Can't Join Games

[matildathehun]

I mentioned this in the "Games Don't Load" thread, but now that that's fixed, this appears to be unrelated.

I can't join a Barbarosa game -- but only if I'm the last person. 5/6 slots filled, can't join. 4/5 slots filled, can't join. 4/6 slots filled - successfully joined.

Not sure if this is true for all games or just the Barbarosa map.

BTW, this isn't meant as a complaint by any means -- I know there is a lot of stuff happening in the background right now. Just wanted to flag this in case it wasn't a known issue.

Thanks,

-MTH

 

[NewSheriffInTown]

Hi MTH,

Yes you are correct, there was an issue with Barbarossa. Specifically, an issue with the last person trying to join a game. I'll give you the details if you're interested....

DETAILS:

When we launched Barbarossa, we forgot to add the "starting neutrals" rule. This was an issue because Barbarossa has 3 auto-deploy regions, and those regions need to start off as neutrals, because a player cannot start a game with a bonus region.

So when the last player tried to join a Barbarossa map, the computer randomly allocated regions to all the players, and 99% of the time, it would give an auto-deploy region to a player, which was not allowed, so the computer rejected the game, and removed the last player who tried to join. That's why a lot of the 4/5 and 5/6 player games would not start, because the computer kept placing players on bonus regions.

However, every once in a while, if you tried joining enough times, the computer would randomly give the auto-deploy region to a neutral, so the game would start, but that was just by chance, and you would have to try and join that game several times before something like that happened.

Either way, we fixed it by adding the "starting neutral" rule. Now the computer places neutral pieces on the 3 auto-deploy regions, and then allocates the rest of the board to the players, and everyone is happy!

TL;DR:

We fixed it!

Thanks for the report!

 

[matildathehun]

Thanks Sheriff.

I haven't done a whole lot of programming in my life, but enough to know that must have been a nightmare bug to track down! Glad it's fixed now.

-MTH