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Thread: [GS] INFO FOR NEW HOTSEATS / GUIDE FOR ADMINS

  1. #1
    Dux's Avatar Warden of Westeros
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    Default [GS] INFO FOR NEW HOTSEATS / GUIDE FOR ADMINS

    Hotseats

    As a solo player, you had it easy. You blitzed the AI. You turtled against the AI. You conquered your computer opponents in every conceivable fashion. When endless stacks marched against you, you directed your forces on the battlefield and personally left the ground littered with enemy corpses. You came, you played, you conquered.


    Now, a new challenge awaits you.

    Enter a world of chaos and intrigue, of wonder and death. Only the clever among you will survive here, in this tumultuous land where every decision could lead to glorious victory…or utter destruction. It is not enough to be a great tactician. You must learn every aspect of military strategy, from the grandest of concepts to the minutest of details. Armies must be moved wisely, agents trained and deployed, diplomacy carefully cultivated. Your economy must be a golden industry, driving your empire to impossible heights. Through it all, you test your mettle against living, breathing humans, opponents with their own dreams and ambitions. Do you hold to honor and expect your allies to do the same? Or are you a knife in the dark, plunging into the backs of those who least expect it?

    The choices are yours. All you need to do is join. Join a Hotseat Campaign. Experience Total War at its most breathtaking, and embrace the intricacies which capture men’s souls…or drive them mad.

    Your destiny awaits you. Do you have the courage to claim it?
    text by Joerock22

    Introduction to Hotseating by SoulGamesInc



    Want to join a hotseat?

    You can post and state your interest in any newly started hotseat topic in one of the subforums: general, Westeros or TATW. Always remember to state as which faction you want to join.

    Want to start a hotseat?
    Joining or starting a new hotseat

    A list of open spots you will find in these topics:
    http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...w-HotSeat-here! and http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...eat-Recruiting

    Guides
    List of guides

    Rules and regulations

    Unlike the material that brings us all together, Total War Center forbids the use of Swearing and Offensive Language,
    Please report any Censor Bypassing or Insulting using the report button!

    Read Total War Center’s Rules Here


    Attachments
    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
    We hereby request that you avoid using Total War Center’s Upload Attachment feature.
    Attachments contribute to the slow loading times which occasionally plague the site and hinder the imminent process of upgrading to vBulletin 4.
    Furthermore, this Hotseat subforum has (at last count) roughly 5000 attachments and so I'm appealing to you all to go to My Account > Attachments
    ...and then Delete as many Attachments as possible, particularly all those old hotseats which are long forgotten.



    Alternate accounts

    Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 
    TWC has an established policy on the use of Alt Accounts, whilst not illegal or in contradiction of the T.O.S they pose a unique, ethical and difficult problem for the M2TW HS Community. TWC Gaming Staff have established a number of Alt accounts are at work within the WTW HS Community. We are not however in the business of naming and shaming or carrying out witch-hunts against the Alts, many are most likely family members sharing a computer some however may be attempts to gain an unfair advantage in HS.

    I don't think I need to outline the potential, and I underline potential harm Alt accounts can do to a HS should they be established for the wrong reasons, what we are in the business of at TWC Gaming Staff is ensuring all HS are carried out in a fair and sporting environment. To that end after a discussion with my TWC Gaming Staff colleagues and the overall head of TWC Gaming Staff, my boss if you will, and established a few guidelines to prevent Alt Abuse without cracking out the burning stakes and pitchforks.

    These are as follows:
    Alts accounts will be barred from participating in TWC Gaming Staff HS, only one account per IP address shall be allowed access.
    Only one account will be allowed per hotseat, if multiple accounts are found to particiapte in a hotseat, that will be regarded as account abuse and actions will be taken


    We'll continue with our periodic sweeps for Alts. We're not here to stop family members playing but at the same time some of us have been playing HS along time and if you speak to some of the older salts around here, especially those with experience from the main area we can tell you of the damage that can be caused by Alt abuse either in manipulating HS or attempting to circumnavigate forum bans. Main thing is that collectively we are aware of this issue and be honest with each other so we may gain the maximum enjoyment from our HS.


    Happy hotseating!



    Last edited by joerock22; January 20, 2018 at 12:43 PM.

  2. #2
    joerock22's Avatar Leader of Third Age HS
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    Default Re: [GS] Hotseats what's it about?

    Starting or joining hotseat campaigns

    By Dux

    Do you want to start or join a new hotseat campaign, but don't know where to begin? Look no further!

    Want to join a hotseat?

    You can post and state your interest in any newly started hotseat topic in one of the subforums: general, Westeros or TATW. Always remember to state as which faction you want to join.

    First check out this topic http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...w-HotSeat-here! or this topic: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...eat-Recruiting for any open spots in ongoing hotseats. If you want to rake over one of the open spots, ask the admin of that hotseat or post in the topic.


    Starting a hotseat

    To start a hotseat, post a topic in the forums, using other topics as an example, like this one: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...arly-era-SS-HS

    Information that must be in the opening post of every hotseat topic:
    Hotseat name
    Admin and co- admin
    Hotseat description
    Mod + setting
    Factions
    Rules

    Before you start a hotseat, you have to be mindful of a few things:


    • When you start a hotseat, you will be responsible for it. You are responsible for finding an admin, finding players and starting the topic. You will also be accountable if the hotseat is struggling.
    • Every hotseat must have a non-player admin before a topic is opened -> all topics without admins will be closed immediately.
    • It is recommended, but not required, to have a non-player co-admin as well (you can ask GS for this)
    • Before you start a hotseat topic, remember to check the Hotseat recruitment topic to see whether your suggested setting gathers enough interest at that moment.
    • Gaming Staff may not allow a hotseat to start if a couple of similar hotseats in setting and mod are struggling to find enough players or if there are are too many open spots in general. Want to be sure your hotseat will be allowed to start? Sent a pm to the GS before you start a topic.
    • You may start the hotseat if you have gathered enough interest in the topic. 100% of advised spots must be filled with active players and an admin must be available.


    To recruit players for your hotseat, as a hotseat creator or admin can post in these topics: http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...w-HotSeat-here! or http://www.twcenter.net/forums/showt...eat-Recruiting

  3. #3
    joerock22's Avatar Leader of Third Age HS
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    Default Re: [GS] Hotseats what's it about?

    Guide for Admins

    By Dux

    Greetings fellow hotseaters and potential admins,

    Just recently I was voted by you as best admin of the WTW community. To honor this, I decided to write a guide to admin a hotseat, including a general part with all relevant console commands for all hotseat areas, Westeros specifics and some known solutions to game breaking crashes.
    As an admin, you are the manager of a hotseat game. You need to start the hotseat, enforce the rules, skip or sub factions, clear turns and remove or add players. An admin should always be an independent and neutral actor, a player admin can be tempted to use the admin console to his advantage.
    As an admin you are responsible for the hotseat, you should make sure it runs smootly, that the rules are honored and that punishments are carried out if the rules are broken.

    Setting up a hotseat

    CFG FILE


    To set up a hotseat, go to the modfolder of the mod you want to play your hotseat on and open the CFG file.
    Let say you want to start a hotseat on youngbloods, go to medieval/mods/youngbloods and click on youngbloods.cfg.

    In this file, scroll down to [hotseat], currently you will find this:

    [hotseat]
    autoresolve_battles = 1
    disable_console = 0
    disable_papal_elections = 1
    save_prefs = 1
    update_ai_camera = 0
    validate_diplomacy = 1
    admin_password = ******

    This is how I originally implanted it in youngbloods, but for a good hotseat game you need to change and add a few things.

    First, disable console needs to be 1, to ensure that the console is always disabled for the players(admin console is always open). You can also do this ingame, however doing this here will make sure you won't forget.

    Secondly it is important to add these lines:

    allow_validation_failures = 0
    validate_data = 1

    These lines ensure all players are using the same files in a hotseat. These lines are crucial to prevent certain forms of cheating (that will not be explained) and to prevent crashes later on in hotseats, because people are using wrong versions of the game. (Thanks to Vipman, Invicta and Mithridate for this.)

    Thirdly, you should set your own admin password. This is the entry password to the admin console, crucial for the continuity of the hotseat. Simply add your password behind admin_password =
    Important: Always check that the admin password works before uploading the save!

    Here is the new entry(you can simply replace the original entry with this one):

    [hotseat]
    autoresolve_battles = 1
    disable_console = 1
    disable_papal_elections = 1
    save_prefs = 1
    update_ai_camera = 0
    validate_diplomacy = 1
    allow_validation_failures = 0
    validate_data = 1
    admin_password = ******


    SET UP IN GAME

    Now that you have altered the CFG file it is time to set up the hotseat in game.

    Start up the game, go to multiplayer and hotseat. Now you will see the faction selection screen. Here, you can select all factions that you want to be in this hotseat, most of the time it is all the factions.

    You will also find some general settings like disable console, passwords and autoresolve only. You can set these to your own preferences, however it is recommended to keep disable console, password and autoresolve only checked.

    You will also find the battle and campaign difficulty, which is often set on h/h, but this is also for your own preferences.

    After you have pressed start game, you will find the starting screen of the first faction. In Youngbloods this is often Lannister. You can now save this with the abbreviation of the hotseat game name, the first faction and the turn. For example, the hotseat save of Winter is Coming is called WiC_Lannister_1.

    Sometimes the players want to change the turnorder of a hotseat, a bit experience with modding the descr_strat is required for this.
    You must change the faction order in the descr.strat (Medieval II Total War/mods/<mod name>/data/world/maps/campaign/imperial campaign --> descr_strat file):

    1. At the top of the file (playable factions)
    2. You must copy paste all faction segments in turn order.

    Turn order is best done from GMT + 12 to GMT - 12, so in a descending order.

    Always save your original file, when meddling with the game files. For the bold ones: "The burned hand teaches best" ~Gandalf
    Before you upload this turn, make sure your admin password works!


    Admin console

    As admin, it is your job to set up a hotseat, making sure it runs smooth, enforce the rules, add and remove players, skip or sub factions and be the neutral party in disputes.

    To assist the admin in managing the game, there is the admin console.

    To access the admin console type ` often this button is located in the top left corner of your keyboard, under the esc button.

    Now a screen will appear in which you can type you commands.

    Before you can type any commands, you need to login as administrator.

    Type:
    logon password (the password you set in the CFG file earlier)

    Now, you should get the message that the admin is logged in. After that you can use the console and various commands to deal punishments, clear saves, skip factions and more.

    After you have done your admin duties, type logoff to logoff.

    It is important to note that faction names in the console are still vanilla M2TW.

    The corresponding faction can (usually) be found in Medieval II Total War/mods/<mod name>/data/world/maps/campaign/imperial campaign --> descr_strat file

    A list of Westeros factions and their original medieval name used in Youngbloods:

    Lannister - england
    Tyrell - milan
    Stark - scotland
    Arryn - portugal
    Greyjoy- hre
    Renly - spain
    Joffrey - venice
    Tully - france
    Stannis- denmark
    Martell - moors


    A list of TATW factions and their original medieval names:
    Milan - Rohan
    England - Mordor
    Egypt - High Elves
    Spain - Harad
    Scotland - Dale
    Venice - Rhun
    Turks - Eriador
    Mongols - Silvan Elves
    Sicily - Gondor
    HRE - OotMM
    Portugal - OoG
    Moors - Dwarves
    France - Isengard


    Console commands that are relevant for hotseats:

    1. clear_password faction

    This command allows you to clear the password of a faction to access the turn. Often this command is used at the start of every admin job and it is often required to clear passwords for subbers and new players of that faction.
    The command only works with the original medieval faction names of all factions.

    So when you want to clear the password of Lannister, simply type clear_password england

    2. set_password faction password password
    This command works the same way as the clear password and allows you to change someone's password without clearing it, it is often not necessary.
    It looks like this: set_password england Tywin Tywin

    3. toggle_fow
    This allows you to see the entire map.

    4. add_money
    This command allows you to either add or remove money from a faction. The easiest way to do this is on the turn of the concerning faction.

    To add money, type:
    add_money 2000

    To remove money type:
    add_money -2000

    You can also do this on another faction's turn, the command should be like this (thanks to Vipman):

    To add money, type:
    add_money faction, 2000 (add_money england, 2000)

    To remove money type:
    add_money faction, -2000

    The limit for adding and removing money by console is 40k

    5. show_cursorstat and move_character

    These two commands allow you to move a character, a captain or an admiral. Sometimes this is necessary when people move armies that were not supposed to move because they were defeated.

    show_cursorstat allows you to get the coordinates of a specific location.

    Simply stand with your cursor on the position that you want to move your troops to and type show_cursorstat.

    This will give you two coordinates, the X and Y, for example: 30,45

    To move the character type:

    move_character "full name" X,Y
    for example: move_character "Tywin Lannister" 30,45
    It is important to write the full name of the character you want to move, else it will not work. Every character has a surname, the title of the character is not a surname.

    So, for example to move Axell the Warrior' Son, you need to type: move_character "Axell Gardner" 30,45

    To move a captain:

    move_character "Captain Name" X,Y

    Captains don't have surnames, they only have one name, but you will need to add Captain for it to work.

    For example: move_character "Captain Robin" 88,100

    To move a admiral:

    move_character "Admiral Name" X,Y

    Same as the captain, beware that you can only move admirals on sea.

    6. process_cq, adding buildings
    This command allows you to build buildings located in the building queue of a settlement instantly. You can use this when buildings have been destroyed illegally.

    To build the buildings type:
    process_cq "settlement name"

    For example: process_cq "Lannisport"

    Important, the settlement name is the name the city currently has. So when someone has changed the name of Lannisport in Lannisters Rulez, then the command looks like this:

    process_cq "Lannisters Rulez"

    If you are restoring buildings, don't forget to add the money you spent on it back to the faction.

    7. create_unit
    This command can be used to create a unit for an army or a settlement, simply type:

    create_unit "character name or settlement name" "unit name" amount experience(0-9) armor(0-3) weapon (0-3)

    The unit name is not the name you see ingame, it is the name as displaced in the export_descr_unit file in the mod's data folder.

    For example to add 2 armored spearmen with 3 experience to Tywin Lannister, type:

    create_unit "Tywin Lannister" "Armored Sergeants" 2 3 0 0

    8. give_trait and remove_trait
    These commands are rarely used, it adds or removes traits to certain characters. A certain knowledge of export_descr_character_traits is required.

    To add a trait to a selected general, type:
    give_trait this trait level

    To remove a trait of a selected general, type:
    remove_trait this trait level

    You can also give it to a not selected general, by replacing this with "general's name"

    To give a trait, you need to know the original trait's level in export_descr_character_traits in the mod's data folder.

    For example to give Tywin Lannister the alcoholic trait, type
    give_trait "Twyin Lannister" Drink 3

    Drink 3 is the alcoholic trait.

    If you need to teleport or add/remove trait/anc from a character that has a title (e.g. the chivalrous) or is king/heir, there is a chance you can find out the family name by looking at relatives names in family tree, like wife/childs/parents.

    9. add_population
    Rarely used, but sometimes might be necessary.

    To add population to a settlement type:
    add_population "settlement name" amount

    So if you want to add 3000 to King's Landing type:
    add_population "King's Landing" 3000

    The limit is 4000 for adding population.

    10. control faction, turning to AI
    This command is used when you want to turn a faction AI, sometimes used to speed up the game when a player has left and the faction has only one settlement left. It is also used as a fix for a game breaking crash.

    To turn House Greyjoy to AI control type,
    control hre

    To turn back to human control, the same command.

    11. surrender_regions, killing a faction
    Sometimes it may be necessary to kill a faction by turning them to rebels.

    The command is surrender_regions faction

    So if you want to kill Joffrey, simply type surrender_regions venice


    That was about all important console commands that an admin can use.


    Fix to game breaking crash

    Sometimes, usually around turn 30, a hotseat turn on a Westeros mod might crash. This is often caused by slightly different versions of the mod or the original game. I have solved many of such issues in the past.

    To solve this, simply go back to the start of the turn and turn every faction AI by using the control faction command. Then let the Ai play an entire turn, transform every faction back to human after the turn has been played and test if it works.
    This has often worked. If you encounter this crash, feel free to contact me.


    That is all for now folks, I might update this in the future but it should be a good overview of what an admin can do. Any suggestions, updates and comments will be appreciated.

  4. #4
    joerock22's Avatar Leader of Third Age HS
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    Default Re: [GS] Hotseats what's it about?

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