Right, that's been around a long time. There are other variations, too. If CPC is really high
and the torper's ping sucks, then they'll miss you. If CPC is low, or the torper's ping is
really low, they can still hit you. By low, I mean 130 or so. Get above 150 and it gets hard
to hit that.

But, again, adapt. See, if you retreat and sit in the previous sector, then you're sitting
in the previous sector. Most of us have retreat torpers too, and can just torp the retreat
sector instead of the hit sector. Add a kill to the back of that, done and done.

But it's even easier to adapt than that: add a pattern detector. Hit-retreats are slower
than standard hit-twarps, so only torp the hits that match specific patterns and don't
torp the ones that are hard to hit. At that point, you can spend a lot of time and effort
getting very little in return.



It's hard to build and maintain a base underneath people's figs. If I fig an area, you aren't
there. Area of denial. If you don't grid, today, people will just map, cash, probe and invade.
All ur bases R belong to gridders.

Now see, that's exactly the type of play that's killing anyone who might want to log into a game for the very first time. I consider myself a bit on the geeky side, but you just went flying over my head talking about CPC.

If I were coming to this game today, not knowing anything about it. I wouldn't stay. Not with all the whizz-bang high graphic games out there to choose from. Why would I? I just got killed within seconds.

So, my question to you is, how do we keep this game alive and help the "script kiddies" to get back to basics?

First of all, this isn't script kiddy anything. It's nothing but knowing your
advantage and knowing how to press it. I do the same thing in other games,
too. Like chess, if you have a positional advantage you have to capitalize
on it or you'll stalemate (positional advantages tend to be temporary), if
you have a material advantage then you want to press it by trading down.

Anyway. Scripts may be one way to do that, but to think they're the only
way is a huge mistake. The difference is in the level of aggression between
now and then. Players today are more aggressive than they used to be. You're
never going to get them "back to basics" because that's simply not fun. It's
the only reason I still (when I do) play this game.

Some of us just enjoy crushing people into dust. A slow killer is still a killer.



That's why it's important to choose a game that isn't aggressive, or chose
a game that's very new. That way you have the best opportunity. JP is working
on a way to slow the game down with an "old school" mode, but until that's
perfected... the best you can do is be mindful of the style of play before you
join a game.

CPC is commands per cycle. The game has a "heartbeat" that you can change
in tedit. By default, this is 1 second. But... it can be set to other things. Each
cycle allows you to queue a certain number of commands. Unlimited CPC can
produce weird results. Very high CPCs mean you can burst a lot of stuff in a
single macro burst. Low CPCs means you can't burst much of anything. Low CPCs
make it difficult to grid because you have to be very careful how much you
buffer in a single macro.

Yeah, that would be nice. We need a TW Bootcamp!

But in the mean time, I've always taken a newbie or two under my wing, if everyone did that it would help. And we could start them in some basic stock MBBS mode games.

So I'm back, training newbies again encouraging more old school players to do the same. Now I just gotta see who's banging stock games anymore.

Oh, I understand that completely. There's only so much building a person can do before you want to break out and kill someone. But, this is what i'm seeing that makes no sense to me what-so-ever. "Team Krakken" had a game completly locked out in week 2, probably could have done it sooner. Now the 3 of them are in the game alone, 2600 planets, not one citadel and they keep playing thier bots. What is up with that? And they are still playing. I make a point to go in and ram their figs, single fig attack their ship if they have me in their IG, and CBY daily.

I play TW for the challenge of playing other real people, so this is what I don't understand, how can anyone enjoy accumulating assets with nothing or no one to use them against? Unless they intend to attempt to invade ferrengal, I just don't get it. An entire 20k sector public game for the private pleasures of 3 people? That's just insane!

Lockdown mode. Games that are considered "done" get put in maintenance until the game
is rebanged. You should let the sysop know so he/she can rebang it for them.

One thing that will help is when JP lets us rebang games w/o taking the server down. I
can lock a game, boot everyone from it and rebang via server-side script. That'd be nice,
I could have games bang every 30 days automatically.



3 aggressive people is plenty for a 20k. I'd imagine, tho, they're just waiting for the
rebang. Since there's no defined "win" criteria, people use #SD# as the measure. If
everyone else is #SD# when the game is rebanged, they win. That's kindof how it works
now.

sure I used to play by hand. but i also adapted and used exactly the tactics sing talked about. knowing what the player is doing when he is busting up a grid, and countering it. Its what made the game fun for me. I later was able to think rather then just build. i never liked building. I always liked some sort of conflict in a game. even if it was just messing with people at dock when they would bust up experience.

oh and cruncher, grids have always been very important. I used to always keep so many turns to bust grids up and lay new grids. if I didn't, a corpie would always designate their turns to do such a thing. Like sing said again, if you have no grid you get found right away.

and newbies... you don't always have to build in a Darn dead end. be creative with your base location to begin with. until you don't really care if you have been found. It may require you to spread thin. but sometimes more locations is better. especially when your trying to get a movable planet.

This is what I don't understand about script or bot playing. I play the game for the challenge as much as the socializing. If all you have are scripts and bots running and you're AFK, what's the point?

This is a multi-player game and I want to play against and with real people. Computer video games are boring, you can figure those out... but playing with real people who make really wild decisions, now that's fun! Watching the CLV list and scratching your head wondering what that player just did to effect their exp/align that way. That's fun! Setting a bot on it's appointed duties and walk away to later learn, oh yeah, I killed that guy today. I don't get it.[/quote]

I started to respond to this last night after the late night trip, but figured after working for 12 hours I would end up getting banned for my initial thoughts.

Write a script and you will find the challenge of writing something that copes with real people making wild decisions. Scripting is a challenge because you have to know the game, what possible outcomes can be, and how your current adversary might respond. What I do by script is much the same as you do by hand to a point. I don't run AFK kill scripts (defensive yes) because they will simply get a person killed if the other player is any good. AFK offensive kill scripts work well on newbies only.

Bots to me indicate another player controlling another player's actions, and I don't care for bots.

               / Promethius / Enigma / Wolfen /

"A man who has no skills can be taught, a man who has no honor has nothing."

Ok, so now I'm learning more. I had no idea people were using a bot to control another player, basically duping then, right? Yes, that is totally unacceptable. I knew a player many years ago whom I thought was a TW genious. Turns out he was a control freak duping. When I found that out I vowed he would never play on a server I was playing on because I would hunt him like the dog that we was.

Ok, back to the script. From what I'm hearing, these scripts are written for basically the first few hours of the game to get the initial advantage? I've played a few tourneys and my corp would practice first day scenerios to get our game down and everyone knew exactly what was expected and our contingincy plans. Is this entriely automated? I'm just trying to understand why you would prefer to play with scritps?

I view controlling another player (live or dupe) as basically duping, but many others find it acceptable due to conflicting time schedules or whatever. I've seen experienced players get frustrated by a newbie, and simply take over that player by bot. If I was the newbie, I would learn how to type CBY.

Scripts are written for different phases of the game and whatever the current goal is. Scripts can be automated to the point of almost locking down some edits if the scripter has enough game knowledge and scripting skill. I use scripts because of the challenge in writing one that (a) doesn't get me killed, and (b) accomplishes whatever my goal is. Alien capping is one of those things easily done by hand, complicated somewhat to script. The player will almost always make better decisions than a script given time to make that decison.

               / Promethius / Enigma / Wolfen /

"A man who has no skills can be taught, a man who has no honor has nothing."

Let me throw this out there ...
The best bot script that was publicly out there and used by alot of players ...
And not considered a bot script (but really is)
Rammers Team SDT

It controls the cashing process of multi players and a furber
All almost totally hands free.

But most do not have a problem with this bot script.

Bots are not always duping , but it can automate multi player interactions to accomplish many things , even invading or going aggressive on others.

This is the point , I think Cruncher wants things to be as they were ... slower when only a few players
could always win their games with most other players being their victims.
The tide has changed and those who were walked on have gotten better and developed the tools to walk over others the way they were walked on before.

Sure bots have made it possible for someone like me with a high ping to get a corpie with a low ping to do the stopping of others ... just another tool.

If you like slow building games , then set up a trade hugs game or a truce type (a false sense of security)
game , or find one .. they are out there.

But the majority of players like the action.
And scripts are just part of it.

Team Kraaken members also teach other players from time to time . We just prefer to teach by voice
instructions.
Those that don't listen are removed and we go on.

Those that stick it out learn.
I'de love the game to continue another 20 yrs.
But wyning about how you want it to be is not productive to the cause.

my 2¢

The difference in Rammers Team SDT and M()M bot, OZ's bot, and the Kraaken bot is that each player must be available to start the cashing for team SDT. The other three bots, someone else can decide what a player (who may or may not be at keys) is going to do.

               / Promethius / Enigma / Wolfen /

"A man who has no skills can be taught, a man who has no honor has nothing."

Sorry if you think I'm wyning, I'm actually saying WTF has happened to the game I love! I love the chatter on Fed Com, I love playing with and against real people, not scripts or bots. I want players at the keys dangit!

If you think I'm one of the ones who did got a kick out of kicking butt, then you don't know me at all. What was that early forum we used.. Majornet? I was one of the first ones who gave away everything I knew about the game. I really enjoyed playing and found I lacked competition, so became the teacher. Students are supposed to surpass the teacher, didn't you know that? Today I continue the tradition of taking newbies onto my corp. The only time I won't is in a tourney.
I don't want a slow game, I want you at the keys! I refuse to play against automation!

Then your likely going to want to wait for JP's oldschool beta to finish. Very few if any players I know do not use some sort of script with the most prevalent being Mombot followed by OZ/K/etc. While there are still players who only use single purpose scripts (Sing/Prom) they are few and far between. I'd estimate that at least 80% of the active base use a form of bot based off my interactions with players. Honestly while I myself use a Modified Mombot I think it is pretty cheap, but I use it anyways to compete and for corp convenience.

That said I don't believe scripts are the issue, as much as I believe the players that rely on them to play the entire game and lose to more aggressive and better versed players. I have yet to see a script that cannot be beat by a intelligent adversary, but it takes work to learn how to compete in todays Tradewars and those that are complaining apparently do not feel they should have to work for said win. As Sing mentioned the issues revolving in todays TW have very little to do with automation (as cheap as I feel 24/7 keytime may be) and very much with game choice and inability to change the 80-90's mindset to 2010.



I think we need a definition of script kiddie here, because the majority of players in this forum your posting on write or attempt to write their own scripts to compete with. As to your question how do you get new players to stop relying totally on WORLD-SST and other automated scripts. Well I think thats pretty simple, force them as the teacher you state you are to play turn based bangs. It's pretty simple actually take away the reliance and their forced to learn OR as has been the case time and time again they go Afk forever and make the teacher do all the work in game via *Bot.

As someone who groups with allot of newer players ive heard the many excuses and have seen far fewer others go onto learn more about the game and hold there own. How many players know what a figdecay is? Truces and Building games cater to a slower crowd who uses these "unique" server settings to build and then at the end of truce those players disappear till the next truce game. Why? Well in my opinion they don't know how to move past building and into offense (and other end of game strats/game mechanics) which in turn leads someone to be overly defensive or worse quit.



Oh and I think a combo of scripts and macros is the best offense because while macros can be faster there is definitely a thought processing delay that well-written scripts can and do overcome.

Have you ever heard of the twgs Outpost4? That's kinda what they are about....

I also believe UTW has a game Titled "Newbie boot camp" or newbie builder game or something like that with 1 or 2 in game moderators....




Saying WTF / whining ...... not seeing the difference from you….



I see fed chatter all the time…maybe people don’t want to talk to you?......hmmmm

Going to be hard to not play against bot’s unless your playing new players….so other then those last 2 servers check the 2 newbie friendly games Ice9 has sence you’re there anyway….50% of those guys I don’t think use bots to much…and think they both have a time limit to boot…



I’m a noob…I don’t have a clue what Majoenet is… what can you teach me…