate" initiative, you oughta be ready for discussions .

PH, I won't accuse you of cheating, don't worry.
But, goddammit, I won't definitely go to a site moderated by someone who dismisses a discussion with "I don't care what you say..."!

BTW, IIRC someone else got banned, or threatened to, for making publicity here to other sites (was it JT?). What's that, double standards?

[Misotu]

Provost: I'm not interested in doing things in games that might be considered cheating. I'm happy to follow the rules. But this is not what the thread is about.

MariOne: No, I'm not a lawyer. I'm making a fair distinction between natural population growth, and artificially forcing additional pop to reside in the base. The point is that when you add a pod, the base will grow by 1. But it won't continue to grow. Any further growth can only be achieved by building another pod, transporting it to the base in question and adding it again. All of which has quite a cost in terms of minerals and turn advantage ...

So IMHO it's not a cheat - it's another example of just how rich and varied this game is. Like I said, in all this time (I bought SMAC on the day it was released) I've used it *once* (!!!). It's really not that powerful, to be honest, except perhaps in SP. But you don't need a tactic like this to beat the AI - just using supply crawlers/orbital improvements properly will be enough.

Stuntman: I too have often had the game itself cause my population to break the hab limits due to the random event pop boom, and I think your point is a good one (especially since it supports my case )

This has occurred in bases at max size without a hab dome, as well as a complex.

So ... it's clearly not the case that hab limits define max population in a base, then. In that case, what possible objection to this tactic can there be? This is a very rich game, with hundreds of options available to a player at every turn. Why do people want fewer options, rather than more?

[MariOne]

Ok, OK, I was convinced already before this last post of you.

About its non-effectiveness, I'm just using my imagination (as I never tested it) but well, if you get to size 14, you still have a long way before STS, and you still have an unexploited mixed-resource tile inside your basezone, investing 3 mineral rows to obtain one more worker should bring better returns than building a crawler (except that you can cash back the crawler).
And even if you wisely packed your bases so that there are no worthy tiles left to put a citizen at work on it, 1 more citizen can be employed as specialist Engineer, giving you +3ec & +2labs per turn from then on.

True, I guess that we can think of many more useful items or higher priorities.
But for those who build a lot of crawlers, maybe running out of decent tiles to put them on, this seems not a bad alternative to them.

[stuntman19]

I think Provost H missed his meds again.

[Misotu]

Stuntman:

MariOne: Sorry, our posts crossed so I didn't see what you wrote earlier.

Just to emphasise the point about limited effectiveness, here's the deal:

In SP, it's a ridiculous thing to do. The AI already has a handicap for goodness sake, why would you be so short-term desperate?

In MP however ... well. If you have a seriously hard-fought game, you might consider it. But only under certain circumstances, IMO. Here's why:

I used this tactic for the only time in an MP game on the tourny map. SMAX tourny map, where your territory is restricted to a tiny island. The Aliens occupy the polar continents, your possibilities for expansion are *extremely* limited. I had the Supercollider and the ToE in a single base. By adding a pop to this base, I generated something like 20 extra RP. BUT, to do this I had to:

a) Build a colony pod in another base (3 turns)
b) Get it to my science base (3 minerals @ 1/turn)
c) Build a supply crawler to get the food to support the extra pop in order to turn it into a thinker (4 turns, 27 minerals)

And after that, all it will ever produce, per turn, is 20 RP. Unless I get a chance to build more science improvements in that base, which I think I won't.

Now, under almost any other circumstance, that colony pod would produce more RPs *long-term* if I found another colony. Not to mention the additional benefits in terms of a) support for units b) energy income c) strategic military/territory benefits.

So you see, it's still a trade. I judged it to be beneficial under these, very particular, circumstances. I have never seen another situation where I thought it would be beneficial.

Because of this, I think that I would beat anyone in MP who actually pursued this as a serious strategy when space was not at a premium. While they are spending all those turns and minerals building a super-science city, I am simply founding bases and building military units to rase their splendid city to rubble Plus I'm generating more research from each pod after a while, plus an energy contribution, plus the extra votes in an election.

Nah. It's not a killer strategy. It's a diversion, and people pay too much attention to it. It's a very specialised approach for very specialised circumstances.

And that, I think, is why it's permitted in the informal Apolyton tournament. BTW MariOne, are you playing in the tourny?