[exikyut]

That might make a good first open source release actually, if it implements a good chunk of the game protocol you might be able to use it to get a rough idea for the types of ideas people would want to run with, and it would also allow people to hit the ground running actually implementing ideas against the engine quickly.

A separate test server would be a very good companion idea.

[ItsFirefly]

I hadn't even considered this before, but I see your point! Getting a "core" part of the game's "API" released first allowing players to fiddle around writing a bot sounds like a beautiful gift for the technically inclined players. Because of the small(er) scope it could help iron out wrinkles in the open-sourcing of the client as a whole later on. Thanks!