The Worst Thing About Multiplayer...

[Helium Pond]

Is the (almost nonexistent) battle reports. You get one lousy pop-up screen telling you battle outcomes, and *sometimes* you get a slightly more detailed description in the MFD, but you don't get anywhere close to what you really need, which is a visual re-enactment of the battle. You get your turn and you're completely baffled: what happened? I don't like it.

[Adam_Smith]

You can always play IP, or have your players tell when there was a battle. You probably already know that though.

[Garth Vader]

I have never heard in MP rules that you have to declare probe actions. Just that you have to select the declare vendetta option if you are treatied or pacted.

You are right about the problems though. I was playing MP once and I had just founded a new base. Next turn I was looking around my empire and I noticed the base was gone. I figured it had been worm raped, but I saw no messages or anything about it. I suppose this is more realistic but annoying.

[Misotu]

Garth, yeah you're right. I worded it badly, but effectively you have to own up to the probe action by choosing the vendetta option. Main problem, though, is that you get far less information than you would in an SP game.

[Simpson II]

In some respects, the human gets too much info in SP. You're shown AI units moving into fungus squares, which is just silly. At least in PBEM the element of surprise is retained.

[Helium Pond]

Niether of those things really help. IP games are a whole separate matter. Having people tell you what happened is unreliable and tedious.

[Misotu]

HP, I agree. It's really hard to piece it together without the visual. One of the things I miss most is seeing how hard or easy it was for, say, a hostile unit to defeat my defender. Even without the odds showing, you can get quite a good feel for how things are stacking up just by looking at the progress of the battle.

The other thing you lose is information about the direction from which hostile units are coming.

The *worst* thing for me, though, is probe attacks. You have no idea which city has been targeted. I know this is made worse by the MP bug, but even so. Although MP rules state that players have to declare any probe action other than infiltrating datalinks, there's no obligation to say where the action occurred. And when your datalinks are infiltrated, you don't even see the probes move in. As far as I know, there's no way to tell if you've been infiltrated?

[Helium Pond]

The information you get in SP is the information you need to mount an effective defense. Without this information, it's extremely difficult to know where to place defenders, and even what kind of defenders you should use.

[Nigel]

Sure you need information for defense, but it should come from sensors and/or patrols, not from the god-like powers of the player watching the map.

I can understand roving units just disappearing without a trace, but it'd be nice to see a replay of any battles near sensors, cities, or surviving units.

Probe teams striking undetected is sort of fitting, isn't it? (assuming they aren't outside of a base between turns). Does the high-security lock thing apply to MP games? Is there any way to see which of your own bases has them in either game? This would be the only useful info to help design a strategy against probe teams, i think.
[This message has been edited by Nigel (edited August 15, 2000).]

[Helium Pond]

There are no "god-like powers" of a player watching the map. Everything you see during SP is a result of a) having a sensor nearby b) having a unit nearby, or c) having a city nearby. Cities, and some units, see two spaces. And come on, we're talking about a wargame here. I can't believe anyone is actually arguing *against* being able to see the battles their own units are involved in.

[drewski]

HP, I'm afraid I have to disagree. I'm playing a SP game right now in which I am located solely on my own small continent, I haven't made an effort to probe (I realize this is strategic flaw on my part, but haven't really had the need yet as everyone else is leaving me alone) and I get to watch a good number of city take-overs. I've been given access to maps through diplomacy, but I have no units anywhere near these battles. (I suppose I should confess, I'm not playing on transcend, so maybe the "god-like powers" are more closely guarded at the highest difficulty level.)

Edit: added the qualifier "SP" to my second sentence.
[This message has been edited by drewski (edited August 15, 2000).]

[Nigel]

Well, it is a wargame, but one thing that hooked me on Civ originally is that in addition to analyzing information, you need a strategy to obtain the information in the first place. Initial exploration and The fog of war are a significant part of what takes these games a level beyond Risk or Axis&Allies. Command is limited by spotty information.

Anyway, i was thinking mostly of what S II said about visible fungus movement. It's idiosyncratic with the turn-based concept. But maybe it's intentional since it gives the AI an overall advantage?

Other semi-omniscient powers:
Mindworms visible in enemy territory
New cities founded by opponents
AI units moving off after defeating you

I'm not sure about drewski's example. Are these allies of yours reporting capture/loss of bases?
[This message has been edited by Nigel (edited August 15, 2000).]

[Helium Pond]

Yeah, drewski, I've never seen anything like what you describe. You get to watch battles that you're nowhere near? Are you sure you haven't hit CTRL+K by mistake? Or do you just mean you have a map of those areas, which is a completely different thing than being able to see what goes on in them?

I don't know what y'all are talking about with the enemy units entering fungus, either. You mean that when you have no units or sensors or bases nearby, you can see enemy units whenever they enter fungus? I haven't seen that.

You can see mind worms in enemy territory?

Yeah, you can see new bases, but is that always true? I always have everybody infiltrated pretty quickly--if you don't have them infiltrated or Pacted, do you get this data? Otherwise, it's a direct result of the infiltration, and perfectly fair.

AI units moving off after defeating you: fine, I suppose this small item is somewhat unrealistic, albeit not entirely (the fleeing non-combatants reported the last moments after the battle to you) but it really has no bearing on the main point: you deserve to get all the information that SP gives you, in MP.

[drewski]

Nigel,
I am currently in a treaty with all six AI factions. I only see the winning unit entering a base and the flag changing from one faction to the conquering factions color, so it may be related to my ally reporting the loss of a base.

HP,
I have not intentionally hit CTRL+K, and to the best of my knowledge I haven't hit it. (I have not yet ever done this intentionally, but from what I gather in these forums, that launches "scenario editing mode", but are there some visual clues that I have done this [i.e. menu options change, text appearing somewhere stating that I'm in the scenario editor, etc.] so that I can verify that I haven't done so accidentally?) I was not able to play last night and I fear that I'll lack the opportunity again this evening, but I plan on hitting CTRL+K in the near future to see what that does, just for the sake of learning.

I'd back what Nigel said about watching mind worms moving in foreign and un-sensor-arrayed/un-unit-laden lands. (Although, they aren't "enemies" presently, as I am in a treaty with everyone.) I do also agree that the minimal, and incomplete, information provided in MP is frustrating.

[Nigel]

On the allied front, when an ally looses a base, i am occasionally shown the units from the victorious stack of attackers moving into the city square and off in various directions.

With the mindworms- OK i was initially thinking of Civ barbarians which are visible anywhere on the explored map. I noticed in my current game, however, that i did stumble across mindworms that weren't visible at the beginning of the turn. For sure, isles of the deep do appear in the middle of nowhere unloading boils. I quickly filter out this kind of info, so it's hard to recall any other specifics right now.

The new cities appear without infiltration or pacting.

In fungus, i believe units should only be visible when:
> in range of a sensor
> adjacent to an air unit
or
> actively involved in a ZOC dispute

However, in fungus squares being passively observed by a unit or city, movement into them is visible, although these units disappear into the fungus afterwards.

I guess having to play the "Memory" game to locate the AI's units once your turn rolls around adds some depth to SP, but it's something i think hotseat/PBEM is better off without.

[Googlie]

My experience is that with C4 or X2, if pacted, maps are constantly exchanged, so that you see military action taking place with pact brothers.

If you are not pacted, but have exchanged maps, you'll see such action for the next move only, then it's static until you next exchange maps.

I've never been able to see other factions' actions (wow - rhymes) without these prerequisites unless within sensor range or unit viewpoint range.

If I see an IoD and move off, tho I am still within my foil's visual or radar range, I see the whole four tile movement of the IoD next turn, but not thereafter.

(btw, when popping sea pods, if you have a choice - and if you are not trying to capture wildlife, say you're popping with a transport, always position your unit on the seaward side of the pod - if you are able to move at least one tile to seaward after popping an IoD, it'll always head for the landmass)

Googlie

[Helium Pond]

Okay, on a completely different topic, can anyone explain something that just happened in one of the PBEM games I'm playing: without the required tech, and without any secret projects, Miriam (an AI player) has apparently performed a Terraform UP. Both myself and the other human being in the game noticed a new land bridge between Lal (the human) and Miriam, both of whom were on self-contained islands. Miriam is nowhere near Ecological Engineering, and as I said, has no Secret Projects at all. The land bridge is too small to be the result of a pod having popped, because as far as I know, pod that cause earthquakes always make huge mountains the size of Mount Planet. So, is the AI just blatantly cheating? Any other explanation? Sorry for going off topic, but what the heck, right?

[stuntman19]

I have never seen the AI terraform up or down. Once I popped a pod that connected two land areas, I think it is just a rare thing. It didnt create the normal mountain formation but extended out to connect the land pieces.

[Black Sunrise]

Regarding Miriam
It was a pod. I've never seen her have the brains to build a land bridge, though I have seen small earthquake pods.
Black Sunrise

[Simpson II]

The AI *will* terraform a land-bridge, if circumstances are right. I've seen if a number of times, after I first started playing Smac and the AI could keep up enough to be cocky. It will only do it across a one-square gap, though, and it is relatively rare.

As to her not having the tech, I understand that before the Smac v4 patch the AI could build bunkers without the correct tech. The interface between the game and the AI is far from clean, I'm afraid. You could add this to the bug-reporting thread if you are using SmaX, and are reasonably sure it wasn't a pod.

[Empress]

The worst thing about multiplayer to me is when the game seems to slow to a hault do to lag and the fact that you can not make changes in your city until it is your turn, which is inefficent.

[Googlie]

Empress:

That's why IP play with simultaneous moves clicked on is so cool.

You can do base maintenance, talk to other faction heads (non human), change build queues, SE weightings, hurry build et al while the AI or other players are moving - then make your unit movements turn when it's over to you.

Fast and efficient. Only slows in 3 or more IP Multiplayer when two are in diplomacy and you're waiting with fingers drumming.

But you can't beat 100 turns in an evening with real opposition

G.

[RedFred]

Yes, Googlie has made me a believer in IP. (But not a "Believer", fortunately)

Not only can you use the period when the other player is moving to manage your empire in just about any way but moving units, you can take the occasional break. In a SP game, I'll often discover that several hours have just evaporated as I do one turn after another.

As with some of the other people in this thread, I found that it was a bit of an adjustment to have less battle information available in IP. But not a huge problem.

[Nigel]

I was just experimenting with a hotseat game, Hive vs UoP. At the end of the unversity turn, i was shown a mindworm attacking a UoP patrol. Does this happen in PBEM, where the last player to move sees any AI action that occurs before the next player's turn? That would seem to throw the balance of MP off in many instances.

[Misotu]

Interesting question. I can certainly confirm that I have often seen other MP players lose units to native lifeforms at the end of my turn. This occurs in an area where logically I should not be able to see anything - away from my territory, no units close by etc etc. It doesn't really help me at all - it's just interesting to see someone's precious probe foil or transport destroyed by an IoD far away from me ...
I play quite a lot of PBEM and I can't state for sure that I'm the last to play in any MY when this occurs. I often am the last to play, however, so there may be a correlation there.

[MariOne]

I am/have been the last human player in the round in many pbems.

Such player is the only one to see the "Planet's Turn".
I have been the Believers with AI Lal more than once, and I can tell that I saw PK units moving only when they were in my proper Fog-of-War scope, but I could see worms landing/moving on continents where I never was (I just traded maps). I am pretty (but not fireproof) sure that this was not necessarily when the worm-victim was a Pactmate of mine. I think I recently saw a spartan ship attacked by an IoD, and I have just informal truce with them. But maybe that's because the IoD *began* its move inside my scope...
OTOH recently a Pactmate of mine popped few worms in the nortpole cap (far from me in all ways), and while I saw them during my turn, I lost their sight as they moved after it. Maybe the screen flipping was too fast.


At the beginning of SMAC pbems, back in OWO and ACOL, it was sometimes said that for fair play the LHPR (Last Human Player in Round) should have neutrally reported to every player the alien movements he got to see. But it was never officially agreed upon, and after few attempts I dropped the practice myself.
There are two main cons to it:
- often the moves are so fast that you can't actually realize what and where is happening exactly.
- the report would be heavily biased: it would be restricted to the map portions the LHPR can actually see

I now sometimes only pay attention to worms menacing my current pactmates, and give them the less vague possible hints.

[Nigel]

So it's not any AI factions, just mindworm actions? Are these haphazard or does the Last Player see all such attacks on their own units?

All these mysterious mindworm occurances; could some... entity... be trying to... communicate?

[MariOne]

I'll try to explain myself better.
Last Human Player sees:
- all AI moves (which come AFTER him of course) which he could *legally* see (i.e. directly involving your units, bases, or sensors)
- supposedly ALL native life moves: all the ones regarding him, but also the ones in his visible map regrading distant and nonpacted factions. (but this is not always guaranteed, or sometimes too fast to see)

Remember that worms appearing because of your ecodamage, do NOT occur at the end of the round, but at the beginning of *your* turn, thus the Last Human Player can't see them.

Anyway, that should be easy to test if you want: start a self-hotseat game with Lal, and pay attention.

[mark13]

Regarding mind worms moving when you shouldn't have been able to see them, could this have been because you had spotted them earlier that turn and then moved away? If this was the case, then such knowledge would appear logical, as the mind worms were there when you spotted them, and thus had no opportunity to move from that location. This happens a lot with alien IoD units. However, the units do disappear when their turn comes around and they move away.

I have not yet experienced native life movement in distant parts of my territory, as mind worms often pop out of nowhere and attack my Formers

I have, however, witnessed mind worms popping up from IoD units within range of an enemy's base, but only those with which I have an infiltrator (which would appear justified).

[Rynn:]

^