two v. two v. two v. two v. two (full)

[The Panther]

I should hopefully be back up and running this evening. Because my old computer quit working, I bought a new one last night. Also, cable is supposed to be installed this afternoon at my new house, so I should not miss any more turns. I am delaying in all my other games, but those are PBEM and therefore not a problem. It is far easier to stale in TCP/IP, which is why I much prefer the PBEM method. I just don't have the time to always get my turns done on time, especially with my recent massive life changes and all. I do hope my RL settles down soon...

As for Tauren, he started college less than a month ago and has been very busy since then. I know he is behind on some of his other Dominion games. He likely staled because the email notification on this game does not seem to be working properly. I do know that he plans to cut back his Dominions games and was regretting his decision to enter this game because it was TCP/IP based. Until the notification system starts working, you can expect additional stales, as neither of us are used to TCP/IP games anymore.

I will be driving up to my son's school on Friday to visit him. On Saturday in his dorm room, I should be able to make my moves in all my Domionions games (except RAND) on his computer, but no guarantees on this.

I did warn everybody that there was no possible way I could make my moves until today, so no one should be surprised that I staled. I am glad to see that my pretender has only one death and is at the top of the HoF, so I obviously won that tough battle a turn ago. Of course, our team losing a turn to everybody will hurt.

I will let you all know on Sunday evening when I return home if Tauren and I will be able to continue this game or not. It really depends on just how busy he is at school. Heck, I have not even seen a post from him on this forum in weeks, which is highly unusual for him. Perhaps I can find a new partner (I bet Boron would be interested) if Tauren cannot continue.

I sure would appreciate ending the forced hosting from this game, though. I would also appreciate rolling back the latest turn, but I fully understand if no one wants to do that.

[Zooko]

Well, the reason that this game has forced hosting isn't because it is a TCP/IP game, but because I chose to make forced-hosting the policy. Perhaps that was a mistake.

I could certainly change the hosting policy so that we would delay in order to let people catch up.

I guess my first two preferences at this point are:

1. Restart the game (regenerating the fatherland file but keeping the pretenders), changing the policy so that people do not *have* to make their moves within the time limit on pain of losing their turn, or

2. Restart the whole game-setup process, starting with inviting five teams of two to join, and specifying that only players who want to play 48-hour quickhost with no exceptions should join this game.

I prefer option #1. If anybody strongly prefers option #2 (which may mean that Panther and Tauren will drop out), then please post about it here.

I'll give this issue a day or so to settle before I decide.

[ioticus]

My solution to all the problems is PBEM!

[Zooko]

I think that the issue of whether hosting is forced or not is separate from the issue of whether turns are transmitted by TCP or by e-mail.

I can easily restart the server and set it to not force hosting until everyone's turns are in. Also I can (perhaps less easily) fix the damn e-mail notification service.

If I did those two things, then the server would have all of the features that you desire from PBEM, right?

Regards,

Zooko the Host

[ioticus]

Zooko said:
I think that the issue of whether hosting is forced or not is separate from the issue of whether turns are transmitted by TCP or by e-mail.

I can easily restart the server and set it to not force hosting until everyone's turns are in. Also I can (perhaps less easily) fix the damn e-mail notification service.

If I did those two things, then the server would have all of the features that you desire from PBEM, right?

Regards,

Zooko the Host

Not really. TCP seems to be plagued with problems. PBEM is much more reliable.

[Zooko]

Can you give me another example of a problem, besides the two known problems:

1. We had to re-upload our Pretenders upon restart (a problem now fixed since I have saved the Pretenders this time),
1. Forced-hosting has caused three players to miss their turns already (a problem that will be fixed by turning off forced-hosting), and
2. People are not receiving e-mail notifications of turns (although it worked at least once, it is currently broken).

If you have any other examples of problems in server operation I would like to know what they are in case I can thus fix them.

[King Lear]

PBEM may be more reliable (and I for one agree that it seems to be), but it can be a pain for who-ever is incharge of the server for it.

I'm going on vacation for a week. ioticus, i've already sent you my password (pm - man). Do as you think best =)

Oh, and if everyone decides that starting over makes sense, you'll have to give me a week and a half: ie till next Saturday, to upload a pretender. Sorry =(

[Zooko]

I believe that I can re-start the game without requiring anyone to upload a Pretender, since I made copies of the Pretenders. However, I've never done so before so I don't know if I did it right.

I'm kind of waiting to hear from Panther and Tauren before I decide whether to restart.

[The Panther]

Hey, I did finally manage to get online late yesterday evening. I loaded Dominions on my new computer and even upgraded to V1.6. However, I was unable to find all the proper mods before I had to get some sleep.

One of the mods I was unable to find was pretender 2.01. Cainehill had attached this mod in this thread long ago, but that attachment was blank. I also found it posted by Cherry in the Zen mod thread, but that was a .rar file which I cannot currently read. I would appreciate if someone would attach this mod in a post here. Alternatively, I think that copying Pretender 2.0 as 2.01 works, and I may try that this evening.

As for the game, I have still to hear from my son about what he wants to do, but I will be seeing him tomorrow. If it turns out that he does not have time for this game, I could try to find a new partner.

[Turin]

copying 2.0 as 2.01 works unless there are changes to your pretender in 2.01 which isn´t likely .