That would be helpful, IF we can keep them interested long enough to explore those options.



The problem here is two-fold, first keeping them alive in the game long enough to hold their interest, then the “learning” curve to learn how to use these new scripts. Talk about time commitment....





But, that is the game. You do your best and hope it holds up to invasion. It’s not that difficult in low turn games. What I see are too many turns, resulting in far too much cash to blow through anyone’s off-line defenses. Limit recourses/turns and off-line defenses will hold. You won’t need AFK defense scripts.





Yes, I remember you asking JP for that option, you could set games to open and close for each time zone. Then players could rest easy knowing no one could log in during x hours.





I know, I’ve asked JP to give us a timer delay for the refresh on that screen. I don’t see why that needs to be refreshed other than once a day, just the give the player looking in an “idea” of what’s going on in the game, and not a blow-by-blow who’s logging in when, doing what, in which ship, etc. Sysops and remote sysops will naturally get a current CLV – just limit the refresh from the players menu.

So, in a nutshell, the timing delays that are a part of this new release will have some effect on game play, but not much. Most of the pacing JP worked on was so the host server’s CPU didn’t get pegged at 100% or over-worked. (I’m not a computer programmer, so this is layman’s terminology.) Sysops can create settings that will favor one style of play over another, but will not prevent more experienced players from killing newbies.

Except there's more to a game than just your base's immediate defense. All MBBS games where people megarob depend on buyer and seller ports. Your cash and fighters (aka your defense) depend on your ability to manage that port set. Also, skilled invaders know how to moth cheaply. You cannot produce enough ore in most games to keep people out indefinitely, which means you need to buy ore. How can you do that if you have no ports? Have no cash?

It's not the number of turns, it's the efficiency ratio of those turns that matter. People are too efficient for early game defenses to matter. It isn't until large numbers of planets are completely full of ore (late game) that long-term passive defense can hold.



I can do it in the beta using a script. Games can be disabled now while the server is still running.



You need to think at a higher level. You are looking to solve a technical problem with a technical solution, but that will only invite someone to come along with yet another technical workaround.

Ex: I can write a bot script to log someone in and have them pass fighits to me via ICQ, the web, SMS, whatever. I can spread out time costs very efficiently using scripts. Don't assume we all need the game scores screen, there are plenty of other ways to walk around the way time limits are currently implemented.

If we want to solve the time limit problem, we need a completely new approach to time limits.

Are you guys really having this debate again?

It's obvious I don't know all the ways high scripters have to play this game. I'm just trying to let new returning sysops know that the new pace settings aren't the end-all of high script players.

And nothing is going to stop newbie deaths, just today an old returning player killed two newbies, thought maybe they were dupes, or that was his story.

This is a war game, and if you can't take the heat, stay out of the kitchen.

That being said we need a few "cooler" kitchens! LOL

Or, better yet more experienced players willing to take newbies in and teach them. I know Vid and Kewl do, but we need more willing to teach the game basics, not just how to use what script when.

Can I withdraw the question?

LOL. It's a bit of a button issue here, isn't it?

This is probably the most debated subject thats ever been brought up that hasn't been resolve yet.

How do you make a game last longer and make it easier for new players coming into the game to get started? That's the question.
The answer isn't so simple.
Here's the problems that arise.

Unlimited turn games rarely last longer than a few days.
Time limits can help, but if you have good scripters with a full corp, that can be overcome.
Delays just give the advantage to the scripters because there's no way someone with lesser scripts or playing by hand are going to compete no matter how much you slow the game down.

My take on the best way to accomplish this is several ways.
1) Defensive ship odds high/offensive odds medium. Nothing more than 3:1 offensive odds.
2) Time limit less than 24 hours when all corp members time is added, with a severe log in penalty imposed. (example 5 man corp times 4 hour limit = 20 hours total with a 30 minute log in penalty)
3) Short cit times up to L2, with much longer cit times thereafter.
4) High production on planet product, but medium fig production on planets.
5) Stardock next to fed space in and out.
6) Red ships slightly less odds than the biggest blue ship.
7) Allow ways for blues to get started early. Start up fuel on new planets ect...

D,

The distillation is simple, if unpalatable.

There is no way in hell to prevent script writers, as opposed to scripters (users of scripts), from using undetectable scripts. The twixie pixies can be detected and stopped. No argument there.

I can write code that would be difficult to detect as a script without significant effort on the gameop/sysop/etc part; there are probably dozens of TW players better at programming than me, with even more off the wall thoughts as to how to go about it.

Kav

Exactly my point. That's why anyone attempting to prevent scripts from being used will be fighting a losing battle. What I was doing was giving examples of ways that players that don't use twx might be able to compete somewhat. Altho, even then it's going to be an uphill battle for anyone with crappy scripts or no scripts.

If we go back and look at the settings that were added 2002 - 2004 you'll see settings that enable or enhance scripts that are used today. If we start peeling back the layers to get this back to the core multi-player game, before things like interactive sub-prompts and abort display were added, then we may have a more "human friendly" game.

I'd like to see a sysop toggle to remove abort display as a player side option. From what I've seen, without that on it cripples most if not all TWX and Mombot scripts. The game can absolutely be played without those, and everything in Swath will work except turbo mode.

And yes, I fully understand that scripts can be modified to work without the abort display, and this game will always be scriptable. But taking that out is a huge "Not Welcome" matt for players who's style of play is not welcome in that game.

Making the game settings even easier is not the answer. I do like your time limit suggestion though.

Abort display isn't a scripter friendly option, it's a macro friendly option. And ISPs benefit non-scripters more than scripters, as you can't possible hope to hold a manual plock w/o it (but you can drop on the decay msg w/ a script and do so pretty fast).



You should be aware that this recommendation will only make scripts far more powerful compared to their macro counter-parts. As for playing strictly by hand, almost nobody actually does that many more. Try colonizing 1m colos w/o the use of macros and you'll see what I mean.

Again, peeling back the layers... let’s keep fig lock turned off. That was an option added later. The only reason it’s there is to use a planet as a weapon. We already have the option to turn that off.



I understand exactly what it takes to play 100% manually. I did it for 2 years when I started, and I did it for 2 months when I returned. I just want to disable TWX and Mombot, players will still have use of Swath and anyone can script Zoc.

So not everyone can script using TWX? Sounds more like you want to force others to use your toys instead of everyone having a choice.

I just want to re-focus on the fact that it's not the scripts that need to be addressed, it's the tactics that are being used. It's the tactics that break the game, not automation.

From that point of view, it shouldn't be that hard to monitor players that are watching when users log on and then monitoring port activity in CIM so they can go kill them.

I'm sure that other undesireable activities have simular things one could monitor.