live VASL and SKYPE. I'm afraid PBEM might be excruciatingly slow. I just can't imagine playing that way.
Live has a lot of advantages over PBEM... the whole back and forth of the Mph and Defensive Fire was designed for live play... it takes some minor PBEM skill to get that crucial phase right, and getting thru a single big active Mph can take several logs... days of back and forth logs to get thru one Mph... excruciating? No. It's slow, yes slow... but excruciating, not really.
Excruciating slowness occurs in live play... as your opponent carefully looks under a concealment counter, scrunches up his eyes... sighs... looks under it again... frowns... brings his attention to a different concealed stack, peaks under that one too shielding it from your view .... shakes his head... returns to the first stack, peeks at it again. Places chin in hand. Thinks. Picks up rule book and begins looking for a rule, a particular rule, he'd ask you about the rule, but, well, that would give too much away, wouldn't it? ... now YOU sigh and He gives you a disdainful sniff -- "oh, so you're one of those 'in-a-rush' players?" It's been three hours. It's turn 1... It won't get better....
In PBEM...
all that is on your opponent's time... you just get a log in the mail. Maybe it took a half hour to create, maybe 48 solid sleepless hours... what's it to you? PBEM is IMHO one of the best ways to avoid
excruciating slowness! And don't get me wrong, I prefer playing live against most opponents....
most.