PBEM Games - selling Contacts

[Fosse]

In multiplayer games, humans cannot trade contact frequencies to other humans. Naturally, human players can speak to each other whenever they want, but typical PBEM rules prohibit this until "official" contact has been made.


Is there an agreement on the idea of one human faction selling contact to another though, even though it would be mechanically meaningless?

If Joe knows Rick and Bob, would it be okay for Rick to just "give" Joe a tech and some EC for the right to contact Bob officially?

I understand that the .sav file contains info that shows who met whom when, and this would not be reflected in a trade like this, but how would people react to it?

[Googlie]

Re: PBEM Games - selling Contacts

Originally posted by Fosse
In multiplayer games, humans cannot trade contact frequencies to other humans.

Not true

If your own alphax.txt has a "0" in the bolded line below:

EcoEng2, ; Technology for +1 mining platform bonus
PlaEcon, ; Technology for economic victory
1, ; If non-zero, probe teams can steal technologies
1, ; If non-zero, humans can always contact each other in net games
0, ; If non-zero, humans can always contact each other in hotseat/email games
50, ; Maximum % damage inflicted by arty versus units in base/bunker
99, ; Maximum % damage inflicted by arty versus units in open

then you won't see other factions in your diplobox until you meet them/get their commlinks

And if you have met them, and meet another, clicking on "offer all techs" or "share technology" in the diplobox will bring up that commlink as a tradeable item if that other faction desn't yet have the commlink

It's only when your alphax.txt has the zero changed to a "1" in that bolded line of text that you have unlimited ability and can see all factions from turn 1.

(And, unfortunately, that particular rule isn't embedded in the CMN's first save file or any subsequrent one - it's up to individual players to plice themselves)

So if you are in a "no contact until meet" game, just change that 1 line in your txt

[Fosse]

Interesting. Thanks Googlie.

So that would mean that one PBEM participant could have a 1 (as mine, being default, is), another have a 0, and they would be playing by different rules according to the program?

Is there any sense among PBEM players in keeping that value at its default setting, given that most games seem to include the "no contact until meet" rule?

[Googlie]

Well, the downside is that you don't see the factions displayed in the right hand infobox, so you can't then click on the "contacts" and left click a faction to see their profile, population, etc

And also, you can't bring them up in the diplobox and "offer all techs" to seee what you have that they don't

And that info becomes vital for many players to see how their competitive strategy is playing out.

So the rule is generally observed on the honour system, trusting players not to use it for in-game messages or trades, etc

[Senethro]

Additional information: You can exchange comm frequencies but to call Planetary Governor you need to physcially own all comm frequencies. That is, you need to have met a unit or city or traded in game. Just having them in your comms menu isn't enough.