                                Concept : Time

NAME
   Time - ETUs, BTUs and ETL

Level: Expert

The  Empire clock counts Empire Time Units (ETUs), just like an ordinary clock
counts seconds.

There's always the same number of ETUs between updates (the "version"  command
shows how many).  ETUs automatically stretch or contract to maintain that when
updates  move  around  for some reason, say a change of schedule, or unplanned
downtime.

Because of the unique nature of Empire governments, (i.e. the decision  makers
spend  most of their time on vacation.  Hmmm, not so unique actually), and the
fact that ideally the Empire "environment" will mirror the "real" world, vari-
ous heuristics dealing with time have been implemented.

The first is the Bureaucratic Time Unit (BTU) concept which keeps track of the
potential for doing "work" possessed by your government.

The second heuristic, (i.e. hack), is the Elapsed Time Limit (ETL) which  lim-
its the amount of time that players may be logged on each day.  The ETL is not
cumulative  and is reset to some particular value, (often two hours, check the
"version" command to be sure), every night at midnight.

The ETL and BTU counts are displayed with each command prompt as follows:
   [##:##] Command :
The first "##" is the Elapsed Time today, in minutes.  This number starts at 0
every midnight.  The second "##" is the number of BTUs remaining.

SEE ALSO
   Innards, version, BTU, Playing

