The admin password (or lack thereof) doesn't impact on cheating of players (exception noted below). Here is my understanding of what an admin password gives you:
- game with admin password
- admin can open any save
- game still 'alive' if a player loses his password
- game still 'alive' if a player disappears
- person with admin password can cheat
- MAC players cannot participate
- game without admin password
- can only open save with player password
- game 'dead' if a player loses his password
- game 'dead' if a player disappears
- MAC players can participate
I think this is not quite right.
If there is no admin password, the game is not dead if a player loses his password or disappears.
For example with Flev, the player who disappeared was the game owner, along with a few others.
I took over the game, reverted to my previous turn, and set an admin password, and replayed my turn.
Now, I could use the admin password to reset the individual passwords of the players who had disappeared, ready for their replacments.
But, once having set an admin password, you cannot then set a null password, you can only set a new one.
So, there is only one way in which a game can truly be dead...if the owner, having set an admin password, then disappears.
Anything else is recoverable.