What Happened To Tim Wiseman!
Clendria
emailed over the last few weeks and he has not answered a single one! What kind
of customer service is that! And another thing, why hasn't he posted anything
to the newsgroup lately?
Cheers!
Mike M.
Oliver Preiss
I sent a mail to him two days ago and got the answer yesterday ... can't complain
about service :-) You sent your mail to 'coc...@aol.com' (?) , if not you should
...
cu, op
^Hawk^
>Does anyone know what on earth happened Tim Wiseman? I have sent him many, many
>emailed over the last few weeks and he has not answered a single one! What kind
Can't agree ... all my mails to coc...@aol.com are answered within
24h (the most in about some minutes) ! ;-)
Are you sure that your mails are adressed right ?
Bye, ^Hawk^ - the DarkSoft-Productions.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
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Clendria
>
Yes!!!! I am not stupid! I emailed to coc...@aol.com and got no answer! I
need to know the new player side file formats for the new 999 host thing for a
new free client me and my friends are working on and lumberjack forgot (or was
too lazy) to post the new formats on the 999 host page! I THINK HE IS IGNORING
ME!!!!!!!!
Mike M.
Cocomax
Oh be quiet Mike,
Because of something that happened a few weeks back, I will no longer have any
dealings with about 30 different people, (including you), I will not even
answer their email anymore. I do not want to talk about it, I would just be
handing them a pile of flame war ammo. Now back to work on version 4.
Tim Wisseman
(Not Wiseman, not Lumberjack and not Smart, Wisseman)
Sumdawgy
In article <19981024133104...@ng86.aol.com>, clen...@aol.com
(Clendria) writes:
>Does anyone know what on earth happened Tim Wiseman? I have sent him many,
>many
>emailed over the last few weeks and he has not answered a single one! What
>kind
>of customer service is that! And another thing, why hasn't he posted anything
>to the newsgroup lately?
sorry I get my answers in 12 hours usually........
are you SURE you sent to the right address.......?
-dawgy
>10. Q: "So the date of conception (of the baby) was August 8th?"
> A: "Yes."
> Q: "And what were you doing at that time?"
Ken and Lois Anderson
Crystals and the Privies at a disadvantage? They might/would have to choose
between capturing enemy ships and building more of their own.
Just a thought....
Cheers
Ken
Cocomax wrote:
> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
> own
>
> or
>
> 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>
> Tim
Lev Zakrevski
>
> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
> own
>
> or
>
> 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
Well, being close to ship limit, I would definetely make a deal with a
neigbhor -
give me 20 planets for 1 turn, then I will give you them back +
additional 20...
Basically, with several races, there can be some tricks. Also, it is a
little bit
unfair to races with small ships (Lisards, Fashists). I would prefer to
count not
the number of ships, but the total mass of all ships (it should be more
difficult
to support a Gorbie than medium freighter!). Also, make all parameters
configurable -
a lot of people (including me) would not like to play with game with too
many ships
(without real good fleet tools etc - took too much time!)
>
> Tim
Lev Zakrevski
Leif N. Petersen
> Hmmmm, I want to think about this a bit more but wouldn't it sort of put the
> Crystals and the Privies at a disadvantage? They might/would have to choose
> between capturing enemy ships and building more of their own.
>
> Just a thought....
>
> Cheers
>
> Ken
>
> Cocomax wrote:
>
> > What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> >
> > 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
> > own
> >
> > or
> >
> > 2X the number of planets that you own
> >
> > If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
> >
> > Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
> >
> > Tim
Tim, that reminds me of Warcraft (both one and two) that the amount of
units depended on the amount of farms you had.........personally I kinda
like the current model, otherwise everybody will be so busy building up
there economy there will be no action!:) Also it would favor strong
players, so that those being attack would be toast.....I've been in that
sorta situation, and it just makes one FRUSTRATED :)
please please please please please please....not that :)
>
>
>
>
>
=-=Leif Petersen=-=
IRC: crewman
Alexander Babanov
> Maybe big ships should count as 2 ships?
That about limit on ship mass per player?
/ Alex
Ken and Lois Anderson
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>
> Tim
On this point, how about no more PBPs for colonizing a ship that you are capable
of building (ie is in your ship list). That would slow down those who use
resources just to fill ship slots but wouldn't penalize players who capture
lesser ships in combat (or web or rob and tow/capture). Either that or have a
"no mercy" option to skuttle the hulk rather than capture the ship.
I also like the idea of basing the number of ships on mass, but better add some
factor for special capabilities like HYP or Grav too.
2 cents worth (maybe)
Cheers
Ken
^Hawk^
>>Are you sure that your mails are adressed right ?
> Yes!!!! I am not stupid! I emailed to coc...@aol.com and got no answer! I
>need to know the new player side file formats for the new 999 host thing for a
>new free client me and my friends are working on and lumberjack forgot (or was
>too lazy) to post the new formats on the 999 host page!
Sorry ... we're (till now) only programming on the host side.
> I THINK HE IS IGNORING ME!!!!!!!!
If it's so then I think that he has a good reason ... =;) ... to
_many_ mails in a to short time !? :-)
Cocomax
What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
own
or
2X the number of planets that you own
If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
Tim
Sumdawgy
In article <19981024203220...@ngol01.aol.com>, coc...@aol.com
(Cocomax) writes:
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
>own
>
>or
>
> 2X the number of planets that you ow
hmmm...........
10 ships per player...... +1 per planet & 2 MORE for ea SB....
Cocomax
<< Hmmmm, I want to think about this a bit more but wouldn't it sort of put the
Crystals and the Privies at a disadvantage? They might/would have to choose
between capturing enemy ships and building more of their own.
>>
They could build to their limit and then capture ships.
Maybe small ships should only count as 1/2 a ship?
Maybe big ships should count as 2 ships?
Tim
r...@casema.net
> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
> own
This is one of the best ideas I've heard on this subject till now. It
is a possibility to exclude the ship per starbase, though. With it,
one might start to think defensively, building starbases to gain
additional ships. Without it, you *have* to expand in order to gain
more ships. Even that crappy amorph planet can become interesting now
that it'll gain you another ship :-)
Greetings,
Reinout
--
Reinout van Rees => R.va...@altavista.net
"A call to arms - but no-one there to answer, silence falls,
drowning the echoes of yesterday's wrongs" - Pallas
Charles Scripter
> Does anyone know what on earth happened Tim Wiseman? I have sent him
> many, many emailed over the last few weeks and he has not answered a
> single one! What kind of customer service is that!
Well, now we see that you've managed to piss Tim off... Now you
know why he doesn't answer your requests...
Just for the record, I've had good results from my emails to Tim,
despite my occassional obtuse questions...
--
Charles Scripter * cescr...@portup.com www.portup.com/~cescripter
Send me NO unsolicited commercial email!
furball
Cocomax wrote in message
>What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that
you
>own
>
>
> 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
Definately in favour of no more PBP's for colonisation.
Ship limit sounds reasonable except for HYP capable empires who tend to
expand far faster in the early game. Somewhat of an advantage there
methinks. Still, only one way to know for sure....... Playtest, playtest,
playtest.
Robert Bohnenberger DMD
controlled by the player so one clan planets wouldn't mean so much?
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you own
> or
> 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
---END OF MESSAGE---
Please note: remove "nospam", or similar tag if present in address when
replying to email. And don't forget to brush and floss daily.
Erik Sprangers
>> Does anyone know what on earth happened Tim Wiseman? I have sent him many, many
>> emailed over the last few weeks and he has not answered a single one! What kind
>> of customer service is that! And another thing, why hasn't he posted anything
>> to the newsgroup lately?
Maybe he's busy:
- programming vgap v4
- programming new v3 hosts
- answering some of his (assumed) 200 emails a day
But then again, i've sent him an email twice and in both cases got a
response within one or two days.... he even found out what the problem
was with my turn file at the time.... how's that for (ahem) customer
service.
Regards, Erik
Siesta en Espana : http://www.xs4all.nl/~syrinx
Syrinx VGA-Planets : http://www.xs4all.nl/~syrinx/vgap
Last Dollar Big Band : http://www.xs4all.nl/~syrinx/ldbb.htm
Carsten (FLP) Blume
Robert Bohnenberger DMD schrieb in Nachricht <3632A9...@erols.com>...
>What if you partially based it on the total number of factories
>controlled by the player so one clan planets wouldn't mean so much?
Good idea. Give me the borgs, please ;-).
I悲 prefer the already mentioned ship mass limit.
Carsten
Donovan
>
>What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
>own
Let's see, one of my games: Fed, 43 planets, 33 bases, 154 ships. In
this model I'd be allowed a max. of 86 ships. Thanks, but no thanks.
IMHO such a model would only reserve slots for the big bad
carrier-races.
On the good side: it would be a good motivation to expand your
territory if you the number of ships is based on number of planets. In
such a situation my friendly border with my neighbour wouldn't be such
a good thing to me.
>or
>
> 2X the number of planets that you own
Hello Cyborg, hello Privateer.....
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
LOL, start out with one planet and two ships: first turn there's
nothing your base can do......
Let's say I'm Priv or Crystal (as another poster suggested). I build
up to my limit, snatch a bunch of ships from other people and I don't
get to build any new ships until I colonize a couple of new planets.
Whoever I snatched the ship from however gets to replace it because he
now has some "personal slots" free.
Hmm.. might actually be a nice way to stop the Privvie's scrificial
lamb tactic. But the Crystalline is screwed.
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
Or scratch the SDSF entirely. Apart from maybe the Borg, does anyone
even use it for anything other than controlling the queue?
Isn't the current system working fine on a "you get to build whatever
your economy can support" basis? If the race you play needs lots of
medium ships and you're able to build them in numbers, there shouldn't
be anything other than a total limit to prevent you from cranking them
out. If your race depends on the biggest of big ships, you probably
won't be able to build them in the same numbers. But then again you
get to exchange them three to one against those medium ships.
True, post-shiplimit requires a slight change of tactics for the
non-carrier races especially, but building a lot of bases gets you a
long way.
My question is: how will fleet-battle alter the (post-limit) balance?
If three medium torpers can whack a large carrier without losing two
ships in return, and the medium torper race already has far more ships
won't this shift the balance over to them?
Donovan
Federal HQ & Bitmap Centre at http://www.xs4all.nl/~donovan
Mark Wilmot
>
>What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
>own
>
>or
>
> 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>
> Tim
An interesting idea; but I'd rather have the numbers all host configurable, ie, x per player + y
ships per planet plus z ships per starbase.
Mark
Wuppdich
should cost something like "support-points (SP)". A Transport should cost
only one support points, perhaps some smaller scouts/probes too. A small
gunboat like the BR4/BR5 2 points, up to the Anni/Gorbie with 20+ points.
Small carrier (Patriot) should cost an extra point, bigger like the virgo 2
extra points (maintance/repair of the fighter).
A planet alone should not give you a SP (one-clan-posts), but spacedocs
(starbases ?) and a speciall type of building on a planet.
The problem of this version is to find a good balance SP in the ship list.
It's a lot of work ...
Sumdawgy
In article <19981024220853...@ngol01.aol.com>, coc...@aol.com
(Cocomax) writes:
> They could build to their limit and then capture ships.
>
> Maybe small ships should only count as 1/2 a ship?
>
> Maybe big ships should count as 2 ships?
how about a hull mass factory multiple
which is raised by # of SB?
I also agree that the factors should be configurable....
Sumdawgy
In article <3632f7ba...@news.xs4all.nl>, don...@xs4all.nl (Donovan)
writes:
>Let's see, one of my games: Fed, 43 planets, 33 bases, 154 ships. In
>this model I'd be allowed a max. of 86 ships. Thanks, but no thanks.
>
>IMHO such a model would only reserve slots for the big bad
>carrier-races.
>
>On the good side: it would be a good motivation to expand your
>territory if you the number of ships is based on number of planets. In
>such a situation my friendly border with my neighbour wouldn't be such
>a good thing to me.
exactly I like this format!! let it fester........uhhh.....GROW..uhhh yah...
a while first!!
Sumdawgy
In article <Pine.GSO.3.95.iB1.0.981024223948.18819B-100000@vtn1>, "Leif N.
Petersen" <yf...@victoria.tc.ca> writes:
>Tim, that reminds me of Warcraft (both one and two) that the amount of
>units depended on the amount of farms you had.........personally I kinda
>like the current model, otherwise everybody will be so busy building up
>there economy there will be no action!:) Also it would favor strong
>players, so that those being attack would be toast.....I've been in that
>sorta situation, and it just makes one FRUSTRATED :)
>
PERSONALLY!! I LOVE WARCRAFT!!
Aand this idea does match the farms idea and I think works well..
>>heh I alwas knew you were a wuss at heart <g> <<
(will change his name on IRC from now on.........just kidding)
beneboy
>
> Does anyone know what on earth happened Tim Wiseman? I have sent him many, many
> emailed over the last few weeks and he has not answered a single one! What kind
> of customer service is that! And another thing, why hasn't he posted anything
> to the newsgroup lately?
>
>
> Mike M.
I sent him an e-mail the other day and got a reply within 2 hours. No
problems for me.
Bryan
MattClousr
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase
> that you own or 2X the number of planets that you own. If you are
> over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
I like the idea, but the previous posts about using mass instead of raw numbers
strikes me as a better way to do this. This solves the Gorbie vs.MCBR issue.
I would also think Donovan's point earlier .... "Let's see, one of my games:
Fed, 43 planets, 33 bases, 154 ships. In this model I'd be allowed a max. of 86
ships. Thanks, but no thanks." is a fair one, but Mark suggestion "... I'd
rather have the numbers all host configurable, ie, x per player + y ships per
planet plus z ships per starbase" is the solution. I greatly prefer Host
configurable options....
A quick question - what about a player close to his max ship limit who just
lost or gave away some planets - how would you (Tim) handle this?? Would he
then "loose" several ships, or would he just not be able to build more 'til his
planet count was back up. I would definitely prefer not being able to produce
instead of "loosing" ships.....
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
Absolutely!!! I agree 100%!!!!
Matt
Cocomax
>From: Lev Zakrevski <za...@bu.edu>
>Date: Sat, 24 Oct 1998 23:58:47 -0400
>...
>Well, being close to ship limit, I would definetely make a deal with a
>neigbhor -
>give me 20 planets for 1 turn, then I will give you them back +
>additional 20...
How about, if you own a planet for 10 turn you get 1 ship 20 turns you get 2
ships and 30 turns you get 3 ships.
Tim
Robert Bohnenberger DMD
You're right about the borgs. All this does is raise the question of
how valuable ships are. Is a cube ton for ton more or less valuable
than an MBR? In my mind a mass limit perhaps unfairly favors races with
small but useful ships. What good are the borgs if you can't chunnel in
lots of cubes? Especially if you're fighting a Priv with lots of MBRs.
--
Darkman
just
> lost or gave away some planets - how would you (Tim) handle this?? Would
he
> then "loose" several ships, or would he just not be able to build more
'til his
> planet count was back up. I would definitely prefer not being able to
produce
> instead of "loosing" ships.....
This also illustrates another problem. Race A is at it's ship limit. Race B
allied with Race A is not. Race B can build and give ships to Race A.
The solution is something from Moo2, each SB produces command points each
ship costs command points based on it's size. If you are over your command
points it's costs a certian amount of money. I don't know how this could be
applied to this version.
Robert Cook
>What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
>own
>or
> 2X the number of planets that you own
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
Eh... I dunno. What would happen if you build up to your limit and
then suffer the loss of some planets? Would your 'extra' ships just
disappear?
Robert M. Cook
http://www.sos.net/~cook/index.htm
Before sending me e-mail, remove the animal name
from my address.
Sumdawgy
In article <19981025092731...@ngol03.aol.com>, mattc...@aol.com
(MattClousr) writes:
>I like the idea, but the previous posts about using mass instead of raw
>numbers
>strikes me as a better way to do this. This solves the Gorbie vs.MCBR issue.
>
I agree the mass & number of factories/SB seem a better way
Not unlike the CIVILIZATION way of tying the number of units to the size of a
city...
Leif N. Petersen
> On 25 Oct 1998 00:32:20 GMT, coc...@aol.com (Cocomax) wrote:
>
> >
> >What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> >
> > 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
> >own
MEGA SNIP!:)
>
>
> Isn't the current system working fine on a "you get to build whatever
> your economy can support" basis? If the race you play needs lots of
> medium ships and you're able to build them in numbers, there shouldn't
> be anything other than a total limit to prevent you from cranking them
> out. If your race depends on the biggest of big ships, you probably
> won't be able to build them in the same numbers. But then again you
> get to exchange them three to one against those medium ships.
Yeah I kinda like this system we have at present.....I mean it's nice and
simple.... all the other systems sound a lot more complicated, and could
really damage the game...IMHO
> True, post-shiplimit requires a slight change of tactics for the
> non-carrier races especially, but building a lot of bases gets you a
> long way.
>
> My question is: how will fleet-battle alter the (post-limit) balance?
> If three medium torpers can whack a large carrier without losing two
> ships in return, and the medium torper race already has far more ships
> won't this shift the balance over to them?
>
> Donovan
>
> Federal HQ & Bitmap Centre at http://www.xs4all.nl/~donovan
>
>
=-=Leif Petersen=-=
IRC: crewman
Leif N. Petersen
won't that really slow down the game a lot? I mean we'd all be waiting
around to get ships built......while the one strong player can than crush
all of us, I mean OUCH!
>
>
>
>
>
>
=-=Leif Petersen=-=
IRC: crewman
Pasternak
>What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
>own
I think it's no good..
I fear it would be a great loss for strategy side.
By now, before to build a base I think twice. It could be even onto a
poor planet, but has some purpose (e.g.: fixing ships for Priv). With
the method you propose, build a lot of bases, senseless but to have a
greater number of ships (not build by the base itself, but permitted
by it!) would be a good "strategy" (it's a pity it isn't a strategy at
all! :( )
Then, it would have no more sense have differente mineral resources
planet by planet! By now a ship limit already existes: resources!! And
in that view meteors showers (or Asteroid Addon) has a sense.
To be repetitive and short: no good! :)
Bye
reply to: vi...@inrete.it
(__)
** NO SPAM!
<>
Sonic Hedgehog
> Oliver Preiss <pre...@rumms.uni-mannheim.de> wrote:
> >> Does anyone know what on earth happened Tim Wiseman? I have sent him many, many
> >> emailed over the last few weeks and he has not answered a single one! What kind
> >> of customer service is that! And another thing, why hasn't he posted anything
> >> to the newsgroup lately?
Funny since I look down the posts in this group and see one from cocomax
(thats Tim) only five or so below this one :-)
> Maybe he's busy:
Damn right... It also depends on what you were asking for?
If it was for source codes then you can forget it.
If its about an addon that Tim has nothing to do with then forget it.
If its just straight complaining about how VGAP is all wrong then forget
it.
If its about a bug then you will get a reply sooner or later.
If its requesting help about a problem then its a good chance he'll
help, but why didnt you post the problem here instead of bothering Tim
with it?
--
---------------------------------------------------------------------
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Jonathan Eerkes
A bit of review:
Ship limit based on empire size alone - Would favor races with big bad
ships.
Ship limit based on empire + ship size - would fix a lot of the
problems the former situation would have, but still it would favor some
more than others, and a value system would need to be made
I personally like the old system. Points for war. If you don't fight,
you don't build. Each race adapts to the situation.
Lets face it folks - No matter what, some races are going to be at a
disadvantage no matter what situation. Some races have to get going
before the ship limit is reached (like the fascists), some keep going
just fine.
As for colonization - I liked building w1 SDSF's to junk later on...
Its what separated the smart from the ill-informed.
Neil Grigg
On 25 Oct 1998 00:32:20 GMT, coc...@aol.com (Cocomax) wrote:
>What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
It appears that discussion is moving towards the total mass of ships with some
sort of modifier based on the ability to support those ships.
Almost any way you cut it, it will give advantages to some races at some
point(s) in the game.
At the moment, when under the ship limit, the economy is used to allow a race to
build ships, but once built there is no additional cost (excluding fuel) to
maintaining those ships.
If we take it that SBs maintain ships, not planets (as planets provide materials
only (minerials, money, supplies & people (aka crew))), then how do you set the
"maintain" element. Is it possible for a SB around a planet with only one clan
on it, to support a SB and build ships that require a crew of over 1000 people?
A SB can build one ship and fix one ship, but resupply many ships, in a single
turn. As "fix" happens before "build", it would appear that a SB has one
drydock and after the fix, the fixed ship is moved out and building parts are
assembled in that same drydock.
To maintain a ship would require what resources? Supplies, crew R&R, routine
maintenance, etc? Does a ship require periodic docking at a SB, so routine mtce
can be done?
Basing ship support on just the number of drydock facilities will limit all
races, as a large ship or a small ship takes up the same "slot".
Is it fair? Probably not. May be the turn_around time of a drydock can be set
by mass, so two small ships can be processed in a turn, where as only one large
ship can be processed in a turn?
All these things add to the complexity and diversity of the game.
Good luck, Tim. :-)
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
As already stated, PBP for colonizing an enemy's ship that you capture (not
given away under the gsX fcode)... of course there would appear to be nothing to
stop an ally and I cancelling our alliance, trading ships via the no fuel SB
surrender rule, colonise the ship and then restore the alliance.
--
Ta-ta,
Neil (Moe, Latrobe Valley, Gippsland, Victoria, Australia)
neilgrigg(at)c031(dot)aone(dot)au.
Eudas
<rtb...@erols.com> wrote:
>What if you partially based it on the total number of factories
>controlled by the player so one clan planets wouldn't mean so much?
Above is subject to abuse by dropping large numbers of clans, building
factories, then picking up clans and moving on... leaving leftover
clans to run the factories.
Recommendation: change the game so that any factories above the number
that the population can support are unused hulks - inactive. Thus they
remain, causing col/nat unhappiness, but provide no benefit. Any
-factories/turn can be taken from the 'unused' category.
Eudas
Jörg Gonschior
>
> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what
> you own?
> that you own
> 2X the number of planets that you own
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
Hi Tim,
- why is there a limit of 500 ships?
- Was it an abritary value for the 'ship-data-array'?
- Or did you choose it relationg to the race advantages, in other
words, was it well balanced?
I didn't get every posted article to this subject, but I do you want
to change it?
Ciao
Jörg
--
Jörg Gonschior
If you don't understand it, stick in a Babelfish and read out loud.
http://www.quantum.de/~gonschio, mailto: joerg.g...@quantum.de
Jan H.Hansen
>
>Because of something that happened a few weeks back, I will no longer have any
>dealings with about 30 different people, (including you), I will not even
>answer their email anymore. I do not want to talk about it, I would just be
>handing them a pile of flame war ammo. Now back to work on version 4.
>
I certainly hope im not on that list. I suspect that one of my friends
may be. Can you confirm or deny whether Lars Dam is one of the 30
people you have chosen to ignore. If so I think you are being unfair
allthough he is working on an alternate client. AFAIK he intends to
honour your registration. His Java project is not intended to take
buisness from you on the contreary I think this may open the Mac
market for you.
Kind Regards Jan H.Hansen
Human intelligence is a curse, we ask too
many questions to problems we know we can
never comprehend.
- Me, afternoon ramblings. Sep. 1997
Sumdawgy
>Recommendation: change the game so that any factories above the number
>that the population can support are unused hulks - inactive. Thus they
>remain, causing col/nat unhappiness, but provide no benefit. Any
>-factories/turn can be taken from the 'unused' category.
>
sounds good
jn...@my-dejanews.com
> >
> > >
> > >What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> > >
> > > 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that
> > >you
> > >own
That sounds pretty good to me. Since I hear 4.0 allows multiple starbases
per planet, this is effectly infinity when one has the resorces and 10
ships ought to be plenty for colonization purposes.
--
Jon Nunn
Friends Don't Let Friends Do Cobol
-----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
Biomenace
>>
>> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what
>> you own?
>> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase
>> that you own
>> 2X the number of planets that you own
>> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>>
>> Tim
>
>Hi Tim,
>
>- why is there a limit of 500 ships?
>- Was it an abritary value for the 'ship-data-array'?
>- Or did you choose it relationg to the race advantages, in other
> words, was it well balanced?
>
>I didn't get every posted article to this subject, but I do you want
>to change it?
It was arbitrary, and was intended to be higher than would ever be
reached. In the docs for very early host versions, there was even a
note about it: "There is a limit of 500 ships to the game, though I've
never actually heard of anyone reaching this limit."
- Biomenace
Email me at bi0m...@removethis.bestweb.net, not
the address you see in "from". Thats a spamtrap.
And note that the 0 is a zero, not an o.
-----BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK----- Version: 3.1
GB/GS!d!sa-C++UP+LE-W++@N+++L-W+OM--V-PS++@PE++Y+PGP-T+++(--)5+++X+R+tv+b+++DI+D--G-eh+ry+
------END GEEK CODE BLOCK------
Andrew
Cocomax wrote in message <19981024203220...@ngol01.aol.com>...
>What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that
you
>own or 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>
the system we have now actually does work well enough. I think that it
actually forces you to use tactics and not simply build up a great economy
and then just overwhelm your opponent with sheer force of numbers. This
seems to be the case for a lot of other strategy games out there, but VGAP
is different because you simply cannot build to your hearts content,
eventually you simply have to go out and destroy people in order to build
more. As for basing it on the number of planets or starbases or whatever
that a person owns, this would force the torper races to have 2-3 times as
many planets as the carrier races in order to stand up in combat.
Alternatively, basing the limit on mass of ships does not account for the
fact that certain low mass ships may have a higher value than higher mass
ships. What I mean is how do you rate low mass ships with special abilities
like Fireclouds, Cobols, MBRs, Terraformers, GDs, etc etc. Without a proper
and fair ranking system for the value of EVERY ship that can be built, I
think that the 500 ship limit is the best thing out there.
And one last point, if Tim should make a new host using some other form of
ship limit, just how many hosts are there going to be anyway? I think a
standard host, whatever it's alleged flaws, should be used to keep
conformity in the game. Other than that, I will gladly wait for 4.0 to come
out where Tim can address problems before the game goes to market.
andrew
Richard C. Innes
i.e. each ship should cost X MC a turn that are removed from your overall
treasury plus X supplies a turn that are removed from the 'home' planet that
built the ship. Of course the bigger ships would cost more. It should
also have a basis on the number of starbases that you have built and what
class (I,II,III) they are, as well as the number of crew training stations,
or marine barracks or something like that.
This would encourage the empires to keep their economies growing in order to
build bigger and badder ships.
Just my 2 cents.
Richard C. Innes
Cocomax wrote in message <19981025112159...@ngol08.aol.com>...
jn...@my-dejanews.com
sumd...@aol.com (Sumdawgy) wrote:
>
> In article <36352cc7...@news.kdi.com>, eu...@kdi.com (Eudas) writes:
>
> >Recommendation: change the game so that any factories above the number
> >that the population can support are unused hulks - inactive. Thus they
> >remain, causing col/nat unhappiness, but provide no benefit. Any
> >-factories/turn can be taken from the 'unused' category.
> >
>
> sounds good
>
agreed, especailly in light that 4.0 will allowing capturing of enemy
colonists, and if your a bad race send them to work the mines, instead
of killing them all.
I imagine the Borg would assimulate captured enemy colonists,
but I'm not sure how other races will deal with captured Borg
unless they somehow disconnect them from the collective reverting
them to what they were before e.g. 7 of 9
Sumdawgy
In article <363476...@quantum.de>, Jörg Gonschior
<joerg.g...@quantum.de> writes:
>Hi Tim,
>
>- why is there a limit of 500 ships?
>- Was it an abritary value for the 'ship-data-array'?
>- Or did you choose it relationg to the race advantages, in other
> words, was it well balanced?
well I'd rather not distract him with a ton of messages unrelated to moving
forward...
I HOPE he'll add thi to the current host but REMBER it will delay the release
of vgap 4.0
let's not sidetrack the issue....
Sumdawgy
In article <7122l1$ldc$1...@news.auaracom.net>, "Andrew"
<ade...@interhop.nospam.net> writes:
>And one last point, if Tim should make a new host using some other form of
>ship limit, just how many hosts are there going to be anyway? I think a
>standard host, whatever it's alleged flaws, should be used to keep
>conformity in the game. Other than that, I will gladly wait for 4.0 to come
>out where Tim can address problems before the game goes to market.
near as I can figure it.......
I think the new 999 host will be THE host once it's out of beta
but that's my guess.....
Sumdawgy
>What I mean is how do you rate low mass ships with special abilities
>like Fireclouds, Cobols, MBRs, Terraformers, GDs, etc etc. Without a proper
>and fair ranking system for the value of EVERY ship that can be built, I
>think that the 500 ship limit is the best thing out there.
good point should be a way of making "special" abilities affect the hull mass
rating without being complex
Chris Lusena
[snip]
> As for colonization - I liked building w1 SDSF's to junk later on...
> Its what separated the smart from the ill-informed.
Also PBP colonizing is a equalizing factor, since every race now as
a ship that is worth while building with w1. Since for the Feds
every ship is worth while. (super refit.) The Pirv, and the Cols have
the Lady Royal, which I'm finding very useful now, in a low resources
game. After the queue hits I find cash more restrictive than
minerals in general. No PBP for colonization is an advantage at least for
the Feds, Privs, Col, and Fast who all have ships to build that are
useful with w1. It is a lesser advantage for the rebels and Borg, since
poor engine probes are useful for them. It is a great disadvantage for
the birds, and Emp. since the emp. must build many SB to equip their
ships, but can't afford the cash to tech them all up. The Bird man need
they ships to be High tech just to have a change in a fight. Since the
bird and the Emp. are two of the weaker races
I don't think no PBP for colonization is a good idea.
--Chris Lusena U of Kentucky, Dept. of Com. Sci.
Just a plain boring .SIG, eh? Lexington, Kentucky, U.S.A.
email: Lus...@cs.engr.uky.edu #include<standard disclaimer>
and for the webbies out there: http://www.cs.engr.uky.edu/~lusena/
Rob Bos
> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
> own
>
> or
>
> 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>
> Tim
As someone in an IRC put it when I mentioned it;
"Why can't we just build as many damn ships as we want?!"
If the ship limit can be changed to 999, then why not make it some insanely high
number that can't be reached in any foreseeable circumstance? Computer
processing speed is 10 fold higher than it was when VGAP was first implemented;
and it's easier to program when there's no arbitrary ship limit in place. This
could be configured; i.e 0=unlimited, XXX=limit.
This would simplify the code in several places; for instance, you could
eliminate PBPs completely, eventually convert to different processing
algorithms, eliminate the ship IDs except for internal program use, and work out
a lot more kinks.
I tell ya, if I could tinker about with the source, I know what I'd be hacking
at. :)
Lord Patrik
As I've said in past postings... I agree with this. No ship limit is
the best alternative IMHO. Also, as someone else said in a previous
post... People just want to sit around and wait for the ship limit.
These are the people I attack first <evil grin>. Guess that's why I've
never been in a game where the ship limit has been reached. But all
these different ideas about ship limit... just make no ship limit. What
player can have a problem with that? I just don't understand the
programming ramifications, is all.
Thanks for listening to 'Ramblings of a Madman', now back to your
regularly scheduled program....
--
Lord Patrik (pmurphy@x.y)
x=yesbank, y=com
Life is a game, VGA Planets is serious business!!
Cocomax
If I do not reply to the email I will be flamed here. If I reply to the email
with the reasons for the lack of reply people will post my email here and flame
me because the reasons are so unbelievible to begin with. I have been already
labeled the most paranoid person in the world by flamers here. I do not want to
hand them more ammo. According to THEIR playbook the next move will be, heck
let me just quote part of their mailing list message a "TimMole" slipped me:
<***Parts snipped to not give flamers ammo***>
. . . Send Tim
>lost of email, report phoney bugs, convince him to work on boneheaded addons
like host999, try
>to get him mixed up in flame wars, forward all your email from Tim to <snip>
so they can
>post it to the news group and make him look like an idiot! Have <snip> make
fun of Tim about
><snipped>, that always gets a great flame war cooking! Paint Tim as being
unfair, greedy, point
>out that <snip snip snip> will open new markets for VGAP and Tim is being
short sighted, is the wrong
>personally type to be in control of VGAP. . .
And that is what is all about.
I got a question, the hackers were talking on their mailing list about
getting inside of my computer using an IP address they grabbed from an IRC chat
with me and "leaving me a package" on my C drive. Is that even possible? I am
running Windows 98 with fileshareing on and with all my harddrives are password
protected.
Things are really strange, heck even the VGA Planets Programmers Web Ring
has sites on it that tells people how to hack into the reg codes even thou the
homepage of the web ring says that is a no no.
Gee, 6 emailed this morning asking me to join them in an IRC chat about me
not answering email. . . . hmmm
Tim
Lord Patrik
--
I don't know about most of the VGAP community, but I enjoy the game
immensely, and don't give a damn if you are paranoid or not. You are
the one that created this game, and you are the one that is responsible
for this community to even exist. How anyone that plays this game can
have negative feelings and ill will toward you I don't know... except
perhaps out of jealousy. I would hope the majority of the great gaming
community (which I'm glad to be a part of) is behind you. I am. Also,
my opinion is that you should stay away from getting involved. I
wouldn't have thought any less of you or the game if you hadn't replied
here. Again, I hope most VGAPers agree with me...
Cocomax
>>I don't know about most of the VGAP community, but I enjoy the game
immensely, and don't give a damn if you are paranoid or not. You are
the one that created this game, and you are the one that is responsible
for this community to even exist. How anyone that plays this game can
have negative feelings and ill will toward you I don't know... except
perhaps out of jealousy.
>>
You know you are right on with that, I have not had any problems with the
players. I welcome comments from players, any comments about the game, what
they like and dislike. What they would like to see added or don't like. I love
that, I welcome that, I use those comments to make the game better.
Even the host side addon writters have been great guys! It is the people
that hack into RST / TRN / REG.KEY and FIZZBIN that have been strongly on the
attack. As well as the people writting rip offs. Jealousy yes I guess it is.
It is a war. My source code, reg keys, income, reputation and time are all
targets. Attacking me also generates PR for their own projects or rip offs that
they like better than planets.
Tim
Blair Nowakowsky
>Cocomax wrote:
>> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
>> own
>> or
>> 2X the number of planets that you own
>>
>> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>>
>> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>>
>> Tim
Instead of having a limit on the number of ships you can build why not have a
different limitation. For example if you could only move a certain
number/mass of ships per turn. This could be a command structure/points
system. Or possiblely have it such that you can move an unlimited number of
ships out to a certain distance from an outpost. You would then have a limit
on how many ships you could move past lets say 150 ly limit.
Now how would this be implemented? Lets say that it is not the moving but the
changing of orders. You could say this is because it take a lot more power to
send a communication signal past a certain point. This would allow you to
still send lots of ships past the limit but once they reached their
destination you might not want to waste the time to recall that ship but would
rather send orders to another ship. This would also help facilitate fleet
style movements. You could have a command ship that you could send orders to
and then if there are any other ships moving with it they could also receive
the order. So giving orders to a single command ship would only count as a
single order. The other ships would have to follow the command ships or they
could be sent out by themself but that would be another set of orders.
What do you think?
Blair.
Blair Nowakowsky
You can't please everyone and if you do someone would be unhappy about that!!!
Just do what you think is best and you will make many people happy. It seems
to be on the Internet you have to have a pretty thick skin. There are a lot
of people who are happy you are still send messages.
TNX
Blair.
Procyon B
> Cocomax wrote in message <19981024203220...@ngol01.aol.com>...
> >What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> > 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that
> you
> >own or 2X the number of planets that you own
> >
> > If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
> >
> > Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
> >
> Well, reading the discussion and I have to throw in my 2cents. I think that
> the system we have now actually does work well enough. I think that it
> actually forces you to use tactics and not simply build up a great economy
> and then just overwhelm your opponent with sheer force of numbers. This
> seems to be the case for a lot of other strategy games out there, but VGAP
> is different because you simply cannot build to your hearts content,
> eventually you simply have to go out and destroy people in order to build
> more. As for basing it on the number of planets or starbases or whatever
> that a person owns, this would force the torper races to have 2-3 times as
> many planets as the carrier races in order to stand up in combat.
> Alternatively, basing the limit on mass of ships does not account for the
> fact that certain low mass ships may have a higher value than higher mass
> ships. What I mean is how do you rate low mass ships with special abilities
> like Fireclouds, Cobols, MBRs, Terraformers, GDs, etc etc. Without a proper
> and fair ranking system for the value of EVERY ship that can be built, I
> think that the 500 ship limit is the best thing out there.
>
> And one last point, if Tim should make a new host using some other form of
> ship limit, just how many hosts are there going to be anyway? I think a
> standard host, whatever it's alleged flaws, should be used to keep
> conformity in the game. Other than that, I will gladly wait for 4.0 to come
> out where Tim can address problems before the game goes to market.
> andrew
If someone is interested, I totally agree with andrew.
--
Lt. Procyon/Delta 1-1/Chimaera
[MoM]
mail-adresses are: <per...@hotmail.com>, <s_pe...@mailbox.2.sbbs.se>
"WORK is a series of forced body movements caused by hunger."
Procyon B
> >Cocomax wrote:
> >> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> >> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
> >> own
> >> or
> >> 2X the number of planets that you own
> >>
> >> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
> >>
> >> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
> >>
> >> Tim
>
> Instead of having a limit on the number of ships you can build why not have a
> different limitation. For example if you could only move a certain
> number/mass of ships per turn. This could be a command structure/points
> system. Or possiblely have it such that you can move an unlimited number of
> ships out to a certain distance from an outpost. You would then have a limit
> on how many ships you could move past lets say 150 ly limit.
>
> Now how would this be implemented? Lets say that it is not the moving but the
> changing of orders. You could say this is because it take a lot more power to
> send a communication signal past a certain point. This would allow you to
> still send lots of ships past the limit but once they reached their
> destination you might not want to waste the time to recall that ship but would
> rather send orders to another ship. This would also help facilitate fleet
> style movements. You could have a command ship that you could send orders to
> and then if there are any other ships moving with it they could also receive
> the order. So giving orders to a single command ship would only count as a
> single order. The other ships would have to follow the command ships or they
> could be sent out by themself but that would be another set of orders.
>
> What do you think?
>
> Blair.
The whole fun with VGAP is that it ISN'T only the ones with the most ships
that win. It's strategy, manouvering, sneaking and diplomacy (not the ship ;-)
And now you want to limit strategy and unlimit ships.
Why not play DOOM?
Donovan
<snippitysnip>
Okay, so the next step would be to turn this into a newsgroup flamewar
or something? Hey ho let's go.....
> <***Parts snipped to not give flamers ammo***>
>
>. . . Send Tim
>>lost of email, report phoney bugs, convince him to work on boneheaded addons
>like host999, try
Right. New version of official program is now called "addon"? Some
people have a truly messed up perception of reality.
What's next? Flaming Westwood for working on mission packs for Red
Alert rather then bringing out Tiberian Sun somewhat earlier?
>>to get him mixed up in flame wars, forward all your email from Tim to <snip>
>so they can
>>post it to the news group and make him look like an idiot! Have <snip> make
>fun of Tim about
>><snipped>, that always gets a great flame war cooking! Paint Tim as being
>unfair, greedy, point
Yes, they don't get any greedier than Tim, $20 for a game, well, the
nerve! Someone should hack his registration codes and make him bleed
for asking such an enormous amount of money for a game which gives you
so little pleasure.
>>out that <snip snip snip> will open new markets for VGAP and Tim is being
>short sighted, is the wrong
>>personally type to be in control of VGAP. . .
Well, as far as I see it: invent it, create it, control it. Simple as
that.
> I got a question, the hackers were talking on their mailing list about
>getting inside of my computer using an IP address they grabbed from an IRC chat
>with me and "leaving me a package" on my C drive. Is that even possible? I am
>running Windows 98 with fileshareing on and with all my harddrives are password
>protected.
Don't know how AOL works, but I get a dynamic IP from my ISP. Fat
chance of leaving anything through my IP from last time I logged on.
> Things are really strange, heck even the VGA Planets Programmers Web Ring
>has sites on it that tells people how to hack into the reg codes even thou the
>homepage of the web ring says that is a no no.
Now I can't program squat (okay, some basic, but that's all) but if
your programming skills are limited to hacking other people's work
rather than programming some of your own ideas it's a waste of skill
and time.
> Gee, 6 emailed this morning asking me to join them in an IRC chat about me
>not answering email. . . . hmmm
So did you answer those mails like you're supposed to? You wouldn't
want anyone whining about getting poor customer service. After all,
any other game-maker replies any email you send them personally within
a day. Really, try mailing Westwood, ID, Lucasarts or any of them.
Donovan
Federal HQ & Bitmap Centre at http://www.xs4all.nl/~donovan
ME
I have been playing VGA Planets for eight years.. I have hosted VGA
planets on my BBS in Edzell Scotland and Now host it Via the Internet in
Puerto Rico. Every time I have had a problem with hosting Tim has replied
to me in less than a day. Hell he even ask for the host files and rst/trn
files so he can see the error. He has been excellent on customer service.
You bitch about 20$ for a game. Well you spend more than that on
games that can only be played one way. You waste that on some of your dates
that did you no good.. 20$ is just pennies compared to other BS games out
there. VGA Planets is for people who like strategy and change to a game..
Not predictability of playing a computer.
Then you have the add-on writers.. There are over 100 add-ons now
and over half are free. The others are priced fairly. Go buy diablo then
the add-on that is 75$ plus... VGA Planets stays the same price and the
add-on money goes to the add-on writer. Not TIM>
Get off his back and let him complete his work.. If you don't like the game
sell your copy of the game to someone who does. Get your twenty dollars
back that way.
Keep up the good work Tim, Looking forward to Version 4 and any updates to
the Host. No bugs in a while.. Just add-on glitches...
beneboy wrote in message <36333409...@telepath.com>...
>Clendria wrote:
>>
>> Does anyone know what on earth happened Tim Wiseman? I have sent him
many, many
>> emailed over the last few weeks and he has not answered a single one!
What kind
>> of customer service is that! And another thing, why hasn't he posted
anything
>> to the newsgroup lately?
>>
>> Cheers!
>>
>> Mike M.
>
>I sent him an e-mail the other day and got a reply within 2 hours. No
>problems for me.
>
>Bryan
Robert Bohnenberger DMD
>
> On Sun, 25 Oct 1998 00:32:45 -0400, Robert Bohnenberger DMD
> <rtb...@erols.com> wrote:
>
> >What if you partially based it on the total number of factories
> >controlled by the player so one clan planets wouldn't mean so much?
>
> Above is subject to abuse by dropping large numbers of clans, building
> factories, then picking up clans and moving on... leaving leftover
> clans to run the factories.
>
> that the population can support are unused hulks - inactive. Thus they
> remain, causing col/nat unhappiness, but provide no benefit. Any
> -factories/turn can be taken from the 'unused' category.
>
I love the idea of making "unstaffed" factories inactive. The effects
of construction, as well as the ability to build ships really ought to
have some basis in common-sense reality, instead of some arbitary
"fair-to-all" rule.
It was previously noted that basing the number of ships on the number of
factories would unfairly benefit the borg. If this is true, so what?
It still makes sense to somehow base the number of ships you can build
on your #planets X population X industrial capacity. A bigger, well
industrialized empire SHOULD be able to build more ships and faster than
a small, backward empire.
--
---END OF MESSAGE---
Please note: remove "nospam", or similar tag if present in address when
replying to email, and don't forget to brush and floss daily.
Procyon B
It they have so many good ideas and the things around Thost is so wrong,
y don't they just go write themselves an own game and become
a little constructive?
--
Lt. Procyon/Delta 1-1/Chimaera
mail-adresses are: <per...@hotmail.com>, <s_pe...@mailbox.2.sbbs.se>
"WORK is a series of forced body movements caused by hunger."
VGAP is series fo mousemovements that is caused by not enough WORK. ;-)
Sonic Hedgehog
> >>I don't know about most of the VGAP community, but I enjoy the game
> immensely, and don't give a damn if you are paranoid or not. You are
> the one that created this game, and you are the one that is responsible
> for this community to even exist. How anyone that plays this game can
> have negative feelings and ill will toward you I don't know... except
> perhaps out of jealousy.
> >>
Agree 100%
> You know you are right on with that, I have not had any problems with the
> players. I welcome comments from players, any comments about the game, what
> they like and dislike. What they would like to see added or don't like. I love
> that, I welcome that, I use those comments to make the game better.
>
> Even the host side addon writters have been great guys! It is the people
> that hack into RST / TRN / REG.KEY and FIZZBIN that have been strongly on the
> attack. As well as the people writting rip offs. Jealousy yes I guess it is.
> It is a war. My source code, reg keys, income, reputation and time are all
> targets. Attacking me also generates PR for their own projects or rip offs that
> they like better than planets.
>
> Tim
I dont believe it is good PR for their rip offs....
I wont touch anything that I believe is ripping you off.
--
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Steven Gedye Email sonic-hedgehog@x.y
Wellington, New Zealand ANTI-SPAM x=geocities y=com
http://members.xoom.com/sgedye/
http://www.geocities.com/TimesSquare/Arena/2626/
The VGA Planets Common Player Utilities List can be found at
http://members.xoom.com/sgedye/vgap/vgap.htm
---------------------------------------------------------------------
r...@casema.net
> I got a question, the hackers were talking on their mailing list about
> getting inside of my computer using an IP address they grabbed from an IRC chat
> with me and "leaving me a package" on my C drive. Is that even possible? I am
> running Windows 98 with fileshareing on and with all my harddrives are password
> protected.
Window's security isn't too good, but password-protecting your
harddrive should solve the most accurate problems, assuming you use a
dial-up link to your provider. If you are directly and permanently
connected to the internet... Better take a medium-sized axe to take
your computer out yourselve before they do :-)
Heck, they even break into well-protected UNIX-systems so windows 98
is toast anyway when directly controlled to the net. But I don't
assume that is the case, so don't worry too much about it. Just be
sure you backup your data *well*. Somebody once mentioned to me "data
not backed up is useless".
But what a incredible junk those people uttered. It sounded to be a
hacker list, but they threathened to become crackers. I respect
hackers (solvers of problems, makers of good software, computer
experts), but I (and real hackers) despise crackers (breaking in into
computers etc.). That's another reason not to respect them. They are
not real.
Good luck coding,
Reinout
btw: I *do* like to see some decent solution worked out to get planets
to work on linux, OS/2, Mac. Your game is too great! Too much
people are longing for it. I'm sure you can figure out how to
write a small, portable C-program to insert the reg-code into the
player files. And I'm also sure you have enough trusted friends
to get it compiled for the mac, OS/2 and linux for a starter.
We simply like it! :-)
--
Reinout van Rees => R.va...@altavista.net
"A call to arms - but no-one there to answer, silence falls,
drowning the echoes of yesterday's wrongs" - Pallas
Sumdawgy
>"Why can't we just build as many damn ships as we want?!"
>
>If the ship limit can be changed to 999, then why not make it some insanely
>high
>number that can't be reached in any foreseeable circumstance? Computer
>processing speed is 10 fold higher than it was when VGAP was first
>implemented;
>and it's easier to program when there's no arbitrary ship limit in place.
>This
>could be configured; i.e 0=unlimited, XXX=limit.
then how do you set the FC to chunnel properly and what abouit addons?
etc?
3 digits is the limit.......in 3.22 let 4.0 handle that.....
^Hawk^
> Even the host side addon writters have been great guys!
Thank you ! :-) But you are better as we. Without you there were noone
of us.
>It is the people
>that hack into RST / TRN / REG.KEY and FIZZBIN that have been strongly on the
>attack.
Those people who hacks into it to write keygens etc. - yes - but you
must agree that there's none chance to write a complete player site
client (e.g. vpa) without doing this, or !? ;)
Bye, ^Hawk^ - the DarkSoft-Productions.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Our URL is: http://www.darksoft.net/ you'll find VGA-Planets addons - tools -
open games and / or slots, also you can join our own discussion mailing list
around our products / us and our hostsystem. Further we have our own chat
place (java) for you on our sites! Come today! EMail: Ha...@DarkSoft.Net
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jan H.Hansen
> I got a question, the hackers were talking on their mailing list about
>getting inside of my computer using an IP address they grabbed from an IRC chat
>with me and "leaving me a package" on my C drive. Is that even possible? I am
>running Windows 98 with fileshareing on and with all my harddrives are password
>protected.
Windows is not the most secure platform and there are some pretty
nasty hacker utils out there. At the moment a program called
backorifice (not sure i spelled it right) is getting a lot of hype if
those people are as stupid as i think. they would be unable to perform
a hack themselfes. I think they would go for a program like
backorifice. it's basically a trojan horse and since you've been hit
by one of those before i hope you take precautions. This one is pretty
nasty it's quite small (250KB i think) and easily attached to an
exe-file. if the exefile is executed it installs a server process on
your machine that lets them remote control your machine as soon as
you're online. When i say remote control i mean they have complete
power over your machine they'll be able to remote anything.
If you i were you I'd be very carefull especially considdering win95's
security flaws. I would go as far as having a machine for development
and one for contact with the outside world.
Lastly you have every reason to be paranoid since you've been hit
by hackers once before.
Kind Regards
Jan H.Hansen
Human intelligence is a curse, we ask too
many questions to problems we know we can
never comprehend.
- Me, afternoon ramblings. Sep. 1997
Tibo
<snip>
> I got a question, the hackers were talking on their mailing list about
>getting inside of my computer using an IP address they grabbed from an IRC
chat
>with me and "leaving me a package" on my C drive. Is that even possible? I
am
>running Windows 98 with fileshareing on and with all my harddrives are
password
>protected.
My internetprovider and even serious newspapers in the Netherlands (and my
brother in law :) are currently a little stressed about a program called
'Back orrifice' that should give someone else complete control over your PC
while you are connected to the net. It seems that thats something they might
use.
Greetings,
Tibo
Ti...@iae.somecountry
replace somecountry with nl
jn...@my-dejanews.com
sumd...@aol.com (Sumdawgy) wrote:
>
> In article <7122l1$ldc$1...@news.auaracom.net>, "Andrew"
> <ade...@interhop.nospam.net> writes:
>
> >like Fireclouds, Cobols, MBRs, Terraformers, GDs, etc etc. Without a proper
> >and fair ranking system for the value of EVERY ship that can be built, I
> >think that the 500 ship limit is the best thing out there.
>
> rating without being complex
>
for the simple reason that every race has at least one cheap ship with
special abilities so they balance out.
Feds: Terraform, Decloak, Bioscanner
Lizards: Hiss, Cloak, Decloak
Birds: Cloak
Fascists: Cloak
Pirate: Rob, Cloak, Grav Accel, Gambling
Borg: Hyp, Chunnel
Crystal: Web Mines, Terraform
Evil Empire: Hyp
Robots: Cheap Fighters in Space, Bioscanner
Rebels: Hyp, Cheap Fighters in Space
Colonies: Cheap Fighters in Space, Bioscanner/Ramscoop, Advanced Refinery,
Gambing
klapa...@mindspring.com
>
>What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that you
>own
>
>or
>
> 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>
The problem I see with that is that sometimes at game start, a player
finds that his homeworld isn't in a very optimal spot. I remember in
one game the only planet that was one turn away from my home world was
an amorphous world. A situation like that can hurt development early
on, and by limiting ships to a factor of the number of planets you
own, it means even more of a struggle in the early game. Your
suggestion rewards those who get lucky in their home planet placement.
____________________________
Illegitimus Non Carborundum!
____________________________
Admiral Ardieff
Cocomax wrote in message <19981025112159...@ngol08.aol.com>...
>>Well, being close to ship limit, I would definetely make a deal with a
>>neigbhor -
>>give me 20 planets for 1 turn, then I will give you them back +
>>additional 20...
>
> How about, if you own a planet for 10 turn you get 1 ship 20 turns you
get 2
>ships and 30 turns you get 3 ships.
>
> Tim
Perhaps there shouldn't be an absolute limit on the number of ships you can
have. Instead, it additional ship should perhaps instead place an additional
burden or cost on the economy (salaray, provisions, fuel, maintenance and so
on, larger ships being more expensive than smaller)?
Just a thought, from.
Admiral Ardieff (aka Rasmus Dyhr Frederiksen)
jn...@my-dejanews.com
> Perhaps there shouldn't be an absolute limit on the number of ships you can
> have. Instead, it additional ship should perhaps instead place an additional
> burden or cost on the economy (salaray, provisions, fuel, maintenance and so
> on, larger ships being more expensive than smaller)?
>
Well there's already fuel, looking at the screen shots 4.0 includes food,
I guess that's for crew, passangers, and colonists.
For manitance howabout a 1 / (n - damage% * n) chance per kt of mass
that the ship is damaged, so light ships usually aren't damaged, but
the heavy ones (900 kt) would be expected to take about 9% damage if
it started undamaged. Also any very badly damaged ship would have
less chance of getting further damage than one in perfect shape
(n >= 100)
Leif N. Petersen
> I think that a fleet size should be based on total economy and 'war' points.
>
> i.e. each ship should cost X MC a turn that are removed from your overall
> treasury plus X supplies a turn that are removed from the 'home' planet that
> built the ship. Of course the bigger ships would cost more. It should
> also have a basis on the number of starbases that you have built and what
> class (I,II,III) they are, as well as the number of crew training stations,
> or marine barracks or something like that.
>
> This would encourage the empires to keep their economies growing in order to
> build bigger and badder ships.
>
> Just my 2 cents.
Ok so what happens when your being attacked? And YOUR smaller? How can you
defend yourself? as you lose planets and ships, you can't rebuild what you
lose! Until you've been in that situation, you don't really understand how
frustrating that can be, at least the current system lets you rebuild what
you lose. Smaller empires can kill bigger ones....but only if THEY HAVE
THE SHIPS TO DO IT!!!!!
my 2 cents
>
> Richard C. Innes
>
>
>
> Cocomax wrote in message <19981025112159...@ngol08.aol.com>...
> >
> >>From: Lev Zakrevski <za...@bu.edu>
> >>Date: Sat, 24 Oct 1998 23:58:47 -0400
> >>...
> >>Well, being close to ship limit, I would definetely make a deal with a
> >>neigbhor -
> >>give me 20 planets for 1 turn, then I will give you them back +
> >>additional 20...
> >
> > How about, if you own a planet for 10 turn you get 1 ship 20 turns you
> get 2
> >ships and 30 turns you get 3 ships.
> >
> > Tim
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
>
=-=Leif Petersen=-=
IRC: crewman
juni...@my-dejanews.com
coc...@aol.com (Cocomax) wrote:
>
> >From: Lev Zakrevski <za...@bu.edu>
> >Date: Sat, 24 Oct 1998 23:58:47 -0400
> >...
> >Well, being close to ship limit, I would definetely make a deal with a
> >neigbhor -
> >give me 20 planets for 1 turn, then I will give you them back +
> >additional 20...
>
> How about, if you own a planet for 10 turn you get 1 ship 20 turns you get
2
> ships and 30 turns you get 3 ships.
>
> Tim
>
>
I like the idea of having the size of the empire determine the number of
supportable ships. However, I would like to see some sort of compensation
for the size of the ships created. It could be complicated like a calculation
based on Beams/bays/weight or it could be simple - big carriers are worth
three ships, Big Torp ships are worth 2 ships, other warships worth 1 ship.
I would consider making freighters not take up a ship slot for the purposes
of fleet limiting...
Just thoughts.
Juniper
The Undead HedgeHog
>getting inside of my computer using an IP address they grabbed from an IRC
chat
>with me and "leaving me a package" on my C drive. Is that even possible? I
am
>running Windows 98 with fileshareing on and with all my harddrives are
password
>protected.
Have you ever thought about using NT 4 rather than 98? I mean 98 is vastly
different
from 95 but is still (at heart) windows running on DOS. NT forces better Win
API
coding (NT is very unwilling to allow any programs direct access to hardware
so
programs written under it tend to be that little bit "better behaved", at
least in stability
terms) which I presume you are aiming for and whilst it suffers many of
similar flaws it
"has" (?) to be better than 98/95 etc. ... er ... doesn't it?
Ever since I did my MCSE training (for those who don't know MCSE = Microsoft
Certified
Systems Engineer) I've used NT 4.0 ... it's a real pain in the ass but it IS
more secure than
the others and I can do virtually anything I can do on 95/98 ... legacy
programs (partic. DOS)
can be a problem though.
I just reinstalled NT on another drive this weekend, built it as a FAT
partition with my
most common applications, HDCP'd it (HDCP copies a HD to an image file for
possible
later recovery or machine duplication), switched to NTFS (NT Filing System)
and used
Partition Magic to stretch the partition to use the 25Mb FAT couldn't see. I
saved over
200 Mb of disc space just by switching from FAT to NTFS and another 100Mb
using
NTFS compression. Add to that that you can set read/write permissions on
directories
and files and I'd say (potentially at least) you have a much more secure
system.
I'm not a hacker so I wouldn't know but surely if you used NT and tightly
controlled it
far less people could hack into your system simply because you could control
it so
much more tightly?
>Things are really strange, heck even the VGA Planets Programmers Web Ring
>has sites on it that tells people how to hack into the reg codes even thou
the
>homepage of the web ring says that is a no no.
I don't suppose a concerted series of complaints by fans who actually
support your point of
view would work with these people would it?
Anyway ... thanks for everything you've done to VGAP so far :-)
James "Undead" Rocks (Editor: Planeteer Resurrection)
E-Mail: planeteer_r...@yahoo.com, ICQ: 15638443
Planeteer Resurrection: http://web.ukonline.co.uk/undead/
PR Mailing List: planeteer_resurr...@egroups.com
Procyon B
> Cocomax wrote in message <19981026144227...@ngol05.aol.com>...
> <snip>
> > I got a question, the hackers were talking on their mailing list about
> >getting inside of my computer using an IP address they grabbed from an IRC
> chat
> >with me and "leaving me a package" on my C drive. Is that even possible? I
> am
> >running Windows 98 with fileshareing on and with all my harddrives are
> password
> >protected.
> <snip>
>
> My internetprovider and even serious newspapers in the Netherlands (and my
> brother in law :) are currently a little stressed about a program called
> 'Back orrifice' that should give someone else complete control over your PC
> while you are connected to the net. It seems that thats something they might
> use.
>
> Greetings,
> Tibo
>
> Ti...@iae.somecountry
> replace somecountry with nl
A friend om my got hit by this program, suddenly his computer
was out of his control. He immediately hit the power-butten, than
had big problems to erase the program, since it had
imbedded itself in the operating system. He was lucky,
and only lost some unimportant game-files.
The guy that did it better pray, he never mets my friend in a
dark alley. ;-)
--
Lt. Procyon/Delta 1-1/Chimaera
[MoM]
slehti
>supportable ships. However, I would like to see some sort of compensation
>for the size of the ships created. It could be complicated like a calculation
>based on Beams/bays/weight or it could be simple - big carriers are worth
>three ships, Big Torp ships are worth 2 ships, other warships worth 1 ship.
>I would consider making freighters not take up a ship slot for the purposes
>of fleet limiting...
>
>Just thoughts.
i came to a conclusion that the most effective way of escaping the
shiplimit is to limit ships/player. This could be done by ship maintainance
cost so that not only building ships cost you resources, but owning them
would cost, too. So i started to design an add-on. However, if some kind of
maintainance is added in vgap by tim (i hope so), there is no need for such
an addon.
If maintaining a ship costs you money (it could cost minerals and/or
supplies as well), the size of your fleet is determined by the size of your
economy, but not by the size of your empire (except indirectly). I think
this is an important point. You cannot maintain a big fleet if you have
colonized 100 planets with only one clan/planet. You have to colonize your
planets well. Not only quantity, but also the quality matters. And if your
fleet is too big to be maintained, you -will- scrap useless ships. Isn't
that closest to the 'real' world?
Details are not important, although i give some below. I think that the
basic idea is good. It is true even now, that your economy determines the
size of your fleet, so there is a hope that the game balance is not altered
dramatically (lizards+hiss?).
*---
Some thoughts and details about my add-on plan (yet just plan):
How much should supporting a ship cost? Big ships cost more, high tech
ships cost more...
Maybe some small fraction of the production cost/month. This fraction (fr)
should be configurable. How about this:
Maint_cost = fr*(hullmass*hulltech*carrierfactor + #ofbeams*beamcost +
#oftubes*tubecost +
#ofengines*engcost)
Carrierfactor (i use 1.5) is introduced, since otherwise carriers are too
cheap to be maintained compared to torpers (tubes cost, but fighterbays do
not).
The money needed for maintaining a ship could be carried in the very same
ship. That way you can decide which ships you really want to maintain and
which you do not. You load couple of thousend megacredits into your ships,
and 'burn' some credits every month.
What if you don't have the money needed or if don't want to pay? There
should be a penalty for that. Maybe accidents? If you do not pay, there
could be a x% chance to have an accident, which kill y% of the crew and
causes z% damage, xyz again configurable.
Maintaining fuelless ships could be cheaper. The money could come from
star bases instead from ship cargo.
SL
qui...@my-dejanews.com
no...@nowhere.null wrote:
> On 24 Oct 1998 23:12:36 GMT, coc...@aol.com (Cocomax) wrote:
> >
> >Because of something that happened a few weeks back, I will no longer have any
> >dealings with about 30 different people, (including you), I will not even
> >answer their email anymore. I do not want to talk about it, I would just be
> >handing them a pile of flame war ammo. Now back to work on version 4.
> >
> I certainly hope im not on that list. I suspect that one of my friends
> may be. Can you confirm or deny whether Lars Dam is one of the 30
> people you have chosen to ignore. If so I think you are being unfair
> allthough he is working on an alternate client. AFAIK he intends to
> honour your registration. His Java project is not intended to take
> buisness from you on the contreary I think this may open the Mac
> market for you.
I certainly hope this is not the case. I've loing a long time for a Client
on Linux and would hate to see another client project terminated.
I'm very happy to use an old client (VPUtil) together with Echoview but
both have to run under an emulator. And... it is still irritating that I
have to close VPUtil to see what was done in Echoview. If only Echoview had
an internal client !!
Pieter van der Eems
The Netherlands
Sumdawgy
In article <3635f15f....@news.mindspring.com>, klapa...@mindspring.com
writes:
>Your
>suggestion rewards those who get lucky in their home planet placement.
yup as does EVERY game.....
you can only make it so fair...
can't help bad breaks...
Sumdawgy
>Myself, I wouldn't bother trying to give ratings on special ships,
>for the simple reason that every race has at least one cheap ship with
>special abilities so they balance out.
>
>Feds: Terraform, Decloak, Bioscanner
>Lizards: Hiss, Cloak, Decloak
>Birds: Cloak
>Fascists: Cloak
>Pirate: Rob, Cloak, Grav Accel, Gambling
>Borg: Hyp, Chunnel
>Crystal: Web Mines, Terraform
>Evil Empire: Hyp
>Robots: Cheap Fighters in Space, Bioscanner
>Rebels: Hyp, Cheap Fighters in Space
>Colonies: Cheap Fighters in Space, Bioscanner/Ramscoop, Advanced
Refinery,Gambing
>
what about the SSD? that's pretty powerful but true I also forgot that the RP
makes affecting ship abilities rough...
UNLESS there's a way for individual host to modify the "ratin" of each ship
alllowing them to balance it out a bit more......
jn...@my-dejanews.com
sumd...@aol.com (Sumdawgy) wrote:
>
> In article <714meh$hbt$1...@nnrp1.dejanews.com>, jn...@my-dejanews.com writes:
>
> >Myself, I wouldn't bother trying to give ratings on special ships,
> >for the simple reason that every race has at least one cheap ship with
> >special abilities so they balance out.
> >
> >Feds: Terraform, Decloak, Bioscanner
> >Lizards: Hiss, Cloak, Decloak
> >Birds: Cloak
> >Fascists: Cloak
> >Pirate: Rob, Cloak, Grav Accel, Gambling
> >Borg: Hyp, Chunnel
> >Crystal: Web Mines, Terraform
> >Evil Empire: Hyp
> >Robots: Cheap Fighters in Space, Bioscanner
> >Rebels: Hyp, Cheap Fighters in Space
> >Colonies: Cheap Fighters in Space, Bioscanner/Ramscoop, Advanced
> Refinery,Gambing
> >
>
> what about the SSD?
Honestly I didn't think about it when I was going thru the list.
If low tech beams are used and only "free" fighters placed on
them, it would qualify.
I see I also forgot to mention Fascist Glory Device ships,
Fascist pillage and Rebel RGA with any ship, and Lizard & Fascists ground
attack advantages especially with cloaked ships.
--
Jon Nunn
Friends Don't Let Friends Do Cobol
-----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
Chris Lusena
[snip]
> Have you ever thought about using NT 4 rather than 98? I mean 98 is vastly
> different
> from 95 but is still (at heart) windows running on DOS. NT forces better Win
> API
> coding (NT is very unwilling to allow any programs direct access to hardware
> so
> programs written under it tend to be that little bit "better behaved", at
> least in stability
> terms) which I presume you are aiming for and whilst it suffers many of
> similar flaws it
> "has" (?) to be better than 98/95 etc. ... er ... doesn't it?
>
NT is more secure that 95, though this is a relative term. It's still not
very secure, one just needs to use actual cracker techniques to do the
job. Unlike in 95 and msdos when just asking for the correct system call was
often enough. NT last I heard was very vulnerable to standard things like,
overflowing the stack to rewrite a small part of the kernel. (This was
one of the ways the InterNet worm worked) Anyway I predict that NT will
be hack more often and easier over the next few year since
NT 5.0 = Windows 2000. Thus making it worth while for all the crackers
out there to figure out how to work over NT well.
--Chris Lusena U of Kentucky, Dept. of Com. Sci.
Just a plain boring .SIG, eh? Lexington, Kentucky, U.S.A.
email: Lus...@cs.engr.uky.edu #include<standard disclaimer>
and for the webbies out there: http://www.cs.engr.uky.edu/~lusena/
jn...@my-dejanews.com
Chris Lusena <lus...@cs.engr.uky.edu> wrote:
> On Tue, 27 Oct 1998, The Undead HedgeHog wrote:
> [snip]
> > Have you ever thought about using NT 4 rather than 98? I mean 98 is vastly
> > different
> > from 95 but is still (at heart) windows running on DOS. NT forces better Win
> > API
> > coding (NT is very unwilling to allow any programs direct access to hardware
> > so
> > programs written under it tend to be that little bit "better behaved", at
> > least in stability
> > terms) which I presume you are aiming for and whilst it suffers many of
> > similar flaws it
> > "has" (?) to be better than 98/95 etc. ... er ... doesn't it?
> >
> [snip]
>
> NT is more secure that 95, though this is a relative term. It's still not
> very secure, one just needs to use actual cracker techniques to do the
> job. Unlike in 95 and msdos when just asking for the correct system call was
> often enough. NT last I heard was very vulnerable to standard things like,
> overflowing the stack to rewrite a small part of the kernel. (This was
> one of the ways the InterNet worm worked) Anyway I predict that NT will
> be hack more often and easier over the next few year since
> NT 5.0 = Windows 2000. Thus making it worth while for all the crackers
> out there to figure out how to work over NT well.
>
The safest thing to do may well be to have 2 seperate computers.
One for development, the other for testing. The Development machine
should be the fastest and have the most disk space and be totally
stand alone, while the testing machine should be slower. Then
you could also use the testing machine for downloading attachments
and communicating via ICQ with no danger to your development machine.
As far as security is concerned:
DOS/Win 3.1 <= 95 < 98 < NT 4.0 < Unix <= Mainframe
NT 2000 will be more secure than 4.0, but still less secure than UNIX.
Leif N. Petersen
> In article <Pine.GSO.3.95.iB1.0.981025181555.14796A-100000@vtn1>,
> "Leif N. Petersen" <yf...@victoria.tc.ca> wrote:
> > On Sun, 25 Oct 1998, Donovan wrote:
> >
> > > On 25 Oct 1998 00:32:20 GMT, coc...@aol.com (Cocomax) wrote:
> > >
> > > >
> > > >What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you own?
> > > >
> > > > 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase that
> > > >you
> > > >own
>
> That sounds pretty good to me. Since I hear 4.0 allows multiple starbases
> per planet, this is effectly infinity when one has the resorces and 10
> ships ought to be plenty for colonization purposes.
Right, and of course these starbases cost a fortune, I mean have you read
about these things? They are HUGE! it'd be insane to build a massive
starbase, to get another lousy ship, you'd probably go broke before you
get a nice fleet. As well it makes attacking other players a snap, heck
those nice lightly defended planets? Take them out! Whammo, you just got
rid of another possible ship. And since all you have is a lousy 10 ships,
the smart guy would in one turn build a few decent warships, and wipeout
those planets (fleet combat, remember?) heck you realize you can wipe out
an enemies chance to build a fleet in only a few turns? ESPECIALLY since
this person will likely have mostly freighters. Anyway I have a feeling
that this setup can be abused pretty badly. Thing is with the 500
shiplimit, in V4 will be a little to...well little, since 30 players can
play, whynot have a 1500 ship limit? Sure it sounds like a lot, but with
30 people playing, Also, add the ability to modify the shiplimit, if there
is less players, than there is a smaller shiplimit.
Anyway I sorta of like the system we have now, yes it has it's
faults...but I think it works out pretty well.
>
> --
> Jon Nunn
> Friends Don't Let Friends Do Cobol
>
> -----------== Posted via Deja News, The Discussion Network ==----------
> http://www.dejanews.com/ Search, Read, Discuss, or Start Your Own
>
>
=-=Leif Petersen=-=
IRC: crewman
Peter Tang
> star bases instead from ship cargo.
>
> SL
It is possible that your idea will help extend the ship limit. It will probably
take a lot longer than it does now to reach the 500 ship limit with your addon
implemented. But it will throw the whole game out of balance. Economy will
become the biggest factor in the game probably resulting in the Federation, the
Lizards, the Cyborgs, and possibly the Colonies dominating the game.
Seth Graham
> In article <Pine.SO4.4.05.981028...@merlin.cs.engr.uky.edu>,
> Chris Lusena <lus...@cs.engr.uky.edu> wrote:
> >
> > NT is more secure that 95, though this is a relative term. It's still not
> > very secure, one just needs to use actual cracker techniques to do the
> > job. [...]
> As far as security is concerned:
> DOS/Win 3.1 <= 95 < 98 < NT 4.0 < Unix <= Mainframe
> NT 2000 will be more secure than 4.0, but still less secure than UNIX.
This is accurate, so long as you add the qualifier that says 'so long as
the person administering the box isn't stupid.' :)
Ignoring possible buffer overflows and the like, UNIX is incredibly easy
to leave holes open if the person who runs the box doesn't have some basic
knowledge. You may even be able to consider telling someone to 'rm -rf /'
as root (or any other tree, or any other user) a security hole.. and it
/has/ worked, before. UNIX neglects telling you that 'doing this will
delete all files in this directory.' DOS doesn't.
UNIX may be more capable of blocking attacks with regards to it's
capabilities than a DOS machine, but that's useless if the operator
doesn't know how to use the software. NT/95/98, OTOH, seems to offer more
'basic' security simply because it doesn't have the tools that UNIX
installs as a standard.
Note, this statement entirely disregards software bugs. :)
Seth Graham |
Network Administrator |
Icon CMT Corp. |
set...@iconnet.net |
G.A.Renting
>
> >>I don't know about most of the VGAP community, but I enjoy the game
> immensely, and don't give a damn if you are paranoid or not. You are
> the one that created this game, and you are the one that is responsible
> for this community to even exist. How anyone that plays this game can
> have negative feelings and ill will toward you I don't know... except
> perhaps out of jealousy.
> >>
>
I didn't follow the entire post, just want to say i agree with you.
I think Tim earns al the credits for creating and maintening this game,
allmost all
the good ideas are from him. I'm busy on writing some add-ons, but i
would never
write something that would by-pass the registery, even if i could.
(which i don't know
how to do at the moment, only reading .dat files now.)
His programs aren't perfect, but who's are.
(i would like it if the Winplan would survive a copy-protected floppy,
now i have to
restart it, if i forget to remove te protection, before making a .trn
file)
Adriaan Renting.
> You know you are right on with that, I have not had any problems with the
> players. I welcome comments from players, any comments about the game, what
> they like and dislike. What they would like to see added or don't like. I love
> that, I welcome that, I use those comments to make the game better.
>
> Even the host side addon writters have been great guys! It is the people
> that hack into RST / TRN / REG.KEY and FIZZBIN that have been strongly on the
jn...@my-dejanews.com
Seth Graham <set...@iconnet.net> wrote:
> On Wed, 28 Oct 1998 jn...@my-dejanews.com wrote:
>
> > In article
<Pine.SO4.4.05.981028...@merlin.cs.engr.uky.edu>,
> > Chris Lusena <lus...@cs.engr.uky.edu> wrote:
> > >
> > > NT is more secure that 95, though this is a relative term. It's still not
> > > very secure, one just needs to use actual cracker techniques to do the
> > > job. [...]
>
> > As far as security is concerned:
> > DOS/Win 3.1 <= 95 < 98 < NT 4.0 < Unix <= Mainframe
> > NT 2000 will be more secure than 4.0, but still less secure than UNIX.
>
> This is accurate, so long as you add the qualifier that says 'so long as
> the person administering the box isn't stupid.' :)
>
> Ignoring possible buffer overflows and the like, UNIX is incredibly easy
> to leave holes open if the person who runs the box doesn't have some basic
> knowledge. You may even be able to consider telling someone to 'rm -rf /'
> as root (or any other tree, or any other user) a security hole.. and it
> /has/ worked, before. UNIX neglects telling you that 'doing this will
> delete all files in this directory.' DOS doesn't.
>
Had the user typed in 'rm -ri <whatever>' the user would be repeatly
prompted for are you sure for each file and directory. With neither the
'-i' nor '-f' it depends upon the user & system defaults.
To defeat the (doing this will delete all files...) in NT one can
can write a one line script containing 'yes', call it the yes file and
then just type in
rm *.* < yes
The key here is only super user can delete root owned files, while
in NT any user can go wipe out the windows directory.
> UNIX may be more capable of blocking attacks with regards to it's
> capabilities than a DOS machine, but that's useless if the operator
> doesn't know how to use the software. NT/95/98, OTOH, seems to offer more
> 'basic' security simply because it doesn't have the tools that UNIX
> installs as a standard.
>
> Note, this statement entirely disregards software bugs. :)
>
Even for software bugs, in the Unix world unless the program
is root-equalvent or it's being run from root, it's not going
to be able to do things like remove the /bin directory. It
can still wipe all programs in the users home directory.
M.R.Heres
>
> What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you > own?
>
> 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase > > that you own
>
>
> 2X the number of planets that you own
>
> If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
>
> Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
>
Some races spread faster and easier (borg). Giving them an advantage.
Further more if someone starts losing a war he will lose planets. When
his support fleet remains the same size he can only build a smaller war
fleet, or sacrafice the support fleet but that would only work for a few
turns.
To be short it minimises the change to strike back at an opponant who
is attacking. On the other hand it does force people to play istead of
sitting back and build.
I would say give 25 shipslots and a few extra per planet just a
compromise between the above arguments. A nice effect should be that
people who stay out of conflicts don't get the chance to build more than
say 45 ships since collonisation is the best reason for war this idea
sounds verry good to me.
Crystals don't need many capships.
Privateer can collonise the best but becomes more vulnerable.
The Cyborg would be very strong, if they could build that fast.
M Heres
Sumdawgy
In article <363A1A...@cpedu.rug.nl>, "M.R.Heres" <M.R....@cpedu.rug.nl>
writes:
> The Cyborg would be very strong, if they could build that fast.
but the borg ships are expensive so it will take them time to get the big
ones....
Leif N. Petersen
> Cocomax wrote:
> >
> > What do you people think about a ship limit that is based on what you > own?
> >
> > 10 ships per player limit + 1 ship per planet + 1 ship per starbase > > that you own
> >
> > or
> >
> > 2X the number of planets that you own
> >
> > If you are over your limit you can not build another ship. . .
> >
> > Also no more PBP's for colonizing a ship
> >
> > Tim
>
> Some races spread faster and easier (borg). Giving them an advantage.
> Further more if someone starts losing a war he will lose planets. When
> his support fleet remains the same size he can only build a smaller war
> fleet, or sacrafice the support fleet but that would only work for a few
> turns.
> To be short it minimises the change to strike back at an opponant who
> is attacking. On the other hand it does force people to play istead of
> sitting back and build.
> I would say give 25 shipslots and a few extra per planet just a
> compromise between the above arguments. A nice effect should be that
> people who stay out of conflicts don't get the chance to build more than
> say 45 ships since collonisation is the best reason for war this idea
> sounds verry good to me.
>
> Crystals don't need many capships.
They don't? WHAT?!?!?! The crystals need warships like the rest of us,
Webs help, sure, but against any experianced opponant (or even a
half-DECENT opponant) it's unlikely that the Xtals will capture a lot of
big ships, probably not enough to survive, so there goes the Xtals.... :-\
> Privateer can collonise the best but becomes more vulnerable.
Well I dunno, try facing a Priv player who owns say 70 planets, builds his
ships. SO what if he loses a few? He'll likely have way more than, perhaps
the borg, and the Borg have problems engaging the Priv player, especially
if the Priv is good at what he (she) does.
> The Cyborg would be very strong, if they could build that fast.
Oh sure, I mean I'd guess that in the right hands the Borg could get about
100-200 planets by turn 15. I mean I've HEARD of a certain player who
actually got upwards of 300 planets in about 10-20 turns. So tell me, what
brilliant strategy could be used against even 30 cubes? In fleet combat?
It'd be like PLIST Borg...:-\
especially when the rest of us have to suffer with a whopping 45 ships.
It seems to me that this ship to planet ratio would make this game quite
unfair, and unbalancing.
Don't get me wrong, I'm all for a change in the ship limit, but I don't
actually have a big beef against the ship limit. With the ship limit it
forces players to go to war, otherwise, they'll get behind and thats the
idea, isn't it? What you want is for people to colonize early on, and
since everyone would be going for planets, go to war. would make for a
more lively game, BUT from what I've experianced, attacking early can
really damage your economy, so the smart players are not likely to do
that. Personally I would HATE having being tied down to the number of
planets, considering I'm ALREADY tied down to the number of planets I own
because you uh kinda NEED minerals to build ships, and they come from
planets :-)
So why would you make it even more restrictive?
-my 20 cents
> M Heres
>
>
=-=Leif Petersen=-=
IRC: crewman
Testing 1 2 3 4
>On 26 Oct 1998, Cocomax wrote:
>
>> I got a question, the hackers were talking on their mailing list about
>> getting inside of my computer using an IP address they grabbed from an IRC chat
>> with me and "leaving me a package" on my C drive. Is that even possible? I am
>> running Windows 98 with fileshareing on and with all my harddrives are password
>> protected.
>
>Window's security isn't too good, but password-protecting your
>harddrive should solve the most accurate problems, assuming you use a
>dial-up link to your provider. If you are directly and permanently
>connected to the internet... Better take a medium-sized axe to take
>your computer out yourselve before they do :-)
Sounds like they installed BackOrifice on your system. I strongly
recommend turning file sharing off when you don't actually need it,
and look around the 'net for ways of seeing if you've been
BackOrificed.
Maurice Bernsen
own planets long enough to mine them and build ships from them. The more
planets you own, and the more structures they have on them, the more
ships you build. It is not exact but it is not an arbitrary limit
either.
It seems to me that the only problem here is how much ships cost to make
a balanced game.
I agree that ship limits favor carrier races. The objective should be
to eliminate that bias by raising ship limits and eliminating junk
ships or making them too expensive. OTOH, I see nothing wrong with a
reasonable arbitrary limit on the number of freighters. Base it on total
population, including natives. It will be another reason to pop those
pesky amorphs. <G>
Maurice
Maurice Bernsen
>
> Cocomax wrote in message <19981025112159...@ngol08.aol.com>...
>
> >>Well, being close to ship limit, I would definetely make a deal with a
> >>neigbhor -
> >>give me 20 planets for 1 turn, then I will give you them back +
> >>additional 20...
> >
> > How about, if you own a planet for 10 turn you get 1 ship 20 turns you
> get 2
> >ships and 30 turns you get 3 ships.
> >
> > Tim
>
> have. Instead, it additional ship should perhaps instead place an additional
> burden or cost on the economy (salaray, provisions, fuel, maintenance and so
> on, larger ships being more expensive than smaller)?
>
>
> Admiral Ardieff (aka Rasmus Dyhr Frederiksen)
I kind of like this idea. I would make the further stipulation that
there be a broad base of materials needed to support the fleets, not
just money or fuel. But supplies, and minerals. That makes it more
difficult for races that are good at raising money or fuel. Maybe draw
those materials in proportion to their hull makeup, or maybe (constant
per element*hull size modifier*race modifier + %hull composition. Tax
planets within x-radius of the ship each turn. If all materials not
present, damage the ship. Perhaps allow a free 10 or 20% damage for
normal operations before cutting into operational efficiency. What about
ships in enemy territory or exploring? They either bring their own, get
resupplied by freighters, or colonize/develop a nearby planet to some
level. Maybe each race can designate x number of "scouts" hardened for
long range work. This would have to be a build option. Like clone, it
takes extra money, materials, or time to build.
It would be expensive to sit on a large fleet. There would be a definite
line of supply and the accompanying strategy opportunities.
Sorry, I got cranked up on this one. I still think the best think is no
ship limits and balanced ship costs.
Maurice
Brian Graham
> there be a broad base of materials needed to support the fleets, not
> just money or fuel. But supplies, and minerals. That makes it more
> difficult for races that are good at raising money or fuel. Maybe draw
> those materials in proportion to their hull makeup, or maybe (constant
> per element*hull size modifier*race modifier + %hull composition. Tax
> planets within x-radius of the ship each turn. If all materials notpresent,
> damage the ship.
Sunday you park your car in your driveway.No money until payday, you say? Too bad.
Monday morning you have a flat.
No money until payday, you say? Too bad. Tuesday morning you have a hole in the
gas tank.
No money until payday, you say? Too bad. Wednesday morning your rear bumper falls
off.
No money until payday, you say? Too bad. Thursday morning the rad is blown.
Friday. Payday. You fix your car. All your money is spent.
No money until payday, you say? Too bad!
--
Brian Graham (gra...@qouest.net)
Web Site: http://www.qouest.net/~grahamb/
Features: VGAP, Space, Aviation links & more..
ICQ Info: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/8771104
PAGE ME NOW!: http://www.qouest.net/~grahamb/ICQ/
Maurice Bernsen
--
That about sums it up. :>) Maybe you need a credit card?
But seriously, it won't be that bad. You or the host can 1. Adjust the
radius so that more planets support the ship. 2. Reduce the support
rates. 3. Live with the damage until "payday." 4. Use superior planning
to minimize the chance of the damage occuring.
Maurice
LEGIONS VGAPlanets Host Site
Regular mentored training games and GREAT team games!!
http://freeweb.pdq.net/mjbernsen/legions/legions.htm