FG: Society III Game Thread

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Gamecube64
Yes, but the turn has to be played to its entirety before victory, or else someone could get eliminated on the turn they build the ship, yet still win...

Makes sense, actually. They launch the ship before being overrun.

[Jonny]

An interesting finish for an interesting game.

I knew that I would probably have to ally with either Skanky or Spaced against the other, because I feared that they might both attack me to stop me from winning the space race, considering all the gold I was sitting on.

I didn't really take into account the possibility of a wonder victory when I decided to befriend Skanky... but co-victory is better than no victory at all.

[Skanky Burns]

I should have sent a spy to Jonny to prevent his building stuff.

[Sparrowhawk]

That's why I thought spies might be key to the finish, if say Skanky sent his to Jonny, Jonny send his to Spaced and Spaced sent his to Skanky, all three would get through and potentially stop their production. (and if all three were targeting space ship production, the space race would have stopped). If 2 of the 3 targeted each other they would cancel out and the 3rd persons spy would be instrumental in eliminating one person from the game and leaving it a 2 person race.

Great finish.

[Sparrowhawk]

Here are several questions I posed to Smiley at one point in the game and his answers (I would have posted them during the game but I didn't want to disrupt the progress).

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1) If I spy successfully negates the action of the Society it is sent to, are the Gold from that action lost or do they return to the treasury to be used for next turn?

1. When spies disrupt something, the unspent gold goes back to the treasury.

2) Military Support, I have asked Gamecube this, and he didn't answer me, but it has come up again with Spaced and Skanky and Gamecube has elected to take the support costs out of the Tax Revenue (which means after Military Production and after Wars). This seems to make sense to me, but I am curious what you intended.

2. You and GC are right about army salaries.

3) Governments. Despotism results is tax revenue from 6 cities, Monarchy from 12 and Republic unlimited?. With the different number of players and the different size maps, should these numbers by variable depending on map size? (I think so, but just a thought).

3. Map size is set to have squares approx. 12 x number of players, so a static sum should work. The intention was that a representative government would be necessary for a multicultural society.

4) Trade: If a government (Monarchy or Republic) receives caravans from a neighbour in Despotism, does the receiving Society get more gold then the sender? (due to the government they are in?)

4. Yes, in a trade swap, a Republic will get a double payout while the Despotism only gets the normal payout.

5) New Cities (2 Questions)
If you have previously lost cities (say you had 5 and lost 2 leaving you with 3), does your next city built cost you as city 6, or city 4. Similarly if you take additional cities (say starting with 5 and taking 2 more) does you next city built cost as city 6 or city 8?

If you state city locations and those locations are used by the time you try to settle them, do you not get the cities or should the GM locate them in the locations or their choice (to minimize borders as you have indicated elsewhere)?

5. New city costs only depends on how many cities you have, those that have been lost or nuked don't count.

6) Science:
If there are 8 societies in the game, and say 4 of them have tech 5 at the start of the turn, does the cost decrease during the turn or do all the societies who research the tech that turn pay the same cost.
(I like decreasing the cost during the turn, more math but it offsets some of the advantage of sending in orders early).

When calculating the costs of techs (reduced) do you round down as in other calculations? (I assume so)

6. Everyone pays the same price. Too hard to balance the budget for the players otherwise.

7) Wonders:
Jihad - you can take any city in the world (every turn? or one use then wonder is expired?)

7. You can sneak attack and take places beyond the border cities. Unlimited uses in theory, in practic you'll rarely make more than one or two before the rest of the world declares war on you.

8) Wars:
If you sneak attack, you can only take cities you border.
If your enemy declares war on you on the same turn, can you take more then border cities?

If you both attack each other, the armies first attack each other as indicated. Does the winning army then continue the attack as normal?

8. In dual sneak attacks, armies first fight, winner attacks. Even if enemy does attack as well, it's still limited to border cities.

9) If a spy does diplomatic action does this count as a declaration of war? (I don't think it does, but I think it should).

9. Spying doesn't declare war, but it can sure provoke it.

10) If someone is building a spaceship, it will take 3 turns to build. If their opponent waits until the third turn to attack them (with Nukes ), does the production of the 3rd spaceship part end the game or do their oppenents have the 3rd turn to attack them and if succesful the spaceship is destroyed, if unsuccessful the spaceship leaves after the turn cycle and the game ends?

10. They gots to survive to the end of the turn to launch the spaceship. This is to add some challenge so that people don't hurl all their funds at the spaceship the last turn and not have to worry about defense.

11) The "University of California" allow you to "build things that you have not yet discovered the technology for, providing that someone else has". Does this mean that the person with the University of California can produce Wonders and Special Units (Nukes, SDI, Spaceship Parts) or just special units?

11. Everything, wonders included. You can also buy more expensive armies, but only a Kuciwalker would.

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In the interest of starting a new game, I think that there are several clarifications which need to be made to the rules (some of the above came up in the game).

In addition to the rules I have refered to above, others were mentioned in the game itself such as spies and defensive spies, but I don't think we reached a conclusion as to how to implement the change.

As I stated earlier and Spaced referred to, I would happily GM the next game, but I cannot start it until next week. If anyone else can start it sooner, that would be great also though.

Perhaps suggested rule changes could be posted below and then implemented in the next game??

/me

[Kuciwalker]

10) If someone is building a spaceship, it will take 3 turns to build. If their opponent waits until the third turn to attack them (with Nukes ), does the production of the 3rd spaceship part end the game or do their oppenents have the 3rd turn to attack them and if succesful the spaceship is destroyed, if unsuccessful the spaceship leaves after the turn cycle and the game ends?

10. They gots to survive to the end of the turn to launch the spaceship. This is to add some challenge so that people don't hurl all their funds at the spaceship the last turn and not have to worry about defense.

I disagree with this one.

[Skanky Burns]

I say get rid of the city caps for the different governments. As it is, as soon as you can switch to Republic there is no reason not to. Not only do all your cities count for taxation, but they all receive more. Despotism receives less per city and is capped. Monarchy receives less than Republic and is capped. They both receive dual penalties, which sucks if you are using them.

[duke o' york]

And it just makes the Acropolis (this is the Republic wonder, right?) incredibly valuable at the start of the game. If you get this, then you should have so much cash the game is entirely yours to throw away.

12. duke is immune to all nukes.

[Gamecube64]

There is a little problem with 2-way attacks. lets say to people at tech 15 attack eachother, with 222 armies and 221 armies. The second person loses all their armies, and the first hardly loses anything. Now lets say another person sends 1000 armies, and the other sends 1. The second person loses their 1 army, but the person with 1000 lose MANY armies. To make a long story short, if you send 1 army your enemy in anticipation he will lose many armies if he attacks with a large number, making it easier for you to defend. An easy and cheap exploit.

[Sparrowhawk]

Point taken and good that you bring it up, I am not sure anyone else would have noticed this.

Here is how the rules read now:

Two-way attacks
When two nations attack each other on the same turn, the armies first fight each other. Compare strength:
A1 * A1T vs. A2 *A2T
A1 = attacker 1's army size
A2 = attacker 2's army size
A1T = attacker 1's tech level
A2T = attacker 2's tech level

The loser's entire attacking army is destroyed. The winner's attacking army takes casualties based on the difference.

Casualties = Difference / Tech Level, round up.

I think the first part (calculating the winner) is fine as it reads, it is the calculating the casualties that we run into the problem (bolding added for emphasis).

For the loser, it makes sense to me that they lose their entire army, but what calculation is needed for the winner?

Could it be as simple as:
Survivors = Difference / Tech Level, round up

Where Difference = Abosulte Value[(A1 * A1T) - (A2 *A2T)}

In this way the opposite of what Gamecube refers to above would occur, if the armies were evenly matched the winner would be left with little while in a grossly overmatched battle the winner would lose little.

[Spaced Cowboy]

Originally posted by Skanky Burns
I should have sent a spy to Jonny to prevent his building stuff.

Ahem..cough...I did that, but you sabo'd that.

[Spaced Cowboy]

Originally posted by Sparrowhawk
Point taken and good that you bring it up, I am not sure anyone else would have noticed this.

Here is how the rules read now:



I think the first part (calculating the winner) is fine as it reads, it is the calculating the casualties that we run into the problem (bolding added for emphasis).

For the loser, it makes sense to me that they lose their entire army, but what calculation is needed for the winner?

Could it be as simple as:
Survivors = Difference / Tech Level, round up

Where Difference = Abosulte Value[(A1 * A1T) - (A2 *A2T)}

In this way the opposite of what Gamecube refers to above would occur, if the armies were evenly matched the winner would be left with little while in a grossly overmatched battle the winner would lose little.

Actually, that was the thought that I had when I proposed the formula. The loser has his army eliminated and the winner loses the same amount of power(army*tech) as the defender. The remaining armies go on to attack.

I do not know how we got to where we were on this one, but I've been known to not commuicate fully at times. Absolute (wow a double letter switch, yet I still understand him).

[Spaced Cowboy]

Originally posted by duke o' york
And it just makes the Acropolis (this is the Republic wonder, right?) incredibly valuable at the start of the game. If you get this, then you should have so much cash the game is entirely yours to throw away.

12. duke is immune to all nukes.

Actually it is not, because you still have to go through the nil turn to switch. Although there is never a good time for the nil turn, early in the game is not good. I found that out this game and was surprised that I was able to stay in it for so long.

Oh and regarding city limits with respect to govs. It is there to balance the cost of armies.

[:) Smiley]

to the proposed formula change for two simultaneously attacking armies.

Another idea: are the three types of governments sufficient, or do we need more?

[Kuciwalker]

Definately sufficient.