I was just wondering, for about 5 years I played on dial up, then I moved to cable, and now, a twist of fate brings me back to the dreaded dial up. I wonder, I know that in an unlimited game, connection speed makes alot of difference (sp) but in a turn game, besides going a little slower, does connection speed make as big of a difference as it does on dial up?

NO! it does not, but it does mean u will have to be way more conservative with ur turns, look for ways to get more done with what you have, then you used to do.

ex. never move with less then full holds when going around base sectors, even if ur just moveing figs or shields take product or colo also to get the most for the turns ur useing. the point is when u move u burn turns so do all u can with them.
a few colo or product moved at a time builds up rather quickly.
also put more weight into that planet transporter, i am seeing more and more after invadeing planets there was no pt built this is a very important tool in low turn games.

If u have ur keyboard set up correctly, w/macros in place,
scripts as tight as u can make im, and you dont try and play
beyond your limits theres no reason you cant be susscessful.
It does take a bit of planing and self control to take on a
broadband player but it can be done. It really dedpends on ur specific style of play.

And dont be doing alot thru ur dial up connection at the same time ur running ur turns.

All I think that needs to be said is that Kemper 3 was on dial up the same year (2003) he got the best overall player and best CEO TW awards. Not that I give the awards a lot of weight, since the player stuff is all subjective. Still...

Maybe for YOU it might make a difference, but one can compete just fine with simple dialup and some publicly available scripts. I can't stress that enough.

Some of the best players that ever played the game were on dialup, or overseas (300+ pings) and never wrote a single script, nor spent a dime on scripts or helpers. They just learned how to play the game, ran their turns, were quick with a macro, and did what it took to win.

For me, I think I have become a better player since going to dail up. I've spent more time on the math of the game, the details of blue play, and calcualting the odds of my actions. Plus, now I burst or macro at least half of all my moves which i've not done before.

The only thing that I have a problem with playign TW from dial up is, sometimes you can't connect when you want (if someone is on the phone, or you are expecting a phone call). That and you can't run 24/7 scripts to photon those people who want to hit your grid, not that that is a big boo hoo or anything.

Best thing is to check your ping rate... To know your limitation... How Fast you are and what you can get away with..

One thing to consider for the bandwidth-limited users out there... know what your system is doing behind the scenes. If you connect up with that blazing-fast dialup speed of 56k, and then Windows Update starts downloading 20 MB of files, and your crappy Symantec AV starts its 2MB definition updates, and Outlook starts downloading email... your TW speed will come to a screeching halt.

Disable Windows Automatic Updates.
Disable all of your applications' auto update features (Java VM, Acrobat Reader, Antivirus, Office, AntiSpyware - all have it).
Keep your PC free of junk by running good antivirus (Nod32) and AdAware (http://www.lavasoftusa.com). Also run msconfig (Start/Run/msconfig) from time to time, unchecking unnecessary startup programs and services when possible.

Naturally, you'll have to do those updates manually, but at least you'll have control over when they update.

If the only thing accessing the internet is your Tradewars helper, and you can achieve a connection over 33.6 kbps, then there will probably be zero performance hit on dial-up vs. broadband. At that point, it will come down to latency (ping times), but > 33.6 kbps signifies a completely digital signal beginning at the phone company's local central office, so latency should be minimal.

+EP+

"Maybe for YOU it might make a difference"

Ouch Traitor, heh guess I have gained 0 respect from anyone. I was just pointing out that it takes me about 2 hours in an unlimited turn game to cash about 100 mill when it takes players on cable or DSL using the same script about half the time. Or do you disagree with that?

Hey, it just had to be said.

Yes, you will see a difference when you run a long term script like that. But for, ahem, AT KEYS THINGS, there isn't as much of a difference as you might think.

You asked for information regarding a turn limited game, I would like to point out. From the perspective of someone who spent most of his trade wars time on dialup, I would say that there can be a significant difference. You can still be a very good player on dialup, but basically any reactive script will be useless to you. If you want to win games, you will probably be required to find corpies that can be successful in stopping the enemy from gridding, as you will not be.

Nods, just a note even when I was on cable I couldnt stop people from gridding Heh, let me stick to cashing plz...hey! its a dirty job, why not make Ender do it??