It's important to relax, Commander.

Taking the edge off.
Missing a 95% chance shot in Xcom and subsequently having your whole party wiped out by aliens
Pick one
- Ayyyyy, if a missed 95% shot fucks things over that bad then you probably weren't handling the situation that well in the first place!
  He says, as his entire squad gets eggs laid in them
  
  A plan is just a list of stuff to go wrong.
  
  Hah, you can try to stay on top of it. But no matter how hard you try, there's always a chance of that one little mistake that turns into a cock-up cascade and leaves most of your squad dead and one remaining soldier trying to crawl to evac.
  I love that game, but I'm probably a masochist.
- I've heard about Xcom for years but never tried it, and BG3 has given me a turn-based itch to scratch, is it as good as everyone says?
  
  Honestly I enjoy the crap out of them. It's definitely less story than BG3 and you WILL lose people you're attached too. It goes on sale fairly often I think, though it's worth it at full price.
  
  I might be biased, since I've been playing the XCOM games since they first came out 30 years ago. But yes, they are really, really good for turn-based combat. I am also a sucker for games with research trees.
- Missing a 95% chance shot in Xcom and subsequently having your whole party wiped out by aliens
  Well I was relaxed until just now. Clenches jaw
  (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻)
  
  Well, 95% is not 100%
- Hey, maybe I find managing probability relaxing!
- Loading last save isn't that stressful.
  
  Sometimes you gotta play XCOM on Ironman Mode just to punish yourself.
- I took a break from XCOM after losing one of my best soldiers on an iron man run. Am currently terrified of going back in because i remember nothing and am sure i'd fuck everything up now.

Doesn't exactly match up but I use Factorio for this. Or more accurately it uses me.
- I mean, factorio has a map, and it's definitely a strategy game.
  
  It's also isometric and you can move units around the map to attack enemies.
- Factorio is so good.
- Mindustry addict here. Check it out, it's FOSS and very multiplatform! I recommend starting on Erekir.
  
  I got into this recently playing with my brother and friend. it's the perfect mix of tower defence and factory builder. Also trying to optimize a ammunition belts mid-wave is a kind of addictive thrill of panic I didn't know I needed in my life.
  
  I have Mindustry for android. I play it on a galaxy note with a stylus, do recommend.
  I like the music in Mindustry also. It makes you want to take over the world by building conveyor belts at it.
- Look the factory must grow and all, but it's all about control. Whether it's mapped based war games or factory on a map, the principle is the same, we dah boss dis time
- I had to stop playing factorio because I stopped sleeping. I keep wanting to try it again but I'm afraid.
  
  OMG yes. I'd sit down and be like "I'll play for a couple hours" of Factorio, then check the clock and it's 4AM lmao. Seriously dangerous game haha.
  
  It's midnight and I just went to bed after playing god help me

I've noticed you've recently settled a statement close to my psyche, I request that you refrain from settling too close in the future to avoid any ill feelings!
- Hey, I just got word that that settlement needs your help. I'll mark it on your map.
  
  You just never quit, do you? Took out Ghaul, woke up the Traveller...
  
  You used me... For land development!

Fellas, is it gay to not play StarCraft?
- "Roger! I'm in the rear, with the gear!"
  
  Reportin’ for duty!
- The "Fellas, is it gay...?" meme is one of my favorites.
  
  I say it to my wife all the time. Was watching Friends with her last night and Chandler gets mad at Joey for telling Rachel he owns lotion. I looked at her and said, “Fellas, is it gay to moisturize?” It’s just so silly how many things aren’t MANLY™
  
  FELLAS, is it gay to like the Fellas is it gay meme? You're literally repeating another man's words in your head for your pleasure.
- In the pipe, five by five!
  
  Fired up
- Yes.
  I watched shaun of the dead the other day and the few gay jokes in it were great. Totally forgot about them so they caught me by surprise. Calling stuff gay is hilarious.
- Indescriminate Justice

The map needs to slowly change to the color of my faction for my life to have any meaning.
- That's the good shit
  
  Turns out it's just the man's equivalent of a coloring book
- That is how I play northgard.

Civ 5 here. I'll be 39 this year and play the least out of my friends group (probably 1 or 2 sessions a month where I quit 3 or 4 hours in, and once a month or less playing for 6 or more hours to almost actually finish a game). The friends I play with are all mid 40s and do a full game at least weekly. We all have wives and kids and stuff but are huge nerds i guess.
- I have launched Civ 6 once, launched a quick game with bots, blinked and realized 2.5 hours have passed. I'm scared to reopen the game. Next time I might wake up with a gray head and wrinkles on my face
- 43yo here, I play x-com and BattleTech, though I would argue BG3 is a map based strategy game as well.

That's silly, you don't know what you're talking about.
Looks at physical copies of original C&C, all three Red Alerts, Civ4, Warcraft, Dungeon Keeper 1 and 2, and a steam library with Mindustry, Factorio, Dyson Sphere Program, Captain of Industry, Desynced
- A life well lived.
- OpenTTD? Yeah? Yeah?
  
  Definitely.
- Im sorry, as far as I'm concerned there are only two RAs... well, 3 if you include Yuri revenge
  
  RA2/YR is/are my gold standard(s) for any rts games, i always find myself going back and playing them whether it be solo campaign, skirmish, or logging into CnCNet and doing some online matches.
  
  RA3 was OK. While RA2 was my favorite, The third one was fun, especially any mission where I could send Tanya to a horrible end.
- Try war selection
- Heard of shapez.io it's on steam, factory game
  
  Shapez.io is great when I want to just kill 15 minutes. It doesn't take over my whole day like Factorio.

Most of us use drugs or alcohol.
- Hell yeah, drugs and alcohol enhance map games so much. Great combination, would recommend.
  
  Played Civ 5 drunk with a friend once and it was amazing. At some point I ended up at war and realized a good few turns in that I forgot to make military units
  
  Ever try drugs and VR?
- The kids these days self-medicate with neurotransmitters in the privacy of their own home like God intended. Regular do-it-yourselfers, they are.

How do I make the wololo dude en passant
- I've got you covered:
  
  Holy hell

Is this like a personal attack or something?
- You would know if you played map-based strategy games

Ah yes, a stellaris weekend full of alien genocide
- I picked up the Star Trek Stellaris that released recently with mixed reviews, having never played Stellaris. I hope it's good.
- I do love my biolumenesent krakens

If my units have action points it also makes me feel like I'm in total control of my life which makes me happy.

Learning curves and time management don’t mix

After your 30s, you move on to sim or survival games.

I know I already replied once, but on a serious note: I would love a new IP that was like Tiberium Sun. That was my first love with RTS and nothing since has been quite as awesome. Not even StarCraft.
- Hell yeah, brother. I liked being NOD so I could make invisible bases all over the map and you could never really be sure where I was building up even if you had radar and the entire map uncovered. Then I hit ya with a swarm of mammoth tanks.
- I never owned it, but I remember playing it at a friend's house many times as a kid. I love RTS games and hope they're not out of the mainstream for good.

Red Alert 2 is cozy gaming
- Red Alert 2 is one of my all time favorites! I think it was my first online gaming experience too.
  
  I always liked C&C 3. JK Simmon, George Takei, and Tim Curry as the faction leaders. What more could you want?
  
  I will always have fond memories of cheesing the hell out of the original C&C. My friend had it for DOS. I later got C&C Gold and could run it in Windows at 640x480! IIRC none of the cheeky bugs were fixed in the Windows port. You are a Command and Conquer veteran if you remember:
  Late game, deciding the hell with it and just swarming the enemy with ~500 bazooka dudes, because money was technically infinite on most maps, limited only by your patience. Every time the Tiberium tree "puffed" it would generate a little more green stuff you could harvest for cash.
  Penning the computer enemy into their base with walls, because their pathfinding was not smart enough to destroy objects in their way and they would never attack a wall (although sandbags would be crushed by tanks).
  Cherry-tapping your opponent by running over his last infantry dudes with your harvester, just to be an ass.
  Running a line of sandbags up to the enemy base, hovering the "sell" cursor one pixel off the edge of your own sandbags, but selling their building and keeping the cash. And preferably then parking a queued up defense tower at the end of the sandbag chain immediately afterwards.
  Baiting the computer into perpetually wasting their nukes or ion cannons by positioning one machine gun guy closer to their base than your own base or main forces, whereupon it would pathologically blow up just that one soldier because he was the "closest threat."
  "Yeah?" "Okay." "Yeah?" "Okay." "Yeah?" "Okay."
  Smuggling an engineer into the enemy's base under cover of some crazy diversion or another, inevitably aiming to nick his construction yard, undeploy it into an MCV, and bugger off with it. Or building MCV's with your friends in multiplayer and deliberately deploying them in each other's bases so you can build stuff from both sides and gang up on the computer with Obelisks and missile towers.
  Leaving the computer opponent with one useless building like a power plant left, so you don't technically "win" and can go on forever uncontested to see how many units you can build before your computer crashes.
  
  I still play the hell out of it
- Rubber boots in motion!
  
  Let the juice flow!
- Civilization 4 is cozy gaming.
  
  Absolutely true

I think those people are the kinds of jerks who watch football. I'm not sure it helps them relax in the slightest. That would explain a few things actually...
- You mean hooligans? Or people actually watching the game?

I generally prefer something more action filled like a dungeon crawler or a bullet hell
- What's your favorite bullet hell? I was craving one a while back after playing Cuphead, which I know isn't really a traditional bullet-hell, but it has some elements of one.
  
  Of all time? Furi
  You can get it dirt cheap during a sale and it was designed to be mastered like an instrument. No cruft, just you, the boss, and some bomb ass music.
  The game has a TON of little ways you can optimize your playstyle and power down the bosses while still being incredibly fair with it's mechanics. I go back every year and beat it again
  
  Enter the Gungeon is pretty good if you like rogelikes
  
  Returnal is great.
- Action packed co-op games really hit for me. Monster Hunter and Deep Rock were the jams for a long time, lately it's been Darktide
  
  Yah boi I've been cranking the Darktide. I've been meaning to go back and try siennas new class in vermintide tho

Does the original Rome:Total War count? It's the only strategy game I return to. It's just that good.
- Only during the steam sale did I buy the new Three Kingdoms Total War. I had spent enough time in R:TW traversing Europe, so naturally it was time to take my skills to the east.
  2000 hours later...
- It's probably what he was thinking of.
  I mean, Warhammer 2 is better, because there are dwarves in it, but it doesn't get more map painting than Total War in general.
  
  Warhammer III is best. All worship the changer.

I play cozy games instead. Can't wait for the next Animal Crossing.
- Palia hits the switch this month I think
  
  Palia has been out on the switch for a month already. It's pretty fun!
- Nothing more cozy than vanquishing your foes and burning their lands
- Check out potionomics, it's neat

I'd rather be on the ground shooting the zombies/vampires/aliens/libertarians(thanks Bioshock series).

Once every few years I have the itch to play Dune 2. It's so simple. It's the perfect RTS. Although the Harkonen Devastator is useless and the Death Hand is overpowered simply by you being lucky.

Patiently waiting for Homeworld 3 tho (it will not get pushed back 9 months like last year)

I'm about to be 40 and I'm a married, hetro-cis woman; I still do this. Though lately I've been leaning more heavily toward city builders
- If you like both genres (and rogue likes) I would recommend Against The Storm. The game is crack. It’s all about getting settlements to the point where they’re successful enough and then you start a new one as you build a caravan of settlements further from the safe haven city in the middle of the map. Then a storm comes through and wipes everything out, but you can extend and extend the length it takes a storm to strike by sealing the gateways that the storm monsters used to enter the world the game takes place in. I don’t know if I’ve sold you on it but I am addicted myself lol
  
  I opened this thread to suggest this one as well. It's a nice come home from work and burn off steam for an hour game.
  
  I played like 2 levels and it was sooo boring.
  It’s more of a puzzle game under the stylization of a city builder. Very little difficulty and no real opportunity for creative city building on small maps you dont spend long on before moving to the next.
  There’s far better roguelites and city builders out there.
  I’d suggest checking out the demo for Metropolis 1998, it’s kinda Sims 1 style building with Sim City 2000 graphics, but you’re building a whole town/city.
  
  I'll try it!

Man i really need to dig up SMAC or something like it.
- If you can't find it, it is nearly always super cheap on GOG.

Because I don't have any friends

Damn it, this made me realize I need to set my computer's logon sound to be the "Welcome back Commander" voice line from the Command & Conquer series.
If you have never played the original C&C Tiberian Dawn and Red Alert, you need to do so, and it is free and easy!
Just grab the stable installer from https://openra.net and install it, it works on Windows, Mac and Linux and is free.
- hell March intensifies
  The last time I listed to hell march my wife asked why I was listening to nazi music.
  
  Well, the original Hell March eventually led me into a rabbit hole that is the German industrial rock/metal scene. So I can kinda see where she's coming from..

Image Transcription: Twitter Post
*Senior Data Masseuse, @yrxcommar
extremely sus of any man in their mid 20s to mid 30s who doesn't play a map-based strategy game. Like how the fuck do you get through life without occasionally taking the edge off by moving soldiers around a map

Well they weren't soldiers but now they have guns and love organ harvesting and other war crimes...

Because I prefer to play as one of the soldiers, so I play Battlefield and Arma.

For those not interested in in the age of empires and command and conquers of the world, you always have a crusader kings to just murder all those who wrong you and then seduce their widows.