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Fellowship of the Ring Empire Thread
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U still at work at 0230hrs? Of course, you're gaming and not working.
Your colleagues will be wondering why you are doing so much OT. 
          
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Yes, I can see how you could relax alternating between designing a hideously complicated system and Galciv Maso. 
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Rick, congrats on the Maso and third place!
Welcome gamer3999! I'll have your name on the Roster page of the website as soon as I can.
In case anyone hasn't been to the Fellowship website, it's at  Link
Well, I can honestly say that taking a vacation last week has proved to be a pain. Why is it that work piles up while I go on vacation...
Hey, anybody realize that if Cotal was still in the Fellowship, we would have the #1,2, and 3 players? Oh well, Cotal's an honorary member, so I guess we can still say that (sort of!)
   
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#1982
by Citizen musicfan55 - 9/25/2003 10:37:12 AM
| Rick, vincible,Cheese aside, how hard do you think Maso is over Crippling? Forget about scoring, I'm asking about difficulty. |
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Ray
It is hard to say after playing one game of maso but it is totally different than crippling. Basically, there is never any surplus cash and one is alway behind. At the other levels a "good game" means dominating (number one in population, military, tech, economy, etc.). In maso I don't think I will ever dominate anything. I was just trying to avoid getting smashed like a bug until I could get cultural maximizing and crank out constructors. When I attacked the one major and two minors during the game, I used only the minimum - early it was one frigate with 5 transports that I traded for and later I actually made a Death Knight and traded for a battle transport - whoop-tee-doo - 
Even when I won, I was not on the top of the heap but had to culture flip my ally. So, maso is definitely MUCH harder. Like vincible, I have trouble giving a quantity but I suggest that maso is at least twice as hard as crippling. And crippling is only a little (?10%) harder than painful, which in only a little harder than tough, which is only a little harder than challenging.
Actually on my anomalous large crippling Cari wrote back that I had tripped a "too much money" flag early in the game but we are not sure why. My guess is that the high diplomacy cash for tech trading may have tripped it. As long as one get lots of cash for tech, the game is MUCH easier. On maso all of I could think of was "Show me the money!!!" Of course, there was none.
Hope this helps. I will play some more maso as it seems like playing maso is sort of like getting a brand new game of Gal Civ compared to the lower levels. One of the things I really like on maso is that you are just trying to win and may have to change strategies during the game to survive. For example, I never intended to ally with the Dregnin but it was that or get toasted. Then I never intended to go to war but it was that or get invaded. My first game was a little chaotic to say the least. On maso, there was never a thought about running the entire tech tree for points because there was not enough income for rapid research and the longer I put off an opportunity for victory the more likely I would get knocked off. And that was tiny, rare ("easy maso" is an oxymoron). It may be a while before I get comfortable enough to play a bigger map. Maso is very, very different from crippling.
Rick
[Message Edited]
   
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#1983
by Citizen Gordeleth - 9/25/2003 11:14:43 AM
Ray, to maybe get a better grip on difficulty level comparisons (for the sake of good ol' fun analysis) you can compare the difficulty in terms of how easy it is to win. For instance:
To me, Average difficulty is a sure win - I could basically set up my game and hit end game until I inevitably won (that's not exactly true, but that's how I feel).
On Tough, I expect to gain early game superiority in 3 out of 4 major catagories, and the rest is a fore-gone conclusion. Mistakes at this level will not cause me to lose.
On Painful, the computer jumps out to a quick lead, but as long as I can play flawlessly, I can overtake the leaders in mid-to-late-game. Mistakes in planning or diplomacy could (and have) cost me the game.
On Crippling (very aptly named for me), I stay hopelessly behind no matter what I do, and I have to hope noone decides to kill me before I can "sneak" up on them with a culture bomb or alpha strike. I do not play this level often, because the fact that I can never really gain superiority in anything is stressful; that and the fact that my game seems 99% out of my control (a win here makes me feel like I have won the lottery - all luck and no skill).
On Maso, I am 100% sure I would never win, so I don't try. 
This is a very personal analysis of the game levels, but it is easy to think of the levels in terms like this, and it's probably fun for others to see an evaluation like this (especially from the top players). From this short post, you can infer quite alot about my play style and where my comfort zone is, etc.
Happy gaming.
  
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Congrats on the Maso win Ric!! Seems you were playing painful just yesterday! I finished my first painful a while back but decided to perfect some strategy before moving up in difficulty. On that, I have a question for you guys.
Has anyone ever used the "dont ask" max option for population growth? Its +70% pop growth (in 1.05). I tried that in a quick little tiny/tough. I chose populists, +70 pop growth, +10 morale, +10 diplo, and +5 PQ. Gave me a total of +30 diplo, +30 morale, +5 PQ, +70 pop growth. The extra morale and PQ were chosen to basically give me a place to put all the extra people. It allowed my population to keep growing. The difference was pretty obvious in my opinion. I had a poor start but still, by the time I had 10 billion on earth, the largest AI pop was 4 billion. I had 18 when they were at like 8bil. This gave me huge advantage in tax income, production, research, influence, you name it. True, it wasnt a very hard setting, but I did that to see the difference easier. It got really absurd when I got aphrodisiac, improved environment, and basic env control. It was still fairly early game but earth could churn out fully loaded transports every 2-3 turns and still GAIN population. It was just sick. I cant imagine what it would be like if I had gone all the way to regenerators.
Anyway, just curious if anyone else had tried this. Its pretty expensive at 5 pts but it worked really well. You have to balance it with some morality and or PQ picks though since they act as a ceiling for max pop. The biggest drawback I see is losing the +speed you need on larger maps. This time around I swaped the pop growth for +1 speed. Same cost. Also dropped the +10 morale for another +10 diplo. I have a lot better start and got to more planets, but I still seem to produce and research slower. Influence is also harder. Interesting.
Happy gaming!
[Message Edited]
 
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Thanks for all the feedback on the difficulties, guys. Much appreciated.
WileyCoyote,
Interesting observations. I've not focused much on the pop growth picks as my initial impression through experimentating with that pick is that my populations maxed out rather rapidly and the pop stopped growing. So I thought to myself that I've lost the benefit of the picks rather quickly. However, it is true that having very big pops on the planets in a short time helps to provide the empire with a lot of resources (taxes, production, research, influence) faster than an empire which grew more slowly.
You certainly got my interest to experiment more with the pop growth pick.
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| Interesting observations. I've not focused much on the pop growth picks as my initial impression through experimentating with that pick is that my populations maxed out rather rapidly and the pop stopped growing. |
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I feared the same thing at first. Thats why I also picked a totat of +30 morale and +5 PQ. This basically raises the cap and lets the pop keep growing. You could choose even more morale to help this out. It would probably be easier to just make sure you grab a morale resource though. Like you said, its interesting because a high pop helps out with everything. Getting one real fast can therefore be a big advantage. However, it might need to be an all or nothing venture.
Let me know if you try it!
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I find that on crippling, I know I will win bar a disaster, by the early game on small maps, and by the mid game on large maps. On maso, I could always lose if another civ declared war (because they usually have a better navy). I couldn't put a percentage on the rise in difficulty level. Amazingly, I still find maso enjoyable if I have a high diplomacy to keep out of wars.
  
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Don't think anyone has updated their tech trees to 1.1 yet.
Javascout did say he is going to update his site soon.
I don't think there are many changes to techs are there?
Disruptors (evil tech) after Interstellar Tactics and a whole bunch of weapon techs after Corvette.
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Rick, I've also made a short post at the Maso Strats thread.
Basically, maso players have to get used to life without tech selling. Trade is especially critical on Tinies because tax income is never going to be great with only a few planets.
Note that you can still tech sell to new minors who appear later in the game. Well, more like TG sell because they start with all your techs.
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I'm currently playing a fun Maso Huge.
Dregs have got a very good start so they have been Strongest in both economy and military for the entire game so far. My bribes of tech are proving ineffective for some reason and they are Wary.
I certainly don't want to war against them because they have 4-5 long trade routes with me and I've 3 medium trade routes with them. I've been very lucky in trade in this game because almost everyone is trading with me even though I'm at NE of the map. Tors who are at SW have a couple of trade routes with me that stretch all the way diagionally across the Huge map.
The trade money is really rolling in.
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Just updated the Metaverse Review. Here's the Link
Ray, I hadn't noticed until today how close Cotal is getting to you. Better start cranking it up! 
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