Bugs

From Eressea

Do not be alarmed that there is an entire section devoted to this topic. The number of bugs in Eressea is low, and we try to keep it that way. The ones that we are aware of, we try to fix as soon as possible.

How to Deal With Bugs

It is not possible to rerun a turn for an individual player. It's either all the players or none of them. Because of this, reruns are rarely ever done, and only if the bug affects a large number of players and is deemed threatening to their existence. Even then, it's still a decision that's made by the game masters alone, and is not guarenteed.

If you can't live with this, stop reading now.

There are several good reasons against reruns. Many players start with their orders as soon as they get the report. Announcing a rerun 24 hours later means they all have to start from scratch, destroying something on the order of 100 hours of work that's already been put into the next weeks turn. More importantly though, a rerun also means additional costs for the GM's, both time and money.

If your losses due to a confirmed bug are extremely severe, you can sometimes get silver or units as a replacement. Since this also amounts to extra work for the GM, there's no guarantee for this either.

Reporting a Bug

If you encounter a bug, no matter how serious it may seem, please report it. But first, read the manual again. Many of the reported "bugs" stem from simple misunderstandings. Check if there were any recent announcements about the kind of bug you reported. Don't report known bugs. If you can, please ask experienced players if what you see is really a bug. If you find out it is, or if you're really, really sure, send it to the developers, together with a good bug report.

A good bug report should include:

• Your faction's id.
• The ids of all involved units, ships, or other objects.
• Messages from the report that are relevant to the event.
• The full name of the region it occurred in.
• A cutout from the text report of the region, or the relevant parts of the region.
• Orders for the units involved.

Use Mantis to report an issue by providing this information including a detailed description. Do not send all of your orders, the full report or the computer report. That's usually far too much information. We try to reply to all bug reports, but sometimes it might take a while.

Cheating and Exploits

First things first: Cheating gets you banned.

Cheating spoils the game for everybody. We consider the following to be cheating:

Sending orders for another faction.

The exception being vacation replacements. If you are going on vacation, and somebody else sends in your orders during this time, please make this visible to the GMs and other players using the EMAIL and BANNER orders.

Playing more than one faction.

This is by far the form of cheating that's been practiced most. We have had to kick countless players because of it. Playing more than one faction, sometimes called "mule'ing", gives you an unfair advantage over other players, and will not be tolerated. Every player shall send in orders for at most one faction. Sharing your password with another player so he can send in orders for your units is not allowed either, except if that player does not have a faction of his own.

Once your faction has reached an age of at least 150 turns, it is allowed to start an additional faction.

Taking over an existing faction.

Taking over an existing faction is forbidden. If you quit the game you have to take care that your friends receive all your resources before your faction is deleted. Only in the case of vacations it is allowed to give your faction to another player, but you have to show this using the BANNER order.

Exploiting bugs in the program.

Knowledge of some bugs could give you a huge advantage if you use it. Bugs should be reported immediately. Using them to your advantage will get you banned from the game.

Abusive social behavior

Eressea started as a game among friends. For a long time, a paragraph like this was unnecessary. Eressea has grown, and while we still think of all the players as nice people, and many have become good friends, not all of them are. Be nice to each other. Even your worst enemy in the game is probably a great person.