[Septimius Severus]

My position on the no rollback policy remains the same (would not change even if we all staled). Though I am sympathetic to Numahr, that is what the decision was.

Very simply though, I can only convey my understanding of how delays are handled via direct connect on Gandalf's server. It is an entirely manual process and I have no direct control of the server:

1. I receive a request from a player asking for a delay with enough lead time to allow me to receive the message and convey it to Gandalf (generally you'll want to allow something like 8 hours or more).

2. I convey the request asking for x hours to be added to the current turn to Gandalf.

3. Gandalf must then receive the message in time and then shut down the game. So if he gets a request for say an 8 hour delay, at the 40th hour of a 48 hour turn, the game must be stopped, the interval adjusted temporarily to 16 hours (8 hours left+8 hours added) and then the game is restarted.

4. After the turn hosts, the external timer will still show only 16 hours . So as soon as he is able to get to it, he must then adjust the timer back to 48 hours or whatever the current interval is. Gandalf's least complicated move would be to just reset it to the current interval (but this will of course result in extra time added to the game turn since there will generally be some time elapsed between when the game hosted and when he can get to it). To account for that time, he'd have to again adjust the timer downward, then wait for the next host, and adjust again, etc.

Now why Gandalf didn't get a chance to adjust the timer down to reflect the additional 8 hours and only the additional 8 hours (not an extra 48), I cannot tell you. But when I noticed it (Ano did as well, as I am sure every else looking at it did) I sent word to Gandalf to use the fatherland file timestamp and count 56 hours from then and adjust the timer accordingly.

In any event, the first delay request (for 8 hours) WAS honored. Gandalf says he did not receive another delay request in time to prevent a stale. And another 4 hours past the hosting time went by before the actual host. That is all I can and will say about it. Gandalf would really be able to tell you more.

I really am against further delays on the current turn at this point, but if absolutely necessary I will consider it. Because of this process, the game time will NOT be accurate when delays are processed. I do recall my mentioning some of my concerns with publishing an external timer. I don't really like it for direct connect games. The game already has a lenient hosting schedule to taking into account the team nature of the game. But even so, things are moving far to slow for my tastes. But that is only my opinion.