From: bc@fccn01.fccn.pt (Luis Miguel Sequeira)
Newsgroups: rec.games.pbm
Subject: Re: Galaxy Playing (was Re: Galaxy Turn Format)
Date: 8 Jan 1993 03:16:11 -0600
Organization: UTexas Mail-to-News Gateway
NNTP-Posting-Host: cs.utexas.edu

Still on this much discussed subject, a few thoughts:

On a _very_ few PBMs & PBeMs I play, there is the notion of "automatic
mode". That  is, if the player doesn't  _actively_ give some orders to
his  "subjects" (fleets, armies, planets, whatever),  they'll  perform
well anyway, according to a semi-automated procedure, but which adapts
itself to   the situation,  provided external feedback   exists.   For
example, on a medieval PBM I know, you can control "nobles". The noble
will automatically create an army and  recruit troops for it (while he
has got  the money).   He'll  also send  money  to  pay his own troops
regularly,  and keep them  fed; if the time  is one of peace, the army
will get trained.

In the mean time,  he has other housekeeping to  do: he'll improve his
own fortresses, for example; and, if he has a fortress near a river or
the coast,  he'll  build a  shipyard,  and start building  ships, from
which he can receive some revenue (due to trade).

If  the noble's   fortresses are attacked, he'll react.   His reaction
won't be what would be expected from a seasoned player,  but he'll try
at least to  intercept the enemy's army  or, if  the invaders are  too
many, to enter the nearest fortress and defend it from there, pursuing
the invaders if they fail the attempt.

Of course this isn't an AI player, as the noble will just "react", and
not make offensive plans  of his own; also,  he lacks the intelligence
of recruiting the "best possible" troops (but the program makes a good
effort to have  a balanced army anyway) or  the best ships, or to find
out the ports where to  trade and make the best  profit... all this is
really left for the player to decide.

But the important issue is that all of  this wasn't implemented at the
start of the game. Nobles were pretty useless characters at the start,
and slowly the  GMs added more  and more features,  even   if the game
wasn't designed from the start to have "automatic responses".

Such  is the case  of Galaxy.   Automated  players weren't foreseen by
Russell (well, or so  I  think...), but they still  can be added.  One
could start slowly, eg. introducing some sort of NPCs (or "agents", as
have already been  proposed here on the  news) and giving  them simple
tasks  to perform. Later on,  this tasks could  be  automated, and the
agents  could give the players  some advice on  what  to do.  With the
increased complexity of  those  agents, they could slowly relieve  the
player from many of the most tedious tasks, and run his "nation" while
he's away (or quits the game...).

I think  that nobody would  ever dream of  an "automated player" which
plays as well as an average Galaxy player. This would be really asking
too much, even if all diplomacy would be ignored. But it would be nice
just to get an automated player to build a  small fleet to  defend his
former master's planet,  and thus surprising a potential  invader  who
thought that nobody was there...

In fact, _all_ planets (ie.  undiscovered & colonized ones) could work
like that, getting on the  nerves of the  players at the  start of the
game... :-)

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  bc@fccn01.fccn.pt                        Luis Miguel Sequeira
                                  Laboratorio Nacional de Engenharia Civil
  Phone 351-1-8482131 Ext. 2752   Centro Informatica/Grupo Sistemas Centrais
  "Don't call me, I'll call you"  Av. Brasil, 101 - 1700 Lisboa, Portugal
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