A vast majority of the players in TODAY's builders games don't even write macros, they only use Swath.

And here lies the difference between scripters and players like myself. If a returning player wants to learn script play - I send them to Vid Kid for lessons. I offer a site that only hosts Classic style games, MBBS mode with Mega Rob turned OFF. You guys on the other hand try to force your style of play on everyone.

I'm one of those players from the 90's, I only used TWar then TWHelper, both in HVS MBBS. It wasn't until later in TWGS that I got Zoc and began writting simple macros - I can now write very simple scripts. The killers on my corps most likely had some sort of simple attack macro, but nothing at all like you have today.

You guys play "Extreme TW!" We're just exploring options to bring back what once was, and I do appreciate your comments and insight.

I might suggest that JP give us a live example of the hybrid delay mode to test on the beta server. Maybe just the Sandbox game if that's possible.

Then they're lazy. Pigs get fed, hogs get slaughtered.



Oh yeh, that's me alright. that's exactly what I do! /sarcasm



Yeh, so am I. I used telemate scripts and macros across several games on local BBSes, and so did most of the ppl I played with. Yes, databases have advanced a little, but you can do a lot with simple macros.



It would need to be tested in a real turny for stuff to start coming out. Nobody is going to invest a lot of time developing tactics for a sandbox game.

Humm.... seems we have a tourney coming up next weekend.

Micro, are you reading any of this?

Yes. The problem is, for whatever reason, you can't seem to analyze one change without holding everything else static. No single change will solve anything. There will be ripple effects that touch many other aspects of the game, and you have to deal with them as well until the game settles into a playable a state. You can't look at every single change and say "if you change that, it breaks the game". You have to be willing to break the game, then fix it again. It's already broken for many anyway. I'm willing to shake things up and see if we can finally make this a real "multiplayer game" rather than just a single player game with the ability to have more than one person in the game, which is what it is. The conversion of TW to a multiplayer game was incomplete. You guys just happen to be satisfied with that situation because you see these flaws as a way to dominate. You see something like being able to spam an opponent with messages as an ingenious tactic, not the bug that it is. Being able to destroy someone before they know you're there, that's a bug, not an elite tactic only available to the most advanced players. In multiplayer mode, there simply must be restrictions on how fast actions can be completed, and they must be balanced so that no single tactic plainly dominates the game. Anytime you say you can "always just do this", that needs to be addressed. In chess, I could "always just shoot you in the head", but that's clearly not a good rule for that game. So let's figure out how to make the game playable AND balanced.

That’s not the point actually and no I really don’t care for time limited games

That’s because you don’t know how they are using swath, The swath colonizer isn’t that fast., but the macro player is a totally different story.

Now your back to being a script writer today and making scripts that will give you more assets then I have( this one seems like a hypocritical statement)

Odd I haven’t seen that

So again.. Is it optional, since everything is supposed to be optional settings, have at it.

Actually they do, but we’re not going to talk about that, I might get ban again ..heh

Again… if it’s all optional why debate.. Just add the option and get your tailor made TWGS going already.


You mean that’s a new setting your playing with on the test server?

Again.. Just add it to the settings it is all optional, I think my self it would just be easier to not have that ship in the game to accomplish the goal I think your going for.


Think that would be when he lead Boo Inc. to one of the only 2 wins over Kraaken in a tournament game in the last 3 years (There was a major beta Issue there too, one of those changes were not going to talk about)

I don’t consider it a little rough when a well know returning player who is playing with you Back stabs noobs, talks smack on fed com all day to the noobs and then breaks the rules of the server, that actually had him ban for a day, your just upset because you decided to corp with him. A greater concern for me and the noobs I try and teach and play with in those games… are these the sort of player’s your trying to bring back?

Got to love macros, or are we back to it’s ok for you to and your less then honorable players to attack but not anyone else?

Ummm no…


That’s a load of BS, and assumed.

Then why is it every time I teach someone how to do it (really not that complicated) They think it’s great and proceed to use it?





Wrong again, they use macros, I sure hope JP isn’t making changes based on the bs your telling him about reality in games for to days players/builders. Yet again it really doesn’t matter, it’s all optional right?

Well you are definitely unique to put it nicely.

Not forced.. Most people ask how to do it, or how I did that and geez when I show them they LOVE it.. I’m working with 3 right now. To bad your boy don’t make the cut, Not going to teach someone like your boy, that has the attitude I would say did lead to loss of players.

Just make it all optional and it’s all good.

Send him an email…

You're missing the time scale on which all of this occurs. Tactics like this won't get fleshed out overnight, it could take years. And to be honest, I don't expect development to continue for that long. Whatever set of changes are made will eventually lead to a static result.

TBH, I don't want to break the game then fix it again... if we do that, the game will probably just end up staying broken forever.

As for the rest of your rant... go ahead, f*ck it all up if you want. At least I tried.

I think that might explain why you seem to think everyone who doesn't agree with you on this issue is misguided (at least that's what I gather from the tone of your posts). You think these people are against automation in any form. But what we're talking about is interactive automation. Automating tedious and repetitive tasks is one thing, and that's been done for as long as the game has been in existence, and very few people are such purists that they don't see the value in that. Even if today's scripts are far more advanced, they're basically still not going to bother most players or would-be players. But when the game became interactive and scripts evolved to interact with other players, that's when the tactics of one group of players started to push out another group of players. If we're talking about scripts that cash, maybe I can't win the game against you, but I can still have fun playing the game. But if your bot is going to pod me and there's nothing I can do about it except get my own scripts and bots and play your game, then I really don't have a choice that I can live with. So I leave.

If you think people just don't want automation in any form, you're engaged in a false argument. That's not what this is about. If you say "nobody wants to play like that today", I'd have to agree. But when it comes to interactive scripting, there are people who want to play who won't because they can't avoid such scripts, and playing against such scripts just isn't fun. For many, it's just not interesting to be killed by a program that the player probably didn't even write using a tactic that the player doesn't even need to understand. Why players who use such tactics get enjoyment out of that is beyond me. I can understand those who write them, because the idea of bot vs bot combat in a game is very appealing to some player types. That I get. But I still contend that bot vs bot games should be a variation of TradeWars, not the only game in town. That's all I'm after here.

Ok, well, I guess I can understand your position if you think it's just impossible to fix all of the problems with the game. But you could just put "I think it's impossible to fix this game so don't even try" in your signature and save us a lot of time reading your arguments against ever doing anything.

I find a lot of very useful information in your arguments, but whenever I hear "you can't do this because that", without acknowledging the possibility that you can fix "that" also, it isn't helpful. It took a lot of time for you guys to figure out how to break the game as bad as it's broken, so it won't be fixed overnight. But that's my problem. And as I've said a time or two, you'll still have your game. It's not going anywhere. So that's a false argument.

No, this is why we think many of the people here are misguided. There's no such thing as a bot that mysteriously and magically pods people. There are a few basic scripts like pdrop and citkill, that follow very basic rules, that can be used to pod people once the game is locked down. But in an open game, where people are running around, those don't work and usually get you killed for trying. In aggressive games, these scripts are rarely used.

The idea that bots magically do everything is a myth, it's propaganda used by those that want to eliminate attack scripts. None of this is about "interactive scripting" it's about attack scripts. When you talk about "interactive scripting" what you mean are scripts to photon, pdrop, and kill people. That's it. I gave you ways to shut those down at the very beginning of this discussion over a year ago.

Btw, cruncher has actually said she was against automation and scripts. She used to call herself a manual player. It's only recently that she has owned up to using other scripts. Originally, when SG was trying to teach her some of this stuff, she made it clear that she didn't even want to run red or colo scripts. So you're not really up on all of the history here.



Then spend a day and figure out how to beat these very basic scripts. If a person can't put in even a single day to learn how to play, then nothing you do will get them to stick around.

Well, it wouldn't be a complete waste of time to repeat those ideas. Some I didn't agree with, some I liked but lost track of with so much other work, and some are just lost in my notes somewhere. Just because I didn't get to something doesn't mean I didn't like the idea.

Is this hybrid delay mode active in v2.08? Where in the editors would I find it?

H

No, just a proposed idea at this point. I just wanted feedback from those who would like to slow down interactive scripts (kill scripts) but don't want to slow down the rest of the game, is this a feature that they'd be willing to use. I wasn't so interested in the debate about whether or not it would solve anything. We won't know that unless we try. But why try if those who it's targeted at won't use it?

That was exactly my stance. I played via the Java access on Ice-9 100% manually for the first 2-3 months, until I thought carple tunnel would set in!

Believe what you want, I told SG that I may some day decide that I would like to learn script play, because I did play very competitively in the past. But, that I was on a mission to return this game to what it once was. As soon as I felt I had settings that would get this game closer to that direction, I put up a server.

My first experience being "botted" myself was in the Kill'em all game on Ice-9 last year, when I called Kraaken out to show me their worse. When I began that game I played only with my own macros I wrote with zoc, after Xanos came to the rescue I had SG set me up with TWX and Mombot. I let Xanos and Timberwolf bot me.

I DO use the trading and moving scripts in Mombot now. Cherokee has done an outstanding job with the planet negotiations. I've never before gotten that much cash from a port.

My second time being botted, and first time botting another player was in the HHT 2010 replay, and again with Xanos. To honor SG I played the style he loved so much. I can honestly say I really don't care for it.

The closer the game gets to what it once was, the closer I get to my own playing style. I do like aggressive games, and don't care for crippled "builders" games. I don't care for botwars or script wars. If you put unlim script wars at one end and truce games at the opposite end of the spectrum, I fall somewhere in the middle.

And there are still players who do, bless their little digits, play this game 100% manually and are proud of it. One that comes to mind is a player named Junkpile on Ice-9.

You are not hearing my tone correctly.

I think these people have pulled the proverbial wool over your eyes and are upset that they can’t kill everyone like they used to in the way back when days.

So is girding and taking down grid and even invading when you get to a point where teams have 100+ planets in a base for example.

Umm no, when a player like cruncher and the crew she rolls with have the ability to generate more resources it will effect the players that don’t.

That’s what builder games are for… and a simple solution for not being attacked would be to make the option that a player can’t attack another player. Right?

Bots can’t pod you, (I really think the understanding of bots is not there and definitely hasn’t been used in the right context) If your in a killem all game on all most any server out there then yeah expect a fight, if you play a builder game.. Well expect to build. My only real concern when it comes to you is what change are you really going to force on people and what really will be optional (not everything has been) Then I can just deal with the sysop on setting.

Not what I think.

Huh… don’t get that one

Sounds more like an advertising issue then a game issue. Like somany of us have pointed out ways to avoiding kill scripts via game setting and different game edits.

There not a lot of players that write scripts out there.. But a lot of them use them, I don’t need to build my own car to have fun driving it. If someone doesn’t understand the script how do they know to use it in the right instance consider there are over 1000 scripts just for twx floating around.

I think it’s because you don’t actually play.


(again not using the “bot’s” in the correct context) I think you mean scripts or macros

It’s not the “only game in town” and so long as what changes go into effect are OPTIONAL then I don’t see any reason for any of these debates or testing, really I think all your doing is tailor making a server for cruncher and I’m fine with that, Only time I have problems is with the changes that the sysop or server can’t have the option for other then upgrade or don’t upgrade to the new versions.

I'll pass on the book. You don't get what I'm saying, and I'll admit, I don't get you. At all. Let's leave it at that. We're coming at this from very different perspectives. I'll leave you alone. That's the best I can do for you.