Game Discussion IV

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by Aeson
Don't confuse "duping" someone with having them in a corner.

We knew GoW and ND were in it for the long haul after our chat where the NAP was signed. An alliance to be the last two in the game was pretty obvious. Why do you think we sided with RP?

So obvious that we didn't even have that planned back then...

We knew we had to intervene on Bob to favor the small end of the 2v1, or at least be the one claiming the "1's" territory, as if GoW and ND split Bob, one of you would win. GS and Lego had a chance at that point to form the alliance to deal with GoW and ND, but we didn't get it done. After Lego sided with GoW and ND against GS, GS saw no option but to try to play 3rd fiddle and hope a rift broke out between GoW and ND. The hope was that one of you would prefer the "little guy" on another landmass as your end opponent rather than the "big guy" neighbor.

We were too afraid that the "little guy" was a team which pulled a lot of "big things". Seriously, GS's performance was totally unproportionate to your size. Then again there was a notable lack of crack Civ3 players on the other teams. Many of us learned along the way and via other demo games like the ISDG (I can't emphasize how much that game helped me with GoW) though admittedly many of us did have (and still have) much more MP/PBEM exprience than the GSers - probably our only offset against your SP skills. I blame that and nothing else for GS's sometimes too-rigid foreign policy (as if you were dealing with the AI and not human opponents), and your lack of consideration of not-in-the-book alternatives since they are all too commonplace in PBEM games and MP.

Likewise another aspect where perhaps my view of this game differed than yours was that to me, this game doesn't prove anything definitive and thus I didn't see the need for there to be a sole undisputed leader. As more than one Apolytoner could have said, perhaps our greatest rival in Civ-dom is precisely the German Webring. One would think that therefore we had everything to prove Apolyton's superiority if we struck at ND in the end. But would it really prove anything? First of all, my team never considered itself "Apolytonian". We were GoW and GoW alone ruled our loyalties. Likewise, beating ND would prove nothing since GWT already beat us in the ISDG, a game which ultimately has more validity in terms of team vs team considerations. Thus, we had no qualms in sharing a victory with our inter-team rivals.

Heck, I'm kinda glad we had the chance to bond so closely with people from another site who on top of that were from a different country and had a different language. Who else am I going to e-mail now to practice my crappy knowledge of the german language? Demogame considerations aside, it was an unprecedented social experiment as far as online gaming is concerned and I'm damn proud to have been a part of it.

Then again there's the fact that there's a PTWDG II and PTWDG III and a plethora of other competitions. It would be very arrogant of us to say we're the "best" just because we won this one. The thriving popularity of demogaming means that this was only the equivalent of the first season. New story next one. Plus, we have Civ4 to see who's the best, and a better chance to continue this healthy rivalry not only amongst ourselves but amongst others I cannot think of.

Start practicing.

If instead GS didn't go along with GoW and ND against Lego, the view was that it would be Lego going along with GoW and ND against GS. Remember GS didn't even have Rubber. Riflemen? Not much of a choice there for us. We were obsolete without an ally. Whether there was a chance to have Lego as that ally or not I'm not sure. I wasn't there during that period, and haven't read through the threads in that timeframe.

I doubt any of us would have considered an alliance with Lego at that stage. They were just too powerful. Heck, they STILL have the biggest score in the game right now!

As for whether GS considered shared victory between ND and GoW, we did discuss it once. It was dealing with a phrase in a message to GoW, and we decided to leave it out because we felt it would be insulting to even hint at as something GoW would consider. This was when GoW was still proclaiming neutrality. So if you want to know our untainted view of shared victory, that is it.

That's what I never understood about GS, why you witheld many things that if I were in your shoes I would have definitely considered. It would not have been insulting to us, heck, it would be a bit frightening since we'd be like "oh sh*t, they know". Likewise I never understood why you never approached us for an alliance against ND. What was the worst thing that could've happened? We'd say no. I'd think that in your position I'd have risked many things since of the final three you had the lesser odds of winning. Same with RP's uranium. For the record, ND wanted to get at you since various turns before the war actually started and it was only after I persuading them otherwise that they backed down. When it became obvious your reluctance to keep that Uranium tile (the first hint was your acceptance of my Lego-split map, despite handing you the Uranium - which I had no choice since keeping it on our side would look real crooked - I placed the border conveniently where an ND city could target it with artillery) they decided to strike RP.

Everything went to hell when you got Uranium. It was this fact, that you weren't even willing to attempt to ally with us against ND, that made us think that you'd have used those nukes against us without fliniching if you had the chance. In our eyes that meant only one thing - you had to go, you had to go soon, and you had to go by whatever means necessary.

While RoP rape (forced due to not being able to cancel treaties) would definitely be cheesy (regular RoP rape is debateable, I personally have no problem with it, and find it less than useful in most cases anyways), it could be easily circumvented.

Simply declare war before entering enemy territory. No more RoP. Problem solved. Then a few Settlers would have had pretty much the exact same effect. I think all but 3 of ND's cities were reachable by "rolling Tank" from GoW with just 3 Settlers.

Yeah, believe it or not GoW never lied to you about that RoP. It automatically renewed itself as did most of our trade deals with others (and for some reason we did not suffer the "diplo bug" until much later than the other teams). Still, my bloodthirsty teammates would have never allowed us not to RoP-rape since that would have kind of been warmongerly orgasmic.

What'd be fun though once the game is "officially" over to test out a respective invasion of the other just for posterity's sake.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Master Zen
I doubt any of us would have considered an alliance with Lego at that stage. They were just too powerful. Heck, they STILL have the biggest score in the game right now!

Had it been in the rules, we would have taken a locked alliance with Lego in a showdown of Bob vs non-Bob, in a New York Minute.

That would have been a game! It would have been glorious. However, we were deprived of that game by the secrecy that surrounded GoW's and ND's introduction of the locked alliance to this game.

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Rhothaerill


Vox has already talked about the "next demogame" in Civ4 having a revamped Vox Controli team. And this time the team won't be so wishy-washy when going after GS....not if I have anything to say about it at least.

Maybe this time my computer won't generate a map where we are sharing a small land mass with no sp, rubber, or uranium.

[Rhothaerill]

Originally posted by notyoueither


Maybe this time my computer won't generate a map where we are sharing a small land mass with no sp, rubber, or uranium.

Or maybe next time we'll have someone create a map for us. I hate random map PBEMs (as evidenced by one of the ones I'm in right now where my capital was 4 tiles away from someone else's capital, and 4 or so tiles to the coastline in the other three directions).

Other than that game and the PTWDG, all the PBEMs and demogames I play have had a mapmaker so that everyone has a fair shot (in most cases; ISDG not being one of them ).

[vondrack]

Originally posted by notyoueither
Had it been in the rules, we would have taken a locked alliance with Lego in a showdown of Bob vs non-Bob, in a New York Minute.

That would have been a game! It would have been glorious. However, we were deprived of that game by the secrecy that surrounded GoW's and ND's introduction of the locked alliance to this game.

Coming as a no surprise at all, I'd say, the Tiger says exactly what I posted some time ago in the "shared victory announcement"thread. A war-to-end-all-wars between Bob and non-Bob would probably have been something to remember. Pity we did not have it. Oh, well... what happened, cannot be unhappened...

I am following this thread, but feel I have nothing else to post. I have made my point of view clear elsewhere.

And personally... MZ, I believe you have zero chance to make some of us change their mind and look more favourably at the shared victory in this game. Call it sore loserism, if you wish... there must be a number of sore losers around, then... Likewise, I can see that none of those not exactly happy about how it all ended are going to make you change your mind. But I myself am far from speaking about sore winnerism...

Thus, I believe this discussion is pointless.

What I believe we could agree upon for next time, if there is any next time, that we should make it a rule that two or more teams can share the victory (I would welcome such a rule, as it significantly cuts on the "cutthroatness" of Civ3). Furthermore, such a locked alliance would have to be made public immediately after being arranged.

Sounds good?

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by vondrack
What I believe we could agree upon for next time, if there is any next time, that we should make it a rule that two or more teams can share the victory (I would welcome such a rule, as it significantly cuts on the "cutthroatness" of Civ3). Furthermore, such a locked alliance would have to be made public immediately after being arranged.

Sounds good?

No need vond, Civ4 will come with cooperative victories possible from the start.

However I would truly disagree on making it public from the start as it would sometimes defeat the entire purpose of it. GoW and ND would NEVER have allied that way if we would have been forced to make it public since it would have likely resulted in a Lego/GS alliance to destroy us.

[notyoueither]

If you want to play a team game, set them up from the start. Take C3C, add eight teams and put them all into four locked alliances. Than have at 'er.

Other than that, you are circumventing the intent of the game.

If your subterfuge is accepted, what keeps the next game going? It starts with 8 teams and they all agree to shared victory. The game is won in 3950 BC. Yaay! We won!

But what did the win mean?

[notyoueither]

Consider this, MZ.

What happens is ND and Lego get on this 'shared victory' crap?

They were one and two in real and potential power for a long time. What if in future the leading teams decide not to compete with each other and instead 'share victory' after squashing all the bugs?

Do you want to spend two years playing a game to be greeted with the message that too bad, so sad the two biggest kids on the block have decided to 'share victory' and take everyone else out?

It is absurd. It is the death of games such as this. Consider well whether you think you and ND did a good thing when you came up with the formula to be able to ignore the possibility of the back stab.

[notyoueither]

What effect will this have on the finals of the C3CISDG?

How does anyone know the rules under which Apolyton is playing?

Maybe it would be better for two small teams to gang up and crush us early so they don't have to face something like this later. What the hell, maybe two small teams in the BCs should sign such a pact and go to town on everyone else. Why not?

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by notyoueither
If you want to play a team game, set them up from the start. Take C3C, add eight teams and put them all into four locked alliances. Than have at 'er.

Other than that, you are circumventing the intent of the game.

If your subterfuge is accepted, what keeps the next game going? It starts with 8 teams and they all agree to shared victory. The game is won in 3950 BC. Yaay! We won!

But what did the win mean?

That is not only so ridiculous but also so unlikely that I can't honestly think you really believe it would happen that way.

[notyoueither]

Why not?

[notyoueither]

What it boils down to is that your nerve failed.

You were so afraid of ND backstabbing you, and vice-versa, you cooked up a condition under which neither of you had to worry about it anymore.

Only one problem. You failed to tell the rest of us. The rest of us continued to play under the one team wins all assumption. All of us had to worry about backstabs.

And you think we are dupes? We didn't know the ****ing rules had been changed!

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by notyoueither
Consider this, MZ.

What happens is ND and Lego get on this 'shared victory' crap?

They were one and two in real and potential power for a long time. What if in future the leading teams decide not to compete with each other and instead 'share victory' after squashing all the bugs?

Do you want to spend two years playing a game to be greeted with the message that too bad, so sad the two biggest kids on the block have decided to 'share victory' and take everyone else out?

It is absurd. It is the death of games such as this. Consider well whether you think you and ND did a good thing when you came up with the formula to be able to ignore the possibility of the back stab.

If ND and Lego in the process of such a thing crushed everyone else I would have no grounds to complain. What strikes me as so odd about this whole controversy is that the ones who have anything to lose about the decision is GoW and ND because neither of us can now claim a sole victory (a tradeoff we thought was worth it). Yet everyone else is whining except us

[Master Zen]

Originally posted by notyoueither
What it boils down to is that your nerve failed.

You were so afraid of ND backstabbing you, and vice-versa, you cooked up a condition under which neither of you had to worry about it anymore.

You are 100% correct. And I have stated this fact more than once in this thread already.

Only one problem. You failed to tell the rest of us. The rest of us continued to play under the one team wins all assumption. All of us had to worry about backstabs.

Why should we have told everybody else? Spoil the plan? Get GS and Lego to ally against a united Bob? Give us some credit, at least we're not stupid.

And you think we are dupes? We didn't know the ****ing rules had been changed!

FOR THE LOVE OF GOD NO RULES WERE CHANGED!!! We chose to ally because we otherwise though we couldn't win this game! You never thought it because you had NO-ONE to ally with at such a level as well as the fact that you were too proud to accept anything else than full victory. We weren't.

Is that so hard to understand? Because frankly I'm getting a bit ****ing tired of repeating it for the umpteenth time.

-MZ

[notyoueither]

Originally posted by Master Zen


If ND and Lego in the process of such a thing crushed everyone else I would have no grounds to complain. What strikes me as so odd about this whole controversy is that the ones who have anything to lose about the decision is GoW and ND because neither of us can now claim a sole victory (a tradeoff we thought was worth it). Yet everyone else is whining except us

I admit you won. I am not whining. I am discussing the nature of your win.

I will not whine about your win so long as you never, ever, mention it as an accomplishment other than taking first place in a cheese contest.