Re: Exploit question
 

Hey Rdonj, tone down the nerd rage. I brought up MoD to sate my appetite for tears. K didn't bring it up.

It's pretty obvious that Bogus's dudes orders and MoD are completely different. You guys should be ashamed for trying to gang up on a forum member because of what ultimately boils down to a difference of opinion.

Nothing said by anyone in this thread deserves nerd rage, except maybe for me bringing up MoD just to goad you guys (Sorry !:angel).

Re: Exploit question
 

In a slightly less antagonistic way let me argue the other side: the point is it doesn't matter what the devs think. There are so many undocumented features, quirks, bugs, and semi-unintended interactions its silly to picture this game as some divinely inspired piece of work that needs to be played in the intended perfection. It's an exploit because the devs didn't intend it to be there? To me that seems an incredibly silly position to take (though admittedly many do). Did the devs 'intend' that archer screens work the way they do? Did they 'intend' that water nations struggle with dominion just because of the way maps usually work? Did they 'intend' each counter for each unit in the game? Did they 'intend' for people to trade mages via hellbind heart/charm? Did they intend for clam hoarding to be required to be competitive in larger games? Or...did they just put a bunch of cool crap in here and tweak it until it was fun and had some semblance of balance?

Trying to play by what the devs intended is not only silly, it's pointless. If it's possible to do in the game, it's part of the game. In very special circumstances (the old mists of deception according to many) some aspect of the game is considered broken to the point it (semi) ruins the game to have people abusing it and it makes sense to agree not to do that. Trying to arbitrarily avoid things you think the devs didn't intend though is something I can't wrap my head around, and getting mad at somebody else for not doing the same thing is just wrong.

Re: Exploit question
 

Yeah except that isn't what's happening. Not much use apologising for trolling then continuing to do so in the same post :P

Baalz: 'If it's possible to do in the game it's part of the game' seems a pointless truism to me. Obviously the 'exploit' in question is part of the game. Is anyone arguing it isn't? You do the entire thing from within the game, without breaking anything.

The question is whether people want it in the game - when they don't and they regard its use as spoiling their enjoyment, they'll react badly to it being used. Maybe they're irrational, but it doesn't matter. It seems to me the reason people don't want the Bogus copy orders 'exploit' in the game is that it /feels/ like a metagaming exploit or unfixed bug. Certainly the fact that if you change Bogus crews orders they lose the special orders forever and if you want to copy them you can only do so through a couple of keyboard shortcuts makes the whole thing feel buggy.

Imagine if you could somehow script a 6th spell on units with a secondary form by getting them killed into their second form then the next turn copying their orders over to an identical unit that was still in the first form, or something like that. I'm certain people would have the same reaction. It may be a pain in the *** to do and only help a marginal amount and be hard to even notice when people are using it but it would still feel like an exploit to a lot of people.

Re: Exploit question
 

Sombre, there is the catch. You don't want it in the game, but I do. Just like I wanted battlefield enchantments staying the way they were. I haven't used either in MP and it is easy enough to detect when someone does and make house rules against it.

It is not fair that YOU can complain to a company that developed a game I paid a lot of money for and get the game altered. Now I am left in a situation where I can never mod in an intended fire and flee enchantment for SP use. If the Bogus thing were to get changed, I wouldn't be able to use his orders towards the end of a SP just to have something to do for fun.

The complaining from your camp alters MY game, not just your MP games. And that is not right. You guys should have used assassins against the MoD commanders, or Mind Hunts etc. You guys should be using amulets of missile protection against fire at enemy commanders.

Instead you guys just want a game where you make a bunch of stupid gargoyles and tartarians and cast arcane nexus. QUIT screwing up my game!

Re: Exploit question
 

So your argument is that the developers shouldn't respond to user requests or complaints?

Re: Exploit question
 

Let me agree with some very respectable people, but from a totally new direction.
I dont care who meant or didnt mean it to be in. If I can RPG it, then its part of the game.

Bogus and company is an important part of Illwinter history. Its based on the devs original DnD adventuring party. Bogus was also the companys name before they changed it to Illwinter. So I have no problem that its a soft spot in the devs heart. They changed the scripting option in all units but those. Maybe it just didnt feel right to nerf Bogus.

So..
if I can manage to capture the legendary Illwinter adventuring groups member named Bogus, then I gain the ability to have him teach a new combat skill to my commanders. There. Its part of the game. (well my games anyway altho I would of course abide by an individual game creators rules)

Its probably not hugely more beneficial than other random events in the game.

Re: Exploit question
 

Battlefield enchantments remaining after the caster retreats, when one is supposed to be able to end enchantments by killing the caster is clearly something that should have been fixed years ago. Leaving it as it only makes first round casting by the defender even more important than it currently is.

This is a ridiculous statement. Of course it's fair. You could have complained back and made valid arguments, but then, nobody really cares about SP balance in this game, because the AI isn't capable of putting up a decent fight.

Assasins? Those guys that can't kill even non-mage commanders and still eat up commander recruitment slots? That less than half the nations have access too? Or mind hunt? Which essentially means that you play R'lyeh, Bandar log, Pythium, or Arco, and only Arco if you don't want a bunch of expensive feebleminded mages sitting around.

Where are we supposed to be getting the hundreds of gems, and the hours of micromanagement needed for management of such items? Are we all supposed to only play air/astral nations so that we have your supposed counters available?

Stop assuming that the vanilla game is sacrosanct.

Re: Exploit question
 

I never once mentioned MoD. I was merely pointing out the various ways in which K was demonstrably wrong. So I have no idea what you are talking about.


I second sombre, on all counts.


Baalz - I would consider things to be an exploit if the devs consider them to be exploits. JK and KO do not always consider "undocumented features" and unintended mechanics to be exploits, such as for example reverse communions. But if they did consider something unintended to be an exploit, I would feel that it was an exploit as well. That is not the only reason I would consider something to be an exploit, though I feel it is a good reason to do so.

Again, I wasn't getting mad at K for having a different opinion, I saw that he was posting nonsense, showed why it was nonsense, and got on his case for attacking another poster (and everyone else who doesn't explicitly agree with him) for saying things that they clearly had not said in any way, shape or form.


And to foodstamp's post after mine - As far as I can tell no one is trying to get it changed so that you can't copy bogus' orders. OP asks a question. A bunch of people respond and state their opinion. No one says "hey this should be changed by the devs because it's buggy". House rules continue to decide whether copying bogus' orders is okay or not and life goes on. Especially since at this point I'm pretty sure the devs are done making such changes to the game.

Re: Exploit question
 

I think that most people prefer smooth and balanced game. Where your skill decides if you win or not. Without some bugs wrecking your game. And exploits are pretty much bugs. As game admin I don't want to list all possible things that should be banned [it'd be nice to create that list though] and as a player I don't want to worry if my neighbour is not using dirty trick, making him suddenly much stronger than he should be.

Most exploits are not vocally protested because they are very rarely used. Be it MoD, Bogus orders or VP ceding. Almost every good player is above strats like that. The problem is with that 'almost' and problems they create. And arguing that most of mp community spoils their fun is really selfish.

And yes, I am against tartarian spamming and whole mechanics behind them. They should be fixed. Same for some other things, like uber globals. Good thing clamming is gone.

Re: Exploit question
 

Foodstamp:

Ok, I used some time and did a proper search for Kristoffer's posts about Bogus as your reference was a bit untrue.

First post: [10-02-07]

"I like the fact that the VIsitors, Bogus and his merry men, have the ability to target commanders.

I think it can be fun in an SP game to get hold of these ancient tactical skills. The older the better (in accordance with the creed of most new religious movements). These are dom-ppp survivals and ancient to boot.

I think it would be naughty to use these orders in MP, unless all players agreed to their eventual use.

I think it would be fun if assassins were given limited access to these orders."


Another post:

"BTW, you are not supposed to take Bogus' things from him. Especially if you think that you can make better stuff for yourself."

Re: Exploit question
 

So? How is that a catch? I already stated my opinion on Bogus and Co does not fall in line with the majority view. I'm in camp 3) the majority is verifiably camp 2). I play keeping the views of the majority in mind on matters like exploits - since I am aware of them I consider them to be the unspoken rules of common sense. It's irrelevant whether I agree with them or not.

I'm not sure who you're ranting at here but it can't be me since I've never complained to Illwinter about anything. I can only assume you're projecting.

Some advice re: SP games - use an older patch.
Some advice re: modding - now you can mod an anti enchantment spell that causes casters to flee. Doors and windows.

I'm not going to quote any more from that post because your spittle spray response is in the wrong thread and directed at the wrong person. But here is a slightly older post:

Well I guess you did give us fair warning you were going to try and drag it that way. And you criticise others for 'nerd rage'. For shame.

Re: Exploit question
 

I concur. Though I think it doesn't really matter if people are asking for something or not. It's selfish to demand nothing changes if change is what people want. It's also insulting to the devs to pretend they are at the beck and call of irrational whiners. If they wanted to change Bogus and Co they would and it's never UNFAIR for those playing their game to provide them with feedback. Who wants to second guess if it will inform their decisions? I sure as hell don't make posts with the intent of changing anyone's mind.

Re: Exploit question
 

Zeldor: I didn't reference any of the Devs posts.

Sombre: the You did not mean you personally. I meant if you (as in anyone) wanted something changed, it affects the people who don't want it changed.

Re: Exploit question
 

Ahahahahaha! That explains so much. :) Thanks for finding that.

-Max

Re: Exploit question
 

There hasn't been a heated discussion like this in a long time - so thanks for the entertaining early X-mas present! :)

Otherwise, I think this is a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing. As others have pointed out, it is supremely unlikely the developers will alter anything at this point, so this all comes down to house rules for MP games. So what's all the fuss about? You don't like the house rules, play another game.

IMO, these special scripts are highly unlikely to occur, but if they do, I can see how they can be unbalancing. Just had a normal MP turn where a Dryad with a Piercer (only 5 E gems - 3 w/ a Hammer - in CBM) gunned down an important enemy mage trying to assist PD. Her script was just 'Eagle Eyes', 'Fire Large Enemy', but she she still zeroed in on a human-sized mage (an Amazon, I think) at the expense of the PD units.

Game over in that fight, and that was just with whatever normal AI algorithms are usually run. But with special Bogus-scripts, and cheap ranged weapons, I can easily see how Bogus' tactics can be seen as game breaking.

But it would be so hard to pull of in MP (OK, Bogus has landed in my territory, and somehow I've got all sorts of free time to organize a Charm-crew, etc.), that it's hard to imagine it's worse than someone finding, say, the Circle Masters magic site, or a Conjuration bonus site.

In the end, I guess that's how I'd rank the outcome: Like finding Mt. Chaining, or that 50% off Conjuration site - yeah, potentially game breaking, but that's the way the lucky ball bounces in Dominions (but then I've seen that some people would like to ban powerful magic sites like that also).

Re: Exploit question
 

That's really interesting. Was it just chance? Can you re-run the battle a few times with new randomization? (Add a unit to the replay and immediately kill it, Shift-U + Shift-K, which resets the randomizer.)

-Max

Re: Exploit question
 

Um, I guess I could, if I knew how to do stuff like that ;) Since I've never played around with the guts of Dominions before, I'd really need someone to walk me through that (PM me with details if you're truly interested).

But yeah, it was either luck, or the AI. Besides the Dryad snipers (there were two), all I had, of missile troops, were some monkey archers. They always fired right at the PD, and apparently so did the Dryads for the first few rounds.

Then about round 5 or so, right after the enemy mage - and it was an Amazon - cast Swarm, blamo, both shot at her, and one nailed her. So why did they change targets? Dunno.

Re: Exploit question
 

As a new person on these boards, can I ask for a neutral explanation of the Mists of Deception brouhaha? I've never cast it or had it cast on me in-game, and the description in the manual is quite vague.

Re: Exploit question
 

Used to be that if you cast it and then retreated the caster the monsters would keep coming. Therefore, if you were the defender it could be literally impossible to lose since the enemy army would hit the turn 50 autorout. Plus it let you kill all of an enemy's mindless and berserk units. All that at the cost of a few A gems and risking a mage for _one_ turn.

Re: Exploit question
 

I won't PM because others may be interested. The method is really simple: while watching a battle replay, type Shift+U (uppercase U) and type in a unit name or number, and it will add as many of that type of unit as you ask for to the battle in the place where your cursor was, as independent units. Type Shift+K to kill the units in the square your cursor is over.

If you do this, it obviously changes the battle from the "official" outcome that gets listed in the after-action report (X units killed, etc.) and it doesn't affect the actual game, but it makes testing certain things easy. For instance, you can test whether your killer army that just stomped all over somebody's PD would have done quite so well if the enemy had had 8 Wraith Lords there instead of PD, or if your mage had died before casting Fire Storm.

-Max

Re: Exploit question
 

All this is true. Let me add: it used to be that the only way to break a battlefield enchantment[1] was by killing the caster, which meant that if the caster Retreated or cast Returning or was banished to Inferno or Cocytus, the enchantment would stay up for the rest of the combat. I *think* all of the above methods of removing the enemy mage from the battlefield now also cancel the spell.

-Max

[1] Battlefield enchantment: any battlefield-wide spell that is not instantaneous, e.g. Mists of Deception, Fire Storm, Rigor Mortis etc. but not Army of Gold, Will of the Fates etc. Listed in the manual as "BE" vs. "BF".

Re: Exploit question
 

It was pretty funny. The best part was the guy who used it first barely spoke English and rarely posted here. It was hilarious to see someone with such little interaction in this forum make so many people have a conniption fit. There were personal insults, liberal use of caps lock and moderators joining in the name calling. Good times :).

Re: Exploit question
 

OK, ran a few test replays (thanks for that Shift-U/K tip, by the way!). Interestingly, in none of the tests did the Dryads shoot at the Amazon Sorceress (or the other two PD-commanders, as far as I could see) again. Not sure what to make of that result, except to say that I must have gotten very lucky in the 'real' turn :confused:

But I can see how Dryads (or some other cheap A or N mage) armed with Pierces (or some such) and Bogus' friends' scripts, that could be really, really nasty...

Re: Exploit question
 

When Shift-U-ing things into a real battle you will also see that the enemy mages will use different spells. So you can practically get to know almost the whole research of your enemy if you shift-u a lot of different stuff into a battle and note down the spells your enemy casts. This is an exploit imo, but I suppose many people know it already, so it's probably better if everyone does.

Re: Exploit question
 

Theorycrafting:

You could also make a guess at figuring out what his scripting orders are. Did that D4 mage cast Raise Skeletons because he was scripted to do so, or was he scripted to Disintegrate and there just wasn't anybody in range because I set my guys toward the back? Let's add somebody within 25 squares of him, Manhattan distance, and see if he tries to Disintegrate them instead. Are those cavalry set to Attack Nearest or Attack Archers? Let's add some archers.

I have never tried this in practice but I conjecture that you could gain useful information. In particular, you could attack with a scout and insert a bunch of units. Normally a scout attack would not trigger any gem-using spells, but with a bunch of added units the mages should act normally.

-Max

Re: Exploit question
 

Didn't know that one. :doh: Off to sift-u/k -> On other thought turns take long allready would take much longer to do that too.

Re: Exploit question
 

It's much faster to see all researched spells in the -ddd log.

Re: Exploit question
 

Oh yeah. For that matter, you see exactly what the script is too.

Re: Exploit question
 

This thread mentioned one thing I agree with.

Its wrong to remove huge parts of the game you dont like. You can easily guess what I mean, since its a main feature of CBM 1.6. It removed a whole tactical layer of the game, instantly nerfing the hell out of some nations and insanely buffing others, altering the gameplay etc.
This is maybe half the reason why I wont join any further games once Lapis and Setsumi end. And yes, I already heard the '90% of non-noob players' and 'good riddance, emo' responds, so dont bother. :)

Re: Exploit question
 

Kurz,
After your other two games end start up a vanilla game. I and others (I'm sure) still swing both ways Dominions-wise. ;)
-ssj

Re: Exploit question
 

How is it wrong? You're talking about a mod. Don't like it, don't use it. At least with a patch I can see /some/ reason to cry about it, even if I would tell such people to suck it up and stop being selfish.

Re: Exploit question
 

Its wrong since vanilla and CBM 1.5 games just won't start now. I've seen one attempt recently; it failed. Perhaps because people, myself included, got used to many good changes of CBM, like worthy rainbow and titan pretenders, usable cavalry, buffed low-level conjurations etc.

Re: Exploit question
 

You talk about a mod that became a MP standart as was described here. And now we see people who talk about "horribly imbalanced" vanilla version, while many, including myself and Kuritza, were playing from the beginning of Dom3 and before that (Dom2) and had lots of fun in this "horribly imbalanced" game. Well, it is true that most of the CBM changes are really great and give more strategic options, but the combination of such global changes as gemgen removal AND the idea that CBM is undoubtely better than vanilla and should be included by default in all MP is in the heart of this situatiuon. Actually I think many of the players who join new games just think "oh my I heard vanilla is horribly imbalanced, I should stay only with CBM party". And in such case some changes can be made that actually take away some interesting strategic variations.

Re: Exploit question
 

So ask qm if you can make your own parallel version of cbm without gemgens removed. It's about 2 minutes work to change the dm to leave them in. Then make the games yourselves and advertise them. It's what people did when they wanted to play cbm and vanilla was far more popular, not too long ago.

Clams were removed in CBM because a lot of people wanted that change. Even more people seem very happy with the change in games they're currently playing. Just because they like to play this way and you don't doesn't make them wrong. Geez.

Re: Exploit question
 

There's not much that's "interesting" about the gem generating items. You build as many of them as possible, send their income back into making more of them, and eventually end up with a gem income that cannot be taken away from you except by unimaginable amounts of luck. They've all been nerfed many times even by the devs since the days of Dominions 2. Basically, if you expect the game to last long enough that you will get a positive return on investment on a gem generating item, then they are almost always the proper way to spend your gems, and that kind of choice really limits viable strategic options. If it were possible to keep the generated gems from being removed from the commander that had them, so that they were only used for battlefield purposes, then they'd be perfectly fine items, but you can't do that, so they are broken.

Re: Exploit question
 

It doesnt reduce your options, it increases them dramatically - at the cost of, yes, being forced to make gemgens. It just silly to say that having more gems narrows your available options, so I wont even explain why its wrong. The only thing gemgens were reducing was the impact of national troops on the lategame. Which was a GREAT thing because national troops are simply not balanced against each other, with gemgens in mind.

And I dont want to make my own balance mods and advertise them - this is exactly the kind of thing that killed Dominions for me, and I dont feel like being a reanimator. I just say that its wrong when several players remove an important part of the game they dont like - for everyone.
As for the rest of community supporting this change... well, I live in Russia and I can tell you much about such things. Our whole history is about weird things being supported by the crowd. :)

Re: Exploit question
 

You didn't play in Prepo or Artifacts as far as I know, and thus haven't been involved in some of the more famous train wrecks that gens have caused. I thought they were a pretty spiffy idea for a while myself (generally because I was the only one using them and they seemed like a great tool to let me win), but extensive experience has taught me otherwise. Can you point me to an MP game in which both you and an opponent have had well over 300 gens each? In artifacts I know that I got to the point where I was mass spamming juggernauts to go for a dom win because I considered winning through military means to be nearly impossible due to the combined might of first turn defensive advantage and gens making raiding pointless.

Saying that they provide more options, while technically true, is also a great justification for playing with the debug mod on. You have SO MANY options then, and national troops don't matter at all, so it's almost perfectly balanced! Doesn't make for a good game though.

Re: Exploit question
 

They didn't. They removed it for themselves and posted the mod up. Others then chose to use it, or not. That's the essence of all mods. So again, how is that wrong?

Re: Exploit question
 

No it's not. If clams are available for mass production, and if the game will last more than the time for their cost to be paid off, then any other use of gems is suboptimal. If one option is clearly the best choice, then the other options might as well not exist. Who would make two water elemental bottles when you could instead make one clam of pearls?

The water elemental bottle also functions as a gem generator, producing the equivalent of one water gem in every battle where it shows up. It's just one that needs to be risked on the battlefield for ten turns to recoup its investment.

Nobody did that. You are free to play whatever version of the game that you want. But the thing is that it's always been the newer, less experienced players who wanted gem generators to remain in the game in nearly every argument over them for the past five or six years. In my experience, almost anybody who's played enough games to see the effect that they can have ends up arguing against them. And eventually, enough people have played in enough games that have been ended in ridiculous situations because of limitless gem income that people don't want to play those games anymore.

Re: Exploit question
 

Everything is a sliding scale, and can be taken to an extreme. Balance is only one of those sliding scales. I dont think there ever will be a complete agreement on balance. People have their own preferences for how much balance is good. Extreme balance would just be, well, chess.

Hmm....
I wonder if anyone has played a game with one of the mods that gives everyone the same nation? And using CBM of course. That might be an interesting test of skill. Not really Dominions but interesting.

Re: Exploit question
 

Kuritza - if you can't get a game with certain settings/mods/rules (including plain vanilla) to start then it's pretty self evident that there aren't many people who want to play that way. Unfortunately this community is fairly small so you either have to roll with what most people are playing or beat the bushes to drum up some interest for what you want to play. Complaining that nobody wants to play the way you do is a bit silly. Maybe some other settings might be more to your liking while also appealing to more players: have you considered more common magic sites, easy research or money/resource multiples to "increase your options"? A game like this (Utopia) is just starting now...

Re: Exploit question
 

I'd have to quibble with that, though I agree overall. If you win battles/survive/take more territory because of those bottles water/Frost Brands/whatever, then they may not be suboptimal. Clams are optimal in the long run, but other investments may have a much shorter payoff, or a shorter window of opportunity (Water Queens?)
There's an opportunity cost to investing in the long term.

Re: Exploit question
 

On the one hand, from a decision theory perspective, removing an option which dominates all other options can increase the *interesting* set of options and thus the strategic complexity of the game.

One the other hand, producing gem gens does not dominate all other options because there are times (i.e. you're under attack) when making more gem gens is a bad investment, just as there are times in Bloons Tower Defense 4 when buying more banana farms is a bad investment because you need the firepower NOW.

On the gripping hand, I personally hate clams even in SP. I feel oddly compelled to forge them because they're so clearly optimal most of the time--I can only imagine how much worse the temptation/pressure is in MP. I've got mixed feelings about bloodstones--I wish there were a way to remove only the gemgen aspect.

-Max

Re: Exploit question
 

Well, in the game I played last year it was just as you say, in the end it was me with over 200 provs and Executor who had about half as many, but he was EA Ctis and clammed like crazy while I (LA Ctis) was conquering the world. In the end I had about 400 converted astral/turn but he had Nexus and FotA up, so we had some nice battles and finally he won with GoH-Armageddon combo because he had more gems than me (999 dispels/recasts were not uncommon there). So I know what are you talking about but still I'm against such changes. About making our own mod - hehe, this mod already exists and is called CBM 1.5 :) Actually I prefer vanilla game (heresy!), but 1.5 was also fine. I see no reason to argue with the community here and actually I was going to start some sort of "nostalgia" no-mods game after I'm finished with in some of my current games but it seems I'm going to stay for a while in them.

Re: Exploit question
 

It still boils down to ZEEEEEEEEEEERGGGGG!!!!! gameplay.

Why? Because there is no alternate source of income. If you are denied land, you die, as simple as that. If somebody invested heavily in early ZEEEEEERGGG!!! and got noobish neighbours, and you got stuck with some Pangaea gaeaey who turtled in his unbreakable castles with endless maenads, you lose automatically.
In Setsumi I struggle ONLY because I have gemgens. Were it down to whoever has more units, HECK, there wouldnt be even a fraction of a chance against LA Ermor who controls half the map.

Who cares if magic sites are common, if national troops remain important throughout the whole game, and your national troops suck? Bandar Log without clams against Shinuyama! Ha ha, Machaka against double-bless Mictlan! Eriu against MA Vanheim! MA Oceania against anything! All strategies revolve against just one thing - imba fast expansion. There is just no alternate route.

I dont complain that nobody wants to play the way I prefer; I complain that some guys decided for everyone that from now on this game will not be Dominions I have come to like. They made decision for me. And since CBM was already popular, of course most players (who would be rather indiffirent to the topic otherwise) went with the flow.
But actually, I dont mind quitting. More free time is always a good thing. I just wanted to say this before I leave - it was a crappy idea to decide how EVERYONE will play.

P.S.

By the way, regarding Utopia - Dimaz can confirm, I was laughing like MAD at that very game. 250% gold, 250% resources, no gemgens, Ashdod banned. Lots of gold and heaps of resources, can I say Dai Oni hacking to bits everything while Bakemono mages find more or less all sites possible? :)

Re: Exploit question
 

Slow day today, guess I'll respond even though we're falling into troll country.

That's just ridiculously false. Obviously you're constrained throughout the game as to what you can do, but your province count is only one factor. Who is in a stronger position when an earlyish war starts? The guy who:
Went with a blistering initial expansion and has the most provinces?
or the guy who...
Went with strong scales and a moderate expansion and has the most gold income?
or the guy who...
Invested in castles instead of expansion and has 3 times as many forts?
or the guy who...
Invested in research rather than expansion?
or the guy who...
Went with early site searching and has the most gems?
or the guy who...
invested in a heavy bless for thugs that didn't help much with initial expansion but are now coming into their own?
etc. etc.

I'm not even sure what you're arguing....that it's not fair to have to use monkeys when playing Bandar Log as the game progresses? If that's so objectionable don't play Bandar Log, and you might even change your mind if somebody shows you some stuff you hadn't considered.

Again, I don't quite follow your logic. There is absolutely nothing stopping you from playing with or without any mods you want other than finding similar minded people to play with. Nobody decided what EVERYONE will play...other than EVERYONE.

Re: Exploit question
 

Actually the point is still worth making and clearly defining who and how many are more for the joy of variety than the idea of everyone playing one way. Earlier I was accused of almost vigilante attacks against cbm which rather surprised me. Its not like I dive into every game-start thread to preach against cbm. I tend to show up when someone (actually mostly just one or two people) show up and tell the game op that all mp games use cbm or should use cbm. They do this even when they proclaim at the same time that they dont plan to play in that game. Particularly irritating when its games involving some variant other than last-one-standing where balance does not necessarily win over game play.

The fact that some of the generally recognized trend-setters in the community are so outspoken against the fostering of such an impression might help to go far in allowing some more variant games where mod selection, if left up for discussion at all, will fall into the realm of please and thankyou.

Re: Exploit question
 

This makes no more sense now than it did the first 4 times you said it. How is one person dictating how everyone else will play? Please explain it to me, step by step. Without hysterics if possible. Apparently I just don't get it, because I've always thought if you didn't want to use CBM in a game you didn't have to. Has this changed without me knowing?

I just assumed people were making use of a completely optional mod provided free of charge by a member of this board because they wanted to.

Re: Exploit question
 

Maybe it's just me, but I'm really struggling to understand what you meant by this.

Re: Exploit question
 

Just read what Gandalf above you said. Perhaps you have better understanding than Rdonj.
CBM was actively promoted; people were directly told that no game should start without CBM, and vanilla games are terrible. Opinion has been forced, it worked.