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[NO PLAYERS] PBEM 7 Map Making & Lurkers

(February 6th, 2018, 09:27)MJW (ya that one) Wrote: I don't understand. City-gifting happened in PBEM#4 and wasn't talked about. Why are people surprised?

I don't know that people are surprised.  I think the difference between the games is a matter of perspective.  In PBEM 4 that city trade was a result of the open diplo.  In this game it's not diplo shenanigans but taking game mechanics and exploiting them in...creative...manners.   mischief  I happen to agree with the viewpoint that the russia/germany trading for the territorial expansion or rome/china for free monuments & roads is a bit too exploitative.  A complete ban on city trading, though, may be too much -- I think some limited (and immediate) trading of captured cities to maintain contiguous territory might be one compromise.

What I'm curious to see is what mechanics from R&F makes it into the base game patch.  There's already been discussion about the fact that the trade route dependency on level 1 buildings will be brought to the base game via patch.  If they also bring in the change to envoy bonuses (3 envoy bonus requires level 1 building,  envoy bonus requires level 2 building) then Sulla's plan to dump all his envoys into Lisbon to retain control won't pay off with Icon_Gold as immediately as he thinks.
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Maybe city gifting is ok just forbid players from giving the city BACK again? That seems to be the issue, exploiting team civ's bonuses for partner. Just a thought...
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(February 6th, 2018, 11:33)Ianus Wrote: Maybe city gifting is ok just forbid players from giving the city BACK again? That seems to be the issue, exploiting team civ's bonuses for partner. Just a thought...

That strikes me as a good idea that gets to the heart of the problem while still permiting reasonable city gifting when necessary. Maybe you should suggest it to the players.
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That almost works. Sadly I think Russia and Germany could build each other's cities, gifting them immediately after founding. That would get both of them the extra tiles from Russia's ability at the cost of a turn's production (and probably some long settler transit times).

Using the same strategy, Rome and China would only get a free monument in Chinese cities, but would get a road to all cities.
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I can't help but wonder what happens if TheArchduke and Singaboy find out that they are direct neighbor of each other. popcorn (Actually third time already, in PBEM 2 and PBEM 4 they too were neighbors)
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More blood for us lurkers, I suppose. hammer
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What a clusterfuck.

So, first off, it is endlessly frustrating to me that Archduke is re-litigating PBEM4 months after the fact. He has framed the deal in question that game as a "city gift" to keep Singaboy alive while in fact it was a "city sale" when Singaboy was in no danger of dying soon. Moreover, due to Woden's razing of the city in question, the sale ended up having next to no impact on the ultimate outcome of that game. The situations are in no way comparable, and the fact that he's using it to justify a blatantly gamey move is really galling. This also conveniently ignores the cheesy Peace for Norway deal from that game, but sure, whatever.

Moreover, he wants to hold the game hostage over a player's opinion on PBEM4, rather than the actual in-game ruling? What?!?

PBEM4 should never have entered this discussion. The question is not whether the move in question fit site precedent, as this game is fundamentally dislike any previous Civ6 game we've run. What mattered in this equation was what other players thought. And all of them, save Emperor K, thought it was a cheesy move. Could he not see that allowing moves like that would open an endless pandora's box of free units for England, free monuments for Rome? This issue came up long ago when I was a DL for Woden and CMF, and we agreed it would be against the spirit of the game pretty quickly. But now we're apparently having to litigate against it anyway...

Second, I'll say it again, in all caps this time. THIS GAME NEEDS TO DIE. 

There is literally no positive outcome at this point. 

Side Bar: Poor Cornflakes, desperately wants a break from mapmaking to play civ to the extent that he's willing to take over a gimped civ with just to get some play time in. 

So, possible outcomes: 

1. Sulla/Singaboy win. 
 - Archduke and possibly other players view it as illegitimate because Sullla came in and wrecked the vet/noob conceit by taking over from BrickAstley.

2. Archduke/EmperorK win. 
 - Their victory is undermined by the fact that they abused city-gifting and alliance mechanics to get extra tiles for Germany. 

3. Cornflakes/Japper007 win. 
 - Their victory is undercut by questions of the punishment leveled against MikeForAll for cheating (was it severe enough) or Cornflakes's mapmaker knowledge. 

4. Woden/CMF win. 
 - Their victory is probably predicated on overrunning Cornflakes and Japper007, an obvious case of the cheating punishment benefiting some players over others. 

There's no hope for a positive outcome, no possible team's win that will be untainted. This is PB7 again, and we kept that game going for ages without fixing the underlying issues to the community's detriment. There's no way this game finishes at this point. Better to just kill it now.
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(February 6th, 2018, 09:45)suboptimal Wrote:
(February 6th, 2018, 09:27)MJW (ya that one) Wrote: I don't understand. City-gifting happened in PBEM#4 and wasn't talked about. Why are people surprised?

I don't know that people are surprised.  I think the difference between the games is a matter of perspective.  In PBEM 4 that city trade was a result of the open diplo.  In this game it's not diplo shenanigans but taking game mechanics and exploiting them in...creative...manners.   mischief  I happen to agree with the viewpoint that the russia/germany trading for the territorial expansion or rome/china for free monuments & roads is a bit too exploitative.  A complete ban on city trading, though, may be too much -- I think some limited (and immediate) trading of captured cities to maintain contiguous territory might be one compromise.

What I'm curious to see is what mechanics from R&F makes it into the base game patch.  There's already been discussion about the fact that the trade route dependency on level 1 buildings will be brought to the base game via patch.  If they also bring in the change to envoy bonuses (3 envoy bonus requires level 1 building,  envoy bonus requires level 2 building) then Sulla's plan to dump all his envoys into Lisbon to retain control won't pay off with Icon_Gold as immediately as he thinks.
This is a nice post. 

oledavy:
I refused to comment on the PB7 game (zero posts). Why? Double-moves + LP =LOL. Gaspar trashed that game and I had nothing more to add. 

1. Sullla/Singaboy wins.
It's the other players fault for not banning dedicated lurkers. 
2. Archduke/Emperor K wins.
Who cares about a few extra tiles?
3. Cornflakes/Japper wins
lol
4. Woden/CMF
If they didn't cheat in the first play MikeForAll would have sucked so bad that they would have overwhelmed them at once and would have an even greater advantage. So the cheating actually helped the other players. If the other players don't like Woden/CMF getting free stuff it's their fault for playing with unverified players.

We wouldn't restart if Mike/Japper just sucked and the game would be even more imbalanced. So it just doesn't make sense to restart here. Sullla made some other arguments but I don't really think about them because a restart shouldn't happen.   

Your attack against Archduke is too much. He messed up because he didn't consider the potential of city-gifting in teamers. He didn't break any rules.
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(February 6th, 2018, 18:42)oledavy Wrote: What a clusterfuck.

[...]

Second, I'll say it again, in all caps this time. THIS GAME NEEDS TO DIE. 

[...]

There's no hope for a positive outcome, no possible team's win that will be untainted. This is PB7 again, and we kept that game going for ages without fixing the underlying issues to the community's detriment. There's no way this game finishes at this point. Better to just kill it now.

Yes, but it is a clusterfuck that the players have elected to continue playing.  I know nothing about PB7 (other than it's a Pitboss game, the 7th one that was organized, involved Civ IV and, apparently, was also a clusterfuck) but sometimes history needs to repeat itself a few times before the lessons (if any) sink in [see also: Suboptimal Wages War].  If your opinion of this game needing to end for the benefit of the community is that strong, perhaps post it in the tech thread and gauge their opinion. 

As for me, I'm curious to see how Cornflakes, even with full map and lurker knowledge, pulls off any sort of recovery from the crappy situation he willingly went into.  I'm curious to see how the Woden/CML team, both of whom admit to builderitis, wage war beyond their initial skirmish.  I'm curious to see what sort of army/navy balance is struck by all the teams.  There's a lot of game left and it's going to be interesting.  Let's keep the flamethrowers and howitizers confined to the player threads.  Unless, of course, you're using the former to make more popcorn.  In that case I think there's some beer around here somewhere.   toast

@MJW: thumbsup
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It doesn't matter who wins the game. The winner is only important insofar as it makes the game more interesting for the players while it is unclear. The important part is that they have fun while playing the game. If that happens I'm sure they'll call it a good outcome.
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