Rules for all Alpha Centauri PBEM and IP games hosted here

[sisko]

Rules for the fully patched game (including the unofficial patch):
1. A player is not permitted to establish contact with another player prior to having met them in-game.
2. A player may not use build queue manipulation or other loopholes to hurry production at a cost that would be lower than directly hurrying the item that one intends to build.
3. A player may not use build queue manipulation or other loopholes to build something you could not directly add to the build queue.
4. A player may not upgrade a particular type of unit using the design workshop, and then attack with that unit in the same turn.
5. A player is not permitted to make more than one social engineering change per line, per turn. For instance, one is not permitted to start the turn in wealth, switch to power mid-turn for the extra disbanded minerals, and then switch back to wealth that same turn, getting the refund.
6. Stockpiling in build queue allowed when building units. (of course when building sp/facility too, but it's not needed to do anything to gain those bonuses too)
7. Upgrading crawlers before adding them to hurry secret project allowed.
8. Reverse-engineering allowed.
9. Exchanging bases with AI forbidden. (It is not possible to do this in random tcp/ip anyway; this is obvious exploit cause AI trades everything; lets say I take over base level 2 with probe and then exchange this base for a base level 6 that has SP, more over I exchange it with my enemy's pact-friend so that to liberate this base my enemy would have to mess with his friend)
10. Additional move after former builds something and his flag is gray is not allowed.

Additional rules if you play without the unofficial patch:
11. It is not allowed to mind control with standard probe teams units or bases of any faction that runs a +3 or higher SE Probe rating.
12. A player may not use the F4 screen when infiltrated to change an opponent's workers to specialists.
13. A player may not make air drops using the right click "air drop to" function, when it is not possible to do so with the "i" button, ie. after already having moved or made a drop.
14. Insta-elite by patrolling forbidden.
15. Air dropping/artillery striking with units who do not have those abilities forbidden.

Notes:
New players are strongly adviced to read this article about bugs, tricks and features before their first multiplayer game:
ALL features discussed in the link are allowed if not specifically foribbden in this set of rules. Note that some rules here may be more general than those in the given article and thus may forbid several things from the article though sentences may be written in different way.
Any feature that you may consider an exploit and which is not discussed in this set of rules should be agreed before the start of the game.

Posted: March 8th, 2012

If you don't understand one or more of these rules or if you want them changed please post in this thread.

[Earthmichael]

Great!  Thanks for posting this!  It should be sticky if it is not already, so it stays at the top.

[Davyboy]

+
Outstanding.
A couple of clarification points:

3. A player may not use build queue manipulation or other loopholes to build something you could not directly add to the build queue.

I assume this relates to such cheating as "dancing around the base priority buttons" coupled with "double hurry" exploits as being a no-no, and NOT something as mundane as (say) building a scout, hurrying it and upgrading it subsequently on a different turn.

10. Additional move after former builds something and his flag is gray is not allowed.

Presumably, if said former is greyed out but still on the job and some situation arises that you want to protect said former, then you are permitted to (attempt) to move it provided the production loss is acceptable to the player.

[Earthmichael]

3.  That is what I understand too.  You can always build something and upgrade it with energy.  That is fine.  One expoit I saw was to build something that allowed supply crawlers to help, and then switch to something where supply crawlers should not have been able to help you build.  Thas is not allowed, I don't think.  I am not sure if this is what is being addressed here, or if it is some other loophole.

10. I never have quite understood this.  If the former is greyed out after building, you can't activate it by clicking it.  If the former has not built yet this turn, you can certainly click it to activate it and move it out of danger.  It seems that the worst that could happen if you don't know if the former has build yet, is that the former either activates and moves (if it has not built yet), or it doesn't activate, so you can't move it. 

[Davyboy]

Re:3

Yes, I think we agree. I was just after clarification regarding the use of Governor button preferences, because some unscrupulous player could enable their use base-by-base, select combinations of Explore, Discover, Build and Conquer, find something (or specify something) to be built that has a low hurry cost -- then switch by Governor manip to something more expensive but desirable and hurry again for minimal cost with the result that the total hurry cost is lower than a non-cheat.

I haven't tried that for donkey's days because I micromanage so regularly. It just struck me that that was a possibility. Less so for SMAC because multiple buttoning was a SMAX development (I think).

Re:10

Here's a hypothetical:
It's 2170 and you were lucky enough to build the WP and are in the process of sinking a BH, to which end you have a pair of Formers with a scout on top as a lookout. All goes well for six turns until a big meaty worm homes in and crisps your scout, damaging both formers. At this point the smart money has to be on doing a runner if you can't pop the worm. But there is an exploit reported where these formers can "carry" work-to-date to a different location. At least, that was my understanding.

Maybe I'm just sitting here in my cubicle - here on the Motherworld imagining this...

[JarlWolf]

With Social policies, are we allowed to chose multiple ones in different categories in a single turn? Say we want to change to Planned and Democratic with value knowledge, are we allowed to change to that in one turn? Or is that not allowed?

[sisko]

With Social policies, are we allowed to chose multiple ones in different categories in a single turn? Say we want to change to Planned and Democratic with value knowledge, are we allowed to change to that in one turn? Or is that not allowed?

that is allowed but also more expensive than changing one setting per turn.
rule #5 forbids changing back and forth to gain an advantage.

[t_ras]

I cant see the probe message issue here. was this fixed in the patch?

[testdummy653]

Insta-elite by patrolling forbidden

What is this?

[Buster's Uncle]

It's a bug where a unit is promoted to Elite if you set a four-point patrol route.

[testdummy653]

It's a bug where a unit is promoted to Elite if you set a four-point patrol route.

WOW. My mind would of been blown if i accidentally did that in a single player game. Crazy

[Buster's Uncle]

I did accidentally do that in a single player game.  I was ruined.

[Earthmichael]

Why were you ruined?  Because you inadvertantly exploited a bug?  I don't see why it would matter much in a single player game anyway.

I never knew about this exploit, but then I rarely ever set a patrol route with more than 2 points.

[Buster's Uncle]

I, er, liked it and kept doing it.  Ruined.

[ikonoklast61]

new here; is there a specific place I can look for people who want to play online?