05-12-2004 01:55									#1
	War of the Worlds - December Bang! Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

Bang scheduled for TODAY December 22th 5PM MST

Spread the word! The War of the Worlds is banging tonight!



Visit the server site at http://www.waroftheworlds.ath.cx for a java client to connect to the game, or telnet to www.waroftheworlds.ath.cx port 2002.

The practice game has been re-banged and will continue to run alongside the WotW game as a place for people to try new strategies and practice their skills. It is set to unlimited turns.

Please register in the pre-registration thread

To get detailed settings for the game, press "*" at the main menu after selecting a game but before logging in.

Strong Recommendations

1) Thou shalt use SWATH

2) Thou shalt park in fedspace at the end of the day if thou wishest not to wake in an escape pod

3) Thou shalt purchase a cloaking device and cloak in fedspace if thou art evil and wishest not to wake up in an escape pod lacking all thy evil credits

4) Thou shalt density scan before warping

5) Thou shalt not destroy toll fighters unless thou art prepared to pay the consequences (also it's cheaper to leave them)

Proposed Rules:

1) No attack-bot scripts that involve automatic t-warp / idling at stardock for evils / any other sort of automatic attacking except simple capture scripts triggered in face to face combat (like the ship capture script in swath)

Proposed General Settings:

20,000 Sectors

1000 Turns per day, can save for five days to a maximum 5000 turns.

NEW Gold Alien Ferrengi & Cylon races, with advanced citadels and dangerous ships - beware!

Photons: multiple fire enabled, wave duration of 20 seconds, enabled from day 1.

Planetary Trade: 80%

Rob/Steal Factor: 50%

Busts Clear: Every 5 days

Port Regen: 10% per day, maximum 100% per visit

Maximum 5 Planets per Sector

Maximum 5 Traders per Corp

Proposed Startup Settings:

Merchant Freighter, 20 holds, 10,000 credits, 100 fighters.

Last edited by aeturneus on 23-12-2004 at 06:54

	05-12-2004 02:09									#2
	Full PM-box? Change here!

For starters, I'm going to suggest making the universe much larger, say 20,000 sectors, and giving players 800 turns instead of 1000 turns.

This will have the combined effect of making it easier for good (blue) players to hide planets in different corners of the universe, and making evil somewhat less efficient with the initial setup cost (in turns) each day being somewhat fixed.

I'd also like to suggest that the turn storage feature currently in place where you can save one day's turns to the next day be increased up to 5 days worth of turns. A lot of us have lives outside this game, I'm sure, and it would be great if I could not play Monday-Friday when I am in a crunch, but could still come back Friday night and not be five days behind turns-wise.

	05-12-2004 02:40									#3
	Increase Your PM Length

quote: Originally posted by aeturneus I'd also like to suggest that the turn storage feature currently in place where you can save one day's turns to the next day be increased up to 5 days worth of turns. A lot of us have lives outside this game, I'm sure, and it would be great if I could not play Monday-Friday when I am in a crunch, but could still come back Friday night and not be five days behind turns-wise.

I give full support for this With my school and homeworks, it's almost impossible for me to play outside weekends.

	05-12-2004 02:59									#4
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

quote: For starters, I'm going to suggest making the universe much larger, say 20,000 sectors, and giving players 800 turns instead of 1000 turns.

agreed as well

i dont like the idea of running a script and spreading figs in half the universe...

quote: I'd also like to suggest that the turn storage feature currently in place where you can save one day's turns to the next day be increased up to 5 days worth of turns.

agreed it should be at least 2 days

	05-12-2004 03:41									#5
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

OK, for starters I'd like to agree on the 20,000 sectors - I think a large universe, with more one -way warps than the current game, would be useful.

As for storing up turns, I think the maximum of 5 days would be best; there's no reason to penalize players that don't make it here every day.

More later...

Last edited by burbel on 15-12-2004 at 02:16

	05-12-2004 03:45									#6
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

I agree for two corp teams, perhaps we should start considering them :

Team 1 :

Aeturneus (evil)

Team 2 :

Oerdin (evil)

How would the rest of us group up in this case? What do you think?

	05-12-2004 11:15									#7
	Support Apolyton

I've updated the proposed settings according to the discussion here, and have also proposed making the location of ferrengal public so that I can edit it and put 100,000 fighters on it so that it will be difficult for a corp to get an advantage by taking it.

Also, Burbel is paying for an upgrade of the server to the Gold version, so we may be able to add other alien races as well!

My thoughts on balancing the teams: Specialization is key. If each corp has players doing the different specializations, the corps will be more or less balanced.

Both corporations should have

1) An evil player to make money. This player shouldn't move except being towed by a good player, and if he's played right, this is the only guy in the corp that hast to make money. Should pull in 10m - 12m per day if he is supported properly.

2) A good player to tow the evil player and his colonial transports around by Transwarp drive, tow merchant freighters to him so he can destroy them to recover holds when he busts, to explore with eprobes and transwarp drive, and to hunt with his remaining turns. This is the most difficult job, should go to the most experienced player (though he doesn't have to be CEO, since he can use an ISS and doesnt need access to a corp flagship). This player needs to be online at the same time as the red player in order to support him properly.

3) A second good player to colonize and upgrade planets in lots of different sectors by Transwarp drive, and manage the defenses of sectors and planets as the game continues. This player doesn't necessarily have to be on at the same time as the other two players, but does need to make sure to keep the citadels upgrading so the corp doesn't get behind.

I suggest that everyone think about which role they would like to play in a corporation. The hardest one is the first blue, who has to know how to help the red, has to be available at regular times to help the red and has to put time in to explore. The other two are both complicated at times, and routine at times, since scripts should be used to SST and to colonize, but a lot of careful thought has to go into choosing sectors to build in and the red player has to play at the same time every day so the corp income is steady and the blue player can help him.

These are my views of how a three player corporation should work. I invite you to share yours and suggest what you would like to do in a corporation. I hope everybody can pick something they would like to do and we can balance the teams that way, each person getting to do something they are interested in and capable of.

I understand it's a big difference to play Trade Wars with organized corporations and assigned roles... some people may not think this will be as much fun as free-wheeling around solo, and of course people are still free to do that but I think teamwork and strategy and co-operation will not only win, but will be a more fun way to play in the long run

Last edited by aeturneus on 05-12-2004 at 11:47

	05-12-2004 11:56									#8
	Got spare money?

Personally, I'd like to play first blue on my corp, and train someone else to play evil like I trained Oerdin in the last game. Obviously, Oerdin knows quite a bit about playing evil now, so he would be a valuable evil player on the other corp, now that he is finished being "apprentice" and is ready to be a "master" though I can't really speak to what role he would want to play specifically.

	06-12-2004 01:57									#9
	Increase Your PM Length

Well, I'm familiar with the second blue position, exploring sectors and dead ends, exploring the universe, dropping figs in key places, and developing sectors, etc.

However, I wouldn't mind a change in pace. Being the evil character might be different for me, although it might be more dificult for me to be on when someone else is.

But I'm open here.

Also, checking some other TW faq pages, it seems that 1,000 turns isn't unreasonable for a 5,000 sector game, so I think that the 20,000 sector universe would be fine with that many turns - ideas?

	06-12-2004 02:42									#10
	Increase the size of your Attachments

Well, 1k turns is reasonable, especially in such a big universe, so yeah, that sounds good.
I wouldn't mind being able to pick a different starting ship though.

	06-12-2004 02:44									#11
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Would you be interested in playing as a corporate red, solar?

Unfortunately if I change the starting ship I have to change it for everyone - did you have one in particular in mind?

Some servers set it to start in a merchant freighter - considering everyone trades the cruiser in for one that might make sense.

	06-12-2004 03:03									#12
	Get a bigger avatar today!

We can also customize the values for ships, but that's a slippery slope. I think that starting everyone in a Merf is fair. and reasonable.

Also, what do we think of this idea? Thou shalt use Swath. If we can standardize what tool everyone is using, then we can share information easier (sector maps and port reports, for example), and we can guarantee that noone has any additional functionality that puts them ahead of the others.

Also, I'd like to ask that folks stay away from custom macros, such as ones that allow automated killing of ships and such.

What do you all think?

	06-12-2004 03:17									#13
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

quote: Originally posted by burbel I think that starting everyone in a Merf is fair. and reasonable.

OK I've updated the proposed startup settings to match this, and raised the turns back up to 1000, though turns are still open for debate as anything else.

quote: Originally posted by burbel Also, what do we think of this idea? Thou shalt use Swath.

I'm leery of requiring corp members to use a specific piece of commercial software, even if it does have a free trial period.

On the other hand, SWATH really is where it's at when it comes to helper programs.

I use SWATH and TWX right now, and the reason I use TWX is I like the keyboard interface for running scripts rather than the SWATH menu interface - they can both run the same scripts. Data files are interchangeable between the two programs, and TWX is free - but you need some sort of helper, perhaps open-source Kokua, to connect to the TWX proxy.

I agree about the attack type scripts, technically the main issue would be if someone was idling on the server just running attack scripts triggered by toll fighters - this simply can't be allowed since the server only has 4 nodes, not to mention the way it completely changes the game. So I think that is a good rule, but I'm not going to prohibit people using SWATH ship capture or simple things like that, just complex twarp-bot type things, which can be detected fairly easily.

	06-12-2004 03:26									#14
	Put an end to popups!

I'll take corporate red for two corps at a time

	06-12-2004 07:47									#15
	Increase Your PM Length

Well, I wouldn't try and *force* anyone to use a specific piece of software, just recommend it, it does establish a good baseline (and allow everyone to do simple things such as PPT, SST, Terra colonization, etc).

If anyone is going to use a seperate script, I'd ask that they upload a reference to it, so that others can use the script if they so desire, and we can keep things even.

Hmm, Solarwind, that seems like a tall order - well, I tell you what, you can make the 5mil credits for our corp first, then I'll be nice and twarp you to the other corp's sectors so you can start making them money. What do you think?

	06-12-2004 21:46									#16
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Sounds good, it'll keep everything even, at least.
I'd personally rather not be affiliated with any corps, but for the sake of game balance, I'll go with whatever corp ends up being one person short.

	07-12-2004 18:58									#17
	Inflate your Upload Space

Given the holiday season and my finals, I'm not sure how much free time I will actually have available...so on this note, I will play un-corped to begin with and depending on how much time I have, I may join up with a corp at a later time.

Oh, and I use ATTAC for my TW games. I'm still trying to figure out how to use all of the features on it. Here is their website:

http://www.tw-attac.com/

	07-12-2004 23:49									#18
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

Well then, I suppose 2 person teams might be best for this game as well - with solarwind and wittlich going indy for the first part at least. Here's my proposal:

Aeturneus / MarkG
Burbel / Oerdin

What do you think? 2v2?

	08-12-2004 00:31									#19
	Inflate your Upload Space

That ought to work; what about your friend, Jesse?

I could see this developing into a 2vs2 and 1vs1 battle, that ought to be fine.

	08-12-2004 00:31									#20
	Full PM-box? Change here!

sounds great to me, of course, and it shouldn't be too bad for anyone else, either.

	09-12-2004 10:32									#21
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

Alright, looking at my exam schedule I've decided to let this game run another week and a half. Unless there are any reasonable objections, I'm going to bang the game Monday, the 20th of December at 5:00PM MST.

Extern will be set to run at 10:00PM MST.

As it is the holiday season, I understand that many of you will not be able to play 1000 turns every day. However, if you are able to log in and create a user at the time of the bang through the Java telnet client which is accessible anywhere through the website, you will at least be able to start saving turns, up to 5000, from day 1. This way, when you are ultimately able to play you will get an accelerated start. I hope that everyone who is corping will at least try to do this, for the sake of balance.

There will be some NPC organizations but they have yet to be completely worked out.

The existing game will run until the 20th.

Since the current game has already been called, players are welcome to create new accounts to try different strategies in the existing game. If you want to go evil, feel free... experiment, do what you like! Now's the time to learn how to SST, etc. if you are wondering what it's like to make 10m credits in a day

However, I would ask that players that take advantage of the legal duping not beat up too much on players that don't...

	11-12-2004 01:53									#22
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

hi fellas. Remember me? I'm thinking of joining in on the next bang. can anyone post the server address for me? I want to just check the server out and show it to a friend to see if she is interested in playing this game. She's a newbie to TW2002

	11-12-2004 02:08									#23
	Put an end to popups!

Hey Aeturneus, I cant telnet to your server or load the applet on your website.

	11-12-2004 02:15									#24
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

so sorry, it should be working now - I forgot to bring the server back up at last reboot

It should work now.

BTW Welcome Back Thor!

	13-12-2004 04:01									#25
	Inflate your Upload Space

I'd like to have more then six players. Can't we dig up a few more people some where?

	13-12-2004 05:46									#26
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

Well, I'm always up for more players, but don't know where to find folks. Also, on this new test server, can we up the number of turns significatnly? I'd like to experiment a bit, and 250 turns is way too low; maybe something like 10,000 for screwing around?

	13-12-2004 05:54									#27
	Support Apolyton, buy Call to Power 2

turns changed in the test server.

Sorry about my sudden invisibility, I'm extremely busy right now - I hope to get back to administering the server and aggressively promoting TW on the 20th, the last day of exams.

	13-12-2004 05:58									#28
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

That's cool, we understand completely. I've been spending a bit more time than I expected on a side project, but I'll be in full-time when the game bangs.

	13-12-2004 19:57									#29
	Put an end to popups!

quote: Originally posted by Oerdin I'd like to have more then six players. Can't we dig up a few more people some where?

Well, I'm somewhat playing, it's just that do I have enough time to TW. At the holiday timews I'm sure to play (almost) every day.

	17-12-2004 00:35									#30
	Support Apolyton, pre-order Civilization IV

I'm glad to see Pave and Tukhachevsky playing regularly, and looking forward to the December bang after exams

Since we're approaching the bang, I thought I'd put the corporations / teams question out there again, and see if anything has changed... I think at last call we had two teams of two,

Aeturneus / MarkG
Burbel / Oerdin

but I haven't talked to MarkG about this yet, and since he's in Greece I'm not sure we'll be able to co-ordinate at a regular time, so the plausibility of this arrangement remains undetermined.

Tukhachevsky, are you interested in corping next game? If so, that would open up some other possibilities - like a third corporation, bringing solarwind back into the mix, or going back to the three-vs-three idea we had earlier... which to me still seems most likely to succeed.

Pave, what about you? Do you think you'll be able to play regularly for about a month after the bang on the 20th? Remember, with 5 days of turn-saving, you only have to get on a couple of times a week.