Vacation?

[webhead]

The rules state the one cannot perform aggression within 24 hrs hours of vacation starting. I take this to mean no attacks, spells, or thievery ops against any province.

So does giving your specialists to get rid of the dragon count as "aggression"?

[Bishop]

not sure, not hard to check though - let us know how you get on.

[webhead]

Bishop, I can't believe you don't know the answer.

I was curious because we have a dragon on us now and we are nearing the end of the war.

There are a couple of provinces who are willing to be active but they are inexperienced and haven't been effective. I just thought it may be an interesting strategy to consider to have one of these newb provinces send specs to finish the dragon. But I know to send off that many specs would make them a sitting duck. Then it occurred to me; what if they timed it so that the hour before they go on vacation they send their specs at the dragon.

Just an idea.

[DHaran]

That would be an abuse of vacation mode imo, and subject to removal from VM and a suspension. That's no different than a province jumping to VM to avoid getting chained or to protect recently gained acres.

[webhead]

The game has certain parameters. Using those parameters to your best strategic advantage should be considered part of the game, not abuse.

[Landro]

The game has certain parameters. Using those parameters to your best strategic advantage should be considered part of the game, not abuse.

I disagree. You could say the same for abusing VM for soldier stocking or for abusing the ambush bug (which has been fixed now)

[DHaran]

It's the definition of abusing a game mechanic for something other than intended, I don't see how you can defend it as a strategic advantage and accept it as such, lol. The only mechanic abuse that has been accepted to my knowledge is fake warring, and that's only because it would take some serious work to find a way to make them illegal or to rework the game so they are no longer necessary.

[Bishop]

The game has certain parameters. Using those parameters to your best strategic advantage should be considered part of the game, not abuse.

Spirit of the Rules

Players attempting to manipulate rules and quirks of the game in ways obviously not intended may be subject to deletion. Because of their nature, these types of circumstances are looked at on a case-by-case basis. Users should avoid actions they believe are against the spirit and intent of the game.

This is a standard rule - do not exploit.

[Luc]

The game has certain parameters. Using those parameters to your best strategic advantage should be considered part of the game, not abuse.

You're aware that you can justify pretty much everything by that logic, right? Such as murder being okay as long as you can get away with it. A game will always be imperfect, just like laws, and the current game mechanics will sometimes fail to enforce the rules. The only way to get around that is the rule Bishop posted. Vacation mode is obviously meant for people going on vacation, and not to be used to protect provinces who are in a bad shape. The only way to completely stop any abusing of Vacation Mode is to remove it, and that's not really an option.

[webhead]

All's fair in love and war. Wouldn't real troops act in the same manner, if they saw an opportunity to attack a foe but receive no damage if they can run and hide out of reach? That is military strategy. The CO would get a medal for making such a wise decision and returning his entire platoon untouched.

This game tries to reflect real life, well doing what I suggested would be equivalent to many military "real life" situations.

I have seen the rule about spirit of the game before, and I completely understand the reasoning. However, what I said already has reasoning as well, and could be considered justifiable military equivalent of what can happen in real war. Is that not the spirit of the game?

[DHaran]

This game tries to reflect real life, well doing what I suggested would be equivalent to many military "real life" situations.

It most certainly does not.

[Luc]

It most certainly does not.

This.

There is no vacation mode in real life war, just like there is no gang bang protection or gains based on networth. It's a game, and it's not up to you to decide what's allowed and not. Of course it makes sense to use the tools you have to do the best you can. However, some tools will always be abusable, but too useful to be removed, and in those cases they will have to be protected by the spirit of the rules instead. You basically want to eat the cookie and keep it at the same time, and that's not how things work. If they were to enforce every single rule explicitly by changing game mechanics, this game would suck ass.

[Ethan]

Since your dropping into vacation anyway - this will clearly hurt the province. You can't train till vacation ends, so you come back out in really bad shape.
You can use it to help the kingdom though, as it lets 1 person do most/all the dragon killing and not take the hits for it *in the war*. I think intra-raze can do similar things, but takes more coordination and lost offense.

So in many ways the question is, since it helps the kingdom but hurts the province... should we be allowing that? Is the "cost" too light, or is the payment from the prov doing the trick sufficient?
We want this class of options available (sac to win) - but how much, and at what cost are open to debate.

[DHaran]

Well this isn't really open to debate, seeing as it's against the rules.

[Luc]

Since your dropping into vacation anyway - this will clearly hurt the province. You can't train till vacation ends, so you come back out in really bad shape.
You can use it to help the kingdom though, as it lets 1 person do most/all the dragon killing and not take the hits for it *in the war*. I think intra-raze can do similar things, but takes more coordination and lost offense.

So in many ways the question is, since it helps the kingdom but hurts the province... should we be allowing that? Is the "cost" too light, or is the payment from the prov doing the trick sufficient?
We want this class of options available (sac to win) - but how much, and at what cost are open to debate.

You could easily send a massacre target into vm, leaving the opposing kd with lots of wasted attacks. It's not about the single province, but the other kd having wasted a huge effort. Vacation mode is for people going on vacation, it's not a mechanic to use for strategy. There is no reason at all to think it was introduced for any other reason than to let people go on vacation without having to worry about getting deleted/starved/whatever. That it's ended on aggressive acts, can't be entered with army out, and takes 24 hours to kick in makes it even clearer what the purpose of VM is.