Disputes Thread

[Zeviz]

Thank you for the summary. It's very helpful for understanding what went on during the game.

A couple things I am wondering are: What was going on with Aidun near the end? (He implied that he wasn't representing official Templar position. Was that correct, or was that just a weird attempt at restarting negotiations?) Also, how closely were you really alligned with PAL and Imperio?

[ecawilson]

- This is my personal impression, and not the viewpoints of the Templar team. -

Aidun is obtaining his graduate degree in international diplomacy. It is what makes him passionate. It was a lot of fun for me hearing him talk about diplomacy, and how excited he got.

For a good chunk of the game, Aidun didn't represent official Templar position. He was given free reign as a professional to come to an agreement, which if beneficial, would be ratified by the rest of the team. He was very in touch with what was beneficial for the team, so that never seemed to be a worry. His efforts were watched very closely and with interest by the rest of the team. After I became active, I got to help out with some American grammar. But by and large, he ran the show.

Now, what was referred to as "schizo" was not his fault. 3 things happened:
1 Due to low activity (as Jon already revealed), communication between him and the turn player was sometimes lacking. The first example that comes to mind was him promising to not have tech trades before other agreements took place, and then Herc accepting a tech trade. Neither of them are to blame, had I been paying more attention, that would not have happened.
2 Sometimes too much knowledge can be a problem. It was assumed that this game would last years. His training taught him that relationships must be built, and trust must be earned, before two nations can rely upon each other. RB, on the other hand, apparently had the assumptions that the game would be over much sooner, and that two teams can work together, as if with an AI, without trust or mutual respect. RB was playing a game, Aidun was practicing for real life. It drove him up the wall.
3 Apparently, his field of study makes most people crazy. Or at least they never sleep. Not easy stuff.

Toward the end, it appears that he felt that talks had broken down, but that he had a responsibility to the team. The team was fully aware of his efforts, and were quite supportive, but he was in no way representing Templar position. He didn't even post his letters in the forum.

To understand Aidun, and his diplomacy: Integrity is paramount. As far as I can tell, he tried very hard to reconcile his team's actions, his words, and his motives. At times, they were irreconcilable, which was difficult for him personally. Next game, I want to be on his team, but we will work from better assumptions next time.

Now, about Pal and Imperio. Pal seemed somewhat of an enigma to me, and apparently to many of our teammates. The pre-game intelligence on them now appears to be incorrect. From my viewpoint, the strategy was to give them whatever they wanted, and to do it with a smile. But, I was never involved in Pal diplomacy. I just couldn't figure it out.

Imperio, on the other hand, was mostly me. I was advised heavily, and learned quite a bit, but the alliance was my baby. And, if I had been active past late January, I think that the war would have gone quite a bit better. Once the war started, without better communication, we were more likely to think the worst, and also less able to change tactics. I feel that lack of communication was the reason that the war went so poorly. And probably the reason that Imperio abandoned the war effort without telling the Templars. The lack of communication rests on my shoulders, as I left without warning, and without anyone to be able to take my spot.

-wilson

[conmcb25]

Thank you for the summary. It's very helpful for understanding what went on during the game.

A couple things I am wondering are: What was going on with Aidun near the end? (He implied that he wasn't representing official Templar position. Was that correct, or was that just a weird attempt at restarting negotiations?) Also, how closely were you really alligned with PAL and Imperio?

Overworked graduate student getting his PhD I believe, really quite as simple as that. By that time our most of our contributors had pretty much scattered, so no one really took up the slack.

Since you have been wondering about his absence lately, I think all I have to say is the start of the school year, and he is also very involved in Social and Academic Organizations, so its that time of year for rushing, recruiting, whatever they call it in the Netherlands.

[Hercules]

Thanks for the summary, jon

I guess you've read that we didn't actually have any military at the point we settled Pink Dot

That's not true. You had warriors Xena and Gogo. Gogo was in place, waiting on the Pink Dot Hill, where you settled, and Xena was in a nearby forest healing. Our warrior, beside Xena was also healing.

If it had been a SP DG game, I think we would have attacked in a few turns, with sufficent force. but because it was so early in the game, and a MP Democracy game, where we expected a more interesting tussle in the industrial age or whatever, we held back.

Your forums assessed us well. But we joined the game to have fun and as Jonc said, to try a different approach.

Also Aidun and Ecawilson added extra dimensions to our forum discussions which added interest and vitality. They were operating within our diplomatic boundaries.

So don't knock Aidun. He was fully signed up and I don't recall, sent any message without our approval.

[Hercules]

I know that winners get to write the history. But RB, in my view, were so close to coming a cropper, through simple mistakes by us and by other teams and by them, that it so easily could have been a different outcome.

So the RB 'history', which we enjoy reading does not really reflect what happened: the communication difficulties, RL, misunderstandings.

Without doubt RB had a solid team, which is why there was the invition to play in the DG in the first place, and through that strenght why they won. The other teams, rightly noted in the RB history, lost members due to the protracted start.

In the end we had a strong and growing RB team and a reduced Bananas team?, reduced Rabbits team, a varying contributing Imperio team. I think the PaL team struggled to find players. And a reduced Templar team.

Anyway,

Congratulations, Realms Beyond.

[scooterf]

That's not true. You had warriors Xena and Gogo. Gogo was in place, waiting on the Pink Dot Hill, where you settled, and Xena was in a nearby forest healing. Our warrior, beside Xena was also healing.

Two warriors is not a military .

I know that winners get to write the history. But RB, in my view, were so close to coming a cropper, through simple mistakes by us and by other teams and by them, that it so easily could have been a different outcome.

So the RB 'history', which we enjoy reading does not really reflect what happened: the communication difficulties, RL, misunderstandings.

In the end we had a strong and growing RB team and a reduced Bananas team?, reduced Rabbits team, a varying contributing Imperio team. I think the PaL team struggled to find players. And a reduced Templar team.

So RB's gameplay should be largely discredited because they did a better job of keeping up interest? The way you're talking it sounds like you're saying "well we could have won if we tried but we all just let RB win" which is pretty unsportsmanlike.

Also, if you discredit RB's history of the game, then what part(s) are represented unfairly? It might be possible to get a better idea of what happened but your team has decided to keep your forum closed.

[Zeviz]

I know that winners get to write the history. ...

Not in this case. With forums open to public, everybody is free to examine all available data and write any history they want. If you choose to hide your side of the story, you can't accuse the rest of us of writing the history without it.

Nobody is stopping you from writing your own history and presenting evidence to back it up. That's the benefit of full disclosure. Our history isn't just "RB version of events". It's what actually happened based on all available evidence from the forums of RB, Imperio, Rabbits, and soon to be Banana.

[mostly-harmless]

If it had been a SP DG game, I think we would have attacked in a few turns, with sufficent force. but because it was so early in the game, and a MP Democracy game, where we expected a more interesting tussle in the industrial age or whatever, we held back.

You were holding back because you wanted to have more fun down the line?
That, I can't believe for a moment!
From comments here and from Imperio forums, it is clear to me that you saw Pink Dot as a thorn in your side right from its founding and probably adopted a tunnel view, trying to do something about. Imperio similarly focused solely on Cape Town, right after the turn they lost that spot to us. I believe Templars and Imperio both lost the view of the greater picture from that moment or even contented yourselves with trying to get those cities back, giving up on the actual goal to win the game.

Your forums assessed us well. But we joined the game to have fun and as Jonc said, to try a different approach.

Fair enough. When trying to a different approach it must be taken into account that the chance for overall failure is higher than compared with a "conventional" approach (eg. Quecha rush?). Towards the end your message to us got more and more bitter and di not sound like you had much fun.
That said, I hold you, Hercules, in high respect for sticking to the game until the end. your teammate said that your team already dwindled after seeing the starting position. Also all other teams threw in the towel way too early (Imperio, after they thought they were treated in an unhonourable way [cough, not the best team to complain about that]; some parts of Rabbits during their first conflict with PAL; the initial Bananas and finally PAL, with the lead in the overall game, after losing their capital). In that regard your performance was exceptional.

So don't knock Aidun. He was fully signed up and I don't recall, sent any message without our approval.

Aidun said himself, that he does not represent the Templar team towards the end and kept bombarding us with rather long letters, with little meat to them. If you say he was will embedded in your team the whole time, then this was part of a devious scheme to have Team RB miss to play their turns, because we are all busy reading Aiduns messages?

I know that winners get to write the history. But RB, in my view, were so close to coming a cropper, through simple mistakes by us and by other teams and by them, that it so easily could have been a different outcome.

No doubt. There were many crucial moments in that game, were our progress and success was on a cusp.
- The race to Cape Town, grabbing our only source of strategic resources. We beat Imperio to it by a half turn, only by settling in a sub-par spot. Both Imperio and us had marked out a different spot to put the city on (N of copper).
- The race to Jericho to grab Iron, where Templars double moved their settler. We did not bring it up, as you were well within the agreed rules for this situation. You can always claim you did not know about our intentions to settle that area. But come on, it must have been clear to you that the race was tight?
- Grabbing important wonders from under the noses of 3 industrious civs!

So the RB 'history', which we enjoy reading does not really reflect what happened: the communication difficulties, RL, misunderstandings.

You are right and Sullla said that his history is from Team RB's perspective only. But unless Krill writes a more neutral history of the game, I think DemoGame historians in 100years will use his text for study.

Without doubt RB had a solid team, which is why there was the invition to play in the DG in the first place, and through that strenght why they won. The other teams, rightly noted in the RB history, lost members due to the protracted start.

In the end we had a strong and growing RB team and a reduced Bananas team?, reduced Rabbits team, a varying contributing Imperio team. I think the PaL team struggled to find players. And a reduced Templar team.

I guess, we at Rb were all relatively new to the format of large team MP gaming, and could hold up a high level of enthusiasm throughout the game. Also the repeated challenges the game threw at us were interesting enough for new members to join (sub-par starting position, map design, wonder races, being dogpiled by Imp, Temp & PAL). You will probably know that digging out of holes and playing challenging variants of CIV is what RB is all about. I doubt we would have gotten many new members if we had started with Imperios land.
Maybe, the Apolyton MP veterans here are just tired of playing demogames? Don't know.

Congratulations, Realms Beyond.

Thanks, I think we still missed a gg from the Templars.
Again, kudos for sticking to it til the end, Herc.

mh

[sooooo]

Two warriors is not a military .

Yes it is in the circumstances. Hercules' point was that with quechuas even killing 2 warriors is difficult if they are on a hill and have cultural bonus. And we could have whipped a third.

[Krill]

Yeah, Pink Dot wasn't going to get razed unless Templars had played the game very differently, by getting copper or maybe horses hooked asap. By the time Templars knew about Pink Dot it was too late for them to do anything. RB wouldn't have been crippled, but Templars would have been (moreso than how they were), as well as providing diplomatic ammuntion to RB.

[joncnunn]

Yes it is in the circumstances. Hercules' point was that with quechuas even killing 2 warriors is difficult if they are on a hill and have cultural bonus. And we could have whipped a third.

Those 2 Warriors were sufficent; at the time I think we had 2 or 3 Qs within our boundaries at the point so our capital and all cities would have been undefended. We were using Qs as scouts.

And we didn't have Bronze Working or even Hunting that turn either.

[joncnunn]

One of the better things about this game, is it convinced me to give several civs a try in my single player games at the time; both during the delay and during the game.
That included just about every civ we as Templars considered playing that I hadn't already played. (Although I didn't get to most of them until after this game had started.)

[Indiansmoke]

WOW!!!

I have been away for 3 weeks and came back to see that the game is over (I knew that before actually, but I thought Cres was continuing for PAL) and that there is a big controvercy on athe map and the forums opening.

After checking most of the things people said and closely looking at Sullas comments on the map I would like to say the following.

1. Private forums are private, to open them you need conscent from EVERY member of a team (not just a majority IMO). The role of the historian is to write a summary of the game and it is tottaly different than opening the forums. If we knew that that was Krill's intension when he asked for access to PAL private forum we would have never given access!
That is very naughty at the very least from you Krill!

2. Regarding the map. Some of Sulla's comments are spot on, I wonder why he did not think of them before making the map for the CFC diplo game, where he has done a better job than this total failure, but still missed some critical issues. Specific things he says here he went on and made the same mistakes when creating the other map!

Now analysing Sulla's claim that they got the short stick out of the map!

1. Starting positions are judged not only by resources but by rivers and total tiles as well. While your starting location has semi-poor food and is slow to start with, it is a much better capital spot for later on in all respects, than our's was. Actually it is the second best capital in the game after Imperio's. Rabbit's capital spot you suggested might look good at first but it is a much worst commerce capital, it has no rivers, the cow is 3 food, the wheat needs to be irigated to be wothwhile and that means 2 plains farms and it has lots of useless sea tiles including the useless whales. Your's has 8 grassland river tiles, yes 8!

That is 8 grassland river cottages, you think that whales and and extra fish resource can compete with that? Or our fish and the 4 flood plains are better?

Not to mention the 12 or so forests that you have in capital BFC which boosted your expansion big time, while we had to do with 2 forests!


2. Starting in the middle of a snake like continent with 2 civs forced to expand towards the center (ie you) because the land from the other side is crap...is not exactly ideal for the middle man. You obviously look at this from your own perspective but having to have troops on 2 fronts 30 tiles away from each other to fight 2 civs is a total nightmare. While you were screwed in the resource allocation (compared to Imperio and Templars not us BTW)you were in the pleasant position to expand in one direction thus leaving your back empty, making for a much easier game.

3. Sulla makes it sound like they were the ones to get screwed with strategic resources. We had copper in second city range, but had no horse or iron. You had horse and copper on a reasonable distance from your capital and iron was in equal distance from Templars.

4. Land beyond capital. Just a quick look at how green Realms continent is compared to ours makes me think 3 teams were playing with temperate climate map and the other 3 with desert/plains scenario! Sulla makes it sound like resources are the only thing that matters...green land and rivers matter much more! It is hugely better to hav only one resource in a city but have lots of river and green tiles, than to have 3 resources and have the rest of the land plains or desert!

Finnaly it continues to amaze me how a so called "experienced" player comes out and say all these things, making it sound like they got the short stick out of the map, when infact they got the second best map after Imperio, and by big margin from us Rabbits and Bannana.

[darrelljs]

Man...using phrases like "big margin" w.r.t to our capital is a bit hard to swallow . From my experience early game is all about resources, particularly food. Having a slow growth capital is one of the worst handicaps you can have. I can't seem to recall what was in the BFC for your capital...but I do remember lots of whipping . We did have lots of forests to chop though, which was nice.

Edit: Checked our Rabbits capital, and they had plains galore, but they had a Fish, Wheat (scoff not at +4 food), and Stone (Whale was useless). That's a sub-par capital but I'd still take it over RB's.

Banana had five seafood resources (where they settled, not where the started). That's too many to use unfortunately, it wasn't a great capital. I would have moved my starting Warrier onto the hill and probably settled south of the lake (loses the ocean fish and a coastal clams but gains irrigated Rice, Oasis and grassland cows, not to mention two grassland hills. That's a strong capital.

Templars capital was junk, Imperials was golden (literally). I'd be curious to see a screenshot from PAL's start if you have one you can share.

Darrell

[Indiansmoke]

http://img229.imageshack.us/i/turn6cityscreenuo1.jpg/