Pitboss Civilization 4 -- RESTART!
 

I've set up a Pitboss game, for those that are interested in it. It's considered an IP game (so it would be private), with 24 hour time limits on turns. What I need now is to find out if it works. :-)

So ... no one needs to download Pitboss, just connect to the game and play your turn.

Pitboss is a persistant PBEM server that allows you to play your turn and not have to wait on an emailed folder, and no one has to play in order -- so, come on anytime, play your turn and the next day, they'll be another turn to play. This makes for a MUCH faster game, and new players can come in (with permission from the group) and sub for missing/unavailable players at any time. I have 24 hour limits turned on, so if you don't play your turn in 24 hours, you're basically skipped. You continue to research, and continue to build if you have items in your queue, but you won't do anything else.

Large games can be played this way, since the turns will go after 24 hours regardless. What I need now is people to try this out and see if it works.

I'm looking for a maximum of 10 people to join.

How to join:

Go to your Civ 4 game, choose "Multiplayer" then "Direct IP", The game name is FOFC Dominion, and my IP is 24.239.76.92

Then choose your leader and play your turn. You can have email notifications sent to you when a new turn comes up if you want, but you don't have to. Simply log on every day and play the next turn. If there's someone else on at the same time as you, you can even chat with them, but again, this is in every way like a PBEM game, only you don't have to wait your turn. Give it a try.

dola -- the password is:

fofc

I hope I can still get in when I get home this afternoon from work, as this sounds like fun.

You should be. I doubt if we'll get 10 players in by that time.

I'm in.

Signed up and played my first turn.

Question...how do you chat? I saw Celeval and "Pittboss" (Eric) doing it, but I couldn't figure out how to do it myself...

Dola-

Nevermind, figured it out...

this is excellent...only question before i join is: what time does the clock run out?

Right now, there's 23 hours left on it. The game gives you a clock timer right on the Civ 4 screen.

dola -- but if there's an open Civ, people can join anytime, even after the first turn.

double dola -- got 5 people playing so far. 5 spots left:

Louis XIV
Hatshepsut
Saladin
Alexander
Cyrus

this is sweet, thanks again

fixed it for you

And you're not going to tell us!?!?!?!?!?!

Anyway, I'll check in tonight when I get a chance and will take a spot if there is one left. But I go home, eat dinner, give the kids baths, put the kids to bed, then I have an online gaming match at 8, so it'll be 9 eastern or so before I check in.

Love this idea. Hope there are spots open when I can get on at 8 pm.

click on the icon directy below you gold reserve in the upper left hand corner.

I'll try to get in this evening. I wanted for the first PBEM game to succeed, but we were hamped by delay after delay. This sounds like a great approach to it.

Cool, I'm in. I took over Louis and the French, and took my turn. I didn't save or anything, and left while it was still saying "Waiting for other players" -- the info is stored on PitBoss, right?

Crap... I'm guessing there's no way to talk thru a proxy?

That's weird, when I logged in, it seemed like WVU was talking to himself. I could see his chat, but no one else's.

When you log in, there's a automated welcome message. I haven't been on in awhile. (been asleep)

You weren't able to log into the game?

Yes. All saves are stored by PitBoss.

dola -- only 3 Civs left open:

Saladin
Alexander
Cyrus

I'm in as Egypt

Yeah, but I could see your responses to questions asked by someone else (most likely from before I logged on)...but not those questions.

I won't be able to until I get home from work, and at the rate it's going, it'll be full up by then...

Doubtful. There'll probably be room. If there isn't, and there's enough people interested, I can start a second Pitboss game.

To the active players -- make sure you have set a password when you entered the game for the first time. Otherwise, anyone can log in and play as you.

Yeah, it'll do that when I respond from Pitboss -- it saves the "announcements" I put out for all the players until the end of the turn.

WVU, what does being the Pitboss entail?

was there a mod you have to download, and is your computer the persistant server, therfore having to be running the game at all times?

just wondering....depending on the details, i might be able to set a game up on my desktop

It's actually really easy. Download the Pitboss client (it's on the Firaxis site -- I'll see if I can't get the link for you if you want, and upzip it into your Civ4 Folder. Insert your original CD, and start up the Pitboss.exe file. The program is made and released by Firaxis, so it's completely compatable.

You actually set up the game from the Pitboss screen, from entering in your SMTP server info to how the game is set up. If you have an existing PBEM game, you can convert it to Pitboss, but otherwise, just follow the instructions on the screen.

The Pitboss file has to remain open at all times, so your CPU in essense becomes the server the game is hosted on, but it's a miniscule file, so for me it's no problem.

Like i said, if you're interested, I can get you the file. If I can set it up, anyone can.

dola -- the file is below:

hxxp://63.236.94.185/2kgames/civ4/civ4pitboss.php

Info about Pitboss:

hxxp://www.2kgames.com/civ4/pitboss.htm

In as the Persians. Alexander and Saladin look like the only ones left.

I took Alexander.

Saladin seems to be the last one. One more and we hit the next turn automatically.

retrospectively, i probably should have taken saladin


get it....saldana....saladin


i got nothin.

In as Saladin...

This should be interesting... my first time playing as him.

And we're full.

Turn 2 is now ready to be played. I've also figured out how to edit things, so now there should be email reminders sent if you have your settings set correctly -- click ALT-D and you can set the game to send you reminders of new turns.

Ok, the votes are (mostly) in -- RESTART
 

So far with only one or two exceptions, everyone is interested in restarting, so that's what we're gonna do.

Now we're gonna be set for 12 players, so if there's other people that are interested, please sign up, as there will be 3 more slots available now.

EVERYONE WILL NEED TO RETAKE A CIVILIZATION.

To do so:

Open Civ4
Click "Multiplayer"
Click "Direct IP game"
Fill in the correct info. The IP for the game is 24.239.76.92.
The name for the new game is "FOFC Global"
Enter a password for the game.
Password is -- fofc
Select your Civ and enjoy!

So, if you haven't tried this out, take your civ. If you're in the old game, take a new civ.

Enjoy!

Sorry for not answering your PM, Eric. From your last post I thought that you had fixed the issues...

I had thought I had fixed the mail issue, but this way we're expanding the game and ensuring it would work.

did anyone else get kicked out of the game. i got terminated and cant reconnect. when i try to get back it, the window starts going through the different players, connecting to each one, and when it gets to "Sharon", i get an error that says i cant connect to Sharon because his firewall is not configured properly, and i get dropped back to the connection screen.

Lemme check on it.

Try it now, Saldana.

seems to be working fine, thanks

btw to everyone, a quick key to the chat window is just to hit TAB, and it pops up....instead of clicking the icon by your gold bank

FranklinNoble took my civ. :(

I'm in, tho.

I get to the where it is finished loading and the game just hangs. I had no trouble last night. Anyone else have this?

It caught up.

I would just like to say before I die on the second turn (damn you, Celeval -- DAMN YOU TO HELL!!!) that the Japanese will rise again!!

:-)

I am now getting this message with saldana having the firewall problem.

You should be able to log in now. There was a Sync error earlier, but that's been fixed.

This started about 5 minutes ago. Its now hanging on Celeval.

Odd, I had no problems last night.

try now wvu

REQUEST FOR RE-RESTART

The original placement sucks. My two units are immediately next to WVUFan's already-built city, with nowhere else to go. For me? Not a problem. For WVUFan? A lot of trouble. Sucky way to start.

Hehe... sorry, WVU. Sucky start, though, and I wouldn't mind restarting.

Sorry, dude... I didn't realize anyone had dibs...

We won't restart just because I got unlucky. Sometimes the game just happens that way. :-) People have been inconvenienced enough already.

Excellent move in eliminating me as soon as possible though, Celeval. It's what I would do. :)

Uh... is the game set to re-spawn if you get whacked that early?

Nope. It'll be the end of the game for me. It's all good, though, as I said, sometimes it just works out that way.

But then you are hosting the server till the end of time? Can you host another one, or is your PitBoss program dedicated to this?

Dude... not cool. We should re-start. It's pretty weak having that sort of starting location.

Well there couldn't be a worse starting location, could there? I can't believe the game would allow that, and I've never had that happen in single player.

I'd have no problem restarting because of this, but I'd hope that a map that has huge land masses would avoid this kind of setup.

It's not a good idea to try and host two games from the same IP. I tried a test and it didn't turn out well.

Just because I get eliminated doesn't mean the game ends. It's really no big deal for me to host the game, and I have another PBEM game I'm active in.

Hell, if push comes to shove, I'll retire the Japs and grab an open Civ, since I think the only one that hasn't retaken their civ is Gstelmack, and I'm making sure there's a spot open for him.

i'm cool with a restart, i havent even founded my city yet. i agree that is shitty that the computer set it up that way. with all the trouble WVU is going through to host this, the least we can do is give him a chance to play

Ditto. I don't think anyone disagrees with the need to restart.

ok ...
 

Ok, then.

I really appreciate you letting me restart this, given that you really don't have to. I do appreciate it.

We'll restart, then. This should be the last time, and I apologize for doing it. We'll do 12 players again. Retake your civs.

Game will be again FOFC Global, same IP, same info.

Game restarted
 

The game has been restarted. Please log on and grab your civs ... again. :-)

Last time. I mean it this time. Barring any technical errors, we're not restarting again.

Ugh... Sharon just logged in and took Persia, and Bismark is right next door... not as bad as WVUFan and Celeval, but Germany will have nowhere to grow, and has a rotten spot.

Ack. It just may be the number of civs we have. I have the map this time as Balanced and Huge. I dunno what else I should do.

Well, Bismark is screwed... here's a screen shot:

This peer-to-peer connection thingy... can that be turned off? I'm erroring out trying to connect to runtheball and saldana...

Aside from lowering the number of civs, I don't know how to fix this. Is there a map with larger amounts of landmass I can use? Anyone have any suggestions?

Nope. Are you and Sharon behind a firewall or proxy?

What kind of map are you using? I like the fractal maps.

We're not behind a firewall or anything... it's like I can connect fine, as long as certain other peers aren't connected before me.

Anyhow... I'd advise against anyone taking Bismark, if they can help it. That's a no-win scenario right there...

I'm using the "Balanced" map. Same map I used in the first 10 player setup.

The second time I used Continents, but I figured there was too much ocean area, so I switched back.

It's rough and would be a challenge, but he hasn't settled, and can move south, so it's technically not a no-win. Certainly a challenge, though. I wonder if someone out there is so confident that they think they can take Germany to victory?

Hey, so I'm about to jump into the new game, and I notice there are different rulers. Anyone object to me not being the French (I sort of took them as a last resort option yesterday :))?

I'm using Zonealarm, but have given the program (and the packet-thingy) all available permissions. I'm sure the problem of connecting is not with me, as I've connected and chatted with several other players on each run of this game so far. In fact, I was connected and chatting before I went in and gave those progams all available permissions, so that step was apparently unnecessary.

Take who you want. Wouldn't recommend the Germans, unless you want a real challenge.

I changed my empire's name, so I hope there's no problems with it...

You always change your empire's name. It's cool.

How do you do that, btw? I want to make West Virginia a nation.

pick My Options on the main menu

In the options screen.

I might come up with a clever name for mine...

And just like that, someone with some big ... aspirations took Germany. Kudos to whomever did that.

I picked up the Germans just as I was following the thread...then I continued to read down. ARGH!!! Should have read the whole thread first. Oh well, should be interesting to see how many turns I last.

Fear the Malinese, and our army of flat-tailed hooligans.

I can kick you from Germany, so you can pick another civ if you want, Miller. I don't want you to keep them if you're not comfortable.

dola -- Germany has been retired from the game. It is ... no more.

EDIT: There are 3 Civs left. One spot is reserved for GStelmack, if he chooses to play. The other three -- come and take 'em! Lonnie, Barkeep -- if you are interested, come on and join us. One turn a day -- minimum! Ceneval, Samdari, still have places for you two.

Huayna Capac -- TAKEN
Napoleon -- TAKEN
Qin Shi Huang -- TAKEN
Montezuma

I think that's probably for the best. That would have ended up just being an early game rush to who can build the first warrior, and it would have taken a lot of fun out of it.

I've changed my Civ name to "California."

Now if I could only find an Arnold Schwarzenegger leaderhead mod...

i'm out til about 10:30, so i will get my 2nd turn in as soon as i come home from work, assuming its moved up by then

Reminder -- make sure you click "End Turn" when you're done. You should see something that says "Waiting on other civilizations ...". Otherwise the system doesn't have you down for your turn being over.

Example: I know runtheball has been on a few times, but you never ended your turn. :-) I did the exact same thing on this turn before i caught it, so I wanted to give a heads-up.

Remember, the sooner everyone takes their turn, the sooner the new turn pops up.

I grabbed the Incans and renamed them. Looked like the Aztecs were the only one still open.

Player List
 

Ok, I'm at work, so someone fill in the rest of the players for me:

Here's the list of active players in this game:

WVUFan
Vince
Runtheball
Saldana
JeeberD
FranklinNobel
Sharon
Miller Time
GStalmack
??

Now that's weird, cause I'm positive I ended my turn. Well, I'm going to log back on now and will fix it, but ... I'm sure I ended my turn so I hope there isn't some glitch. And if I'm wrong I'm sorry I held things up.

There should be still a civ open, so you didn't hold anything up until that civ gets taken.

EDIT: In the Pitboss admin page, it lets us know when someone's turn is ended. I'm just going by that. It could be wrong, and if it is, sorry. :-)

You were right. I screwed up. Sorry about that.
I believe that the little star beside our names in the lower right corner is also an indication of who has finished their turn.
Glad to see I didn't cause a delay, as the Aztecs are still available.

Who took the Chinese?

I'm in as Monte.