Next AU course

[nbarclay]

We've already done an "always war" course in AU 208, titled "Total Eternal Forever War." It was an interesting thing to do once, but I personally have no desire to do it again.

[Harovan]

Originally posted by punkbass2000
Sir Ralph's Always War suggestion sounds interesting. It is a very common and difficult variant, and I'd recommend everyone play a level down.

Argh, don't associate this with my name please. I have played such a game (although not completely through), I absolutely hated it and will never do it again.

[punkbass2000]

Too late!

Sir 'Always War Curmudgeon' Ralph

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
Yes I do.

It would nice, then, if you were to propose them upfront.

I haven't played any serious civ for almost a year now and think, that I could fire up an epic game for a change.

My general impression is that this you are the exception; most people that are still frequenting these forums would shudder at the thought of starting up another random epic game.

We want to cater to both the casual/newer players and the serious/veteran ones. Neither player wants too many restrictions, but the latter wants at least some else the scenario is boring. The casual/newer player would probably enjoy a scenario without any restrictions whatsoever, but he/she could just play a random epic game on his own instead (and post it in the Strategy forum if he/she is interested in comparison). The Apolyton University should provide at least something over and above just another random epic game.

This leads me to the question, will people play your proposals?

I'm not sure, that's what this thread is for. Some of them may be too involve too many restrictions for the majority's tastes. That's fine. But at least I'm working with proposals, and ones that fit the goals of AU.

PBEM has been popular for the past one and a half years, it's just that most of you noticed it only now.

The PBEM forum has been at its top usage in the past few months, both absolutely and relative to the other Civ3 forums. PBEM is certainly a lot more popular right now than it was 1.5 years ago.

Banana island was never meant to be an AU course or even a minitourney, it wasn't me who promoted it in these ranks. It served 2 purposes. First and foremost it was a joke, obviously. And second, it was a test, how seven independent AI civs would do under exactly the same circumstances. Spoken in university terms, it was a bit of research.

I was defending Banana Island as a fine example of a non-restrictive course theme. Let's think of some others!

Finally worth to mention: We are talking about a game, people. And the sole purpose of a game is to provide fun. If you make a science out of it, fine. Although streamlined, it still is complex enough to give this opportunity, and it gives plenty of space to learn and improve the own skills. But you never, ever should forget about the fun aspect.

AU is based on the idea that learning about Civ3 is fun. That's why I'm pushing so hard for the scholastic component of each course. The fact that I come up with ideas that involve harsh restrictions reflects my own personal bias. But to remove the educational aspect of AU entirely and just make "fun" courses would be, although fun, not AU. Maybe I'm too hung up on the goal and purpose of AU.

[nbarclay]

I have no idea how many people might be interested in this idea, but I'll go ahead and share it anyhow. Fairly early in the C3C era (albeit after at least the first beta patch had come out), I decided to try for the "ultimate wonder game," searching for a truly fantastic starting position and trying to build as many wonders as I possibly could on Emperor. With the help of a couple lucky early SGLs, I think I got all but about two wonders up to the point where I stopped playing (and I would easily have gotten the rest had I finished the game). I'd check more precisely what the situation was when I left off, but the game was under a beta patch and won't load under 1.22, and I haven't kept a copy of C3C at an earlier patch level around.

In order to make that kind of game work, I loaded the dice big time. I played the Mayas (Agricultural and Industrious) and restarted numerous times until I found a starting position with something along the lines of two cattle in the capital’s radius and a couple more accessible to other first-ring cities built on rivers, and also a good number of grasslands with shield in that core area. Further, I played a huge map with only eight civs on the theory that that would cause the AIs to spend more time REXing before they started putting much focus on wonders and that such a map would maximize human REXing advantages. (If we’d play an AU game on a similar theme, we’d probably drop the map size down to large.) And there were no barbarians, partly so I could REX unmolested without building military units and partly so the AIs couldn't gain techs from huts.

Clearly, such a game is interesting only from an Ultimate Power perspective, not as a challenge where AIs might have a realistic chance of winning. That’s the main reason I’m not sure how many people it would appeal to. But I thought I’d mention the idea in case other people might be interested in such a game as an AU course.

[nbarclay]

To me, any comparison game is inherently more than just another epic game. Just firing up an epic game on one's own, there isn't much to go by in judging how well or poorly you're doing. But in a comparison game, there's more of a frame of reference to judge against. Players can gain satisfaction from doing well relative to other players, or from getting better relative to the best players as they learn more. And players can learn from watching others who did better than they did, or who used strategies that they didn't think of but might find useful sometime in the future.

That also means that comparison games have inherent learning value even without specially rigged rules. I think it's great for AU courses to have a theme, but that theme can be nothing more than making good use of a particular civ and UU (as in the case of Gallic Glory) or playing a map that offers a bit of extra challenge (as in the case of Son of SVC).

When playing with a particular limitation on what players are allowed to do has clear and significant learning value, that's fine in my view. But I absolutely hate the idea of games where my options are limited essentially arbitrarily just for the sake of limiting them. In my view, there needs to be a clear learning goal associated with any special restrictions, and there needs to be a clear and significant tie between the restrictions and the learning goal.

"The Glory of Culture," "Total, Eternal, Forever War," and "The Power of Communsim" are good examples of courses where the ties between restrictions and learning objectives were relatively strong. In the case of "The Glory of Culture," requiring cultural victory helped ensure that players would learn how to pursue cultural victory. "Total, Eternal, Forever War" taught some useful lessons about fighting and about the value of being able to trade with AIs (since once we declared war, trading was permanently cut off). In "The Power of Communism," the requirement to fight offensively only in a communist government was central in pushing players into using a government that many of us would not have chosen if we'd had a choice, thereby causing us to learn a little more about it. (For those who don't know, that game was played back in PtW where Communism was a relatively weak government.)

In contrast, "No Gold For You" included a restriction that seemed so arbitrary to me, with so little incremental learning value, that it tipped the balance causing me not to play that course: the addition of GA-triggering flags to additional wonders so that avoiding triggering a GA with wonders would be even more difficult than normal. The idea of a "no Golden Age" course wasn't something I was exactly enthusiastic about to begin with, especially playing a civ with a cavalry-era UU (meaning that avoiding triggering a GA would require not building a cavalry-type unit). But it was the arbitrary addition of extra GA-triggering flags that really turned me off.

The point I'm trying to make is that while some players might like special restrictions just for variety, there are those of us - I'm not sure how many - that don't like having our options limited unless there is clear and significant learning value involved. From our perspective (or from mine, at any rate), special restrictions introduced just to make AU games different from other games do more harm than good.

Nathan

[Dominae]

I like the ecclectic mix of courses that have been offered at AU. Yes, some of them were more "harsh" than others and appealed to a specific audience. On the other hand, some of them were not harsh enough (if that's an adequate description) and again did not appeal to everyone. On the whole, it's not clear to me that there's a general preference one way or the other.

I'm thinking of, for example, the Ultimate Power, huge map (both varieties) and Power of Randomness (the fact that you, Nathan, prefer the latter while I prefer the former is indicative of the source of our disagreement here). To me these games were the epitome of boring (thematically-speaking), but they seemed to receive a lot of support at the time and at least involved some educational content, so I did not oppose them too strongly.

It's perfectly all right for some players not to like some courses, and "sit them out" so to speak. There's no "harm" in AU offering a course you do not like. Every time a thread like this starts up we try to pick the suggestion that receives the most support, but this often unfortunately displeases some people.

If you do not like a proposal, either because it is too "harsh" or not harsh enough, just say so. But I do not see the point in arguing the relative merits of either form because it ultimately amounts to a matter of preference. There is educational value in either form and I think that is what we should be focusing on.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by nbarclay
In contrast, "No Gold For You" included a restriction that seemed so arbitrary to me, with so little incremental learning value, that it tipped the balance causing me not to play that course: the addition of GA-triggering flags to additional wonders so that avoiding triggering a GA with wonders would be even more difficult than normal. The idea of a "no Golden Age" course wasn't something I was exactly enthusiastic about to begin with, especially playing a civ with a cavalry-era UU (meaning that avoiding triggering a GA would require not building a cavalry-type unit). But it was the arbitrary addition of extra GA-triggering flags that really turned me off.

The point of that course was to make players aware of the intricacies of Golden Age triggering. That's a pretty specific topic that required a rather elaborate set of restrictions. The fact that you were very knowledgeable on the topic before playing the course is probably the reason you did not see the point in going through the exercise.

In retrospect, the course was harsher than I meant it to be, both in terms of the civ selected (no Cavalry is apparently rough on people) and the difficulty of the map. I added these difficulties because I felt the course would be too broad otherwise. But I can definitely see how it turned a lot of players off. A lesson learned.

[Rommel2D]

Originally posted by Dominae
The PBEM forum has been at its top usage in the past few months, both absolutely and relative to the other Civ3 forums. PBEM is certainly a lot more popular right now than it was 1.5 years ago.

Although it has been definitely growing, I don't think player numbers are really spiking that much. I only notice a few new players a month, and I see steady, established players fade away every now and then. I think the jump in PBEM traffic is due more to Paddy and Beta going from double to triple digits in their # of games recently. Isn't the measure of popularity how many people there are, not how often they post?

Getting back to the earlier proposal of AU PBEM and concerns about the inevitable drive to eliminate opponents, I have a thought. In my only PBEM I've played to completion so far my 'solid' empire fell to foreign conquest because I badly misjudged the relative military might of my opponents. While I could have improved some with closer attention to the F3 and F8 screens, would it be possible to improve the information channels by moving espionage back to the ancient age? I ask in complete ignorance as I've never even researched espionage in CivIII SP.

With or without such a change would it be an appropriate area of study to do an AU PBEM with the intent to closely monitor your opponents' strength and maintain proper defenses? Ideally, we should be able to achieve Nathan's PBEM goals without resorting to extraneous out-of-game rule fabrication (sorry con ;-). As a side benefit, a 4 player, 500 turn PBEM game should last until CivIV is released when the AU will have fresh subject matter to delve into.

[Harovan]

Originally posted by Dominae
It would nice, then, if you were to propose them upfront.

I did so even before you posted.

My general impression is that this you are the exception; most people that are still frequenting these forums would shudder at the thought of starting up another random epic game.

The difference is probably, that I haven't played at all for quite long. But it is purely theoretical anyway, there are other games that keep me busy. And EQ2 is to be released in a few days, too.

The PBEM forum has been at its top usage in the past few months, both absolutely and relative to the other Civ3 forums. PBEM is certainly a lot more popular right now than it was 1.5 years ago.

What Rommel2D said. Few dedicated players come, few others like GhengisFarb or myself are practically gone. Just the average number of games of PBEM fundamentalists like Beta and Paddy are growing.

AU is based on the idea that learning about Civ3 is fun. That's why I'm pushing so hard for the scholastic component of each course. The fact that I come up with ideas that involve harsh restrictions reflects my own personal bias. But to remove the educational aspect of AU entirely and just make "fun" courses would be, although fun, not AU. Maybe I'm too hung up on the goal and purpose of AU.

I'm not talking about dropping the scholastic aspect. Just preaching not to forget the fun whilst inflicting restrictions. But this is perhaps my personal bias. I prefer fun over difficulty. I have enough difficulties at work. When I am playing games, I want fun. If a game is difficult in addition of being fun, it's awesome. However I will never play a game, that is difficult, but unfun.

[Dominae]

Show me the proposal!

The need of time for SP and PBEMs is different. For a SP game you need several hours of contiguous time in one piece; if you have less time, it gets hopeless hackly. However, if you have 10 or 15 minutes of time per day, it suffices for a PBEM by all means. So if you have just a little time, but on a regular basis, play PBEM.

(Not this.)

Nathans proposals (I won't quote all of it again) sound promising indeed and as a whole matches my feelings about a fun game. However I doubt that it will work, simply because it is very hard to introduce a ruleset to enforce it. Games like this are generally called games of diplomacy. The Civ2 community plays them as online MP games and there has been an attempt to launch a Civ3 one in the Civ3-MP forum, which however, unfortunately didn't fly. The Civ2 community does have a diplomacy ruleset, perhaps you ask them for help. It has grown for years and should be near perfect. You should contact OzzyKP, he's the master diplomacy gamer.

I will watch your effort with interest.

(Maybe this is it?)

Yes it is hard, because the goals are not well defined. Who except me is to decide, if a war is "in the best interest of my civ" and not to "stop the other side to win"? As far as I remember, one of the game goals of the Civ2 diplomacy community is to keep all civs in the game by all means. This does not exclude warfare per se, but if one side is going to be extinct, it obliges the others to help this side and not to gang up against it.

All I am trying to do is to help you by pointing in a direction, where such a ruleset already exists and is tested over years. You are of course free to ignore it and try own ideas, especially since I am a non-participant by all means. I just would stop to bother and move on with the games I enjoy.

(Or this?!)

Sorry to meddle into your discussion, but... not building this, build only one instance of that, don't build wonders, must space cities either tight or wide - in every proposal I see either a negation or a restriction. This sounds terribly unfun to me. Do you not have any positive ideals, for Christs sake? I think Nathan has a point with his reasoning.

(The post that got me all in a funk.)

That's a good start, learning should be the goal of the AU, not negating or restricting. I understand your goal to learn to make the right decisions by not building everything everywhere. You could achieve this by a slight acceleration of the tech rate and lowering the research limits, say, to 3..30 turns. This would just not give you the time to build everything everywhere, without any restriction.

(Ah, finally! Again, upfront would have been better.)

[Harovan]

It still came before your flame. Sometimes, some patience and reading is in order.

[JimiD]

how about no strategic resources in proximity to the start? have to go out of your way to rex, invade, trade for any of them. May have additional bonus or luxury to compensate (ie swapped over).

this may fail on the no fun test of course.

There are potentially different ways of overcoming the lack of resources:
Fight to get horses->iron->saltpeter->coal->oil->rubber etc.

Or trade just for whats needed.

If AIs are elimintated, there will be more available for trading, so some manipulation might be in order.

Then again a KAI might be too much if you feel too weakened.

learning overcoming the shortfall in resources:
how to wage wars without resources
how to get hold of resources
which are the important ones (the really important ones)

[Tassadar500]

And with that, we could choose the Indians for their War Elephant!

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
It still came before your flame. Sometimes, some patience and reading is in order.

Huh!?

It took you ~five posts (not all of which, admittedly, were negative), including a couple after my defense of "restrictive" games, for you to half-propose we maybe could sort of redo a previous course because you heard some people wanted to do that in the past. My "flame" still stands, wherever you put it in the post order: it would be nice if you could propose stuff up front.

The reason I'm fighting this battle, by the way, is that I dislike this approach:

"I hate that idea. Maybe you should do this instead."

If you were a more active participant in actually playing the games instead of just shooting down ideas in the "Next..." threads, I would be a bit more patient. To my knowledge, the last AU you played and posted about was either Seafaring or OCC. Do you really hate all the ideas that AU implements? Perhaps you're just not interested in Civ3 anymore. On independent grounds (including your own admissions), I believe this is the case.