HOTW7 Set up thread

[Rasputin]

Ozzy - Arabs - Confirmed
LzPrst - Vikings - Confirmed
Nolan - Egypt - Confirmed
Kuno - China - Confirmed
CyberShy - India - Confirmed
Prussia - Carthage - Confirmed
MMC - England - Confirmed
deity - Korea - Confirmed
Frank (Dangime) - Inca - Confirmed
civil_obedience - Greece - Confirmed
Capo - Rome - Confirmed
Toni - Persia - Confirmed
Schtix - Russia
Rasputin - ANY - Unconfirmed

[OzzyKP]

14 players. Outstanding

Ok, lets start posting availability times.

[KunojiLym]

Semester's starting for me, so my starting time is pretty much the same as for HOTW5 - which is to say, 0700 to 1100 on Saturdays, GMT +8

[Schtix]

I start classes August 15th.

Weekdays: 23:00-4:00 UTC
Weekends: 16:00-22:00 UTC

Weekends sometimes change, but that also means I can change those times a bit if needed.

*These are the times I CAN play*

[LzPrst]

ok. now we have the players together (omni still might be available if we're starting as late as september. I'll ask him when we're nearing the startline and he can work around our timeschedule if he wants in)

now comes the difficult part. time. first of all, I say we all start using UTC time. it is the easiest by far as it doesnt change with daylight savings time and such.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coordinated_Universal_Time

Everyone work out what time zone they are in, in UTC and post it, AND their availability, also in UTC. nice to know your schedule schtix, but what we have to work with is when you can, not when you cant.

I am currently UTC +2, but that will change to UTC +1 on the last sunday of october.

my availability is pretty much weekends. in other words,
friday - 16:00 - 0:00 UTC
saturday - (anytime, though some sleep is desired)
sunday - 0:00 - 22:00 UTC

your particular time zone isnt actually that important, it is when you can play. if we all calculate this in UTC then it's easy.

in case anyone has questions about the UTC system (didnt you read the wiki? ) it works like this, UTC is the base unit of time we will use. everything will be posted in UTC. so if schtix were to post his schedule in UTC it would be something like...
weekdays: 8:00 - 14:00 UTC and
weekends: 2:00 - 7:00 UTC.

this means everyone has to calculate for themselves what their schedule (or rather availability) is like in UTC. it is quite simple really, just look at the wiki article list, find where you are in the world, add or subtract the number of hours from your local time to make it UTC then work with that. it takes a little getting used to, but it is well worth it as the only thing you have to keep in order is your availabilty in +/- a few hours. much better than everyone having to calculate what is 12 o'clock in GMT +4 and what is 17 o'clock in GMT -8.

once again, (just to be slightly rude to poor schtix) what we need is your availability. if you're busy washing your socks every thursday from 12-15, thats fine, but its easier for us if you just say; available thursdays from 15 -> 23 (UTC!).

[Schtix]

Sorry, I wasn't very clear in my post. I was just making a mention that my schedule from when my classes start is different to my *current* schedule. But I see that isn't relevant, so that's my mistake.

That last post is my available times, just to clear that up. And thanks to LzPrst for getting the UTC plan going.

[LzPrst]

no worries. also. I would request that EVERYONE, take a quick look at the diplogames rules discussion thread. we need to work out a decision about what, if any tech rules we should use.

also. I popped over to http://www.civfanatics.com/ and saw.... MODS MODS MODS!! PRECIOUS LOVELY BEAUTIFUL MODS!!

I especially encourage everyone to take a look at the ethnically diverse unit mods. now there is something that I would pay expansion pack price for. also the ship size graphic is pretty decent and the flag mod. lots of lovely beautiful stuff here. we can discuss any use of it in the Diplogames Rules Discussion Thread.

[LzPrst]

oh! and I forgot. one very important thing to mention. it seems that on marathon speed the Great General emergence rate is skewed. It is 3x that of normal speed and according to some posters it is way too high. someone said it should be changed to 1.5 instead. I think we should discuss this as well (in the diplogames rules discussion thread)

Originally posted by Proteus_MST

As for the speed of GG generation: Probably you played your game at epic or marathon speed.
I agree (with many other players here) that it isn´t suitable to double/triple the XP needed for GGs at epic/marathon.
But this is something which can be solved by altering a single line within an XML-File, so I don´t see a problem there (for example I have modded it in a way that in marathon mode you just need 1.5 times the XP you would need for a GG on normal speed, instead of 3 times.

from this thread, http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...hreadid=155843

[Robert]

I suggest that we take the HOTW5 time as a default if we cant figure out a better time, since that time proved to be a good time at least.

Im available:
friday - saturday night: 20:30 - 01:00 UTC
saturday - sunday night: 21:00 01:00 UTC

saturday playtime may be earlier every week (by hours) but Im sure that my wife wont be happy if I cant go out with her EVERY saturday evening.

[MMC]

Anytime GMT/UTC/BST(GMT+1) with the exception of Sunday mornings, and around 2am to 10am. Plus I think someone should PM me before each session as I know I'll forget (I'll remmebr up until about 3 hours before the start, then forget completely - always happens).

[Frank Johnson]

I can play UTC-5....

Monday - Thursday - Anytime

Friday(Saturday UTC :P) - 1:30 am - 7:30 am

Saturday(partially Sunday UTC) 12:00am - 9:00 am

Sunday(partially monday UTC) 9:30pm - whenever

[Prussia]

Schtix, can you confirm?

[Schtix]

Yes, I'm good for confirmation.

And it seems that the times are slowly working themselves out...

[Prussia]

Made a poll for the time of the week.

[deity]

I've set up a pitboss save. The good thing about pitboss is you can all check out your starting positions to see if it's OK.

It's huge terra balanced so I don't expect too many complaints.

If Frank can't make the HOTW7 timeslot then Raz might like to take the Incas.

Check it out but please do not play it beyond the 4000BC start.