Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Sept

DrP, Grudge, Immaculate all requested delays. Lingchi noted a delay of up to 4 days was customary, and I don't think the delay was ever explicity stated.

I'll shut up and support ya whenever you tell me to, but otherwise, I'd suggest setting getting involved in a blitz game and waiting on this one till monday = )

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Um, the only explicit/specific delay request I received (with a set time and date) was from Pyg. We stopped the timer on Tuesday at around Noon and we are going to restart the timer on Saturday at around Noon. That is a 4 day delay. I've got to take into account the needs of those not living in the US and/or not celebrating the holiday. I must consider what is fair to all and I think I've been fair.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Not to throw fuel on the fire, but most of us think of the 'Thanksgiving Holiday' to begin weds evening and end Sunday evening.

If I hadn't had people in town and staying with me, instead of traveling as usual to stay with them, I would have read the 'extension' to go to Sunday and never giving it another thought.

I agree that most of the normal early game attrition has taken place, and we certainly don't want to run off anyone over a 1 day misunderstanding.

Lets just let everyone get their turn in by Sunday and don't have anyone Stale.

Christmas is coming up and THAT will be another time with folks living and celebrating (or not) in different fashions and times. If we light the fuse now it will explode in another month.

Just my opinion.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Yep, Wednesday was what I was shooting for, but the hosting timer got shut off a day earlier than I had anticipated. Still no one staled and the turn didn't budge till late Friday night so no problems so far.

Still waiting on:

caelum
kailasa
lanka
mictlan
pangaea
sauromatia
tirnanog

For the current turn. Let's get those turns in.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Sauromatia here.

I won't be home until late Sunday US Central time. I could potentially submit a turn before i leave to return home, but it would be kind of rushed, and coordinating with allies while having limited time to do turns is kinda hard.

So I'll try to submit sometime after I get home on Sunday, and I hope that's not too terribly inconvenient for people. (If this weren't a team game it would be in already, but team games complicate things).

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Note that llamaserver appears to be broken right now (and for the last 12 or so hours to my knowledge), and that I'm not sure if turns are getting logged or admin orders are getting read. Turns aren't hosting until it comes back, and I'm not sure what it will do in what order when it gets back.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Thanks for that info Stretch. Luckily our game hosts via the Dom3Minions server so we shouldn't have any issues.

Sauro and Pan, you two are the last to submit but you should have plenty of time left to get in your turns by Sunday night (preferably) or Monday morning.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Hmm, lets see what we've got:

As of turn 17, 33 provinces were still in the hands of the AI Team, but that number appears to be dropping.

7 Independents left, wonder where they are?

No need to thank and praise me for this info. This information is being provided free of charge as a service by your kind, caring, considerate, admin. I am too humble to accept such praise anyway.:D

Now, get those turns in!

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

A few of them are about to become mine. I had a number of units tied up clearing an AI out of my corner that are free now to finish taking the few indies left behind my lines.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

This seems like a good place to drop this..
http://www.scriblink.com/

Team Captains might want to play with it. Let me know your impressions please.
Its a WhiteBoard. So far its the simplest I have found which allows (A) uploading an image and (B) saving the board to an URL you can give out. This should allow a team to upload the map image and scribble on it.

Its one of my jobs to have an idea of whats available and for wht purposes. And altho I dont work for Shrapnel anymore I will probably make a recommendation to them to upgrade the CHAT we have on this forum to some sort of a WhiteBoard. Possibly with VoIP abilities also (voice chat). It just seems a good idea for a strategy wargames company that has team games.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Yeah, I d used a different whiteboard software.
Wanted to say thanks again for a great resource gandalf. Setting up the game, coding the ais.. everything.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Well, Gandalf, a very intriguing solution. This may eliminate the need to constantly edit and upload new map images every time the strategic situation changes and the website appears to allow online chat as well. You do need to turn off pop-up blockers at least temporarily it seems to upload the image and/or possibly use other functions. But seems very good. Wonder what the Captains and/or everyone else thinks of this? This may be a good tool/link to incorporate for our current and/or future games.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Well I appreciate that. :)
But you might want to hold off thanking me for the AIs. Game 2 will have harder ones. And Game 3 will release all limitations on what I can do them them. MUHAhahahahahaha (evil laugh) :evil:

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Oh good these ones are far too easy. Not your fault.. just the limits of what AI intelligence can do.

All the might in the world matters not a whit if you have the disposition of a flea.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I'm not finding it easy at all; in fact i'm having a bit of difficulty with the pretender of one of the AIs.

I.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

The secondary AI starts (in this game the AIs in the corners) are/were intended to be able to be handled by noobs (will need to fix their expansion issues for next game though) while the primary AI starts (in the center) are/were intended to provide a little bit more challenge.

Assuming everyone went with default placement and the captain and lieutenant of every human team were played by vets and intermediate level players, or by two intermediate level players, the difficulty level should be reasonable. Things on your team are/were a bit different with 3 noobs, and yourself being placed in the number 2 slot, putting you more at risk and closer to the harder center AIs.

Of course the corner AIs locations could draw on the magic/gem/slave/gold pool of the center and flying pretenders can get around anyway, but I am assuming you are not talking about the corner AI starts in general.

You are very industrious and scrappy for a noob though, and the game was meant in part to provide an AI challenge for noobs, so I guess we have accomplished our goals at least in part. ;)

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Yeah, my corner AI decided to summon summer lions at me. That they did so in the first year gave me a bit of a shock initially.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I would love to lay out the entire plan for scaling-up the AI. Im so very tempted.
But since Septimius put out some on the Game 1 AI I will also just for this initial one.

I figured that for a noobs game with vets, on a scale of 1 to 10, I should shoot for about a 4 in game one. Better than the randomized AI of the vanilla game that I figured noobs had already had experience against. But only about as improved as an average player could make it. The AIs in this game are built off of pretender builds recommended in those nations game guides that have been posted. So basically this was the AI playing Human Player styled builds. Better than crap, but not optimized for AI use.

As Septimius alluded to, the central castles were "expanding". The corners were lab/temple mages and priests. Not very expansive early on but not something you want to leave in operation for too long. You wont have that split in game two helping you simplify tactics. :)

Note: If you found this AI an improvement in the game, this level of AI was fairly common for the SemiRand program which can do the same thing for all your games.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I've received a request for a 12 hour extension by Agema and have asked Gandalf to implement it. Hopefully all of it will not need to used though.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

For those that may not be aware and for our loyal NaV fans, a war :fight: has broken out between Deva's Darlings and The Mysterios.

It is a time of woe. The unprovoked, savage, and dastardly aggression of the evil Devas :evil: against the peace loving Mysterios :angel has shocked and stunned the whole of the world even the leaders of the AI team.

When Mali of C'tis learned of these cowardly attacks, he had this to say: "The Devas must be destroyed!"

Riora of Agartha chimed in adding "The Devan juggernaut of destruction represents a threat to all nations. They are public enemy #1 and must be resisted at all costs by humans and non-humans alike!"

Our noble Captain has vowed that we shall not go into the abyss quietly nor become slaves to their brutal :tough: slay-o-matic machine. :D

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

What's going on with the server? Last night I checked and there was 21 hours till timer up. This morning I checked and I had a stale. I see that a total of 3 people staled. Also the timer now shows 47 hours. Looks like we have a bad turn. I think we deserve a roll back due to the server error.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Without looking at the turn, I have to admit I was surprised as well.

I know that when I went to bed there was 16 hours remaining, and 7 people (or so) had not submitted turns. When I woke up 6 or 8 hours later - the turn had hosted.

I suspect that what happened is that the previous turn had an extension, causing this turn to run long; and an acmin subtracted time.

Regardless if one of my nations were affected or not, I support a roll back.

However, I would *really* like it if only the nations that did not submit a turn were allowed to do so.

Also, SS or M, could you fix the first post? The staling dating and results don't work.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Well, Gandalf had not removed the extra 12 hours from the previous turn. I had decided I would not bother Gandalf about it though I admit I was getting a bit irritated when it looked like people were taking advantage of the extra 12 hours, can't blame them though. Either Gandalf took out the extra time or the server did something on its own causing those 3 people (Lanka, Kailasa, and Caelum) still outstanding to stale apparently.

Though it could be argued that everyone had sufficient time since the real hosting would have taken place at 8 AM PST (5 AM est), it could also be argued that people were going based upon what they saw. Therefore, I will leave it to the discretion of Gandalf if we wants to do a rollback or not. I agree with Chris, if it is done only those 3 people need to resubmit, and I will ask that they get their turns in with all do haste. Last time I put 16 hours on the clock for this to take place, this time I think 8 might be reasonable and fair. I am sure people won't want any longer delays than necessary. I am forwarding a copy of this post to Gandalf for his review.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Rolling back the game is simply unzipping the game save into the game directory.

BUT then it also means cancelling the timers, re-computing the time, and starting new timers. I dont know where that failed last time but its probably in there someplace. Do we want to do that again?

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

The failure to reset the displayed hosting timer rests with me to some degree, as I didn't want to bother reminding Gandalf to do it, especially since we were moving to 48 this turn anyway. I also assumed that Gandalf would remember to remove it. That could be considered partly my fault since I have overall responsiblity. I have the feeling people tend to view me as rather harsh and tough on time and turns anyway and I hate to reinforce this.

It is evident though that at least 40 hours did elapse before the turn hosted. I am biased of course in this decision as two of my teammates are among the 3 that staled. That is why I have asked Gandalf to use his discretion.

I want to be fair, even if it means a decision that is not favorable to my team. We do need to get going one way or the other soon. In the absence of a decision by Gandalf or objections (and as much as I may dislike rollbacks myself) I will order a rollback be commenced immediately, all turns already submitted retained, 8 hours put on the clock,and the 3 staled to get their turns in. After that 8 hours is up, we move forward one way or another and proceed at our regularly scheduled 48 hour host.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

OK the files from just before last hosting have been unpacked

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

the flaw to your logic sept- no sane person counts in their head how many hours have [i]passed[i]since the turn hosted. we just look at the timer, see if we have time to do it tomorrrow, and go to sleep. if the server hosts before the timer indicated it was supposed to, it is in no way anyones fault, and we deserve a rollback

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I understand that Frozen, as I have stated above. We admins goofed up, the players are not to blame really, if given extra time people will take it, I have always known that. I do want to not delay things any longer than necessary for those that did get their turns in.

Gandalf is rolling back, 8 hours should be enough for turns that are already/should already be done. Lanka, Kailasa, Caelum, please get your turns in. After this we go back to our normal schedule. Everyone else sit tight. I will check back in tonight and I will send personal e-mails to all those who have staled.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I was just curious as to why there was any discussion at all about whether we would roll back or not

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Are you sure you have the right turn for a rollback from me?
I'm pretty sure what you have is the file for the next turn, I've sent one for turn 20 now.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Frozen -its a tough position for an admin to be in, taking an action that primarily benefits his team, especially as SS is always wanting to push forward.

But even though y'all are kicking the rest of us .. I still support the roll back ..

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I would like to second a rollback as well.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

How many people staled?

My only issue with a rollback is that they tend to breed bugs, especially with newbie players who don't know to redo their turns from scratch.

Also, I got some *awesome* events which I'm not happy to lose.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

3 people staled, the rollback has already been completed, only waiting for Agema apparently, everyone else is good. No one else except for Kailasa, Caelum, and Lanka, NEEDS to resubmit turn 20.

Noobs, and anyone else, unless you are one of the three sit tight, and wait for a new turn 21 to be sent to you. :D

Thanks for your cooperation and patience.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Does this mean that Kailasa and Lanka have seen the new turn? I know that Illum has.

If *anyone* has seen their new turn, then *everyone* needs to be given at least 12 hours to make changes to their old turns!

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Well, I didn't look at my turn after the stale message. Also, I repeated my orders exactly as I had done them before. I did not submit while waiting for any more discussion amongst our team.

To reiterate, I did nothing different than I had before the stale. I just redid the turn exactly the same.

Maer

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Correct my friends, whenever there is a rollback there is opportunity for cheating. I am counting on all of you to remain as ethical as your admin. There is no ethical reason to change or redo your turn that I know of.

Edit:

And why would someone have to redo their turn from scratch? Your orders have not changed, the server will still see your turn as turn 20. Every rollback that I have participated in I didn't bother to redo my turns from scratch, I just resubmitted them, including the previous rollback in this game. No adverse effects were noted, my orders were followed.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Well, I have no other chance than to play the turn with what I know from the last turn. It's been so quiet I know nothing though. :dk:

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Suppose that Illum. had not staled, and that he had attacked one of Kailasa's provinces. We do a rollback, Kailasa has seen the stale turn, Kailasa now knows where Illum is attacking!

This is bad enough, but Illum. at least needs the *chance* to change his target.

So if the people who staled have seen their turns before doing the new turns, everyone should have a chance to redo. Otherwise we have no guarantee that the stalers haven't seen the next turn before making decisions.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

How could I possibly know Illuminated's target if he staled? He staled so he obviously didn't attack anyone and I clearly can't tell from the turn I didn't look at. Your example is a bit sketchy DrP. Since Caelum and I both staled and we are aggressively fighting each other seems like a simple roll back of just the stalers is just fine.

That doesn't account for Lanka, but you didn't use that as an example and Lanka is a fair way from your team generally.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Sounds like you misread that bit.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Yup. Sorry DrP. I misread.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Generally, if you are not involved in an active war with another player it usually doesn't hurt if you've seen the next turns actions. However, as I stated before nobody should have any reason for redoing a turn including those that staled.

Furthermore, no one except for the 3 who staled should be taking advantage of this opportunity to "rethink" or "redo" a turn.

I have the following information:

early_arcoscephale.2h 2009-12-06 19:24:23 2h file is OK!
early_niefelheim.2h 2009-12-06 19:55:44 2h file is OK!
early_pangaea.2h 2009-12-06 21:05:25 2h file is OK!

Aside from Caelum and Kailasa, who should be resubmitting their turns, the above 3 people have resubmited their turn files. I can't stop people from doing this since I am not the host, but I can replace these three turns with the originals myself to keep things as fair as possible. If you've an issue with it take it up with me.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I do not know what has happened with Agema.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

maybe he's like me. after i go to bed, i usually don't see the forums again for ~15 hours or so

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I have decided to submit Agema's turn, to keep things moving along. Though I knew there might be a risk of key violations, we were lucky and no one staled. It has been now over 60 hours, since the original turn hosted, if we were going to hear from Agema, we would have heard something by now. I am dispatching an e-mail to Gandalf to reset our hosting interval to 48 hours and fix the displayed timer ASAP for the current turn. We move forward. Again, if anyone has an issue with these actions of mine, take it up with me via PM, that is your right.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Sept, did you undo everyone's newly-submitted turns or not? Because I clearly saw a player do things differently this time around and I want to be sure whether everyone who submitted a new turn was allowed to or not.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

I undid those three turns which I could undo. I could not undo the three who had staled because I did not have their original 2h files to resubmit. I was counting on those 3 (actually only 2, since I took no actions for Lanka myself) to adhere to an ethical code, if they did not, I cannot do anything about it really aside from booting players, and I am sure we don't want that.

So to clarify, it was clear to me that Arco, Pangaea, and Neifel, who SHOULD NOT have resubmitted turn files for the rollback, did so and may have used the forknowledge of the new turn to alter their actions. To keep things as fair as possible I did the only thing I could do to try to arrest any cheating. I resubmitted the original .2h files for those 3. However, I could do nothing about the 3 who staled originally (or 2 rather since I played Lanka), because since they staled, they did not have any 2h files in the backup archive for me to resubmit.

Rollbacks are very problematic and it is especially so if people do not adhere to an ethical code. Personally, I never look at any new turns when a rollback happens. But that is just me.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

The player in question was not one of the staling players. I am not suggesting any sort of action against them, I would rather just move forward with the game. But a non-staling player redid their turn and benefitted from it, and I am not particularly thrilled about it since other players did not get that luxury. Thankfully the player in question does not appear to be fighting other players, or this could have gotten ugly.

Let us please endeavor to avoid rollbacks unless there is a serious, game threatening bug. They are just too dramatic otherwise and have too much potential for abuse.

Re: Noobs & Vets: Rise of the AI Menace. EA, BI, Running.
 

Please accept my apologies.

I had an unexpected and absolute ***** of a weekend and wasn't able to sort my turn or, frankly, much else in any regard. This shouldn't happen again, I'm now fully back up to speed.