Tournament rules: Allow Stockpile Energy in the queues?

[Tau Ceti]

As we know, SMAC is buggy when it comes to Stockpile Energy. If you build a facility and your construction queue is empty, the game automatically inserts Stockpile Energy and counts it as income in the same turn, thus essentially letting you produce twice and giving you some ill-gotten energy credits. The same thing happens if you manually insert Stockpile Energy into your build queue after a unit, but in this case it is not automatic.

Due to the potentially different effects depending on player preference, most PBEMs have made a rule to cover this specific situation. The current tournament rule, prohibiting the insertion of Stockpile Energy in the build queues, has been a bone of contention for some. When I first heard about the bug, the current rule was my suggested solution, and the only comments I received back then were positive. However, it appears that the Apolyton tournament games are pretty much the only ones that use this rule, so I thought I could put it to a vote. The two options are explained below.

• Keep the current rule
  Prohibit the use of Stockpile Energy in build queues.
  Allows the player to keep the queues empty with no negative effects, thus being the least intrusive option. Is exploitation of a bug, but only through not actively avoiding it. Slightly favours facility builders over unit builders. Players who wish to use queues for their intended purpose can do so, but only if all but the last element in the list are units.
• Allow Stockpile energy in queues
  Some players like to insert Stockpile Energy after a unit to avoid accidentally building more units of the same type. This option allows them to do so. Forces players to use Stockpile Energy or lose out on a great amount of credits over the course of a game. Is active exploitation of a bug. Slightly favours low energy, high production factions like the Hive (and Gaians, Drones to a lesser extent). Players who wish to use queues for their intended purpose can do so, but will lose out on Stockpile Energy every single time, losing a lot of credits.

There is also a third logical option: forcing non-empty queues after facilities. This would make the game behave the way it should, never giving additional energy, not skewing any balance and letting players use production queues properly without penalty. However, it forces players never to leave their queues empty and has therefore been extremely unpopular. Due to potential difficulties in determining a majority, this option is therefore not included in the poll, but strong supporters can post here and try to convert people if they wish.

This poll will run for two weeks. Let the discussion begin!

[knowhow2]

I vote for allow stockpile in queues.

[mark13]

I think in tournament games, it should be disallowed - simply to ensure a level-playing field. The ideal solution would be to disallow empty queues after facilities - but I agree that the PIA factor will be too high.

The main reason for my argument is that it gives a *massive* boost to the low income, high energy factions (such as the Hive). I'm in a game right now where insertion is allowed - and because of my focus on high minerals (which I believe to be necessary for the Hive) my income per turn has effectively tripled. This is completely unacceptable in my book, and makes such factions too powerful.

[H0bbes]

I vote to allow the queue.

[H0bbes]

I vote to allow the queue.

[H0bbes]

I vote to allow the queue.

[Flubber]

I'm on the fence but

I can't help but agree with Tau that this is an obvious bug and we should not intentionally exploit it. Also as a matter of balance it would seem to give a greater cash advantage to a high support faction like the Hive. Crawling minerals becomes even a greater advantage-- If you can build a unit a turn, you would get a unit and the cash EVERY TURN. High efficiency factions might be advantaged as well as they are better able to emphasize science when their cash problems are solved by this.

The only good thing about it is that more cash speeds gameplay as players can rush more stuff. But if that is seen as desirable, it is simpler to just start with more cash.

[WhiteElephants]

I was going to say allow it, but Mark13 makes a good point particularly concerning Yang, Miriam, and Domia. I would think these factions would be the ones pumping out units and raking in the credits at the same time.

[Rastapopoulos]

My opinion: disallow it, for the reasons stated above by others.
Question, though: who is actually enforcing it, or put it another way: what keeps a player from actually doing it (in the beginning of the game, while he is sure he hasn't been infiltrated)
I guess there is no way to control it, so why not say: allow stockpile energy in queues until a governor has been elected, effectively up to the point where it can be controlled...? And that's in early midgame, so there won't be any serious unbalancing until then.
It might even be fun to allow the governor to allow or disallow the use of stockpile energy in queues as he chooses, thus giving him another power on top of the ones he already has.
Just an idea.....

[big_canuk]

It is obviously a bug, and in SP one can do with it what one wants. In SP, bases "pop up" when the build queue is empty. In MP, they don't. In MP, I find it easier to make sure stockpile is in the queue of every base at turn end, rather than having to scrutinize every base for units with 10 or less mins, that I might want to change to something else.

There is a side-effect of allowing it in MP. Everyone gets more energy (in proportion to their mineral output). This makes the game go faster. Anything that makes MP games go faster is welcome.

I vote for lifting the restriction. (allowing stockpile in the queue)

[big_canuk]

dp, oops

[Googlie]

There is a feature you can turn on in "preferences" called "Stop when units completed" This pops up the base screen when a unit is completed, with stockpile inserted by the computer.

In scenario tests, I found that this has the same effect as manually inserting 'stockpile energy' in the build queue - you get the unit completed and you get the full energy accrual for that base that turn.

So I'm not sure it's necessarily a bug (or if it is, it's just a 'sequence' bug in that the order for events being transacted generates the 'bug' - but it does for facilities too.

So to create a level playing field, I vote to let players insert stockpile energy in the queue if they wish (or use the "stop when ..." feature, which can't be picked up by the governor or the empath guild)

[knowhow2]

Rasta.... makes a point with the "not able to control if everybody actually are following the rules" thing. As long as no one have infiltrated you or been elected governer the rule could be disregarded. ....
so it would be more fair too all players but it's like instead of cathing the cheaters lets all become cheaters to level things (a similar debate have been going on about illegal drugs for sports)

[Googlie]

b_c is making a good point (to me via ICQ) that he doesn't think the 'stop" feature is active in Multiplayer games. I'm pretty certain I have set up some scenarioed games with the "stop for units built", "stop for Golden Age warning", etc - but of course I don't play in any of me scenarioed games.

Any players out there experiencing that (the Forum Wars ones wouldn't have those 'stops')?

G.

[Tau Ceti]

Considering that none of the other "stop for"-options work, I would be very surprised if this one did. In any case, I fail to see how that would change the bug status - you would still get your production counted twice. (And yes, it is a sequencing bug. The game does all production first, then goes back to check economy; at that point, a number of your bases are stockpiling and get counted. Under standard settings in SP, you get no benefit, because the "stop for" settings are active and let you change production before energy is counted.)

Now for some arguments:

"It is more convenient to have Stockpile Energy as a marker" - only because you have developed your playstyle that way. I, for one, have not, and find this a fairly weak argument. There are so many other ways to keep track of production - for example, the message box with all the turn's events and the fact that a newly built unit plays a sound effect the first time it is activated (at which point you can simply hit enter to get into the city screen and change the production of you like).

"It cannot be controlled" - if you look at the other rules, you will find that most of them cannot be controlled - at least not unless they are done on a grand scale and very blatantly. How should I be able to tell if someone has done an SE flip-flop to gain extra minerals when cashing a crawler? How can I check that none of the others ever use the right-click menu to execute an illegal airdrop? Breaches of the Stockpile Energy rule would actually be some of the most obvious breaches you could get. Yes, it is invisible in the early game, but that is when the benefits of using it are smallest - with just a few, low-production bases. No big deal if someone is so desperate to cheat.

"It makes the games go faster, which is good" - I tend to disagree. Not everything that makes a game go faster is good. (I actually think the game benefits from Tech Stagnation, but that is somewhat beside the point.) The games last so long anyway that an extra turn or five are no big deal. The most critical time where acceleration is beneficial is at the start, and that acceleration can be more fairly achieved through CMN action. If the price of acceleration is skewing faction balance (see mark13's example) then acceleration is bad.

It probably does not come as a surprise that I support the current rule.

[big_canuk]

First off, let me say, I play and am happy to play both ways. This is not a game destroying feature, and is strictly a matter of preference.

Originally posted by Tau Ceti

"It is more convenient to have Stockpile Energy as a marker" - only because you have developed your playstyle that way. I, for one, have not, and find this a fairly weak argument. There are so many other ways to keep track of production - for example, the message box with all the turn's events and the fact that a newly built unit plays a sound effect the first time it is activated (at which point you can simply hit enter to get into the city screen and change the production of you like).

I agree, strictly a matter of preference.

Originally posted by Tau Ceti

"It cannot be controlled" - if you look at the other rules, you will find that most of them cannot be controlled - at least not unless they are done on a grand scale and very blatantly. How should I be able to tell if someone has done an SE flip-flop to gain extra minerals when cashing a crawler? How can I check that none of the others ever use the right-click menu to execute an illegal airdrop? Breaches of the Stockpile Energy rule would actually be some of the most obvious breaches you could get. Yes, it is invisible in the early game, but that is when the benefits of using it are smallest - with just a few, low-production bases. No big deal if someone is so desperate to cheat.

Agreed.

Originally posted by Tau Ceti

"It makes the games go faster, which is good" - I tend to disagree. Not everything that makes a game go faster is good. (I actually think the game benefits from Tech Stagnation, but that is somewhat beside the point.) The games last so long anyway that an extra turn or five are no big deal. The most critical time where acceleration is beneficial is at the start, and that acceleration can be more fairly achieved through CMN action. If the price of acceleration is skewing faction balance (see mark13's example) then acceleration is bad.

Here i don't quite agree. I also think tech stag is great, because it allows more time to actually use the techs before the next one comes along and makes it obsolete, or before the game finishes, 'cause by the end you are at 3 techs/turn. Stockpile in the queue doesn't make techs come faster. It has, in fact, a similar effect to tech stag. It gives you more ecs, which gives you more resources to *do something* with your techs once you get them.

The faction balance is a factor, but is far outweighed by the "playstyle" balance. Stockpile in the queue favours players (and to a lesser extent factions), which have high mineral outputs. This can be any faction. It has been said, that Hive and Drones are more favoured, but in fact, if I was the Spartans, I would want my industry to be bigger, cause it would have to be, to make up for my negative industry. Drones and Hive, can maybe build industry faster (maybe not than Morgan, or UoP), if they want to. It is more a factor of playstyle, than faction.

Ecs are *good*. Allow it.

[Rastapopoulos]

Well, yes.
When I was proposing to allow it until the governor may control it I really wasn't thinking: let's all become cheaters since we can't control the cheaters anyway. I realize there are a number of bugs we can't stop people from exploiting and we'll simply have to rely on everyone's fairplay attitude which I'm sure is highly developped among players at Apolyton.
(Sidestory: I am at this very moment exploiting the stockpile bug against a friend I am opposing in Mp outside Apolyton. He doesn't know the feature and I am laughing inside everytime he tells me: where do you get all those ec ? I am checking your balance every turn and calculating what you should have next turn and everytime it's more than it should be. We are at war, so I'm building a lot of units, some bases one per turn, so there is a lot of extra cash. Still loosing the game, though, once we're done I'll tell him about it.)
Anyway, I was rather proposing what I did in order to let the Govn'er have an influence on a new level, some sort of meta-level really. If this poll turns out to be close to a fifty-fifty situation (which it looks like at the moment), it may be a good idea lo leave that decision up to the Gov. He can then consider all those pros and cons we're discussing here and find his own decision. Which can be reverted by the next, of course.
But if the poll shows a clear majority, then one should go along with that.

[mark13]

The faction balance is a factor, but is far outweighed by the "playstyle" balance. Stockpile in the queue favours players (and to a lesser extent factions), which have high mineral outputs. This can be any faction. It has been said, that Hive and Drones are more favoured, but in fact, if I was the Spartans, I would want my industry to be bigger, cause it would have to be, to make up for my negative industry. Drones and Hive, can maybe build industry faster (maybe not than Morgan, or UoP), if they want to. It is more a factor of playstyle, than faction.

....which is precisely my point - whether it pertains to faction choice or playing style (or a combination of both) is neither here nor there. Are you saying that Firaxis intended this bug to make high-mineral production a more viable policy? The fact is this is an unintended game feature, that unbalances the game - therefore, it should be disallowed. It is as simple as that.

[big_canuk]

Originally posted by mark13

... Are you saying that Firaxis intended this bug to make high-mineral production a more viable policy? The fact is this is an unintended game feature, that unbalances the game - therefore, it should be disallowed. It is as simple as that.

Of course this is a bug. But bugs can have good consequences. Of course this is unbalancing in SP against the AI. I can't see however, how an option equally available to all human players is "unbalancing". Is that an unfortunate choice of words? If you mean you don't prefer it, because it doesn't fit with your playstyle, fine. Don't label it unbalancing, because it is not.

[mark13]

Of course it's unbalancing, because it gives an advantage to a certain playstyle/faction choice which was not intended in the game! It's a bit like having a bug whereby, say, every faction started with IndAuto. The rules are the same for everybody, but it would unbalance the game, of course, and lead all factions to use the advantages of IndAuto from the get-go, instead of just the high-tech factions.

See my first post in this thread for an example whereby th rule is hugely unbalancing. Of course, the rules were the same for all, and everybody else used the SE bug as well - but the sheer power of Hive industry, the fact that builds were a lot more frequent, and the low income of the Hive faction generally meant an enormous unbalancing effect.

[big_canuk]

OK, Mark, I see where you are coming from. I guess the Canadians just define unbalance differently. You mean unbalance as: change the balance of the power of playstyle/faction in a way unintended by the game designers. I agree with that.

I define unbalance as: change the game to make it less playable. There I disgree. Stockpile in the queue makes the game more enjoyable and playable against other humans in MP, because it gives all factions more ecs, so you can take advantage of tech better. You can do more *stuff*.

Ecs are *good*. Lift the restriction

[mark13]

Well, I've always defined 'unbalanced' as an unfair advantage to a particular playing style/civ. Yes, you can do more 'stuff', but if it unbalances the game, surely that's got to take precedence! This is a tournament, after all....and the first rule of thumb has to be to ensure fair play.

[big_canuk]

I respect your opinion Mark, but I fail to see how an option available to all is unfair. Sure it gives advantage to a particular playstyle/faction choice, but that choice is available to all at the beginning of the game. "Unfair", would be an advantage for one unavailable to another.
Stockpile in the queue is a matter of preference. You may prefer an energy emphasis, so prefer not to have it. That is a perfectly valid, and possibly superior approach. I prefer a minerals emphasis, so I like stockpile in the queue. I'm just trying to show the other benefits(which I get to a lesser extent anyway, even without stockpile in the queue), which may encourage others to try it too.
The "able to do more stuff" argument is real. It makes the game more interesting, when one has more ecs with which to work(stockpile or not).

[mark13]

Big C - a mineral emphasis strategy is fine - however, when one of the major perks of that strategy is a bug in the game which tournament rules allow you to exploit it seems a little....well, unfair to me. Dunno - that's my opinion (and I'm sure Tau would like to see a few other opinions other than us two ranting on about it ).

[buster]

While it may to some degree shift the balance of powers between the factions a bit towards the mineral approach - I personally don't think it is significant.

I like the speeding up thing, but then of course we could start playing MP games with no AIs on talent.

Personally I want it forbidden as I find it annoying to have to go through my cities to double-check that I did not forget this.

So on the sole basis of lazyness I vote no.

[johndmuller]

I was sorry when I first heard about this bug because my playstyle in SP had developed into making extensive use of the queues and knowing about the bug changes everything. I used the queues in SP to cut down on MM and as a way of keeping track of what I wanted to do with each base without having to take notes if I was going to play the game over a period of time.

All that stuff is largely irrelevant when we are talking about MP because unless RL is really giving you a hard go of it, when you only take a turn a day plus or minus, looking at each base is not such a big deal, in fact it seems like a good idea and keeping at least some notes seems just about necessary. Therefore, it seems to me that the PIA factor should not a compelling reason to dismiss the "Mandatory use of the queue after facilities" (unavailable option 3 - unless you are using the butterfly ballot, in which case it is on your 2nd monitor, in between choices 1 & 2) if that is how to make the game work the way we think the game was supposed to work.

That is the real point here IMhO: Do we really know how they were playing it when they calibrated the game play? If they were using a lot of queues, If they weren't using them at all, who knows? Would they have calibrated anything differently if they had known about (and maybe even fixed) the bug?

The trouble with this bug is that you can't really afford to ignore it in MP, both because you might be violating the rules in some cases and also because you might be giving up an advantage in other cases. The current rule pretty much forces you not to use the queue, in the case of facilities, to your advantage; in the case of units, to your disadvantage. Allowing Stockpile Energy after units would just as much force everyone to do that too. In fact whatever the rule, we would be just as forced to do one thing or another as we are now, even if the rule were to do whatever the hell we wanted to do.

So apparently I'm still ****** off about this after all this time, because I don't think that any of these solutions are any good.

What we need is Option 4: Make Firaxis or Brian Reynolds FIX THE D*** THING! or else we'll . . . .

So There.

[SITS]

I vote to keep the current rule. I'm playing in a game where the rules have been agreed by all and I find it a major pain in the ass to make sure I include it in the queue but I have to do it otherwise I won't be able to compete but I would rather not.

I do have a question about it - if I overpay when rush building do I get extra credits from the stockpile and do I have those extra minerals available to me for my next build?

[mark13]

^bump^

JDM - I hope I'm not going to disappoint you too much when I say that's not going to happen. Unfortunately, the bug exists, and we have to live with it.

The MM factor is a real pain, IMO - simply because most people are in 8-10 (or more ) PBEMs, so when you get them in the morning you typically have a batch. So you can imagine the extra playing tie is involved with the theoretical option 3. Say you have 6 turns to play that day. If half of those are in the micromanagement central period of the endgame, you're looking at adding at least 45 mins/1 hour extra to play your batch of turns. Plus, it makes the game less fun, something I'm sure Sid and Brian didn't intend.

SITS - if you overpay when rushbuilding, you lose te excess minerals - the maximum number of minerals that can be carried over from surplus production on the last build is 10 though. Just to give you an example:

My defensive probe team costs 20 minerals. My city produces 6 production/turn - if I pay for all 20 minerals, then 6 minerals will carry over to my next production. However, if I overpay to 24 minerals, I will lose the excess 4 minerals, and still only have 6 surplus.

Likewise, if my city produces 15 minerals/turn, and I pay for all 20 for the defensive probe, I will only have 10 surplus to the next production (as that is the maximum number that can be carried over). Bear in mind that Stockpile Energy makes absolutely no difference to this - it just adds half your mineral production to your energy reserves each turn.

[SITS]

Originally posted by mark13

SITS - if you overpay when rushbuilding, you lose te excess minerals - the maximum number of minerals that can be carried over from surplus production on the last build is 10 though. Just to give you an example:

My defensive probe team costs 20 minerals. My city produces 6 production/turn - if I pay for all 20 minerals, then 6 minerals will carry over to my next production. However, if I overpay to 24 minerals, I will lose the excess 4 minerals, and still only have 6 surplus.

Likewise, if my city produces 15 minerals/turn, and I pay for all 20 for the defensive probe, I will only have 10 surplus to the next production (as that is the maximum number that can be carried over). Bear in mind that Stockpile Energy makes absolutely no difference to this - it just adds half your mineral production to your energy reserves each turn.

Thanks Mark but I'm a little confused. Do you mean that you cannot carry production over if you use the Stockpile bug? Because I read in Vel's excellent strategy guide that it is an idea to overpay for rushbuilding so you get the 10 mins boost for the next thing you produce. Does this make sense?

[mark13]

I kind of expeted that last post to get that sort of reaction I'll try and explain it a little fuller now:

What Vel means when he says overpay is not actually to pay for more minerals than the build itself costs. For instance, in the aforementioned exampe of the probe defender, it makes no sense to pay any more than the base 20 credits - the excess production is simply lost.

Instead, what he means is that you should pay more than is necessary for the build to be complete in 1 turn. I'll try another example:

Let's say I'm building a research hospital, which costs 120 minerals. I've already got 10 minerals for that build.

My city is producing 17 minerals/turn. This means, for economic rush-bulding, I should make partial payment for all but the last 17 minerals - all but 34 credits. The remaining 110 minerals will cost 220 credits, meaning I should pay 220-34 = 186 credits for the rush. This will give me the build next turn, but without carrying any minerals over to the next build.

What Vel means by 'overpaying' is to pay for all but 7 minerals. This would cost 220- (7x2) = 206 credits, but means 10 minerals would carry over to the next build, making it much cheaper to rush next turn, instead of having to wait for the 10 minerals to be produced. Of course, there's no point rushing any more than that, as 10 minerals is the max that can be carried over to your next build.

Note that in both cases, you still get the full benefit of the Stockpile bug, while carrying your surplus minerals over to your next build.