I know it has been said a hundred times before, but i say it again.

[kc1000]

I think the biggest thing missing from civ III is an in game editor. I spent countless hours in Alpha Centauri turning on the editor and building colony pods all over the place and completely stomping out the enemy ai. That is what made the game replayable in my opinion. All of these gamers who claim that they never used the cheat mode (and this is my opinion), I bet 95% of them are lying. All of these self righteous people that claim trainers are a crutch of full of it. As far as I,m concerned, once I play through the game a couple of times without cheating, cheating becomes the main reason to replay, not that I completely cheat, but I use the cheat mode in a limited manner to steadily decrease the challenge. I love building a huge empire by cheating and interacting with the ai after I have a complete and overwhelming lead, and then slowly giving the enemy players techs and letting them build up under my supervision and then in the later game going to war with them. I wish they had kept the in game editor that was in all previous civ, call to power and alpha centauri games. To me, that is the biggest thing missing in Civ III. I hope that this is addressed in an add on.

PS I am right 99% of the time and the for the other 1% of the time everybody seems to be wrong. (ha, ha)

[Kolyana]

I'm the opposite of you ... I never cheat. Nothing moralistic about it, it just ruins my fun inside and out, so I don't do it.

[Chronus]

I can't tell if kc1000 is serious or not. If he is then . . . well . . . whatever.

I never cheat. Nothing moralistic about it, it just ruins my fun inside and out, so I don't do it.

I definately agree about how it ruins the fun. I just can't see the enjoyment in having a huge advantage over the AI when I didn't even earn it. This takes out a good 90% of the fun.

As far as it being a moral issue: many people like to repeat battles and such to experiment with different strategies. I prefer doing this after the game is already over.

[Moraelin]

Personally I do or don't on a per-game basis. In some games I cheated, in some games I didn't.

Basically, if I get to a point where 2-3 tries won't get me past a certain point, I'll cheat like a little piggy. The level bosses in some games are prime candidates for that. I just don't have the patience to try and try again, just to see what happens next. I simply want to see what's next, and see it now.

In other cases, I'll cheat once I've finished a game normally, just to see if I've missed any secrets. E.g., when I was making the walkthrough for Fallout 2, there were a ton of quests you couldn't do or never even knew they existed, unless your char met certain stat and skill requirements. So after finishing the game many times with various characters, I made a super-character with max stats and a ton of money, just to see what I've missed.

The one point where I DO draw the line, though, is multi-player. Frankly, there is no use in cheating in MP, other than to ruin other people's fun. I think people cheating in internet games should be at least suspended for a while. (Preferrably by the neck, from a thick branch But if that's not an option, ban their serial number for a couple of weeks.)

[Ralf]

Originally posted by kc1000
I spent countless hours in Alpha Centauri turning on the editor and building colony pods all over the place and completely stomping out the enemy ai. That is what made the game replayable in my opinion. All of these gamers who claim that they never used the cheat mode (and this is my opinion), I bet 95% of them are lying.

Im fully aware about all the different ways how one want to play TBS-games like Civ & SMAC, but this must be the absolute nuttiest variant I ever heared of. (no offense).

I agree with Chronus. Im not quite sure at all if you really have serious intentions with this topic.

[Ralf]

Originally posted by kc1000
I love building a huge empire by cheating and interacting with the ai after I have a complete and overwhelming lead, and then slowly giving the enemy players techs and letting them build up under my supervision and then in the later game going to war with them.

So you cheated on the AI:s behalf as well?

Giving all AI-factions free units, base-improvements, techs & terrain-improvements and so on, until they where more or less equally matched with your own faction? Then go to war against them, and STILL being able to beat them?

If so, I can understand the challenge-part of it, although it seems to be a pretty laborious and time-consuming way to play the game.

[kc1000]

Sorry I didn,t make it clear that I was being subtle and sarcastic or sarcastically subtle.