A Wolfpack Empire Publication
"All the news that fits, we print."
May, 2003

In This Edition

• What's New?
• Links/Resources/Getting Started
• Games --
  • Upcoming
  • Current
  • Recently ended
  • Not so recently ended
• Clients and Player Tools
• Server and Deity Info
• From the Editor
• Hints of the Month
• Anno of the Month
  

What's New?

Wolfpack has a new leader!

Jim Simons (co-ruler of Escher) stepped down as the leader of
Wolfpack. For two years, Jim lead Empire in the second generation of Wolfpack Empire. Unfortunately, all things must end sometime. Jim will remain on as an advisor to the Wolfpack team. Thanks, Jim!

Geoff Cashman (a.k.a Mithrilien) has agreed to take over as lead for the Wolfpack Empire project. Geoff brings 15 years of experience to the table, and is the author of the "User's Guide to Empire".

WinACE project has a new leader!

Jim Simons founded the WinACE project and developed the first ever true GUI client for Empire, producing something of a revolution in Empire development and playability for the masses. Along with Jim's stepping down from being head of Wolfpack, he has now passed on the baton of leadership in the WinACE project.

Daniel Kiracofe (Bwian) has agreed to take over administration of this project. Daniel is pursuing a Master's degree in Mechanical
Engineering at Ohio State University. Happy WinACE users all over the planet, wish him luck and enough spare time for WinACE!

Laurent Martin released PTkEI 1.18.0. See `Clients and Player tools'
below.

Empire News publication resumed! The new editor is Markus Armbruster
(Dorwinion).

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Links/Resources/Getting Started

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New Games

No new long term games have been brought to the attention of the
Empire News.

Please contact us if you want your game listed here!

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Current Games

Newbie Game #2 is run by Lanny Andelin at 208.187.205.245 port 5000
with the usual visitor/visitor account. The intent and purpose of the
game is to give newer/less experienced players a chance to learn the
basics and intricacies of the game. The Empire community needs such
games. Thanks, Lanny!

The Changeling Blitz is running at blitz.wolfpackempire.com, port
6789. This blitz resets at 7:00pm US/Eastern (currently 23:00 UTC)
every day. Updates are enabled at 7:30pm. There is a 60 ETU update
every 10 minutes. Note that world size and some options change daily.
It is up to players to figure that out each day, but typing "version"
helps.

The Zebra Blitz is running at blitz.wolfpackempire.com, port 5678.
This blitz resets at 6:00pm US/Eastern (currently 22:00 UTC) every
Sunday. Updates are enabled at 6:30pm. There is a 48 ETU update
every hour on the hour.

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Recently Ended Games

Ice World V, run by John Yockey a.k.a. The Ice Barbarian Warlord was
won by Lowland (co-ruled by Lowland and Pendor) and Niflheim (co-ruled
by Byzantium, Dorwinion, Plundaria and Mithrilien). This game was set
up on an ice continent with valleys, lakes, mountain ranges, passes
and ice, and featured special units for its rugged terrain, venture
enterprises (convert cms and oil into money), and a special `must stay
logged out for 1 etu to get any BTUs at all' hack.

            sects  eff civ  mil  shell gun pet  iron dust oil  pln ship unit money
     Lowland 423   97% 247K 7.5K 9.9K 972  7.3K 106K 1.0K 9.7K 200   33  154  3.7K
    23177.84
    Niflheim 439   98% 272K  10K 5.7K 1.2K  11K  80K 754   14K 173   45  141   12K
    21012.28
   Ragnarook 255   99% 152K 4.7K 4.3K 236  2.3K  33K 1.6K 4.3K 180   14  103   13K
    12068.06
         ^^^ 187  100% 110K 3.6K 5.4K 945  6.8K  48K 235  8.9K 151   20  163   53K
    10879.30
   Shakespea 158   99%  99K 6.2K 7.0K 1.4K 6.6K  28K 554  2.9K 360   14  150  2.4K
     9176.99
   IndustMec 172   99%  90K 3.1K 2.8K 583  4.0K  21K 2.0K 7.4K 112   15   96   68K
     9109.23
   unemploye 148  100%  80K 3.6K 3.1K 571  1.9K  28K 504  3.0K  62   12   44  6.5K
     7610.17
   Aquataine 129   99%  76K 2.5K 743   83  4.9K  17K 1.9K 1.4K  70   10   30   14K
     5128.55
    VailGulf  35   73%  14K 620  132   18   51  2.7K  72  1.2K   0    7    0 -450
      822.76
        DPRK   7   85% 4.9K 311    0    0    1  1.2K  48    1    0    7   11 -1.2K
      287.87
      Coyote   8   92% 5.7K 140    5    2    1  1.7K  12    0    2    3    1 -2.0K
      257.06
   SilentBob   4   99% 2.5K  95    7    0    0  1.9K   5    1    0    1    0  715
      101.27
     Vaujany   4   62% 1.7K 189    0    0    4  2.3K   0    1    0    0    0 -3.8K
       81.27
             ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ---- ----
   worldwide 2.0K  98% 1.2M  43K  39K 6.0K  45K 369K 8.7K  54K 1.3K 180  890  155K
 

More info is available at http://empire.wolfpaw.net/

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Not so Recently Ended Games

Ice World IV, run by John Yockey, ran from October to January, and was
won by Ski, 976-SHEEP (Bungholio) and Zirconia. The world was set up
for naval warfare. There were venture enterprises, a somewhat
controversial login limit, slower BTU growth (also controversial), and
numerous other tweaks.

You can read more at http://empire.wolfpaw.net/

Newbie Game #1, run by Lanny Andelin, was won by Armengar and Pax.

OGRE Empire, run by Walter Moore, ran in July 2002, and was won by
Dunbar and Helepolis.

This game was a homage to the legendary war-game Ogre from Steve
Jackson Games. Each country started at tech 350 with a 50 sector
island already populated. New units at the top of the tech scale
represented the units from the Ogre game.

Additional information can be found in rec.games.empire. Try
http://groups.google.de/groups?q=ogre+group%3Arec.games.empire

Snowball in Hell 2 ended in August 2002 and was won by No-man,
L33T-SH33P, and Coyote. They systematically dismantled several
empires before the remaining players cried uncle. There were some
hard fought battles, but in the end the seasoned players came out on
top.

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Clients and Player Tools

The basic Empire client can be found at
http://www.wolfpackempire.com/clients.html, source as well as binaries
for many platforms.

The latest version of WinACE is 2.2.11. Read the announcement at
http://tinyurl.com/afc0 and download from
http://sourceforge.net/projects/winace/

The latest version of PTkEI is 1.18.0. See the PTkEI home page at
http://www.lfmm.org/ptkei/

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Server and Deity Information

The current Empire server is 4.2.11. Download it from
http://www.wolfpackempire.com/server.html

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From the Editor

It was an embarrassingly long time in the making, for various reasons,
but finally it's done, and you're reading it now: The first issue of
the Empire News prepared by me.

The Empire News is meant to be published monthly. I'll do my best :)

Markus, a.k.a. Dorwinion

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Hint of the Month

The One True Way to Mine Gold: Get out all the gold in one update. If
you mine only a fraction, say half of it, then the same amount of work
will mine half of the rest next update. It takes four updates to get
out some 90% of the gold that way. This is a terrible waste of work,
which you cannot afford in the early game.

With the usual game parameters, a sector yields five times its gold
contents, as shown by the `resource' command, in dust. So a sector
with gold=100 yields 500 dust. If the `production' command predicts
that less will be made, move in workers.

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Anno of the Month

> Announcement from Tanugi, (#2) dated Wed Nov 6 04:42:41 2002
Dear Doctor Temekula,

You have to understand that this is no easy step for me, but
under consideration of your advanced technology, your research
efforts, and your clinical experience I have to come up with a
problem, which needs medication urgently.

We have Thistles.

They are not present permanently, but every now and then they have
been spotted on our islands. We are not sure whether Thistles are
a lethal infection, so far we have observed damage to our
civilization. It seems to be worse on neighboring islands, which are
completly covered by Thistles.

I have used the "battleship spell" and they have vanished for quite a
while, but this infection seems to be rather adaptive.

I even sacrificed some beer to our gods, and they came up with the
word "nuke". When I asked on the meaning of that, there was some
roaring "That's not about belief, that's science.
Go and ask a Knowing One!".

So now I hope for your support and advice on this problem, please find
a cure against Thistles. And in case even your research has no
antidote - can I have a prescription for a couple of nukes?

Your humble servant,

Matata,
Priest and Healer

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