23-02-2003 19:06									#1
	Reflex-Challenged Survival Victory Inflate your Upload Space

Yesterday I played my first online game (RoN Press Beta #2) against a webmaster, and I didn’t lose.

This is significant. I’m a misplaced TBS-type who enjoys RTS games despite my limited dexterity with a mouse.

My opponent chose Russia while I let the computer pick my nation, which turned out to be Egypt. We played on a Mediterranean-style map from Ancient to Industrial (and not to Information so to limit the duration of the game). At the 55-minute mark we were both in Industrial; I had taken one on his cities on the left side of the map and he was poised to take one of mine on the right. I had about twice as many points, due to my interest in keeping up research, and he had one Wonder which put him slightly ahead in that category. Russia had to resign because of real-world time constraints.

Post-game discussion revealed my opponent had a large army in Medieval (RoN’s third age) and he should have attacked then. He probably would have won had he done so, especially as I’m usually tardy in building military forces. As it was, I was able to repel his Gunpowder/Enlightenment offensive on my left due to my basic army, attrition, and a well-developed city (adding structures to a city apparently increases its hit points, making it harder to capture).

The Point: A reflex-challenged gamer did not expire in the first portion of a game of RoN while facing a more youthful, faster opponent. I won’t delude myself into thinking I’m a better player; he could have won, but RoN’s mechanics evened the odds at least a bit in my favor. I could never have done so well in other RTS games against similar opponents.

	23-02-2003 19:10									#2
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Rohag, could I ask you one thing:

You said you were in industrial by 55th minute, so were all other ages like in AoE, just a filler before you get to the last age? Also, were there any options to lenghten the game (probably setting minimum time in each age, etc.) except adding more ages?

	23-02-2003 20:15									#3
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Sorry for the confusion...I don't remember when we reached the Industrial Age (age 6), but it was before the 45-minute mark, I believe. Some minor fighting occurred in Medieval (age 3), which was around 20-minutes, and major fighting in Gunpowder/Enlightenment (ages 4-5) at 25-40 minutes and later in Industrial (45-55 minutes) - again sorry I can't be more precise.

(My single-player games I usually construct with multiple AI nations, so wars happen throughout the course of a game.)

We played this particular online multi-player match with mostly standard settings, but there are all sorts of settings we could have used, and several options exist for slowing down the game in different ways. Of course you can limit the game to one or two or three ages. Or you can make technology more expensive or research times slower. You can make resource accumulation slower (or faster). You can mix and match these settings.

Yours is an excellent question, and, situation permitting, I'll try to play with the settings "maxed out" on the slow end of the scale just to see how long things take. Perhaps Markos has already tried that?

	23-02-2003 22:24									#4
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Victory!!!! Nice work Rohag.

	23-02-2003 23:33									#5
	Re: Reflex-Challenged Survival Victory Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

quote: Originally posted by Rohag The Point: A reflex-challenged gamer did not expire in the first portion of a game of RoN while facing a more youthful, faster opponent.

That's a great thing to hear! I am youthful enough, but not exactly fast with the mouse... Very nice report. Thanks, Rohag!

	24-02-2003 01:34									#6
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I’m not expecting to win any rated tournaments (!), but the experience of that online game reinforced my impression that RoN’s mechanics enhance the importance of strategy and planning relative to speed. I don’t think RoN overturns the equation; speedy power gamers still have a clear advantage (provided they give some thought to strategy), but they don’t enjoy as much of an advantage as in other RTS games I've played.

Check this RoN Pantheon thread for an account of Zhou vs. Axehilt. Axehilt is a no-kidding, highly-experienced player, but his victory did not come in the first fifteen minutes of the game and depended on factors other than speed.

	24-02-2003 02:08									#7
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Rohag, this is great then... I was always a good planner and I was ussually quickly rushed :-)

	24-02-2003 02:23									#8
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Oh man! I just had an epiphany: I may actually get stuck playing RoN ALOT. It just dawned on me that it may be the next big game in my life. And you know, its been a long time since an RTS has taken up a great deal of my time.. since AoE times in fact. Lately I've been doing the Tribes2 and Morrowind thing, but not really sitting down and playing any one RTS to the point of nausea.

RoN might change that.

	24-02-2003 14:41									#9
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In the interest of full disclosure, I’ve noticed the postings of GX_Farmer at RoN Pantheon. Farmer is a RoN Beta tester and all-round RTS competitor. He’s saying that all his 1v1 online games are over in 20-40 minutes. I have no idea what types of games these are or what settings he’s using – and RoN features bunches of setting options. He might be playing “fast, turbo-resources” or even “fast, infinite resources, fast & cheap technology research.” My game described above was played on normal, standard settings.

But this brings up the issue of online standardization, and I don’t have the online competitive experience to address it. RoN can be rather different games depending on the settings, and folks have already mentioned the possibility of several different online RoN gaming communities arising, each based on different settings standards.

	25-02-2003 02:24									#10
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That will certainly be interesting for that to happen. I am all for there being more than one community playing different rule sets. I would assume ACS would be a little slower being the TBS background that many members have. But that could all change.