January 19, 2024

Episode 13 - A Brief History of Async TI4, with somno

39 minutes

somno joins the show to talk about the history and pre-history of the async TI4 server, from BoardGameGeek play-by-forum games 6 years ago, to getting all the image files loaded up for the maps, and seeing the community grow from 20 to 2000.

1:17 - Best thing I saw this week

3:12 - Tech of the week - Self-Assembly Routines

6:10 - somno!

7:00 - Starting on BGG forums, descriptions of early maps, needing a host/GM

9:36 - somno's intro to TI4

10:30 - On GMing early games and uploading all the image files

16:26 - On perfectionism

17:40 - Moving to Discord and the beginning of the bot (TerTerro)

22:30 - The community growth

25:20 - Shoutout to various developers, and the joy of both backend improvements and buttons

28:15 - Googley-eyed stroters, Jack-o-war suns, and cucumber fields

31:30 - On being an admin for a huge community

35:10 - Weird rules thing of the week

36:08 - Various updates

---------

Map images from somno:

PBF#1: https://cf.geekdo-images.com/guv2EVIJuqNSQDPsyG4xXg__original/img/Yk9Svwvq5nbjjd6KAt3Muk5BWJA=/0x0/filters:format(jpeg)/pic4041742.jpg

PBF#2: somno's first game as a host and the first iteration of his map file: https://cf.geekdo-images.com/aQBcLp0ajxOkdiW39YFHSQ__original/img/ish7C1f0gY96Zo9LwTEuFhpm3F4=/0x0/filters:format(jpeg)/pic4034391.jpg

PBF#5: second iteration of the map file. First tech board and planet overview. And the Sweet Candy colour. Theoretically no more status blocks needed at this point: https://cf.geekdo-images.com/CoKfnFSl9PzvbfzpY-Ffyw__original/img/ROvdB7dXjwhbAFA4IeD3dtDH2Wo=/0x0/filters:format(jpeg)/pic4307474.jpg

PBF#9: 8p game with some wacky house rules and a couple of custom tiles that still exist today and are in the bot: https://cf.geekdo-images.com/sqb0srJK8Nyded3LRFjoCA__original/img/Z_0vugCVEH5GdeVVR1OoO0Feb4A=/0x0/filters:format(jpeg)/pic4475849.jpg

PBF#43: the Ordinian Scenario from Codex I, featuring HolyTiSpoon as Nekro. Also a refined tech board I made somewhere in between. You can definitely see the roots of the tech board we have today: https://cf.geekdo-images.com/UGBTzR8QtwSAdvVlYCYczw__original/img/A6eZlANqwRV-h7f5RWMCndUSFeM=/0x0/filters:format(jpeg)/pic6029555.jpg

PBF#64, a full 5p PoK game on the final version of the map file. Several known faces here: https://cf.geekdo-images.com/JLw4rAXdEucrzBCXxcZiXA__original/img/eGK55nmu_wxpzqILiULHi8XojNc=/0x0/filters:format(jpeg)/pic6832767.jpg

...more