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I haven't gotten to PVP yet in Scourge... I'm making sure all the general underlying fighting framework is working first, then I'll put the PVP layer on top of it. But the way I'm planning it, is to have a separate table for PVP fights that stores enough info to pull the appropriate userrows. User 1 submits an action, and all the math is done to User 2's userrow and the table is set so that it's supposed to be User 2's turn. User 2 then has X seconds to make their action before the fight times out and User 1 gets counted as winning, and the process repeats. And basically, the fight page would refresh every X seconds and check to see if the other user has completed their action yet - if yes, they get their command input page, otherwise they get a "still waiting" page.



Admittedly, the problem with this is that it draws out fights. They're not instantaneous like the purely server-based monster fights are. But since PHP doesn't really have much in the way of a "server push" ability, that's the best method I can think of. With the little iframe to check, it would be possible to make the update checker go faster without denting bandwidth much (since the in-iframe page could be essentially empty), but it'd still be a drain on the processor. Most hosts aren't really going to be thrilled about a script that runs database queries every three seconds. Such is the inherent problem with browser-based games... without writing your own client and server, you're limited to what other apps can handle.


---Jamin

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Dude, I think I so have the answer for you. AJAX.

I use IPB forum software and the next release uses something that may handle what you're looking for. The ability to update without refresh.

Still would be a teeny delay, ie, a few seconds or so before the data is retrieved (instead of non-stop queries), but instead of the page refreshing those seconds, it would only update when necessary.