Re: [pbmserv-dev] First impressions - cribbage

[Chris Nash <chris_nash@prodigy.net>]

> 1. Would the program score the hands, or would there be an option to self declare hand
> points and have a "muggins" phase.  The muggins phase seems like it would be harder to
> program.  I'm also not sure how many people play the muggins variant (I don't).

While debugging I have remembered how hard cutthroat rules are - I had the program scoring for me
and trying to count hand after hand to make sure it would work sent me blind. The game plays
*very* quickly with the server doing all the auto moves, like the count. My first thought about
muggins was not to do it - this is PBeM, so you'd have up to 21 days to make sure you counted
right, therefore muggins wouldn't happen but the game would get tiresome. It's a bit different
from playing over the table!

> 2. What were your thoughts on how to show the hand as the cards were played?  Something
> like:
> A regular looking PBM move set:
> 
>     A       B    pts    score
> 1.  2D     7H     9
> 2.  7D            16    Pair - 2
> 
> 
> OR going accross the screen
> 
> A->   2D   ...   7D
>                  Pair-2
> 
> B->   ...  7H    ...
> 
> pts:  2    9     16

Right now I have the default that the PBeM code nicely provides - the history at the top, and
anything else I generate myself. So this move sequence might look like

It is B's turn.

     A           B
     1. ->       2. ->
     3. --       4. s:JS (2) (Auto)
     5. 2D       6. 7H
     7. 7D (2)

A played the seven of diamonds to make the count 16
and scores
     a pair       (7H 7D)
to peg 2.

Starter:                Table: (16)

jack of spades          two of diamonds
                        seven of hearts
                        seven of diamonds

B holds:

A: eight of spades
B: eight of clubs
C: nine of diamonds

Right now I'm working on a nice way to count the hand (which is an auto move right now without
muggins). That might look something like:

B scores the hand (JS) 7H 8S 8C 9D
     Fifteen-two,               (7H 8S)                2
     Fifteen-four,              (7H 8C)                2
     a pair,                    (8S 8C)                2
     and a double run of three  (7H 8S 8C 9D)          6
                                                      ==
                                             and pegs 12.

The trouble is, the last mail in a hand can be very noisy - there are usually auto moves for go,
last card, forced moves with one card left in the hand, the hand counts, and the crib count... I
told you it was fast-moving!