New & raw web based Dominion II game server

[Norfleet]

Originally posted by Esben Mose Hansen:
And perhaps one could imagine gamers who would avoid game creators with many games that have been restarted? I would, at least.

Except that it's not really THEIR fault that the game had to be restarted, the blame can be squarely placed on the unknown individual who accidentally or deliberately started the game without permission, or the guy who uploaded his pretender over somebody else....

[Esben Mose Hansen]

Originally posted by Norfleet:

quote:

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Originally posted by Esben Mose Hansen:
And perhaps one could imagine gamers who would avoid game creators with many games that have been restarted? I would, at least.

Except that it's not really THEIR fault that the game had to be restarted, the blame can be squarely placed on the unknown individual who accidentally or deliberately started the game without permission, or the guy who uploaded his pretender over somebody else....

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Before those statistics kicks in, both of those problems will be solved, somehow. Actually, I just had an idea on how to make sure that only the game owner can start the game: Just make --noclientstart a game option. Then the game owner could have it on in the beginning, and then turn it off from the change game option page before start. How does that sound?

The problem with pretender overwrites, on the other hand, HAS to be solved. This is what I am currently contemplating:

1. When creating a game, the port is NOT selected by the creator, but generated (in secret) by the server.
2. Then the players select what nation they want to play. This is recorded, and the port is displayed (to those players)

Not perfect --- I can't see how it can be without password protected slots on the server itself --- but pretty close, no?

[Esben Mose Hansen]

Originally posted by Norfleet:

quote:

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Originally posted by Esben Mose Hansen:
I prefer to avoid the latter, since it would mess up my plans for making statistics, but some sort of "hidden", "not relevant" and/or "aged" flag+filter would be nice.

I'm not sure why you would want to keep statistics on dead games, such as the ones that failed to ever actually start, though. Given that a game will likely have at least one false start, wouldn't it better if the failed game could just be completely expunged, freeing the port as well?

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Freeing up the port is a non-issue. I'll have a port-reclaiming feature ready way before we use up the 200 ports currently allocated.

I would like the statistics --- for fun. (Yes, I'm a mathematician, can't help it). And perhaps one could imagine gamers who would avoid game creators with many games that have been restarted? I would, at least.

[Esben Mose Hansen]

Hmmm. Are you aware that there is empty new game slots on the server?

Anyways, I work from the feedback principle. If noone cares to comment on my suggestions, I'm certainly not going to implement any. So I've canned the suggestions posted below, and now go to work on other stuff (than the server)

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Esben Mose Hansen:
The problem with pretender overwrites, on the other hand, HAS to be solved. This is what I am currently contemplating:

What you've described is probably the best way to do it without creating a web-based upload interface.

[Gandalf Parker]

Originally posted by Esben Mose Hansen:
1. When creating a game, the port is NOT selected by the creator, but generated (in secret) by the server.
2. Then the players select what nation they want to play. This is recorded, and the port is displayed (to those players)

Not perfect --- I can't see how it can be without password protected slots on the server itself --- but pretty close, no?

Sounds good.
how about a cron that watches for file uploads and copies them to a save dir? If man.2h is there then 2Man.2h is put into the save dir. That way you can always restore.

In fact maybe the cron could always restore? A new Man.2h file is saved as 2man.sh but the original Man.2h is copied back. if a player meant to replace his god he would need to request a manual deletion of the...

OK new thought. Have the cron watch the upload directorys and remove the write priveleges on uploaded god files. Would that work?

*sigh* Im still thinking a php drag-n-drop might answer things. You could put all the checks and balances in then. I need to get off my ascii and try to get my own working.

[Norfleet]

I still say web-based upload interface is best: This will also allow you to implement an element of accountability, so that people go AWOL from games can thus be blacklisted from joining future games automatically.

[Esben Mose Hansen]

I may implement all 3 things, then. THEN we'll see who is right ;-)

Thanks for commenting again. I go strange without feedback, as you see

The upload thing is very simple to do. I'll look into that first. As for the cron script, that would be simple too, though a bit worse (harder to test). I don't even need a cron script; the domwatcher script sees every upload. The main problem with that approach is no feedback. Still, it may not be too bad.

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Norfleet:
I still say web-based upload interface is best: This will also allow you to implement an element of accountability, so that people go AWOL from games can thus be blacklisted from joining future games automatically.

I think it would be much simpler to just have the game owner confirm whether each applicant can join.

[Norfleet]

Perhaps, but most of the time, it's generally implicit that people can join unless they have a history of not upholding their commitments. That, and it's always fun to blacklist people.