Legitimate vs Cheating Strategies

[MarshalN]

Now that you mention it, it's totally true.

I think like I said before, we just have to accept certain "problems" in the game as inherent. If we take out everyone of those, it's not Civ3 anymore. It's a compromise, and we just have to live with it. You can't make a perfect game.... if it's perfect, then nobody will play it because it'll be enormously complicated.

[David Weldon]

I think that the palace trick, while perhaps unrealistic, is a completely intended design decision. Just like switching between wonders. They even made it so that you don't take _any_ penalty for switching! Clearly they wanted you (and the AI) to be able to switch production in mid-stream. Just one of those things that makes it a game...

Since it is such a "standard", intended, and useful vs. human tactic, my own opinion would be that it's OK.

[MarshalN]

Yes, so they intended that land improvements will be faster with more workers, so they clearly encourage you to use more if you want things to happen faster, which is why people don't like IFE. The general opposition states that IFE is stupid because forests don't grow faster if you have more people working on it.

But then, you can't build a palace halfway and then switch it to say a manhattan project, can you? You might be able to make a case for something like the hangnig gardens, but something like manhattan project or Apollo Program? I don't think so.

So, moot point. This is a game, and IFE is part of it. I don't think it's so much a problem as just an unrealistic protrayal of real life situations. I don't think IFE is necessarily unintended, and unintended doesn't always mean it's bad.

[FALVES]

Whats the point of this argument anyway?
Me, I just play the game the way it damn pleases me, and I dont give a rat's @ss about what the others think about the way I play.
I mean, I'm just having fun here! Isn't that the whole point?

[Barchan]

Originally posted by eMarkM


What, you mean it's wrong to modify my Jaguar Warrior and give it 100.100.100? Man, I love discovering and conquering the whole map in a couple of turns!

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No, no, it's not wrong, per se, if that's what you really love doing. But it *is* wrong, IMO, to do so and then say "dudz, I just beet deeity lvl an its only 3050 bc. Jagwar warriers are soooo cool! I rawk!!!"

But anyway, I'm not saying that IFE is necessarily wrong, I’m just saying that I don’t think the designers intended for players to be able to increase the production of their cities by using hordes of workers to speed-plant and clear-cut giant swaths of forest each turn.

It’ll be interesting to see how well IFE holds up during MP games (hell, it’ll be interesting to see MP games…). I’d imagine that players would quickly target the huge stacks of workers to cripple the production of their enemies. Frankly, I think they’d be the primary target for fast units.

Also, someone suggested that sending out workers to lure the AI into an ambush or bleed off AI attacks were not valid strategies. I disagree; I think that makes sense. I rarely pass up the opportunity to capture a worker. Why should the AI?

Lastly, while it doesn't really make sense to be able to convert a 90% complete lighthouse into the pyramids overnight, it just has to be that way to play the game. ITRW, there was no race to build these wonders (at least the ancient ones, anyway). It's not like the Persians had some pyramids 75% done when the ones at Giza were finished and said "Aw, nuts. The Egyptians finished first. All our good work wasted!" The Egyptians built the pyramids and it seems no one else was interested in such a project.

But even if there were competing projects, it's not like they'd be abandoned for naught once someone else "finished" theirs first. If India and China were building great walls and China finished first, it's not like India would run out and tear down what they'd already built. They too would have a wall. A pretty damn big one, too, even if not a great one.

I suppose the most "realistic" way to go about it would be to penalize players for switching wonder/palace production but allow all wonders to be built by each Civ once, giving the status of "wonder of the world" to the first Civ to build a great wonder. I.e., Egypt builds the pyramids first, so they get all the bonuses associated with the great wonder. The next turn the Persians complete their pyramid project, which is classified as a small wonder with lesser bonuses (perhaps a free granary in the city and half the culture production).

Not only does this seem to make more sense, I think this would really make players think (sadly, the AI would just begin building first and ask questions later...) about whether or not to begin building a great wonder. It’d be a big commitment to only wind up later with a second-rate lighthouse that no one marvels at (unlike the one the stinking Greeks built 20 years ago, da bastads!).

[shayovitz]

Brilliant post by Barchan, I'm still hanging on to my chair even though I fell off it a couple of times from the laughs.
(just thinking of the Persians trying to say "Aw, nuts ..." got me)

But I do think it is a legit strat to switch productions, even though it lacks on realism. It is a game, can't copy the real world one by one, compromises must be made.

My questions is: what do you guys think of editor "tweaking" which seems logical ? (not that I tweaked, I'm playing the game completely without modifications) One mod I wanted to make was to have an "unload" command added to the army unit. Would I be spanked and called a cheater ? Or is it something that David Weldon can live with in MP games ? Something all players can use and would make armies more useful.

[MarshalN]

Tweak all you want if it's fun, just don't tweak it (100.100.100 jags) and tell us you beat the game easily

[shayovitz]

I would never do that, it'd ruin the whole experience of the game.

The unload command in an army is something the designers should have put in the game, and maybe some balancing issues prevented them from doing it. I didn't see the Firaxis chaps being asked that, might be interesting to hear what they have to say about it.

[Barchan]

I know it's off topic, but...

Anyone remember the original Warlords game? Remember the Wizard special ally with its 50 movement points? Remember how if you got lucky searching some ruins and found 2 or 3 of those little spuds you could run rampant all over the map and raze nearly every lightly defended castle the other players had in like one turn? Man, were those things game breakers or what? Anyway, I'm getting the same image with the 100.100.100 Jaguar Warriors.

It'd be pretty neat once or twice as a MP goof, though. Imagine the shock on your friend's face as your Unholy Jaguar Warriors immediately appear and brush him aside like so much insignificant dust.

Oh, and you might as well make 'em amphibious, too, so they can travel across water as well....

Going back on topic. Sorry, Mods, I'll be good from now on....

[Elowan]

Originally posted by David Weldon
[1Elowan:
You and the others who have posted similar sentiments are simply wrong1

But I'm not 'wrong' -- I merely have a different opinion.

Furthermore -- I was referring to game play. Bragging about your prowess when you've been cheating - is - in my opinion -- wrong; having fun whilst playing and how -- is your own business.

[karlmarx9001]

'However, I'm personally not convinced that IFE is all that powerful. There _is_ a startup cost (the workers), and a continuing cost (the upkeep of the workers or else the unit spot that the workers take up), and with pop-rushing or money-rushing as alternatives I would not be afraid of playing someone who used IFE mercilessly. Perhaps this is only because I haven't perfected it myself, but I just don't think it breaks the game in any way whatsoever. So I say: let 'em do it!'

I think it's really that powerful, as it lets you get around corruption in all those one-shield cities you'll have by the middle ages. Workers cost 20, you can rush build as long as you want to turn 2 population into 1 worker; the worker then produces .5 production a turn, or a 50% production increase for a 1-shield corruption city. I actually don't think it's that effective for non-corrupt cities, as there's better things you can do with your time in those.

[David Weldon]

Elowan:
You're right, of course. Anyone's opinion on cheating/not cheating can't possibly be right or wrong. I was reacting to your comment that it's disingenuous to talk about a common standard of play so that such discussions don't have to happen over and over again at the beginning of each game. I think it's wrong to say that such an enterprise is useless or less than sincere. Perhaps I worded my post poorly or offensively, and I apologize if so.

shayovitz:
I won't whack you for making reasonable (or even unreasonable) edits while playing. I do it just like everyone else (make edits, that is, not whack you...). For the record, I would think that any obvious modification of the game (in this case, editing) would not normally be used in MP or in a tourny unless that's the "theme" of the game. Everyone has ideas about how to make CivIII "better", and most people are probably right, but at some point we have to agree to play the same game (unless, as has been mentioned, you're playing by yourself). Off the record, your edit is a great start to making armies something I might consider building, and the only reason I would think it might be unfair is that the AI will never take advantage of the opportunity while you will. Of course, the AI hardly ever has any armies anyway, so maybe that doesn't matter...

I'm not trying to be a Civ Nazi or anything of that sort. It looks like that's how I've come off throughout this thread, but I really think it would be useful to do what the original poster wanted, and try to find some common definition of legitimate vs. illegitimate for purposes of MP (mostly). I can imagine cases where MP is a couple of humans with a bunch of AIs for spice, and therefore techniques vs. AI are also worth discussing.

Along those lines, what I think is "unfair" about using workers is when you have a vulnerable, but valuable force (say artillery or longbowmen or something) that could be attacked by AI units. So you send out workers that don't _block_ the AI, but you know they'll go after the workers instead of your offensive units. Then you can use your offensive units to kill the AI units and take back your workers. I think this kind of baiting is very "unfair" because no sentient opponent would pass up the opportunity to kill your force first, and then take the workers later. The AI, of course, falls right into your "clever" trap.

There is definitely a fine line near this issue. We can't rule out all tactics that rely on the opponent screwing up. Things like that can and will happen even (especially) with humans, but I think we should to try and prevent things that would _never_ happen if the opponent wasn't an AI. Just one opinion among many...