STARWEB EMAIL DISCUSSION GROUP (THE SEDG) (Sponsored by Flying Moose Technologies' Starweb Analyzer - http://flyingmoose.cjb.net) VOLUME 31 April 10, 2000 CONTENTS Letter from the Editor Feature Article - STARWEB TRIVIA by John Shannonhouse Questions - Anonymous and Bitter End Games SEDG Web Page URL The Captain's Log - Loyalty, Fidelity Revisited The Swap Corner - Filters Correspondence - On being an Evil Overlord. LOOFLIRPA! Subscribers - I hope you have been enjoying the SEDG. I have enjoyed producing them and as a keen Gamer it has been a labor of love. I am making a plea for articles. As it stands I am starting to run short of good material and I really would like to keep the SEDG going for a while. I know that a newsletter based on one PBM game can only generate a finite amount of material and at some point the SEDG will end. But at that point I hope the SEDG will be a complete work and the recognized bible of Starweb . I don't mind if it's a short article as I can always put more than one together (like this issue's Trivia Posts). To give you someplace to start, here are some ideas that haven't been fully explored and would be welcome Feature Articles. How to play different Starweb Variants - best character mix, strategies, alliances. - Multi games - Anonymous games - Bitter End - Time Travel - Virtual Con (turns emailed every 2 days) Playing the Backstabber - could be pro or con. Some descriptions of old/dead variants might be interesting such as the Pandora's Box Starweb. The use of undead characters used in the 80's. I would even like to see a play by play descriptive article about specific games if the game was very entertaining and had some twists (try to avoid too much description of worlds and fleet numbers - it gets confusing). Elliot Hudes FEATURE ARTICLE - STARWEB TRIVIA by John Shannonhouse Editor's note: John's Tricks of the Trade have been previously published on the internet. Enjoy! Useful trivia post number 1... Whenever the Starweb rules say that targets or order of events are determined randomly, they are wrong. I don't think the original program had a random number generator, and that part has never been changed. They are determined by the fleet numbers. For example, if multiple ships owned by different players (all of them declared loaders) are picking up raw materials from a world, the owner of the world loads first. After that, it is in numerical order by fleet. You can figure the other instances out by observation yourself, now that you know the concept. This information can come in useful. For example, you may want to declare all of your allies as loaders. To slow down the merchant score a bit, give him the highest numbered fleets. If he loads at the same world as another ally the lower numbered fleet will load first and haul to the home world. Of course, if you are a merchant, you may want to bargain for a low numbered fleet. Useful trivia post number 2... Knowledge is power. In Starweb, it is frequently useful to find out about your opponent's territory without him knowing about it. The rules talk about probing neighboring worlds without being discovered, What is not clear is the fact that probes come before combat. If you send a fleet with only one ship into enemy territory, and he can destroy it, don't bother to try and fight back or move. Just probe with the single ship as he attacks. He will never know that you know more about his area than you did earlier. The same thing can be done if he is attacking a world with a single protecting ship. I used this to very good effect in one Starweb game. I came back later in massive force on the boundaries of his territory. He moved forward to block me with enough force to stop my attack, but due to the probe I had enough information to go one more world, so I flew over his newly amassed fleet direct to his home world, where he could not stop my capture. In Starweb, losing the home world is not just losing the battle, but also losing the war. The guy was certain that one of his allies had stabbed him in the back. Useful trivia post number 3... If they are not "at peace", all Apostle ships and converts have a chance of converting population to their particular religion. A world cannot have more than one set of converts. This has an interesting little glitch. If a world is already fully converted, such as the Apostle's home world, then it does no more conversions. If another Apostle shows up, even with just one ship, he has a chance of converting the whole world and gaining control, and the home Apostle's ships and converts do *nothing* to make this process less likely. You should *never* let another Apostle get ships to your home world. Of course, this is also a useful piece of information if you want to take over the other Apostle's territory... This is also an important point to consider if you have declared a Jihad against another Apostle. Make sure your ships are at peace before firing, or you might kill your own converts and *lose* points instead of gaining them. Useful trivia post number 4... For those "Goodlife" Berserker fans, here is another (actually three tips, but they interrelate closely) Starweb tip. Everyone knows that when a Berserker drops a PBB (Planet Buster Bomb), it kills off all population, even robots. Timing is a critical issue, though. What is *not* explained in the rules is that Robots are handled differently from normal population. If some nice person from a neighboring world (you can do this yourself, of course) will migrate people to the world you are bombing or robotizing from a neighboring world, they will get killed off as well, for the additional points per population killed. This happens even if they exceed the normal population limit of the world, and would have died off anyway. However, if you migrate a robot from a robotized neighboring world as it is being bombed, it does *not* get killed off in the explosion. Instead, it runs around admiring the newly sterilized world, giving the berserker an extra five points a turn for a robotized world, starting immediately. This also works if you have two fleets, and one robotizes while the other bombs. That gives a nice marginal assist, but some players are greedy. They want it all, preferably in big hunks. For those, you can modify the scenario just slightly for big points for minimal effort. If another Berserker or Apostle is bombing a world next to your robotized world, migrate a robot there. You will not only get the 5 point/world/turn bonus, but you will also get points for *all* population killed, just as if you had killed them all off yourself. This is just the thing for the Berserker whose opponents are trying to steal his points from him by doing the killing first. Because of this, it is a *very* good idea to robotize surrounding industrial worlds before the real fun starts. Useful trivia post number 5... In Starweb, most players traditionally run turn one poorly. You can hardly blame them since the example given in the rules is very misleading. It would be bad enough if the example was given with a disclaimer, but instead the rules say that their example is so standard that Flying Buffalo will automatically run it that way if you miss turn 1. This results in all five keys moving out to the adjacent worlds. You will almost always have more keys than connecting worlds on turn 1. And you should *not* move a fleet away from the home world without a good reason. You also need to balance fleet size for critical stages around turn 4. To do this, assume that you will pick up a new fleet on each connecting world (they are actually staggered more irregularly than this, but this is your best assumption). Take the industry at the home world (30), add the 1 ISHP and one PSHP, and one more turn of builds (2 more ships) to get 34. Divide this number by the number of fleets at the home world(5) plus the number of connections (normally three). For a three connector world, that is (30+1+1+2)/(5+3), or four and a fraction. Double this number, and put that on a number of fleets equal to the number of connection worlds. Send those fleets out to the connecting worlds. Divide the remaining builds and ships evenly among the remaining fleets. Make a guess as to connecting worlds beyond your immediate connections, and try to move these to the next ring out. If they succeed, you have a big advantage over your opponents. If the move fails (and it almost always will), the fleet will still be at the home world, and will be able to pick up those two additional builds from the home world before moving out the following turn. Those two extra ships can make a huge difference on the critical turn 4. Editor's Note: I have seen a player succeed in guessing the connection to a ring 2 world on turn 1. Awesome! Useful trivia post number 6... Since there were a few comments on religious issues on the list, a helpful Apostle hint seems in order... The Starweb rules say that an Apostle can give away a fully converted world, but he will get it back the following turn, because he always captures a fully converted world. This seems pretty useful and straightforward. An Apostle can give an Empire Builder his home world for the points, and even if the Empire Builder decides to stab him, the world comes right back the next turn. The Apostle can make the gift with minimal risk, unlike every other character class in the game, who has to trust the Empire Builder to do what is right. There is only one small problem with this scenario -- sometimes it does not work. If the world has not reached its full population limit, the world grows non-converts, even if the world is already 100% converts! The converts will try to convert the new population, but there is an excellent chance that they will not fully succeed. Even if the home world is at the full population limit, the new owner can migrate out converts. The world then grows non-converts, and he maintains control. He can continue to migrate out converts every turn to free up space for new population growth, maintaining control of the world indefinitely. John Shannonhouse ----------------------------------------------------------------------- QUESTIONS - Can anyone answer these? Two issues ago I asked - Did you know that FBI has a way to ensure that anonymous games remain that way. Anyone care to take a stab at how? Answer - The turnsheets are produced in a scrambled format. The world and key numbers that you see will not be the same as viewed by other players who are at the same worlds. So, if you are at W134 with F10 another player may view this as W10 and F33. In this way, trading turnsheets (highly illegal in an anonymous game) won't ruin the anonymous nature of the game. Hi Elliot, Got a question for you. What role does score play in bitter end games? I understand the game end happens when someone has 128 planets and that person is the winner, but is there still a ranking of players by score? Does the score get recorded on the FBI score sheet? Sean Corrigall Sean - I have never played a Bitter end game so I don't know. It would seem to me you would rank by the number of worlds owned and not score. Why don't you ask Rick at FBI. Meanwhile it will make an excellent question for the next issue of the SEDG. Thanks. ----------------------------------------------------------------------- STARWEB EMAIL DISCUSSION GROUP - is now available on the web. Look for our new MAPPER'S SECTION on the SEDG Web Page. http://www.accessv.com/~somnos/sedg.htm ----------------------------------------------------------------------- FEATURE - THE CAPTAIN'S LOG 000402.081896-4 By Walt Schmidt walts@dorsai.org Loyalty, Fidelity Revisited - Gimmee Those Old-Fashion Virtues, They're Good Enough For Me! "Histories are more full of examples of the fidelity of dogs than of friends." - Alexander Pope "Beware he who lets you do his dirty work for him. Beware "him of the clean hands." - anon "We cannot always assure the future of our friends; we have a better chance of assuring our (own) future if we remember who our friends are." - Henry Kissinger [NEMO, are you out of your expletive-deleted mind! Now we have to suffer through three quotes!?!] [Alter, Alter, please - humor me - and speaking of humor - nice Log last issue.] [THANKS - but I gotta tell ya - I thought Long Island was cold! Sheesh!!!] [Be nice, now, Alter - remember we are Elliot's guests] [OH Canada...] [...but at least make it believable, Alter] While John Shannonhouse's article was entitled "STARWEB TRIVIA," in my humble opinion there was nothing trivial about it. And it got me thinking about one of (if not the most) non-trivial aspects of the game - the Alliance. As it's been almost five months since we've lasted visited it - this time not to talk about it at any length - but to mention it once again... Nemo's Three Laws of Alliance: 1 - My Comrades - first and foremost! 2 - Myself - a damn close second. 3 - All Others - can go scratch... And the zeroeth's law: 0 - Death to All Traitors - Shai Dorsai! But as Pope said, history isn't exactly full of examples of fidelity amongst friends. And in many (most?) cases, your allies either come with some form of baggage, or they are really unknown to you. So what can you do to gauge their mettle - gauge how they are working within the alliance? Once the alliance is up and running, but not before, you can always turn to: Nemo's Four Questions of Alliance Fidelity: 4 - Has he ever missed a turn, no matter what the reason? 3 - Has he ever mis-spoke, regardless of why? 2 - Has he ever broken a promise, period? 1 - Does he shy-away from getting his public hands dirty? Taken one at a time, and in a non-alliance mode, we are all guilty of missing a turn, not always being forthright, forgetting a promise made, and not necessarily approaching combat as if we were "Vikings with a special invite into Valhalla!" But look closely at your fellow alliance members, and judge their actions accordingly. And regardless of the existence of, or your participation in an alliance - remember: "The best index to a person's character is how he treats people who can't do him any good, and how he treats people who can't fight back." - Abigail Van Buren See you next Log... Shai Dorsai ! Nemo ----------------------------------------------------------------------- FEATURE - THE SWAP CORNER FILTERS Selecting a filter listed in the Filter Control will cause the List View and Map View to only show items that satisfy the selected filter criteria. A filter description containing the (owner) designation requires at least one of the owners from the Owner Control to be selected. Selecting multiple filters from Filter Control act to show only items that satisfy all of the selected filters criteria. E.g. if you use the filters to select plunderable, industry and > ring limit you will only see a list of worlds that can be plundered, have industry and are at a distance greater than the selected ring limit from the chosen center of the universe. The Owner Control acts differently. For those filter descriptions listed in the Filter Control containing the (owner) tag (E.g. Worlds(owner)) you must designate an owner. If no owners are selected in conjunction with such a filter, then no items will be displayed since no items can satisfy being owned by nobody! Multiple owners can be selected and since items cannot be owned by more than one person it acts differently than the Filter Control. It will show you a list of all the items satisfying the selected filter criteria for any of the selected owners. For example: If you wish to see worlds(owner)=Somnos, Moose you will see a list of all the Somnos and Moose worlds in the List and Map Views. Tip: If you are ready to start a new filtering of the List View remember to uncheck the previously chosen filters or they will still be active. A quick way to do this is to use the Clear all button on the tool bar. Many examples of filters were used in the Previous SEDG's 'How do I' articles. I find the most useful are to - 1) Find metal within ring 3 of a HW. 2) Find reinforcement keys within 3 rings of a battle. 3) Find industry worlds when sending keys out from the HW. 4) Finding a gift for an EB. 5) Find a high population world to PBB ----------------------------------------------------------------------- CORRESPONDENCE In regards to the issue's "On Being an Evil Overlord" article - Herb Diehr said: Someone has watched 'way too many B science-fiction movies!!! (And I should know.) John Shannonhouse said: It was mentioned in a past SEDG the possibility of reverse engineering. My comments regarding proposed rule changes were written with that idea in mind. My earlier comment about merely minimizing the amount of metal available could be asily done in current rules. It would certainly be possible and ethical to reverse engineer the game and provide the new one to FBI. I think there is a lot of difficulty with reprogramming the current version, and a reprogramming might be the best solution. John Shannonhouse Editor: Assuming that it can be done I suppose it would be prudent to invite Rick to collaborate on the types of changes. After all, it's a lot of work and it would be wasted if FBI weren't interested in trying out such an updated 'Starweb'. The next problem would be WHO would wish to do such a large job and would they get remunerated. My impression is that FBI is not interested in an expensive revamp of Starweb. In reference to Volume 30 - The April Fools Issue - David Benepe said: I was suspicious from the first trap. But, my CURIOSITY was up, so I read on... It was the Looflirpa that gave it away... Probably the most time consuming ekoj looflirpa that I've ever seen. It was very inventive. The best jokes are those with significant plausibility. So, yes, I enjoyed it very much! Don McEntee said: You know, there wasn't much that was unreasonable in that whole silly story. However, your credibility is still toast until at least 2004... Editor: Don't tell me you fell for it :-)? I hope you enjoyed the issue. Speaking of falling for it ... Sharon Wyatt said: Got me! Editor: Then there are those who 'claim' to have seen through our ruse. Gary Schaefers said: You guys have TOO MUCH TIME on your hands. Enjoyed the "articles". Yes, I did "smell" something funny and spotted the backwards SEMANEDOC. (used to do that myself years back) More appropriately, I used EROCS for my code name in the SW game where I tried to "score backwards" - or - get the highest negative score that I could. That was a fun game. Hey, why not have a game where the winner is the player with the LOWEST score? Maybe a multi game where only your lowest score counts and the game is tripped by the highest score? Geez - I had better get some rest. You guys tend to rub off on people. (Ya, what was my excuse before I met you?) Gary Editor: Oh, we had fun with this issue. I should have scrambled the letters more in the character names. I thought Multi Games worked that only your lowest score counted already? Then you would need to say it's the lowest score of all that wins. Sure would foul up the merchants . Berserkers could quietly do nothing and EBs would give away their worlds :-). I like it! Here's an interesting idea for yet another private game. Well, that's it for Volume 31. Don't be afraid to submit articles or suggestions. They don't have to be long. Address your correspondence to Elliot Hudes at somnos@compuserve.com