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  • #1

    Monoliths Vanishing

    this just came up recently: "the monolith has upgraded our unit to XXX status. then it vanished."

    i had seen it once before and i thought it was just a fluke because it had only come up once before in so many games. it seems though that maybe a monolith can only upgrade so many units and then it says "alright that's it! i'm vanishing!" .

    so does anyone know exactly how many units (or whatever it takes) until a monolith vanishes? basically i have a whole whack of units upgrading before entering into a war, i could maybe alternate monoliths so i could still get an upgrade and keep the old monolith from vanishing for the 2-2-2 FOP i get from it.

    and i also find the whole concept of a building just "vanishing" ridiculous...
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  • #2
    I don't know how many but I have seen this feature before and it is a LOT of upgrades before it happens. As for the loss of the 2-2-2, I think by the time this occurs I am just as happy to have it disappear and allow a crawled condensor or mine or worked borehole
    You don't get to 300 losses without being a pretty exceptional goaltender.-- Ben Kenobi speaking of Roberto Luongo

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    • #3
      While it generally seems to be a long time into the game before any Monoliths vanish (and I use them religiously, although perhaps not as much as a restlessly pacing AI might visit them), sadly, I have seen some (rarely) vanish disappointingly early in the game. So I think that it might be a (low) probability thing, likely weighted also by the MY (more likely to vanish as time goes on), but perhaps with some triggering event/tech/year introducing a noticable change in odds as it does seem that quite often several will go in the same or adjacent turns or close to it.

      Assuming that the data is maintained in a simplistic style (i.e. fixed number of bytes per map location), the allocation of a byte or two (for every tile) just for monolith visit counters seems too unlikely-wasteful to support the necessary data to operate a usage based phase out system. The data could be stored less space-wastefully than that, but from hints left by various firaxis people, I've gotten the impression that much of the data is stored in a big table fixed format, so many bytes per cell style rather than a more database like method of numerous smaller specialized tables.

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      • #4
        IIRC, every time you upgrade a unit at a monolith it has a 1 in 32 chance of vanishing. I've only seen it happen once or twice myself.
        "Love the earth and sun and animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown . . . reexamine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency" - Walt Whitman

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        • #5
          ah, 1 in 32. that would explain why one might vanish after only 2 or 3 units in 1 turn, and not after 12 r-laser rovers in a row.

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          • #6
            in my 2 (ever) games of SMAC, I have lost 2 monoliths (1 per game). first one late in the game and the second early in the game. so me thinks its propability.
            My Words Are Backed With Bad Attitude And VETERAN KNIGHTS!

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            • #7
              This has never happend to me in my games. But thats easily explained by the 1 in 32 chance.

              Edited to make more sense.
              Eventis is the only refuge of the spammer. Join us now.
              Long live teh paranoia smiley!

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              • #8
                Happens quit often to me...wounder why, I think I lost three or four in my last game.
                What do I care about your suffering? Pain, even agony, is no more than information before the senses, data fed to the computer of the mind. The lesson is simple: you have received the information, now act on it. Take control of the input and you shall become master of the output.

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                • #9
                  Originally posted by waab
                  Happens quit often to me...wounder why, I think I lost three or four in my last game.
                  Really? Well, I suppose that your lucky enough to be the 1 in 32.
                  Eventis is the only refuge of the spammer. Join us now.
                  Long live teh paranoia smiley!

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                  • #10
                    Happens every once and awhile.... always towards the end of game and almost always a monolith prviously controlled by AI (as mentioned, they visit those monoliths OFTEN).
                    It's close to midnight and something evil's is lurking in the dark.

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                    • #11
                      Oh yeah. The AI uses monoliths as often as it can - actually one of its few decent strategies. If AI Dee finds a monolith early on, it can practically eliminate her morale penalty throughout the early game.
                      "Love the earth and sun and animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown . . . reexamine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency" - Walt Whitman

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                      • #12
                        Yang utilizes this tactic fairly well as the AI, as well. He can be potentially hazardous when rolling up on a monolith near one of your cities with a hoard of impact rovers.

                        Dave
                        "Perhaps a new spirit is rising among us. If it is, let us trace its movements and pray that our own inner being may be sensitive to its guidance, for we are deeply in need of a new way beyond the darkness that seems so close around us." --MLK Jr.

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                        • #13
                          I've had a fair number of monoliths vanish.
                          I strongly suspect it's only the 'popped' monoliths that can vanish, can anyone deny this? Prehaps with a ruins where one or more monolith has vanished.

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                          • #14
                            I deny that, Blake.

                            Ruins monoliths frequently vanish. This is particularly true when the AI puts a base in the center of them and them proceeds to run a couple of hundred units through the monoliths. It's not at all uncommon to see the ruins reduced to three or four monoliths in the late game, if AI has had them the entire game.

                            Of course, you have to let them hang around that long to get to see it happen.

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                            • #15
                              heh, okay. Then that opens some interesting possibilities... monoliths oft get in the way of my boreholes, so by throwing hundreds of units at the offending monolith it would hopefully vanish and let me drill the borehole

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