Just refreshed our empire data. Onward to 4 million! And 1000 games is really close, too!

meanwhile in the infermery:

Smeagol lies there like petrified flesh..

then all of a sudden he starts talking in a language that no one seems to be able to understand..

it has the rhyme and rythum of elvish but its not elvish

just at that time as if it were planned Mathew walked passed the enteranceof the infermery and he couldn't believe his elvish ears.

Mathew: "It can't be.... it just can't...." and bursts through the infermery doors.. excited to hear an old familiar voice from the past..

Mathew "How are you old friend.. how did you get back" he says in ancient elvish to which no one else in the room can understand.. that is ALL except a voice from the other side of a closed curtian

Smeagol: Voice1 (Male elvish) "The time draws near my brother.."
Smeagol: Voice2 (female elvish) "But we still require the other 2 rings.. only then..." voice breaks off.. as Mathew opens the curtian and in fright gasps for it wasn't whom he had expected to see.. he was so taken aback that he cryed for his friends from the past..

Mathew: (in ancient elvish) "Why... why.. when will i see you again..."

Then as Mathew touched Smeagol's hand he seemed to hear "Soon..... very soon"

then all of a sudden Smeagol starts Screaming "It hurts us... gets its off us... ohhh it hurts....."

To which Mathew Jumps back in suprise.. the difference in the voices so dramatic from a smooth rhyming rythmic voice to a gastly common hi pitched whyning voice enough to get on any ones nerves

Mathew then leaves to contimplate what had just happened.. and what he had just been told...

Mathew's blocked memory from the other side starts to lift is pieces.. NOW he remembers that he was sent back here so that one day he could aid in the return of the elves... but he can't remember how.. or what he was told his part would be... just that it was his destiny..

Mathew also remembered what the female voice that aparently came through that pittyfull creature Golum. umm Smeagol ... {Smeagol: Voice2 (female elvish) "But we still require the other 2 rings.. only then..."}

What other 2 rings he asks to himself (not knowing that smeagol had already had one ring that had disapeared) What do they mean...

Meanwhile.. smeagol who has now come to grips with the fact that someone must have already removed the ring from his finger goes back to his ship.. muttering "We've gots to finds it.. we must finds our precous... those nasty hobitses stoles its from us they did.. and we wants it back... now..... " and he heads off once again on his search for his precous


{To be continued}

ok now then I need someone or a couple of people to join in here.. where mathew and the council meats to try to work out what is going on.. and what is about to happen.. so please .. some people are needed to contnue this story while Smeagol is out of the kingdom for a while.. Deep in battle with Aliens and himself to find his precous....

You've got my expectations up now, vincible!

I'm usually part of the laggards when catching a new show as I don't like big crowds (especially it's the school hols and christmas season now), but I think I will make an exception this time.

~SDC~

We are rather near to the 4mil mark now, aren't we?
Let's go make it a hat-trick of million pointers.

I've started to play a new game under 1.13.
Yes, there are some bugs but those can be easily fixed on our side.
Realised I've not submitted a game for a whole month.

~SDC~

I have noticed that too. I did not play a 1.13 full game yet but I started and abandonned a few games to try out some things. In every start, some minor civ would build the Diplo translators sometimes between june and october of the second year. In one case, frictionless clothing, Tri-steel and the stock exchange were built by various civ before th end of the second year!

It used to do that in 1.12 if I used ctrl-N or re-loaded from the start. I thought this was done on purpose to discourage players from hunting for a good starting location. But the way it is now, we might as well hunt for a good location since we are penalized anyway. LOL

~SDC~

Now if that was true, wouldn't it be too simple to trash their production by setting up a bogus queue in Ford and then use another Governor for yourself?



Maybe that's a function of weaker minors so majors get more systems in 1.13.

~SDC~

Adds a lot of tedium to the game. There are easier ways to cheat

Smeagol: I might take a crack at writing something sometime soon. Good to hear from you again! I was afraid the score thing would drive you away or something.

Everybody: Just had the weirdest thing happen on SDC Chat. A "Guest" private messaged me and asked me for my serial number, email address and name! I couldn't believe somebody would be so direct! He said he loved windowblinds. Just wondered if anybody else had been contacted like that...

Indeed, vincible.

Update on my game. I've got a so-so start with my current Maso Large Abundant with one sector of systems + a PQ14 but got a lucky break as my wormholed survey ship stumbled upon the 3 system Alexians. They even got a PQ26 so they are going to bankroll me and in the near future join me in my conquest of this map.

- Find the Alexians. Check.

~SDC~

Ray, does Megatron's fix correct enough of the bugs to play 1.13 successfully? I just downloaded and installed but want to be sure.

Those two new bugs in 1.13 are the serious ones that have been reported so far.

Go ahead and fix them yourself but back up the three affected files just to be safe.

~SDC~

Ok...I'm actually going to move the Tech Sharing problem files to my desktop until things are sorted out.

Talk to everyone in a few hours!

Good of you to try to get more story-writing going in the Fellowship, Smeagol.

Just scanned through the Spec Forces thread and saw that they are contemplating writing fantasy stories! C'mon, we can't have them walking all over our fantasy theme turf...

Instead of the usual(now getting rather old) Metaverse race/war, let's have a fantasy-themed story writing spar. I miss the characters that I've written for my old Fellowship MMORPG series.

~SDC~

Kinda ironic. We could only play with 2 UP issues in 1.12 and in 1.13 we get all except 2.
Well, I'm definitely happier with the latter.

I don't think anyone should wait for a perfect patch before upgrading cause that will never happen.
1.13 is fine except for the two simple D-I-Y fixes to be made.

~SDC~

I've updated my profile.
http://www.galciv.com/info.asp?accountID=117340

let me know what you think..

Very nice, Smeagol!

I was also surfing the Return of the King websites few hours ago and was thinking of getting one of those Gandalf pics for my profile too! I saw Smeagol ones as well and was thinking that you should be getting one.

~SDC~

Smeagol is scanned into my computer off the LOTR TTT bbooklet.. not off any web page

Great pic, Smeagol! I finally got my profile pic changed too. See what you think!

I'm finding no problems now that I installed Megatron's fix and removed the two bad UP events. I'm in a Huge/Maso/Occasional and I picked Populists and maxed out Morale and Pop Growth. Wow!! What awesome picks!! I'm thinking of staying Neutral for a while to maintain relations with the Evils while I research Diplomacy techs. Oh, and minors still seem pretty capable of colonization in 1.13. If Stardock tweaked them, it wasn't much.

Yeah, both Alexians and Caris got triples in my game. Much better than the single the Altarians got.

I've knocked out the 4-system Yors just. They managed to conquer a system off the Arceans but it flipped back because the Arceans already have 2 influence starbases up. The Arceans flipped one ofthe 3 Alexian systems that I was eyeing and I had to rush transports over to capture the remaining two. I've used Tidal to capture one, one more to go.

No problems with TGs/wonders in my game. I've got them all so far, thanks to my kind Alexian sponsor.

~SDC~

Too many FOTR post so I have to break the cycle. Merry Christmas to you all and Happy New Year.

Eh? Do you mean two influence resource SBs? Cause they certainly aren't smart enough to build culture SBs! LOL

Nah, 2 influence resource starbases, one of which is +19%.

The first Alexian system I captured shared a sector with the Alexian system that flipped to the Arceans so skull and crossbones appeared predictably after a few turns. I bought the +19% starbase for a clutch of techs and TGs + 1200bcs. Those bunch of TGs built by me sure came in handy.

~SDC~

Carinoids got Diplomatic Translators really, really fast in my game, but after that I've racked up on TGs/Wonders. Really weird how I missed out on Diplo Translators, though...

Actually in my last game the Torians had a planet under cultural pressure. And they actually built a culture starbase next to it! It got up to 60% before I invaded them. It was definitely a case of way too little, way too late, but at least they were trying.


I got curious about what it would have been like to play with that +15% PQ pick that was removed (I didn't pick up Galciv until after it was gone), so I modded a political party to give +8% and combined it with the +7% pick and... wow! it's amazingly easy. I'm glad that pick is gone.

I think in my next game I'll make a party with 5 luck points, just to see what'll happen. Should be crazy

Story writing: I had a continuation for Evil Ray in mind but I never got around to writing it, and it's pretty much dead by now. I'll think about it... it promises to be a slow day today at work.

vincible, how much experience have you had with H50's Mod Writer? I've been thinking of downloading it and creating a couple of political parties, but was wondering how hard it is to use.