Enoch

Assuming no objections about going out of turn, I could take a quick round this afternoon.

I don't agree. Our economy can't support a war right now without making our research rate collapse. We'd do better to build a city to get that gold mined, and build up our infrastructure before provoking a war. Also, we can't really scout his territory until we get Writing, and that would require an OB treaty (which I don't think we want). I say hold off on invading Babylon until we have a nice stack of catapults to support our invaders. We can do without Red Dot for a while, and I doubt that Babylon or Egypt are going to try to sneak in there-- it looks like there's plenty of land for them to claim out West. This isn't Civ 3 where the AI would plop a city down on any little gap in your cultural borders.

That was part of the plan. When I made the post after having drawn and uploaded the dotmap, I realized that both Red and Green would be better off 2 tiles south. Since the 2-South Green is now DOOM (?), I was referring to the 2-South Red as well. 2 food bonuses and 7 floodplains make it the perfect place to build our National Epic (2X GP production) and Globe Theatre (no unhappiness, ever).

Not bad. A few things for the next player to look out for: I still like my purple, black, white, and pink city locations from the dotmap I did a while back. As for the Red location (the perfect GP factory), we'll have to raze that Babylonian city first. We need more workers to get those roads done and to continue to upgrade our cities' infrastructure. (That Iron mine near Irvine needs a road!) I don't particularly like Tale's research choices. Archery is a dead-end tech that we don't particularly need because we can build axemen to defend our cities. I only ever research it if I have no early metals or horses. Horseback Riding (the current tech) is also a dead-end, and we don't even have the horses to take advantage of it. We're doing a REX (Rapid Early eXpansion) strategy here, so we should be rushing for techs to support our economy, like Currency and Code of Laws. Once we get Writing, I think we should open borders with the civs that don't border us directly (Liz and Zara). They're no threat to sneak in and settle city sites we want, and if we can get some international trade routes, it will help our economy. Also, we might get a religion spread to us that way, which is handy.

Defamation torts (slander & libel) are still valid causes of action in the U.S. But if the person being slandered is considered a "public figure," the 1st Amendment offers broad protection to the speech. New York Times v. Sullivan was the landmark SCOTUS case that broke the U.S. away from the British common law tradition on defamation. Apart from that, there are some obscenity restrictions (most notably the aforementioned kiddy porn). And try not to violate U.S. Copyright laws or incite any imminent lawless activity. (See Brandenburg v. Ohio.)

It is interesting how they decide these things. The Peace Prize has been awarded for advocacy on certain issues before, but this is the first prize that has gone for advocacy of environmental issues. Most of the past "issue advocacy" awards have had to do with democracy, dangerous weapons, or oppressed people..

Thanks Drabs, I feel quite old now. <sigh> Me, too. I remember my sister playing Automatic repeatedly on her CD-boombox while she, I, and my mother were in the garage of our then-under-construction house, sanding, staining, and varnishing the wood trim that would shortly be nailed up throughout the house. I think it was the summer before my sophomore year of high school. Charlie Parker -- Billie's Bounce.

Not much. I just made suggestions for various mechanics and gave balance feedback for combat. What have you been doing with your time then? Work involved with this, I imagine.

Does this mean that Dragon Age now has a publisher?

Awesome. I didn't realize that you'd be getting so deep into wholesale rule changes. AC/DR and weapon categories are a few of the things in D&D that need some serious fixing, so it's great to see that you'll be taking them on.

So who's next?

It's not all about building ships. Coastal locations get significantly better trade route income (via harbors), and the Dutch Dike adds 1 hammer to each riverfront and coastal tile (but can only be built in a coastal or riverfront city). EDIT: Also, we're financial, so working coast tiles is much more attractive, but only worthwhile if we have coastal frontage in the city so that we can build a lighthouse. My point about the Double Gems site is that, with all that grassland around (under the jungle), we really don't need more than 1 food bonus to make the city grow-- you'll want to be working those gems and some cottages, not the extra food bonuses. If we can move the city so that those extra food-bonus squares can contribute to a different city that would use them better (by using them to feed specialists), we'll be in a more advantageous situation.

Hmmm... I can't say that I like settling 1 tile away from the coast, especially as a naval-oriented civ like the Dutch. But it is nice to grab the copper and deny it to our neighbors. I'd either fill in with a city to claim the Gold next, or go for my relocated Green dot (one square SE of Steve's warrior)-- if we can beat Egypt there, that'll be a huge advantage. But 2 cities way out on the frontier will tax our economy heavily. I wouldn't worry about the Heffalumps for now. Not as evil as settling on a Flood Plain or 1 tile from the coast. Seriously, for 90% of the game, your cities will not be at maximum population. That means that the overlapping really doesn't cost you anything. And sharing a high-value resource can make sure that you're always getting the benefit of it, even when one city is focusing on something else.

My attempt at a dotmap: Purple first-- I don't like to build a city on a floodplain, and I think the Rice will help get that gold worked as soon as possible. White and Yellow are potential GP factories. Pink is a production city (Moai Statues + Dikes!). The others are mostly commerce pumps. I threw Yellow up there just to start the conversation. We really need more info about the northern reaches, but it looks like there aren't any rivals that way, so settling there can wait. Alternative I just thought of: Move Green and Red bot two squares south. You don't need that much food in a commerce city (and, with 2 gems, it won't be anything but a commerce city), and, as the Dutch, we should be building on the coast whenever possible. Red become a first-rate GP pump with 2 food bonuses and 7 workable floodplains. Actually, I like that much better. (But I'm too lazy to re-do the dotmap.)

In techs, usually the way to go for me is bronze working and iron working, whatever is necessary to get workers moving and an oracle slingshot for Code of Laws, Metal Casting, Machinery or Civil Service. Or, occasionally, Monarchy. Also, in the lower difficulty levels tech trading is kind of useless unless you're following a very specific tech path. The usefulness of tech trading also depends heavily on the number of other civs you have contact with. If there's only 1 or 2 opponents on your continent, the trading opportunities will be few. We haven't met any rivals yet, which feels odd to me-- I doubt that the Big & Small map would generate us a landmass this large that is isolated. Although I'm used to playing Monarch, where the AI has extra explorers in the beginning and usually finds you (and most of the goodie huts) pretty quickly. I usually don't prioritize the Oracle's tech requirements enough to beat that AI to the wonder on Monarch, but we should be able to build it in this game if we want to. (I'd still vote no, unless we find some marble first-- those hammers could be put to better use.) My current favorite early-game gambit is to research Metal Casting, build a forge somewhere, and run an engineer specialist as quickly as possible. A couple dozen turns later (depending on game speed and whether I'm a playing Philosophical leader), I get a Great Engineer that I can use to build the Pyramids instantly in whatever city I wish. I doubt we need to do that in this game, though. We're not going to be running a specialist economy (i.e., farm everywhere and get our commerce from scientist/priest/merchant specialists), and we're not going to be hurting for happiness on Noble with 2 luxury resources within sight, so the two big bonuses the Pyramids bring won't help us very much. I'm looking forward to seeing what you do with the next round. And thanks for opening the imageshack account-- it was getting late when I was uploading and I was too lazy to shop around for a less-restrictive image hosting site.

Bruce Springsteen -- 4th of July, Asbury Park (Sandy)

On turns: I took 20 turns, but we can change that as we go along. If you reach a major "decision point" that would be good for discussion (e.g., to war or not, where to settle, etc.), try to pause your turn at that point and post it for our feedback.

Welcome to the second-ever semi-official Obsidian Forums Civilization IV Succession Game Thread!!! As discussed in this thread, we'll be taking turns playing through a game of Civilization 4, with the relatively new Beyond the Sword expansion pack. So, lets get on with it! Game: Civ4 BTS v. 3.13 (no unofficial patches) Settings: Normal speed, Standard size, "Big and Small" map script. Mostly standard stuff. Difficulty: Noble Leader: Willem of the Dutch, renamed as: Fear the Mighty Obsidian Empire and its Glorious Leader, Feargus! I picked Willem because I wanted to do one of the BTS new leaders, and he's one of the most popular of them. The Creative trait is nice for the land grab, and gives us cheap libraries. The Financial trait makes cottages and coast tiles commerce powerhouses. The unique unit is a souped-up Galleon, and the unique building (Dike) is really, really good, although it isn't available until Steam Power. So here we go: Our starting location: Lots of nice green grasslands to cottage over. There's Corn to help our early growth, and lots of river for extra commerce, health, and hammers (once we get our Dike built), and enough hills to get production going when we want to. I'm a little bummed that such a good naval civ doesn't have a coastal start, but I can't complain about this terrain. Lacking a good reason to do otherwise, I decide to settle in place. Thus, Irvine, HQ Capitol of Obsidiania! Since the Dutch Obsids start with knowledge of Agriculture, I set our first build on a Worker, to get that Corn farmed. Some prefer to let the city grow before going with a worker, but I find that 1 population working an improved tile is better than 2 or 3 pop working unimproved tiles. Our first research priority will be Bronze Working. It's simply the most valuable early tech. It enables Slavery (and, with it, pop-rushing), forest chopping (which is invaluable for speeding production of those first settlers), and reveals the most important early resource (copper). I set our first tech to research at Mining, which is a necessary pre-requisite for BW. I moved our Warrior to see what's in that hut to the West, and got a free technology! Not a particularly valuable tech, but I won't turn it away. At this point, I screwed up a couple of screenshots, so I'll summarize: In general, I continued to move our warrior in a counter-clockwise direction around the capitol. Turn 7: Finished Mining, began BW. Turn 9: Somebody founded Buddhism. I don't like going for an early religion very much. BW and the early worker techs are just more valuable. If I want a religion and a shrine, I'll either conquer one or rush to Code of Laws for Confucianism. But I don't even do that very often. To me, the best play is to pick an ally I want to get close to and adopt his religion. Unless you devote a lot of hammers to missionary production, diplomatic flexibility is worth more than a holy city. With every faith you found yourself, you reduce the likelihood of rival AIs having different faiths (and thus religious wars). Turn 11: Our warrior ran into some animals NW of Irvine. Beat the wolves, healed for a couple of turns, and then beat the Lions. I gave him the Woodsman I promotion, which helped him heal a bit. Turn 15: Busy one. Got 50 GP from another hut. The Worker finished in Irvine. Lacking a reason for another Worker (which I often build right off the bat if there are a lot of forests to chop), I set production on a Warrior. The Worker, of course, will go and Farm the Corn tile. Turn 20: Another hut-- this one gave us a free Warrior. Bronze Working is finished, but, unfortunately, the known world contains no major Copper deposits. That's where I stopped. The Known World: The Northern part: Tough to tell where our next city should go yet. I'd like to claim that Gold sooner rather than later, though. Here's Irvine at turn 20: I've left it building the Warrior, although with the free one we just got, we really don't need it. Were it my decision, I'd keep production as-is for 2 turns until Irvine grows to size 2 (and get our Worker mining one of those riverfront hills), then switch to a Settler. Research is set on Animal Husbandry (to reveal Horses), but I'm not committed to that. The Wheel might be a better choice (pre-requisite for Pottery and cottages!). Or maybe something else. I'll leave that decision to whoever goes next. Also, I didn't switch to Slavery immediately, so you all might want to do that. The earlier we do it, the less the 1-turn of anarchy costs us in terms of commerce and production. The starting and current savegames are attached. Happy Civving! Post-Preview Edit: Photobucket's 800-pixel breadth limit is irritating. But I think you can make out all the important stuff. Feargus_BC_4000.zip Feargus_BC_3200.zip

Okay, I'll get started tonight. The start and first round should be up within a couple of hours. I'll do it in a new thread.

That's true, but my experience (albeit before the current patch) is that the AI tends to use the espionage slider a lot, which slows its tech rate. It is also coded not to trade a technology that it has a monopoly on. We can do Noble for the succession game (assuming adequate interest). I find that level pretty easy-- you can out-produce the AI on even footing just by controlling your workers manually and turning the city governors off-- but I'm not going to be the only person playing. I think 10 turns is a bit short, at least for the early game. Maybe start at 20 and consider shortening them in the middle ages. Note: There have already been a few issues with the new patch. An unofficial patch from a civfanatics poster is available that fixes the most egregious of them. I haven't tried it personally yet, but it looks like a must-have. Note-the-Second: Anyone who wants to improve their CivIV play and increase their understanding of the game should read the civfanatics threads on Sisiutil's "All Leaders Challenge". Great walkthroughs of games by a very smart player. Only 3 have been done in BTS so far, but many of the strategies used in the earlier ones are still pertinent.

Great (but sloppy) game to watch. Dallas did everything it could to give the Bills the win, but they didn't want it I guess. Feel sorry for Bills fans, between this game and the broncos game, losing games due to last second field goals HURTS. I went to bed around the start of the 4th quarter. I was not at all surprised to discover that the Bills had found a way to lose the game. They couldn't maintain any offense against the Cowboys rather ordinary D. (The Boys have only faced 1 decent offense so far this season, and they gave up 35 points in that game-- apart from Ware and Newman, their guys on D are all average at best.) The Bills defense was impressive, but eventually, the Cowboys' stronger offensive personnel started to win out. When the majority of your scoring comes from fluky plays like INT returns (Getting an INT = skill. Getting said INT in a part of the field where it can be easily returned for a TD = dumb luck), you're not nearly as good a team as the final score suggests. As for my Giants, they're still not impressing me overly. The offensive playcalling is poor, the pass coverage by linebackers and safeties still needs work, and the special teams, apart from Jeff Feagles, are awful. But they're 3-2, with 3 winnable games coming up (@ATL, SF, @MIA). They should have 5, maybe even 6, wins at the bye, which would be well ahead of the pace for my predictions. I was worried about the secondary when the season started, but rookie Aaron Ross is looking like he might already be the best CB on the team.

Ooh. Good idea, considering that I will, in fact, be flying to California this afternoon. I'll program that for our drive to the airport, and R.E.M.'s "I Remember California" for the return trip!

Well, as is often the case with patches, that "next week" turned into "three weeks from now." You can now see the change list and get it here. If there's still interest in doing a new succession game around here, I'd be happy to get things started. However, I'll be off on the left coast visiting with my fiancee's family until Monday, so somebody else is welcome to kick it off if they can't wait. In the meantime, lets decide on some settings. I think "Prince" is probably a good difficulty to start on-- the last one was on Noble, but BTS is generally easier than vanilla Civ4 because the AI trades less and techs slower (although I don't know if that is still true after this patch). I'm thinking that one of the new map scripts would be appropriate. Perhaps "Big and Small"? Standard speed and 'normal' map size is probably best. Any preferences on Civs/Leaders?

Radiohead -- Thinking About You

Well, the modern economy is not so dependent on natural resources as it once was. Local median incomes and per-capita GDP is probably the best measure of how well a state or region would do on its own. The Northeast would do pretty well by itself, as would the Pacific coast and parts of Texas & Florida. The rest of the country less so. One interesting way to view the federal government is as a funnel of funds and resources from the parts of the country that are economically productive to the parts that aren't. Places where per capita income is high contribute more to the Feds in taxes than they get back in services. The opposite is true in less developed states-- they get most of the farm subsidies, military bases, federal highway aid, etc, but pay less in taxes because their incomes are lower. If the Northeast seceded, people in the South, Midwest, etc., would face either dramatic tax increases or large reductions in federal spending in their states. (Oddly enough, places who benefit the most from the federal government tend to elect politicians who want to reduce its size. Ungreatful bastards!)