As an honourary Fellow, I should also say that you're a great bunch of fellows, and Theoden, you've been a wonderful chum and a source of inspiration for the community. Your contributions are always read, even if not always commented on.

Thanks guys. I really appreciate everything you've done for the Meta as well. Your stories and lighthearted conversations have lifted my spirits more than once.

I just spent some time finishing my Small/Maso, and you know what? It's probably the most fun I've had with this game in a long time. I guess all the trouble going on with the Metaverse made me forget just how fun this game is. I tried some new things and was impressed that they worked. I'm really liking the new attitude of the AI in ver 1.11.

I'm going to be returning to my Metaverse Review duties soon. I think the Metaverse is recovering from this mess and things are getting a little bit back to normal. Hey, did you guys see my pirate picture? I posted it on the POSSe thread, you've gotta see it!

Well, I'm going to get offline and spend some time with the baby. Just wanted to let everybody know that playing the game seems to really improve the attitude (especially when you trounce the Yor! )

Wombat, your post was nice, but not nice enough for me to forgive you for stealing fifth place back from me.

LOL Blast! And, er...stealing? I THINK NOT! I am inevitably going to be overrun by the gigantic players, although I'm DAMN well going to make them earn it!

[Wombat curses failure of plan, hoping niceness would lull vincible into having a few days off to recover]
[Message Edited]

Hey Mr. Wombat. How are you? Have you downloaded 1.11? Can you do a small maso on 1.11 and let us know what the scoring change is please? But wait until vincible submits another. LOL.



Squinting at that tiny strategy map in the upper right corner, totally losing orientation as to where the heck Sol is on the map, not being able to see open resources as a "x" at 100% size, and wearing out your index finger on your mouse wheel adjusting map size, etc. You see, anyone who is silly enough to play gigantic DOES earn it.

After I finish this one, I might try a huge or large size next. Gigantic is a little bit of an information overload but I am glad Stardock made it.

I'm halfway through a medium, when I can find time to finish it...

Hiya, ric - I must say I have not yet upgraded; I'm trying to get a complete sense of what they have done with the patch from the various threads. After twenty years playing computer games, I have learned NEVER to be the first guy to download a new patch

After the last patch, which created the masoverse, I resolved to be more circumspect this time - I was planning a little personal protest if the patch introduced more crappy stuff; I just wasn't going to upgrade. For instance, Ray suggested the 1 IP bug was NOT fixed in this patch - your opinion? And the scoring tweaks? I read about real inconsistencies in map size scoring from your other thread. I'll probably go ahead with it soon - I've also had other stuff on my mind re the Posse and empires . Do you suggest I play through a game on 1.10 to the last move, save, upgrade then reload the game and submit?

Er...have you considered your intake of certain substances as a cause of this 'problem'? LOL

As am I by the maso ones. AFAICT I am the only player in the top 25 who hasn't played a scoring maso at all - in fact all the others had masos for their last four games!

Alex


~SDC~

AFAICT it certainly has been reduced in effect - it works (sometimes!) if you trade with an AI to their advantage!

Alex


~SDC~

Hey Alex - and I love you for it.... I'm also considering, depending on what I hear, dropping back to crippling after upgrading - I have to admit I certainly had more fun at that level, and probably a bit more flexibility regarding tactics. Maso grinds at you after a while. I could probably sustain myself in the Top 25, although maybe not Top 10 in that way.

I have been trying all levels and I love the easier ones, you get fun watching the sharks eating all the Altarians and Drengins ships, it is fun!!!

Fun?? Enjoyment of hapless aliens being eaten by sharks?? A Jedi craves not these things....Mayito has not been taking his medication again....

That's why he's in the Jedi Academy, to purge himself of those inappropriate emotions.

Alex Ascendant: if that picture is of you, then you are a looker. Although, it is a touch ambiguous...I hope you aren't being taken before your time or something, by that ethereal being. Got quite a shock when it loaded...

Try http://www.alex-robertson.co.uk/images/alex.gif if you want the real me - the kids at school have nicknamed me Pavarotti! That is actually a copy of a book cover I have - it seemed appropriate somehow...

Alex


~SDC~

Do you sing too?

Good morning everybody!

Hope everyone is feeling better and the events of the past few days have blown over. This thread certainly seems to reflect that!:D

I would say the scoring has been bumped on Small/Maso from 1.10 to 1.11. If you'll see my scores, I went from scoring around 19,500 on 1.10 to around 22k on 1.11. I tried the 1 IP trick and yes, it's still there in Maso. I've also noticed an increase in random events (events not linked to colonization), which I actually like. I thought it was kind of strange you could only change your morality when you were colonizing, and this seems to be a bit more realistic. The AI is much more conservative with their money. If you get their treasury a bit too low, they will no longer pay you for anything. It seems a bit easier to trade for ships, though.

I, too, am dropping back from Maso for a while. I started a Huge/Crippling and have enjoyed every turn! The Carinoids actually beat me to a couple of yellow stars! I really like the more expansive Minors!

Wombie: So far, I haven't seen anything in 1.11 that I don't like. The fact that the 1 IP bug is still there is a little disappointing, but I guess there are plausible arguments as to why it's there. In my mind, it's like sending flowers to the AI. Not really anything significant, but enough to make them feel good.



You have been published? What's the name of the book?

Well, guys, it's going to be a busy day at work. I might be a little scarce today. Have a great day!

Unfortunately not by me.... Citizen Mexal has though http://www.rpg-resource.org.uk/

As to singing - well, give me enough of Pontius' decent red and you never know

Alex


~SDC~

A very happening thread for sure. I can hardly keep up.

I agree with Theoden on the 1.11 changes but the scoring issues still perplex me. Wild Wombat, just have fun, so if you stick with 1.10 until the bugs get worked out that makes sense. I confess to feeling a bit of a dork when 1.05 was working fine, then I downloaded 1.10, and got the "survey ship crash" until Stardock put out the newer patch. Doh!!!

1.10 seems like a stable version. I was needing a little spice in the game again and downloaded 1.11, figuring "what the heck". I do like the stuff Theoden says like expanding minors (in my current game the Carinoids scarfed up two yellow stars I would have had under 1.10 so it's pretty cool). The gifting of 1 IP never worked for me all the time anyway but I can't tell much difference with the new version and 1 IP gifting. The 1.11 scoring seems higher by reports but the amount is still unclear to me. Rainbird reports little change in a normal difficulty game. Ray gets 53k on a huge maso 1.11 while he usually got 50k on a 1.10, which is not much change. But others report 50% to 60% score bumps . . . at least on maso resubmissions. I think the mystery now is what happens when a person starts a game in 1.11 and finishes it in 1.11. It is pretty clear that hitting the 60k cap on gigantic maso may be easier because twice I ended up at 58 or 59k but more recently hit 60k on a gigantic maso (started and finished in 1.11) without researching tech past 4D philosophy (Gal guide book) or Evolution (The terraformer). I like maso because so far I have had no anomalous scores and I get decent metaverse points without milking the tech tree (or anything else). There seems to be more freedom to simply win the game however you can pull it off.

I am now just far enough into a gigantic maso now that I have to find out if I can win it . . . but I am not far enough into it to finish soon. Maybe we can work the 1.11 maso tree up and down in map size and resolve this 1.11 scoring mystery. Anyway, that sounds fun to me. Playing the game is the main dish but playing the Empire competition and the metaverse is a nice dessert.

Especially as you should get Fleet Admiral in about half a dozen games...

Alex


~SDC~

Hmmm. So it looks like I will be erasing the top 25 tier in my next difficulty report after all. Anti-masos were already a dying breed last time I looked a while back.

I've updated the Roster on the website to reflect our latest membership. I've taken the liberty of naming Alex Ascendant (arobertson) Honorary Member, I hope nobody minds. I've also labeled Matthew Downie as merely on a Solo Adventure. I'm still hoping he'll return and again share his talents of storytelling and poetry with us.

Finally, I've explained our new Senate situation a little bit. As most everybody knows, the Fellowship has never had a Senate, because we really never needed one. So, with the formation of our Senate when Ray decided to retire, I've sort of wrote in a little reasoning. Hope everybody likes it. Is everybody cool with the name Council of Four? If not, let me know.

http://www.angelfire.com/rings/fellowshipgalciv/roster.htm

The Metaverse Review is out.

http://metaversereview.joeuser.com

Special Edition

Hehe. When I read that, I thought you must have been a school kid with a mullet.