
Player stuck in an eternal Civ II war - keeganjw
http://kernelmag.dailydot.com/issue-sections/headline-story/16223/james-moore-eternal-war-a-decade-of-civilization/
======
astrosi
Hacker News discussion from the original reddit post:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4100032](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4100032)

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kej
It has somewhat died down, but a lot of the strategies people came up with and
other information have been collected at
[https://www.reddit.com/r/theeternalwar](https://www.reddit.com/r/theeternalwar)

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choward
Wtf? I clicked that link expecting some screenshots.

~~~
sharkweek
Here's some screenshots from the original reddit thread

[http://imgur.com/a/rAnZs](http://imgur.com/a/rAnZs)

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ChrisArgyle
TL;DR

Man plays a single Civ II game, locked in a 3-way stalemate, for 10 years
(2000 in-game years).

He asks reddit for advice on ending the stalemate, posting his savegame.
Quickly a community forms around it. Fans post not only strategies but also
art and fiction.

The game and related discussions have also been added to collections in the
Stanford University Libraries.

~~~
Kenji
Thank you for this. The signal-to-noise ratio of the article was dangerously
low for my attention span ;)

~~~
jnordwick
It's a human interest story, and a very interesting one.

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julie1
I love how this sim makes you a tyrannic psychopath.

As if one man was the Nation and that people had no rights on their own lives
and could not have a free will.

These games are wrong on so many level.

Some RPG can transform your psyche, like the jail experiment in SF has proven.
Civlization/colonization have let me with a bitter taste in the mouth as a
player once I realized how it was making me think, in the real world.

Since then, I uninstalled all of these games.

I think this article about muv luv is right on spot :
[http://tay.kinja.com/why-the-muv-luv-saga-is-the-greatest-
st...](http://tay.kinja.com/why-the-muv-luv-saga-is-the-greatest-story-ive-
ever-ex-1544334468)

~~~
BEEdwards
Have you tried Crusader Kings 2? It's a strategy game which tries to simulate
all the people from courtiers to kings all with their own motivations.

~~~
a-priori
Last night, I was playing Crusader Kings 2 as the Byzantine Empire. I had just
conquered Jerusalem in a holy war (after the Catholics failed to take it in a
crusade, ha!) and everything was good. I had tons of money rolling in, I was
secure in my realm with a son groomed to inherit, and I was thinking about
expanding further south to take Alexandria. I figured it was a good time to
call it a night at about 11:30pm.

I was just squashing a peasant uprising before going to bed when suddenly the
Shia caliph -- the same guy I just stole Jerusalem from -- declared a jihad
for Anatolia! Their armies start moving north into Armenia and Anatolia and
while I was trying to get enough of my troops in one place to fend them off,
some vassals decided to shift their votes and nominate the Exarch of Greece as
heir to the empire instead of my son. Stupid elective succession.

I had to get rid of him, because I was about 45 years old and sick with
pneumonia. If I lost the empire then my son would just be a random duke with a
few counties. It'd probably be a generation before I could retake the empire.
But my council wouldn't let me revoke his title because too many of them owed
him favours. I had him excommunicated, but that didn't help, and I couldn't
imprison him because I'd almost certainly fail and I couldn't have him
rebelling while I'm fighting the Muslims.

So I spied on him until I got a chance to abduct and imprison him. Great, now
what do I do to get rid of him without angering all my vassals? Executing him
would incur tyranny. Should I blind him? That's a big deal to Greeks; they
wouldn't vote for a blind emperor right? Or just throw him in the Oubliette
and hope he dies before I do?

Next thing I know it's 1:30am and I have to be up in the morning.

~~~
nickik
That sounds fun. Can i play it on linux?

~~~
okasaki
Yes

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusader_Kings_II](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusader_Kings_II)

