No Diplo EA Game - No Wankers Allowed - Game Over, Baalz/Abysia Wins

[Marmaduke]

I would like to know what are the civilizations in game before having to send my pretender, would it be possible to announce them first? This way, we could better design our pretenders and scales.

[Calahan]

Originally Posted by Marmaduke

I would like to know what are the civilizations in game before having to send my pretender, would it be possible to announce them first? This way, we could better design our pretenders and scales.

Tough call that. On the one hand, I know if I was playing, I'd prefer to keep the nations in the game secret as an extra design challenge. (as knowing pre-game what other nations are in the game will be a big help to some nations during design)

But on the other hand from experience I know that because this game is on the llamaserver, those submitting their pretenders near the end can gain an advantage by seeing which other Pretenders have been submitted before them. Meaning whoever submits last will know all the other nations

I'll see what Executor has to say (since it is his game) but right now I'm thinking that once sign-ups close, I'll post the full list of nations. Unless someone has a sensible suggestion of how to keep the info hidden on a llamaserver game (easy enough of course if it was private hosting like PashaDawg does, for those fortunate enough to have played in his games)

[Kobal2]

Originally Posted by Calahan

Unless someone has a sensible suggestion of how to keep the info hidden on a llamaserver game (easy enough of course if it was private hosting like PashaDawg does, for those fortunate enough to have played in his games)

It'd be a bit work-intensive for you, but you could ask everyone to send their pretender design picks and password by PM, create the .2h files on your side and register them all at once. If I'm not mistaken, the game doesn't check or use the pretender file in /newlords once the game has started, the host sends a new one along with each .trn file.

[Calahan]

Originally Posted by Kobal2

It'd be a bit work-intensive for you, but you could ask everyone to send their pretender design picks and password by PM, create the .2h files on your side and register them all at once. If I'm not mistaken, the game doesn't check or use the pretender file in /newlords once the game has started, the host sends a new one along with each .trn file.

I did think of that, and while I probably wouldn't mind everyone sending their designs to me, and then I send them to the llamaserver, a potential problem arrises when I have to change every email address to the correct player. As the llamaserver automatically sends the turns to the email address it recieved the pretender from. ie. They'd all come to me.

The problem then is that if I make one mistake with the nation-email matchups, the wrong player gets the wrong turn file, and those secret ID's start to get busted. I can't say I'm one for making mistakes though, as I'd never survive a day in my RL work if I did. But there is a potential mistake there to be made, which means it is a possibility. So if you all think doing that would help enhance the game a lot, then ok. But doing it only keeps info secret that immediately becomes known once the game starts.

Now if the game and the llamaserver didn't automatically tell you which other nations were in the game from the in-game Pretedner screen/web status page, then it'd surely be awesome keeping nations secret until you found them in-game But otherwise, I'm not sure the gain vs potential loss ratio is worth the hassle. (loss being a complete re-start and nation re-roll if I get an email address wrong)


Edit -
Just realised getting the email address wrong wouldn't actually reveal ID's, since if a player got the wrong turn file, then he/Fantomen () still wouldn't know which player the turn file should have gone to. But it would still give design / Pretender / start location info away etc, and that in itself is bad enough.

[Kobal2]

Originally Posted by Calahan

Edit -
Just realised getting the email address wrong wouldn't actually reveal ID's, since if a player got the wrong turn file, then he/Fantomen () still wouldn't know which player the turn file should have gone to. But it would still give design / Pretender / start location info away etc, and that in itself is bad enough.

Wouldn't even give that away, since the wrong guy wouldn't have the right password to open the turn file. Unless there are ways to hack into the file itself or read its contents outside the game, but that would be a massive jerk thing to do.

I'm not sure the ephemeral secrecy is worth that much troubling yourself over myself, or that people would even pick their own gods based on nations they might never encounter in-game but hey. If you want to, you can do it.

[Executor]

That's a tough call, ok, so far we have 13 nations, I recon some of them are water too so knowing the nations could perhaps have some impact on players pretender design, now as Calahan stated you Could simply wait and submit the pretender last as to help to pretender build. So I guess that's one reason to announce the nation list.

Now, I recon if we get a few more players knowing the full nation list should have little difference on the pretender design, however I think it's been a while since someone signed up so I'm not sure if there's a point in waiting much longer.

And finally, sending pretenders to Calahan could work but it might be a hassle for him, sending individual turns to Llamaserver, waiting for a conformation, getting the email addresses, changing them back to us, and watching that he doesn't screw up in the proses.

In any case, we still can't decide on that until we get a full player list and I create the game and give Calahan the admin code, or he crates it, either way, to make that decision.
There was something else I wanted to say too but I just can't remember what...

[Ossa]

I'd like to join the game if still possible.

[Baalz]

I'll play.

[ghoul31]

Originally Posted by Baalz

I'll play.

Just don't quit the game the instant you get attacked, like your last 4 games

[Fantomen]

Originally Posted by ghoul31

Just don't quit the game the instant you get attacked, like your last 4 games

It is unwise to throw stones in a greenhouse.