From god.000 at gmail.com Wed Dec 1 23:28:51 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2004 06:28:51 +0000 Subject: [conquest] conquest etiquette part 1 - the VAX game of the past Message-ID: sheesh, I hate spelling that word. Also this is more of a history lesson - you might find it boring, the second part has my suggestions. Well, we have all been in some fun games so far...this indeed brings back many memories from my college days. Most of those memories are some of the most fun I ever had that many considered wastefull...not so I would say - what the spirit within enjoys, the spirit without enjoys (cryptic, I know) But some of those memories are very bitter. The following were different in VAX conquest: there was no vacancy - if you closed the program your ship got wasted...you could only cloak around a class M planet - anything else and your fuel would run out and you would uncloak...generally there was only 1 ship allowed per user account - and most users only had one account. Even before it was known that (some) players had access to conqoper, there were many accusations in heated games about players having autopilot. You need to understand that back in that day, the robot was considered well nigh undefeatable by one opponent. Things like kill count effeciency improvement and sudden turn torp blasts, and detonating a bots own torps on top of it with your own were not yet discovered. If a player had auto and could turn it on at the right moment in a battle, it was devastating. Especially during high lag sessions. And any time there were over 10 - 12 players or a lot of students using the system high lag abounded. Once I had conqoper access I found out the only players that ever had it turned on were other opers and thier friends - not very cool... When it became known people playing had conqoper (some geek just had to show off...) many rude words were said in raised voices and game exe access was locked out by the system manager a few times due to complaints by staff. Following this were a number of discussions of what was and was not cool amongst the players, some with the system manager. In general these were our mutual agreements for play: No one played with another users account (students werent allowed to access others accts anyway) or any of the work study accts. Anyone caught playing on two terminals simultaneously was barred from the game and had all accounts they used to access the game blocked. (a few opers that wouldnt respect this and kept enabling locked out users lost oper access amidst some bitter feelings...) If an oper was changing the U, expermenting etc. the game should be closed - and when if was re-opened things should be the way they were, or in an initial state. An oper/player should not have a second term session with oper open while they were playing live. Slimy things like changing owning teams, un-genociding races, reseting the U prior to a conquer, targeting certain planets with the eater and others were strict no-nos. If an oper was caught doing any of that they lost oper access permanently. Serious abusive messages were also grounds for banishment from the game. Most importantly if everyone couldnt get along, not shout in the lab and follow the rules laid down by the sysmgr - the game exes would be locked by access control. In time things like autopilot became a mute issue - bots are just plain stupid. Opers learned the hard way not to screw around - by losing oper privs. In time everyone learned to play nice, and those that couldnt were banned or shamed into quitting voluntarily... Now there is a new era of conquest, and I feel it important to point a few things out along the same lines - to be published in part 2, so everyone doesnt have to wade through all this. -Cataboligne- -Cat- -Z- (sheesh, do I have enough nicks or what) ---------------------------------------------- 3 4 | 2 \|/ 5--*----> 1 Thing is facing this direction /|\ 6 | 8 7 From god.000 at gmail.com Thu Dec 2 00:33:24 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2004 07:33:24 +0000 Subject: [conquest] conquest etiquette part 2 - suggestions Message-ID: A game is just a subset of rules players agree to abide by in order to interact in playing. Interactive computer games have introduced some new factors - things the designer never intended that may unbalance play. And most games have this to some extent. I dont think any of the VAX issues I mentioned in part 1 are any issue presently. I have yet to see autopilot or conqoper abuse. However I have noticed some players taking advantage of the ability to play multiple ships. This could seem a trifle unfair and I have thought of the following: When its probably fair: A single player with no team help protecting thier home system from genocide by multiple (unique separate player) opponents. Or trying to achieve a coup under the same heavy fire situation. There is nothing worse than building up the requisite kills to try a coup, waiting for the timer to count down, and then getting wacked by 2, 3 or more ships (specially when there are only 2 other players)...every time you try it. Help in taking out bots when playing alone and overwhelmed (home team planets with high army count, or low effeciency ratio). When it might not be fair: Using multiple ships to defend your ongoing conquest (your team has a few more planets than your home system...) Different players using many multiple ships on the same team (if you are not alone on a team, you prob, shouldnt be using multiples.) Preventing a bot from defending its team to achieve a genocide (if you are going for a geno, you should let the bot at least defend the last planet you take...and have more than 3 - 10 armies on it!) Joining a team with a second ship only for the purpose of sabotage or spying - tho if you only pilot a *single* ship this is prob. ok. Also having one ship at war with a peaceful opponent and another at peace - forcing them to war if they want to fight all your ships... Using multiples to *unfairly* increase your stats. My personal feelings: If everyone isnt running multiple ships (or at least agrees with it...) I dont think anyone should - just out of respect and fairness. Yes this makes conquest harder, and bots more troublesome...but hey - why play if it isnt a challenge? You dont kill a dummy 100 or more times (even if you are alone on a public server) just to crank your efficiency up. Or play a user one time and get the high skill score then never play again. Bomb armies and fight bots the hard way. It is possible to make a conquest with only 1 ship. And if you want the high score you need to play often enough to risk lowering the score and being killed by players, bots, armies, suns, etc... If you block a bot to avoid the bot attack with a home planet that has like 100 armies - stop blocking around 35 - 45 and fight the bot fairly for the planet. Same goes for the genocide. 2 or more ppl on the same team should not be blocking bots either. Besides its fun for a player at peace to tow a bot while the other takes the system - then you put the bot in a sun (Muh-hah-hah-hah-hah...ahem, sorry.) If you do have multiples and someone keeps killing the ones you arent paying close attention to, you dont chase down their ship with everything you have just for revenge...same with taking your team planets. The same person having different user accounts is also abuse-able. Its one thing to have a dummy account (doodie anyone?), an account to mess with (backup), and one for serious play (cat)...its quite another to make a new user just to harass another player, or interfere with their stats. If I tell you something is cheating, the above is why I think it so. Some things are fair (alls fair in love and war?) by the established rules, but are considered (at least by me) to be dishonorable. Tormenting an opponent with overheated weps, or no fuel...endlessly hounding an opponent with no team or friendly planets for refueling...going to war just to take recently conquered planets - just because you know they have low army counts... Such are usually followed by comments of "cowardly", "{insert team name} scum", etc...usually in good fun. I'm not saying anyone should change thier play style or anything. I just think if there are more than 2 players on a server, especially 2 on 1 team that multiple ships should be limited to 2 or not used at all. (And no creating *fake* identites to get around it either - thats still cheating.) Besides - you are a much better player if you only have one ship to focus on. Multiple ships usually just lead to easier kills...and we dont want that. -Cataboligne- ---------------------------------------------- 3 4 | 2 \|/ 5--*----> 1 Thing is facing this direction /|\ 6 | 8 7 From dwpayne at gravitic.com Thu Dec 2 00:47:02 2004 From: dwpayne at gravitic.com (David W. Payne) Date: Thu, 02 Dec 2004 00:47:02 -0700 Subject: [conquest] conquest etiquette part 1 - the VAX game of the past In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <41AEC876.9020209@gravitic.com> I look forward to your part 2. This message brings back memories. I think everyone should remember that Jon has tried to stay with the spirit of the original Conquest and that change is also good........ example: vacancy issue - there is a system option for that. Jon and I have discussed any number of these issues for quite a while. Join in. NO ONE uses conqoper for cheating. I have conqoper privs but actually have no access currently to the machine where conquest resides so I can not use conqoper. Only Jon can use it now. And there is an "all" message that states when "God" is entering conqoper. Personally, as a Christian I think that that should be changed to "Oper" but others do not agree. Sometimes Jon and I talk about creating "situations" on the regular server which give people a chance to see different aspects of Conquest. I have never used autopilot on the regular server while live. I did try it once recently when vacating the game just to give new players a new perspective. I think you should post your suggestions. Just remember Jon, John and I and I hope the rest of you want to see Conquest become a more popular game. And outright cheating is not acceptable to anyone I know. Davep Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: >sheesh, I hate spelling that word. > >Also this is more of a history lesson - you might find it boring, the >second part has my suggestions. > >Well, we have all been in some fun games so far...this indeed brings >back many memories from my college days. > >Most of those memories are some of the most fun I ever had that many >considered wastefull...not so I would say - what the spirit within >enjoys, the spirit without enjoys (cryptic, I know) > >But some of those memories are very bitter. > >The following were different in VAX conquest: there was no vacancy - >if you closed the program your ship got wasted...you could only cloak >around a class M planet - anything else and your fuel would run out >and you would uncloak...generally there was only 1 ship allowed per >user account - and most users only had one account. > >Even before it was known that (some) players had access to conqoper, >there were many accusations in heated games about players having >autopilot. You need to understand that back in that day, the robot >was considered well nigh undefeatable by one opponent. Things like >kill count effeciency improvement and sudden turn torp blasts, and >detonating a bots own torps on top of it with your own were not yet >discovered. > >If a player had auto and could turn it on at the right moment in a >battle, it was devastating. Especially during high lag sessions. And >any time there were over 10 - 12 players or a lot of students using >the system high lag abounded. > >Once I had conqoper access I found out the only players that ever had >it turned on were other opers and thier friends - not very cool... > >When it became known people playing had conqoper (some geek just had >to show off...) many rude words were said in raised voices and game >exe access was locked out by the system manager a few times due to >complaints by staff. > >Following this were a number of discussions of what was and was not >cool amongst the players, some with the system manager. > >In general these were our mutual agreements for play: > >No one played with another users account (students werent allowed to >access others accts anyway) or any of the work study accts. Anyone >caught playing on two terminals simultaneously was barred from the >game and had all accounts they used to access the game blocked. (a >few opers that wouldnt respect this and kept enabling locked out users >lost oper access amidst some bitter feelings...) > >If an oper was changing the U, expermenting etc. the game should be >closed - and when if was re-opened things should be the way they were, >or in an initial state. > >An oper/player should not have a second term session with oper open >while they were playing live. Slimy things like changing owning >teams, un-genociding races, reseting the U prior to a conquer, >targeting certain planets with the eater and others were strict >no-nos. If an oper was caught doing any of that they lost oper access >permanently. > >Serious abusive messages were also grounds for banishment from the game. > >Most importantly if everyone couldnt get along, not shout in the lab >and follow the rules laid down by the sysmgr - the game exes would be >locked by access control. > >In time things like autopilot became a mute issue - bots are just plain stupid. >Opers learned the hard way not to screw around - by losing oper privs. >In time everyone learned to play nice, and those that couldnt were >banned or shamed into quitting voluntarily... > >Now there is a new era of conquest, and I feel it important to point a >few things out along the same lines - to be published in part 2, so >everyone doesnt have to wade through all this. > >-Cataboligne- >-Cat- >-Z- >(sheesh, do I have enough nicks or what) > >---------------------------------------------- > 3 > 4 | 2 > \|/ > 5--*----> 1 Thing is facing this direction > /|\ > 6 | 8 > 7 > > > -- #include From jon at radscan.com Thu Dec 2 11:47:48 2004 From: jon at radscan.com (Jon Trulson) Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2004 11:47:48 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] conquest etiquette part 1 - the VAX game of the past In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Thu, 2 Dec 2004, Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: > sheesh, I hate spelling that word. > > Also this is more of a history lesson - you might find it boring, the > second part has my suggestions. > > Well, we have all been in some fun games so far...this indeed brings > back many memories from my college days. > Indeed... Couple of really good battles. > The following were different in VAX conquest: there was no vacancy - > if you closed the program your ship got wasted...you could only cloak Actually there was - it just happened by accident. I was able to go vacant on a modem just by hanging up the connection, or on a LAT terminal by detaching. Of course it wasn't called vacant. Was very common for highkill ships that wanted to stick around after leaving the game. We did it all the time. > around a class M planet - anything else and your fuel would run out > and you would uncloak... Cloaking was completely useless in original conquest. Don;t know why they even bothered to add it. Nobody ever used it because to do so (especially in the presence of enemy ships) was just plain suicide. >generally there was only 1 ship allowed per > user account - and most users only had one account. > True. Ships were allowed multiples (built into conquest), but you needed access to multiple terminals to do so. When we had our big games, noone ever did this as it was hard enough managing one ship. > Even before it was known that (some) players had access to conqoper, > there were many accusations in heated games about players having > autopilot. You need to understand that back in that day, the robot > was considered well nigh undefeatable by one opponent. Things like > kill count effeciency improvement and sudden turn torp blasts, and > detonating a bots own torps on top of it with your own were not yet > discovered. > Hmm.. deting a robots torps on top of it doesn't affect the robot since a ship cannot be damaged by it's own torps.. > If a player had auto and could turn it on at the right moment in a > battle, it was devastating. Especially during high lag sessions. And > any time there were over 10 - 12 players or a lot of students using > the system high lag abounded. > I don't believe we ever had anybody try this on the games we had, though only the SM had oper access. I don't see it as being too useful anyways... The few times we tried it here about 5 years ago, it was always a crapshoot as to wether you would survive. None of the users on the main public server have autopilot cap. [...] > If an oper was changing the U, expermenting etc. the game should be > closed - and when if was re-opened things should be the way they were, > or in an initial state. On my public server (1701), no changes are ever made to the universe. That's what the exp server is for (1702). The public server is never tweaked or otherwise adjusted. > An oper/player should not have a second term session with oper open > while they were playing live. Slimy things like changing owning Yeah, that's just plain cheating. A game is no phun if you have to cheat to win. Though it usually would not help you too much anyway. You can see which users have oper privs by looking for the '+' next to their names. Currently only myself and two others have this priv. Since I moved the servers to a different machine, I am currently the only one who can run conqoper at this time, though we are considering a new remote oper protocol for the future (after the 8.1 release of course). Of course I play conquest for fun, the battles can really get the heart pounding :) Nobody want's to play on a server where the oper cheats - I've played a variety of online games where this happened, and I just don't play on those systems. No one has ever cheated on my server that I'm aware of, certainly I haven't. > teams, un-genociding races, reseting the U prior to a conquer, > targeting certain planets with the eater and others were strict > no-nos. If an oper was caught doing any of that they lost oper access > permanently. Wow, that sucks. Never had these issues with our college games (or presently). > > Now there is a new era of conquest, and I feel it important to point a > few things out along the same lines - to be published in part 2, so > everyone doesnt have to wade through all this. I hope so, I really enjoy the game. Doom3 is for cowards that can't handle conquest :) -- Jon Trulson mailto:jon at radscan.com ID: 1A9A2B09, FP: C23F328A721264E7 B6188192EC733962 PGP keys at http://radscan.com/~jon/PGPKeys.txt #include "I am Nomad." -Nomad From jon at radscan.com Thu Dec 2 12:11:16 2004 From: jon at radscan.com (Jon Trulson) Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2004 12:11:16 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] conquest etiquette part 2 - suggestions In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Thu, 2 Dec 2004, Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: [...] > However I have noticed some players taking advantage of the ability to > play multiple ships. This could seem a trifle unfair and I have > thought of the following: > Oh man, Wintermute is very good flying 4 ships ;-) Coupled with SlingShot, the only way to survive is to do the same thing. Which is why SlingShot is now disabled on the main server. [...] Multiple ships is a kind of tricky thing. On one hand, I feel if you can actually handle multiple ships you should be given the chance to do so. Though in the last game, when dave and I took the rom planets, WM kept sending ship after ship to rom. After about 20 minutes of this I was tired and just left. > > Using multiples to *unfairly* increase your stats. > > My personal feelings: > I think what will be needed here is a new 'max clients per ip' option that an CO can specify. This option would only allow the configured number of client from a single IP to connect. Maybe the default is 1 or 2. Adding complicated logic to determine when to allow it and when not too I think is not waranted. It should apply to everyone under all circumstances. The current problem with multiples is that aginast a player who is good at it, you really have no choice but to do the same or you're screwed. > If everyone isnt running multiple ships (or at least agrees with > it...) I dont think anyone should - just out of respect and fairness. > Yes this makes conquest harder, and bots more troublesome...but hey - > why play if it isnt a challenge? > > You dont kill a dummy 100 or more times (even if you are alone on a Ahem. I believe I've seen you do this :) > public server) just to crank your efficiency up. Or play a user one > time and get the high skill score then never play again. Bomb armies > and fight bots the hard way. It is possible to make a conquest with > only 1 ship. And if you want the high score you need to play often > enough to risk lowering the score and being killed by players, bots, > armies, suns, etc... > > If you block a bot to avoid the bot attack with a home planet that has > like 100 armies - stop blocking around 35 - 45 and fight the bot > fairly for the planet. Same goes for the genocide. 2 or more ppl on > the same team should not be blocking bots either. Besides its fun for > a player at peace to tow a bot while the other takes the system - then > you put the bot in a sun (Muh-hah-hah-hah-hah...ahem, sorry.) > These would have to be enforced by the game. Expecting players to subscribe here and read this thread and then play by these recomendations isn't realistic. I do not believe WM is subscribed here for example. > If you do have multiples and someone keeps killing the ones you arent > paying close attention to, you dont chase down their ship with > everything you have just for revenge...same with taking your team > planets. > Revenge is a dish best served on a bed of torpedos. > The same person having different user accounts is also abuse-able. > Its one thing to have a dummy account (doodie anyone?), an account to > mess with (backup), and one for serious play (cat)...its quite another > to make a new user just to harass another player, or interfere with > their stats. Again, due to the nature of network play, there is not much that can be done in this regard. I think a new IP limiting capability is the way to go here. For my server, I'd probably set the limit at 2 per IP addr. > > If I tell you something is cheating, the above is why I think it so. > Well, technically they are not really cheating. If the game permits it, you can't really call that a cheat. The game should simply not permit more than a specified number of clients from the same IP to connect. > > Some things are fair (alls fair in love and war?) by the established > rules, but are considered (at least by me) to be dishonorable. > Tormenting an opponent with overheated weps, or no fuel...endlessly > hounding an opponent with no team or friendly planets for > refueling...going to war just to take recently conquered planets - > just because you know they have low army counts... Hey, that's part of the game. I did that to you I believe in the last game. I followed you around, zipped in and out getting you to waste fuel and heat (while you were attacking my Orion planets), knowing you had no friendly planets nearby to fuel on, then I blew up your ship when you were sufficiently weak and had to run away. That's a perfectly valid way to play. Conquest is as much about strategy as it is about aiming right. :) Next time don't mess with my planets unless you want to tangle, and have a viable exit strategy :) > I'm not saying anyone should change thier play style or anything. > > I just think if there are more than 2 players on a server, especially > 2 on 1 team that multiple ships should be limited to 2 or not used at > all. (And no creating *fake* identites to get around it either - > thats still cheating.) Should be limited by IP. I'll think about an implementation for the next dev release. It may need to wait until after 8.1 is released... Not sure yet. > > Besides - you are a much better player if you only have one ship to > focus on. Multiple ships usually just lead to easier kills...and we > dont want that. Well... :) -- Jon Trulson mailto:jon at radscan.com ID: 1A9A2B09, FP: C23F328A721264E7 B6188192EC733962 PGP keys at http://radscan.com/~jon/PGPKeys.txt #include "I am Nomad." -Nomad From god.000 at gmail.com Thu Dec 2 14:39:52 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Thu, 2 Dec 2004 21:39:52 +0000 Subject: [conquest] conquest etiquette part 2 - suggestions In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Grrr, gmail has some annoying habits...I already typed a reply and it didnt get sent AND I cant go back to the page where it was typed...doh. > SlingShot, the only way to survive is to do the same thing. Which is why Exactly my point - its no fun taking on a whole slew of fresh ships when you are trying to play with just one. You get a fair kill on an opponent and you want a chance to repair and refuel... > kept sending ship after ship to rom. After about 20 minutes of this I was > tired and just left. Yes. > I think what will be needed here is a new 'max clients per ip' > option that an CO can specify. This option would only allow the > configured number of client from a single IP to connect. Maybe the > default is 1 or 2. A limit of 2 per IP should work nicely in the majority of cases...the many multiple ships can be left on for the experimental server. There are situations like 2 or more players only having one portal - and thus 1 phys IP, but I think those can possibly be dealt with fairly by an op. > > My personal feelings: > > If I tell you something is cheating, the above is why I think it so. > Well, technically they are not really cheating. If the game > permits it, you can't really call that a cheat. Which is precisely why I specified them as my personal feelings...for me its more a matter of honorable play - I wont do to another player as I dont want done to myself. > > You dont kill a dummy 100 or more times (even if you are alone on a > Ahem. I believe I've seen you do this :) Kill dummy ship(s) 100 times? I really think not. You know how boring that would be...maybe 3 or 4 dummy kills when the conquer is almost done and there are no armies to bomb (like you just came back in after a sun wiped out your 75 kill ship...doh) If I have 100 kills, it is from bombing and bot destruction. Well 95% anyway. Might shoot a dummy ship to watch the explosion, or discover when 1 single torp can deal 100 dmg points...or skeet shooting, thats always fun, practicing with moving targets. But nowhere near enough kills to effect the skill rating. Tho I have pumped up bot effeciency when using one as a defensive helper before - then again it seems I'm usually alone on the Klingon team. And Guardian is my friend - but he should be named Landru. LOL That rec where I have 400 kills - 90% of that is from bot destruction. > These would have to be enforced by the game. Expecting players to > subscribe here and read this thread and then play by these recomendations > isn't realistic. I do not believe WM is subscribed here for example. Yeah...I just like to think in terms of ideals. > Hey, that's part of the game. I did that to you I believe in the > last game. I followed you around, zipped in and out getting you to waste > fuel and heat (while you were attacking my Orion planets), knowing you had > no friendly planets nearby to fuel on, then I blew up your ship when you > were sufficiently weak and had to run away. That's a perfectly valid way > to play. Conquest is as much about strategy as it is about aiming right. Yes, its valid...just not what I consider entirely honorable...and were you the one playing on the Orion and Feddy bear teams? Not sure, I just remember someone was. > :) Next time don't mess with my planets unless you want to tangle, and > have a viable exit strategy :) And this is my point - if you spend the majority of a play session working on a Fed victory you shouldnt jump in as an Orion and stomp someone on the Klingon team working on a coup...leave them to HAL - HAL is fun and easy to kill. :-) But again - my personal feelings on this. Ta, ta all. ---------------------------------------------- 3 4 | 2 \|/ 5--*----> 1 Thing is facing this direction /|\ 6 | 8 7 "I am not a number, I am a free man" Number 6 - The Prisoner From god.000 at gmail.com Wed Dec 8 12:39:18 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 19:39:18 +0000 Subject: [conquest] Re: conquest etiquette... "Maybe its just me" In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Maybe its just me... Yes, that will be the working title of this piece. I've pretty much decided playing against the multi-ship players is an excersize in futility and anger managment. It just sucks when all you want to do is take or defend your home system, and some butt-munch with 4 different ships wont leave you be. The game isnt fun anymore. And if I want to play a frustrating game, I'll try something like gauntlet 2. (well compared to g-1 anyway.) Maybe its because when I started playing years back, the only ppl who could try to fly more than one ship per individual were breaking the established rules and would be banned when caught. Of course only being able to fly one ship makes it hard for 1 person / team to get a conquer...that was the point though, its a multiplayer game. You either persuade that other team person to join your team, or wait until a friend could help you. And then even if there were 3 or 4 players on 1 team, they would never have used the tactics I've seen used. (excluding a few slime balls that everyone would stomp when they came in the game - and why were they always flying orion ships?) If one team was going after another teams home planets, everyone had war set with the other team...unless it was just 2 ppl up against a bot - and realize bots were viewed differently back in those halcyon days. It was also common practice if you were alone on a team, to bring your bot out as a helper. With more than 2 ppl tho, one person had to defend while the other went out for conquests. Its still my feeling that (a single individual) playing more than one ship against an individual who doesnt want to play that way is cheating...even if the game rules allow it. I'll also take this moment to appologize to any "polite" players for past and future profanity (at least towards the multi ship players - all else is good natured ribbing in jest...) - but darn it your cheating holes work my nerves and you are just asking for it... My point of view is thus - if you choose to play more than one ship, I choose foul langauge when you piss me off. (And NO, I have never attacked anyone {bombing armies or shooting ships} with 2 different ships (simultaneously) - the most I use a second ship for is acquiring / building a bot helper. And mebbe fighting bots if I feel lazy. but never against human players, ever... And ALSO NOTE: switching to a different username-ship does not count - I mean flying one ship at a time...) That is my piece of wisdom for the moment...so might it be. -Cat- From dwpayne at gravitic.com Wed Dec 8 14:40:06 2004 From: dwpayne at gravitic.com (David W. Payne) Date: Wed, 08 Dec 2004 14:40:06 -0700 Subject: [conquest] Re: conquest etiquette... "Maybe its just me" In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <41B774B6.3070501@gravitic.com> I do not have time right now to answer all of this so I'll just make one or two points. WE NEED MORE PLAYERS! If we had more people interested in Conquest there wouldn't be such an interest/need for multiship players. So GET YOUR FRIENDS to play! I've noticed that most things about Conquest come in phases. What I believe is that the multiship playing is a phase. Just endure/ignore it. And the next time you see Wintermute in the game, tell him/her to subscribe to the list so we can get his opinion on things too. Just reach out to him and tell him how to subscribe. Can't work out differences if people don't communicate. Dave Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: >Maybe its just me... >Yes, that will be the working title of this piece. > >I've pretty much decided playing against the multi-ship players is an >excersize in futility and anger managment. > >It just sucks when all you want to do is take or defend your home >system, and some butt-munch with 4 different ships wont leave you be. >The game isnt fun anymore. And if I want to play a frustrating game, >I'll try something like gauntlet 2. (well compared to g-1 anyway.) > >Maybe its because when I started playing years back, the only ppl who >could try to fly more than one ship per individual were breaking the >established rules and would be banned when caught. > >Of course only being able to fly one ship makes it hard for 1 person / >team to get a conquer...that was the point though, its a multiplayer >game. You either persuade that other team person to join your team, >or wait until a friend could help you. > >And then even if there were 3 or 4 players on 1 team, they would never >have used the tactics I've seen used. (excluding a few slime balls >that everyone would stomp when they came in the game - and why were >they always flying orion ships?) > >If one team was going after another teams home planets, everyone had >war set with the other team...unless it was just 2 ppl up against a >bot - and realize bots were viewed differently back in those halcyon >days. > >It was also common practice if you were alone on a team, to bring your >bot out as a helper. With more than 2 ppl tho, one person had to >defend while the other went out for conquests. > >Its still my feeling that (a single individual) playing more than one >ship against an individual who doesnt want to play that way is >cheating...even if the game rules allow it. > >I'll also take this moment to appologize to any "polite" players for >past and future profanity (at least towards the multi ship players - >all else is good natured ribbing in jest...) - but darn it your >cheating holes work my nerves and you are just asking for it... My >point of view is thus - if you choose to play more than one ship, I >choose foul langauge when you piss me off. > >(And NO, I have never attacked anyone {bombing armies or shooting >ships} with 2 different ships (simultaneously) - the most I use a >second ship for is acquiring / building a bot helper. And mebbe >fighting bots if I feel lazy. but never against human players, >ever... And ALSO NOTE: switching to a different username-ship does >not count - I mean flying one ship at a time...) > >That is my piece of wisdom for the moment...so might it be. > >-Cat- > > > -- #include From god.000 at gmail.com Fri Dec 10 01:50:00 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Fri, 10 Dec 2004 08:50:00 +0000 Subject: [conquest] last conquer... Message-ID: well. its nice to see someone can get a conquer when all I see is this: conquest -m Querying metaserver at conquest.radscan.com metaGetServerList() failed conquest -s conquest.radscan.com:1701 -t conquest: clientHello() failed, check log conquest -s conquest.radscan.com:1701 conquest: clientHello() failed, check log tail .conquest.log 1102647965:8248:conquest: clientHello() failed 1102647966:8251:NET: Opening UDP... 1102647966:8251:Connecting to host: conquest.radscan.com, port 1701 1102647977:8251:clientHello: read server hello: timeout. 1102647977:8251:conquest: clientHello() failed And here I thought the server was down hard - niether ping nor website was working. note to self: always cloak when exiting the cli for ANY reason... ---------------------------------------------- 3 4 | 2 \|/ 5--*----> 1 Thing is facing this direction /|\ 6 | 8 7 From jon at radscan.com Fri Dec 10 09:49:11 2004 From: jon at radscan.com (Jon Trulson) Date: Fri, 10 Dec 2004 09:49:11 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] last conquer... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Fri, 10 Dec 2004, Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: > well. its nice to see someone can get a conquer when all I see is this: > > conquest -m > Querying metaserver at conquest.radscan.com > metaGetServerList() failed > Well strangely the metaserver was down. Not sure why yet (will investigate later)... Never had that happen before. > conquest -s conquest.radscan.com:1701 -t > conquest: clientHello() failed, check log > conquest -s conquest.radscan.com:1701 > conquest: clientHello() failed, check log > The game servers were up though - maybe a sporadic network problem? -- Jon Trulson mailto:jon at radscan.com ID: 1A9A2B09, FP: C23F328A721264E7 B6188192EC733962 PGP keys at http://radscan.com/~jon/PGPKeys.txt #include "I am Nomad." -Nomad From god.000 at gmail.com Fri Dec 10 12:43:29 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Fri, 10 Dec 2004 19:43:29 +0000 Subject: [conquest] last conquer... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Found at http://www.starfleetcom.net/lcars/cloak2.htm "If a ship had the ability to generate enough energy to to maintain the cloaking device as well as defensive shields, the nullifier cores could neither mask all of the erergy required to accomplish this, nor the interference created by defensive shields. In addition, the spatial distortions created by defensive shields would mean that the shield itself would have to exist within the cloaking field, and the larger the cloaking field is, the more energy is required to generate it. These reasons completely eliminate the possibility of using defensive shields." oops, looks like conquest isnt cannon...wait a sec, dont know for sure if this text is cannon. Oh well. Still the base website is pretty cool: http://www.lcarscom.net/ From god.000 at gmail.com Fri Dec 10 12:45:07 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Fri, 10 Dec 2004 19:45:07 +0000 Subject: [conquest] cloaking info... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: the subject should have been "cloaking info"...duh/ I'm starting to tire of gmails idiosyncrhosies. On Fri, 10 Dec 2004 19:43:29 +0000, Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: > Found at http://www.starfleetcom.net/lcars/cloak2.htm > From god.000 at gmail.com Sat Dec 11 12:58:04 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Sat, 11 Dec 2004 19:58:04 +0000 Subject: [conquest] last conquer... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: Jon; You know of the 2 conquers I've done, there has been no genocide recorded for the fed geno... I know the first time the armies poped while I was beaming down...leaving 1 fed army instead of taking the planet. When I beamed over that one, no geno was indicated. But that didnt happen the second time. And yet no genocide was indicated. And I usually do the systems in the order of Orion - Earth - Romulus. -R- ---------------------------------------------- 3 4 | 2 \|/ 5--*----> 1 Thing is facing this direction /|\ 6 | 8 7 From jon at radscan.com Sun Dec 12 16:50:19 2004 From: jon at radscan.com (Jon Trulson) Date: Sun, 12 Dec 2004 16:50:19 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] last conquer... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: On Sat, 11 Dec 2004, Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: > Jon; > > You know of the 2 conquers I've done, there has been no genocide > recorded for the fed geno... > > I know the first time the armies poped while I was beaming > down...leaving 1 fed army instead of taking the planet. When I beamed > over that one, no geno was indicated. > > But that didnt happen the second time. And yet no genocide was indicated. > > And I usually do the systems in the order of Orion - Earth - Romulus. That is a bug that dave and I spent quite some time tracking down this afternoon. It's true, fed geno's were not counted properly. It was possible for other genos to not be counted properly either. This problem (and several others) are fixed in an upcoming 8.0.1q dev release (already running on the public servers). -- Jon Trulson mailto:jon at radscan.com ID: 1A9A2B09, FP: C23F328A721264E7 B6188192EC733962 PGP keys at http://radscan.com/~jon/PGPKeys.txt #include "I am Nomad." -Nomad From jon at radscan.com Sun Dec 19 13:33:32 2004 From: jon at radscan.com (Jon Trulson) Date: Sun, 19 Dec 2004 13:33:32 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] 8.0.1q is now available. Message-ID: at the usual location, http://radscan.com/conquest.html This is probably a good one for server operators to upgrade to. Here is the relevant portion of the release notes: Version 8.0.1q 12/11/2004 (devel) - another in a long line of 8.1 release candidates - FEEDBACK messages (beaming/bombing, etc) are now sent directly from the server rather than being enqueued into the common block's message ring for later delivery. This avoids alot of uneccessary lock contention, and makes sure the client gets feedback messages quickly, without making a trip through the common block. - a server's client update interrupts are now blocked when a lock is aquired, and unblocked when the lock is released. This avoids some potential races that could cause a lock to be held too long, or to be improperly interrupted. - fixed a couple of problems with counting geno's. Reported by Cat. Fed geno's were almost never counted properly. - when couping, re-couped planets should not be marked scannable by anything other than the coup'ing team. - when cloaked and in orbit, approximate location data was not available to other ships as it should be for any cloaked ship that is moving. - When a team is geno'd, all armies of that team still residing on live ships are also destroyed. A message is sent to a team when it is genocided notifying them of this. - semaphore interface cleaned up - fixed potential core in GL.c when padding message lines. This could happen most often when getting (i)nfo or locking onto a planet. - recording/playback of planet 'realness' was broken. Now it isn't. -- Jon Trulson mailto:jon at radscan.com ID: 1A9A2B09, FP: C23F328A721264E7 B6188192EC733962 PGP keys at http://radscan.com/~jon/PGPKeys.txt #include "I am Nomad." -Nomad From dwpayne at gravitic.com Tue Dec 21 13:09:38 2004 From: dwpayne at gravitic.com (David W. Payne) Date: Tue, 21 Dec 2004 13:09:38 -0700 Subject: [conquest] 8.0.1q is now available. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <41C88302.5090302@gravitic.com> I think whomever started this thread should of had the decency to post this to the conquest mailing list. We NEED to make use of that list and get others on it too. Look below for my two cents worth. Jon Trulson wrote: > On Mon, 20 Dec 2004, Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: > >>> - When a team is geno'd, all armies of that team still >>> residing on live ships are also destroyed. A message is >>> sent to a team when it is genocided notifying them of this. >> >> >> Dont you mean vacant ships? >> I mean if I'm live and in the game, and going to beam down to a >> planet, the armies better NOT dissappear from my ship... And there is >> simply no previous existing in game rule, or even trek-lore based >> logic for this. > > > The only logic for this was a discussion with Dave and I on what > should happen... ie: currently you can always avoid having to do a > coup by simply loading up a dummy ship with armies and stash it away > somewhere. We thought simply removing the armies from all ships (of > the geno'd team) was a good way to prevent this tactic. I do not know > if this tactic has ever been used, but I didn't want to provide > another reason to use a multi. > > I've CC'd dave on this. > > The thinking being, what are you doing flying around with armies > when your last planet is going down? > > I am certainly open to discussion on this, I was trying to not > create even more reasons to create/use a dummy ship. Do you think > this should only be applied to vacant ships? Dave? > A player or team should not be allowed to load a dummy ship with armies. That is insurance against genocide and having to coup, just poor play. A player/team that is going down should not be allowed the insurance of carrying armies around to avoid having to coup. That player/team should be working hard at defending team planets. Why shouldn't the armies disappear? The civilization the armies were a part of just disappeared...... The only reason we can't do that with the ships themselves is that the ships are associated with the user in the game. A player/user would be very annoyed at losing a high kill ship just because his last planet was taken and a genocide occurred. It would be frustrating if you were trying to defend your civilization by getting some armies and running to a different part of the galaxy, just to have them disappear before you could beam them down to a new planet. But think about it. You should have done a better job planning ahead placing armies on planets (with the additional cost of having to defend them with ships). And you should have done a better job initially of defending your team planets to avoid genocide. And the name of this game is CONQUEST. Not INSURANCE! Sure you can run off with some armies when you face superior odds. I know I've done it myself. It's just that you have to get to another planet, bomb it and beam down your armies. You better move fast....... That is fair and life isn't fair anyway. Armies are not "crew". Logically, armies may be transported to around but they need to be on planets to properly train and take care of themselves. Can't see logically leaving armies on ships and expecting them to fight worth a darn. I'm just saying armies should not have a long ship life..... ;-) And a cloaked ship at warp 0 and not orbiting is not detectable at all. Before we went client/server we could triangulate using a couple of live ships and eventually find the cloaker. But until and unless we can bring that functionality back in client/server the cloakers have just too much of an advantage. A few options exist in my opinion. 1) This could be a run-time option like doomsday machine and slingshot...... I think we should actually make a decision and implement it. This option is wishy washy...... 2) Make the ship carrying armies non cloakable, the logic being that the power needed to maintain and transport armies is just too high to allow cloaking at the same time. But that would change the logic of how people using cloaking now. 3) Put a timer on life expectancy of ship armies of team genocided ships to give the player/user a chance to populate/reconquer some planet (5 min). I personally believe that coup time should be limited to five to seven or eight minutes tops. I recently ran into a 25 minute period for reorganizing after a failed coup and that was way, way too long. >> There's the Tholian Web, but that would mean a part of space was going >> into interphase...not that having a part of space interphasing isnt a >> worthwhile idea. Maybe where a large amount of weapon fire has >> occured. >> >> Hmm, on second thought why would vacant ships lose armies? Hunting >> cloaked ships that have been vacated is a valid strategy. More so if >> they are suspected carriers. > > > The problem is that you will never know if they are carriers... > Hunting cloaked ships is good, yes. Do you think it's good to have a > cloaked carrier hiding somewhere so that a team can avoid couping? > > >> >> I'm not sure this will be a very popular change... > > > I'm not sure it's ever happened in real-life anyway, so I didn't > think anyone would really care. Ususally if your last planet is under > attack, your whole team needs to be defending it. > > As I said, I am not married to this. I certainly do not believe > vacant ships should keep their armies if the team is geno'd. I > believe it's best that a team on the verge of a geno should be > concentrating on defense rather than avoiding having to do a coup with > dummy ships and stashed armies. > > Of course, if your planet was about to be geno'd and another team > ship has armies they are going to put on another planet... Hmm. > > Let's discuss/agree on a proper course of action. > >> I would just leave the geno logic for bombing all planet based armies >> and not count ship carried armies...they could be considered part of >> the crew. > > > But they aren't :) Also, I don't really like the idea of a > cloaked carrier sitting out there somewhere just so the team can avoid > a coup. But, as I said, I am not married to it :) > > -- #include From god.000 at gmail.com Tue Dec 21 19:12:20 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2004 02:12:20 +0000 Subject: [conquest] 8.0.1q - carrier mods In-Reply-To: <41C88302.5090302@gravitic.com> References: <41C88302.5090302@gravitic.com> Message-ID: > I think whomever started this thread should of had the decency > to post this to the conquest mailing list. We NEED to make What do you mean? It was posted to the list by the person that started it... here is the header: From: Jon Trulson Reply-To: jon at radscan.com To: Conquest Date: Sun, 19 Dec 2004 13:33:32 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] 8.0.1q is now available. > use of that list and get others on it too. My initial reply was meant to be private. I'm working very long hours right now and dont have time to sit down and think about video games... > > The thinking being, what are you doing flying around with armies > > when your last planet is going down? Well, for one by taking more planets you can prevent a genocide. (And isnt this supposed to be about conquest? Taking planets, ruling the universe, that sort of thing? You dont conquer by sitting around defending a few planets.) For instance, if you are playing one ship against Wintermutes armada, pretty much your only strategy is to get an army planet somewhere, let him steal your home system and wait till he's occupied elsewhere to take it back. > A player or team should not be allowed to load a dummy ship with > armies. That What if you have to duck out to do something important, like attend your wife? You might just be in the middle of taking some planets when some knob decides to genocide you. They get the geno, and you can then repopulate. > is insurance against genocide and having to coup, just poor play. Not true in either case - the genocide happens if your ship is carrying. And whats the difference between beaming armies down and getting a coup? You will be left with 1 army planet with a very small count... > A player/team that is going down should not be allowed the insurance of > carrying > armies around to avoid having to coup. That player/team should be > working hard > at defending team planets. Bullshit pure and simple...what if you are overwhelmed? either against mutiple players, or a Wintermute type player. Grabbing some armies and running is the best thing you can do when outnumbered. It might be slimy for 3 or 4 real human players (so is runinning multiple ships when you have multiple real players), but for a lone gunman facing insurmountable odds, it may be the only way to save your race! > Why shouldn't the armies disappear? The civilization the armies were a > part of Because its just plain wrong...why cant you understand that? > your team planets to avoid genocide. And the name of this game is > CONQUEST. Not > INSURANCE! Who are you to judge someones method of play? What if the rest of us judged your methods and found them in-appropriate. And told everyone our opinion...would you be pleased with that? (And yes I realize I've called Wintermute a cheater because he doesnt play by the "old" rules that I consider honorable. Well, life is a fine line to walk...) > That is fair and life isn't fair anyway. No, I do not believe killing a carrier ships armies is fair. And why shouldnt we do everything in our power to make people (and animals) lives more fair? > Armies are not "crew". Logically, armies may be transported to around > but they need to be Yes, I was suggesting that they be considered such. > > Let's discuss/agree on a proper course of action. Discuss yes, agree...well I'm not sure we are going to reach a collective agreement here...for instance - I'm convinced I'm right. (I'm really stubborn too.) > > cloaked carrier sitting out there somewhere just so the team can avoid > > a coup. But, as I said, I am not married to it :) A coup gives you 1 army planet with a small number of armies...a carrier attack would give you 1 army planet with less armies than a coup in all likely hood...the team / individual attacking is still getting a geno, whether you coup or have a carrier. So what could it possibly matter? You cant prevent the genocide by carrying armies - and you are no further ahead whether you coup or just take a planet! My stand is this - changing the state of a live players ship like that is wrong. You want thier carrier eliminated, go blow it up yourself. If they cloak to hide, find them. Its that simple. -Cataboligne- ---------------------------------------------- 3 4 | 2 \|/ 5--*----> 1 Thing is facing this direction /|\ 6 | 8 7 From jon at radscan.com Tue Dec 21 19:13:06 2004 From: jon at radscan.com (Jon Trulson) Date: Tue, 21 Dec 2004 19:13:06 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] 8.0.1q is now available. In-Reply-To: <41C88302.5090302@gravitic.com> References: <41C88302.5090302@gravitic.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 21 Dec 2004, David W. Payne wrote: > Jon Trulson wrote: > >> On Mon, 20 Dec 2004, Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: >> >>>> - When a team is geno'd, all armies of that team still >>>> residing on live ships are also destroyed. A message is >>>> sent to a team when it is genocided notifying them of this. >>> >>> [...] >> > A player or team should not be allowed to load a dummy ship with armies. > That > is insurance against genocide and having to coup, just poor play. > Well it won't affect a geno at all. But couping is part of the game :) > your team planets to avoid genocide. And the name of this game is CONQUEST. > Not > INSURANCE! Whoa... put...the..gun...down...and...step...back... :) > A few options exist in my opinion. 1) This could be a run-time option like > doomsday machine and slingshot...... I think we > should actually make a decision and implement it. This option is wishy > washy...... Ick. I'll pass. > 2) Make the ship carrying armies non cloakable, the logic being that the > power needed to > maintain and transport armies is just too high to allow cloaking at the same > time. But that > would change the logic of how people using cloaking now. Well, beig able to bomb/beam while cloaked was rather useful against WM and his multi-ship onslaught if I recall. I say waste the armies on a geno. > 3) Put a timer on > life expectancy of ship armies of team genocided ships to give the > player/user > a chance to populate/reconquer some planet (5 min). > I'd also rather not introduce timers and the like for this. More complex than it needs to be. I think we should just waste the armies. Haven't heard Cat's option yet. > I personally believe that coup time should be limited to five to seven or > eight minutes tops. Right now, MIN_COUP_MINUTES = 10 and MAX_COUP_MINUTES = 45 . You could have a long wait. > I recently ran into a 25 minute period for reorganizing after a failed coup > and that was > way, way too long. > The original code was on the matter of hours minimum for a coup. (min was 2hrs, max was 4hrs). Ouch. I'd prefer to make these selections based on what people who play the game can agree on rather than me just decide arbitrarily. Maybe someday we can have a vote on tweaking some of Conquest's constants :) [...] -- Jon Trulson mailto:jon at radscan.com ID: 1A9A2B09, FP: C23F328A721264E7 B6188192EC733962 PGP keys at http://radscan.com/~jon/PGPKeys.txt #include "I am Nomad." -Nomad From jon at radscan.com Wed Dec 22 15:15:28 2004 From: jon at radscan.com (Jon Trulson) Date: Wed, 22 Dec 2004 15:15:28 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] 8.0.1q is now available. In-Reply-To: References: <41C88302.5090302@gravitic.com> Message-ID: On Tue, 21 Dec 2004, Jon Trulson wrote: > On Tue, 21 Dec 2004, David W. Payne wrote: >> Jon Trulson wrote: >> >>> On Mon, 20 Dec 2004, Almighty Tallest Cataboligne wrote: >>> >>>>> - When a team is geno'd, all armies of that team still >>>>> residing on live ships are also destroyed. A message is >>>>> sent to a team when it is genocided notifying them of this. >>>> >>>> > [...] >>> >> A player or team should not be allowed to load a dummy ship with armies. Well, due to the unexpected controversy of this change, I will back out the geno'd-ship-army killing code for the next release, until this becomes a real problem that needs to be dealt with. -- Jon Trulson mailto:jon at radscan.com ID: 1A9A2B09, FP: C23F328A721264E7 B6188192EC733962 PGP keys at http://radscan.com/~jon/PGPKeys.txt #include "I am Nomad." -Nomad From god.000 at gmail.com Sat Dec 25 14:10:42 2004 From: god.000 at gmail.com (Almighty Tallest Cataboligne) Date: Sat, 25 Dec 2004 21:10:42 +0000 Subject: [conquest] Merry christmas to one and all...ho ho ho. In-Reply-To: References: <41C88302.5090302@gravitic.com> Message-ID: I hope this day has brought you all closer to the conquest you want. And amidst the presents, feasting, and joy stop for a moment to remember what we celebrate for. later, back to the feast for me... :-) -Cataboligne- ---------------------------------------------- 3 4 | 2 \|/ 5--*----> 1 Thing is facing this direction /|\ 6 | 8 7 From jon at radscan.com Thu Dec 30 21:36:33 2004 From: jon at radscan.com (Jon Trulson) Date: Thu, 30 Dec 2004 21:36:33 -0700 (MST) Subject: [conquest] Conquest 8.1 (stable) is released. Message-ID: ... at long last. http://radscan.com/conquest.html This release corrects a few bugs (one pretty serious) in the last development version (8.0.1q) and is now 'stable' in theory :) Here is the relevant portion of the HISTORY file. - changes since the last development release (8.0.1q) - fixed bad bug that could prevent a ship from seeing enemy torps that were fired at it from >ACCINFO_DIST away, depending on the firing ship's war settings. Ouch. - block updates when a RELOAD is occuring to prevent possbility of sending a corrupt packet stream. This could also happen when starting a client recording. - fixed problem with around() and round() which depend on BSD rint(). rint() seems to screw up rounding when the fractional part is exactly .5 - rounding down on even numbers, rounding up on odd. How odd. Now use our own rounding function that always does the right thing. - the wrong team was logged as the geno'd team to the logfile. - remove code that killed armies on ships belonging to a geno'd team. I did not expect that code would cause a war in itself :) - here is a brief overview of major features/changes since last stable release (8.0.1) - GLUT based OpenGL client, conquestgl. - the conqreplay program is gone, as the clients, conquest (curses) and conquestgl (OpenGL) are now used to replay .cqr files via the '-P ' cmdline option. - The game protocol changed (in devel version 8.0.1j). This protocol corrects some shortcomings in the 8.0.1 protocol (like doomsday, planet realness, etc), and now provides for client-side computation of torpedo and planet movement. This makes the game smoother, particularly in conquestgl, and significantly cuts down on the network bandwidth required. - a variety of game related bugs fixed, including, but not limited to: - doomsday protocol was 'missing'. - planet 'realness' was never propagated to a client. - geno's against the feds were rarely counted. - Slingshot flag could be bypassed. - a planet's army count is sent immediately to a newly scanning ship. - a bug in system entry selection could cause you to get stuck in Murisak when entering the game. - several lock contention, and signal interrupt issues/races fixed. - FEEDBACK messages are now sent directly to the client without making a round trip through the common block. - UDP support (auto-negotiated, but still perhaps a bit weak) for ship motion data. - UDP support can be disabled by specifying the '-u' option to the client. - Improve TCP performance via TCP_NODELAY. - use CTL-R in the cockpit to force a complete packet refresh from the server. - new user options (~/.conquestrc) - 'do_enemyshipbox' - when set to 'true', will draw a 1 pixel red square around enemy ships in the LR/SR views. (GL client only). - 'do_draw_viewerbg' - define this as 'true' if you want to see the rather attractive background image (Hubble Ultra Deep Field) displayed in the viewer. (GL client only). - conqdriv - conqdriv now updates planet positions every 10th/sec. Previously these were only updated every 5 seconds. This provides much smoother planet movement, especially in the GL client. - conqdriv now updates a ship's orbital position every 10th/sec rather than 1/sec. This makes orbiting planets much smoother. - meta server/protocol changes - The meta protocol has been updated to support new 'server_contact' and 'localtime' fields. - the meta server now sorts the server list by the number of currently active players, rather than the server registration order. - meta selection code in client can now differentiate between incompatible servers. - fixed a bug where the meta server could not distinguish between multiple servers that were running on the same host, but listening on different ports. - much code restructuring, new libraries, removal of dead code. Enjoy! -- Jon Trulson mailto:jon at radscan.com ID: 1A9A2B09, FP: C23F328A721264E7 B6188192EC733962 PGP keys at http://radscan.com/~jon/PGPKeys.txt #include "I am Nomad." -Nomad