Pitboss game for non-experts

Hello you,

I am settin up a PB game for the first time. Time to see how it goes. The game will be open for 6-8 players total. I am +02:00 GMT myself. We will meet on irc channel (somewhere @quakenet) during games and for pre-game discussion (timetables etc, maybe we can use teamspeak,ventrilo). 1 player / nation, sign up here.

I copy-pasted this from Mysteri10k's thread:

Player #: Forum Name/Game Name (civ selection = random)

Player 1: Wainio/wainio
Player 2: x/x
Player 3: g_storrow/x
Player 4: oagersnap/x
Player 5: micah_czar/x
Player 6: x/x (x)
Player 7: x/x (x)
Player 8: x/x (x)

The game will have the following specs:

SETTINGS
Human Players: 6 min./8 max.
AI Players: 0
Map: pangaea

Size: Standard
Climate: Tropical
Sea Level: Low
Era: Ancient
Speed: Normal

GAME OPTIONS ENABLED
No Cheating
No barbarians

VICTORY CONDITIONS ENABLED
Turn
Conquest
Domination
Cultural
Space Race
Diplomatic

MULTIPLAYER OPTIONS
Simultaneous Turns: On
Take Over AI: On
Turn Timer: 12 hours

Player Requirements
-Don't sing up if you gonna only play for few rounds
-You are dedicated to play with rest of the group (times decided weekly)
-You are be able to play online sessions (when all players are online at once) for 1-2 hours a few times during the week, and for 1-2 hours or more Saturday or Sunday
-You can be European or from USA, if you adjust to online sessions decided by group

Hi Wainio,

you'll need to increase the turn timer to at least 12 hours. It applies not only when players are online, but when they are offline as well. So if you put less than 12 hours, you will not allow your players to sleep at night for fear of missing turns.

Also, I would suggest that you turn on the AI take over. This way an AI will take over if a player has to quit, or if you end up having a player go on vacation and they want their Civ to be controlled by the AI for that time, or if (as Mysterio has had to do) you have to boot someone from the game because they can't make enough online sessions to make it worthwhile and hence slowing down the game.
If you don't have the AI take over, I don't know what happens, but you may have to take the game offline until you locate a replacement player. Letting the AI take over will allow the rest of your group to keep playing while you look for a replacement player.

I would also suggest posting what times you would like to try to get online group sessions with all of the players there. That way you can try to get signups of people who will be able to make it to at least a couple sessions a week. It makes the game go much faster, smoother, and more fun.
For example, you'll see that Mysterio has it set so that we generally do our sessions from like 7-9pm EST a couple times a week.

Corossol said:

Hi Wainio,

you'll need to increase the turn timer to at least 12 hours. It applies not only when players are online, but when they are offline as well. So if you put less than 12 hours, you will not allow your players to sleep at night for fear of missing turns.

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Does the turn timer (=2 hours) mean that for example if u have 8 players, all 8 must complete their turns in 2 hours. Or does it mean that every player has 2 hours to complete (=max 2*8 = 16 hours)

If I end turn -> 1)does pitboss notice it 2)does it automagicly upload "the game state" from me 3)next player in line downloads the current save file and so on

I was thinking that the game would be played live, so that all players would be always online when turns take place... don't if it is possible though....

HitAnyKey said:

Also, I would suggest...

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Yeah, I was thinking of setting the AI on for the reasons you wrote.

I didn't set any times when game was to be played or so, because I wanted to set times that would suit for them who sign up. Times will be agreed later and the intensity of sessions/week. Yeah, I red the mysterios thread (and was hoping to join but i'm out of the 5-9EST being +02:00gmt )

With "simultaneous turns" (players can play at the same time during a turn), the timer is for the whole turn, not for each player. I've never played with sequential turns so I don't know if it's different then.

Pitboss manages the game state for you (the server is always up). No one has to e-mail download any turns à la PBEM; you just log in ("direct IP connection") and play. There's a PitBoss utility to send e-mails to all players when a new turn begins; make sure you get it.

Okey. I thought it would work as "simultaneous". Thats why I meant that turn timer could only be 1-2 hours and all (mostly) players would be online at the same time when turns take place. Pitboss can save the game state, so I dont have to keep the server online 24/7, only the time when sessions are played.

That is true that it would save the game state. But the main purpose of the PitBoss gaming method is that it's sort of a combination of PBEM & MP.
If you have it set with a 12 hour timer (like we do) each player just has to log in a minimum of every 12 hours and do a turn. So I'd generally do one in the morning before work and one at night. And that's only if no one is around to do multiples in a single night, which we're often able to do even if we don't all get online at the same time for a session.

So the PB server is running all the time, and you log in when you can within the 12 hour limit. Once the last person completes their turn, the 12 hour timer restarts from that time giving the players 12 hours to do their next turn. Etc, etc.

When you have a session, you all log in and do your turns at the same time. As soon as the last person ends their turn, the next turn starts, and you just continue until someone has to leave. Then you just log out and go back to doing them whenever the turns rollover.

atm all victory conditions are on automatically. I believe the next patch may fix that.

I would like to join this game it would be my first pit boss game but I am in a couple of PBEM games with Corossol and HitAnyKey. I am in GMT, weekends apart from early mornings 8am - 10am might be difficult for me but most evenings mon-thu 7pm -11pm I could be on for a couple of hours at least 2 out of them.

Nice! Tell me which civ you wanna be. Times you suggested suits me perfectly!

I'd like to join too. I'm in GMT+1. Weekends I can play almost all the time, weekdays mostly in the afternoon. (Or also a bit in the evening. Not so late though, only before 22:00.)
I'd suggest that you set the turn timer to 24 hours, 12 might be too little for me, and we're going to play at set times anyway, so how many turns we complete in between doesn't really matter anyway.

Random civ for me please. I like a real challenge. Just a note ,when I work away the hotel I stay at is a bit hit and miss with the wireless router. Some nights it works(60%), some nights it doesnt(40%), but Ishoudl only be there a coupel more weeks. I can play my turn during day when that happens.

Is it ok for you oeger and storrow if we play with 4-5 players? I think we could start on monday, let's say 21:00 GMT +02:00 (=7 pm gmt +00:00)? Can you get yourselves to irc channel @ quakenet, or do u use messenger or skype?

Hey, too late to get in on this game? I'll take a random civ. How do I get in?

not too late, you're in!

excellent. thankyasir

Okey guys, please let me know if u are up for it tonight as mentioned in post #14?! If not, I start the pb and send you ip and passwords in PM. I changed the turn timer 12. good luck!

Wainio said:

Okey guys, please let me know if u are up for it tonight as mentioned in post #14?! If not, I start the pb and send you ip and passwords in PM. I changed the turn timer 12. good luck!

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I can play tonight to about 22:00 CET (21:00 GMT). Is that okay with you?

Okay, fine by me lets start 21:00 GMT. can you give me your email here or to wainio at gmail.com