Conquer God Mode

The Power of God

A world in Conquer is a complex thing, and needs to have someone to watch over it. The creation of the world, the updating of the turns, and the monitoring of events are all assigned to the control of one person. It is that person's responsibility to make sure that the game flows smoothly and fairly. The title of "god" is given to this person, and any aspect of the game may be adjusted by them.

There are times when players will be unable to get their nations started properly, such as if there are no metal or wood sectors near them, or if, though pure bad luck, they are placed on a very small island. Or, the nation might accidently lose all of their money by drafting the wrong type of unit by accident. In such situations, god may add land or resources to the nation, disband troops and return spent resources, or even give gifts of wood or metals to the nation to provide them with a second chance.

If the site is large enough, or the tasks of the god too time consuming, it is possible for the god to give another player the ability to be a "god" to a world. Such a person would be called a "demi-god". In this way, many campaigns may take place on a single machine, with different demi-gods monitoring each. This provides the ideal environment for players, where they can have a variety of worlds, each one configured just a bit differently.

Genesis: A Conquer Cookbook

To begin a Conquer game, there must first be a world upon which to run the campaign. A Conquer world is created using the command:

        conqrun -m -d campaign

If an empty string is specified [conqrun -m -d ""], then the default Conquer campaign is assumed. If no '-d' flag is used, then either the default campaign is used, or the campaign specified using the CONQ_OPTS environment variable is used.

Once a check is made to be sure that the world creation is both allowed and desired, a startup screen is displayed. After a key press, Conquer will prompt you to enter super-user password for the new world. This password will be used whenever access to god powers is needed, to preserve security. Once that has been entered, the configuration screen will be presented to you.

The Configuration Screen

The configuration screen is a mode where the world parameters can be specified, and where different options can be enabled or disabled. The screen itself will look something like:

                         < Conquer Configuration Mode >
 Demi-god..highlndr  Min Ntn Dist....13  Check Range......2  Scout Battles..25%
 God Passwd........  Navy Bonus.....-25  Pct Reject....100%  Rand Events......6
 Add Passwd........  Cvan Bonus.....-50  Pct Tgoods.....90%  Disasters........5
 Limit D-god..False  Combat Dice......9   % Metals......25%  Mercenaries..91171
 D-god Builds..True  Avg Damage.....50%   % Jewels......25%   Atck Bonus....+75
 Map Type....HexMap  Deter Damage...50%   % Magical.....15%   Dfns Bonus....+75
 Relative Map..True  Overmatch......10%  Growth Rate....1.0  % Disb Mercs...15%
 Verify Login..True  Min Damage......5%  Npc Ntns.........4  % Mnst Mercs....6%
 Hide Scores...True  Year.............8  Monst Repro....20%  Max Diplo Adj....1
 Hide Users....True  Month.......Junius  Lizards.........50  Bribe Value.200000
 Late Start.......5  Pct Water......65%  Savages.........50  Max Supply.......3
 World X Size...136  Pct Contour....75%  Nomads..........50  Unit Sply Dist...1
 World Y Size...136  Expose Ratio...2.0  Pirates.........20  City Xfer Dist...2
 Max Build Pts..100  Smoothings.......7  Revolt Pct.....25%
 Conquer Version 5.0: World Adjustor                        Datadir: [default]
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  'hjkl'-select item  ' ',DEL-cycle  'c',ESC-change item  'q'-save   'Q'-quit

If your terminal supports it, the current item will be highlighted. In any case, the cursor will be placed after the current item. If the new world is being created over an old one, the configuration of the prior world will be kept, otherwise the default configuration will be used.

To change a configuration option, use the VI movement keys, or the numeric keypad, to move to the selection you wish to change, and hit the `c' or ESCAPE key. Then enter a new value. When you are done specifying the world parameters, enter a `q' if you wish to build the new world or a `Q' if you wish to abort the creation.

Configuration Options

In order to clarify what each of the possible configuration options is, I have provided a description of each of them. Those with an asterisk (*) following the name are adjustable at any time after the world has been built:

Demi-god*: During compilation, the user who is empowered to control all of the Conquer campaigns is specified using the LOGIN definition in the header.h file. While it would be nice if a single person could manage all of the campaigns that a site would want to run, experience has shown that only with large amounts of caffeine would it be close to possible. Thus, the demi-god is born! The demi-god is the login name of the person that god designates to run that particular world. The powers of the demi-god may be limited to just world updating, or can include all of the powers that god possesses but only for that particular world. Whether or not a world has been assigned a demi-god, the powers, if not the responsibilities, of god will remain the same. The string "[none]" may be used to specify that there should be no demi-god for a campaign.
God Passwd*: In order to access all of the powers of god, a password will need to be entered. This option allows the adjustment of the password. Demi-gods must know the old password before changing it.
Add Passwd*: After a number of game turns have passed, users will be asked to enter a password before being allowed to create a new nation. This option controls the setting of that password. Demi-gods must know the old password before being allowed to change it.
Limited D-god*: If set, this option will prevent the demi-god from being able to enter the nation "god", and will also prevent the demi-god from being able to rebuild the world. In essence, this means that the demi-god will only be able to update the game.
D-god builds*: If this option is set to "False", the person designated as the demi-god will not be able to rebuild the world and start a new game. This is useful for preventing people from starting a new campaign without checking with god first.
Map Type: This is a nice, nifty, neato-keen, feature which allows you to determine what map will be used for a campaign. The two possible choices are HexMap and RectMap. The RectMap is the plain old 8 directional coordinate system. The HexMap, on the other hand, is where each sector has only 6 neighboring sectors, and all sectors are joined by the edges. The Hexagonal coordinate system is a much more realistic system and should be the preferred system, but the RectMap is provided as an alternative for those who wish to use it.
Relative Map*: If this option is set to "True", everyone, except god, will have sector locations displayed as the relative displacement between the current location and some central sector [By default, the national capital.] So, the sector one up and to the left of the capital will appear to be [-1,1] to that nation. The reason this feature was added was to decrease the amount of help player nations can give each other if they have not actually met. [I can't put limitations on the mail system, since they can just use the normal computer mail if they want... this feature serves as a nice compromise.]
Verify Login*: Each nation has, stored within it, the login name of the person who created it. If this option is set to "True", only that person will be allowed access to the nation. This acts as an added security feature and will also enable a check preventing people from creating more than one nation, attempting to thus gain an advantage by doubling their information resources. [I got sick and tired of having to delete nations created by people who would create two or three nations and then play out the one with the better starting position. Annoying cheaters!]
Hide Scores*: If this configuration option is set to "True", any information which could possibly determine a national strength or ability will be hidden from players during the various score reports.
Hide Users*: If set to "True", the identity of the nation owners will not be displayed during score reports to other nations.
Late Start*: After a number of turns have been played in the game, nation creation will not be allowed for all players. This option controls how long, in game turns, before users will be asked for the Add Passwd when trying to build a new nation.
World X Size: World Y Size -- These two options control the size of the world used in the campaign. The larger the world, the longer before nations meet, and, thus, the longer the game. When adjusting the size of the world, be sure to also adjust the number of monsters and NPC nations within the world.
Max Build Pts*: When creating nations using the "conqrun -a" interface, each of the options within the nation configuration is assigned a "cost" which will be deducted from the construction points remaining. The "Max Build Pts" are the total number of construction points which a nation will be given at the start of the nation building process.
Min Ntn Dist*: This setting is used to determine how far apart nations' capitals must be when initially placed. Be sure to reduce this value if you are building a small world.
Navy Bonus*: Cvan Bonus* -- During combat between the various military units, each unit is assigned a combat bonus. Army units are given a default bonus of zero, which is then adjusted by the combat bonus of the particular army type. These two options control the adjustment of the combat bonuses for navy and caravan units, and can have a great affect on the results of combat for those units.
Combat Dice*: When a military conflict occurs within Conquer, Conquer will roll a number of combat dice to determine the outcome of the battle. With more dice, a more pronounced bell curve is given, but more time is required to compute the results. With less dice, the bell curve becomes flatter and the results become much more random, but the results are more quickly determined. The "conqrun -Q" command is available to set and/or test the various dice settings available. For example, on my system, the results show that using 9 dice is superior to using 10, since the algorithm used ends up with a smaller standard deviation at that setting.
Avg Damage*: During combat, there is a certain amount of damage which will occur to each troop. The "Avg Damage" is the damage that a military unit will receive if it were to meet a unit of the same combat strength and a balanced result takes place. Increasing this value makes combats more devastating to all units involved.
Deter Damage*: Attacking forces will keep on searching for enemy troops until they have engaged all enemy forces, or they have received enough damage in one encounter to cause them to turn back. This selection controls what that amount of damage is.
Overmatch*: When the number of troops is larger for one side in an engagement than the other, the combat damage will be adjusted by this percentage for each odds level of a combat. For example, with an Overmatch value of 10% and if side A is 3 times the size of side B, side A's damage will be decreased by 20% and side B's will be increased by 20%. Increasing this value increases the affect of numerical superiority.
Min Damage*: This setting indicates the minimum amount of damage which a unit must receive, based on the combat roll. This is calculated after the Overmatch to assure that a military unit will suffer something for the battle. So, if a unit would have received 25% damage, but by Overmatch it went below zero, the troop would get an actual damage result of 5%x25% or 1.25% worth of damage. This is calculated based on a Min Damage value of 5%.
Year*: Month* -- During world creation you may specify a different time at which the game is to begin. This is mostly provided as a cosmetic feature, but by specifying a different month, you can control the season during which the campaign will begin. You might want to refer to the calendar information, to get a clear idea of the dating scheme used by Conquer.
Pct Water: This item is also fairly straight forward. It controls how much of the world should be composed of water sectors. I recommend at least fifty percent to make the use of naval fleets worthwhile, even higher if you wish to require the use of such units.
Pct Contour: This option controls what percentage of the sectors which are land sectors should be non-flat in nature. Non-flat means any of: Valley, Hill, Mountains, or Mountain Peak.
Expose Ratio*: This value controls how hazardous it is for troops to be out in bad weather or vegetation. Lowering the value makes it less hazardous for troops.
Smoothings: This item is the most important in determining the general shape of the land masses in the world. The number entered under this option means literally what it says: the number of times a smoothing algorithm is run on the world. The smoothing algorithm is simple: on a N% (currently 33%) chance, change the current sector to be land or water depending on whether there is more water or land within a 2 sector radius. The altitude of the land sectors are also raised or lowered depending on if there are more things nearby which are higher or lower. Setting this number to 1 creates a very splotchy world with a large number of small islands scattered around, and setting it to the highest value (15), creates a world of solid land masses with no small islands. [Except for pirate bases which are ALWAYS single sector mountainous islands] I usually choose a value between 5 and 7 depending on how many little islands I want to have scattered throughout the world.
Check Range: Pct Reject -- These two options control the initial placement of the solid 8x8 blocks of land. All of the solid land masses are placed, with surrounding blocks of "75% land, 25% water", at random. A check is made of blocks within "Check Range" to determine if there is already land close by. If there is, that location will be rejected on a "Pct Reject" chance, and a new location will be selected. A larger range and higher percentage causes more separate continental islands to be placed, while lowering them will allow the possibility for a single dominant land mass to be formed.
Pct Tgoods: % Metals -- % Jewels -- % Magical -- These options control the amount of tradegoods placed during the creation of the world. The "Pct Tgoods" is the percent chance that a land sector will contain some form of tradegood, and the other percentages indicate what chance there is that a tradegood will be of the given type. Since there are types of tradegoods other than the metal, jewel, and magical tradegoods, there is a limit to the combined percentage of those options.
Growth Rate*: The player nations, NPC nations and monster units within Conquer each will slowly grow in size as time passes. The growth is controlled by the reproductive rates of each of the nations and the "Monst Repro" and "% Mnst Mercs" settings for monsters. It is possible to globally increase or decrease the reproductive ability by adjusting this value. Increasing this value increases the rate at which nations will grow.
Npc Ntns: This controls the number of non-player character nations that are created when the world is built. These nations are read from the "nations" data file, so it is also limited by the number of entries within that file. You may use the "conqrun -A" command to add more nations to the "nations" file, and the "conqrun -Z" command to remove all of the nations.
Monster Repro*: This selection controls how quickly the monster nation populations increase on a yearly basis. It is offset by both the death of the monster races (lizards, nomads, savages, pirates and peasant rebellions) from combat, as well as setting of the "% Mnst Mercs" option.
Lizards: This indicates exactly how many lizard castles should be placed upon the world. Each lizard castle will be placed upon a highly valuable jewel tradegood, and will have fortifications consistent with the jewel level of the sector. Two lizard army troops will be guarding each castle: one roaming infantry troop, and one garrisoned archer troop. The combat bonus of the lizard troops is that of the mercenaries during the build, plus 20 to the defensive bonus.
Savages: Units of this nation randomly roam about the world as agressive army units. Half of all of the savage troops are actually monster units of some type, with the size an inverse ratio to the strength of the troop, the remaining unit are randomly sized infantry troops. Combat bonuses for savages are those of mercenaries at the time the world was built.
Nomads: This nation is composed of a number of armies of Light Cavalry. They must move every turn, never staying in any sector for more than a month. The combat bonus of nomad armies is that of the mercenaries at build time, plus 10 more to the attack bonus.
Pirates: Controlling the seas, these pirate bases each have a fleet of warships and an army of soldiers protecting its horde of minerals. The combat bonus of the pirate nation is that of the mercenaries at build time, with an adjustment of plus 20 to the attack, and minus 10 to the defense.
Revolt Pct*: Every turn, each nation will have a certain chance that the population will rebel and break away from the mother nation. This item is used as a multiplier of the calculated chance to influence the chance of revolts. Thus, a setting of 100% means no adjustment, while a setting of 0% prevents revolts altogether.
Scout Capture*: This indicates the chance that scouts may be dragged into combat and possibly be destroyed.
Rand Events*: On the average, how many random (non-weather) events take place over the entire world during each update.
Disasters*: How many random weather events should occur each update.
Mercenaries*: Atck Bonus* -- Dfns Bonus* -- These options control the amount and strength of the mercenary troops within the campaign. It is also used as a base determinant for the "monster" nations. Note: Once a world is built, God may change the mercenaries' combat bonus, but it will not affect the combat bonuses of the various monster nations. At that point, the monster combat bonuses must be adjusted like that of any other nation.
% Disb Mercs: This option determines what percentage of disbanded troops decide to become mercenaries, instead of meekly becoming part of the population.
% Mnst Mercs: This option determines what percentage of men within the monster nations decide to join the pool of available mercenaries each year.
Max Diplo Adj*: Each nation is able to adjust the diplomatic status it has for any nation it has met. The value of this option determines the maximum adjustment from the current diplomatic setting which may be made. Keeping this value to 1 or 2 means that it will not be possible to declare War on a nation without any prior warning. Due to the diplomacy change not being visible to other nations until after an update, it is recommended that a low value be used for this option.
Bribery Value*: This item sets a minimum relative value at which a bribery is effective on an NPC nation. It should be noted that the new bribery system simulates real events that can take place when nations send money to each other through envoys. [ie., The envoy you sent disappeared with your money and was last seen in the vicinity of the French Riviera...]
Max Supply*: Each army or other military unit may carry only so many months worth of food and pay with them. This selection determines the limit as to how many months may be carried at one time.
Unit Sply Dist*: This option controls the distance over which the navies and caravans can provide support when they are on "Support" status. If this value is set to 0, they may only distribute to the current sector, other settings indicate the maximum range over which they may distribute, with a value of -1 being entered to have them distribute based on the national communication range.
City Xfer Dist*: This selection controls the maximum distance which can separate two cities before they will be unable to transfer goods directly using the "region-command" transfer mechanism. Like the Unit Sply Dist setting, entering a -1 will make it conform to the communication range of the nation.

Changing Things Later On

Once the world has already been created, there will probably be some times when god will have to make adjustments to the state of the campaign. After all, what fun would it be to play god without being able to "Play God"? :-)

Anyway, the most basic of changes, such as turning on or off campaign options, is done through the an interface similar to that used during world creation. This is available through the "conqrun -E" command. Those options which are not able to be changed will simply not allow themselves to be adjusted. This command provides the only method available for god to change the campaign and add user passwords, if they should ever need changing.

If god wishes to adjust the number of dice to be rolled during combat, then the command "conqrun -Q" provides a interface for viewing and adjusting the probably of various dice settings. Any changes made to the Combat Dice here will be reflected on the world options.

To get a quick listing of some campaign settings, simply use the "conqrun -I" command. Conquer will then display statistics about each nation that might be of interest to a campaign deity.

Finally, there is the most powerful ability of god: the ability to change anything in any portion of the campaign. Such powers are granted by just logging in as nation "god". [I often refer to this as "going into god-mode".] Almost all of the commands available to normal players will also function for god, and each will also provide additional options which will allow god to manipulate almost any item. It is simply a matter of determining which commands will do what for god, and that is what the remainder of this section of the documentation is for...

How to do God's Work

Well, as I said earlier, many of the normal user commands will simply function differently if you are logged in as god. Also, when god wishes to adjust some information about a given nation, god will, for a short period of time, become that nation, and will then be able to manipulate that nations' sectors, units or cities. So, in order for god to adjust items for a nation, that nation must not be logged in. This is to prevent conflicts between adjustments god might make and adjustments a player might make.

It should be noted that god will only assume the identity of a nation for the duration of the individual commands. For some commands, such as "move-unit", god will automatically assume the identity of the nation that owns the current unit. For others, such as "economy-report" or "enlist", god will be queried for the name of the nation to become.

As Conquer is currently implemented, god will retain the login "lock" on any nation that is adjusted. This is to avoid any conflicts that might develop from reading in the commands already issued by a nation more than once. So, if you wish to release a lock on an edited nation, you must get out of god-mode.

Making Adjustments

There are many different objects within Conquer, each of which has a variety of commands which may affect it. Whenever god accesses a function which may make changes, a nation name to apply the changes to will be asked for. Some commands, such as "move-unit" will automatically assume that the nation owning the current unit will be the one affected. Whenever god makes changes to a nation, that nation may not be using Conquer, so once god is done makes changes, it would be a good idea to log out.

The following list is to let god know which commands to use to get various tasks done:

adjusting army units: Army units may be adjusted using the "army-report" or "group-report" functions. The "command-unit" function will also change a limited subset of unit information.
adjusting caravans: Caravans may be manipulated using the "caravan-report" or "command-unit" functions, much as an army unit.
adjusting naval units: Navies may be manipulated using the "navy-report" or "command-unit" functions, just like armies and caravans.
relocating a unit: Armies, navies and caravans may be relocated using the "move-unit" function. The currently selected unit will be the one to be relocated.
creating a unit: A unit may be created using the "enlist" command or using the appropriate "{navy,caravan,army}-report" function.
disbanding a unit: A unit may be deleted by using the "command-unit" function or the appropriate "{navy,caravan,army}-report" function.
changing material amounts within a supply center: The amount of raw materials within a supply center may be adjusted using either the "economy-report" interface or the "region-command" function.
changing material amounts stored on a unit: The amount of raw materials on a caravan or a navy may be adjusted using the "navy-report" or "caravan-report" funtions, as appropriate.
changing supply levels on a unit: The supply levels on units may be adjusted individually using the "command-unit" function or the appropriate "{navy,caravan,army}-report function. Global adjustments may be performed using the "region-command" function.
renaming a supply center: Supply centers may be renamed by using the "region-command" function.
renaming a nation: Nations may be renamed using the "nation-info" function.
changing the owner of a nation: The login name for the owner of a nation must be changed using the "nation-info" command.
adjusting national statistics: National attributes, such as the eat and communication rates, may be adjusted using the "nation-info" command.
deleting a nation: Nations may only be deleted through the "nation-info" command.
creating a nation: Nations must be created using the conqrun program, with the -a flag. Additional NPC nations may be added by creating a nation and then using the "nation-info" command to change the nation to a non-player nation.
changing the constructions of a sector: The constructions within a sector may be changed using the "construct" command. Removal of old constructions is done by devastating the sector.
changing any other information about a sector: The owner, contour, designation, population, vegetation, trade good, and many other traits of a sector may be changed by using the "change-designation" function.
relocating people from a sector: The "move-people" function may also be used by god to change the population of two sectors at the same time.
changing the magical powers a nation possesses: The "magic-info" function may be used to add to or take away from the magical powers a nation has.
casting spells: God may cast any spell upon any sector or unit by using the "cast-spells" function.
call down a natural disaster: The "cast-spells" function also allows god to erupt volcanos, shake the earth, or call down other natural disasters.
going to a specific capital: It is possible to go to the capital of any nation using the "jump-to-capital" command.
going to a specific city: It is possible to go directly to any city in the world using the "city-choose" function.
going to a specific unit: To jump directly to any unit in any nation, the "army-choose", "navy-choose", and "caravan-choose" functions are available.
going to a specific sector: To relocate to a given sector, just use the "jump-to-pick" function.
giving a message to players during startup: While in god-mode, use the "edit-motd" function to start an editor for the message of the day. The "conquer -M" program may also be used, if you do not wish to log into Conquer just to edit the MOTD.
kick players out of the game: You may prevent players from logging into Conquer by using the "conqrun -T" program. This should give them a short delay before they are automatically logged out, if they are currently in the program.
update the game: A very important aspect of godhood is having to update the world. The program "conqrun -x" is used to update the program, and depending on how it was compiled will wait until all players have logged out, preventing further logins, and then update the world. Using this program with an automated script program, such as "at" on Unix, can make life much easier for a god.

A detailed listing of which keys are bound to what functions is listed elsewhere in the documentation.