STARWEB EMAIL DISCUSSION GROUP (THE SEDG) (Sponsored by Flying Moose Technologies' Starweb Analyzer - http://flyingmoose.cjb.net) VOLUME 40, SEPT. 18, 2000 CONTENTS Feature Article - Octagon by Fred Saberhagen Questions – Increasing the Population Limit SEDG Web Page URL The Captain's Log - Things Change . . . The Swap Corner - Reading the Map Correspondence FEATURE ARTICLE Octagon by Fred Saberhagen For those of you who don't know it yet (and just where have you been hiding) the concept of the Berserkers in Starweb are the brainchild of author Fred Saberhagen. He created these gruesome monsters that travel the space lanes looking to clear all life from the galaxy save those few goodlife who help them. FBI has used the name and credo of the berserker with permission. What many people don't know is that over 20 years ago Fred Saberhagen himself played the game under the character name of Octagon. I'm not sure what position he played but the big metallic monster would be a good guess. Following this he wrote a science fiction novel centered on a game of Starweb. I remembered vaguely reading it a long time ago and after recent correspondence with Fred Saberhagen I was able to track down this out of print novel copyright 1981 at Amazon.com and reread it. For a fan of Starweb I would say this novel is required reading. I'm not much of a book reviewer but let me give it a try and give you a taste of this book. The back flap (often how I judge whether to read a book) reads as follows: Nice guys finish dead! It was a game. That was all it was ever meant to be. All the men and women, young and old who paid their fees and took roles in the mail-order STARWEB adventure had never had the slightest reason to suspect that they were letting themselves in for anything other than some harmless escapism, fighting imaginary battles on the immaterial killing-ground of a computer's memory banks. Then they began to die. Alex Barrow finds himself a not entirely willing participant in this grisly shadow-war, drafted into it by his uncle, Bob Gregory.... Obviously Mr. Saberhagen had done his homework. The opening chapter centers on Carl Tartaglia a minor player both in the novel and the Starweb game he is playing. He doesn't survive the opening chapter but anyone who is a gamer will recognize himself in Saberhagen's chilling rendition of a gamer's obsession. Here are a few excerpts that brought a smile to my face as it accurately describes gamers everywhere . "Delia's recent departure, with substantail baggage, had had both its bad points and its good, from Tartaglia's point of view. One of the positive aspects was that he now let all his game paraphernalia sprawl and expand all over the apartment just as he pleased. The floor of the spare bedroom still had Diplomacy laid out on it, from last Friday when the guys were over. They meant to resume it one of these evenings when they could all get together again. An now Tartaglia's Starweb map, a home-made construction, dominated the center of the floor in the living-dining area, with the table nudged over by about a foot to give it room. Surrounding the map on the floor were stacks of papers, notes and folders and envelopes, all useful in keeping track of the game's complexities...." snip ".... Not far from the small stack of diplomatic envelopes lay the rule booklet, forty well-thumbed, closely printed pages ready for consultation. Close to the booklet a pile of computer print-out sheets, one sheet for each past turn of the game, showed its progress from the viewpoint of Tartaglia's character. And then there was the pile of Tartaglia's previous movements, orders he had written to be fed by the moderators into their computers, and which were then returned to him by mail. And then the set of little plastic bins, used by Tartaglia to hold supplies of the various counters, bits of wood and plastic recruited from other games, that Tartaglia was using on the map to represent his fleets and industries and populations and sources of raw material." The chapter goes into further detail of Tartaglia's obsession with the game and we are not surprised by his wife's departure. This is the story of Alex Barrow who soon after discharge from the military decides to visit his reclusive Uncle Robert Gregory. Uncle Bob is an older well to do man who made his fortune in computers. Recently he has played Starweb by mail, a game produced by Berserkers Inc. (The name Saberhagen chose to represent FBI). As he explains the game to Alex he offers him a job to go out to Albuquerque and look over the company as a potential investment opportunity for him. As a side issue he also asks him to look up an old friend and colleague while there - a Dr. Henry Brahmaguptra. Alex takes the job and soon finds himself at the storefront of Berserkers, Inc. where a description of an office with little furniture and abounding with stacks of papers is very reminiscent of the FBI office that I visited this summer. He meets with Ike Jacobi the CEO of Berserker's Inc. He is described as a rather lean and intense man in jeans, loafers and a sport shirt with long dark hair. Rick - did you sport long dark hair 20 years ago? After discussions about the possibility of investments and a tour of the business Alex briefly meets Mrs. Tartaglia. Recently widowed, she is here to clear out his account. Alex leaves his meeting here with several important things. One, He takes a standby position replacing Tartaglia as AGRAVAN the Empire Builder. He also receives some diplomatic messages where he realizes he is in the same game as his Uncle who is playing LUCIFER and even more coincidentally a diplo from OCTAGON played by Henry Brahmaguptra. He muses that this is much too big a coincidence. A visit to Brahmaguptra reveals several things. Both Brahmaguptra and Uncle Bob had worked together years before in the computer field but went their separate ways years before not on very good terms. We find that the Henry Brahmaguptra playing the Starweb game as Octagon is the grandson and 12-year-old opponent of both AGRAVAN and LUCIFER. Upon meeting Alex tells him that he is in the process of creaming him! And after a little look at young Henry's game setup on a personal computer including computer mapping (which must have been very state of the art for 1981 the year PCs were introduced) the two warm up to each other. In the ensuing chapters Alex returns to Berserkers Inc. and makes a date with the receptionist Iris Cardano. In the inevitable bedroom scene we are introduced to an intruder that is some kind of mechanical device in a wheelchair that has reached down and throttled the young women as Alex visits the bathroom. It then turns it's attention to Alex. Waking from near strangulation, a body in hand and the strange wheelchair contraption gone, Alex begins to run as an imagined murder suspect. Over the next chapters we are treated to the insight that many odd and terrible things are happening to players who are not allied to Octagon and in fact is his opposition. In fact, Tartaglia isn't the only player to meet his maker under suspicious circumstances. Alex continues his flight and investigation where he finds similar threats and strange things afoot occurring with other players. Except in the case of ARCHANGEL, a minister and another self confessed opponent of Octagon he tells Alex he has not had any difficulties. He has had some odd things happen with a bank loan being repaid electronically but not by him. It turns out that ARCHANGEL pays no heed to Alex's fears and suppositions about the sinister side of the game and being a cagey gamer himself doesn't reveal that he is an Ally of OCTAGON rather than the fierce opponent he claimed to be. It appears that the Opponents of OCTAGON are meeting their fate in the real world just as allies are reaping benefits. Without ruining this absolutely delightful tale I must tell you that once the truth is revealed it is neither too far-fetched nor impossible to believe. Even though written in the early 1980s his handling of computer technology would read as modern today. Saberhagen does add a few technologic leaps to society to allow our unknown protagonist to strike from a distance, impersonally and often electronically that would be even more fun in the 21st century with the things we can do via the internet. By the end of the Novel OCTAGON's enemy LUCIFER (A.K.A. Uncle Bob) is under attack not only via his SW turn but his estate by via computer driven robotic devices. Most of these are not in existence today but certainly not too far off with our present state of robotics that includes Mars landing probes. In fact one of the vehicles was labeled a Venerian landing Module. So how did Henry Brahmaguptra Jr. and Uncle Bob get into the same game as Alex? And how is a 12-year-old boy having such profound effects on his imaginary allies and opponents in the real world? The tension and the fun escalate as the invasion of Uncle Bob's by murderous technology continues and Alex Barlow and 12 year old Henry have to figure out how to stop it. Sadly this novel is out of print but I was able to get a copy relatively inexpensively from an online bookstore - Amazon.com. Many others also have services to obtain out of print books such as Indigo and Chapters. So if you play Starweb and like Science fiction I would strongly recommend this book as well as the many other Berserker novels by Fred Saberhagen. Elliot Hudes ----------------------------------------------------------------------- QUESTIONS - Can anyone answer these? Last issue I asked if anyone had the opportunity to use the raise the Population limit of a world order. Don McEntee said: El Re: Increasing population limit of a world -- only found ONE time to use it: I was about to have a home world taken from me and didn't want usable metal to fall into enemy hands, so I wasted it by using it to increase the pop limit. (Don't recall why building 30 homefleet ships wasn't the thing to do. I hate answering a question with a question!) Editor: Maybe it was a robotic attack and you didn't want to give the enemy ships. Ron Ruemmler/FLUFFY also answered: >> In answer to your question 2), in SW-L/3, W112 started out as (0,1,1,253,PSHP=1) in the old format. On turn 95 it was: (255,11,255C,255,T/O=4,RMS=255,ISHP=255,PSHP=255,CGU=1,TP=2), just before the PBB that ended the game. By the way, on turn 64 I gave the order W112I42I which may have set some sort of record. Let us know if Walt shows up. Phil Boyd asked: Does an Apostle get points for dropping a PBB while on Jihad like a Berserker, or does he just get the pop points? Phil Boyd Just the pop points. And the target of the Jihad must own the world at the beginning of the turn. (Rule said it must be owned by the Jihad target at the beginning or end of the turn but at the end of a PBB it is neutral). This means you can't gift the world to your Jihad target the same turn you drop the PBB. Anyone have any new questions? ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 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 000917.0932?4 By Walt Schmidt walts@dorsai.org Things Change . . . "All things change . . . There is nothing in the whole world which is permanent." - Ovid At one time getting seven of us together to play a private game would have been a matter of days, if not hours. At one time the predictability of a game wasn't! At one time selflessness not selfishness was the rule. At one time there were game-generated beta-endorphins to spare. At one time the details of a game-turn were never a chore. But things do change . . . I guess it's like model building. It isn't the model - it's the process. I know of a private game where most communications have been prohibited. Now I like an anonymous game as much as the next guy. But I gotta tell ya - never again. To me it is all in the process - but a full and rich process. A process that includes good old fashion double-speak (anonymous) messages, eMail amongst all my fellow game players, and full and complete sharing of information amongst my inner-circle. None of this wishee-washee ". . . believe me when I tell you, but I can't send you my turn-sheet because I made someone else a promise." stuff. Sheesh!!! Thanks to Elliot Hudes, Herb Diehr, John Muije, Ken Cassady, Mic Hammerschmitt, and myself - there is a good old-fashion, anything and everything goes game that has six players. As we're all gonna control two characters each, we need a seventh. At one time getting seven of us together to play a private game would have been a matter of days, if not hours - and not the two-plus months and still not there, that it's been. If you're game - let me know - first come first served! [And Alter - you're very quiet this log?!?] [YOU noticed! ITS just the current state-of-events are a tad depressing.] [I'm sure there is another, a seventh - let's wait and see] 'Til next log - Shai Dorsai ! Nemo ----------------------------------------------------------------------- FEATURE - THE SWAP CORNER Reading the Map For those of you who have not seen a bitmap file containing the map generated by Flying Moose Technologies Starweb Analyzer here are a few pointers for reading it. 1)Any world with more than 10 industry will have a starburst in the top left corner of the world. HWs all have this. 2)For worlds that wraparound - that is appear more than once by going off the edge of the universe and reappearing on another border due to the 3D nature of the universe - they will have a '+' in the upper right corner of the world. 3)Worlds with a very thin line border and a '?' as the owner have not been visited by anyone whose turns were involved in generating the map. 4)Gray border worlds with [] as the owner are neutral worlds. 5)Each player or alliance (if defined in the program) will have its own color and the worlds will contain the first 3 letters of the player name. Coming up in V1.4 – if you click on the key in the world view (not the map view) the path the key took the last turn will be traced out by red arrows along the connections. If you write orders for the key in the order editor – any subsequent clicking on the key will show the upcoming path of the key with yellow arrows. (The reason you cannot do the same in the map view is that clicking on a key from the map view is already utilized in the function where you use the mouse to create orders for the Order box). ----------------------------------------------------------------------- CORRESPONDENCE After doing the book review on Octagon by Fred Saberhagen I sent it to him for his perusal. Dear Fred Saberhagen: A couple months ago I had corresponded with you mostly to thank you for the enjoyment I had from your books. I am that person who mentioned my introduction to your work was via Flying Buffalo's Starweb game. I run the Starweb Email Discussion Group for things pertaining to Starweb (which is also posted on the Web http://www.accessv.com/~somnos/sedg.htm. I have recently obtained your book OCTAGON that is now out of print. After rereading it I decided to write a review of it for publication in the discussion group. I think this would be of interest for Starweb Gamers. I felt I should notify you about it and let you read a copy of it. Please remember that I am not a writer and the last book review I did was in high school (a long time ago). I am actually an Anesthesiologist. I hope I was able to capture the essence of the book and the fun I had reading it. Here is the review for you. Any comments are welcome. Elliot Fred replied: Dear Elliot -- Thanks for the glowing review. I wish they were all that favorable. Best Fred Last issue I talked about my victory at the FBI Con 2000. I said the following and have had a few players correct me – "I squeezed every point out of that printout I could, with no time to produce and deploy new PBBs I resorted to PBBing already Busted worlds," Paul Balsamo correctly pointed out: >> Elliot, I always assumed that the rule meant that you wouldn't get the 200 points for the bomb (it seems pretty silly for them to tell you that you wouldn't get any kill points for dropping a bomb on 0 population) or any points for population that might be migrated there. I assume that there is a flag in the program for each world that keeps track of whether it has been PBBed or not and if the flag is positive that you couldn't score any points there anymore. Of course, that's all theory since I've never actually tried it. Paul << More than one person at FBI even corrected me ?. Chuck said: No. A world that's already busted isn't scored if you bust it again. -Chuck Rick got into the act too: Elliot, Generally, we say exactly what we mean. You only get points "for dropping a PBB on a world" once per world. the computer keeps track of whether the world has been PBBd before. Simple answer: no you would not. Rick Editor's Note: Last month Lee Knirko and I were talking about the Mega alliance. There is a thread forming on the Flying Moose Technologies Coolboard (here it is again. Coolboard is an online message board where Flying Moose Technologies has registered Starweb. Go there to lurk and enjoy many threads pertaining to Starweb or join in by posting responses of your own or entirely new threads. Lee, the subject of mega-alliances would make a terrific thread. Why don't you post your concerns and start the ball rolling (or submit them to SEDG). To access the Starweb Coolboard go to the Flying Moose Technologies web page at http://www.flyingmoose.cjb.net and on the main page click the link to the Discussion Forum.) Lee said: >> Here's another example of a megaalliance in B/28. We had a solid alliance of 4 players, and Bob started a rumor that we were "taking over the web". He convinced 8 others to attack us, resulting in 9 against our 4. Sean destroyed almost all the Industry on his HW, and the rest of us are under massive attack. Maybe that's the way Bitter End is supposed to work:). Couldn't even convince my old pal Ted Miller (Portangel) the ridiculous case Bob presented, and offered for him and Fergus to join us. He waffled some, but in the end joined in the attack. I guess the lesson is to ally with every neighbor that you meet. Which would probably result in a mega alliance! << Editor: I think it's a problem with email (and I'm glad that it isn't just me you blame :-). With such good communication you can talk to everyone easily. Getting half the game to ally is a good way to ensure you have power. The only defense is to polarize the rest of the map into an alliance and the eventual two-pole game. But if you stay in a small alliance you do take the risk of losing to a bigger one. Not always true - if you remember SW 1281 - my alliance was 6 to your 8. We won because we struck first and hard. So if FBI won't restrict the number of allies what is the answer? Even the regular games have most players using email. Perhaps the more experienced players must make a concerted effort amongst ourselves to keep things small. I must admit the anonymous games don't suffer from this and I'm in 3 that are a lot of fun. Well, that's it for Volume 40. 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