Realism Invictus Pitboss game

[AspiringScholar]

I expect a long game, I was thinking about one session a week if we can all agree, but then again people can play turns between sessions being a pitboss game; so the game can progress even if slowly. I'm happy if you want to join! My only hope is it doesn't get too difficult to arrange these sessions together given different timezones.

Ok, sure, I'm in.

One session a week should be manageable. I am glad to see that this mod is getting so much love lately. I spent un unhealthy amount of time involved with it over the last year, but more people playing it still excites me. I have an offline single player game, my let's play, and this, but it should still be manageable.

One complication though is that if you are in Europe, my available time (7:00pm - 1:00am, my time) won't be your evening time, so is there a way that that can be worked?

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Ok, sure, I'm in.

One session a week should be manageable. I am glad to see that this mod is getting so much love lately. I spent un unhealthy amount of time involved with it over the last year, but more people playing it still excites me. I have an offline single player game, my let's play, and this, but it should still be manageable.

One complication though is that if you are in Europe, my available time (7:00pm - 1:00am, my time) won't be your evening time, so is there a way that that can be worked?

Yeah, time might be a problem, I fear. 7PM your time is 2AM here in Europe and 5AM in India where bluecivdoom is, which makes it almost impossible to play together. I was hoping that from time to time we can all agree on a different time than we're usually available but this is getting very hard. If we are all going to play together, I suppose the only reasonable time might be during weekends, probably between 8PM-10PM here in Europe, which makes 11PM-1AM in India and 1PM-3PM in your timezone. Pretty uncomfortable for bluecivdoom, probably for you and I think for some other players here in Europe too; but I suppose any other time involves a time when people usually sleep. I wonder if other players might agree to play less frequently all together (once per month? twice per month?) but playing at a time which was not their first choice, or if their proposed times are final and not negotiable. Opinions?

 

[bluecivdoom]

I can easily slot time for 10-12am or 11-1am (the later obviously more uncomfortable) night games are fine, I don't think my morning would ever work for Europeans though, so that's the thing. And yeah I'm usually up by 8am in the morning

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

I can easily slot time for 10-12am or 11-1am (the later obviously more uncomfortable) night games are fine, I don't think my morning would ever work for Europeans though, so that's the thing. And yeah I'm usually up by 8am in the morning

Yeah, I'm also one of those who usually goes to bed 1AM and wakes up 7AM. And your morning time might work for me from time to time because I work in the afternoon 13-19 GMT; but that would be more uncomfortable for AspiringScholar, and I suppose for other people working/studying here in Europe. Let's see what other people say.

 

[fdelbene]

Hi, I would be interested but I cannot guarantee to be able to join a "live session", independently of the frequency (too many variables in my RL schedule ). If that's mandatory don't worry and don't consider my candidacy.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Hi, I would be interested but I cannot guarantee to be able to join a "live session", independently of the frequency (too many variables in my RL schedule ). If that's mandatory don't worry and don't consider my candidacy.

I'd say it's mandatory if we want to end the game in what is probably a reasonable time; otherwise it would be like a PBEM. I've always found PBEM fascinating and especially for how people can keep playing for that long. I've only tried in once and dropped out of it after a few weeks because I lost interest and I was too busy with other projects at the time. I hope a pitboss game can be more engaging for everyone.

 

[AspiringScholar]

So, we'd be looking at an afternoon weekend time for me? That's perfectly doable.

Could someone explain pitboss to me though as a mechanism? I honestly have never played Civ online so I am not sure how the platform works.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

So, we'd be looking at an afternoon weekend time for me? That's perfectly doable.

Could someone explain pitboss to me though as a mechanism? I honestly have never played Civ online so I am not sure how the platform works.

Pitboss is kind of halfway between PBEM and DirectIP/LAN game. I'll host the pitboss server and players (myself included) only need to connect to the server via a static IP. Since IP address might change over time, that's why I proposed in an earlier post to use a virtual LAN program (ZeroTier) so that we all have static IP addresses (only for playing this game, of course). Players can either connect together to the server, so they can play like they would in a normal LAN multiplayer game (I suggest simultaneous turns to speed up the game), or they can play separately; in this last case they connect, play their turn, then disconnect. When all players are finished with their turn, the pitboss server starts another turn and players will play next turn when they connect. This way everyone can play a single turn when they have time, like in a PBEM game. I've also setup a program in python that sends a notification e-mail to the players to tell them when a new turn has started (provided players are willing to share their e-mail address with me); I tested this program too and it works (ChatGPT works like a charm for python coding).

So a good proposal might be once or twice per month, hypothetically 19-21 GMT, which would be 1PM-3PM for you, 20-22 for players in Europe, 11PM-1AM for bluecivdoom. Depending on other european players we might be able to do something like 18-20 GMT, so 12-2PM US CST, 19-21 in Europe and 10PM-12AM for India.
Temae should be ok with this proposal, but I'd like to hear from Monsijo and Sinocpm because I think they preferred working days; I suppose this would make it impossible to use any different time than 20-22 for Europe, 11PM-1AM for India and 1PM-3PM for US, which I think would be impossible for AspiringScholar. So if Monsijo and Sinocpm are available once or twice per month during the weekend evenings, we might have found a good soluion. Otherwise we'll have to think of something else or drop someone
I still need a feedback from 2 other people I found on a discord channel and on RealmsBeyond though.

 

[AspiringScholar]

Again, if anyone ends up needing to bend inconveniently around my schedule, I can drop out, but 1PM-3PM on a weekend should be no stretch at all, especially if it's only once or twice a month. Looking forward to it, in fact!

Who wants to be who is the question I expect will come to real conflicts...

 

[bluecivdoom]

@AspiringScholar linky to your let's play?

Also are we going to be playing something like a huge world map scenario or a randomly generated map?

Edit: I'm one of those people on the discord channel so I've already responded

 

[AspiringScholar]

@AspiringScholar linky to your let's play?

Also are we going to be playing something like a huge world map scenario or a randomly generated map?

Edit: I'm one of those people on the discord channel so I've already responded

Sure:

(Be warned, the audio quality on the first episode is really bad, but I bought a proper microphone for all of the subsequent videos.)

As for your other question, I'll just go with the group consensus. I don't particularly care one way or the other, myself.

 

[bluecivdoom]

Sure:

(Be warned, the audio quality on the first episode is really bad, but I bought a proper microphone for all of the subsequent videos.)

As for your other question, I'll just go with the group consensus. I don't particularly care one way or the other, myself.

Interesting first video, I don't know how much further you've gone into the game but:

The olive groves seem great in hilly maps, especially coastal hill cities. Potentially 6 commerce per hill tile on a river is great for research in the medieval era, only bad thing being that they're worse than windmills food-wise in the long run, but you should be able to keep the slider at 80% the whole time with them.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Who wants to be who is the question I expect will come to real conflicts...

there are so many leaders and civ, I hope they will be enough to delay the carnage to when we actually play

Also are we going to be playing something like a huge world map scenario or a randomly generated map?

Edit: I'm one of those people on the discord channel so I've already responded

Good question; I'm open to both. I've always liked scenarios and I'm currently playing the large earth map (not the huge one) in a singleplayer game. But I suppose there might be balancing issues in this case. What do you and other players think about it? If we choose a random map, I'd prefer Totestra mapscript which I think is probably the best. As for size, I think it also depends on how many human players there are. I'd say large with 4 human players, huge with 6 and giant with 8 although I'm not sure about the last one; I would let the default number of AI players for each map size. I think my pc can handle a giant map even if it's 3 years old (I've autoplayed some games to the end to check), but I don't know about others.

@bluecivdoom About the discord channel, are you Abhi96 in Monsijo (here) / Simon (on discord) discord? If so I was talking about another discord channel and the player's username is Yaldabaoth.

 

[bluecivdoom]

there are so many leaders and civ, I hope they will be enough to delay the carnage to when we actually play



Good question; I'm open to both. I've always liked scenarios and I'm currently playing the large earth map (not the huge one) in a singleplayer game. But I suppose there might be balancing issues in this case. What do you and other players think about it? If we choose a random map, I'd prefer Totestra mapscript which I think is probably the best. As for size, I think it also depends on how many human players there are. I'd say large with 4 human players, huge with 6 and giant with 8 although I'm not sure about the last one; I would let the default number of AI players for each map size. I think my pc can handle a giant map even if it's 3 years old (I've autoplayed some games to the end to check), but I don't know about others.

@bluecivdoom About the discord channel, are you Abhi96 in Monsijo (here) / Simon (on discord) discord? If so I was talking about another discord channel and the player's username is Yaldabaoth.

I'm Abhi96 on discord yeah. Yaldabaoth is a familiar name, talked with him once about a possible RI game, good to know that its picking up.



Problem with giant is going to be progression turns in the lategame, but hey more players are always fun.


I prefer totestra myself for random map script. The nice thing about huge Earth map is that you can generally have everyone in the same vicinity and play politics a lot better because we have better knowledge of geography... But it does take away the exploration part of the game to a large extent. I'm good with either but depends on the game most people want.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

I'm Abhi96 on discord yeah. Yaldabaoth is a familiar name, talked with him once about a possible RI game, good to know that its picking up.



Problem with giant is going to be progression turns in the lategame, but hey more players are always fun.


I prefer totestra myself for random map script. The nice thing about huge Earth map is that you can generally have everyone in the same vicinity and play politics a lot better because we have better knowledge of geography... But it does take away the exploration part of the game to a large extent. I'm good with either but depends on the game most people want.

Ok, I totally agree with you on the points you've raised here. I like the playing politics part which comes with the Earth map, but exploration is much fun too. I'm also good with either so let's wait for other people's opinion.

 

[bluecivdoom]

Another question is installing the latest version; I think I'm playing a pbem of the previous version, wouldn't that be a problem if I install the newer version? Or will that not overwrite the previous version?

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Another question is installing the latest version; I think I'm playing a pbem of the previous version, wouldn't that be a problem if I install the newer version? Or will that not overwrite the previous version?

Good question. AFAIK Realism Invictus is not always fully compatible between different versions. And yes, the installer will overwrite the previous RI folder. I can see 2 solutions: either you rename your PBEM folder temporarily, install the new version, rename the new version as "Realism Invictus Pitboss" and then rename your PBEM game folder to the original "Realism Invictus" folder; OR you can make a copy of your Civ4BeyondSword.exe in another folder (like C:\Temp for example) and then install the new RI version in that folder, since it asks you where the exe is when installing. This way you have the mod installed under C:\Temp\Mods\Realism Invictus. You then rename your newly created folder to "Realism Invictus Pitboss" and move it under BTS\Mods folder. This way you don't need to rename your PBEM game folder. Either way, we all have to change the name of the folder to "Realism Invictus Pitboss" and change the argument of the desktop shortcut accordingly, pointing to something like

"YOUR_PATH_TO_THE_FOLDER_Beyond the Sword\BTS_Wrapper.exe" mod= "Realism Invictus Pitboss"

I can't see any other way I think, because if you change the name of your PBEM folder you probably won't be able to play with it anymore in your PBEM game, until you revert its name to the original one.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Another solution, but I don't know if it works, is to simply rename your current PBEM game folder to "Realism Invictus PBEM", then check if you can load one of your savegames in that folder which would basically be kind of another mod with almost identical feature and almost identical name. I suppose it doesn't work, but I'm not sure. And then again, once you saved your savegame the next player in your PBEM game should check if he can load your savegame properly. I'm not sure if the mod folder name is saved as something critical that might break the PBEM game.

Edit: actually neither solution seems to work. I tried renaming the RI folder to something else and changing the shortcut accordingly but I get a GFC error. Maybe it's not possible to make the mod work under a different folder. The only solution then would be renaming the mod folders (pbem and pitboss) each time you play with one or the other. Like renaming them "Realism Invictus PBEM" and "Realism Invictus Pitboss" and renaming the simply "Realism Invictus" accordingly to which game you're playing at that moment.

 

[Sinocpm]

So if Monsijo and Sinocpm are available once or twice per month during the weekend evenings, we might have found a good soluion.

I think I can manage that! We're talking once or twice per month on a weekend, right? In any case should be manageable.

Realism Invictus 3.6 full version

There is a 3.6a patch which I have installed, I think it makes the most sense to go with that latest version, which has all the latest bugfixes incorporated, no?

I've joined the discord server (also Sinocpm there), maybe we can agree on a time when we can all "meet" there and chat about the setup, discuss the various options etc. At best we could start the game right after, maybe just the first round, but just to make sure it's all set up and working for everyone

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

I think I can manage that! We're talking once or twice per month on a weekend, right? In any case should be manageable.

There is a 3.6a patch which I have installed, I think it makes the most sense to go with that latest version, which has all the latest bugfixes incorporated, no?

I've joined the discord server (also Sinocpm there), maybe we can agree on a time when we can all "meet" there and chat about the setup, discuss the various options etc. At best we could start the game right after, maybe just the first round, but just to make sure it's all set up and working for everyone

Yes, it would be once or twice per month on a weekend evening (Central Europe Time). I know about the patch and I'm ok with that version if other people agree. I don't remember where I've downloaded it though, I still haven't used it, I just installed it for a test in a separate folder. AFAIK it doesn't include the fix I'm talking about in my first post anyway (there's a division by zero in the dll code when a unit is airbombing improvements, so it crashes the game frequently when you reach modern era: I've fixed it). If I'm not mistaken the latest version you're talking about didn't change anything at dll level. Do you have a link to the latest version so I can check?
If people all agree to use that discord channel, that's fine with me, I'm already there too (username Jackal). Either here or there, we can discuss what options we want to play with, then we can catch up to try and start a game; if it works, we can play on for the first session. If it doesn't we try and fix any possible problem and then we start another game as soon as we can. Let's wait for Monsijo opinion about time for playing, and hopefully for 2 more people from RealmsBeyond (he should post something here tomorrow) and from another discord channel. If we all agree on the timeframe for playing, then we start discussing about map/speed/options and so on.