Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">So far the people who know bits and pieces of the subject have been ironing out questions. But none of them have jumped up and said they would run it. Ive offered a linux host site and Shrapnel offered a windows hosting.

Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

Excellent start there. The tcpip server method will be good for marathon games.

But if you get some of the 1-turn-a-day games then they can Last months. I figure if I can make the upload/download simple then a cron to do a daily host can allow the same machine to start a new game every day even if they are all running. If we can get 2 servers going.. one for marathons and one for daily-turn then I think a large gap in the community could be provided for.

Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

Gandalf has very good points http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif But just to make it perfectly clear: I won't mind hosting a few one-turn-pr.day games on my server. So if someone out there wants to start one of those, and needs a place to host it, go ahead http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif (As long as you don't mind me joining)

A real problem, not specific to my setup, is "how to get some AIs"? One could, of course, start with several gods and then become computer controlled. But then a lot intellegence about that AI would be known to someone.

What I would like would be a command line switch:
--AI Man --AI Ulm
but I'm not sure such can be faked...

Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

Such a switch would be nice but there is a possible work-around. AI's can be created with map commands.

I think the map is probably in the player files so to avoid an error you would probably have to leave the map named the same. But you could...
1) copy xxxxx.map to xxxxx.tmp
2) append the AI comands
3) start the game
4) copy xxxxx.tmp back to xxxxx.map so that you always have the original in place

Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">If there's a mechanical way I'm sure I could whip up a Perl script to automate it.... or rather, build it into my existing "launch&control" script.

That would be awesome... I'll go read & experiment some.

Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

<font size="2" face="sans-serif, arial, verdana">That won't be a problem with the coming Version. There will be switches to enable AI players as well as some other switches that I have forgotten about. Maybe the --preexec is a new one.

Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

YAY! yes the preexec is one I requested. Thank you! We can automate backups and have email notices tell us who didnt do their turn.

By any chance...
make game and quit?
more involved stat output?
is master password a switch? (I cant remember)

[ February 15, 2004, 17:36: Message edited by: Gandalf Parker ]

Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

One point at the time (none of these are currently implemeted in my wrapper). Also note that my wrapper uses mysql for statistics output. This would have to be changed to be used in a wider audience.

- make game and quit?
Easy. I can just kill the server; or I think some option combination can archieve this.

- more involved stat output?
Currently, I'm only reading output from the game process. From that, very little information can be gathered. I'm hoping the --statfile option will give me some more input for putting into my little databases.

- is master password a switch? (I cant remember)
It is, but my wrapper script does not support it. I'm guessing the master password is for having games not joinable for all? My server will never support that by choice, but it's trivial to add.

Of these, the stat output and AI adding are the most interesting, IMHO. My todo is currently:

1. Support all gamerelated switches (I'm 30% there in my "beta" scripts)
2. AI support
3. Extra stats
4. Email notifications.

But that list will surely change before I get to 3, if not before http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif

P.S: If anyone wants to help, I could probably make the source avaible. Perhaps I can even make a cvs server avaible http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/icon7.gif It's all written in Perl, and I would need to use an hour or so to prepare my scripts for publishing. The license will be (has to be) GPLv2.

Re: Dedicated Servers?
 

I've made a Dominions Server not following the ideas below http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/icons/blush.gif ) It's pure TCP/IP hosting, and not fleshed out fully yet. But do head over, post some comments here
and play a game!