Allies should see current orders

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Ophiuchus
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Allies should see current orders

#1 Post by Ophiuchus »

Cant find the posts talking about this, but there is a good way to enhance communication between allies.

When an ally sets an order, like starting a building on a planet or more important giving fleet flight orders, the allies should see that orders.

Looking at an ally's orders one can review what the other one plans to do. This makes a lot of communication unnecessary.
This communication via the game objects is unambiguous (e.g. which fleets goes where) and arbitrarily detailed (which ships are in those fleets) and asynchronous (so one can finish orders and the later one can do orders based on that).

Don't know enough about how orders/savegames/messages work in multiplayer, hopefully o01eg or geoff will comment.

Opened up a feature request to track this #3228.
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Geoff the Medio
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Re: Allies should see current orders

#2 Post by Geoff the Medio »

Ophiuchus wrote: Wed Nov 11, 2020 10:08 amDon't know enough about how orders/savegames/messages work in multiplayer, hopefully o01eg or geoff will comment.
Not sure what should be commented on...

wobbly
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Re: Allies should see current orders

#3 Post by wobbly »

I suspect he is asking about how easily it can be implemented? Or in what way it can be implemented?

The problem with how it is now, is if my fleet and Ophiuchus's fleet are sitting at the same spot and the enemy fleet is 1 jump away I want to know if he is standing/retreating or advancing and I need to PM him to ask so I can match orders. Compare to the situation where I can just look where his ships are headed and move mine appropriately. Likewise if I can see his build queue I can work out when reinforcements are coming without asking.

If I can tack a request on, I'd also like to be able to see allies combat reports in the sit rep. Currently I'm unsure if combat even took place. The ships disappear, were they destroyed? or did it just move out of sight?

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Oberlus
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Re: Allies should see current orders

#4 Post by Oberlus »

Is it doable to make the following (or something along the lines) happen?

In a multiplayer game with four players, A, B, C and D, where A, B and C are allied, clients A, B and D are connected (online), client C is offline:

- Client A sends orders to server (player presses "Turn" or whatever).
- Server gets client A's orders and transmit them to connected client A's allied empires' clients (client B).
- Client B updates/shows player A's orders (where is going that ship, what building is enqueued there).
- Client C connects.
- Server sends client C all game status including client A's current orders (so client C sees the same as clients A and B).
Client D never gets the information of client A's orders (not even in the serialized data, to avoid hacking) since they aren't allied.

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Geoff the Medio
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Re: Allies should see current orders

#5 Post by Geoff the Medio »

If a player disconnects from the server, they send orders to the server first normally. I'm not sure if orders are sent more often than than, though they could be if needed. The server could send those orders as a batch to allies when the allies connect later during a turn, or forward them immediately if both players are connected at the same time.

If a client received orders for another empire that have been issued on the current turn, then they'd need to do something with them. I'm not sure whether that will work easily, as likely clients have been set up only to issue orders from their own empire. Could work relatively easily or could require some modifications to handle. It will be necessary to be able to handle already-issued orders or recinded orders received from other players, which might be tricky. I think (not sure) that normally the gamestate is received by clients from the server for the start of the current turn and any issued orders are re-applied client side. But if other players' orders are received repeatedly by a client as more are issued, then that would be more complicated to handle since the pre-orders gamestate isn't separately remembered by clients.

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Oberlus
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Re: Allies should see current orders

#6 Post by Oberlus »

Geoff the Medio wrote: Wed Nov 11, 2020 4:50 pmclients have been set up only to issue orders from their own empire
I can see some orders issued by my allies on previous turns: I can know final destination and route of allied fleets. If I understand you correctly, that comes from gamestate, and to be able to see destination from current-turn allied orders it should be done through the mechanics to issue orders, as if you were issuing your ally's orders?

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Geoff the Medio
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Re: Allies should see current orders

#7 Post by Geoff the Medio »

Oberlus wrote: Wed Nov 11, 2020 5:31 pmI can see some orders issued by my allies on previous turns: I can know final destination and route of allied fleets. If I understand you correctly, that comes from gamestate...
Yes.
...and to be able to see destination from current-turn allied orders it should be done through the mechanics to issue orders, as if you were issuing your ally's orders?
A better word would be "executing" the orders. Not as if "you" issue them and then they are executed, but just the execution of orders that the server tells your client that other empires issued.

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Re: Allies should see current orders

#8 Post by LienRag »

I have to point that such a setting, if it gets implemented, should not get in the way of treason - "highlander"-style victory condition (and subsequent diplomacy) is something that should always be on the menu (as I explained in details elsewhere, I believe it's the only one which makes any sense whatsoever, but hey different folks, different strokes; at least it should be an option taken into account when designing the technical consequences of an alliance).
Last edited by LienRag on Wed Nov 24, 2021 11:34 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Allies should see current orders

#9 Post by Ophiuchus »

Probably as soon as one changes the relationship below alliance, no orders should be transferred. Also the change in relationship should not be known in the same turn.

So if one does treason, one can fake orders to give a wrong sense of security, switch to war, change the orders and attack in a surprising way.
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