Traditionally, PHost has the myth of being much more complex,
much harder to set up and to use than HOST, for both host and player side.
This document tries to help those who use PHost for the first
time, to see it's not actually that hard.
At some places, mainly combat, it is indeed a bit more
complicated than the standard VGA Planets host. PHost replaces
parts of the VGA Planets host side, so some changes must be done to
the client side, too. But once you've set up everything -- which is
easier than you might think -- it will work seamlessly.
These are the major areas where PHost differs from the standard
host:
-
Combat. PHost does combat different than the standard
host. Due to the way combat works, you must watch PHost combat
with a different program than "normal" combat.
-
Configuration. Instead of a hconfig.hst
file and a menu-driven configuration editor, PHost uses the
pconfig.src text file.
-
Extended Missions. PHost offers a few more ship
missions. Players must be able to set those.
-
UTILx.DAT. In addition to the normal RST files,
UTILx.DAT contains all the information players
receive by message, plus some more information for use by
client-side programs.
-
Additional features. PHost has some additional
features you should be aware of. This is more a matter of
knowledge than programs.
-
Differences. Some rules are handled differently than
in Host. Some subtle tricks don't work, some new subtleties were
added. This is also more a matter of knowledge than code.
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Unlike in the early days of PHost, many current client programs
explicitly support PHost, or can be configured to do so.
Essentially, PHost combat files (VCRx.DAT) must be interpreted
differently than standard combat files. The standard combat viewer
for PHost is PVCR, a DOS program. This is an issue for client
programs and combat simulators.
-
Winplan does not support PHost combat. You
must not run Winplan's combat viewer (VCR) for
PHost-generated battles. Winplan will either crash or display
complete nonsense. You must either run PVCR manually, or try the
rather new PlayVCR
package. The same
goes for VPUtil.
-
DOS Planets does not know how to play
PHost combat, but we can replace its VCR player with PVCR.
-
VPA 3.51d and later know how to call PVCR when
needed. In some versions after that, this ability was broken, but
got back again in 3.60f.
-
PCC 0.99.9 and later, and all CCBSim versions based on
it have a pirate copy :-) of PVCR built-in.
-
BSim has PVCR built in.
-
EchoView's simulator has PVCR built in, too.
- Get the resource.pln file from the DOS version
of VGA Planets (shareware or registered), and copy it into your
main Winplan/VPA directory. If you use VPA, you should already have
that file.
- Get the PVCR distribution from the PHost home page and unzip
it into your Winplan/VPA directory, too.
- To view a PHost-generated battle, open a DOS box
and type
In this command, "3" is your player number and "vpwork5" is the
game directory (here: Winplan game slot 5). You may want to
create a shortcut or batch file for that command.
-
(v4.0f:) If you use Winplan, you can also simply
invoke PVCR from your Winplan directory (using a shortcut icon
maybe); PVCR has a simple built-in game selector.
VPA will automatically call PVCR when needed, but Winplan will
not. Do not use the "VCR" button in Winplan; that button
might crash Winplan.
- Get the PVCR distribution from the PHost home page and unzip
it into your planets directory.
- Copy vcr.exe to
vcrold.exe using a command such as (surprise!)
Only do this the first time you install PVCR.
- Copy pvcr.exe to vcr.exe
When you hit the "VCR" button in planets.exe,
you'll now get dropped into PVCR if the battles were generated
by PHost, and into the normal VCR if the were generated by the
Wisseman host.
PlayVCR is a rather new, advanced VCR player which runs
natively under Windows (and other operating systems).
- Get the PlayVCR distribution
.
Normally you want the version with Winplan integration.
Install it. The installation program will ask you for the
directory you installed Winplan in. It will replace your
winplan.exe with a small program that hooks PlayVCR
into Winplan.
- When you hit Winplan's "VCR" button, you'll get PlayVCR.
Sit back and watch :-) PlayVCR also plays "standard" combat.
If you want PlayVCR for another operating system, get the
source code and compile it yourself. Instructions are included.
All major client programs except DOS Planets support extended
missions. The standard method is a file mission.ini
which defines all these missions.
-
Winplan supports extended missions via the
mission.ini file. Actually, Winplan introduced this
mechanism.
-
DOS Planets does not support extended missions.
-
VPA supports mission.ini
-
PCC comes with PHost mission definitions
pre-configured, and also supports mission.ini
The file mission.ini is part of the PHost
distribution. You can probably also obtain it from your host. All
you need to do is to copy it into your game directory. You can
then select the extended missions from the mission menu.
When you can not use mission.ini, you can still
set extended missions using the
extmission command. To
set an extended mission, write a message to yourself containing
the line
Here, 123 is the ship Id, 32 is the mission number, and 4 and 9
are the parameters. This directs PHost to set the mission for
you. Note that this will override the mission you set in the normal ship
screen! As a reminder, set the mission on the ship screen to
something you normally don't use, say, Explore. Since
planets.exe won't let you edit messages afterwards, it
makes sense to collect these commands on a sheet of paper and
send them afterwards as a group.
utilx.dat contains all the information from your
sub-space messages, and some more. If you have a program which
supports utilx.dat files, it will benefit from the
added information by providing you more reliable displays.
PHost can send you files through utilx.dat.
One important file sent this way is the configuration file
pconfig.src. When you request such a file using the
send command, you need a program to extract
it. If you cannot do that, obtain the files from your host manually.
-
Winplan and DOS Planets do not support
util.dat nor pconfig.src.
-
VPA 3.51 reads file transfers, and a few other parts of
utilx.dat; VPA 3.61 reads many more parts. It also reads
pconfig.src.
-
PCC reads most parts of utilx.dat. File
transfers are handled during unpacking. It also reads
pconfig.src.
-
EchoView reads almost all utilx.dat parts.
It also reads pconfig.src.
In general, you have to place the utilx.dat and
pconfig.src file in the game directory for the
programs to find it.
Most features of PHost are designed to work with all client
versions.
More than 500 Minefields are, at the time of this
writing, only supported by PCC and EchoView. For VPA users,
there's a workaround (VPA10k
). I guess
this feature is not widely used anyway.
Remote Control and PlayerRace games, as well as
extensive Hull function editing, can cause client programs
to guess wrong about whether you are allowed to do your special
mission (mission 9) or to cloak (mission 10).
- With all programs, you can use the replacement extended
missions instead.
-
VPA supports PlayerRace, check the file
races.ini for details. VPA 3.61a and later also
supports remote control. If it still won't let you set
the missions you need, enable the DullMissions
option in vpa.ini, VPA will then let you set any
mission. Very recent versions support most of PHost's current
hull functions.
-
PCC supports remote control and PlayerRace.
PlayerSpecialMission and the new hull function
abilities are supported in recent versions. You can always enter
any mission through the "Extended mission" window.
More than 50 Targets (scanned enemy ships) are more
common with PHost than with (older) Wisseman hosts due to the
alliance feature. Newer Wisseman hosts also have a comparable thing
("FF allies").
-
DOS Planets users can only see 50 ships, period. This
is a limitation of the program which can't be removed. The same
holds for shareware Winplan.
-
Winplan (registered) can display any number of targets.
Reportedly, it has problems displaying the 50th target (or
some-such), but all the others will be displayed just fine.
-
VPA, PCC and EchoView can display all
targets.
Because of the DOS Planets limitation, PHost will only send 50
targets when you submit a TRN file that seems to be made by
DOS Planets. When you're not actually using DOS Planets, you can
request to be sent all targets using the
bigtargets command resp. the
AllowMoreThan50Targets configuration option. Note that
you must not unpack such results with DOS Unpack, use
VPUnpack or the built-in unpacker of
VPA or PCC instead. Alternatively, compile your turns and unpack
your results with registered Winplan or equivalent.
More than 500 Ships are handled by PHost in the very same
way as in Host999. Every client that handles Host999 should also
be able to deal with PHost configured to more than 500 ships.
- There is a version of DOS Planets with 999 ships support.
- Recent Winplan versions support 999 ships.
-
VPA 3.58, PCC 1.0.11 and
EchoView 1.2.14a (and later versions) support Host999.
PHost has some features that might be dangerous when you don't
know about them.
- When you enable an alliance to someone else, you should be
fully aware of the implications of that alliance. One pitfall is
the ship-level alliance: by default, all your ships are
remote-controllable. When you offer ship level to someone, he
will be able to take control over all your ships. The best
counter-action for this is to forbid remote control for your
ships at the beginning of the game; send a message to yourself
containing the following:
remote forbid default
remote forbid 1
remote forbid 12 |
The first line disables remote control for all ships you will
build in the future, the other two disable remote control for
your first ships (change the Id numbers as appropriate).
Shameless plug: when you have to do that for many more ships,
PCC
can generate the "remote forbid" commands automatically for
all ships.
- Likewise, a planet-level alliance will allow the ally to
freely beam up stuff from your planets. He can even clone his
ships on your bases - you pay and he gets the ship. Beware.
- When you use alternate combat, simulation results from HOST
simulators will be worthless. In particular, do not use VPA's or
Winplan's built-in simulator for alternate combat. For
non-alternate combat, results will come close but not be exact
either.
-
BSim 2.1 supports PHost 2. It will
yield accurate results most of the time, but doesn't support
all PHost 3 peculiarities.
-
CCBSim
supports PHost 3; since
version 1.1.4 it also supports PHost 4. However,
it has problems handling very long fights.
- When you're taking over for someone, and receive sub-space
messages in a strange language you don't understand, you can
usually change the language back to English (or whatever you
prefer) by sending a command message
Traditionally, programs have been scanning subspace messages to
figure out certain information. For example, to display
minefields, programs read your subspace mail for messages from
your ships saying "we have laid N mines at (X,Y)". This only works
when you use English messages. When you set your messages to
another languages, the programs will no longer understand them.
This is also the reason why English messages read a bit strange
sometimes: we will not change them to not break message
scanners. If your program does not rely on message
scanning, you can switch to your native tongue, or to "NewEnglish"
(PHost 3.4c and later) using the
language command.
Programs that need message scanning:
-
VPA before version 3.61
- Informer
- iron-age versions of PCC and EchoView
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Hosting with PHost is not much different than with the Wisseman
hosts. Due to the greater configurability, you can easily over-do
it, though, and you can easily get lost in all those switches. The
main differences are:
-
Configuration is way different.
- You have to send out utilx.dat files to your players.
-
Add-ons ("auxhost" programs) work slightly different.
PHost does not come with a menu-driven configuration program
like the Wisseman host. PHost is configured via a text file,
pconfig.src. (If someone told you you had to
"compile" that file: this is no longer true in PHost 3 and
later.)
You can edit this file with any text editor of your choice
("Edit" under DOS, "Notepad" under Windows).
You don't usually make a new pconfig.src file from
scratch. Instead, take one of the files shipped with PHost and
edit it to suit your needs (this is like hitting the D key
("defaults") in hconfig.exe and editing one or two
parameters). If you want to do your players a favor, add some
comments that describe what you changed.
Normally, you should leave the player-modifiable parameters
(like Language, AllowMoreThan50Targets, ...) at
their defaults and let the players edit them themselves using
command messages.
You should send utilX.dat files to your players,
along with their RST files. You'll probably have to modify your
hosting scripts to allow that.
The best way probably is to pack each player's RST and
utilX.dat into a zip file and send that. This will
reduce the file sizes, and increase the probability that the file
arrives undamaged.
Most add-ons written for the Wisseman host work with PHost, too.
All PHost versions for DOS, and PHost 3.x and later on all
platforms, use the same file formats as the original host.
- PHost runs the auxhost1.ini,
auxhost2.ini and auxbc.ini files in the
same way HOST does. PHost does not run auxhostN.bat
and auxhostN.exe, though.
- PHost does not automatically run the auxbatt.ini
file. When you need that, you can easily configure it: set the
parameter
Combat = Replace auxbatt.ini |
in the
pcontrol section in pconfig.src.
- PHost does not support TacCom. TacCom generates a different
TRN file format.
-
Sphere is already built into PHost
(AllowWraparoundMap). You should not use external Sphere-type
programs with PHost.
- PHost versions 3.x and before treat nextturn.hst
differently from the original host. Programs which need this file
may not work reliably.
- Some add-ons need hconfig.hst, the HOST
configuration file, to function. This applies to the Dan&Dave
add-ons, for example. For those, you have to manually create that
file using hconfig.exe.
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This document is maintained by The Portable Host Project
(support@phost.de).
Last updated 03 September 2006.