Old player wanting an update on this game...

I am unsure if the game still has mini dumps, but from what i've read it does not seem to be an issue anymore. As for the multiplayer community, it is a bit unwelcoming and small but during most games usual primetime hours there are people to play with.

1) Minidumps appear to be fixed; the last of the big minidump bugs was fixed in the last patch, and there haven't been reports of widespread issues since.

2) Yes, although it's somewhat divided between Diplomacy and Entrenchment.

Yes, for the most part.  About a month ago, a major cause of desyncs and minidumps was fixed.

Very sadly, no.  People still play the game online, but you can really only find players during North American prime times and it still takes patience to find a game.  Shortly after Diplomacy was released in early February, the online player counts dropped precipitously, perhaps because the community was divided, making it harder to find games.  If you travel 5 months back in time, you would have seen multiple 5v5 games played every night.  Here's an example of what I mean by low player counts.  Let's look at the online player counts for April 12, 9:40 pm U.S. EST on a Monday night (prime gaming time):

Regular/Entrenchment server:  36 players online.

Diplomacy server:  42 players online.

That makes 78 players total online, but they are split up.  Now, 5 months ago at this time, the number might have been 110 people online on one server (Regular/Entrenchment).  (The people on the Regular/Entrenchment server cannot see the people on the Diplomacy server and vice-versa.)  With 110 people on one server it wasn't too hard to find games but did require a little patience sometimes.

It's too bad that you gave up on Sins so early.  It has been improved tremendously since then, especially with the Entrenchment expansion.  Back when you played, only 20% of the players could host, etc.  Since then the hosting problems have been fixed and many people have enjoyed a great many Sins games, often without any minidumps.

I think you should give Sins another try.  See if you can find games for regular Sins.  You're probably near noob level at this point, and the good news is that there are many new players on Regular Sins.  Most of the pros, at least the ones who are still playing, purchased Diplomacy (which requires Entrenchment).  Of the three versions of the game, my guess is that Entrenchment is the least played now.

Note that you will need to download and install Impulse to be able to update your game so that you can play it online.  Impulse became Sins's form of DRM.

Thanks a lot for your responses guys, I appreciate it. I am still considering if I should purchase the micro expansions or not, however.

purchase the micro x packs they are worth every penny (though Diplomacy has taken a while to truly appreciate)

Value is relative.  If you only play the game in online multiplayer against human opponents and few people are playing it online, then it might not be worth it.  If you don't have much money, then it is a serious consideration.  If you're earning $70,000/year then go ahead and purchase Diplomacy; it won't harm you at all.

Entrenchment alone may not be worth $10 at this point because most of the people who had Entrenchment purchased Diplomacy, so few people play Entrenchment by itself.  Also, by default, it will be easier to fill games on regular Sins than Entrenchment since everyone who is online has regular Sins.  So, the question is whether it's worth $20 for Diplomacy.  It's a gamble because with the low player counts this game has, there isn't any guarantee that people will still be playing Diplomacy online in two or three months.

Look at that number I found on Monday night in the middle of prime time, just 42 people online for Diplomacy.  (That number is not out-of-the-ordinary nor are the player counts that much higher on the weekends.)  Half of those people are probably noobs playing friends-only comp stomps, which leaves about 21 people who actually want to play against human opponents.  With those kinds of numbers you might have to wait an hour or two to be able to fill a 2v2 or 3v3 game.  Not an illustrious 5v5, but a mere 2v2 or 3v3.  Is having to wait for a game like that really worth $20?  Personally, I don't think it is.  I love the game and I don't have any regrets about having dropped $60 on it over the years, but knowing what I know, if I only had regular Sins and I only wanted to play online multiplayer, I don't think I would want to spend $20 to be able to play Diplomacy.  (When Diplomacy came out, I already had Entrenchment, so I only had to spend $10 on it.)

One other point.  From what I can tell, Stardock does not like to lower the prices of its titles over time.  This means that Sins will probably not go on sale for $10 as its regular price nor that Trinity will come down to $20 for its regular price.  Perhaps their pricing model makes economic sense, I don't know, but don't expect to see a huge influx of new players anytime soon as a result of sale prices. 

As a current player, I would like an update on this game too.... even a hint of what problems the developers feel remain, or what direction they're working on?  Before the last micro-expansion was released it was clear that they were working on that.. then the sync bug was a priority.  Some kind of statement might help?

They have been very tight-lipped about their future plans for Sins.  It's almost impossible to read anything into it.  However, if they were planning another micro-expansion or a non-micro full expansion or a Sins-2, you would think that they would have said something about it already.  If anything, what you might be able to read into it is a conjectural guess that they might not have any further plans for Sins, or that they might be debating the possibility of not continuing the Sins franchise any further.

Hi,

           I just bought both expations but my origional game refuses to update to the final 1.19 version.  Without the patch I cannot install the 2 addons I just paid 20 dollars for.  It has been several days but I have not heard back from StarDock.  My origional games is on version 1.05 and is registered properly.  I just keep getting a "file size smaller than expected error" when it attempts to download the file.  I have reinstalled impulse, uninstalled AVG and windows defender, and reset the XML file in impulse prefrences, all things I that were suggested in the forums.  Sadly, this didnt work and since those posts were dated circa 2008 I would say this issue has been around a while.  I would definitly NOT recommend purchasing the 2 expantions as I have spent maybe 60 hours trying to get them installed to no avail.  I would pay shiping and handling at this point just to get the darn files on CD.  Thats been my experience thus far your milage may vary.  

The first thing you need to do is to download and install Impulse and then update your version of regular Sins to v1.191.  From there you should be able to download and install the add-ons.  Of course, you have to register your original copy of Sins with its CD-Key, etc.  If you're really having a problem, you could also email Ironclad at:  [email protected] (I think).