"January Game" Setup & TTT

[JeroenDStout]

Not technically a 2v2 but a game where alliances are encouraged. So if you want you can try to hook up with everybody. The only limitation (house rule) is that you cannot win with an alliance of more than 2 human players. Nobody is forced to ally, but if a player goes for the war path the other 3 can unite against this player.

Goes without sayin', mate. I can't imagine still alive SMAC players going 3 against 1 or even 3 against 2 if those 3 are good. We are all gentlemen and ladies here. Actually, it is my personal rule that I concede defeat only to one player if there are no pre-set alliances. Otherwise, 2 reasonable players early allied can dominate virtually any game, even a 5-player one. I don't need any specific house rule here, but let's have some class, saying to noone in particular as we all surely have it. I have this impression that you two are friends so I thought I'm gonna look forward to ally with Misotu. If we want to truly start out neutral, let's stress it from the beginning. Of course, ganging up on the strongest one is a thing I'm always for.

Eadee and I know one-another, yeah, but we won't specifically team up because of it (maybe we won't because of it ). The house rule about victory is more to stop people from going 'let's all team up against the AI and build until turn 350' which, er, just feels a bit empty to me.

I can see the problem with Cloud-Base, but not with Empath Guild.

It's all about infiltration. It should be costly as hell and it's not for the one player who's got EG. A custom from 'poly times. I'm not gonna insist on everything I suggest so I can back down here but please do know I consider this Project super important and I'd definitely beeline to it if not for that pesky blind research (see how handy it comes already?)

As far as choppers go... I think by the time choppers show up, and there is war, it is already a heavy air war with great casualties. I don't think choppers at this point really change much, they just speed up the game. I also just think with the right strategy you can make sure you can intercept or prevent choppers from attacking (air superiority, AAA, interceptors, SAM rovers, &c).

AAA is off the basic tech lines, SAM rovers prove no resistance against the chop & drop strategy. I just wanted to avoid one of two inevitable things (1) aircraft slugfest, or (2) "I got D:AP/MMI first so I won this game, thank you very much".

Just recently we had a game when it was all strategic growth up to some point and then I threw the towel shortly after. There was literally no point in coming to the battlefield. As long as airpower is strong as it is, there are no super cunning tactical shenanigans you can employ, it's all about who can throw more aircraft at the front line. I'd like to see some use for navy besides exploration/scouting and for infantry besides airborne base taking. Let's talk about it more perhaps...?

Eh, eh, I suppose, but the EG costs about as much as six naval probe teams. I actually never really built it until a recent game and never needed.

I still disagree about what you say about aircraft, but I think we just had different experiences and expectations. Shall we perhaps say no choppers against cities and no Cloud Base? To be honest, I'd rather meet in the middle (and play!) than argue the rules

- caught probing requires notifying the victim; fair enough, but the issue we discussed here on this board - do you have to say why we have vendetta now? Can you play dumb about it? (the replies here were inconclusive to me but I got this impression that people think it's okay that I tell you 'uh oh, we have vendetta now' and then pretend I don't know why)

- please tell me about the bugs about tiles in the fog of war; I thought I know most of them, but not these

- first time I hear about 'suspicion towards a player going rogue'; how do we go about that? what do you have in mind?

- You have to say vendetta because of probe team actions. (That way if you try to frame someone and it backfires they won't know you tried to frame them, only that you used probe teams somewhere.)

- You can zoom out all the way (the whole map fitting on the screen), which reveals coast lines in the unrevealed tiles. You can also hover or click on tiles, which shows whether there are unknown cities; and pathing units into fog of war tiles will reveal the terrain because they use the optimal way and avoid opponent cities (even when unknown). They're not the most useful and/or known of exploits

- I just mean that if any player starts having the largest army and is preparing for war, the other three would feel (under the U.N. charter!) obliged to stop this player. In the early game that threat of eradication could be enough to stop little acts of war. It's not really a hard rule, more a guideline.

[Misotu]

I think it's worth discussing the rules a bit since every PBEM is quite a big investment in time, but I'm keen to get up and running! My votes, for what it's worth:

Empath Guild: I've never built this in an MP game, but a recent PBEM showed me exactly why many people like to ban it. Of course, it's only really the same as Planetary Governor, which is similarly over-powered!

Blind research:  Frustrating as hell but it makes MP so much more interesting so I'm happy with that even though I never get IA or MMI if there's any other possibility whatsoever   

Cloudbase: I agree with banning it, for the reasons given, and I'm fine with no choppers against bases too.

Patch: I have Yitzi installed too and find it very good. It hasn't caused me any problems running the game either.

Thanks for the clarification on fog of war. I didn't understand that either and am happy to confirm that I won't do it now I know what it is 

I'd rather keep the game to four players if possible, just for turn rate.

I saw that you said that if you send another player a PM you have to notify them that you've done so but I'm puzzled about how to do that - does that mean you have to announce a PM on the turn tracking thread? Or have I completely misunderstood?

I assume that communicating with other players before contact in-game is prohibited? 

[Kirov]

And one more thing - the Thinker difficulty?

[Kirov]

And one thing more - I know a player who's committed to fast turnover - Vishniac. If we want a 5-some, he'll be doing his turns within 24 hours. Putting it out there just in case.

[Misotu]

I don't mind Thinker difficulty, but I'd also be fine with Transcend and really the AI needs all the help it can get.

Whatever    Looking forward to the game - I haven't played Gaia in MP for years and years and years ... and you can probably tell from my avatar that I'm very fond of them, even though they can't run FM, which is definitely a bit of a shame ...

[Eadee]

I think it's worth discussing the rules a bit since every PBEM is quite a big investment in time, but I'm keen to get up and running!

Well, I don't need a big discussion, I'm a low-maintenance player, I can adapt to almost any rules you people want.

Empath Guild: I've never built this in an MP game, but a recent PBEM showed me exactly why many people like to ban it. Of course, it's only really the same as Planetary Governor, which is similarly over-powered!

I think I lost my last game against Jeroen also because of the Empath Guild, no reason for me to ban it, but if you two insist on doing so, and I abstain... Jeroen, they got a majority.

Blind research:  Frustrating as hell but it makes MP so much more interesting so I'm happy with that even though I never get IA or MMI if there's any other possibility whatsoever   

The RNG for random research screwed me as well pretty hard last game, but I think you all are probably far more expierienced players. And YOU will screw me over for SURE if we turn blind research off.

Cloudbase: I agree with banning it, for the reasons given, and I'm fine with no choppers against bases too.

I don't even remember what it does (airbase in every city I guess?). So since I abstain and you two vote it out. Leave it out.

Patch: I have Yitzi installed too and find it very good. It hasn't caused me any problems running the game either.

Ok, seems everyone can go with Yitzi's patch. Sounds good to go.

Thanks for the clarification on fog of war. I didn't understand that either and am happy to confirm that I won't do it now I know what it is 

Same for me.

I'd rather keep the game to four players if possible, just for turn rate.

At this point I'm more afraid of the duration this pre-game-discussion will take if we take in another player or two.

I saw that you said that if you send another player a PM you have to notify them that you've done so but I'm puzzled about how to do that - does that mean you have to announce a PM on the turn tracking thread? Or have I completely misunderstood?

The game pop-ups for communication between players is simply not reliable. If you send someone a message without making an offer, the other player won't be noticed at all. Its just smarter to inform someone if you sent an ingame-message so they do not miss it for several turns until you wonder why noone replies.

I assume that communicating with other players before contact in-game is prohibited?

No ingame communication before meeting the other players faction (or buying their comlink frequencies or stuff), correct. Casual conversation outside of the game without naming details is fine.

And one more thing - the Thinker difficulty?

Well, usually I play on Librarian difficulty. I'm fine with going up to thinker, but if we go to transcend I might get pretty annoyed by all those drones that pop up. Since the majority of factions will be player-factions I don't think it will make the game "too easy" for anyone to enjoy it.
If you people feel otherwise we can go up to transcend, but please don't expect me to be any threat in such a game, since I'll be busy keeping my base operations up like all the time.

And one thing more - I know a player who's committed to fast turnover - Vishniac. If we want a 5-some, he'll be doing his turns within 24 hours. Putting it out there just in case.

See my answer to Misotu, I'm really more afraid of extended discussion over game rules then about the turns/day. So if he is picky about the rules I'd like to decline kindly, if he can go with almost anything like me, then I'm fine with it.

[Misotu]

Eadee, thanks for the explanation about the messages. I completely misunderstood. So if you send an in-game message without an actual offer, it doesn't pop up. I didn't know this - I generally avoid using the in-game stuff as far as possible because it increases the upload file size massively over time. This is good to know 

And I'd like to get going too ... I'm not too worried about the settings as long as I know what they are ...

[JeroenDStout]

I think I lost my last game against Jeroen also because of the Empath Guild, no reason for me to ban it, but if you two insist on doing so, and I abstain... Jeroen, they got a majority.

I'll actually respond properly tomorrow (though most is decided, I believe!), but I just want to correct this because of my honour!

I had an infiltration in your faction on MY 2185, then just before MY 2206 you rush-bought the Citizen's Defence Force. I knew you were building the Empath Guild so I switched to that instead. I think you would have had an advantage by getting it but to me the Empath Guild was only worth something because 1) it was better than wasting minerals and 2) I know it might really annoy you if I stole it.

[Misotu]

Your honour is preserved   

And your sense of humour. Mind you, the last time I built a little SP just to annoy someone, just, you know, for the craic, he eventually made me pay for it in spades. There I was, building away and only 100 turns or so away from transcending peacefully, and he came up with a planet buster or six. Some people have *no* sense of humour ...

Mentioning no names, but you know who you are Kirov   

[JeroenDStout]

Haha, thank you I'll keep my eyes open for those busters, too 

OK, responding anyway, since I am already here

I still think Empath Guild is weaker than most secret projects (Defence Force, Command Nexus, Cloning Vats, &c, surely all are better) but if you really dislike it so much 

In my view the Transcend difficulty is when the game is just being mean rather than hard; the AI cheating also just gets a bit annoying. Hence my choice for Thinker, which I think we can agree on?

Beyond clarification per Eadee above, this is the tally so far. Please correct me if you really disagree:

- Copters: No attacking against cities
- Cloudbase: Banned
- Empath Guild: Only if you really want it banned
- Blind research: No change (stays on)
- Players: if Vishniac agrees with all the rules we'll be 5, otherwise 4
- Difficulty: stays at Thinker
- Patch: Yitzi

I saw that you said that if you send another player a PM you have to notify them that you've done so but I'm puzzled about how to do that - does that mean you have to announce a PM on the turn tracking thread? Or have I completely misunderstood?

Probably better if you send it to them via some private message if you want to keep it a secret you sent it. The interface only takes 3 lines of text so it should not take too much space.

[Kirov]

OK, I back down on EG, let's see how it works. Let it stay. At worst, I'll get to say 'said so' a lot.

Game difficulty - fine by me, but you need to tell me what the actual changes are. I remember the number of drones and SE price. Anything else? Artificial Idiots only get idioter, I presume?

Guys, I must say your impatience puzzles me. This is SMAC PBEM, for god's sake. No matter your turnover, before we finish this, Donald [Sleezebag] will have been on all dollar bills of all nominations. The other game we've finished recently was started in May 2013. Of course, you can count on me, however, I have to start with saying I'm away this weekend.

I'm thinking about native life set to average for Deedee balance purposes but oh well, I will be that guy again.

The only real faction choice is Morgan, so let it be. Please don't beat me up.

[Kirov]

Mentioning no names, but you know who you are Kirov   

First and foremost, your humble servant. I thought you wanted to be entertained! And now people will get wrong impression about me. Sometimes words can hurt as much as planet busters, dear Misotu. Well, in a way.

[JeroenDStout]

Guys, I must say your impatience puzzles me. This is SMAC PBEM, for god's sake. No matter your turnover, before we finish this, Donald [Sleezebag] will have been on all dollar bills of all nominations. The other game we've finished recently was started in May 2013. Of course, you can count on me, however, I have to start with saying I'm away this weekend.

You'll have to excuse me and Eadee, we are young and need our time for being up to no good!

The only real faction choice is Morgan, so let it be. Please don't beat me up.

OK, I have set you as Morgan. May I ask what is your timezone? That's just for my mental safe-keeping.

Also, since I am making a video of this, may I refer to you as Kirov inside the game/text? That way players might know should we ever play again or... find out who that six planet buster legend is.

[Eadee]

still mad can't mount rovers with planetbusters

[Kirov]

You'll have to excuse me and Eadee, we are young and need our time for being up to no good!

Ah, back in my century nobody hurried anywhere and people took their time with their turns...

OK, I have set you as Morgan. May I ask what is your timezone? That's just for my mental safe-keeping.

It's Warsaw, buddy, GMT +1. Misotu, I see that you stay in Spain for good? No coming back to the Rainy Isle anytime soon?

Also, since I am making a video of this, may I refer to you as Kirov inside the game/text? That way players might know should we ever play again or... find out who that six planet buster legend is.

I deny everything! I have nothing to hide, but how much will there be in the videos? Is it one video after we're done or are you going to upload something while we still play and we're supposed not to watch? How much do you want for not showing my true colours to the world? Is it in Euros? And it was only one teeny tiny planet buster!