Planetarion Wiki - User contributions [en]

New Player Manual

2005-12-18T04:32:13Z

Nano61: /* Planet: x,y,z */

== Introduction ==

Little experience in [[Planetarion]]? You've come to the right place.

Browse around before the beginning of the round to gain an advantage about the inner workings of the game.

=== A Relaxing Browser Game For The Whole Family ===

In [[Planetarion]] you compete with thousands of other players over a 2 month period of non-stop gaming. Activity, skill, endurance and a solid [[alliance]] are the building blocks of a winner in this game. Use of [[IRC]], while not a required to play the game, is necessary to communicate between other players and to succeed in the game.

At the beginning you construct [[structures]] and initiate [[asteroids]] that orbit your planet to gain resources. With these [[resource|resources]] you are able to construct 6 different [[Ship_Class|classes of ship]]. Two classes are capable of [[Pods|stealing asteroids]] from enemy planets while another is capable of bombarding enemy planets ruthlessly destroying their [[structure]]s.
There are 4 [[race]]s to choose from each equipped with 12 unique ships.

Planets are ranked by their [[score]]. The planet with the highest score wins the game.

Each planet (including your own!) is grouped into [[galaxy|galaxies]]. Planetarion is a turn-based game with turns being called a [[tick]] (a 1 hour period). In speed rounds ticks vary between 1-5 minutes.

Rounds are generally announced 2-3 weeks before the ticks (turns) start. Around this time signups are opened allowing everyone to register their very own planet. When the game starts, everyone is placed in [[Protection|protection mode]] and temporarily grouped into large galaxies. At tick 36, planets are "[[shuffle|shuffled]]" and placed into their true starting galaxy using a highly intelligent AI. If your planet is unpaid you are placed randomly otherwise you can form [[buddy pack]]s with friends, which can contain up to 5 people.

=== The First 72 Hours: Under Protection ===

During the first 72 [[tick]]s of the game your planet is under [[protection]]. During this time, get used to the game, and as often as possible visit the mining page to initiate asteroids, the research page to start new researches and the construction page to start new constructions.

It is recommended to have some ships built by [[tick]] 82, as that is when the first attacks will be able to reach your planet. In the beginning of the game it is nearly impossible to stop attacks on your planet. As such, it is preferable to build mainly [[Pods#Astropod|pods]] and send them out to attack others.

== Race: Killing, Freezing or Stealing? ==

An all-round impacting choice is your race: [[Race|Terran]], [[Race|Cathaar]], [[Race|Xandathrii]] or [[Race|Zikonian]]. [[Race|Terran]] is suggested as the starting race, as the ships have high armour and so are harder to kill.
Read about the races in the [[Round_14#Guides| Race Guides]].

== Planet: x,y,z ==

=== Engineering ===

A good starting setup is [[Research]] (1st), [[Mining]] (2nd) and [[Construction]] (3rd). Make sure you set your Engineering Priorities '''before''' starting a Research or Construction.

=== Research ===

The undisputed first choice for research is [[Improved Resource Handling]], so please click the ''initate'' button next to this research.

This technology branch allows you to mine more of the [[asteroids]] than you have collected around your planet. This is because you can "initate" as many asteroids as you wish, but you can only recieve resources from those you are able to, depending on your resource handling ability. All of the more experienced players spend the first 60 or so [[tick]]s initiating asteroids in the Mining screen, but shortly after protection ends it is far more cost-effective to attack other players to gain roids (this also gets you [[XP]] - see [[combat]] for more information).

Just a quick note about the number of ticks beside the Research and the Construction items below. Those numbers represent the 'base' amount of time it will take to complete this research, however your Race, your Engineering Setup and the number of Research Labs you have ''will'' significantly reduce this time - indeed you should be able to fit the Infrastructure Upgrade research before protection is over, and perhaps HCT 3 as well.

'''Starting Research'''
# Improved Resource Handling - 16 Ticks to complete
# Heavy Cargo Transfers II - 24
# Fighter Class Hulls - 24
# Jumpgate - 16
# ''**End of Protection**''
# Infrastructure Upgrade - 16
# Heavy Cargo Transfers III - 24
# Warpgate - 32
# Advanced Core Extraction - 24
# Frigate Class Hulls
# Heavy Cargo Transfers IV - 48
Then, about this time you'll need to try and get as much Scan technology as you can whilst keeping up with your roids (at least until Unit scans)

The things to research least if you are a free account are the [[Waves|scans]] and [[Covert_Operations|covert ops]], as they're heavily limited and there's nothing worthwhile available until you upgrade.

=== Construction ===

The most beneficial construction to start with is the [[Research lab]]. This increases your research speed by up to 20% (when 1 in 5 or more of your constructions are [[research lab]]s). To build ships you need a factory and the appropriate research.

'''Starting Constructions'''
# Research Lab - 12 ticks
# Refinery - 12 (the number of which Refinery depends on your race. If you are Terran, focus on Metal Refineries as your ships cost alot of Metal. Cathaar = Crystal and Zikonian = Eonium. Eonium is no longer fuel, but is as important as Metal and Crystal - so keep it in mind ).
# Refinery - 12
# Refinery - 12
# Light Factory - 12
# Research Lab - 12
# ''**End of Protection**''
# Refinery - 12
# Refinery - 12
# Amplifier - 12
# Refinery - 12
# Research Lab - 12
# Medium Factory - 12

=== Mining ===

Mining is one of the important screens (together with research and construction) at the beginning of the round.

When you first sign up, you have 5000 of each resource. This is enough to buy 3 of each type of asteroid in the "Mining" screen. Paid accounts have 10000 of each resource, and so can afford 6 of each roid type.

To initiate asteroids, put the numbers in the corresponding boxes beside the three different resource types and click ''initiate''.

'''Note:''' You want to be the biggest planet you can be. You initiate asteroids at the beginning of the game as that's the most cost effective way of gaining asteroids, and you need asteroids to give you more resources. However, after 100-150 initiated asteroids of a specific resource the most cost effective way to gain more is by building ships that can steal asteroids and attacking other planets (you also gain [[XP]] for doing this, which adds to your planets [[score]]). Therefore, while you use this page a lot in the first 5-10 days, afterwards you won't need it much unless exchanging resources with others.
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== Galaxy: x,y ==

A [[galaxy]] allows its own planets to launch ships to defend each other with a low [[ETA]]. In the galaxy status you can see details on friendly and hostile fleet movement (only paid accounts see outgoing fleets).

=== Galaxy Politics ===

Each planet can vote for a player they want to be the overall leader of the galaxy called the [[Galactic Commander]]. When a player has the most votes, he or she is automatically appointed the role of GC. The galaxy screen shows the current galaxy staff setup.

==== Minister Of Development (yellow) ====

The MoD is responsible for the Galaxy Fund. He can donate funds to the smallest planets in the galaxy (the planets with the lowest score). He can also regulate trade within the fund: at any time the MoD can choose to forbid or allow trade of one or more (or even all!) types of resources.

==== Minister of Communication (light blue) ====

The MoC is the spokesperson for a galaxy: he can send message to all other MoCs in a certain Cluster, or to all members within the Galaxy itself. Another task of the MoC is to keep the Galaxy Forums tidy.

==== Minister of War (red) ====

The Minister of war is responsible for arranging attacks and defences in a galaxy. He's generally the one, together with the Minister of Communication, that organises contact information on the forums and overview for defence. He may often also look for galaxies for his own galaxy to attack.

'''Note:'''
Not all galaxies follow these ideas. Some planets play with friends and alliances as much or more than their own galaxy mates (especially for attacking). Therefore it's a good idea to also have an alliance.

The bottom line for defence and organisation is your galaxy, and generally "galaxy mates" know each other quite well by the end of the round. Communication is essential, which is why many galaxies use a form of communication such as [[IRC]] where they have their own private channel to discuss and organise galaxy issues. Mobile phones are often also used in emergencies, such as when the galaxy is being heavily attacked (although giving your mobile phone out is always optional).

It's generally up to the galaxy how much they play for fun and how active they are, as in any galaxy there's some people on 18 hours a day and some only 2-4 hours. As there's only a limited amount of people in a galaxy, some of the more serious players are determined to get active players, but even the smaller less active galaxies often have a certain amount of fun.

== Alliance: 1st line of support ==

Beside galaxies, your main line of defence is [[alliance|alliances]]. Alliances are groups of players that agree to defend and perform coordinated attacks together.

=== Are Alliances Made Of Green Men And Cheese? ===

Alliances have several ranks within them.

The [[High Commander]]s are in charge of the alliance. There's no set limit for how many people are in this most powerful position, but generally there's between 3 and 5 who are in ultimate authority.

[[Officer]]s sort out the alliance attacks and defences, and are often responsible (together with some of the HCs) for the technical responsibility of the alliance. Some are in charge of intelligence, internal and external affairs, and even "scanners" - those devoted to scanning for the alliance.

Normal members (aka. pe0ns) help with duties within the alliance, but mostly are required to be as active as possible and participate in alliance attacks and defences. Some alliances give points for attacking and defending, so they can keep track of how helpful alliance members are. Alliances generally are organised on IRC and often have their own forums and/or IRC servers to increase privacy and communication ability. Some alliances have a "minimum IRC activity time" together or instead of a points system - inactive players don't pull their weight in the long term and so often require a lot more defence than they give. At the beginning of the round, many alliances would prefer players with less experience but that are online 8 or more hours a day than experienced players that won't be on more than 2 hours a day.

=== How Do I Get An Alliance? ===

Most alliances require [[IRC|IRC]] activity. The established alliances require vouches (people already in the alliance knowing you and saying you're a good player), but many just interview and require a minimum activity time. A list of all the Round 14 alliances playing can be found on the [[:Category:Alliances:Round_14|Round14 alliances page]]. New players should look in the [http://pirate.planetarion.com/forumdisplay.php?f=37 Alliance Recruitment Forum].

== Combat ==

This is a space war game in which [[combat]] is an important part.

=== Ships, Classes and Targets ===

Ship from different [[Ship_Class|classes]] can be categorized into their respective [[Ship_Type|primary functionalities]].

=== Inititative ===

[[Initiative]] defines the order that ships fire in battle. Generally, [[Race|Cathaar]] EMP ships fire first, then [[Race|Xandathrii]] ships, then [[Race|Terran]] and [[Race|Zikonian]] kill ships and [[Race|Cathaar]] kill ships, and then the astropods, and then steal ships, and then structure killers.

=== Arm/Cost and Dam/Cost explained ===

In the [http://game.planetarion.com/stats.pl?page=33 ship statistics] these are, in some ways, more important than the armour, damage and cost columns themselves. They summarize these columns by saying, per cost, how much armour or damage the ship does. This means you can quickly compare ships no matter their different costs. looking at Terran, you can see their "Arm/Cost" column is much bigger than the other races. [[Race|Cathaar]] and [[Race|Xandathrii]] have bigger "Dam/Cost" columns, but keep in mind that 6 of the [[Race|Cathaar]] ships only stun their opponents (the ships that are listed as EMP).

==== Attacking ====

Look around for targets you can handle, unit scan, produce a [[battle calculation]] and attack. Remember to send enough [[pods]] to capture 25% of the targets [[asteroid|roid]]s, which have an armour of 50. Get a News scan at [[ETA]] 1 or a Jump Gate Proble scan between [[ETA]]1-4 to be aware of any defence the planet might have obtained. It is advisable to watch your targets resource spending during the attack not to be caught unaware of ships coming out of production. The [http://pirate.planetarion.com/showthread.php?t=185199 How to Attack] thread on the [Strategy] Forum outlines a procedure for attacking, however it does include some more advanced [[:Category:Terminology|Terminology]] so it may be initially confusing, however it is still a good viable guide. Furthermore, a description of the various [[Fleet Strategy]] is also available - it outlines common names for the various tactics involved, provides an example, and identifies counter-strategy too. Again, it uses complex [[:Category:Terminology|Terminology]] and so it is something to work towards :).

==== Defending ====

When under attack several planets will receive defense from their alliance. However, those without an [[alliance]] have to rely on the planets within their galaxy (or a buddy within the cluster) to receive defence. In-galaxy defence is usually coordinated within the galaxy's [[IRC]] channel.

If you have just started out, you will likely be uncovered, meaning you do not have enough ships in defensive to stop the attacker from taking a share of your roids.

Sending random ships for defence is counter-productive as ships target a certain [[ship class]]. Unit scanning the attacker and producing a [[battle calculation]] based on an estimation of what the attacker sent should always be done before any defence is done.

== Troubleshooting ==

=== Can't Login? ===

* Check that computer time is set correctly
* Clear cookies, cache and restart browser.
* Gamepage does not load, while others do? Restart internet connection or your computer.

=== Exceptions ===

If you play from the same place as someone else in your family, it is strongly recommended you apply for an [[exception]].

Loging in from different url's :

http://p45.planetarion.com/

http://round15.planetarion.com/

http://struggleforsupremacy.planetarion.com/

== Further Help ==

[[Sovereign]], a Planetarion [[Strategy|Strategy Forum]] [[Moderator]] is able and very willing to help players who are new, uncertain on where to go or what to do next, or to provide advice and assistance on a whole range of topics in Planetarion. The [[HashStrategy|#Strategy]] Channel on the Netgamers [[IRC]] Network (see [[Connecting To IRC]]) is ideal to drop by, or you can make a post on the [[Strategy|Strategy Forum]] for a more in-depth answer. [[Sovereign]] also maintains other Planetarion Resources, some of which can be found in the [http://pirate.planetarion.com/showthread.php?t=169297 Useful Links] (Help Guides section) thread on the [[Strategy|Strategy Forum]].

[[Category:Strategy]]

New Player Manual

2005-12-18T04:27:18Z

Nano61: /* Engineering */

== Introduction ==

Little experience in [[Planetarion]]? You've come to the right place.

Browse around before the beginning of the round to gain an advantage about the inner workings of the game.

=== A Relaxing Browser Game For The Whole Family ===

In [[Planetarion]] you compete with thousands of other players over a 2 month period of non-stop gaming. Activity, skill, endurance and a solid [[alliance]] are the building blocks of a winner in this game. Use of [[IRC]], while not a required to play the game, is necessary to communicate between other players and to succeed in the game.

At the beginning you construct [[structures]] and initiate [[asteroids]] that orbit your planet to gain resources. With these [[resource|resources]] you are able to construct 6 different [[Ship_Class|classes of ship]]. Two classes are capable of [[Pods|stealing asteroids]] from enemy planets while another is capable of bombarding enemy planets ruthlessly destroying their [[structure]]s.
There are 4 [[race]]s to choose from each equipped with 12 unique ships.

Planets are ranked by their [[score]]. The planet with the highest score wins the game.

Each planet (including your own!) is grouped into [[galaxy|galaxies]]. Planetarion is a turn-based game with turns being called a [[tick]] (a 1 hour period). In speed rounds ticks vary between 1-5 minutes.

Rounds are generally announced 2-3 weeks before the ticks (turns) start. Around this time signups are opened allowing everyone to register their very own planet. When the game starts, everyone is placed in [[Protection|protection mode]] and temporarily grouped into large galaxies. At tick 36, planets are "[[shuffle|shuffled]]" and placed into their true starting galaxy using a highly intelligent AI. If your planet is unpaid you are placed randomly otherwise you can form [[buddy pack]]s with friends, which can contain up to 5 people.

=== The First 72 Hours: Under Protection ===

During the first 72 [[tick]]s of the game your planet is under [[protection]]. During this time, get used to the game, and as often as possible visit the mining page to initiate asteroids, the research page to start new researches and the construction page to start new constructions.

It is recommended to have some ships built by [[tick]] 82, as that is when the first attacks will be able to reach your planet. In the beginning of the game it is nearly impossible to stop attacks on your planet. As such, it is preferable to build mainly [[Pods#Astropod|pods]] and send them out to attack others.

== Race: Killing, Freezing or Stealing? ==

An all-round impacting choice is your race: [[Race|Terran]], [[Race|Cathaar]], [[Race|Xandathrii]] or [[Race|Zikonian]]. [[Race|Terran]] is suggested as the starting race, as the ships have high armour and so are harder to kill.
Read about the races in the [[Round_14#Guides| Race Guides]].

== Planet: x,y,z ==

=== Engineering ===

A good starting setup is [[Research]] (1st), [[Mining]] (2nd) and [[Construction]] (3rd). Make sure you set your Engineering Priorities '''before''' starting a Research or Construction.
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=== Research ===

The undisputed first choice for research is [[Improved Resource Handling]], so please click the ''initate'' button next to this research.

This technology branch allows you to mine more of the [[asteroids]] than you have collected around your planet. This is because you can "initate" as many asteroids as you wish, but you can only recieve resources from those you are able to, depending on your resource handling ability. All of the more experienced players spend the first 60 or so [[tick]]s initiating asteroids in the Mining screen, but shortly after protection ends it is far more cost-effective to attack other players to gain roids (this also gets you [[XP]] - see [[combat]] for more information).

Just a quick note about the number of ticks beside the Research and the Construction items below. Those numbers represent the 'base' amount of time it will take to complete this research, however your Race, your Engineering Setup and the number of Research Labs you have ''will'' significantly reduce this time - indeed you should be able to fit the Infrastructure Upgrade research before protection is over, and perhaps HCT 3 as well.

'''Starting Research'''
# Improved Resource Handling - 16 Ticks to complete
# Heavy Cargo Transfers II - 24
# Fighter Class Hulls - 24
# Jumpgate - 16
# ''**End of Protection**''
# Infrastructure Upgrade - 16
# Heavy Cargo Transfers III - 24
# Warpgate - 32
# Advanced Core Extraction - 24
# Frigate Class Hulls
# Heavy Cargo Transfers IV - 48
Then, about this time you'll need to try and get as much Scan technology as you can whilst keeping up with your roids (at least until Unit scans)

The things to research least if you are a free account are the [[Waves|scans]] and [[Covert_Operations|covert ops]], as they're heavily limited and there's nothing worthwhile available until you upgrade.

=== Construction ===

The most beneficial construction to start with is the [[Research lab]]. This increases your research speed by up to 20% (when 1 in 5 or more of your constructions are [[research lab]]s). To build ships you need a factory and the appropriate research.

'''Starting Constructions'''
# Research Lab - 12 ticks
# Refinery - 12 (the number of which Refinery depends on your race. If you are Terran, focus on Metal Refineries as your ships cost alot of Metal. Cathaar = Crystal and Zikonian = Eonium. Eonium is no longer fuel, but is as important as Metal and Crystal - so keep it in mind ).
# Refinery - 12
# Refinery - 12
# Light Factory - 12
# Research Lab - 12
# ''**End of Protection**''
# Refinery - 12
# Refinery - 12
# Amplifier - 12
# Refinery - 12
# Research Lab - 12
# Medium Factory - 12

=== Mining ===

Mining is one of the important screens (together with research and construction) at the beginning of the round.

When you first sign up, you have 5000 of each resource. This is enough to buy 3 of each type of asteroid in the "Mining" screen. Paid accounts have 10000 of each resource, and so can afford 6 of each roid type.

To initiate asteroids, put the numbers in the corresponding boxes beside the three different resource types and click ''initiate''.

'''Note:''' You want to be the biggest planet you can be. You initiate asteroids at the beginning of the game as that's the most cost effective way of gaining asteroids, and you need asteroids to give you more resources. However, after 100-150 initiated asteroids of a specific resource the most cost effective way to gain more is by building ships that can steal asteroids and attacking other planets (you also gain [[XP]] for doing this, which adds to your planets [[score]]). Therefore, while you use this page a lot in the first 5-10 days, afterwards you won't need it much unless exchanging resources with others.

== Galaxy: x,y ==

A [[galaxy]] allows its own planets to launch ships to defend each other with a low [[ETA]]. In the galaxy status you can see details on friendly and hostile fleet movement (only paid accounts see outgoing fleets).

=== Galaxy Politics ===

Each planet can vote for a player they want to be the overall leader of the galaxy called the [[Galactic Commander]]. When a player has the most votes, he or she is automatically appointed the role of GC. The galaxy screen shows the current galaxy staff setup.

==== Minister Of Development (yellow) ====

The MoD is responsible for the Galaxy Fund. He can donate funds to the smallest planets in the galaxy (the planets with the lowest score). He can also regulate trade within the fund: at any time the MoD can choose to forbid or allow trade of one or more (or even all!) types of resources.

==== Minister of Communication (light blue) ====

The MoC is the spokesperson for a galaxy: he can send message to all other MoCs in a certain Cluster, or to all members within the Galaxy itself. Another task of the MoC is to keep the Galaxy Forums tidy.

==== Minister of War (red) ====

The Minister of war is responsible for arranging attacks and defences in a galaxy. He's generally the one, together with the Minister of Communication, that organises contact information on the forums and overview for defence. He may often also look for galaxies for his own galaxy to attack.

'''Note:'''
Not all galaxies follow these ideas. Some planets play with friends and alliances as much or more than their own galaxy mates (especially for attacking). Therefore it's a good idea to also have an alliance.

The bottom line for defence and organisation is your galaxy, and generally "galaxy mates" know each other quite well by the end of the round. Communication is essential, which is why many galaxies use a form of communication such as [[IRC]] where they have their own private channel to discuss and organise galaxy issues. Mobile phones are often also used in emergencies, such as when the galaxy is being heavily attacked (although giving your mobile phone out is always optional).

It's generally up to the galaxy how much they play for fun and how active they are, as in any galaxy there's some people on 18 hours a day and some only 2-4 hours. As there's only a limited amount of people in a galaxy, some of the more serious players are determined to get active players, but even the smaller less active galaxies often have a certain amount of fun.

== Alliance: 1st line of support ==

Beside galaxies, your main line of defence is [[alliance|alliances]]. Alliances are groups of players that agree to defend and perform coordinated attacks together.

=== Are Alliances Made Of Green Men And Cheese? ===

Alliances have several ranks within them.

The [[High Commander]]s are in charge of the alliance. There's no set limit for how many people are in this most powerful position, but generally there's between 3 and 5 who are in ultimate authority.

[[Officer]]s sort out the alliance attacks and defences, and are often responsible (together with some of the HCs) for the technical responsibility of the alliance. Some are in charge of intelligence, internal and external affairs, and even "scanners" - those devoted to scanning for the alliance.

Normal members (aka. pe0ns) help with duties within the alliance, but mostly are required to be as active as possible and participate in alliance attacks and defences. Some alliances give points for attacking and defending, so they can keep track of how helpful alliance members are. Alliances generally are organised on IRC and often have their own forums and/or IRC servers to increase privacy and communication ability. Some alliances have a "minimum IRC activity time" together or instead of a points system - inactive players don't pull their weight in the long term and so often require a lot more defence than they give. At the beginning of the round, many alliances would prefer players with less experience but that are online 8 or more hours a day than experienced players that won't be on more than 2 hours a day.

=== How Do I Get An Alliance? ===

Most alliances require [[IRC|IRC]] activity. The established alliances require vouches (people already in the alliance knowing you and saying you're a good player), but many just interview and require a minimum activity time. A list of all the Round 14 alliances playing can be found on the [[:Category:Alliances:Round_14|Round14 alliances page]]. New players should look in the [http://pirate.planetarion.com/forumdisplay.php?f=37 Alliance Recruitment Forum].

== Combat ==

This is a space war game in which [[combat]] is an important part.

=== Ships, Classes and Targets ===

Ship from different [[Ship_Class|classes]] can be categorized into their respective [[Ship_Type|primary functionalities]].

=== Inititative ===

[[Initiative]] defines the order that ships fire in battle. Generally, [[Race|Cathaar]] EMP ships fire first, then [[Race|Xandathrii]] ships, then [[Race|Terran]] and [[Race|Zikonian]] kill ships and [[Race|Cathaar]] kill ships, and then the astropods, and then steal ships, and then structure killers.

=== Arm/Cost and Dam/Cost explained ===

In the [http://game.planetarion.com/stats.pl?page=33 ship statistics] these are, in some ways, more important than the armour, damage and cost columns themselves. They summarize these columns by saying, per cost, how much armour or damage the ship does. This means you can quickly compare ships no matter their different costs. looking at Terran, you can see their "Arm/Cost" column is much bigger than the other races. [[Race|Cathaar]] and [[Race|Xandathrii]] have bigger "Dam/Cost" columns, but keep in mind that 6 of the [[Race|Cathaar]] ships only stun their opponents (the ships that are listed as EMP).

==== Attacking ====

Look around for targets you can handle, unit scan, produce a [[battle calculation]] and attack. Remember to send enough [[pods]] to capture 25% of the targets [[asteroid|roid]]s, which have an armour of 50. Get a News scan at [[ETA]] 1 or a Jump Gate Proble scan between [[ETA]]1-4 to be aware of any defence the planet might have obtained. It is advisable to watch your targets resource spending during the attack not to be caught unaware of ships coming out of production. The [http://pirate.planetarion.com/showthread.php?t=185199 How to Attack] thread on the [Strategy] Forum outlines a procedure for attacking, however it does include some more advanced [[:Category:Terminology|Terminology]] so it may be initially confusing, however it is still a good viable guide. Furthermore, a description of the various [[Fleet Strategy]] is also available - it outlines common names for the various tactics involved, provides an example, and identifies counter-strategy too. Again, it uses complex [[:Category:Terminology|Terminology]] and so it is something to work towards :).

==== Defending ====

When under attack several planets will receive defense from their alliance. However, those without an [[alliance]] have to rely on the planets within their galaxy (or a buddy within the cluster) to receive defence. In-galaxy defence is usually coordinated within the galaxy's [[IRC]] channel.

If you have just started out, you will likely be uncovered, meaning you do not have enough ships in defensive to stop the attacker from taking a share of your roids.

Sending random ships for defence is counter-productive as ships target a certain [[ship class]]. Unit scanning the attacker and producing a [[battle calculation]] based on an estimation of what the attacker sent should always be done before any defence is done.

== Troubleshooting ==

=== Can't Login? ===

* Check that computer time is set correctly
* Clear cookies, cache and restart browser.
* Gamepage does not load, while others do? Restart internet connection or your computer.

=== Exceptions ===

If you play from the same place as someone else in your family, it is strongly recommended you apply for an [[exception]].

Loging in from different url's :

http://p45.planetarion.com/

http://round15.planetarion.com/

http://struggleforsupremacy.planetarion.com/

== Further Help ==

[[Sovereign]], a Planetarion [[Strategy|Strategy Forum]] [[Moderator]] is able and very willing to help players who are new, uncertain on where to go or what to do next, or to provide advice and assistance on a whole range of topics in Planetarion. The [[HashStrategy|#Strategy]] Channel on the Netgamers [[IRC]] Network (see [[Connecting To IRC]]) is ideal to drop by, or you can make a post on the [[Strategy|Strategy Forum]] for a more in-depth answer. [[Sovereign]] also maintains other Planetarion Resources, some of which can be found in the [http://pirate.planetarion.com/showthread.php?t=169297 Useful Links] (Help Guides section) thread on the [[Strategy|Strategy Forum]].

[[Category:Strategy]]

Round 4

2005-12-18T04:20:37Z

Nano61:

=== Information ===

Round4 had a bulgin' hot community portal in the works providing [[Alliance Hosting]] and a [[PNN|Planetarion News Network]] (PNN).
* [[PNN:Alliance_Classifieds|Alliance Classifieds]] from PNN
* [[PNN:Spy_Reports| Spy Reports]]
* [[Humor]] by Drano.

The massive amount of players posed a lot of [[Round_4:Error |problems]] to the performance of the game hosted on 6 web and 2 DB servers.
* [[Round_4:Late_Night_Bugs | Vish vents out ]]

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Creators Hour

2005-12-18T04:11:19Z

Nano61: /* Database Dumps */

== Creators Hour background ==

Creators Hour (Or Creators Question Time as it was orginal known) started in [[round 2]] and became an integral part of [[Planetarion]] culture. Here was your chance to get answers to questions directly from [[Spinner]], [[Vish]], [[Fudge]], [[Zeus]], [[Messiah]] and later on [[Oreo]] and [[PATeam]] as well as a place to put forward any ideas you had directly to the creators. While most of the questions and the responces were fairly unintresting it would throw up some intresting comments, ideas and future plans.

Since [[Jolt]] took over the running of the game these 'Q&A' sessions have become less frequent and the information coming out of them has become less informative.

'Creators Hour' was brought back after Round 14. One of the PA Team members poste dthe IRC log of 'that Creators Hour', but I can't seen to find the durn post. If someone else can, please edit this page to add the link...
== Creators Hour #1 ==

'''Time: '''''Round 2 - Aug 2004'' '''Place: '''''#creators''

Heres a summary of some of the more intresting aspects of the very first creators hour

=== Galaxy Defence Fleet ===

<Messiah> Next question:
<Messiah> What is your status on the GDF? When will the GC have control over it? And how much
<Messiah> control will he actually have?
<Spinner> Yes..The GDF has certainly aroused many people's intrest
<Spinner> We have ot been able to do any work on the GDF yet, as of controloling it
<Spinner> SO an exact date when this is possible, I can not give here
<Spinner> But...
<Spinner> When it is in, it will be possible for the GC to launch it out on missions, attack or
defend, as a regular fleet
<Spinner> Except it would require some kind of "GO" from either planets, or pherhaps some new
minister.....
<Spinner> So it can not be abused for the GC's own egotripping (-:
<Spinner> The launchcost will then be taken out of the Development Fund
<Spinner> If there is not enough Eonium in there...it can not launch
<Messiah> Some people are concerned that it can be used for transferring fleets with no travel
<Messiah> time. Will this be the case?
<Spinner> Note that I said nothing about the GC being able to transfer ships out from the GDF
<Spinner> (-:
<Spinner> That answers it I belive

One of the most hotly talked about features of [[Round 2]] was the [[Galaxy Defence Fleet]] which was initially unfinished. The basic premise as you have probally guessed was that galaxy members could donate [[ships]] to this [[fleet]] and they would then be under the control of the [[GC]] to use in galactic defence. Due to the fact the the [[GC]] couldnt yet control the [[GDF]] the fleets in it were initially equally spread across all the planets in the [[Galaxy]]. While an idea that had promise the inability of the [[Creators]] to find a viable way to let the [[GC]] control the [[fleet]] resulted in it never getting beyond this basic stage and by [[round 3]] it had dissapeared for good
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=== Commanders Message ===

<Messiah> What other jobs are GCs going to get?
<Spinner> The GC will be able to control the Galactic Fleet as I said
<Spinner> Nothing more has been planned there now, execept maybe he gets a special
Message of the Day thing for his Galaxy

Where would we be today if this hadnt cropped up :) It was the first real mention of a feature that would become a constant feature in the rounds to come

=== Downtime ===

<Messiah> How are things going with your line? Is that still what's causing the game to appear
to go down sometimes?
* Spinner hopes that was enough
<Spinner> Line, yes...
<Spinner> First of all, within a very short periode of time, we will get some hosting help tp
relieve our lines a bit, or upgrade our existing lines
<Spinner> This is a question of money actually....
<Spinner> Which we dont quite make enough of (-: Who does anyway (-:
<Spinner> And our budget right now does not allow us to upgrade the lines
<Spinner> But we have good hopes to earn more on advertising in the future
<Spinner> And also to get some good hosting help
<Zeus> click banners is main income @ mo
<Spinner> The first step will prolly be to put the images and the manual on a totally different
line, maybe with the boards
<Zeus> so get fingers clicking:)
<Spinner> So we will have more capacity for our game itself
<Spinner> But I promise
<Spinner> The minute we run this game with a profit
<Spinner> We WILL upgrade lines!

In these early days the demand outsripped teh supply and during busy periods the server would frequently serve up the infamous [[Burp]] error page. It was a constant struggle for the Creators to stay ahead of the demand and it wouldnt be until Round 3 when [[Barrysworld]] took over the hosting of the game that a stable and reliable PA became a true possability.

=== P2P and Selling of PA ===

<Messiah> Is there any chance of Planetarion going commercial in the future, and charging for play?
If not, is there a planned "end" to planetarion?
<Spinner> Going commercial? I thought we had done that! (-:
<Spinner> There is no plan to charge players tfor playing PLanetarion
<Zeus> :)
<Spinner> Absolutely not
<Zeus> free, made by gamers for gamers
<Spinner> indeed
<Spinner> Thank you , Zeus for handing me word on a golden platter (-:
* Zeus hides
<Messiah> Do you think you'll ever get bored of planetarion, and sell it to some money grabbing
corporation?
<Spinner> EA slogan, isnt it?
<Spinner> Or something?
<Spinner> No
<Spinner> Selling Planetarion is not an option either...
<Spinner> We made it because we wanted to make it
<Spinner> And we want to keep making games like it
<Spinner> Because it is fun
<Spinner> We just have to learn how to do it and make a profit (-:
< Spinner> You asked for an "end"...
<Spinner> I am not sure PLanetarion will ever end..
<Spinner> Not as long as poeple play it
<Spinner> Of course, if people stop playing it, well, it sort of has ended...
<Zeus> k
<Spinner> But there will be resets

Something thats all too often hindered [[Planetarion]] has been lack or forsight and heres a prime example. Just two rounds later the [[Creators]] would announce that the game was going P2P which caused uproar amongst players who remembered comments like this. Just 4 rounds after going P2P [[Planetarion]] would then be sold off to [[Jolt]] after [[Fifth Seasons]] went bankrupt.

If theres one thing we all learn from these statements its never make bold claims, while things may look rosy now you never know what the future brings
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=== WAP and SMS ===

<Messiah> The WAP phone thing that has been mentioned, would it be possible for people without WAP
phones to make their own thing, designed for non-WAP phones.
<Spinner> WAP / PDA / SMS services
<Spinner> I am happy to announce, that we are looking at possibilites to have support for some of
these things
<Spinner> Next week actually, we will be in a meeting with a company who claims to be able to do
all the work for us to implament this, which would be the very best solution
<Spinner> So it doesnt take valuable working hours from us on the core team
<Zeus> :)
<Spinner> But no promises, we still dont know that anyone will do it
<Spinner> But rest assured, we know the wish is out there!

While the WAP feature would make an appearance in round 3 and would remain until the bot stopper made WAP access impossible the intresting part here is the SMS feature. SMS alerts were a regular request on the suggestions forum at this time as it was seen as a feature that would help those who couldnt be at a PC 24/7 as well as being a source of income for the game. However mid way through round 3 when the [[Creators]] announced they had a SMS feature ready to launch a bakclash against the idea started. Why this backlash happened no-one is too sure, perhaps they just didnt understand the implementation correctly or maybe they didnt want their advantage of WAP or 24/7 net conenction access removed, either way it scuppered the whole idea.

=== Galaxy Exiles ===

<Messiah> Are there any plans to implement the "boot" function in the galaxy, where the GC can
nominate someone to be kicked out of the galaxy?
<Spinner> Ah, yes, the booting thing
<Spinner> We decided against it the last time, as the poeple asked to share their opinions on the
boards were split indeed.
<Spinner> But
<Spinner> We see that some galaxies would definately benefit from soemthing like this, so it might
go back onto our to-do list again. But right now, I dont know

When it comes to galazies we have it easy today. If a galaxy member isnt pulling their weight or they are in a rival alliance you can exile them and hopefully get a more suitable replacement but back in Round 1 and 2 things were different. You got your random galaxy and it was upto you to ensure you got the best out of it, there was little room for rivalries and you just had to shut up and get on with working together. However as we can see here the thinking behind this was starting to be thought about and it wouldnt be long before exiling of planets was a possability.

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=== Round Length ===

<Messiah> When is the reset?!?
<Spinner> The next reset!
<Spinner> ?
<Spinner> I reckon the game will run about 6 months
<Messiah> yes
<Spinner> Unless something drastic happnes
<Spinner> So 10th of july, plus 6 months..or so...

The generally view of the community is that the length of a round has always been around the 3 month mark BUT this wasnt the case. Round 1 had run from Feb 2000 until June 2000 with Round 2 lasting around the same length of time. Rounds this long however became unsubstainable later on, especially after [[P2P]] which saw them shrinking to the kind of lengths we have now

== Creators Hour #2 ==

'''Time: '''''Round 2 - 21 Aug 2004'' '''Place: '''''#creators''

Heres a summary of some of the more intresting aspects of the second ever creators hour

=== Database Dumps ===

<Spinner> The Tahmer search page is an unauthorized bot page
<Spinner> These days, we are completeing the work on the data that Pbot will access
<Spinner> And it will be available VERY soon
<Spinner> for everyone to use
<vish> this info will be placed on a server outside planetarion so that we do not get that extra
load
<Spinner> As soon as that is ready, we do not want any loose bots out there using different data

In the early rounds if you wanted to run a site like [[Pilkara]] or [[Sandmans]] your only method of gathering the data was through a use of a Data Miner bot. The likes of [[Sn0w]] and [[Tahmer]] would create a seperate account and set their bot to login to this acocunt and parse all the galaxy pages. This data would then be stored and could then be used by their tools. The two most famous tools at the time were [[SnOws]] IRC bot [[PBOT]] and [[Tahmers]] website. The amount of bandwith these bots and others like them took to gather the data forced the [[Creators]] to start producing the database dumps that all tools today run off
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=== Alliance Controls ===

<Messiah> From Kittenpurr:
<Messiah> Have you got anything planned regarding the limiting or controlling alliance size?
<Spinner> Yes, but not anything you will see in a very near future
<Spinner> But sometime in this round, something like this will be implemented
<Spinner> The actual way we are doing it is still inside my head.....
<Spinner> In very dynamic forms...
<Spinner> So I dont have detils on this yet

As always time in PA gets distorted, if they say 10 mins it means 10 hours and if they say in near future they mean in around 4 years :) This feature took until Round 10 to implement and seems alot more static than what [[Spinner]] had in mind

== Creators Hour Mid Round 3 ==

'''Time: '''''Round 3 - January 22th 2001'' '''Place: '''''#creators''

Heres a summary of some of the creators hour that took place just after [[Barrysworld]], the compnay that was hosting [[Planetarion]] had announced it was folding

=== Server Requirements ===

<Messiah> What type of server are you after? You could try the likes of Yahoo. They're always up for stuff like this and ahve ercently been buying all sort of new web-projects.
<Spinner> Ok
<Spinner> first of all, we need 7-8 machines
<Spinner> in total
<Spinner> and we use approx 10-12 Mbit / Second
<Spinner> SO it si quite a lot
<Spinner> Pherhaps Yahoo can do it
<Spinner> Thanks for the tip
<Spinner> I will check up on that as well
<Spinner> Have 16 companies to check up on nopw
<Spinner> now
<Spinner> hehe
<Spinner> And general intrest to host Planetarion is quite high!
<Spinner> (-:
<Messiah> Do you think that there is any chance you won't get a new hosting within the timelimit ? What will you in that case do ?
<Spinner> We have backup plans to cover us in this event too
<Spinner> We have not had that long to make all details clear yet
<Spinner> But we will have them all sorted out
<Spinner> We do have our old line at PA HQ
<Spinner> Which is now quite bored
<Spinner> (-:
<Spinner> But that is only 2Mbit
<Spinner> But if worst comes to worst
<Spinner> We might be able to borrow some here and there
<Spinner> Cut back on the graphics on the pages
<Spinner> And get away with maybe a total of 6Mbit
<Spinner> its doable
<Zeus> temperially, but only last resort.
<Spinner> But we hope to make this ok without cutting back on quiality
<Spinner> And it is looking good
<Spinner> If anyone feels like gving us a support
<Spinner> This would be a good time to use the mousebuttons more
<Spinner> (-:

While these server requirements may seem like overkill by todays standards at this point the game had a total of around 130k players and was growing at a steady rate. In the end the servers moved to [[Chello]] who while providing a fairly good service never quite reached the level of service that [[Barrysworld]] provided.

=== Galaxy Sizes ===

<Messiah> is it true that there will 35 ppl in a glaxery next round
<Spinner> That has not been decided
<Spinner> We have though along those lines
<Spinner> But have been seeing some potential hazards about it

Galaxies of 35 members were on the cards at this point for [[Round 4]]. With the game going to a [[Private Galaxy]] setup in [[Round 4]] that certainly would have made things intresting/ === Alliance Controls Again! ===

<Messiah> will you be bringing back the facillity to have alliance tags next to our nmaes?
<Spinner> Maybe
<Spinner> We are thinking it though
<Spinner> through
<Spinner> pros and cons really
<Spinner> But I belive, BELIVE it will be back
<Spinner> But not JUST like it was
<Spinner> In some kind of system

For the second round running the mention of better alliance controls were mentioned. A Feature which wouldnt see the light of day into [[Round 10]] === Hidden Stats and Formulas ===

<Messiah> Would you consider next round not releasing stats and equations for the ships, scanning, combat etc. Instead just give a general description of how things work and
make us have to gain experience and experiment with things?
<Spinner> IT is an intresting idea
<Spinner> But for a game with tectics and staratgy
<Spinner> it is dangerous
<Spinner> So we do not think so
<Spinner> Would be fun to try though
<Spinner> We cam try it in the beta we run

Its intresting how something that was considered dangerous at this time would pop up later. In [[Round 10]] [[Spinner]] experimented with this exact same principle when he only released the very basic Stats and Forumulas to the community. He should probally have stuck to his gut instict that he had then as It was shown to be something that didnt work in a game like this
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== Creators Hour End of Round 3 ==

'''Time: '''''Round 3 - April 2nd 2001'' '''Place: '''''#creators''

This Creators Hour happened at the very end of the round and turned into what we would now call the 'Winners Ceremony'

=== Nostalgia ===

<vish> > 2k players

Ah the good old days where you would have over 2000 players attending a creators hour

===Prizes===

<Zeus> for this round the prizes are as follows.
<Zeus> 1st Ruler Award = Dreamcast with 3games tshirt/cap. Offer to pacrew/beta
<Zeus> 2nd Ruler Award t-shirt/cap two top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 3rd Ruler Award t-shirt/cap one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 4th & 5th Ruler Award t-shirt/cap one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 5th - upto 10th ruler award t-shirt/cap one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 1st Galaxy Award t-shirt/cap one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 2nd Galaxy Award t-shirt one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 3rd Galaxy Award t-shirt
<Zeus> Worst Roiding Galaxy Target Award = high roids less ships
<Zeus> t-shirt one top 5 pc game to GC

Back then the game used to offer some fairly good prizes for those who were successful as you can see. Winning the round would also get you an invite to be part of [[PACrew]], although its unknown how many people actually took that offer up.

===Theres a catch===

<Spinner> And, many thanks to TheSlammer for sponsoring us with prizes

The prizes were supplied by [[TheSlammer.com]] a company who would later become affectionatly known as [[TheScammer.com]] after the PS2 incident. They ran a referal scheme with [[Planetarion]] to offer players the ability to purchase half price PS2's, all you had to do was purchase the PS2 from them at the market price on upon receiveing the unit you could claim half the cost back using the supplied cashback form. However most people either didnt receive their PS2, or their cashback form and even if they received both very few got their money back. [[TheSlammer]] then pulled a dissappearing act leaving many players out of pocket. It will be no suprise to you to hear that most of the prizes for winners didnt turn up.

[[Category:Terminology]]

Creators Hour

2005-12-18T04:07:56Z

Nano61: /* Galaxy Exiles */

== Creators Hour background ==

Creators Hour (Or Creators Question Time as it was orginal known) started in [[round 2]] and became an integral part of [[Planetarion]] culture. Here was your chance to get answers to questions directly from [[Spinner]], [[Vish]], [[Fudge]], [[Zeus]], [[Messiah]] and later on [[Oreo]] and [[PATeam]] as well as a place to put forward any ideas you had directly to the creators. While most of the questions and the responces were fairly unintresting it would throw up some intresting comments, ideas and future plans.

Since [[Jolt]] took over the running of the game these 'Q&A' sessions have become less frequent and the information coming out of them has become less informative.

'Creators Hour' was brought back after Round 14. One of the PA Team members poste dthe IRC log of 'that Creators Hour', but I can't seen to find the durn post. If someone else can, please edit this page to add the link...
== Creators Hour #1 ==

'''Time: '''''Round 2 - Aug 2004'' '''Place: '''''#creators''

Heres a summary of some of the more intresting aspects of the very first creators hour

=== Galaxy Defence Fleet ===

<Messiah> Next question:
<Messiah> What is your status on the GDF? When will the GC have control over it? And how much
<Messiah> control will he actually have?
<Spinner> Yes..The GDF has certainly aroused many people's intrest
<Spinner> We have ot been able to do any work on the GDF yet, as of controloling it
<Spinner> SO an exact date when this is possible, I can not give here
<Spinner> But...
<Spinner> When it is in, it will be possible for the GC to launch it out on missions, attack or
defend, as a regular fleet
<Spinner> Except it would require some kind of "GO" from either planets, or pherhaps some new
minister.....
<Spinner> So it can not be abused for the GC's own egotripping (-:
<Spinner> The launchcost will then be taken out of the Development Fund
<Spinner> If there is not enough Eonium in there...it can not launch
<Messiah> Some people are concerned that it can be used for transferring fleets with no travel
<Messiah> time. Will this be the case?
<Spinner> Note that I said nothing about the GC being able to transfer ships out from the GDF
<Spinner> (-:
<Spinner> That answers it I belive

One of the most hotly talked about features of [[Round 2]] was the [[Galaxy Defence Fleet]] which was initially unfinished. The basic premise as you have probally guessed was that galaxy members could donate [[ships]] to this [[fleet]] and they would then be under the control of the [[GC]] to use in galactic defence. Due to the fact the the [[GC]] couldnt yet control the [[GDF]] the fleets in it were initially equally spread across all the planets in the [[Galaxy]]. While an idea that had promise the inability of the [[Creators]] to find a viable way to let the [[GC]] control the [[fleet]] resulted in it never getting beyond this basic stage and by [[round 3]] it had dissapeared for good
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=== Commanders Message ===

<Messiah> What other jobs are GCs going to get?
<Spinner> The GC will be able to control the Galactic Fleet as I said
<Spinner> Nothing more has been planned there now, execept maybe he gets a special
Message of the Day thing for his Galaxy

Where would we be today if this hadnt cropped up :) It was the first real mention of a feature that would become a constant feature in the rounds to come

=== Downtime ===

<Messiah> How are things going with your line? Is that still what's causing the game to appear
to go down sometimes?
* Spinner hopes that was enough
<Spinner> Line, yes...
<Spinner> First of all, within a very short periode of time, we will get some hosting help tp
relieve our lines a bit, or upgrade our existing lines
<Spinner> This is a question of money actually....
<Spinner> Which we dont quite make enough of (-: Who does anyway (-:
<Spinner> And our budget right now does not allow us to upgrade the lines
<Spinner> But we have good hopes to earn more on advertising in the future
<Spinner> And also to get some good hosting help
<Zeus> click banners is main income @ mo
<Spinner> The first step will prolly be to put the images and the manual on a totally different
line, maybe with the boards
<Zeus> so get fingers clicking:)
<Spinner> So we will have more capacity for our game itself
<Spinner> But I promise
<Spinner> The minute we run this game with a profit
<Spinner> We WILL upgrade lines!

In these early days the demand outsripped teh supply and during busy periods the server would frequently serve up the infamous [[Burp]] error page. It was a constant struggle for the Creators to stay ahead of the demand and it wouldnt be until Round 3 when [[Barrysworld]] took over the hosting of the game that a stable and reliable PA became a true possability.

=== P2P and Selling of PA ===

<Messiah> Is there any chance of Planetarion going commercial in the future, and charging for play?
If not, is there a planned "end" to planetarion?
<Spinner> Going commercial? I thought we had done that! (-:
<Spinner> There is no plan to charge players tfor playing PLanetarion
<Zeus> :)
<Spinner> Absolutely not
<Zeus> free, made by gamers for gamers
<Spinner> indeed
<Spinner> Thank you , Zeus for handing me word on a golden platter (-:
* Zeus hides
<Messiah> Do you think you'll ever get bored of planetarion, and sell it to some money grabbing
corporation?
<Spinner> EA slogan, isnt it?
<Spinner> Or something?
<Spinner> No
<Spinner> Selling Planetarion is not an option either...
<Spinner> We made it because we wanted to make it
<Spinner> And we want to keep making games like it
<Spinner> Because it is fun
<Spinner> We just have to learn how to do it and make a profit (-:
< Spinner> You asked for an "end"...
<Spinner> I am not sure PLanetarion will ever end..
<Spinner> Not as long as poeple play it
<Spinner> Of course, if people stop playing it, well, it sort of has ended...
<Zeus> k
<Spinner> But there will be resets

Something thats all too often hindered [[Planetarion]] has been lack or forsight and heres a prime example. Just two rounds later the [[Creators]] would announce that the game was going P2P which caused uproar amongst players who remembered comments like this. Just 4 rounds after going P2P [[Planetarion]] would then be sold off to [[Jolt]] after [[Fifth Seasons]] went bankrupt.

If theres one thing we all learn from these statements its never make bold claims, while things may look rosy now you never know what the future brings
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=== WAP and SMS ===

<Messiah> The WAP phone thing that has been mentioned, would it be possible for people without WAP
phones to make their own thing, designed for non-WAP phones.
<Spinner> WAP / PDA / SMS services
<Spinner> I am happy to announce, that we are looking at possibilites to have support for some of
these things
<Spinner> Next week actually, we will be in a meeting with a company who claims to be able to do
all the work for us to implament this, which would be the very best solution
<Spinner> So it doesnt take valuable working hours from us on the core team
<Zeus> :)
<Spinner> But no promises, we still dont know that anyone will do it
<Spinner> But rest assured, we know the wish is out there!

While the WAP feature would make an appearance in round 3 and would remain until the bot stopper made WAP access impossible the intresting part here is the SMS feature. SMS alerts were a regular request on the suggestions forum at this time as it was seen as a feature that would help those who couldnt be at a PC 24/7 as well as being a source of income for the game. However mid way through round 3 when the [[Creators]] announced they had a SMS feature ready to launch a bakclash against the idea started. Why this backlash happened no-one is too sure, perhaps they just didnt understand the implementation correctly or maybe they didnt want their advantage of WAP or 24/7 net conenction access removed, either way it scuppered the whole idea.

=== Galaxy Exiles ===

<Messiah> Are there any plans to implement the "boot" function in the galaxy, where the GC can
nominate someone to be kicked out of the galaxy?
<Spinner> Ah, yes, the booting thing
<Spinner> We decided against it the last time, as the poeple asked to share their opinions on the
boards were split indeed.
<Spinner> But
<Spinner> We see that some galaxies would definately benefit from soemthing like this, so it might
go back onto our to-do list again. But right now, I dont know

When it comes to galazies we have it easy today. If a galaxy member isnt pulling their weight or they are in a rival alliance you can exile them and hopefully get a more suitable replacement but back in Round 1 and 2 things were different. You got your random galaxy and it was upto you to ensure you got the best out of it, there was little room for rivalries and you just had to shut up and get on with working together. However as we can see here the thinking behind this was starting to be thought about and it wouldnt be long before exiling of planets was a possability.

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=== Round Length ===

<Messiah> When is the reset?!?
<Spinner> The next reset!
<Spinner> ?
<Spinner> I reckon the game will run about 6 months
<Messiah> yes
<Spinner> Unless something drastic happnes
<Spinner> So 10th of july, plus 6 months..or so...

The generally view of the community is that the length of a round has always been around the 3 month mark BUT this wasnt the case. Round 1 had run from Feb 2000 until June 2000 with Round 2 lasting around the same length of time. Rounds this long however became unsubstainable later on, especially after [[P2P]] which saw them shrinking to the kind of lengths we have now

== Creators Hour #2 ==

'''Time: '''''Round 2 - 21 Aug 2004'' '''Place: '''''#creators''

Heres a summary of some of the more intresting aspects of the second ever creators hour

=== Database Dumps ===

<Spinner> The Tahmer search page is an unauthorized bot page
<Spinner> These days, we are completeing the work on the data that Pbot will access
<Spinner> And it will be available VERY soon
<Spinner> for everyone to use
<vish> this info will be placed on a server outside planetarion so that we do not get that extra
load
<Spinner> As soon as that is ready, we do not want any loose bots out there using different data

In the early rounds if you wanted to run a site like [[Pilkara]] or [[Sandmans]] your only method of gathering the data was through a use of a Data Miner bot. The likes of [[Sn0w]] and [[Tahmer]] would create a seperate account and set their bot to login to this acocunt and parse all the galaxy pages. This data would then be stored and could then be used by their tools. The two most famous tools at the time were [[SnOws]] IRC bot [[PBOT]] and [[Tahmers]] website. The amount of bandwith these bots and others like them took to gather the data forced the [[Creators]] to start producing the database dumps that all tools today run off

=== Alliance Controls ===

<Messiah> From Kittenpurr:
<Messiah> Have you got anything planned regarding the limiting or controlling alliance size?
<Spinner> Yes, but not anything you will see in a very near future
<Spinner> But sometime in this round, something like this will be implemented
<Spinner> The actual way we are doing it is still inside my head.....
<Spinner> In very dynamic forms...
<Spinner> So I dont have detils on this yet

As always time in PA gets distorted, if they say 10 mins it means 10 hours and if they say in near future they mean in around 4 years :) This feature took until Round 10 to implement and seems alot more static than what [[Spinner]] had in mind

== Creators Hour Mid Round 3 ==

'''Time: '''''Round 3 - January 22th 2001'' '''Place: '''''#creators''

Heres a summary of some of the creators hour that took place just after [[Barrysworld]], the compnay that was hosting [[Planetarion]] had announced it was folding

=== Server Requirements ===

<Messiah> What type of server are you after? You could try the likes of Yahoo. They're always up for stuff like this and ahve ercently been buying all sort of new web-projects.
<Spinner> Ok
<Spinner> first of all, we need 7-8 machines
<Spinner> in total
<Spinner> and we use approx 10-12 Mbit / Second
<Spinner> SO it si quite a lot
<Spinner> Pherhaps Yahoo can do it
<Spinner> Thanks for the tip
<Spinner> I will check up on that as well
<Spinner> Have 16 companies to check up on nopw
<Spinner> now
<Spinner> hehe
<Spinner> And general intrest to host Planetarion is quite high!
<Spinner> (-:
<Messiah> Do you think that there is any chance you won't get a new hosting within the timelimit ? What will you in that case do ?
<Spinner> We have backup plans to cover us in this event too
<Spinner> We have not had that long to make all details clear yet
<Spinner> But we will have them all sorted out
<Spinner> We do have our old line at PA HQ
<Spinner> Which is now quite bored
<Spinner> (-:
<Spinner> But that is only 2Mbit
<Spinner> But if worst comes to worst
<Spinner> We might be able to borrow some here and there
<Spinner> Cut back on the graphics on the pages
<Spinner> And get away with maybe a total of 6Mbit
<Spinner> its doable
<Zeus> temperially, but only last resort.
<Spinner> But we hope to make this ok without cutting back on quiality
<Spinner> And it is looking good
<Spinner> If anyone feels like gving us a support
<Spinner> This would be a good time to use the mousebuttons more
<Spinner> (-:

While these server requirements may seem like overkill by todays standards at this point the game had a total of around 130k players and was growing at a steady rate. In the end the servers moved to [[Chello]] who while providing a fairly good service never quite reached the level of service that [[Barrysworld]] provided.

=== Galaxy Sizes ===

<Messiah> is it true that there will 35 ppl in a glaxery next round
<Spinner> That has not been decided
<Spinner> We have though along those lines
<Spinner> But have been seeing some potential hazards about it

Galaxies of 35 members were on the cards at this point for [[Round 4]]. With the game going to a [[Private Galaxy]] setup in [[Round 4]] that certainly would have made things intresting/ === Alliance Controls Again! ===

<Messiah> will you be bringing back the facillity to have alliance tags next to our nmaes?
<Spinner> Maybe
<Spinner> We are thinking it though
<Spinner> through
<Spinner> pros and cons really
<Spinner> But I belive, BELIVE it will be back
<Spinner> But not JUST like it was
<Spinner> In some kind of system

For the second round running the mention of better alliance controls were mentioned. A Feature which wouldnt see the light of day into [[Round 10]] === Hidden Stats and Formulas ===

<Messiah> Would you consider next round not releasing stats and equations for the ships, scanning, combat etc. Instead just give a general description of how things work and
make us have to gain experience and experiment with things?
<Spinner> IT is an intresting idea
<Spinner> But for a game with tectics and staratgy
<Spinner> it is dangerous
<Spinner> So we do not think so
<Spinner> Would be fun to try though
<Spinner> We cam try it in the beta we run

Its intresting how something that was considered dangerous at this time would pop up later. In [[Round 10]] [[Spinner]] experimented with this exact same principle when he only released the very basic Stats and Forumulas to the community. He should probally have stuck to his gut instict that he had then as It was shown to be something that didnt work in a game like this
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== Creators Hour End of Round 3 ==

'''Time: '''''Round 3 - April 2nd 2001'' '''Place: '''''#creators''

This Creators Hour happened at the very end of the round and turned into what we would now call the 'Winners Ceremony'

=== Nostalgia ===

<vish> > 2k players

Ah the good old days where you would have over 2000 players attending a creators hour

===Prizes===

<Zeus> for this round the prizes are as follows.
<Zeus> 1st Ruler Award = Dreamcast with 3games tshirt/cap. Offer to pacrew/beta
<Zeus> 2nd Ruler Award t-shirt/cap two top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 3rd Ruler Award t-shirt/cap one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 4th & 5th Ruler Award t-shirt/cap one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 5th - upto 10th ruler award t-shirt/cap one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 1st Galaxy Award t-shirt/cap one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 2nd Galaxy Award t-shirt one top 5 pc game
<Zeus> 3rd Galaxy Award t-shirt
<Zeus> Worst Roiding Galaxy Target Award = high roids less ships
<Zeus> t-shirt one top 5 pc game to GC

Back then the game used to offer some fairly good prizes for those who were successful as you can see. Winning the round would also get you an invite to be part of [[PACrew]], although its unknown how many people actually took that offer up.

===Theres a catch===

<Spinner> And, many thanks to TheSlammer for sponsoring us with prizes

The prizes were supplied by [[TheSlammer.com]] a company who would later become affectionatly known as [[TheScammer.com]] after the PS2 incident. They ran a referal scheme with [[Planetarion]] to offer players the ability to purchase half price PS2's, all you had to do was purchase the PS2 from them at the market price on upon receiveing the unit you could claim half the cost back using the supplied cashback form. However most people either didnt receive their PS2, or their cashback form and even if they received both very few got their money back. [[TheSlammer]] then pulled a dissappearing act leaving many players out of pocket. It will be no suprise to you to hear that most of the prizes for winners didnt turn up.

[[Category:Terminology]]

Help:Editing

2005-12-18T04:07:13Z

Nano61: /* The wiki markup */

==General==
To edit a [[Help:What PAWiki is|PAWiki]] page, click on the "'''Edit this page'''" (or just "'''edit'''") link at one of its edges. This will bring you to a page with a text box containing the ''[[Help:wikitext]]'': the editable source code from which the server produces the webpage. For the special codes, see below.

After adding to or changing the wikitext it is useful to press "Preview", which produces the corresponding webpage in your browser but does not make it publicly available yet (not until you press "Save"). Errors in formatting, links, tables, etc., are often much easier to discover from the rendered page than from the raw wikitext.

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== Dummy edit ==

If the wikitext is not changed no edit will be recorded and the edit summary is discarded.

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==Templates==

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==Page protection==

In a few cases the link labeled "edit" is replaced by the text "view source". In that case the page can not be edited.

==Position-independent wikitext==

Wikitext for which the result does not depend on the position in the wikitext page:

*[[category]] specification - ditto
*<nowiki>__NOTOC__, __FORCETOC__</nowiki>, see [[Help:Section]]

==Separating edits==

When moving or copying a piece of text within a page or from another page, and also making other edits, it is useful to separate these edits. This way the [[Help:Diff|diff function]] can be usefully applied for checking these other edits.

==See also==

*[[Help:Automatic conversion of wikitext]]
*[[Help:Calculation]]
*[[Help:Editing toolbar]]
*[[Help:Html in wikitext]]
*[[Help:Administration#Page_protection| Protecting pages]]
*[[Help:Starting a new page]]
*[[Help:Variable]]
*[[Parser testing]]
*[[en:UseModWiki|UseModWiki]] and [[en:Wikipedia:PHP script|Wikipedia:PHP script]].
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==External links==
*[http://home.earthlink.net/~awinkelried/keyboard_shortcuts.html Special characters in HTML]