Playing Duals: Tips for the Trade War Newbie

In early days, most players of Trade Wars had

‘duals’, that is; they played two characters;

one Good, one Evil.

An “Evil” might pod “Good” for alignment, (or

vice versa) or help the other out of a jam.

No one objected, cause everyone had duals.

In tournaments, using Duals disqualify you.

Players, aware their IP would be captured,

would play the other character at work or

school.

Very often, undetected, hence, the existence

of duals can not be prevented when one uses

different computers/servers/proxies, etc.

The risk is, of course, if your are discovered

using Duals, you will be kicked off. Some Sysops

will lock out your IP address(es).

Sometimes, alas, even the best players “cheat”.

For example, OD has his good ship at the

Stardock. He has transported to a crap ship

to bring it forward to sell.

Maybe he runs out of turns or the crap ship is

blown, (fill in any scenario), but at midnight,

anything unmanned parked at the Stardock is

repossessed. OD’s expensive ISS is gone unless

it can be towed from the Stardock.

As OD created a Corp at virtual log in, he creates

a dual, DO, who simply tows that ISS from the StarDock.

That’s all.

As soon as the ISS is safe, OD abandons

that dual.

It’s inactivity causes it to be removed from the game.

The Dual “DO” has not really interfered in play.

Academically, OD’s loss of such a good ship might

substantially weaken him to the extent another

player could take advantage.

Realistically, whether OD is at the Stardock or some

other place in the Universe at midnight is of little

effect on other players.

One would not expect OD to be penalised if his “dual”

was discovered.

However, if OD goes to town with DO, using

it’s turns, having it do the dog’s body work;

he is cheating.

If you think someone is playing two characters

you can inform the Sysop or ask other players

if they’d all like a dual, while alerting the

Admin; basically saying; if OD has a dual,

why can’t we all have a dual?

In old days, with one Server and you telnetting

from your BBS, playing two characters, good/evil

was how you learned.

Today, with dozens of Servers holding dozens

of games, it’s far wiser to log on to one game

and play evil, log on to another and play good.

After all, you don’t really gain by cheating

when there are good players, capable of

destroying “both” of you.

Think of it like this; if you can’t play one

character properly with the 250 or so turns,

playing two doesn’t help you.?