I'd been playing Scourge of War occasionally since it was released in April 2010. I really wanted to make it easier to get balanced, interesting multiplayer battles started, as this was very difficult to do. I also wanted the results of one battle affect the next, so players could grow attached to their troops. Having an obsession with American Civil War military history and organization, this project was very interesting.

I put together a simple but working system within a week and we started using it. Like all of my projects here, I used my automatic updater so that I could work on it and make releases frequently. I would test the part I had just done, and if it worked I'd click "Deploy" and the changes were in effect for the next game. This meant I didn't need to hold off on releasing anything, so we could use it the whole time it was in development.

The software is two parts. The web application, www.sowmp.com, is written in C#. This keeps track of battles, players and their troops, letting the players customize their forces. The desktop app, also in C#, connects this server to the game itself, passing maps and scenarios generated on the server into the game, and returning the results of the game so they affect future battles.