Spring RTS Engine

Warlord Zsinj wrote:I'd be really disappointed if this didn't have a multiplayer mode; something of this design definitely needs the ability to play against other humans, otherwise it would feel like a cop out.

Q. I wonder how the game would resolve this complex example: Player A sends units back in time and destroys player B's factories. Before the timewaves reach the present, player B sends his army back in time and destroys player A's factories.
A. This is definitely a paradox. It will oscillate between these two states. If you're as good of a player as you claim, you might be able to time everything just so such that the paradox falls off the timeline in your favor. At worst, it's worth trying, as you have a 50-50 shot of getting your units back. While I told the person whose head was exploding that such paradoxes aren't too common in games, they can definitely happen much more frequently in games between advanced players (if we crank up the AI difficulty to 11, this does happen frequently).

Q. Dude, paradoxes?! You know, grandfather paradox, units fighting side by side?
A. Paradoxes can exist, but since the window of time is limited (e.g., an 8 minute window) all events eventually fall off. A paradox will oscillate between its different states until one of the states reaches the edge of the time window, leaving the players locked into one of the two states. Example: in the case of the grandfather paradox (where you use a factory to build a tank, have the tank time travel to before it was built, and then use it to destroy the factory) you will play with the paradox until it 'falls off' the time window, at which point there is a 50/50 chance of either the tank lives and the factory is destroyed, or the factory remains and the tank was never created. All paradoxes are nicely resolved with time.