Comments

Pressing the "Comment" button will allow you to enter a comment at any point in the game.  Comments will also be required whenever combat is declared or resolved, or a die is thrown.  Pressing "Save" at the bottom of the comment box will save the comment as part of the replay function.



Pressing the "Cancel" button will return to play without recording the comment.


The WarGame Processor uses a special feature of the comment function to allow players to secretly record option selections required for the game, and send them to their opponent without worrying if their opponent will cheat and read the selection before it's time to be revealed.  Pressing "Encrypt" will do the same as saving your comment, except you will be asked for a password. Passwords may be up to 8 letters long, and are case-sensitive.  You should be careful to record what a password for a comment was, and what the comment pertained to.  If you decide you don't want to encode the comment after you press this button, simply don't enter a password.  Once you enter your password, this comment will not be able to be read during playback unless the correct password is entered. The text will be encrypted in the saved game file to prevent prying eyes armed with sector editors from finding out your comment. 


For instance, a game might allow you to secretly deploy a number of submarines to sea without your opponent knowing how many there are until they attack. You would make that choice, record it as a comment and then encrypt it and send it to your opponent.  When the time comes to reveal your secret, you can give him your password, and he can verify that you aren't cheating, since he would have been in possession of your choice all along, even though he couldn't read it. 


Because someone might go back to review a turn and read a comment that he just acquired the password for, it might be considered a good practice to preface an encrypted comment with an unencrypted explanation of what you're hiding -- "The following comment is my submarine deployment."


The encryption logic uses a random hash table method.  It's reasonably secure and should withstand a casual effort to break it.  Of course it could not withstand a dedicated effort to break it, but the effort to do so would hardly be worthwhile.


You may wish to set your preferences (menu option "File ->Preferences") to cause a blank comment box to appear before every die roll.

Copyright © 2010, Sean Emerson

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