Aharpo.616
net.games.emp
utzoo!decvax!harpo!ber
Fri May 7 07:43:56 1982
Re: Re: who else is running empire? - from a notesfile
#R:u1100a:-13800:harpo:15500003:040:1165
harpo!ber May 7 07:30:00 1982
Accumulated time is expressed in "Bureaucratic Time Units" or
B.T.U.s. The purpose of the B.T.U. Concept is three-fold:
I) Commands use up B.T.U.s. This limits the number of commands
that any player can give in any particular time period. Thus the
fanatics can't overrun the players with less free time by
tenacity alone.
II) The build up of B.T.U.s not being dependent on being logged
on at any particular time allows players to participate when it
is convenient rather than at some fixed time (as in the case of
monopoly, the stock market, etc).
III) The B.T.U. arrangement helps compensate for the fact that in
concept, the governments of each country are always "playing"
although the player representing that country may only play
periodically. The geography of the game is embodied in a
rectangular map partitioned into M x N sectors (where M and N are
typically but not necessarily powers of two, usually 32, 64 or
128) that is approximately 50% sea, 45% habitable land and 5%
uninhabitable mountains. This "map" is generated by a program
(the "creation") that places volcanoes pseudo-randomly forming
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