Preponderance - Big Team Game! [1-2 subs needed!]

[chrispedersen]

Two games on llamaserver and they both point to the turn 8.
And I haven't received the turn 0.

[Apsophos]

They "both" point to turn 8 because they have the same name, so you actually see the same page when you click on them. The llamaserver website probably displays the first game that has the name in the url.
I think the new Preponderance actually goes fine (turn 1), but we're gonne be polluted by the old one until it can be deleted.

That you haven't recieved the first turn is strange, though, and you can't request a resend if you get pointed to the old game's page.

[llamabeast]

Fear not, it's just a few little mess-ups. I shall fix it and do a restart forthwith. We shall overcome the curse on this game!

[Zeldor]

Nah, it's neither old or new game now. It's a mixture. It shows it had only 1 turn total, but it was turn 7->8. But it takes staling data from old game, hosting time too. So it hosted after 6 hours and shows that everyone staled. Add not working admin pass and mess with mods on top of that.

[llamabeast]

Right! I think it's fixed now. You should just have got your first turns, hopefully. Did it work okay?

[fungalreason]

I received the first turn, and everything seems fine. Thanks llama!

[Zeldor]

All looks fine, admin pasword is working too so I can do all my stuff :) We love you llamabeast. I will name some provs after you in my next map :P

[Gregstrom]

Time for the devs to code in the mountain relative of the bog beast if you ask me.

[DrPraetorious]

Was there a code update for llamasever? b/c I've been sloppily using improper game names (the same folder for all PBEM games) and llamserver had never noticed - until now, when it kept saying my turn was from an unknown game until I created a folder with the same name as this game and put the savedgame there.

[JimMorrison]

I would have to say no - I am in the game A1ComfortZone, and my save folder is just named ComfortZone. Also I had a typo on Kingmaker, and it's Kimgmaker. Both games submit turns with no problem whatsoever.

[llamabeast]

Yep, no change for the LlamaServer, and it can't tell what directory name you use.

[PsiSoldier]

Hrrrm so did this restart use the updated pretender I had sent in to Preponderancenew ???

[PsiSoldier]

Errr. well it kind of looks like it did use the updated pretender. At least my scales are starting out roughly where they should.

[Zeldor]

I think so, not sure though. I didn't expect anyone to change a pretender.

[PsiSoldier]

I just tried a few more tests against the AI and saw weaknesses in my design and tried to work out some of the problems. Nothing big, I'm ok either way.

[chrispedersen]

We're down to a few hours left till hosting, with 3 nations still unsubmitted......

Guys, give your team mates a prod.... looks like ferrosol, Jim Morrison, and vfb...

[Zeldor]

Well, they will stale if the don't submit their turns. I already moved hosting by few h. They all got reminder e-mails. And my email about restart. Jomon's teammate was not interested in getting anything done. Vanheim and Ulm is coobe + Ferrosol. Ferrosol is missing and I changed his e-mail to coobes yesterday, so he can do both turns until he finds a sub. He was online yesterday and today and I'm not going to give him more time, it wouldn't be fair.

[WingedDog]

Jomon's teammate was not interested in getting anything done.

How's that?

[Zeldor]

I mean I didn't get any PM from their team.

[Zeldor]

Ok, WingedDog explained me the situation with Yomi/Mictlan played from same cdkey.

Coobe is looking for a sub for Ferrosol.

[MadFrancis]

CC:

Wow ... so the game is finally started without any warning huh? I staled my first turn because I never recieved a message saying which Jomon turns were valid (I have been getting several emails at a time with various Jomon turns) ... I thought the server was still having problems. I had no idea the game was actually running until I woke up this morning and saw your message about the game hosting in a couple of hours, by which time it was too late. Some warning (more than an hours worth) that the real game is up and valid would have been nice. As it is I think I will just go AI since I don't feel like starting my turn 1 on everyone else's turn 2 when my partner (JimMorisson/Lanka) hasn't even recieved any turns from perponderance at all. This is really kind of lame if we get penalized for the server not working correctly.

FYI, the last PM I have recieved from Perponderance was on Dec 2, until this morning when I got one (too late) saying I was about to stale.

[JimMorrison]

Look, I don't know what's going on here. I do not even have a turn 2 in my mail right now. Apparently, Madfrancis didn't get his turn 1. He was fairly busy yesterday, and boom, a first turn stale.

Ordinarily I would entertain the thought that he managed to delete it prematurely, but since I don't have a turn 2, I wonder if anyone else is not receiving turns automatically?

< sigh > Not what I wanted to sleep late, and wake up to.....

[Zeldor]

There were over 50 hours for new turn 1. Everyone got an e-mail with all info. You also got emails with reminders about host.

I know the game had unlucky start, but I simply couldn't postpone it for unknown time just for 1 player. Staling one turn is not the end of the world. Not cool, but not game breaking.

All turns come to e-mails you submitted your pretender from. I don't have an option to check where it goes. If you don't have the turn you should request a resend, it sometimes gets stuck, just use that link: http://www.llamaserver.net/doAdminAction.cgi?game=Preponderance&action=resend

[MadFrancis]

I also was never informed that Perponderance was fixed and not to be looking for a PreponderanceNew turn ... I am sorry, I am busy and do not have time to browse through bulky threads looking for this vital info. I check my PM's on the forums everyday, but really do not have the time to be sifting through the threads. I guess that means those of us who work full time and are in school full time don't get to play because PM's aren't sent out by admins letting us know what is going on, but rather we are expected to spend an hour a day sorting through the crap on the forums to find the relevant information. I guess that means I am excluded from PBEM games.

[Zeldor]

Nah. All was send to the email you submitted your pretender from.

New forums are really bad and sending PMs is pain in the ***. It has a limit of 5 recipients, 60 seconds wait between sending PMs... I just figured sending e-mail to everyone will be enough.

As I said - staling turn1 is not catastrophe, other people here got worse things, look at income of EA Mictlan [95, Marignon has about 950!] or EA Lanka. They got some nasty events and live.

Also - if it comes to be llamaserver problem, I will roll back and rehost with your turn. But I want to be as fair as possible towards all 24 players.

[MadFrancis]

There were over 50 hours for new turn 1. Everyone got an e-mail with all info. You also got emails with reminders about host.

I know the game had unlucky start, but I simply couldn't postpone it for unknown time just for 1 player. Staling one turn is not the end of the world. Not cool, but not game breaking.

All turns come to e-mails you submitted your pretender from. I don't have an option to check where it goes. If you don't have the turn you should request a resend, it sometimes gets stuck, just use that link: http://www.llamaserver.net/doAdminAction.cgi?game=Preponderance&action=resend



Sorry, the last I heard I was looking for PreponderanceNew turn 1, I never recieved that, I stopped checking ALL the many useless Jomon Preponderance emails I was getting because they were all invalid turns. Recieving a PM about what was actually going on with this game would have been great. But instead I get ****ed because of something I was NOT told about. All of my other messages regarding the status of perponderance have been through the forum PM's that is where I was looking for a green flag about the status of the game. It doesn't really matter now I guess, I've set Jomon to AI. I'm not playing a game where I am penalized simply because the game I was looking for (PreponderanceNew) was scrapped. I never recieved a PM about any of this. Like I said, the last PM I recieved for preponderance was on Dec 2, asking for pretender submissions for PreponderanceNew. I guess that is the game I am still waiting for.


As an aside, I am not trying to blame Zeldor, I sympathise with his plight and the ****tines of these forums, however I don't feel like wasting my time on a game where I am penalized for it being too difficult to get the proper information out to everyone in some form of standardized format. Also, I had filtered out any email with Preponderance simply because I was waiting for PreponderanceNew and got tired of having my inbox filled with junk from a broken game.

[fungalreason]

Honestly, I think it's a bit much to expect a personal PM from Zeldor about every change with the game. What about having consideration for HIS time? Note: the forum here limits you to 5 recepients at a time for pms, so it's not a trivial task to make sure 24 people are up to date. That's why the forum thread is here, so everyone can follow what's happening.

Besides missing a single turn is not a big deal. People with bad events on turn one are certainly far worse off than you would ever be.

[atul]

Seriously.

Going AI at this point is about the worst thing anyone could do. People make mistakes, and it includes missing their emails. But going AI at this point of a _team_ game is nothing but spoiling the game for the rest of 23 players.

I don't know you and this is the first time I've responded to your posts, but please could you not go AI.

This game has been truly jinxed, it would be a pity that now that technical stuff works it goes down the drain because someone gets angry about email he himself said he ignored.

Group hug?

[WingedDog]

MadFrancis
Man, I hope you cool down and reconsider your behavior. Admining a game, especially large one - is a hard work, and Zeldor has put great efforts in this game. He gathered 24 people, he was designing map for weeks - so we could enjoy it. Doesn't he deserve the respect for all that?
Besides, there are 23 other people. Are you so selfish you willingly ruin the game they were waiting for for a long time?
Nobody going to rush you in this game becouse of garrisons, you'll recover all your losses caused by staling in 3-4 turns.

<WingedDog gives atul a hug> :D

[Ironhawk]

Hahah, I can't believe there is so much angst over a turn 1 stale. You do realize that turn 1 is probably like the LEAST critical turn of all time, right? As an uninvolved observer I can tell you that this situation is ballooning way out of proportion to the actual problem :)

[MadFrancis]

True, I'm annoyed. But I am not exactly angry either. I have a lot of sympathy for Zeldor and think he has done an admirable job. I just am not wasting any more time on this. These forums suck. That's not my fault. It's also not my fault that I was told the game name had changed and then sent in a pretender to the new game. I wasn't ignoring PreponderanceNew emails ... just the old bugged game Preponderance. If the email heading would have said anything other than Preponderance or in some other way stood out from the many other Preponderance emails I was being flooded with it would have been read and this problem wouldn't have arisen.

I am not doing this to be spiteful or vindictive. Like I said, too much of my time has been wasted on this game already due to seriously flawed forums and messaging system. Whoever designed these forums needs to pull their heads out of their asses. In fact, I am fairly new here, but I have not been involved in a game where the forums didn't **** someone over. I am pretty much giving up on Dom3 MP because of these forums and the lack of any real MP support.

<Hugs all>

[MadFrancis]

Also, those who say a first turn stale is no big deal have obviously not had much experience playing Jomon.

[Zeldor]

I must admit - I could do more. I was so fed up with PM system that I decided to skip that and send just an e-mail to everyone. I also underestimated possible problems with llamabeast's suggestion to use old name.

I totally agree about new forums. Whole community had huge hopes about the new forum. Especially with many days of down time and huge announcements. And we got one of the worst forums ever, with so many annoying things. Like they wanted to get rid of us and force us to make a new forum for that wonderful MP community. And we were quite close to that. I also agree that game should have built-in lobby system with at least info about games, even if it was just a simple interface to get game status, send/receive turns.

P.S. I think it's fair to ask you to play till your teammate finds a sub, even if you made up your mind and won't change it.

[WingedDog]

If I was turning myself to AI after every stale, I wouldn't get much experience playing any nation.
You should really meet Baalz, he has taken a sub in one game for Jomon staling 5 first turns. Now one of the top nations.
In another game 1 person had lost an enire army on turn 19 becouse of staling. He has won the game aftermath.

[vfb]

We're down to a few hours left till hosting, with 3 nations still unsubmitted......

Guys, give your team mates a prod.... looks like ferrosol, Jim Morrison, and vfb... :re:

Chris, if you're going to complain, please make some sort of effort to get the names right. I'm MA Marignon, and I don't need to be prodded.

[MadFrancis]

So you are going to ... postpone the game until a Sub has been found? or are you just going to expect someone to want to play Jomon that has staled its first three or four (or more) turns. Also, my teammate doesn't want to play with someone who is starting off so disadvantaged and possibly has no strategy for Jomon.

Okay then, a simple solution. I send in turn 1 (I have it in my filtered email box) rollback the game plug it in, host turn one ... everone else's orders will be exactly the same and it will put the game back on schedule easily with the least amount of hiccups.

If not, well you will probably have to find two subs (I am only guessing, but I think the idea of playing with a seriously hampered partner strikes him as unfair and a waste of time as well).

Zeldor, again I am sorry. I have admined two games now and will never do it again if I have to use these forums, I really do think you have done as great a job as one can expect with the tools you have been given. Please know that I do hold you in high esteem and none of the problems this game is having do I lay at your feet.

[MadFrancis]

If I was turning myself to AI after every stale, I wouldn't get much experience playing any nation.
You should really meet Baalz, he has taken a sub in one game for Jomon staling 5 first turns. Now one of the top nations.
In another game 1 person had lost an enire army on turn 19 becouse of staling. He has won the game aftermath.

Oh, I've played through stales before. I have no issue when the stale is my fault sucking it up and pushing through. I just have limited time and would like to have a fair start in the few games I have the time to play. This would be the first and only time I will have given up a game because of stales. Please don't misrepresent me so harshly. I do not go AI "every time I stale".

[MadFrancis]

I keep seeing people say that I should inconvinience myself so that no one else is inconvinienced. Why? No one is offering to go out of their way for my sake, why should I consider doing the same for them? That being said:

Another solution, simple and fair for everyone. Everyone stales turn two and I catch up. Apparently it's no big deal and you'll be able to catch up in 3-4 turns so this shouldn't be a problem.

[PsiSoldier]

Geez if it will stop his crying I vote just roll back to turn one left him get it in and hopefully Llamaserver will still have everyone else's turn one and can host immediately, I'm not exactly sure how that works.

But either way having AI at this point kind of gives an unfair advantage to whoever is close by to it as well since the AI isnt exactly all that impressive of an opponent. Not to mention the fact that if his teammate still wants to play then he's kinda ****ed if Jomon goes AI.

But there is always the option to just forward Jomons turns to his teamamte and let him play both turns until he can find a sub.

[Micah]

I don't see how checking the forums and your email once a day is an undue burden on your time, especially compared to the hour or more of time a turn takes to do late game. Oh, and the time you've spent posting here about the stale. Twenty three people managed to figure out what was going on with the game without any problems, which leads me to think that the fault does, in fact, lie with you, and not the game admin.

If you don't like your position play a few turns so it's less obviously damaged by the stale and then find a sub for it, it'll probably take less time than I spend on a single late-game turn to do so.

[JimMorrison]

I am very unhappy with the current situation. It is dissatisfactory on so many levels, I can't hardly begin to describe my own feelings on the whole thing.

We have been crafting a specific strategy for this team, and not I do not expect a sub to grasp it quickly (anyone ever hear that Jomon is not considered easy to play well as it is?), nor do I have any hope for this current chain of events to have a positive end, as a gaming experience.

Say what you want about Madfrancis, not knowing his personal character, or how he reacts to and treats those around him - but many of you have seen me stick through a rough patch just to play it out for the sake of the game. So even though I have done dozens of turns for a hopeless nation, to keep a game intact for others on multiple occasions already - I am not alright with this, and I will drop out if Madfrancis drops out. I signed up for a team game, and I made a competitive team, with a competitive gameplan. We worked on it for weeks. If people want to demand that all of our time preparing for this gets wasted to justify the few minutes it took you to submit your turn 2, then that's fine, but I won't accept that. Zeldor cut a corner in notifying due to frustration, and Madfrancis cut a corner due to frustration. Those events crossed paths, and we all got bitten for it.

The irony is that if there hadn't been such resistance, the turn could have been rehosted a couple of hours ago, with minimal disruption or heartache..... There was a miscommunication, it crippled a team, we found the problem and it had an easy solution. Now everyone wants to paint Madfrancis as a bad person, and by proxy, due to my support, probably paint me as such as well. That's fine, but it certainly isn't going to inspire or encourage a better solution to this problem. And it is a problem, people need to just accept that fact.

[MadFrancis]

I don't see how checking the forums and your email once a day is an undue burden on your time, especially compared to the hour or more of time a turn takes to do late game. Oh, and the time you've spent posting here about the stale. Twenty three people managed to figure out what was going on with the game without any problems, which leads me to think that the fault does, in fact, lie with you, and not the game admin.

If you don't like your position play a few turns so it's less obviously damaged by the stale and then find a sub for it, it'll probably take less time than I spend on a single late-game turn to do so.

Wow ... you obviously didn't read a thing I stated (at least not read it correctly). I do check the forums and emails everyday and I said as much earlier. But when I was told that Perponderance was no longer viable and that the new game was PreponderanceNew I stopped checking Preponderance emails. I also said that I check the forums everyday, but do not have time to sift through the threads (usually I am too busy with school and work, but today is the first day of winter vacation for me, hence my time spent of the forums now). I check my PMs which, until the game-start email, was how every other message for this game has been delivered.

As far as my position in concerned, it is fine. I would just like to have been notified in a reasonable manner consistant with all other notifications I have recieved regarding this game about the fact that the game had A) returned to its original name and B) started. If that is unreasonable ... well fine, I'm unreasonable.

And I'd like to clarify, I am not holding this against Zeldor. He is a great guy and one of the few people around these forums I have had enough reasonable interaction with to develop a sense of respect for. I think the largest problem is that these forums suck large hairy balls. I guess it wouldn't be a problem if I had the opportunity to sit around all day on a computer with email access, but I don't. Since that is a requirement for MP Dom3 games (apparently) I guess I lose. That's too bad to, because after looking into this game and playing singleplayer for awhile I really thought this game had some great MP potential. But not so, apparently, if you are concerned with fair-ish starts.

[chrispedersen]

We're down to a few hours left till hosting, with 3 nations still unsubmitted......

Guys, give your team mates a prod.... looks like ferrosol, Jim Morrison, and vfb... :re:

Chris, if you're going to complain, please make some sort of effort to get the names right. I'm MA Marignon, and I don't need to be prodded.

Um, Dude - I *did* spend a little effort - more than anyone else in fact, to try to make sure that everyone AND THEIR PARTNERS got their turns in ok.

From the Second post in this thread....


6. Ossa - vfb

MA MAri + EA Sauromatia


It makes it look as if *you* are playing EA-Sauromatia, which with three hours to go, hadn't submitted a turn. I have no way of knowing that you and Ossa switched.

But cmon man - I was just doing everyone a favor....


On other topics - Zeldor, I have to say that you did an absolutely AMAZING job with the map, AND with setting up the game.

And before anyone criticizes, if you haven't tried admin'ing a game you have NO idea how hard it is. And generally how thankless.

Now, I know that zeldor did delay hosting for a few hours. But I really do think that everything leadiing up to the game - Zeldor gets an A+ - but I do think a little bit more time and care should have gone to the starting of the game. I have tried to suggest this to others - that ANY time there is a glitch in the forums, or in the game server that extra time be allocated to make sure that everyone is on board. This is another time I think that advice prudent. By my earlier email, I was trying to suggest that with 24 players, it would be a better plan to wait a few hours to get everyone on board than to host on time and risk a game meltdown.

(Game Plug: missed turns are why I created the game Mulligan. Go look at that thread).

I do know that with the structure of the game - many lesser nations were bid on - I know that I have spent weeks learning viable strategies for my weak nation - so I fully believe that Jim, being a better player, would do the same.

Now, there was some mention that Jim and Mad Francis are playing on the same CD key, being room mates. I do not know the legality of it - it seems legal to me - one computer has it. They being roomates can play separate nations on it. Huge advantage for coordination of course.

But Jim claims that he has not received a turn. I do know that lama was looking at preventing multiple turns from going to the same ip / email address. This may be the cause for Jim not getting a turn.

Had Jim gotten turn notification, he may well have prodded his partner.

So, here are my suggestions:

First, I got a *great* start - and I can't imagine any start being better for me.
However, I play this game to enjoy it - and I play it to play against humans - to cut my teeth against other breathing and presumably, thinking opponents. I dont think there should be *any* stales in any game.

Every player should be informed of a turn deadline - but just that - a turn deadline. Set the game to just quickhost when all turns are submitted.
If a player is routinely missing turn deadlines, its incumbent on him to find a substitute.

When making the decision about the game, as game admin, I try to decide what is best for the game itself. Our option is to proceed with some nations staling, restarting, or finding a substitute.

Personally, I find proceeding with staling nations unpalatable as it gives a huge advantage to the staling neighbors. Likewise, I think finding a new team to choose nations and play - would require a longer delay than to just restart the game.

And yes, I don't' want to hear anyone who didn't get a national hero on turn one complaining!


Chris

[namad]

whatever you do do not go ai....
this is a team game, AI doesn't know what a team is.

staling 30turns in a row is better than going ai at least your teammate could easily kill you and control the entire starting pocket... if you refuse to play at very least stale instead of going ai

[Zeldor]

Calm down everyone, please. Give me a while to sit and think. We don't want bad emotions like that here. Do it on the battlefield. It's Christmas coming, relax everybody and think twice before posting - while most people here have reasonable things to say, the ways of saying them are far from civilized.

[MadFrancis]

whatever you do do not go ai....
this is a team game, AI doesn't know what a team is.

staling 30turns in a row is better than going ai at least your teammate could easily kill you and control the entire starting pocket... if you refuse to play at very least stale instead of going ai

Not refusing to play. I want to play very much. I have been working on my strategy with my teammate for weeks now. I just think that I would rather play a game where the people I was playing with were actually considerate of others and interested in everyone having a good time and as fair a start as possible, not just themselves. Why should I waste my time on people who can't even take two minutes out of their day to make simple fix to the flawed start of a game?

Out of respect for Zeldor and HIS efforts on the behalf of others I will not go AI. However, from the little I've seen about the rest of you and your willingness to take other players into consideration... well, you should all just thank Zeldor for being a decent guy.

[vfb]

Usually I am totally opposed to rollbacks, but this is turn 2 and there were no battles at all this month. If there had not been such a mess getting this game started (multiple games on llamasever for the same game), I'd be against a rehost. But there was pretty much a big mess, and the game was renamed, and unrenamed, and there were 2 games with the same name, etc.

Also I think it's impossible that anyone has spent more than 5 minutes giving their turn 2 orders.

So I vote for MadFrancis to email his turn to llamabeast, and we ask llamabeast nicely to untar the saved turn 1 orders, add MadFrancis's .2h, and rehost.

[Executor]

Wow, what the hell happened here?

This game does seem to be cursed!

I don't see what the problem is on either side, stale is bad, but so is plague on turn 1, which 3 players apparently had.
Rollback will take a day but it'll save a week looking for two subs, and seriously I don't know why everyone is making a fuss about this, a single stale turn?

[Zeldor]

vfb:

I can do that myself as a game admin. But from my experience all rollbacks made the problems even bigger.

But rollback will be probably the best solution to calm it down. So expect it within few minutes, with new turn coming in and email with explanations.

[PsiSoldier]

Usually I am totally opposed to rollbacks, but this is turn 2 and there were no battles at all this month. If there had not been such a mess getting this game started (multiple games on llamasever for the same game), I'd be against a rehost. But there was pretty much a big mess, and the game was renamed, and unrenamed, and there were 2 games with the same name, etc.

Also I think it's impossible that anyone has spent more than 5 minutes giving their turn 2 orders.

So I vote for MadFrancis to email his turn to llamabeast, and we ask llamabeast nicely to untar the saved turn 1 orders, add MadFrancis's .2h, and rehost.

I second that. I don't care who's fault it was and I hear anyone really objecting to a Turn one rollback. Nothing big happened and far more good than bad can come from a rollback at this point. A roll back just seems to be the lesser of two evils here.

Even if we did have to resubmit turn one how hard could that be. Its not like you have any major decisions to go over again that will take more than 2 minutes.

[MadFrancis]

You can also force host as soon as you get my turn as the server will save the turns originally sent by everyone else. If they do not resubmit turn 1 their old turn 1 will be used.

[Zeldor]

Waiting for it.

[Executor]

Well at least do your turns now seeing that everyone's online.

[Zeldor]

Yep, let's get that turn fast :)

And obey the orders sent in mass email. It's really important.


And it looks like overall economical situation of most nations really improved that time.

[Executor]

Quote>
And it looks like overall economical situation of most nations really improved that time.

Well not for everyone, but I don't want to make any more rows just let the game on.

[PsiSoldier]

Just so no one can say they did not get the mass email..

Yep, let's get that turn fast :)

And obey the orders sent in mass email. It's really important.


And it looks like overall economical situation of most nations really improved that time.

The admin for the game Preponderance has sent you a message:

__Read it! Rollback important info!__

Game has been rolled back because of Jomon's stale. You can read all the epic sage in the game thread.

VERY IMPORTANT INFO!:
- DELETE, like remove, destroy, annihilate, old .2h file you have from prevous turn 2
- under any circumstances do not try to save time by submitting old .2h file

DO THE TURN 2 AGAIN!! and submit NEW .2h file you generate. I will take a look at turn files if someone forces me to.

(End of message)

[Zeldor]

Ha, it had to be saga, not sage! Stupid mistake :(

Executor:

Yeah, someone losing was unevitable :(

[Executor]

I'm not complaining, just saying.
But I do believe that we shouldn't tolerate this a second time.

[JimMorrison]

I'm pretty sure that this mix up was only able to occur under very specific circumstances that never exist outside of the first turn of a game that has multiple restarts. :p

I'm also pretty sure, that if Madfrancis hadn't remembered at the last possible moment that he had to be at work earlier than normal - that he would have taken the time to make a very public apology and thanks. So mine will have to do, until his shift is over -

Thank you so much Zeldor, and everyone who was understanding - very sorry to everyone that this situation may have inconvenienced at all, neither I or Madfrancis wanted anything but a smooth start to what should be a very fun and exciting team game.

<3

[chrispedersen]

I don't see what the problem is on either side, stale is bad, but so is plague on turn 1, which 3 players apparently had.
Rollback will take a day but it'll save a week looking for two subs, and seriously I don't know why everyone is making a fuss about this, a single stale turn?


People often forget that the implications of luck are much more severe with CBM than with vanilla Dominions.

But I really think restarts are in order if you get the merchants in the temple event (knocking you out of the game)
the barbarian horder or knights on your capital, or the huge unrest event...

[MadFrancis]

People often forget that the implications of luck are much more severe with CBM than with vanilla Dominions.

But I really think restarts are in order if you get the merchants in the temple event (knocking you out of the game)
the barbarian horder or knights on your capital, or the huge unrest event...

I agree. For me, only being able to participate in two games at a time, I see no issue restarting a game until everyone has at least a decent start (don't worry, I'm not advocating just opinion-ing). I know some people feel that that is just the way the cookie crumbles sometimes and you should just deal with it and move on. While that may be reasonable for those who have time for three or four or five or six games at a time (you know who you are ... [cough]JimMorrison[cough]), those of us whose gaming time is a bit more limited really get screwed.

It takes me weeks to either find a game to participate in or get a game started. Getting a game ender first thing after weeks of planning and then having to look forward to more weeks of planning to get into a different game (once you have done your duty and played out the end of your original game or taken the time to find someone willing to sub a lost cause, of course) is really unrewarding. So far I haven't had very good luck with MP games. I seem to spend more time looking or preparing for a game to start than I do actually playing. It just gets really old after awhile.

I wonder how difficult it would be to script a mod that just banned some of the more terrible bad events (and maybe as a balance some of the best good events) within the first three turns or so, or maybe even just the first. I know it might unbalance the value of luck scales (+ or -) somewhat, but it seems like it would be pretty negligible over the course of a whole game (I'm certainly no expert). Just a though, and probably one for a different thread.

Anyway, I would like to thank everyone for the chance to actually see my weeks of preparation for this game come to fruition. I do greatly appreciate it and am eagerly looking forward to pitting myself (as Jomon, along with JimMorrison as Lanka) against everyone here and having a great game.

Good luck everyone (unless you took negative luck scales I guess).

[Zeldor]

I think the only possibility would be to add a fortuneteller 100 immobile commander with disease and enough HP to die within 3-5 turns. But you'd need to deal with nations that have access to healers. Or some other way to prevent healing.

[chrispedersen]

OKAY guys we have 22 and are *STILL* waiting for 2 more.

EA-Vanheim & MA-Ulm!!!!! Both of which are coobe <bleh>

[vfb]

I had no problem whatsoever with restarting because you didn't see the turn, because the game was all messed up and had 2 different names and 3 different copies.

But, bad events are just part of the game and it's something you have to deal with. Especially in a team game, where your teammate can help you out (if he actually reads/responds to your firkin' emails). The only real "game ender" is a dom death from the merchant event. I've never seen that on turn 2, and if you don't have another white candle somewhere else on turn 3, then that's a risk you took with your build.

Actually, bad events are more than just part of the game. They are part of the fun of the game, since they are adding an element of surprise and risk. I'd hate to see them taken out or nerfed.

People often forget that the implications of luck are much more severe with CBM than with vanilla Dominions.

But I really think restarts are in order if you get the merchants in the temple event (knocking you out of the game)
the barbarian horder or knights on your capital, or the huge unrest event...

I agree. For me, only being able to participate in two games at a time, I see no issue restarting a game until everyone has at least a decent start (don't worry, I'm not advocating just opinion-ing). I know some people feel that that is just the way the cookie crumbles sometimes and you should just deal with it and move on. While that may be reasonable for those who have time for three or four or five or six games at a time (you know who you are ... [cough]JimMorrison[cough]), those of us whose gaming time is a bit more limited really get screwed.

It takes me weeks to either find a game to participate in or get a game started. Getting a game ender first thing after weeks of planning and then having to look forward to more weeks of planning to get into a different game (once you have done your duty and played out the end of your original game or taken the time to find someone willing to sub a lost cause, of course) is really unrewarding. So far I haven't had very good luck with MP games. I seem to spend more time looking or preparing for a game to start than I do actually playing. It just gets really old after awhile.

I wonder how difficult it would be to script a mod that just banned some of the more terrible bad events (and maybe as a balance some of the best good events) within the first three turns or so, or maybe even just the first. I know it might unbalance the value of luck scales (+ or -) somewhat, but it seems like it would be pretty negligible over the course of a whole game (I'm certainly no expert). Just a though, and probably one for a different thread.

Anyway, I would like to thank everyone for the chance to actually see my weeks of preparation for this game come to fruition. I do greatly appreciate it and am eagerly looking forward to pitting myself (as Jomon, along with JimMorrison as Lanka) against everyone here and having a great game.

Good luck everyone (unless you took negative luck scales I guess).

[DrPraetorious]

Do lifeless units that aren't undead suffer damage from disease? They can't be healed (or given regeneration), so...

I actually wish the game had a "random events super-common" setting, where you could get a random event in a third of your provinces every turn, regardless of empire size. That'd be pretty crazy, of course.

[vfb]

They get the disease icon but don't lose HP, I saw this with some mech men. They also heal when they are in a province with a lab.

[PsiSoldier]

Eh looks like maybe several of us are getting our turns with bad events. Here I sit with Order 3 and less income than anyone else in the game. Doh!

Shoulda taken more cold and less misfortune.. after all my undead dont need to eat..

[chrispedersen]

They get the disease icon but don't lose HP, I saw this with some mech men. They also heal when they are in a province with a lab.

Its true, but I've had immortal undead pretenders die from disease....

[MadFrancis]

I actually wish the game had a "random events super-common" setting, where you could get a random event in a third of your provinces every turn, regardless of empire size. That'd be pretty crazy, of course.

I'd definatley play with that in single player or LAN games. Sounds like an interesting twist.

[MadFrancis]

I had no problem whatsoever with restarting because you didn't see the turn, because the game was all messed up and had 2 different names and 3 different copies.

But, bad events are just part of the game and it's something you have to deal with. Especially in a team game, where your teammate can help you out (if he actually reads/responds to your firkin' emails). The only real "game ender" is a dom death from the merchant event. I've never seen that on turn 2, and if you don't have another white candle somewhere else on turn 3, then that's a risk you took with your build.

Actually, bad events are more than just part of the game. They are part of the fun of the game, since they are adding an element of surprise and risk. I'd hate to see them taken out or nerfed.

Actually I think you make a good point. My problems with MP DOM3 isn't anything other than how long it takes and how much effort goes into starting a new game. Nerfing the game to fix that problem is a bit heavy handed. If it wasn't quite so cumbersome to find and start new games (for someone like me) it wouldn't matter so much if you got bumped out early from bad events or unlucky starting positions, etc.

Speaking of which, I do have to give Llamabeast a heartfelt tip of the hat for all the work he has put into his Llamaserver and the ease with which it facilitates MP game creation. On my behalf, thanks alot Llama.

[chrispedersen]

We are once again waiting on coobe for both nations...
I'm going to post in the subs wanted.

Again, this is not criticism, just want to make sure you everyone knows figure out what we want to do.

[Zeldor]

Yep, we may have to replace the whole team :(

[Zeldor]

Ok, I found a sub for Vanheim. I will play few turns for coobes MA Ulm, but I cannot do much of it, with all the info I have. That wouldn't be fair. But I hope I can get a sub in that time.

[Zeldor]

nkican will play for EA Vanheim

[NKIcan]

Yup folks, guess Im filling in for Vanheim. If you see me, say hello. Us Vanheimiens are quite friendly. :)

[WingedDog]

Hello, NKIcan, and welcome! :)

[PsiSoldier]

Hrrrm, I'm not getting my turns for Preponderance, something is goofed up. My teammate has his turns being forwarded to an email account I am using for this game and I got his turn that was forwarded over 2 hours ago but I have not yet recieved my turn. I have requested a turn resend but still no luck.

This is not the first time that this has happened in this game It has happened at least one other time where I had to request turn resend 3 or 4 times before I finaly got it.

[fungalreason]

That happened to me as well on the first turn of this game. The re-send worked though. I haven't had it happen again since that.

[Zeldor]

PsiSoldier:

Maybe it's your e-mail? Some free ones can be really really slow. Maybe make a gmail account for your turns?

[PsiSoldier]

hrrrm I use Yahoo Mail. And I finaly got one of the turn resends. But I dont think its a problem with it being slow, after all I did get the one that my teammate auto forwards for his turn.

[Kheldron]

I also use yahoo and I got another pb : my orders didnt arrive and I staled :mad:

[WingedDog]

There's something wrong with llamaserver again, it hasn't updatad for hours. Maybe that's caused the problem.

[atul]

It updates since it shows my turn as uploaded, I sent it only couple hours ago. There's something wrong with the timestamp at least, maybe with other stuff too... :-/

[Zeldor]

Kheldron:

Even worse thing happened to me. I submitted a turn, got confirmation and next turn shows that I staled. In other game that is.

[chrispedersen]

There is a very subtle virus that is attacking yahoo and yahoo messanger.

Symptoms can range from lost messages/email to complete denial of service.

I have 6 or so computer.. one of them got infected in the last few days. It took me almost 2 days to find the cause.

The easiest way to fix for me, was load a copy of mozilla - a brower which I didn't have on the computer at the time.
Then I did the virus scans.

[Zeldor]

Turns from/to llamaserver should take no more than 5-10 mins, if you don't get it by then, request/send a turn again. If that does not help, there is a problem somwewhere. If llamaserver is updating it's probably your side :)

But if anyone has some problems, contacting me is the best solution.

[PsiSoldier]

Blah. Not only am I still not getting my turn from lammaserver but appearantly lammaserver did not get my last turn that I sent to it either as it says I staled.. :mad:

Not that I'm asking for a rollback or anything. I'll be ok. But its really damn annoying. I guess I will have to start checking to see if it updates and shows that my turn has been recieved.

I am not having this problem with any other game on lammaserver so I dunno whats up with this one. Granted I have had this happen once or twice in some other games but this is an every turn thing in Preponderance.

[Zeldor]

PsiSoldier:

Really, try using gmail and see if the problem continues. You can PM llamabeast too, he can probably help.

And remember - you get confirmation of a turn. It arrives after 5-10 mins max, usually 1-3 mins. So check if you get it. I am not able to control everything as game admin and I am against rollbacks and postpones as it slows the game down and makes peopel abusive [just talking in wider context].

So do you turn early on, so you have time to make sure it works fine :)

[PsiSoldier]

I'll just check the game page on lammaserver a few mins after I send it in to see if it is recieved.

[Zeldor]

If someone finds mistakes on a map, let me know. Map editor is really really bad. It sets some things properly, but on saving there appear some mistakes and you have to check every prov by hand. Easy to miss things like that.

So far I've found that:
- 245 should be a neighbour of 223
- 239, 240 should be swamps
- 183 should be also a forest

[chrispedersen]

Zeldor, did you see my earlier post, that the neighbors of the hexes around the inland water are not symmetrical? I reported that earlier...

[Zeldor]

You mean one prov bordering 2 water tiles? I don't think it could've been avoided with 5 water provs there. Now unchangable, as it would wreck half the map.

[chrispedersen]

No, the asyymmetry was on the land side. One port had more neighbors than the others.

[Zeldor]

As I said - one port bordering 2 water provinces.

[chrispedersen]

LA Mictlan has gone on vacation. In the interrim, please address FullerBrush inquiries in care of Agartha.

'Nothing polishes Marble, like a Marble'


Fulminyx.
(Aka, Zeldor, you have mail!)

[Zeldor]

Ok, email changed. Hit turn resend when you get a confirmation email.

[namad]

holiday break? yes/no? from when till when? (my teammate has left and i'm doing his turns for a week but maybe we won't have that many turns this week?)

[Zeldor]

Yes. 23.12 till 2.1. Break starts after you get the new turn on 23.12 [so last hosting is on 23.12]. Quickhost will be left on, so there is a chance for few turns.

[chrispedersen]

I'd like to urge those leaving to pipe up - I'd like to see (ask)if we can expect team mates to cover.

[DrPraetorious]

We may have located the hideous and evil forces of Caelum (boo! hiss!).

Based on the province graphs, and mammoths, we believe they wallow in filth and malice around province 131.

< :rant: > Only swift action can save the free peoples of the world! We officially encourage everyone to send forces to hit them as soon as possible. Hopefully, we have located them in time to find the one chink in their near-flawless plan for victory, which has already advanced to stage 3! < /:rant: >

I love those little guys.

[Executor]

This standards mod is very confusing, there are some nation whose banners like exactly the same so you don't know who to PM.

[chrispedersen]

The standards mod is an improvement - but I have to second Executors comment - They are still hard to distinguish.

I'd like to suggest the use of / bars as well as \ bars - between those and the dots, and the various color combinations I think we'd have enough combinations to distinguish.

[atul]

If in serious doubt, you can always attack him, and ingame message tells you which nation it is. Easy and fast. ;)

The different eras are distinguishable, but not at glance. I kinda like the differences in details, though.

[JimMorrison]

This standards mod is very confusing, there are some nation whose banners like exactly the same so you don't know who to PM.

They can be difficult to tell, but if you go to the Pretender list, or to Graphs, you can see both offenders (C'tis is the worst, IMO) almost side by side, and you should be able to tell them apart then.

[chrispedersen]

Why was the game delayed? Originally it was scheduled to go off in about 3 hours... it seems it is now delayed...

[Zeldor]

Well, I promised that last hosting is on 23th. I didn't expect it to be 3 AM, but well, word is a word. I had 3 requests to postpone that turn, due to Christmas. And I perfectly know how much preparations take, so I agreed. I don't think we are in a hurry, small break will do good for everyone :)

[chrispedersen]

Hey Zel,

No offense but this was going to be 24 hours turns until the 23rd. And we've already delay the turn on the 22nd now until the 24th.

I'm all in favor of liberal delays - ie., but can people post the request here - and/or can you post up what the plan is? I've been checking on here to do my turns - presumably other people are too.

Last I heard we were delayed until 18:30 Tues - so I've checked back more than one time. Now its delayed till wednesday. Did someone request another delay or are you just pausing the game?

[namad]

a new turn hosted and has 24h..... should this turn have a week to do it?

[DrPraetorious]

The Sauromatians have been duped by the vile Caelumites into attacking us.

I must emphasize - when I ***** and moan about QM+Micah killing us all, I am not at all kidding. But I'm not going to deal with them by myself if I get stabbed in the back.

[vfb]

The great Sauromarignonian alliance was duped by no-one.

Abysia has in their pride expanded far into lands that belong to Sauromarignon, and challenged us to try and seize them if we want to reclaim what is rightfully ours.

We have merely accepted Abysia's challenge.

-- Marignon

[chrispedersen]

Agarthians, great in stature,

Nonethess stare in wide eyed wonder, at what the Caelums and the Abyssians, and the Sauromatians have accomplished - and feels humbled.

Things on the surface are different indeed!

[chrispedersen]

Bump to remind everyone the game is starting up again!

[vfb]

Ossa has vanished and has not replied to my emails. So, I am currently taking over as temporary commander of the Sauromatian forces. I've posted for a temp sub.

[vfb]

Lingchih has kindly offered to sub for Sauromatia. I've done this turn while he gets the maps and stuff downloaded.

[Lingchih]

Hello. Nice to see so many folks that have kicked my butt once again.

[DrPraetorious]

Sauromatia/Marignon and Caelum/Caelum are allied against me, it is quite clear.

Sauromatia's SC God is dead, he staled a turn, and I wiped out one of his armies (about 100 troops.) I had earlier offered him peace, he attacked me (claiming I had seized too much territory). My latest peace offer, admittedly somewhat less generous, was simply ignored. So Sauromatia is enough of a threat that he may tilt the balance of my war in Caelum's favor, but if he wastes further resources against me, he's hardly going to be a counterweight against Caelum.

I'm going to fight Caelum and Saur as long as I'm able, but unless you guys want Micah taking half the map and soon, someone had better attack his other flank.

[Executor]

Kailasa has the same trouble, we are being attacked by Yomi/Ea Mictlan/Vanheim, but we'll give them a run for those lands.
So, neighbors of Yomi/Mictlan feel free to attack them since all their troops are busy as well as pretenders.

[Ossa]

I somehow misread the nest turn time - I thought turn 16 was due for today evening. Sorry, was on vacation - could you plz reset my email adress?

[vfb]

That's okay, I'm forwarding you the turn now.

Zeldor will need to change the email address back for you.

[Zeldor]

PM it to me, I don't have e-mails stored anywhere. I will change it tomorrow.

[Lingchih]

So Im out? OK, cool. PM me if you need any help in the future.

[vfb]

Sorry about that Lingchih, I hadn't heard from Ossa at all and he staled, so I assumed I needed a sub for him.

[DrPraetorious]

So Ossa is still playing or not?

[Lingchih]

Yes, I believe he is playing. I was not sent the new turn.

[vfb]

Yep, Ossa is back and I forwarded him the .trn file 3 or 4 hours ago.

[chrispedersen]

Sooooo the results are in - and there are quite a few surprises!
Ive collate the results by team (saved and attached as an html file). Which looks better. Raw data below.


So, a few big surprises. Through 18, the winner is not MA/LA Caelum.. but it is ... (drum roll please).

Winged Dog / Pretorian:...LA Abysia +LA Midguard
JimMorrison / MadFrancis:.La Jomon + EA Lanka
Micah / QM:...............MA Caelum + LA Caelum
Gregstrom / Dr.P..........MA Bander + EA Abysia


LlamaServer Scores, Preponderance turn 18
Provinces
Nation Provinces Forts Income Gem Income Research Dominion Army Size Victory Points
EA Sauromatia 11 3 1809 20 907 121 856 1
EA Mictlan 14 4 1013 18 107 30 794 1
EA Abysia 14 4 2612 13 321 180 748 1
EA C'tis 12 3 1919 12 1118 151 646 1
EA Agartha 15 2 1490 17 333 250 550 1
EA Vanheim 12 2 1437 7 692 161 315 1
EA Kailasa 8 3 965 15 178 143 579 1
EA Yomi 12 3 1685 27 639 295 344 1
Independents 122 0 9313 204 0 0 23562 2
MA Ermor 13 2 1654 15 100 157 1522 1
MA Pythium 6 2 1436 11 900 143 550 1
MA Ulm 12 4 1535 17 651 180 680 1
MA Marignon 12 3 2030 17 529 228 582 1
MA Caelum 15 2 1840 37 792 218 553 1
MA C'tis 12 2 1866 5 374 191 1229 1
MA Bandar Log 14 3 1806 15 733 211 460 1
LA Marignon 12 3 1671 15 1055 197 760 1
LA Mictlan 10 4 934 10 224 91 195 1
LA Jomon 14 4 2411 17 605 247 822 1
LA Abysia 10 3 1407 20 888 185 408 1
LA Caelum 14 4 2361 21 794 245 488 1
LA Midgard 17 4 2694 40 832 157 952 1
LA Utgard 11 3 1771 15 772 81 583 1
EA Lanka 13 3 1805 14 664 171 622 1
LA Bogarus 11 3 2012 24 1241 182 429 1
Team 1: EaVaneim+MA Ulm 21 5 2619 30 278 300 2101 2
Team 2: LA Abysia +LA Midguard 27 7 4101 60 1720 342 1360 2
Team 3: EA-Yomi +EA Mictlan 26 7 2698 45 746 325 1138 2
Team 4: EA Ctis + La Marignon 24 6 3590 27 2173 348 1406 2
Team 5: MA Bander + EA Abysia 28 7 4418 28 1054 391 1208 2
Team 6: MA Mari +EA Sauro 23 6 3839 37 1436 349 1438 2
Team 7: LA Utgard + LA Bogarus 22 6 3783 39 2013 263 1012 2
Team 8: La Jomon + EA Lanka 27 7 4216 31 1269 418 1444 2
Team 9: MA Caelum + LA Caelum 29 6 4201 58 1586 463 1041 2
Team10:EA Agartha+LAMictlan 25 6 2424 27 557 341 745 2
Team 11:MA Pyth + MACtis 18 4 3302 16 1274 334 1779 2
Team12:EA Kailasa + MA Ermor 21 5 2619 30 278 300 2101 2
Provinces Forts Income Gem Income Research Dominion Army Size Victory Points Overall Rankings
Team 1: EaVaneim+MA Ulm 10 10 10 7 11 10 1 1 60 9
Team 2: LA Abysia +LA Midguard 3 1 4 1 3 6 6 1 25 1
Team 3: EA-Yomi +EA Mictlan 5 1 9 3 9 9 9 1 46 7
Team 4: EA Ctis + La Marignon 7 5 7 10 1 5 6 1 42 6
Team 5: MA Bander + EA Abysia 2 1 1 9 8 3 8 1 33 4
Team 6: MA Mari +EA Sauro 8 5 5 5 5 4 5 1 38 5
Team 7: LA Utgard + LA Bogarus 9 5 6 4 2 12 11 1 50 8
Team 8: La Jomon + EA Lanka 3 1 2 6 7 2 4 1 26 2
Team 9: MA Caelum + LA Caelum 1 5 3 2 4 1 10 1 27 3
Team10:EA Agartha+LAMictlan 6 5 12 10 10 7 12 1 63 12
Team 11:MA Pyth + MACtis 12 12 8 12 6 8 3 1 62 11
Team12:EA Kailasa + MA Ermor 10 10 10 7 11 10 1 1 60 9

[Zeldor]

LA Abya/ LA Midgard is atul + evilhomer :)

[atul]

...what? Game over already?

I wouldn't call any team a decisive leader yet, though there are some strong contenders.

Besides, there's something funny going on with your nation / player pairings. (And it's spelled Midgård) ;p

[Zeldor]

Miðgarðr would be even more proper.

[Ossa]

Can the host plz change the emailadress for sauromatae back to the old one?

[Zeldor]

PM me your email, so I can do it.

[DrPraetorious]

I'm in the market to buy thunder rings (and possibly rime hauberks) for my thugs. The good news is that Caelum just burnt five high seraphs and his dinky prophet - the bad news is, he's within striking distance of my capital.

I can trade fire items in huge quantities, if anyone is hankering for fire resistance or just for some kind of armor.

Really, though, I'm not in this game to stop Micah+QM from winning. If you guys are just going to ignore them, I'm not going to make it my job to stop 'em.

[PsiSoldier]

Hrrrrm My teammate in this game seems to have dissapeared over Christmas and New years break never to be heard from again.. Or at least not yet. I'm afraid that at this point most of his provinces have been lost through what looks like at least 3 staled turns now. I suppose I'll keep chugging along for a little while longer, but I'm not sure there is much point if my teammate is gone...

[WingedDog]

PsiSoldier
According 1st page of this thread - your teammate is Executor playing Kailasa. He's currantly at forum and he never staled.

[PsiSoldier]

Hrrrrm. Ok your right. have not heard from him since Christmas and Chrispenderson sent me a PM I guess because he was trying to talk to Executor and could not get a reply from him either. Just checked his latest turn and it was not a stale. But everytime I have looked at the game page on lammaserver he has not submitted his turn. Must have been while I was at work when it happened. All is well I guess.

[chrispedersen]

Kind of curious .... if people don't mind me asking....
I've got a good positive $$ dominion, reasonable number of provinces, and taxes averaging 140%. Yet most players in the game are right around double my income.

Are y'all mostly setting higher taxes.. or are the provinces I'm conquering just sucking? They seem to be averaging 50 income or so.....

[JimMorrison]

I think all he was saying was, that according to the raw data from the current graphs, that is how he's analyzing the game. It's like the Sports section in the newspaper discussing league standings - a lot can change, but there's always something to talk about. ;)

[namad]

a lot of nations have good scales, and the PLAINS portion of the map is mostly PLAINS and hence good income.... also.... setting 140% tax leaves you with lower income in the long run than 100% does it not?

[Evilhomer]

zeldor please change back my email to me as soon as possible, thanks.

[atul]

I'd believe overtaxing really kills your money balance on the long run, 140% on average would already spell doom in my mind. Chrispedersen, it's just that you're in the caves which are really poor.

On the other hand, many have taken superb scales in this game. I'm not saying anything about my own, but it would seem my neighbour in the next valley has something like Order3, Prod3, Growth3. Hard to be poor with scales like that.

[chrispedersen]

LA-Mictlan and Jomon are pleased to announce a treaty of mutual defence and support.

[chrispedersen]

May we have a 12 hour extension?

[WingedDog]

I talked today with Zeldor on IRC channel - he's away and likely would be unavailible for the next 2-4 hours, so chances are he is not getting your message in time.

[chrispedersen]

laughing - why didn't you just forward my request?? =P

[Zeldor]

I was not here already when you wrote that. I am usually against any delays, besides holidays. So if you want turn postponed at least give me a good reason [may be fake :)]. And inform me sooner.

Anyway, we will be on 48h hosting in few turns.

[MadFrancis]

The people of Jomon and Lanka rejoice! A treaty of alliance has been struck with the people of Mictlan (LA) and Agartha (EA).

[chrispedersen]

Ea- Kailasa has staled for the last 2 turns - and as he is under attack Mictlan, Yomi, and EA Vanheim - I'd like to at least suggest that he be put to AI.

I'm going to email Executor and see if he will do it. If I don't get a response in 24 hours, I will send a private message to Zeldor.

[Zeldor]

It is his teammate that should be trying to take care of that. And yeah, if he will continue to stale, let me know and I will turn him AI.

[namad]

turning him to ai is going to make him attack his teammate.... can't you just set the emails to be forwarded to his teammate?

[chrispedersen]

Underground News Dispatch

Disturbing news from the Surface of the World!

Consolidation of the surface by the surface worlds continues.
Our worms on the street confirm that over the last quarter...

The FireBreathers of LA-Abysia and Midguard have picked up more than 10 provinces - equal to the totals of the next two teams combined (Caelum & Utgard). The wealth of all those provinces also garnered them the largest increase in gold - an increase per turn of 939!

The sleeper of the last quarter had to be Utgard - picking up more than 1400!!!! in research, as well as 82 Dominion candles, and garnishing more than 29 ADDITIONAL gems per turn. Truly Incredible.

Meanwhile the two caelum added 3 forts and almost double the size of their armies, adding 819 to their upkeep, at a time when they are engaged in a war. Truly amazing and disturbing tidings.

The Top 4 teams were responsible for every first place finish. Truly a dominating performance.

By our lowly rankings the top teams are.....

#3.. Jomon/Lanka. We have no idea how they did it. IF we had hands we'd be scratching our (multiple) heads.
#2 LA Abysia / LA Midguard. Simultaneously taking out an underground garrison AND almost completely destroying Marignon.
and.. for the second straight quarter.....

#1... the Twin Caelums. The clouds are about the only place these birds haven't put a fort. The peace they have reached with their other neighbors has allowed them to Dominate Dr.P and control the south center. Will it last? ..Will the caelums continue their unfettered flight to the top... Tune in next quarter for more .. upside news.. if we're not extinct.

The underground oracle predicts that tomorrow's weather will be clear. Temperature will be a balmy 68 degrees. Just like last year. And the year before.

[vfb]

The Sauromarignon alliance has a Stone Bird and a Cat Charm for sale at forge cost. PM vfb (http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/private.php?do=newpm&u=8915) if you are interested.

[DrPraetorious]

I remain in a bit of a bind.

As expected, Caelum has continued raiding - and although Sauromatia is suffering more severe losses than I am (including many summoned troops), he doesn't have a major raiding force on his other border.

I'm not sure what I can do, at this stage of the game, about Caelum's ghost king. Sauromatia is now a pathetic shell - he has poison archers and skeleton spam, but all his melle troops are dead.

Caelum is unreduced, and if no-one else wants to help deal with him, the situation appears grim to our heroes.

[JimMorrison]

I don't know who else borders with Caelum, but really, you need to understand 2 things - first they are as busy as they're going to get, and second, if you don't cause them problems before they secure another set of capitals, everyone is going to die.

This has been a public service announcement for the "Haven't you seen Alfred Hitchcock's movie _Birds_? Foundation".

[vfb]

The Sauromarignonian Alliance is as strong as ever. Just because we don't fit Abysia's ideal image of an army, full of plodding infantry perhaps, it doesn't mean we are weak. Abysia's Burning Ones fared very poorly against poison archers and skelly spam this month. It's an effective force.

EA Abysia in its pride refused to negotiate a settlement for the expansion provinces of Sauromatia that it had greedily swallowed up in its overly hasty expansion. EA Abysia was then lucky to attack Sauromatia on a turn where they staled, and until now had taken advantage of that disaster. But now they are paying the price for their hubris.


And now for something completely different:

There is a small chance that some of your nations may be visited unexpectedly by the MA Marignon Inquisition. We apologize in advance for these occurrences, and the Inquisition should not cause you any difficulty whatsoever since they will Return immediately from your lands. It's the nicest Inquisition you'll ever meet!

-- Virtuous, of Sauromarignon

[Zeldor]

namad:

I can, if I get a request like that from him.

[JimMorrison]

...It's the nicest Inquisition you'll ever meet!

-- Virtuous, of Sauromarignon


Not the comfortable chair!

[Ossa]

I just wish to announce that this turn Abyssia will loose his annointed priests sieging my capital without the possibility to harm my walls, as a breakout of their main sacred infantry failed miserably against my reinforcements.

Abyssia just managed to get to my capital while my main army chased him, arriving 2 turns after him. But now his forces are destroyed, and he shall pay bitter for his ignorance.

Our god shall also soon rejoin this world, a bit wiser about the usage of snake bladder staffs:/

[DrPraetorious]

To be clear:
1) That was not a breakout. I could've played round-and-round the mulberry bush forever if I wanted, except that I knew Caelum was about to jump on my capital.
2) The skelly spam trick only works if you have an enormous infantry army (about 130 units, in the most recent case) which you are willing to lose. With just the archers and skelly spam, the identical army will wipe him out.

That said, my position is certainly dire. What is the best strategy when facing two opponents at once? Don't get in that situation in the first place.

[fungalreason]

Bogarus is interested in trading some death gems for a small quantity of fire gems. Please PM if interested.

[fungalreason]

Thanks for all the speedy responses! We have all we need at this time.

[JimMorrison]

The god of Midgard seems to have perished on the field of battle. I smell weakness. <3

;)

[atul]

Erm, the propaganda minister of the alliance of wimps (LA Mictlan and Lanka? C'moon, seriously guys) needs to check his facts.

No need to pay for immortal pretender if you don't put the immortality into use.

[namad]

more rumors and taunts please

[vfb]

From the patch progress page (http://ulm.illwinter.com/dom3/dom3progress.html):

9th january 2009
* Battles in Inferno, Cocytus and the Void could not be viewed, fixed.
* Various magic items got bonuses on returning from other planes.

5th january 2009
* Forgotten city adventures had broken traps. E.g. the ballista only dealt 1 point of damage.

This should make Preponderance even more exciting ... hope we get a new patch soon!

[chrispedersen]

hmm.. I don't know about that ballista being broken. It did 299 points of damage in my try outs for this game.

[DrPraetorious]

Oh, damnit, I sent in the wrong turn file last turn :(.

Weren't we about to increase the interval to 48 hrs? I've got a very busy week next week...

[atul]

Yeah, the game's on turn 24 already, way past the usual 48h-mark. I'd prefer two-day hosting schedule also quite soon. Pretty please?

[Zeldor]

My plan was to set it to 48h on turn 25, so it will be after that turn :)

[WingedDog]

Yes, I would be great.

[chrispedersen]

Oh bosh. Means I'm way behind. I have no problem doing the turn in roughly 20 minutes.

yeouch.

[Zeldor]

Ok, switched timer to 48h.

[Evilhomer]

Any reason why kailasa is not on AI ? he does not seem to be playing (stalling every turn)

[chrispedersen]

Any reason why kailasa is not on AI ? he does not seem to be playing (stalling every turn)

I asked the same question;

When I spoke to executor he said he was going to process his turns, and so I let the matter drop.

[vfb]

Kailasa should be switched to PsiSoldier so he can at least scarf up all the gems from his dead teammate.

[PsiSoldier]

Yeah I'll take the gems.. Kailasa will not last much longer anyways so not much point in worrying about it his last fort is under siege at the moment.

[vfb]

I think you need to PM your email address to Zeldor.

[Zeldor]

Yeah, I'm not the one that should look at people's teammates. I have changed Kailasa email to the one sent me by PsiSoldier. What happened with Kailasa? They grew extremely big in the beginning, angering some neighbours.

[atul]

Probably got heavily ganged upon after a stellar start, and then got frustrated. That kind of thing appears to be happening in other parts of the map, at least if thread posts are to be believed.

[chrispedersen]

Is there a definitive feeling that we are going to switch to CBM 1.4?

While I like, for example that glamoured calvary got more expensive, and that boulders bypass shields can we get a feeling for whats going to happen Zel?

[Zeldor]

There is no updating. Game started with CBM 1.3 will stay that way. The only way to change it in the game would be to make llamabeast replace CBM 1.3 with 1.4 and rename it to 1.3 [and everyone else to do it], and that won't happen. So Prepo stays with 1.3 and Madness will be with 1.4.

[PsiSoldier]

Blah we need to rollback and fix this.. when I tried to do my teammates turn it hit me with a CD key voilation and said it did not execute MY turn orders. That needs to be rolled back, fixed and rehosted so it will execute MY orders. (And preferably the one I submitted for my teammate as well, but if thats not possible then I damn well want MY orders executed at least)

[Zeldor]

As I said - contact llamabeast so it can be checked. If I just rehost it may happen again. So get an explanation and PM me, so I can do what's necessary. We have plenty of time till next turn.

[PsiSoldier]

Ok I PM'd Llamabeast, hopefully its something he can fix easily. It would really suck if I had to choose between getting whats left of my teammates gems and gold and getting set back with my own stuff or simply doing my own turn and forfeiting what is left of my teammates things.

[Zeldor]

People here had no problem with doing turns from 2 nations. You are sure you used the same machine, dom installation etc to make both files?

[PsiSoldier]

Yep, same computer same installation. Same game folder even which I wonder perhaps if that may have been the problem. although when I did Kalasia's turn I moved my nations files into a backup folder did Kalasia's then submitted them and deleted the files and put my nations turn files back in the folder.

[PsiSoldier]

Hi PsiSoldier,

The CD key violation mechanism remains rather mysterious to me, and I can't really work out when it triggers and when it doesn't. In any case, it's a dom3 thing rather than a LlamaServer one, so there's nothing I can do about it.

What I can do is delete the orders for EA Kailasa after Zeldor's done the rollback, so at least your own orders will work as normal. Let me know when the rollback's been done and I'll do it.

Cheers,

llama


Hrrrm Ok do the rollback I guess and maybe I'll see if I can get someone else to do Kalasia's turn for me and submit it.

[vfb]

I wonder if he has a dynamic IP address, and it got changed between doing the two turns. Maybe it's only okay if both turns contain the same IP address or something.

[Zeldor]

It's not network game. I would be surprised if smth like IP address would be stored in .2h file. Or if it had a way of checking and putting it there.

[WingedDog]

So...
1) Would there be a rollback? People should be notified - they are doing next turns already.
2) If there is a rollback do I need to redo my previous turn?

[Zeldor]

I will do it fast and send an email to everyone. It should take about 5 minutes. And no, just next one. I hope no one will get a worse turn.

[vfb]

I got a worse turn. :shock: :)

Does everyone know they need to delete any turn 26 .2h file they had previously created? Otherwise the game gets really screwed up. When I opened the turn and forgot to delete the old .2h, I could see a magic item that should not exist according to the .trn file. So I deleted the .2h, and everything is normal now.

Edit: Oh, your admin email pretty much said that already. But since you didn't explicitly say to delete the .2h file, I'll leave this post up instead of deleting it.

[chrispedersen]

I am not home to get my turn. However, I was the victim last turn of 9 remote spells, and 17!! assasination attempts. Of which, only *1* worked.

So I am going to ask for a re-run myself if my turn is significantly horrible. I got lucky once; making me have to be lucky twice doesn't seem fair.

In cases like these I think it should run until all are satisfied the results are reasonable.

[vfb]

Chris, I'd prefer not to turn this into some sort of Mulligans game. Otherwise we'll just be re-running the turn until everyone is happy with the result, and that's not going to happen if there are any fights going on. And there are obviously fights going on.

The turn was not originally rehosted because someone didn't like the results, it was rehosted because of a bug. No matter what happened in the original turn, like getting a nice magic item, or surviving 17 assassinations, it needs to be treated like it did not actually happen.

[chrispedersen]

Chris, I'd prefer not to turn this into some sort of Mulligans game. Otherwise we'll just be re-running the turn until everyone is happy with the result, and that's not going to happen if there are any fights going on. And there are obviously fights going on.

The turn was not originally rehosted because someone didn't like the results, it was rehosted because of a bug. No matter what happened in the original turn, like getting a nice magic item, or surviving 17 assassinations, it needs to be treated like it did not actually happen.

see my response off line

[chrispedersen]

Didn't know that was a public post. Please delete for reasons I will explain.

[vfb]

Chris's offline explanation, which he prefers that I do not disclose, does help explain why he wants to re-run the turn.

However, in my opinion, it does not justify re-running the turn. But anyway, it's not for me to decide.

So Chris, I'd suggest you either just publicly post your reasons here, or drop it and move on.

[DrPraetorious]

Personally, I'm opposed to all rollbacks on practical grounds - people inevitably end up failing to replace .2h files or otherwise sending in corrupted turns.

Why is everyone ganging up on *me*? I've am war with both of my immediate neighbors *and* Caelum. Micah is the one with an unhealthy number of MP wins - gang up on him!

[fungalreason]

The Bogatyr trading company is proud to announce that its mages have mastered the creation of items of great power (Const 6).

We are happy to make a wide variety of magical trinkets available. More powerful items will run a premium of course, and will also be subject to the availability of our master smiths. Please send specific requests by PM, and we'll get back to you as soon as possible.

Additionally we're trading death gems for earth and/or astral while supplies last.

[vfb]

Clarification:

Chris, I suggested "drop it and move on", meaning drop your suggestion to re-run the turn one more time, and move on with the game. I wasn't suggesting that you drop out of the game. Sorry, the wording is kind of similar.

[atul]

Damn. Seriously worse turn than before. I demand all my stuff back from parties not to be disclosed, provinces I lost due rehost back and enemy units I didn't get to kill this time to die.

:(

[Zeldor]

I got caught when I should've been sleeping with that situation. Maybe it would have been better not to do the rollback, but it was done. And believe me Jim, some people got screwed by it way more than you did.

[JimMorrison]

Wait, what? I didn't get screwed. I mean, I got 6 less Blood Slaves I think, kind of a bummer. I actually had the same random event both hostings. o.O

If I pay extra, can I get screwed? Or is there some sort of euphemism for that on this forum, but the admins don't care what the girls do once we're in private, and it's consensual? I'd still pay extra, just so we're clear.

Chris did get really screwed though, but in his case, sounds like he accidentally got the giant Czech man as his masseusse. Lot of people had a bad day, from the sounds of it.

[namad]

do the water provinces on this map have any special sites?

[Zeldor]

No.

[Zeldor]

BTW, if someone didn't notice - coobe took MA Ulm back around 10 turns ago.

And Kailasa is AI [not that there is much left of it].

Any other interesting news? Any attempts to take on central island? Remember about Throne of the World, Mountain of Power and Citadel of the Lore Masters there :)

And any luck with getting Asmegs?

[vfb]

News from the Sauromarignonian alliance:

Abysia flees from the mighty Sauromatian forces, and once again the Gorgon rules the skies over Sauromatia.

Marignon has decided it would be prudent to prevent Agartha from taking over the caves. Our invasion is imminent.

Our Void Summoning is proceeding spectacularly, and all must bow in fear before our mighty Vile Thing. Several mages have been lost in Time and Space, but we expect them to return within a few years, perhaps wiser for the experience.

Oh, and several Cavemen have been fed to Kurgi. We hope to tame him and use him to root out those pesky Agarthans hiding under the rocks, but it's a bit of a long term project.

Wait! More news from the Agarthan front. It seems communications in the caves systems are most unreliable. A small Marignon detachment of the Sauromarignonian alliance has already captured a key Agarthan property, and we promptly razed the temple they had erected to their false god.

-- Virtuous of Marignon

[atul]

Shh! Be vewy vewy quiet! We're hunting wabbits!

At least people in the north and east have been way too busy to even try to take harbour cities. I'd assume from the graphs that either Utgård or team Caelum has taken the summoning sites in SW corner, though. Dunno what's happening in the caves, there are still some Conj7 summons blocking my way there...

[chrispedersen]

Agartha learned a new word today:

paladin: deceitful, treacherous, wretch. Exemplar thereof.

And the god thereof preferred a treacherous attack rather than an open declaration of war. His other neighbors might beware.

It was rather spectacular to watch the fireworks his 20+ mages set off - as they closed on .. empty caverns. His mages alone outnumbered the PD.

Welcome to the caverns surface lander. By the way surface lander - is your northern flank as secure as you think it is?.....Could I have an army of 200 just on the other side of those cave drakes?

[vfb]

It seems Agartha is not well versed in the ways of the court.

Three times this month did they visit the throne of Virtuous, and beseech her for a pact, and three times they were politely declined. If Agartha fails to understand what that means, then it is not only the caverns in which they dwell that are dim.

-- Virtuous of Sauromarignon

[chrispedersen]

The Agarthan ambassadour dusts off his munitions list.

Agartha will pay for any/all the following items:


2 Staff of Storms
Shrouds
Lucky Amulets
Demon Bane Swords
Water boosters
Blood Thorns
Black Hearts
Black Bows of Botox
Winged boots
Horror helmets
Antimagic Amulets
Astral Serpents

Will trade in kind (items) or for gems / gold.

[chrispedersen]

1 Staff of Storms - Thank you. One still wanted but in negot.
Shrouds
Lucky Amulets
Demon Bane Swords
Water boosters - More still needed.
Blood Thorns
Black Hearts - Thanks
Black Bows of Botox - Thanks
Winged boots - still want more.
Horror helmets
Antimagic Amulets
Astral Serpents

[DrPraetorious]

Caelum (Micah+QM!) has taken the entire section of the center ring between he and I - and Pythium (who is between us) is not only letting him keep it, he's wasting his armies flailing against me like a little girl. He could've done something against Caelum - Caelum has huge hosts of crud which legionaires can take out. But no, he joined in attacking me, costing him an army and gaining him nothing.

Sauromatia has raised his God from the dead, and he's recruited more chaff. I don't have much of a prospect of holding off three enemy players at once, but my ally is doing okay, so that's fine.

[vfb]

The Sauromarignonian Alliance lodges a formal diplomatic protest against our elite fighting forces being characterized as "chaff".

If you want to see "chaff", then have a look at what Agartha is throwing at me in the caves.

-- Virtuous of Marignon

[Micah]

Caelum has not encroached on Pythium's territory any more than Abysia ever had, and indeed, has yielded territory to Pythium vital to their expansion. Abysia had completely cut Pythium off from expanding (taking both 142 and 143) and would have taken all of the lands they now condemn us for holding in short order. If our allies have any grievances with our dealings with them they are welcome to express them for all to hear, but I think their continued silence speaks volumes.

-Caelum

[otthegreat]

Normally Pythium wouldn't bother to reply to such insults yet we feel it is perhaps time to explain ourselves. Firstly, we are a very manly civilization (if you are looking for effeminate men we kindly direct you towards Arcos - wait is there an Arcos in this game? ah well never mind).

My army would have done much better if it had been scripted to fight an army with 10+ Anointed of Rhuax rather than a single Kinnara.

Abysia's rapid early expansion left me in a tough spot, diplomatically if nothing else, so I was left with little choice. I have no complaints about my allies, and I will pursue the war with Abysia to its conclusion.

[chrispedersen]

This game is *so* freaking buggy.

I move from B-->A, fighting and successfully taking A. In the process about 50 troops start to route.

The combat ends with about 40 of the 50 off map. The only square to retreat to is B.

The next combat enemy moves from C--B.

No sign of the routed units.

Even worse, the units that were routing, and yet were still on the map are ALSO gone.

In direct contradiction of the manual, p 81:

"units in a victorious army.....If the battle ends before the routing units exit the map, at they end of the battle they remain with the victorious army."

[archaeolept]

retreats are resolved after combats and, as such, the units had no legitimate province left to retreat to. That is not a bug, but how the game works.

If there were units in your army which are not in the province afterwards, two possibilities exist: 1) that they were under the effect of poison or decay or somesuch, and so died, or 2) that the battle result you saw was not the actual battle, due to some incompatibility of OS or versions.

edit: I believe routed units from a magical phase battle will appear in the retreated to province in time for the normal battle there, though.

[chrispedersen]

retreats are resolved after combats and, as such, the units had no legitimate province left to retreat to. That is not a bug, but how the game works.

If there were units in your army which are not in the province afterwards, two possibilities exist: 1) that they were under the effect of poison or decay or somesuch, and so died, or 2) that the battle result you saw was not the actual battle, due to some incompatibility of OS or versions.

edit: I believe routed units from a magical phase battle will appear in the retreated to province in time for the normal battle there, though.


In the original post I edited out the bit about the 40 units.
The point was that the 10 units remaining on the map should have stayed in province and did not.

No special effects were in play. Could be a case of "the combat you see is not the one that occurred". Or not. Either way, its hard to call non deterministic and non reproducible behavior anything other than a bug.

[archaeolept]

did the losses reported in the battle report precisely match the losses seen? If so, it would indicate an actual bug other than "what you see is not what you get" battle view. What sort of units were these?

[PsiSoldier]

This game is *so* freaking buggy.

I move from B-->A, fighting and successfully taking A. In the process about 50 troops start to route.

The combat ends with about 40 of the 50 off map. The only square to retreat to is B.

The next combat enemy moves from C--B.

No sign of the routed units.

Even worse, the units that were routing, and yet were still on the map are ALSO gone.

In direct contradiction of the manual, p 81:

"units in a victorious army.....If the battle ends before the routing units exit the map, at they end of the battle they remain with the victorious army."

Well if you like that then how about what happened to me this turn. I attack one of the special provinces with about 600 troops, I rout the enemy army but some of the crushers stay behind with only the telastic animation left My troops spend time trying to kill the crushers and kill all but one (when they are set to attack rear and should have moved behind and killed the telastic animation) And then the turn timer ends because the turn lasted 50 turns or whatever it is and my guys auto rout while I still have hundreds of undead on the field. And to top it off I have a random Barbarian invasion in the province they would have retreated to and I loose everyone. :mad:

I'm so damn pissed right now I could throw my monitor across the room.

If Ctis (or anyone) takes that province that now only has a telastic animation left in it before I can take back the other province and that one then it will be WAR. (Just a friendly warning)

[archaeolept]

oh god psi, we've all been there ;)

the crusher provinces are tough. normal troops just take so long wearing them down.

[chrispedersen]

retreats are resolved after combats and, as such, the units had no legitimate province left to retreat to. That is not a bug, but how the game works.

If there were units in your army which are not in the province afterwards, two possibilities exist: 1) that they were under the effect of poison or decay or somesuch, and so died, or 2) that the battle result you saw was not the actual battle, due to some incompatibility of OS or versions.

edit: I believe routed units from a magical phase battle will appear in the retreated to province in time for the normal battle there, though.


In the original post I edited out the bit about the 40 units.
The point was that the 10 units remaining on the map should have stayed in province and did not.

No special effects were in play. Could be a case of "the combat you see is not the one that occurred". Or not. Either way, its hard to call non deterministic and non reproducible behavior anything other than a bug.

[atul]

Department of Redundancy Department strikes again?

Dunno about the routings, at least for routed units it's exactly as it should have been. Cutting off an enemy escape is true and tried tactic.

But Ermor's troop loss is quite spectacular, don't know how many people have achieved that even intentionally against someone else. Well you've still got the troops to spare.

[PsiSoldier]

Department of Redundancy Department strikes again?

Dunno about the routings, at least for routed units it's exactly as it should have been. Cutting off an enemy escape is true and tried tactic.

But Ermor's troop loss is quite spectacular, don't know how many people have achieved that even intentionally against someone else. Well you've still got the troops to spare.

Yeah the troops are easily replaced It was less than 3 turns of reanimation that was lost and I have hundreds more already in place taking back the lost provinces so its not too bad. Just really annoying because it was a loss because of the stupid battle turn limit or whatever. Had the battle continued I would have ended with all commanders and about 300 troops left.

[DrPraetorious]

chrispedersen - I see two combats, one where your commander and his troops fight my ally's army, and another where your theurgs are routed by my province defense. You lose both.

Did you mean to move the commander as well?

[atul]

...I can't say anything conclusive, but I have this distinct feeling you and your ally aren't the only ones poor chrispedersen faces at moment. Unless I'm totally oblivious to current political situation. Which of course wouldn't be that surprising.

[Gregstrom]

My troops spend time trying to kill the crushers and kill all but one (when they are set to attack rear and should have moved behind and killed the telastic animation)

Attack rear only seems to attack the rearmost regular troops, not commander types like the telestic animate.

[DrPraetorious]

I don't think that's quite right. I believe that attack rear tries to choose targets farther to the back, but it's simply not reliable in choosing the very rearmost target. Certainly I've seen a lot of inconsistency in how my troops "interpret" that order, even with identical setups.

[otthegreat]

chrispedersen - I see two combats, one where your commander and his troops fight my ally's army, and another where your theurgs are routed by my province defense. You lose both.

Did you mean to move the commander as well?

Are you sure you don't mean the battles with me in 106 and 121? Because that describes exactly what happened this turn. The commander was supposed to join the theurgs in their attack but for some reason it didn't happen(I might have forgotten to tell him to but I was sure I did). No matter, its a minor setback.

[Gregstrom]

Commander? That was a prophet in heavy disguise, surely.

[chrispedersen]

chrispedersen - I see two combats, one where your commander and his troops fight my ally's army, and another where your theurgs are routed by my province defense. You lose both.

Did you mean to move the commander as well?


Huh?

I haven't seen the most recent turn, if it hosted recently. I had no knowledge of fighting your ally Dr. P. And I don't have any theurgs.

[chrispedersen]

...I can't say anything conclusive, but I have this distinct feeling you and your ally aren't the only ones poor chrispedersen faces at moment. Unless I'm totally oblivious to current political situation. Which of course wouldn't be that surprising.

Well, if I'm fighting Dr. P and his ally - it seems that I am now engaged with no less than 4 people.

[Gregstrom]

Well, I'm pretty sure I haven't fought you yet. Shurely shome mishtake?

[PsiSoldier]

Damn.. Had windows screw up on me last night so I reformatted, reinstalled and the whole 9 yards and after doing it two different times I kept rebooting to find NTLDR file missing press ctrl+alt+delete and not being able to boot so today after the 3rd install It finaly works but the damn turn hosts ((((1)))) Minute before I get my turn sent in. Or actually when looking the game page the server had not hosted yet at the time that I emailed my turn but by the time the server recieved the turn it had already hosted :mad: Grrrr.

I was thinking that the server had been hosting around 7pm Eastern time but appearantly it was hosting slightly sooner than that. Otherwise I'd have had 2 hours to spare.

[vfb]

Sauromarignon appreciates the fine gifts Agartha brought with its chafftastic armies to the sacred lands of Marignon this month. The staff of storms is especially nice! We look forward to next month's amphibious assault of Agartha's enormous armies of GoR'ed tritons. Don't forget your fish amulets!

-- Virtuous of Sauromarignon

[DrPraetorious]

Ugh, ottheperson is Pythium, not chrispedersen. Well, Pythiums army was also fleeing all over the place :).

Sorry, Chris, total brain fart.

Also, chrispedersen - your mailbox is full.

[chrispedersen]

So, as I informed a few people, likely I would be resigning the position after this turn. As the turn went as predicted - I am resigning.

Best wishes to all.

[Zeldor]

Why are you leaving?

[Gregstrom]

I'm guessing it's linked somehow to vfb's post.

[Zeldor]

I'd think that chris is Mictlan, not Agartha. But I already talked with chris via PM.


P.S. After talking with namad on IRC I decided that there will be probably 2nd edition of that game. Same map, same setup. I will find someone else to place teams, so I can play too :) Of course that one will get near the end first, so I can get some feedback on the map. I know that some garrisons will need tweaks.

[vfb]

ooc: Chris was negotiating with Marignon (me) as Agartha, and it looks like he's Agartha from this post here (http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showpost.php?p=668509&postcount=460).

Agartha lost a couple of battles against Marignon this month, but Agartha is still 5th in provinces and 5th in army size (though I suspect a lot of that is tritons), so it's not in terrible shape for a sub to take over. I don't know why Chris is quitting.

[atul]

Not only tritons but ichytoids and disease demons in the parts of the caverns I'm camping at. But considering that Agartha still has his main lands intact and that ally of his with W9F9S4-blessed jaguar warriors prowling around I'd say his days are far from numbered. His replacement should have good time.

[PsiSoldier]

The nation of Mictlan appears to be contemplating breaking their NAP with Ermor looking at the build up of troops on our shared border.

We will spare you the dishonor of a sneak attack and declare the NAP ended. Parties may attack freely in 3 turns when the NAP expires. It is currently turn 34

[WingedDog]

On the behalf of my Mictlan partner I'd like to make something clear: lethal menace to Ermor Empire PsiSoldier speaking of are 20 jaguar warriors taken as bodyguards for bloodhunters and sitesearcher.
PsiSoldier
If you want to brake a NAP - it is your right, but don't you dare to throw big words about dishonor in the future IF there is no fact of an actual atack.

[JimMorrison]

The nation of Mictlan appears to be contemplating breaking their NAP with Ermor looking at the build up of troops on our shared border.

We will spare you the dishonor of a sneak attack and declare the NAP ended. Parties may attack freely in 3 turns when the NAP expires. It is currently turn 34


I've got an idea - let's attack from the other side, one of the nations that is struggling to fight Midgard. You know, Midgard, those guys who are making everyone else's graphs shrink. I am sure that Mictlan wants to open up another front while he deals with the minor inconvenience of Midgard.

In fact, everyone should continue to ignore the nation who is running away with the game. Nothing to see in Midgard. :p

[namad]

both mictlan's are on the other side of the map from midgard aren't they?

[vfb]

Sauromarignon sends its greetings to whoever is decimating the armies of the other Mictlan (LA). The Sauromarignon alliance has captured the Agarthan heartlands, and we do not wish to accidentally collide with your forces, should it come to pass that we need to conduct offensive operations to repel any attempt by Mictlan to evict us from our hard-won gains.

But we don't know who you are. So, please give us a call (http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/private.php?do=newpm&u=8915), our phone lines are always open.

-- Virtuous of Sauromarignon

[Pretorian]

Gentleman, we are talking about different Mictlans here. I represent the early one, and I think I really need to reconsider my opinion on Dom 3 balance, since 20 Jaguar Warriors are such a horrible threat enough to capture single nation entirely.

[vfb]

Oh, I know! It's just a complete coincidence that Ermor is canceling their NAP with EA Mictlan in the same month that Sauromarignon has acquired some prime Agarthan real estate, bordering on LA Mictlan. Progress on the Agarthan front was more rapid than anticipated, accounting for my complete lack of scouting out who is fighting LA Mictlan from the island side.

[atul]

Quite contrary to the Master of Propaganda's posts, Midgård hasn't been fighting LA Mictlan for some time. After dealing with the raiding jaguars from our lands we've been preoccupied for a while. However, the insult LA Mictlan dealt is still yet to be avenged. While we're preoccupied with our current affairs, everyone beating on the late aztecs gets the honorary mention of OK Guy. Current OK Guys thus include at least Sauromarignon alliance and EA Vanheim.

So in response to vfb's inquiries, it's EA Vanheim who finally got off his *** and started doing something productive a few turns ago.