Offline play and associated issues

[Xenorath]

Hi

So I've been playing FA kinda forever but only really as the original vanilla mod. I discovered FAF about a year or so agoish and I really do think its a solid balance and play upgrade mod. In 2 weeks time I'll be part of a huge LAN and would like to host a SupComm FA tourney.

The biggest issue is that all play will occur OFFLINE so i just want to confirm the intended behavior of the FAF mod with the wisdom of the forum.

If I want to get players to play FAF offline who have only ever had vanilla:
--> They should have the vanilla install and just run the FAF install. Will this allow different versions of FA vanilla to be played against each other (since afaik all actual gameplay is moderated by the FAF mod)
--> LAN lobbies shouldn't be a problem but is there a way to potentially upload any games to the vault after-the-fact? Or if theres a really solid final match would I have to upload it if it were to be cast.
--> FAF allows spectators to watch via the live-ish replay functionality. Can this be recreated for FAF-offline?

Xenorath

[ColonelSheppard]

--> Yes, but be aweare that you cannot start FAF without Internet, and while you CAN start the FAF version without internet (from the FA exe in the FAF folder) you cannot start it without having had connected FAF to the internet at least once because you need to download the files that are later stored in programdata/faf/gamedata, maybe cou are just able to copy them, but i am not sure about that
---> I don't know to be honest, you have to try out if these games are saved as replay files/are automaticly saved
---> No (I mean yes ofc everything can be recreated/emulated if you have the knowledge but not as a trivial manner)

[Deering]

It would be best if people could preinstall faf so they can download the files like sheppard mentioned. You could probably just copy the files manually from your faf folder to theirs. Not sure how well it would work.

Games from the offline version of faf are not automatically saved and I don't know of any functionality that would allow them to be uploaded. Furthermore if you manually save them after the game they are saved as SCFAreplays not fafreplays. Which greatly limits their replay-ability.

You can have observers, there will be no way to watch live replays.

The offline faf exe basically works the way standard forged alliance did but with updated stats. You won't be able to use any functionality of the faf lobby itself.

[ColonelSheppard]

One more thing: If everybody does have FAF installed and correctly updated, the internetbandwith needed to play would be minimal because even when you start the game via FAF the connection should be directly via lan. (I noticed this once when everybody but the guy that was also in my network lost connection)

[Xenorath]

Thanks both of you.

Sadly getting pre installs will not be a guaranteed option but I can try encourage it.
Luckily the LAN will have a connection out but it wont be for gaming - so getting updated and the once off authentication shouldn't be an issue.
As for watching a live replay its likely that I will just be a single observer and project the finals onto a screen. Maybe do some commentary if a crowd gathers at all.

If there is a decent game i'll save the SCFAreplay and offer it to the casters but I remain reserved as to the actual quality of the games

Thanks again

[Deering]

No problem,

Hopefully you get some people into faf