From: ccoprdj@prism.gatech.EDU (Jorge Diaz)
Newsgroups: rec.games.empire
Subject: Swamp Empire - A Sad Finish
Date: 18 Nov 92 14:26:14 GMT
Organization: Georgia Institute of Technology


Well, Swamp Empire has finally closed.  Actually, it ground to a halt.

Throughout the game, we'd been having problems with the updates - they were
consistently between 2 and 5 minutes late...  This was a pain in the ass, but
at least everyone could live with it.

Things were progressing normally, with only 7 viable countries left in the
game.  The top three countries were all very close in power, and two of them
were within a single point of each other in tech.  None were allied.  This
looked to be a game where there was only going to be one or two survivors,
and everyone else would be exterminated.

Then fantasy tossed its cookies.  Monday, there was supposed to be an update
at 1pm.  1pm rolled around, and no update.  1:05, 1:10, 1:15.  Anyone seen
the update?  Nothing.  Jorge was sleeping, having worked a 12-hour night shift
on Sunday, and wasn't there to force the update.  Oh, well.  Then, at 6pm, an
update occurred.  No one forced it, it just happened....

Now, fanatsy has been slow lately, but REALLY!!!

Tuesday, the udpate again did not occur at the scheduled time, and then we had
one about 4 hours late again. At this point, we all agreed that this game was
fucked (actually, the machine, fantasy, was fucked), so we declared a 
three-way draw between the top three players and called the game.  I saved
a final copy of the power chart, and the game was declared officially over.

So, here's the final power chart:

     - = [   Empire Power Report   ] = -
      as of Mon Nov 16 19:02:42 1992

         sects  eff  civ  mil shell gun  pet iron dust food oil  pln ship money
Park Plac 477   92% 407K  18K  11K 1.0K 4.3K 145K  13K 148K  40K 537   38  1.0M
113639.84
   Undead 432   98% 378K  17K  16K 1.0K  11K 135K 6.3K 135K 8.3K 647   43  1.2M
112311.05
    Huron 424   96% 360K  12K  16K 1.8K  13K  95K 5.2K 191K 7.9K 397   34  2.1M
109620.98
     beep 295   92% 248K 9.1K  12K 723   14K  95K 2.7K 130K 7.6K 619   59  852K
 77505.79
   Matrix 292   95% 239K  15K 6.5K 1.1K 6.3K  36K 3.7K 134K 2.5K 498   26  508K
 61080.22
Militaria 189   85% 140K 7.4K 3.6K 423  1.4K  25K 2.1K  67K 1.3K 254   17  569K
 38719.32
   Dharma 124   88%  79K 3.1K 1.3K 360  1.4K 8.1K 1.6K  19K 1.4K  85   26  564K
Land_Of_F  41  100%  11K 713  528   36  1.0K 5.7K 1.5K 215  1.6K   0    8  368K
Militaria  82   74%  22K 6.8K 131    9   64  5.0K 1.6K  13K 2.2K  10    4 -278K
Janinslan   6   98% 1.8K 211   25    4    0  999    0   84    0    0    2  346K
   Europa  14   81% 8.2K 1.9K   0    0    0  4.8K 295  8.2K 942    0   10   95K
 Kenaitze   5   98% 4.2K 202  468    0    0  4.3K   0  4.8K   0    0    2   13K
Pandemoni   1   91% 470   24    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    6   98K
   Mashad   0    0%   0   19   30    6    0    0    0   24    0    0    4   46K
   Paenne   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0   47K
     Hawk   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0   27K
  Council   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0   18K
Best_Brai   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0   16K
Newfunlan   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0   15K
   Avalon   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    1   13K
Tharkadia   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0   12K
  Eclipse   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0  9.9K
Aquitaine   0    0%   0   25    0    0    0    0    0   63    0    0    2  5.5K
   Hecate   0    0%   0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0    0  4.3K
          ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
worldwide 2.4K  93% 1.9M  91K  67K 6.4K  52K 559K  38K 851K  74K 3.0K 280  7.6M


As you can see, the top three countries were all very close.  Closer, in all
honesty, than this power chart might lead you to believe.  Before the
unexpected updates that killed this game, all three were within 100 points
of each other.  Those two updates made a slight difference in the rankings,
but you get the idea.  In the last few days of the game, Park Place, Huron,
and Undead had all been in the #1 slot at one time or another....

Anyway, after those top three, you can see that the power points drop
dramatically.  This is the reason that only the top three countries were
included in the draw.

Still, it was a good game until this point.  We were down to only 7 countries
left alive, which is better than most empire games I've seen that actually
"finished".  Were it not for the machine, this game would have actually ended
with only one or two winners.

So, the game declared over, some of the countries made their thanks and gave
out congratulations to the other players:

> Announcement from Park Place, (#14)  dated Tue Nov 17 16:01:37 1992
   I guess it's a good tihng for me that the game has
wrapped up, since I'm on a business trip and can only
log in a few minutes a day...:-)

   Anyway, time for some belated thank yous etc...

Thanks to Jorge for running a really good game...
too bad about the machine being uppity, but as I've said,
I really like the Swamp empire concept and will be there
for Swamp 2...

   Thanks for being nice guys go to all my neighbors, which
at this point in the game is everyone! :-)


> Announcement from Park Place, (#14)  dated Tue Nov 17 16:13:46 1992
   Special salutes to:

Undead: Is this really his 4th or 5th game? This guy plays
   like a veteran, and is also a reasonable guy. Certainly
   the winner of the 'best announcer' award. :-)

[Note: No, it's his 3rd, including his first game which was a local game open
 only to newbies.]

Dharma: The little ally with the indomitable will. He stood
   his ground against much bigger opponents and 'went the 
   distance'.

Huron: Who, along with Undead and myself, made the power
   chart into a real competition. Lucky for me the game
   was called while it was my turn to lead. :-)

> Announcement from Park Place, (#14)  dated Tue Nov 17 16:15:04 1992
And, a salute to all of us who went the distance under
such adverse conditions. Thanks all!
  -- Park

> Announcement from Undead, (#6)  dated Tue Nov 17 16:36:10 1992
Welp, looks like it's mainly over, so here's my chance to
congratulate:

Park Place - for voraciously devouring most of my allies and
finally passing me up on the power chart on the last day of
the game (grr! snarl!).

beep - for tenaciously refusing to give up in the face of
adversity.  (Which brings me to the question, IS there any
efficient way to conquer nests of fortresses?  sigh..)

Matrix - for remaining allied with me to the end

Militaria - for keeping me posted on tech developments

(I guess the latter two are actually thanks rather than
congratulations, but you get the idea.)



Yeah, thanks everyone for putting up with my screwups.  Did I forgot to mention
the runaway cron that caused 13 updates in one weekend?  Ah, just as well. :-)
Fortunately, I did have a recent backup, and I only had to go back to the day
before the screwed up updates began.

Anyway, that's it for Swamp Empire I.  Enough people seemed to like the idea
to merit a Swamp Empire II.  The new game will be run on a different, faster
machine (one that is not only faster, but it doesn't get a whole lot of use,
either :-).  Only problem is it runs under AIX, and I haven't got all the
code ready yet.  Right now, I've got standard KSU 1.04 with Merc mods ready
to go.  I'm trying to get Chainsaw ready by next year, so we can run Swamp
II with Chainsaw 2.0 (2.1?  2.2?).

For now, I'm going to run two or three blitzes between now and the end of
the year to test the code we have.  Look for them.

Again, thanks to everyone who played.  I'll leave it to the players to
toot their own horns about the game. ;-)


-- 
Jorge Diaz                       | "I want you to remember, Clark... in all
Georgia Institute of Technology  |  the years to come, in your most private
Office of Information Technology |  moments...my hand at your throat.  I want
ccoprdj@prism.gatech.edu         |  you to remember the one man who beat you."
Newsgroups: rec.games.empire