More Vassel

I'm having Mucho funo mucking around with Arkham on Vassel, which is new to me.
I wouldn't mind getting a second game going of something simple, pref 2 player.
Maybe Memoir 44, which I haven't played in years.
Anyone interested?

Where'd you find AH for VASSAL?

gschmidl wrote:

Where'd you find AH for VASSAL?

On the Vassal site.

It is actually playing very well - helps having a good group putting a lot of theme and effort into it.

Frank - Tommy Ozjesting loves M'44 on Vassal, it is a very good module as well.

I'd like to learn how to use vassal. Perhaps I'll poke around and jump in on a game with you guys.

Is the learning curve steep?

Steve"I'm so not techical"Avery

Stephen Avery wrote:

I'd like to learn how to use vassal. Perhaps I'll poke around and jump in on a game with you guys.

Is the learning curve steep?

Steve"I'm so not techical"Avery

It seems like the more automatic the module is, the more out of it you feel. The old no-smarts ones are easy to work with, once you figure out where they've hidden the counter you're looking for.

However, the biggest thing is that VASSAL doesn't fact-check you, so learning a new game with it can be hard. If you already know the game you're trying to play, then you can see you're doing something wrong early on.

If you're doing PBEM, you *have* to remember to step through the logfiles, too. That's a mistake everyone makes and then grows out of.

Not Sure wrote:
If you're doing PBEM, you *have* to remember to step through the logfiles, too. That's a mistake everyone makes and then grows out of.[/quote]

Huh, what do you mean?


Avery - happy to play M'44 with you if you are up for it. I'm a VassAl newb too so we can learn together!

After receiving your opponent's logfile you have to run through it.

I never actually forgot to do that. What I however did a couple of times was doing my moves without recording them.

Schweig! wrote:

After receiving your opponent's logfile you have to run through it.

I never actually forgot to do that. What I however did a couple of times was doing my moves without recording them.

I've done both of those. Probably even at the same time.

If you're sending game save files, (.vsav instead of .vlog) you don't step through them, but that's bad because the guy on the other end may not know how you got to where you are now.

With log files, you watch the little pieces move around, ideally synced with the notes about what's going on. In a big game where lots of pieces may move in one player's turn, it's critical.

edit: Oh, and Simon can attest that my specialty mistake is sending the wrong game's move file as an attachment.

Apparently I don't know how to use Vassal as well as I thought I did.

I only use it for solo play. When you guys use it for non-live-online play, do you just email the log file (vlog) and is it sufficient to pick up where your opponent left off, or do you need to send the vsav file as well? After you play the log all the way through it appears you can pick up from there and play. Is that correct?

S.

Everything I know about Vassal I've learned by playing Here I Stand with F:ATties.

Yes, in a multi-player email you just send the vlog file. You load that up, step through the previous player's moves, and then Vassal will helpfully remind you "End of logfile. Do you want to start a new logfile?" Then you start recording, do your moves, stop recording, and send that new vlog file to everyone. If you want to watch multiple player's logs you run the first one, then use "Load continuation" to load up the next one. Reading them out of order is a recipe for disaster.

For solo play using savefiles would be much simpler. Although if you were recording at the same time you could watch the replay of the game at the end.

I'm trying it out right now. I think I'll use the vlog file from now on. I'd like to use this via PBEM since it's rare that I can dependably sit down to a long session with someone, but I haven't given it a shot yet. I imagine it's better for some games than others. Battle Cry or Memoir would likely work reasonably well, Warriors of God likely would crash and burn because of the initiative phase and the combat fight/retreat decisions. Wooden Ships & Iron Men has simultaneous movement rules . . . that's a No.

Maybe this will be my ticket into GCACW titles.

Thanks for the tips.

S.

Not Sure wrote:

If you want to watch multiple player's logs you run the first one, then use "Load continuation" to load up the next one.

How does one do this?

I'm digging in it right now. When you install Vassal you get a user guide that's pretty doggone short and well written. On my standard install it appears as C:\Program Files\VASSAL\doc\userguide\userguide.pdf.

I'm on page 9 and 10 which explains how to play be email. With it installed I'm able to just double-click on a file with a .vlog extension and Vassal pops open and picks up the game at the beginning of my opponent's turn. There's a little Play button in the menu bar on my Valor & Victory module and each click on it steps me through the previous player's log.

So, you'll get a log from the previous player as an email attachment. You double click on it and step through what they did. When it finishes you start your own log, make your moves, add a bit of text to explain anything you need to, and when you're done you select End Logfile from the menu. Mail that to your opponent and the loop starts again.

I'd imagine that if you're playing with more than two players you'd all mail your move to everyone else, and as the game progresses you'd just have them all pile up in a directory so that you can step through as many previous turns as you like.

Pretty simple now that I look at the details. Vassal has gotten much better than when I started with it three or four years ago.

S.

Sag has it precisely. From our six-player game of HIS (in Turn 6 at the moment), I have a couple hundred small vlog files.

If I were dedicated (and I haven't lost any), I could restep through the entire game.

"Load Continuation" is right there in the File menu with "Save", "Begin Logfile" and "End Logfile".

One thing of note is that the text comments are synced with the moves. So it's common to say "moving Henry + 4 troops to Antwerp" in the text, then do it with the pieces. Then if you have another move, type "Charles to Paris with 5 mercs", and do that on the board. When the other player steps the log, he'll see the text, then see the pieces move. It acts as a double-check for sanity, and lets you know what's going on.

In a game with multiple screens like Here I Stand, stuff may be moving on the religious marker board, and if you don't have that one open you won't see it happening. A simple note like "flipping debaters" tells the other players to pay attention there if they care about that step.

What's Load Continuation do exactly? Just leat you load another log file?