When should we open up the forum to discussions

[Chaos Theory]

Interesting comments about the last civ demo game. In the last Alpha Centauri demo game, the public posts were received quite well, without rancor, whereas the private diplomacy was full of deceit and hostility.

[proviisori]

Originally posted by RobWorham
Indeed, posting roleplay talk in your team colour (or as close a shade as possible) would make life much easier for those of us who don't know all the team members from all the teams - whoever they might be??

What about team Merc? What they use... black?

[Daddy-O]

What about team Merc? What they use... black?

Sure but then all other Merc Communication should be yellow. Just so there is no confusion.

[RobWorham]

or 'as close a shade as possible'

Maybe silver??

[Daddy-O]

Silver is not quite as bad as the other colors. But Yellow is still prefered.

Are there other methods of RP that people prefer? Are there other rules that should be considered? I don't think we should allow people to make overt personal attacks against each other under the guise of RP.

START RP:
Con is a thin skinned weazel that wouldn't know spamming if it bit him in the ar$e!
/END RP

Even though I could claim that it was just RP a post like that would still be uncalled for.

For the record, I prefer the color method to the Start/End method & we all know that con's favorite meal is Spam.

[Daddy-O]

Another idea that would allow role play (RP) without allowing the possibility of direct player to player confrontation would be to disallow cross talk. It would work like this.

The teams are allowed to start threads to make certain proclamations and such. The other teams would not be allowed to post in that thread. They could however use their own threads to issue their own statements in response.

This suggestion is not to be looked at as a limit on free speech but rather adding a bit of reality. In real life when a gov't issues a statement and another counters or supports they more often release statements from their home office.

Example from this week. North Korea claims to have gone nuclear and is shaking its fist at the US. The US, China, Russia, France, The British, S Korea, and Japan did not rush over to North Korea's press release and disrupt it. No each nation made separate statements from its gov't officials.

When the Soviets ruled Russia, during the big May Day parades, did the US disrupt the parade by sending in the Shriners with their mini cars? No. They made some statements via diplomatic and press channels.

So, the second RP option that I am suggesting is to allow teams to start RP threads such as a War Memorial, State Department, Cultural Affairs, News, etc as they see fit and not allow other teams to post in those threads. These topical team threads would of course need to be color coded or otherwise marked as RP so as not to personally offend.

Maybe we end up with a combination of the two.

Any comments or other ideas?

[OzzyKP]

I don't speak for my team, but I'm good with opening up discussion and role playing and info sharing now.

Diplogames don't have these restrictions on them, and I think they go pretty damn good.

btw, if anyone has any interest in joining a diplogame, now is your chance. We have two open slots for players in the soon to be epic, History of the World 7. Check out the set up thread here:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=157715&goto=lastpost

And the story (roleplay) thread here:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=156677

We have weekly sessions, in Civ4 Warlords, from about 6:30 to 10 pm EST, USA Friday nights. If you aren't sure you can commit now, no problem, we need subs too for this week.

[Donegeal]

Originally posted by Flamer(fin)
The idea is good, but it should not be adopted too soon. The right time for it would be when there is a way for the "rumours" to reach every civ in the game. When the continents are diplomatically connected or some pre-defined tech is discovered. That would be more realistic. Meanwhile you can RP all you want in the private fora.

We will need a team vote on this matter.

Setting RP matter aside for a moment, lets bring the disscussion back to when to oopen the forum.

Ealier I made the suggestion that sailing be the trigger to allow people to post to the open forum. Here is the reason why I feel that sailing is better than the aformentioned diplo-connect.

Ancient humans settled all parts of this world long before caravels. Hell, they'd cut a damn log and cross an ocean (ok, it's more than a log and it took a LONG time, but I think you get the idea). By making the trigger tech sailing (which does allow cities to be connected via coast) it allows for the chance of rumors of great empires to cross oceans. Further, I really like the idea of limiting these rumor communications to the public forums until direct in-game contact is made. It would be the best of both worlds. The forum would be open, yet the realism of no direct communication would be preserved (plus it would be great to see how ALL people interact with other teams knowing that everything they say is heard by every team.

Any other suggestions on when to open it up?

[Daddy-O]

Please note that I am NOT speaking on behalf of Team Banana but as an individual player of the game.

My suggestion on opening the forums was two part.
1) define rules on RP and how we interact in this forum.
2) define an in-game trigger that will open communication.

I believe the RP/interaction definition is primary because this group NEEDS some structure put on that part of the demo game or else it will devolve into personal insults again.

The in-game trigger also needs to be defined. I have seen tech specific triggers, and contact based triggers suggested. Both are valid. This does need to be define sooned.

Sailing seems as good a tech as any for me. But would that be too soon? It is a second level tech. I have seen Calendar suggested as well.

Any ideas guys?

Snoopy369, what are your opinions? I really do think that at some point soon you need to poll the team leaders, maybe in private, and announce a ruling.

[binTravkin]

So you're saying, when everyone researches Sailing we open up.

I see a problem in it.
Some civs might not have need for Sailing (no need at all, or no need for a long time), either because they have no coastal cities or their coastal cities are good enough without sailing and they have good enough trade without it.

Therefore I propose that the condition is changed to:

- each team has Sailing OR Writing
- if the team has only Writing then there's another team on the same continent which has Sailing AND Writing (so it can transfer 'the rumours' overseas)



There's downside that someone could conclude someone else has Sailing and Writing, but I think that at the time all teams have either or both of them, it won't be that much of a leak of information.

[Donegeal]

Originally posted by binTravkin
So you're saying, when everyone researches Sailing we open up.

No... I saying, and have said, that each team can post to the public forum as they discover sailing.

Once you have sailing, your little logs that cross oceans are capable of sending out a rumor (ie: your post). Actual communication between civs would be when both have sailing.

And since you cannot control a rumor, you cannot have private communications until you have in-game contact.

Oh... BTW, I am also just speaking as an individual here and not speaking for Vox.

[binTravkin]

Okay, but my second argument was left unanswered:

Some teams might not be so interested in researching Sailing as others, which is not the case with Writing (sooner or later everyone will need Writing because it's a prereq both directly and indirectly for a lot of techs).

[snoopy369]

DaddyO, I was (am) waiting for more discussion here to get some concrete poll options first Perhaps tomorrow (day off) I'll see if I can figure out some concrete poll options

[Arrian]

In my opinion (not GS - we haven't discussed this at all), I kinda like the sailing or writing idea. Once everyone has one of those two.

-Arrian

[Krill]

Personally wouldn't mind Writing either. Sailing si too situational a tech; some team might be in a positin that they won't need it for another 100 turns. But making this an open forum when everyone has Writing sounds good to me.