Balanced Pangaea PBEM

[DaveMcW]

Originally posted by jshelr

I vote with Sir on whoring since he feels the strongest on the subject. I think this vote will result in a much faster tech speed, however.

Apparently I didn't disagree strongly enough.

Respecting tech monopolies is unnatural , illogical , and results in a peaceful fast-tech game .

I thought we agreed that extended ancient warfare is desirable!

If we ban tech whoring, PLEASE use accelerated production so we get to tanks faster.

[Nor Me]

Originally posted by jshelr
The civ that has currency to sell -- the one who researched it -- will try to get you to buy it. It should not be necessary to ask around. I would not object, however, to advertising on the thread, open to all.

O.K. If it's true. But if they're your enemy, they can effectively force you to research it yourself without you knowing who to blame.

In short, I fear that tech whoring favours, say, the 3 vs 3 researchers vs warmongers scenario that DaveMcW said he was trying to avoid earlier.




I'll go with any natural solution. I think the rules the previous games we're played by and the simple no communications rule are both those. But I don't think we should go for an ugly compromise solution unless we're clear what aims motivated it.

I think that many of the aims here are contradictory so some of the solutions suggested help no-one. If we're not going for something simple, could we discuss and compromise on the aims first so that the solution makes sense.

I've just seen DaveMcW's post. I agree. See, there are huge disagreements about what we're trying to achieve here.

[alexman]

It wasn't immediately apparent to me that honoring monopolies would speed up the tech rate, but it definitely makes sense.

I agree that we need to agree on our goals first. We have a balanced map, so we should not ruin that by making unbalancing military and research alliances easy to form. Also, I think we agree that we want early action. Are there any other goals?

With that in mind, Dominae's no-comm rules with free tech trading makes the most sense to me. This is actually the solution I voted for several posts ago, even if it was for the wrong reason.

Sir Ralph pointed out that without communications it's difficult to make multiple trades of your hard-earned research happen before they get passed around by others. So I propose that every time you send an unaccepted offer for something to trade, you simultaneously send an e-mail with what you expect back. The other player has the option of either giving you what you want, and accepting, or making a counter-proposal by sending his offer and and e-mail of what he expects back. This is mechanical enough that it could be considered part of the game mechanics.

[Harovan]

To be honest, I'm sick with this discussion. Apparently, we can't come together, and therefor I suggest to split this game in two.

[Harovan]

Originally posted by DaveMcW
Respecting tech monopolies is unnatural , illogical , and results in a peaceful fast-tech game .

I don't see the logic behind your statement. Why does respecting tech ownership accelerate the research speed over tech whoring for dumping prices? And how does it make a game more peaceful?

[alexman]

The first part I believe was explained by jshelr a few posts ago, and was apparent in PBEM 4. Basically, tech whoring encourages minimal research because nobody wants to pay full-price for getting the tech.

The second part follows from the first. If you attack (like Shaka) in a fast-paced tech game, you get left behind. So nobody attacks.

I still think we can all come together on this, because we don't have different goals - just different solutions.

[DaveMcW]

Ok, I'm tired of arguing too. I'll go along with whatever you guys decide. 3 on 3, superfast research, 5 on 1 to stop Dave from winning...

Attacking each other ingame is much more fun than doing it out of game.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by alexman
The second part follows from the first. If you attack (like Shaka) in a fast-paced tech game, you get left behind. So nobody attacks.

...except for Shaka!

Which gets me thinking (probably the wrong place to ask this): are we going to write AARs for Strat 4? I know the game is getting more and more distant in our memories, but I think it would make for an interesting read on the Strat forum if we could piece together the main events.

As for this game, I'll vote for anything at this point; Catt has created a map for the six of us, and I'm sure we can have fun if we try. If the issue of tech whoring really divides us, I guess we'll have to abandon this game.

Here's my last attempt at finding a solution:

1. No comm. (like before). I think this will be fun.

2. Modified no-whoring: if you traded for a tech, you may only re-trade to one other party; if you researched a tech yourself, you may trade it away at will. This is obviously a compromise.


Dominae

[Nor Me]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
To be honest, I'm sick with this discussion. Apparently, we can't come together, and therefor I suggest to split this game in two.

Stick with it unless you really believe that we can't agree on a decent outcome! The discussion will be short compared to the game.

We have at least three people willing to go with no communication. The others should start disagreeing if that's what they think.

Although I'd play that, I'd rather we stuck with the rules played in the other PBEMs. I'm not convinced that 6 players on a small pangea won't solve any of the problems.

Basically, with 3 vs 3 alliances it's much easier for a player to defect than with 2 vs 2. If one of those is a research agreement, this is where tech whoring comes in. In that case he might even be able to eliminate one of the players he betrayed with, say, freshly upgraded Ans...I mean Knights, from the gold so gained.

With 6 players a 2-player alliance of any sort is simply going to be much less powerful so there is less need to control them.

A disadvantage of a balanced map is that geography might not necessarily doom world peace as it probably would on a random one but I'm sure we've enough aspiring warmongers here. None of the games I've been in have made uninterrupted peace that likely.

By the time players have been eliminated, the situation is likely to be far more interesting than in previous games so the problems might not reoccur. If they do we might still have a satisfactory 3 or 4 way draw.

I'm just not convinced that any of you have exhausted the depth of the standard game.

I don't think it's likely that everyone's going to agree to a proposal that isn't at most a slight modification of one of those two. Otherwise we'll have to split and start recruiting on radically different platforms.

[Harovan]

I see, that some of us just want to play the same game like against the AI. Freeload research for some miserable gold, stockpile the rest, upgrade, attack the dumb researcher and demand even more. The same silly way like in every SP game. Now who would like to be the dumb AI? I ran away from SP to avoid this mess. Now it takes over MP too. Guess it's GalCiv time.

Nor Me: We are not playing permanent alliances, nor tolerate we research agreements. And we don't need to enforce these rules. Everyone in this game will play honorable without being enforced. At least I hope so.

By the way, in this game's predecessor (game 4) we basically had a no whore agreement from the mid of the ancient age till the end of the game. Tech pace was fast only because we coordinated research. This won't be the case in this game.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
I see, that some of us just want to play the same game like against the AI. Freeload research for some miserable gold, stockpile the rest, upgrade, attack the dumb researcher and demand even more. The same silly way like in every SP game. Now who would like to be the dumb AI? I ran away from SP to avoid this mess. Now it takes over MP too. Guess it's GalCiv time.

You should give human players more credit. Tech trading against the AI is not boring because of whoring, it's boring because the AI is predictable. You're assuming that everyone will hoard Gold and wait for the other guy to research techs. This may happen, but the "other guy" need not sell his techs! Plus, if tech moves too slow, there is always the lure of doing your own research so that you can gain an advantage by getting ahead. It's not like research came to a crawl in Strat 4; the promise of the next age made research still very attractive.

Anyway, I agree with you on the tech whoring issue, so I guess what I'm asking is: what's wrong with playing SP Civ3, but with actually intelligent opponents? Clearly some avenues of diplomacy employed by us humans render the game degenerate. Therefore, let's just play with the options Firaxis gave us. If you think think tech trading will be "broken", it's up to you to exploit the heck out of us in-game (challenge!).


Dominae

[Harovan]

I'm not interested in this kind of game, honestly. It should be not hard to replace me.

[Dominae]

Are we giving up because Sir Ralph has decided to leave? Should we try harder to get everyone to agree? It seems like a lot of work.

I still like my ideas, but I'll play "whatever" at this point.


Dominae

[alexman]

You're not going anywhere, Sir!
We'll figure it out.

As I see it, we have set three goals for this game:

1. Early warfare. Because "staring contests" are boring. To achieve this, we need weak tech alliances, and a slow tech rate.
2. Imprortance of research. Because ignoring research is a one-dimensional strategy that takes away a significant element of the game. To achieve this, we need to somehow restrict trading.
3. Individual play. This means that 3-on-3 team games are not desirable, because they end unfinished when one side wins. In order to achieve this, we need weak tech alliances and weak military alliances.

To summarize the above, I think we would all be happy if we could find a way to accomplish the following:

• Weak tech alliances. I don't see any major objections in restricting communications so that we do not coordinate our research with others.
• Weak military alliances. Alliances that last the whole game (turning the game into team play), should be discouraged. An acceptable way to accomplish this is again to restrict communications.
• Slow tech rate. We have not agreed on a solution yet. One option is to allow free tech trade, but this would be in conflict with the necessity to restrict trading for making research important. Another option could be to increase the tech costs. Another option would be to completely disallow tech trade.
• Restrict Trading. This is necessary so we don't render research useless. One way to accomplish this would be to honor tech monopolies, but this would speed up tech rate. Another solution would be to allow no trading at all.

So our major problem is that two of our goals (early warfare and important research) are seemingly conflicting. But there are at least two ways of accomplishing both of these goals at the same time:

1. Don't allow trading. This would change the game a lot (trading is, after all, an element of the game, just as is research), but it is an option that might be acceptable to all of us after the alternatives have been shot down.
2. Honor tech monopolies and increase tech cost at the same time. Hopefully the increase in tech progress from the "more efficient market" would balance the extra cost. Research would be beneficial, but the warmongers would have a reasonably wide window of opportunity to launch an early attack.

[Harovan]

This is necessary so we don't render research useless. One way to accomplish this would be to honor tech monopolies, but this would speed up tech rate.

How?

Without communication about research advances will mostly be researched by more than one player. This way, more research capacity is wasted and the game goes slower. We will very often have several players having researched a tech, so wars aren't such a problem for the trades. Since money is still needed for upgrades and trade differences, the players will have to adjust their sliders wisely and research won't go at full 100%. Look again: Wasted research capacity + the need for monetary balance lowering research spending = slower game.

With tech whoring, there will be freeloaders, who feed the researchers with money. This way the probability of double researches sinks even without communication, because there are less researchers. Those who research, can do it at or close to 100% due to the gpt they get from the parasites. Every tech they research, will be whored around in 2-3 turns. The game runs very quick. Summary: Less waste of research + no need for monetary balance and research at 100% = faster game.

[alexman]

Perhaps you're right, but it might not turn out that way. I guess the game may go faster or slower because humans are not as predictable as the AI. Isn't is possible that a tech-whoring game will go much slower than a non-whoring game, if there aren't players willing to do (or trade) the research? Isn't it possible that I don't want to sell my tech to anyone if I know that someone else will benefit from by reselling it?

So here is the question: Do we lose anything by increasing the tech costs? I know it would probably benefit early warfare, but would it have any negative side effects if new tech comes too slow? Why not disallow tech whoring, and increase the tech costs? Does anyone have a problem with that?

[DaveMcW]

Increased tech costs is not the answer. It will give warmongers a huge short-term advantage, and a huge long-term disadvantage.

There is just too much motivation for the researchers to protect each other until they have an overwhelming advantage.

In other words: you can take out one civ early but then you are screwed. This will discourage warfare.

[Harovan]

In my (now rare) SP games I use a mod, that increases all tech rates (not tech costs!) by 50%, sets the minimum research time at 6 and the maximum at 60 turns. It helps a lot, a builder style Emperor game lasts till the 19th, sometimes even 20th century instead of having a spaceship launch about 1500.

[Harovan]

Originally posted by DaveMcW
In other words: you can take out one civ early but then you are screwed. This will discourage warfare.

We don't want to take civs out early. The game should have some dynamics, we should fight early for a resource or 1-2 border cities and then make peace. If you fight till the bloody end, yes you are screwed, but it is your own fault.

[DaveMcW]

Originally posted by alexman

As I see it, we have set three goals for this game:

1. Early warfare. Because "staring contests" are boring. To achieve this, we need weak tech alliances, and a slow tech rate.
2. Imprortance of research. Because ignoring research is a one-dimensional strategy that takes away a significant element of the game. To achieve this, we need to somehow restrict trading.
3. Individual play. This means that 3-on-3 team games are not desirable, because they end unfinished when one side wins. In order to achieve this, we need weak tech alliances and weak military alliances.

I would be willing to sacrifice early warfare to avoid all the painful fixes. Just use accelerated production to keep the game moving. Does everyone else think I'm crazy?

[Nor Me]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
I see, that some of us just want to play the same game like against the AI. Freeload research for some miserable gold, stockpile the rest, upgrade, attack the dumb researcher and demand even more. The same silly way like in every SP game. Now who would like to be the dumb AI? I ran away from SP to avoid this mess. Now it takes over MP too. Guess it's GalCiv time.

That's the point. No-one will play like the AI.

I just think that solutions like No tech whoring are worse than leaving research partnerships in with 6 players

Nor Me: We are not playing permanent alliances, nor tolerate we research agreements. And we don't need to enforce these rules. Everyone in this game will play honorable without being enforced. At least I hope so.

(a)Why are we trying to outlaw these in the first place?

(b) If that's the case why alter the rules at all?

By the way, in this game's predecessor (game 4) we basically had a no whore agreement from the mid of the ancient age till the end of the game. Tech pace was fast only because we coordinated research. This won't be the case in this game.

Isn't that the kind of thing we're trying to avoid? If we can, what is the problem.

[Harovan]

Something says me, we can't get this game together.

I will keep the savegame and although I already deleted the scenario, I still have Catts mail in my inbox.

PM me if you need one of them.

[Nor Me]

Originally posted by alexman
[*]Individual play. This means that 3-on-3 team games are not desirable, because they end unfinished when one side wins. In order to achieve this, we need weak tech alliances and weak military alliances.

As I've said before, I just don't think this problem will materialise. A 3-way alliance is less likely to hold than a 2-way one.

If you want any result better than a 3-way draw, we'd have to enable AP and go for the space race. A 3-way draw is fine.

[Nor Me]

Originally posted by DaveMcW
I would be willing to sacrifice early warfare to avoid all the painful fixes. Just use accelerated production to keep the game moving. Does everyone else think I'm crazy?

No. It sounds sensible. I just don't know how to play it.

[alexman]

I would be willing to play any PBEM game with you guys. Accelerated production, no communication, no rules at all, ANYTHING.

But to be fair, for this game I think we should stick close to the settings we agreed upon in the PBEM 4 thread, which are summarized in the first post of this thread (granted, some points in that post need clarification). We can start another game for anyone interested in something else (I would play in that too).

Are we all in?

[Edit: Oops, I see that no-tech-whoring was not specified in that first post. Here we go again... ]

[jshelr]

Sir

Will you accept players' right to form no tech whoring agreements with each other? We would have no comm rules, but no whoring agreements by email that could be published on the thread if transparency is desired. I would much rather trade with a no whoring partner, and that might make the no whoring agreement a natural equilibrium solution that most civs will adopt.

[Harovan]

I think the interests are too different. This game is doomed from the start.

I find both types of games boring to hell. Staring contests, and endless slugfests. I want to encourage short campaigns with changing alliances, that is it what makes a game interesting, at least for me. But I want to penaltize long wars of extermination.

I will not agree to accelerated production. I play it in GS PBEM 1, and although I'm doing pretty well, the crazy tech pace annoys the hell out of me. It is a huge no-no for me.

As it stands, I give this game very low chances ever to start with this staff of players. And even if we get it started, it will be a mess for everyone who was "convinced" to play with rules he didn't want.

Sigh, last try. I would agree for player to player no whoring agreements and hereby announce, that I will heavily favor such trade partners. I will agree for trading my techs only, if my counterpart offers me a tech as well, at least half worth of mine, with differences being paid off in gold. Who offers me only gold, gets no discounts. He will either have to pay full price (25 * reasearch points) or can go get the tech somewhere else.

[jshelr]

The last try looks good to me. I bet Sir does well with his trading rules since they are fair to both sides.

[alexman]

Yes, that's fair, and I think there are several players here that would agree to trade with you on those terms, alexman included.

So players are free to set the "rules" of trade individually with every other player. The only restrictions are that you can't talk about unknown techs, and that you are honest when you promise that you won't whore a tech.

[DaveMcW]

I'll agree to that.

Alexman, can you add the restriction on discussing unknown techs to the rules section?