In a message dated 7/23/02 11:50:43 PM Eastern Daylight Time, jasonab@acm.org
writes:
<< Ovatha Easterling wrote:
> If ever there was a game designed for lies, cheating and stealing it
> is this one. And, yes, it was deliberately designed that way. This
Don't forget the victory conditions that encourage you to backstab your
teammates.
The thing is, the game has changed since then. The players have decided
that they don't want to play that way, and I don't blame them. Clint's
rule reflects the game that is played today, and tells people what they
can and can't expect from their opponents.
jason
>>
A thing that happened in my last game has soured me. A couple of my ally
nations, Northern Gondor and Dwarves, were dropped early after missing 2
turns in a row, apparently standard procedure. I picked up Dwarves and
another ally picked up Northern Gondor.
The player who got Northern Gondor offered to a couple of neutrals to
sacrifice NG, for purposes of "game balance", if they would ally with the FP.
Having enticed the neutrals into allying, he then proceeded to transfer most
of the NG pop centers to his original nation before letting it go bankrupt.
I considered this cheating because he used the NG nation as a pawn to enrich
his original nation, (the negotiations with the neutrals merely being a
"cover" for what he apparently intended all along) thus gaining a significant
advantage toward becoming the game winner which was not available to his
allies, except for me (I did not follow his example). When I complained to
the management about this practice, they said that he could do whatever he
wanted with his nation.
I don't like to use the word "never" but I may not play again, principally
because I consider that such use of a picked-up nation gave that player an
unfair advantage over the others and I think the management's ruling was
improper. Going even farther, I think the management practice of allowing
allies to pick up dropped nations in the early stages of the game is itself
unfair to the players who did not get a second nation. I can see the business
advantage to them of not wanting games to fall apart due to loss of a few
players early on, but there seems to be sufficient players willing to pick up
early-stage "stand-by" positions that giving them to allies should be
unnecessary. I have offered to pick up stand-by positions and been told they
were already taken but I don't know if they were taken by standby players or
by allies.
For those who might wish to play the game closer to the way it was
originally designed, I suggest "no e-mail" games in which turns would only
be sent out by mail, turn orders only accepted by mail, and no allied player
information included on the results sheets. Players could still communicate
with each other by any means once they made contact. This might be
attractive to incarcerated players who would have some -- though not all --
of the disadvantages of their situation balanced.
Ed Taborek
