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        Arimaa >> Site Discussion >> Re: What about simultaneous games ?
        
(Message started by: 99of9 on Apr 12^th, 2005, 6:26am)

Title: Re: What about simultaneous games ?
Post by 99of9 on Apr 12^th, 2005, 6:26am

I think you underestimate how difficult it would be for Omar to automate this.

However, it is already possible, as long as Fritz is happy to switch windows himself :-).

Title: Re: What about simultaneous games ?
Post by 99of9 on Apr 12^th, 2005, 9:15am

on 04/12/05 at 05:27:33, Arimanator wrote:

Omar, please don't tell me that this is another figment of my imagination, but I believe that your program could easily be modified to admit simultaneous games.

Someone (would it be Fritzlein by any chance? ;D ) could initiate a SG and invite a list of opponents, he then would see each board in a certain order and play on each one, one move at a time, that is, when he would hit the send button it would switch automatically to the next board from his point of view with maybe a field telling him what current board he is on. From every one else's point of view it would be exactly as it is now.

I apologize if I was condescending. It is true I have no idea about your computer background, but "easily modified to admit simultaneous games" is a very strong claim. It's almost as though if Omar can't do it, he must be incompetent :-). My guess/assessment of the ease of this task is very different to yours - or maybe we simply have a widely different definition of "easy". Nevertheless, I'm very happy not to debate this, and to leave it to Omar as to whether he can/wants to easily implement your suggested feature.

As for me beating you at arimaa... I don't think we've played yet. But I have noticed that you are playing very well against my bot, so it may well be time for a game sometime soon if you're up for it.

Title: Re: What about simultaneous games ?
Post by omar on Apr 13^th, 2005, 7:01pm

It is possible, but not so easy that I can do it right away. If someone wants to play simultaneous games and wants this feature, please let me know. Although I probably won't be able to get to it too soon. There are still a lot of more urgent changes I need to make to the client and server software, but haven't been able to do it yet.

Pat, I just want to reassure you that we are fortunate to have a very nice group of people here. So even if something may seem negitive, I can assure you that it was unintentional. If you see that from me, please keep in mind I might have just been in a hurry and it was not intentional.

Title: Re: What about simultaneous games ?
Post by 99of9 on Apr 15^th, 2005, 8:04am

I'm also happy to play a (small) simul some day, but I'll happily switch windows myself - so don't actually need anything changed in order to play it. To be honest though simuls could be fun but don't enthuse me any more than a good quick game. When playing players of significantly lower ability I try to play very quickly anyway, just in order to train my thinking a bit.

Title: Re: What about simultaneous games ?
Post by Fritzlein on Apr 15^th, 2005, 8:24am

on 04/14/05 at 18:02:36, Arimanator wrote:

By the way I would have liked to have Fritzlein's opinion about this. He is the most likely to use that feature after all.

I'm not sure I would like playing in a simultaneous game. I usually avoid a challenge because I'm afraid I might lose. I think that you might have a more willing customer in 99of9: he's the one who gives away half his pieces and still beats a bot, and I'll bet he's the one to beat half a dozen folks at the same time.

Title: Re: What about simultaneous games ?
Post by PMertens on Apr 15^th, 2005, 12:05pm

Paul Lefert and I even played a Blitz-simultaneous game once :-)

It was really fun, but very hard.

I played several games simultaneous against low ranked bots as well, and must say that I play far worse that way ... actually I might beat them faster one after the other simply because my blunderrate greatly prolonges those games.

Another problem is the possibility to play NULL-moves with one opponent to get back on track with your timer.

As soon as we are talking Windows, there should be no problem (not even a small one) to write an additional programm that monitors the game-windows and does exactly what you want :-)
(I am sure its easy in other OS's as well - I just dont know how to do it there :-P )

The one thing I dislike for many reasons is the feature to stop the clock when not watching, not because I think anyone would abuse it but because it would make it possible.