It's a risk to play with 2.5 ruleset and there might be issues with this new and shiny version of Freeciv. There are lots of new features and possibilities but with those there are also a real risk with a new unknown bug or feature making the game unfair or even unplayable at some point. This is why we need to choose from two basic choices before we start playing the game.
The thing is that e play for fun and that's of course what comes first. Because of this there shouldn't be a reason to delay the start of the game if we think it's playable.
The real question is if it should be played as a ranking game or not a ranking game. The difference between those is basically only that ranking games have more traditional rules and quite strict "do not change the settings" after the game has started policy. With a non ranking game changing the settings can be done and only keeping the game fair is the limit. That's of course how it should be with ranking games but with the changes to the settings it's very hard to be absolutely sure there are no unfair events making the game easier or harder for someone.
The question.
Can we play a ranking game with the new 2.5 ruleset if we do few more test rounds? Also, if there are some changes that must be done to the ruleset, what would be the fair way of doing those? We may not have a game master who is not playing the game and who could do the final call. Another way would be making some kind of time table about how some features could be changed at the latest. I propose one of the following ideas:
1) Techs: We make a time table telling us how late some feature can be changed. For example Level 2 techs could be changed at the latest before the end of T2 and level 6 (level 6 is where Gunpowder is) at the latest in the end of T40. We would simply guess that no one should have those at that time. Changing only when something is fundamentally broken.
Terrain and other: Before the end of T10.
2) We vote and if most people agree, a feature can be changed. This however would require someone outside the game to make the final call.
3) The admins ask the players about opinions, talk with each other and then make a change if they agree about it. I think we could be fair about this. With a non ranking game, I propose this anyway.
In any case, changes shouldn't be made without really good reasons. I'll give few examples.
When a change should not be maid: The restrict infra is off while it should be on. Triremes have 5 moves instead of 9. A musk will have 1 move instead of 3.
When a change should be maid: Ships can't move military units, walls give 20x defense, techs can't be researched further after some improvement/tech/wonder, a musk accidentally has 30x attack and wins every time.
In short, changing only features that will either make the game unplayable (in a way it's supposed to be played) or something that's very different from previous games and makes the game completely unfair.
What do you think? A ranking game or not?
