Trade unit prototypes, trade world maps and give units to another player.

[Kataphraktoi]

Is it even physically possible to win a multiplayer game? Recalling back to the old rule about not taking a players last base, but instead posting the pic proving you could take it, and then that player must destroy the base and save and exit on to the next player to continue the game. Because if you actually killed a player on your turn, it is or was impossible to continue playing.

Most games i recall ending when victory was clearly inevitable and the towel was thrown in by the remaining players. The only game i remember winning was actually BE2 pbem where i launched a orbital drop attack using the graviton theory technology(to avoid my opponent knowing i had constructed the orbital space elevator) and took 1\3 of his bases in a single turn this way...he never posted again in the thread or answered pms\emails so i guess i won  Although it doesnt count for much, as i replaced in.

In summary i would say some corny BS like winning and losing has no meaning and all that matters is the process of playing 
In order for a ELO(or any ranking system) to have much relevance, requires a fair number of results, and the glacial rate of PBEM makes finishing games rare


On the topic of trading prototypes, in the ACDG2 the drones swapped control of a plasma infantry unit for one turn to the hive to give them 3 defense ability, but maybe they were allied at that point and not trading.

[Yitzi]

Is it even physically possible to win a multiplayer game? Recalling back to the old rule about not taking a players last base, but instead posting the pic proving you could take it, and then that player must destroy the base and save and exit on to the next player to continue the game. Because if you actually killed a player on your turn, it is or was impossible to continue playing.

If you can find me a link, perhaps I can investigate and see what's going on there and fix the bug...

to avoid my opponent knowing i had constructed the orbital space elevator

How could he not know you had the Space Elevator?  It's a project; who has it is publicly visible.

In summary i would say some corny BS like winning and losing has no meaning and all that matters is the process of playing

But if you're not playing to win, it's not really the same game.

In order for a ELO(or any ranking system) to have much relevance, requires a fair number of results, and the glacial rate of PBEM makes finishing games rare

I see no reason PBEM needs to be so slow...a 24-hour posting time with limited pre-arranged suspensions (for when you won't be able to do it for more than 24 hours in a row) would make it go at a halfway decent pace, and there's no rule that you can have only one game going at a time.

Also, ranking systems should be a decent approximation fairly quickly (especially if you can get a ranking advantage by taking a handicap), even if they'll take a long time to be really good.

On the topic of trading prototypes, in the ACDG2 the drones swapped control of a plasma infantry unit for one turn to the hive to give them 3 defense ability, but maybe they were allied at that point and not trading.

Yeah, you can always give a unit instead of giving a prototype.

[Kirov]

My point about the COOP victory was only about diplomacy and trade. What I meant is that in SMAC, you don't get to see any perma-alliances along the lines of: "I give you everything I have, you give me everything you have, we roll the others over and call it a day". No, the absolute best-case scenario for you is "we share some resources to eliminate everyone else, then we fight it out between the two of us". This is actually completely different dynamics, as you may still get backstabbed by your partner at any moment. This in turn makes you cautious and prevents any "we fight as one" scenarios. You are wary with the stuff you trade away, especially of strategic importance, and the risk of any exchange becoming OP is driven down to zero, by the magic of your common sense.

If anything, SMAC players should be encouraged to talk, negotiate and trade more. Only in exceptional cases I see any intensive, vibrating, anything-can-happen diplomacy. Part of it is because players are busy with work and child rearing, but some of it is because in certain periods of game there's not that much interesting stuff to trade in. Hence, I fully support any additional diplomatic option, literally anything which gives you more chips at the table, as long as it's not game-breaking.

And if prototype trading can be considered OP and banned, then giving 5000 EC should be banned as well, and I don't see anyone voting for that. The entire point of proto trade is not to avoid higher tech costs, there is actually much more to that. In the MP game, after you contacted someone (and I assume you did before launching an assault), you can always check if they have the same techs you have. Click on the option 'Share techs' and those you both have are marked with '(already has)'. Again, this takes place even if you don't infiltrate that player. So let's say you play Zak and has Sparta as a neighbour. For you, it's enough to research AP and NLM (at much lower cost than Sparta) and watch when/if Sparta gets the same tech. Once they do get NLM, voila! High time to prototype yours and get ready for defence. But if you see that Sparta researched IndBase and then InfNet (you have both already, don't you?), then you can take a deep breath and relax. You're completely safe.

Now, just imagine that Sparta met somebody else and took the 4-1-2 prototype, soon pouring rovers in through the borders of an unsuspecting Zak... My God, yes, I'm all for that. Please make it an option, guys, or at least send it to somebody who knows how to implement it!!! The game can only benefit from that.

[Yitzi]

Ok, it seems to be popular enough that I'll accept it as a vote-on for a later project.  It's not making the short list, though.

[Kataphraktoi]

If you can find me a link, perhaps I can investigate and see what's going on there and fix the bug...

From every PBEM ever? It should be easy to verify from a 4 player pbem game that killing one of the other players then trying to continue, will eventually result in a turn being created to send to that deceased player, but he cannot play and continue the turn, being dead. Thats all from memory though.

Edit:I tried it out to see what would happen with a game i recently made for Kirov vs Tras PBEM. I recreated the scenario with a few changes, put mk3 ogres near player2s start position and played both as Kirov\Tras and added one of the AI as a third human. After playing a few turns forward, i advanced and destroyed the believers and got the usual eradication message, a score and map recap, and got kicked back to the main menu! And the third player, who could have been a human in a PBEM, would not be given a savegame to continue playing with because i simply wasnt presented with the choice to make a save game-as if i just won it all. Using scient patch.

[Kataphraktoi]

I was going to add on that i have never managed to kill a human in PBEM, but then i remembered this old game from apolyton where i killed 3 people in a 4 player game;Fast and Furious PBEM
You can see the process we used in that game of posting a screenshot to prove the defeat of a human.

[Yitzi]

It shouldn't be too hard to test and hunt down the bug and fix it; I probably won't do it in 2.4 (as I want to get that out sooner because it includes a very important bugfix), but it'll probably be done in 2.5.