Doing some authentication with Steam would be much more work than what we are willing to put into the Company Tool right now. In the probably far future, we plan on using a different kind of database that is more suitable for games to talk to, though it of course also works fine for websites. The plan is to switch the Company Tool over to using this database system instead of the type of database we are currently using. This will allow the game to directly communicate with the Company Tool, allowing us to store various ingame stats which can then be seen on the Company Tool and also in the game itself. It will probably also make it much easier for the Company Tool to verify if somebody actually own the game. It will however require the entire backend of the Company Tool that communicates with the database to be reworked into the syntax the new database system uses. This is also one of the reasons why we hesitate to add more functionality to the Company Tool as the more stuff we add, the harder it will be to eventually transition to the database system the game can talk to.
On another note,
During the weekend I have been working on getting the new automatic disbanding of companies working. Currently it seems like its nearly fully working, though I will have to look through it again tommorow and do some more tests as we really dont want active companies to be disbanded by accident
The way the code is currently set up to behave is like this. (I will be referring to the "Company Staff" multiple times in the following. Here's an explanation of what "Company Staff" is. If you are an admin for your company in the Company Tool, there is a setting where you can specify which minimum rank gets admin rights, Captain, 1st Lieutenant, 2nd Lieutenant and so on.. Any member of the company at this rank or above is identified as part of the company staff. You are also part of the company staff if you are designated as the "owner" of the company.)
When we launch the automatic disbandment system. For all companies where none of their staff has signed in for the last 30 days, their staff will receive an email notifying them that if none of the companys staff sign in during the next 60 days, their company will automatically get disbanded.
If 30 days pass and there is still no staff member that has signed in, then the company staff gets a second email saying they now have 30 days to sign in or their company will get disbanded.
If 55 days pass and there is still no staff member that has signed in, then the company staff gets a third email saying they now have 5 days to sign in or their company will get disbanded.
If 59 days pass and there is still no staff member that has signed in, then the company staff gets a fourth email saying they now have 1 day to sign in or their company will get disbanded.
If one of the staff members signs in during this 60 day period, an email is sent to the entire company staff, notifying them that their company is no longer at risk of being disbanded for the time being. The email will also state which staff member was the one who logged in and saved the company (future promotion incoming
).
If no staff member logs in during the 60 day period, then the company gets disbanded and each member of the company will receive an email stating that the company has been disbanded due to an inactive staff.
This will then cycle again and again for the time to come, the only difference is that it wont tell you that you have 60 days to sign in but instead, when somebody signs in, you are good for 30 days. Then when these 30 days have passed and if no staff member has signed in, the staff will get an email stating you have 30 days to sign, so still 60 days in total from the last staff sign in until the company is disbanded.
It is also important to mention that for the time being, this effect will be active an ALL companies, mustering companies and formed companies.
You are all free to comment on these rules and the timings of emails and time it takes to get disbanded. We dont want to be too harsh on the timings, in case all staff members were on a long holiday or whatever and missed the emails, but we also want the cleanup of the Company Tool to happen relatively soon.