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Prowling in a PBEM near you!
Nov 2002
time: 00:24
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Vondrack posted this in the intersite game forum, as an example of what that team might do, and what Legoland does now. Wow. It has similiarities to the Thread of Everything, but is wrapped in a prettier package. Not suggesting we do this - just thought you might be interested. Given the small number of us involved on Vox - I would suggest the best way to share the status is to share the game save. Let everyone crank it up - take a look at the build queues, terrain, etc. If we feel there is a need. I know that I for one, have barley enough time for the forums and the game, let alone the Thread of everything. Maybe as the game progesses we should be more dilligent about updating it. Here is vondrack's post: (and I note that the maps and his charts/spreadsheets did not copy over - oh well - you get the idea)
vondrack's post
Contrary to what I stated in the sign-up thread, I have changed my mind and would be willing to get involved in the IS-DG to the extent of running for a Consul.
With the exception of my fellow Legos, most people here perhaps not know much about me, so I believe I should say a few words about myself, about what I would be willing/able to do as a Consul, and about how I would expect things to be.
I would definitely not rate myself as a brilliant SP player... My SP skills are at solid Monarch, I have been following the forums here for about a year, hopefully absorbing much of the Poly collective wisdom. In a DG MP, I try to rely on a detailed plan discussed and precised ahead by the team. Whatever the team decides is what is going to be played, unless there is a sudden change of situation, requiring an emergency response, but that goes without saying, I believe...
After some messy start, we got ourselves pretty well organized in Legoland and I believe much of what we are using now would be of great benefit to the ISDG Poly team, too. We have found out that the best way to deal with the game (at least with the opening part) is to have someone proposing detailed plans for the next turn with the rest of the team commenting and suggesting changes.
So, currently, it's like that after playing our turn, I update our Chronicle ASAP (see an example Chronicle entry below... it is usually posted within 2-3 hours of playing the turn) and post a brief summary of moves intended for the next turn. These "very short term plans" are based upon previous "long/er term strategy discussions" organized by our ministers, and include requests for long(er) term strategy decisions to be taken, whenever I can foresee them coming.
I haven't seen anybody proposing a concrete mechanics for playing our ISDG turns, so I think I would better do that now. My idea would be as follows (keep in mind that this is meant for the opening phase of the game, where most turns are precisely planned in advance, with few events demanding an "emergency" response taking place ingame):
1) after getting the save, whichever Consul would be ready to play the turn for us would check to see if there is any other Consul online, probably by checking in at a special private ISDG chatroom. After agreeing upon who will be playing the turn, he would post in a special service thread he's going to play the turn - to make double sure the turn will not be cross-played by two Consuls and to let everybody else know there will be news coming in shortly (members subscribing to this service thread would get a timely notice there is something happening).
2) playing the turn, the Consul would be making notes of every single action taken, to be later posted in the turn report (AFAIK, with 1.14f, there is - due to the extra production load bug - no possibility to correctly load a save "just before hitting the End Turn button", which makes it necessary to load the incoming save and replay every single action taken, if you wish to examine the save at its "valid" (outgoing) state or take accurate screenshots.
3) after playing the save, this Consul would immediately post the list of actions taken in a special thread, making the incoming savegame available from there, too.
4) either he or whoever would be responsible for posting information would then post the current map(s), summary tables, plus whatever other information we agree upon (see my example below). All that ASAP, of course.
5) (preferrably) he would then post a brief summary of proposed moves for the next turn, considering the ministerial and senatorial bills, suggestions etc., including requests to specific executives for whatever long/er term decisions he will be able to foresee the need for (this is to make sure that someone will take care of considering the issue, proposing a solution, initiating a discussion, setting up a poll if necessary... so that once we need to make that decision ingame, it will not be a sole responsibility of the Consuls).
This should work for many turns... once the turns get more complicated and we need to respond to situations that were impossible to foresee/plan ahead for, we may utilize turnchats held within a couple of hours from receiving the save or have a Consul posting the "Start of the Turn" information, arranging for emergency response discussion in the ISDG forum...
If the actual turnplay arrangement is something reasonably close to this, I would be happy to serve as a Consul, posting the information in a way illustrated by the following sample - using a couple of nifty PhotoShop and Excel templates/macros I created for the purpose, I am able to post this information within an hour since playing the turn (on condition I am online, of course... which is the case for most time from 8am to as late as 12pm GMT every day, often even longer). BTW, I am from Europe, so if we are going for Consuls from different timezones, I would be able to cover this part of the world).
Keep in mind, please, that the sample is to illustrate the form, not the content. It is not meant to illustrate my playing style (most of the info is fake anyway), just to give an idea what kind of information I am able to quickly post.
Turn 53: 1700 BC
Actions taken
1) Archer in the northwestern desert moved E
2) Worker near Camulodunum ordered to mine the tile
3) Worker on the Ivory tile ordered to road it
4) Archer W of Lugdunum fortified
5) research slider set to 60%
6) production in Camoludunum changed to Temple
Note: in our Legoland game, we have all our units named, thus referring to them using their short, easy to remember names, not having to use long descriptions like in this example
Map
Summary
Note: the yellow background indicates that the value changed from the previous turn (ever-changing values like number of turns to completion are, however, not background painted to keep the table uncluttered and "important" changes easier to notice). If there is a strong demand to include different info in the table (like the level of corruption, happy/content/unhappy faces etc.), it should not be a problem... just that it is reasonable to keep the table this total width - otherwise it is a bit difficult to view it at once in a forum thread post.
Minimap
Additional Info
Demographics
Top 5 Cities
Savegames
incoming/received save
played/before-the-End-of-Turn save
Note: no actual saves linked to... but normally, these would be links allowing to download the saves.
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And this would get posted in the "very short term plans" thread:
Movement/Action Plans for the next turn
1) Archer in the northwestern desert to NE
2) Entremont to start building Barracks
Agenda
Minister of War - decide on whether to leave the Archers fortified on those hills, maintaining the killing grounds, or advance them against Trondheim
Minister of Construction - decide on the next production job for Lugdunum, prepare new orders for the workers
Minister of Finances - check the slider settings for possible savings not delaying the discovery of Writing
Note: sorry, I can't recall now what exactly are the ministerial posts called in the proposed Constitution
All I would ask for would be some decent server space on Poly to upload the pics to... (one turn eats up like 100-300 kB) but I hope Markos would be able to arrange that.
Well. That's it. Even if I do not get elected, I will be happy to submit my tools (PhotoShop and Excel templates) to anybody being put in charge.
Cheers,
Radek
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02-02-2003 22:06
. 
I noticed. 
I think it supposed to be AFAIK - As Far As I Know. I don't have the foggiest idea what AFK would be...unless it's just a typo for AFAIK. 
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