[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Play By E-Mail - PBEM

[Raimar Falke <rf13@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sun, May 25, 2003 at 03:52:43PM +0000, Per I. Mathisen wrote:
> On Sun, 25 May 2003, Raimar Falke wrote:
> > The problem is another one: it isn't fair. In a "normal" freeciv turn
> > all players move at the same time. This isn't possible in PBEM. The
> > one solution we came up was that we need to record the commands of the
> > all players and thenexecute them at the server in a fair manner which
> > is very likely pseudo parallel. This requires major code rewrite and
> > is unlikely to happen.
> 
> Alternating move phases solves this problem. (See TODO on web page.)

There is still some unfairness left. If the order is:

 1) new turn
 2) player 1 moves
 3) player 2 moves
 4) goto 1

it is obvious that it is still unfair. Better is:

 1) new turn
 2) generate a random order of players
 3) player move according to this order
 4) goto 1

Really fair (at least for 2 players) is the following:

 1) new turn for player 1
 2) player 1 moves
 3) new turn for player 2
 4) player 2 moves

This is the model you find for example in Magic the Gathering and
Battle Isle. But you loose the "main" new turn. I'm also not sure if
this helps at all in the PBEM problem.

        Raimar

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