Crisis at 'Poly

[1889]

If you voted B or C then lucky you, if you voted A then lets try to come with some suggestions to speed things up. That is suggestions that we can do to send our turns on faster.

When I get a turn in the mail I leave marked as unread until I have time to play it and send it.

I keep a note book for my PBEMs where I record any deals I'm working on. On the cover I make a note of when I last sent it on. If I haven't seen it in a few days I start wondering if I missed it in the mail so I check the thread.

Also posting in the thread is a big help.

For all those people playing 10+ games, whould you play as many if your games were faster?

[Kloreep]

Re: Crisis at 'Poly

Originally posted by 1889
When I get a turn in the mail I leave marked as unread until I have time to play it and send it.

Originally posted by 1889
I keep a note book for my PBEMs where I record any deals I'm working on. On the cover I make a note of when I last sent it on. If I haven't seen it in a few days I start wondering if I missed it in the mail so I check the thread.

Wow, that's organized. I just subscribe to all the tracking thread and do some bumping/emailing to ones that don't get replied to for a few days.

[snoopy369]

Re: Re: Crisis at 'Poly

Originally posted by Kloreep






Wow, that's organized. I just subscribe to all the tracking thread and do some bumping/emailing to ones that don't get replied to for a few days.

I'm pretty much the same. I sometimes keep track of things that I really am worried about, but not much more ... but I'm in the Paddy Club of too many games

I'd probably not play quite as many, but only because I can probably manage 15-20 turns a day max - if I were in 40 turnaday games i'd be screwed.

[Modo44]

Heck, I don't even have separate folders for them. Started some scenarios though, and those are tendious, because I can't save them mid-turn.

And there's always those people, who manage to stall any and every game. I just bump the threads for Beta them in that case.

[Paddy]

1889, not sure what the issue is here

do you find that you are in too many games?

Join ya for a jug

[1889]

I just feel that games are running a bit slow. I am also hinting that rather than play more slow games, maybe we would get more enjoyment from playing fewer faster games.

I only have six PBEMs and I can check mail 2-3 times a day. I'm sure that most people are a lot busier than me. Since I have the time to track games a little closer I do so and I hope that keeps the games more interesting for everyone in them.

I hope that others will recognise how important a decent pace is to keeping PBEMs entertaining. Some of these people may decide to put a little more effort into speeding up their play or at least cus at me less next time I send a PM.

I am not ranting at people who can not check mail every day or at people who play lots of games. I am enjoying all the folks in my PBEMs. I am only asking that if you also feel games are too slow I hope you will try to do something about it.

[GodKing]

I am currently in 7 games.

2 are alive, 1 on life support.

I find that most of my games don't even survive til the end of the ancient age, usually due to someone not playing. I have a rule of thumb - do my best to play within 24 hours after receiving it, and post in the turn tracker. Some games, I get back once every month or so. It sucks, but so be it.

One solution I have seen sucessfull is to keep games to 4 or less players, and to let everybody know eachothers password so that if someone is gone, their turn can be skipped. There are a couple of program turnskippers out there as well, so nobody see's the others confidential information. Check with UberKruX / II as he has one of the best ones out there that I have seen.

[UnOrthOdOx]

I check my email generally once a day, and will play any I have.

I keep a notebook of negotiations with the other parties, or important builds/plans if a game makes it that far. Generally, that's about the time the games seem to die off, though. I think this is likely due to one or more person being unhappy with the general position they are in and losing interest. This is understandable to a degree, not everyone likes to play out an unfavorable or hopeless position. I know one game I have no hope of winning. But I'll sure have fun trying something crazy out if the game keeps moving. I'll probably actually have MORE fun with that than a more standard game, actually.

I'm in maybe 8-10 PBEM's, of which 2 are moving good 1/day or close to it, 2 more are moving...sorta 1-3/week, and the rest are either dead or moving slower than 1/week.


And as GK alludes to, the "massive Diplomatic" game that Uber/Inverse Icarus set up on MZO, where we have an enforced turn/day rule where there's a timeslot, and we are skipped if we don't play in that time or can skip the previous player if we don't get the save, has moved VERY well so far. Even despite being 8 players.

[Theseus]

6 out of my 7 games are progressing OK...

[bongo]

Lets see....

2 games moves pretty fast (1 turn a day unles someone is vacationing), the rest drop in once or twice a week.


I try to keep my civ stuff organized.

When a new save arrive I copy the save into the appropriate folder (like my documents->civ->iron civer final). From there I make another copy into the 'saves' folder (I keep a shortcut to 'saves' within each game folder, very convenient ).

If several mail arrive at once I repeat until I'm done.

If I got the time I will now start c3c and pick any of the saves that are waiting for me(some saves gets priority). I then open the appropriate turn protocol to see what's happening. The level of details vary wildly, in some games this protocol is kept at a bare minimum while other games recieve a minute protocol of *all* events. I then play the game, take notes, save the game and close the protocol(and then open the next game, when appropriate). When I'm done playing, I close c3c and look at my saves folder. Incoming saves(which have been played) are dumped in an 'old saves' folder while the fresh saves gets moved to the games folders.

Then I start the 'clean-up' process. Each game folder has one or more sub-folder for old stuff. When the outgoing save has been sent off, the save(s) gets dumped in the 'old stuff' folders.

When I'm all done, any .SAV files left in either the game folders or the 'saves' folder is saves waiting to be played.

I also keep other stuff in my game folders. Like maps, statistics, strategies and diplomacy.



I'm not sure if this makes me faster but it makes sure I don't forget to play a save.

[Kloreep]

Originally posted by UnOrthOdOx
I keep a notebook of negotiations with the other parties, or important builds/plans if a game makes it that far. Generally, that's about the time the games seem to die off, though. I think this is likely due to one or more person being unhappy with the general position they are in and losing interest. This is understandable to a degree, not everyone likes to play out an unfavorable or hopeless position. I know one game I have no hope of winning. But I'll sure have fun trying something crazy out if the game keeps moving. I'll probably actually have MORE fun with that than a more standard game, actually.

Agreed. I have some starts I don't think I'll ever recover from, but I play them anyway.

[joncnunn]

So far I'm in only 2 PBEM games.

The first one is a slow moving 8 player no AI epic one (accel = on). Mostly my fault; I set up the order of the players without regard to what timezones / what times people would actually play in and so there were even large gaps to open the save, hit enter and send it on.

In the second one, WW II Europe, the save hasn't even reached the last player the first time yet.

[Rommel2D]

My tights are blue and I have a banana on the chest. How should I vote?

Originally posted by Modo44
And there's always those people, who manage to stall any and every game. I just bump the threads for Beta them in that case.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Rommel2D
My tights are blue and I have a banana on the chest. How should I vote?

Rommel, you're not Con. He's the blue banana man. You're the green tights with a switchblade on the front ...

[Paddy]

ojn other things

game administration / management is very important

when a game is slowing down, or has come to a halt, I find that a post in the thread, along with an email to the player involved, along with a link to the thread is very helpful

the spice must flow