PBEM does it work?

[markcalltopower]

I have played a hot-seat game with a few friends and for the first 30 minutes we were changing seats every second. In PBEM this will take weeks in the early game. In PBEM games is there a quick start option or will the game have to be played slowly in the first hundred years when civilizations have one city and no units???

[Robm]

You hit it on the head. PBEM is just like hotseat, only slower.

[hexagonian]

Just wondering,
How about the following, and are these possible?

Any Scenerio Builders out there able/willing to set up a PBEM/Hotseat game that begins midgame (each civ with 10-15 cities) with equal advances, units, and tile improvements in each city? The trick would be to balance everything so that no-one would have a distinct advantage.

Or is it possible to play a Multiplay game for the first 100-150 turns, and then convert into a PBEM game?

[wilfal]

HEX:

I HAVE BEEN WONDERING THE SAME THING MYSELF AND I CANNOT SEEM TO GET A STRAIGHT ANSWER FROM ANYONE, MAYBE IT IS HOW I ASK THE QUESTION.......

TO ANYONE WHO KNOWS.......

CAN YOU START MULTIPLAYER OVER THE INTERNET, PLAY MANY TURNS THEN SWITH THE GAME TO PBEM STYLE.

HEX: I DONT THINK YOU CAN PLAY THAT WAY....BUT YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO, I WAS 150 TURNS IN ON A GOOD GAME LAST NIGHT (MULTI) I SAVED THE GAME BUT WE WERE UNABLE TO FIND A TIME WHEN WE COULD RE-GROUP....PBEM WOULD BE GREAT TO KEEP THE TURN GOING FOR 20 TO 30 TURNS THEN GOING TO STRAIGHT MULTI...(OVER THE INTERNET) :O

WIL

[wilfal]

BY THE WAY I'LL BE PLAYING TONIGHT...MULTI AROUND 8:30 TO 9:00 pm STOP BY.

WIL :-o

[Monkey]

Wil,

Don't know if you got my e-mail regarding this topic but I suggested that

the host starts the game with all human players... attaches an AI for the first 20 turns and then detaches the ai and resumes sending the games... of course the disadvantage is that you will have an ai controlling your civ for the first 20 turns...

Don't know about the multiplayer idea but the scenario option sounds feasible... except you will run into the scenario bug described in the creation forum

[skorpion59]

You can not convert HS & PBEM games to/from Multiplayer games. There is severe limitations in what the Activision code will let you do.

You CAN create a scenario and use that as a bases for starting your HS or PBEM game. Just make sure every player has the same scenario pack on their computer. (You can play a default game by creating a scenario pack with only the 2 required default scenario files and the map to be used saved as a savegame.csg file.)

The Patch 1.2 readme states you HAVE to double-click on the saved game which is emailed to you to start PBEM games. This is incorrect. You have to start CTP and do a double load just like you would with any single player scenario.

Hope this helps.