Date: Thu, 24 Jul 1997 21:01:15 +0100 From: "Robert F. Heeter"Subject: W2WT: Introduction to the Remailer [ Please read this even if you are not yet certified or have not yet been subbed into a game. We will not leave anyone behind! ] Greetings, Warlords - Most of our Practice Round games are ready to go, so once this message is sent, all Moderators are asked to start carrying out the game-creation procedure! Over the next few days you will receive a warning message from your moderator, then (if all goes well) a long message from the Warlords Remailer (see below), and finally a confirmation message from your Moderator. You will then be asked to "check in" and reply to the Moderator to confirm that you got the Remailer introductory message and are ready to play! We will probably need to find a few substitutes and straighten out minor glitches, so this process will probably take the whole weekend. Headquarters (me) will be on a 5-day vacation during this period, so we will officially start playing the games after I return, probably next Thursday (July 31), if all goes according to plan! (In the meantime, urgent crisis emails can be sent to the Backup Headquarters, Gary Best, gsb@compupick.com.) Gamefiles will not be distributed until everything is ready. [ If you are a PC player in the #1 slot of your game, and you haven't yet told your moderator what you wish your hero to be named, do so immediately! ] *** Introduction to the Warlords Remailer *** This message is to let all of you know some essential things about the Warlords Remailer, which we use to run our tournament games. (You will want to read this even if you are not yet Certified or involved in a game.) The Warlords Remailer (http://www.pixgen.com/elam/warlords/Remailer.html) was designed to automate most of the tedious tasks of play-by-email gaming, including the enforcement of turnaround time limits and the transfer of gamefiles and diplomatic messages. It was developed by Elam Birnbaum (elam@pixgen.com) in collaboration with the tournament organizers and playtesters. At this point you only need to know a few things about the Remailer. First, the Remailer has two interfaces, the Web interface above, and an email list-serv type interface (warlords@pixgen.com) described below. As soon as this message goes out, the Moderators will start to create new games in the Remailer. It may take a couple of days (Moderators have lives too), but it will happen! When a new game is created, a long introductory message is sent out. This message is an essential reference for your game and you should save it immediately. Virtually everything that you need to do to play in the tournament can be done by email commands to the Remailer. The remailer accepts commands sent in the Subject: line of an email message. A basic Remailer command looks like this: To: warlords@pixgen.com Subject: MyGame, MyPassword, MyCommand Note that each game has a name (P01 to P43 for the Practice Round) and a password (which the moderator chooses; it is included in the introductory message you get from the Remailer.) REMEMBER YOUR GAME NAME AND PASSWORD, AND warlords@pixgen.com!!! The only other Remailer command you really need to remember is the Quick Reference command: To: warlords@pixgen.com Subject: MyGame, MyPassword, reference Sending a message with this subject will result in the Remailer sending you a nice summary of all the Remailer's commands. For example, in the (now completed) Duel playtesting game, the password was "timesup", so this worked: To: warlords@pixgen.com Subject: Duel, timesup, reference The Most Important Remailer Commands are these: 1. Subject: MyGame, MyPassword, query 2. Subject: MyGame, MyPassword, message 3. Subject: MyGame, MyPassword, gamefile 4. Subject: MyGame, MyPassword, noarchive 1. The first command ("query") sends the body of your message (whatever you send to the Remailer) back to all players in the game, plus the Moderator. This is the normal way to carry out discussion *about* the game. Whatever you send is logged on the Web site in the "Event and Query Log", for later reference. Messages with attached files will be rejected. 2. The second command ("message") acts just like the "query" command, except that it is used for actual diplomatic traffic *in* the game. Official "message" emails are archived on the Web site in the Diplomatic History. Only three types of email should be sent this way: (a) your official turn-report message, sent after you complete each turn (more on this next week), (b) your official diplomacy message (limit one per turn in addition to turn reports), and (c) corrections of the diplomatic history in case of rules errors. 3. The third command ("gamefile") is (of course!) used to send gamefiles. In the tournament all players are entitled to receive all gamefiles, and that is the default setting of the Remailer. (Ask your moderator if you need to change it.) To send a gamefile, simply attach the compressed file to the message with the Subject: MyGame, MyPassword, gamefile, and the Remailer will pass the gamefile on to the other players (but not the current player). The Remailer will also update the turn, reset the timer for the game, and send out a turn-change notice stating whose turn it is and when the next move is due. 4. The fourth command ("noarchive") is used for emails that are either unrelated to the game (fun stuff, real life, etc.) or emails that have attached files. "Noarchive" emails are sent to all players and the moderator, but they are not logged. The "noarchive" command is especially useful if you need to re-send a gamefile without making the Remailer change the turn. Attachments (scenarios, army sets, screenshots, etc.) are limited to 1 MB. Elam asks that you not use the Remailer for anything other than Warlords gaming. There are many more features to the Remailer, but these are the most important to understand, especially at the start of a game. We will explain the more sophisticated features when the time comes! After the games are created, but before the gamefiles are sent out, we will send out more specific instructions about how to take your turn and send it to the next player. But that is the subject of a later message! A mighty battle is brewing... -- Bob Heeter, Tournament Coordinator