Ops/Attacks from within a war.

[Beau]

In my current war, our opponents are losing the econ battle convincingly. As a result they have taken to plundering "inactive" provs outside the war with their chained provs. I'm talking provs that are 500 acres or less. One would think this would give them nothing in the way of decent gains right? wrong. All of a sudden the econs on both kd's are looking fairly similar, most of them are training like mad out of nowhere and a dragon they haven't even been able to throw change at miraculously completed itself and arrived.

I have nothing against this strat per se, if you can find a legitimate advantage you'd be stupid not to take it. My problem is more to do with how quickly this has been done, we tested it a little ourselves and our chained provs are getting 500-750k returns from provs with less than 2m.

I can't speak for anyone else but I find this to be completely unacceptable, the game is full of 100-500 acre provs that nobody cares about and most of them probably have millions of gc that the majority of provs can't take from them under normal circumstances. Yet, get in to a war, get chained, have 3/4 of your kd's econ decimated and you can just go plunder an inactive from the war to solve the problem? Does that sound ok to anyone else?

I don't know what I am asking for, I am not a dev and I don't program but from a simple leymans point of view this seems like utter rubbish to me. Personally I would like to see gains on provs hitting out of, or in to war reduced to almost nothing. However I understand this poses problems as kd's would use the protection to run or hide and so forth, so I am hoping others can offer viable suggestions. Thoughts?

[neanderthal]

Welcome to the world of dirty wars. It's despicable, but the only way some kds can win.

[chalsdk]

well dont go into wars with that kind of provs.. go into wars with peaple in protection mode.. or leave them on very very low acres.. like 20, so they will starve themself to death.. ask for outside plunders on yourself.. be create.. its not a problem, its just how the game works.

[Bishop]

It is a problem imo. Provinces hitting oow should be raze killed by the kd they hit into until the devs implement something else.

[Elldallan]

It is a problem imo. Provinces hitting oow should be raze killed by the kd they hit into until the devs implement something else.

It is a problem yes but not a violation of the game as you've said before, this is no different than hitting into war/hostile or intentional farmouts as well as innumerable other despicable actions, they're despicable but not something that needs to be dealt with by rules or implementations, it's something better left to the community.

I can't speak for anyone else but I find this to be completely unacceptable, the game is full of 100-500 acre provs that nobody cares about and most of them probably have millions of gc that the majority of provs can't take from them under normal circumstances. Yet, get in to a war, get chained, have 3/4 of your kd's econ decimated and you can just go plunder an inactive from the war to solve the problem? Does that sound ok to anyone else?

I don't know what I am asking for, I am not a dev and I don't program but from a simple leymans point of view this seems like utter rubbish to me. Personally I would like to see gains on provs hitting out of, or in to war reduced to almost nothing. However I understand this poses problems as kd's would use the protection to run or hide and so forth, so I am hoping others can offer viable suggestions. Thoughts?

Using war to hide aka fake war is a rules violation so not a problem, you just report it and Bishop takes action eventually(reports can understandably pile up and he's just one guy)

It is unacceptable but it's something that can and should be dealt with by the community and not specificallytargeted by rules or game code.

The solution isn't to limit interactions with the outside it is to actually allow for meaningful chaining and making it feasible to destroy the offense of a province. this is something that is desperately needed anyway for several other reasonse and would certainly help to alleviate this "problem" to some degree.

[Beau]

It is a problem yes but not a violation of the game as you've said before, this is no different than hitting into war/hostile or intentional farmouts as well as innumerable other despicable actions, they're despicable but not something that needs to be dealt with by rules or implementations, it's something better left to the community.

And if this were to become the gold standard of play? Would that draw your seemingly complacent "oh well, not the devs problem" attitude?" If every single time a prov was chained in a war the standard response was to start plundering oow, that would just be bad luck as well?

I personally think the ball is squarely in the devs court on this one, they are the ones responsible for tweaking the numbers that relate to gains when hitting under X circumstance. They've made hitting in to or out of a war for acres almost pointless as the damage done is minimal, same with razes, learns indeed any other attack type, seemingly except plunder.

Using war to hide aka fake war is a rules violation so not a problem, you just report it and Bishop takes action eventually(reports can understandably pile up and he's just one guy)

Which is precisely why the coding needs to deal with the problem on a macro scale rather than a case by case instance seen to by a dev who are, as you pointed out, in short supply.

It is unacceptable but it's something that can and should be dealt with by the community and not specificallytargeted by rules or game code.

The community rarely rises over anything. It does happen from time to time, I'll grant you that. But we'd be talking about maybe once an age, and generally only when high profile people/kd's are involved. Do you honestly mean to say that every single time a prov hits oow from within its own war that we should all rise up and raze them out? Do you really see that happening? ever? Particularly when the kd's involved are unknown, tiny and ghetto like? I just don't see it personally.

The solution isn't to limit interactions with the outside it is to actually allow for meaningful chaining and making it feasible to destroy the offense of a province. this is something that is desperately needed anyway for several other reasonse and would certainly help to alleviate this "problem" to some degree.

The solution is absolutely to limit interactions with the outside, which is what the devs have been steadily trying to do all along. Almost every age there is a tweak relating to hitting in to or out of war, generally aimed at those who like to powerplay and throw their weight around at the high-mid/top end of the game. But that doesn't mean it doesn't happen at the lower end of the spectrum as well and this needs seeing to just as much, if not more than the top end. Those at the lower end out numbering those at the top by many many times.

I'm really not sure what you mean by meaningful chaining, are you trying to say it can't be done now? It's not good enough now? I'm stumped by that statement, I see no severe problem with chaining mechanics at all personally.

[boz]

well dont go into wars with that kind of provs.. go into wars with peaple in protection mode.. or leave them on very very low acres.. like 20, so they will starve themself to death.. ask for outside plunders on yourself.. be create.. its not a problem, its just how the game works.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5hfYJsQAhl0

Bishop are the plunder gains reduced by the same modifier as land gains when hitting into or oow?

[Thunder TA]

Another thread about this same thing in the forums also. Yes we killed one guy for doing it already.Dont know if they stopped doing it or not.My guess not

http://forums.utopia-game.com/showth...ategy-or-Multi

[Bishop]

Yes boz

[Elldallan]

And if this were to become the gold standard of play? Would that draw your seemingly complacent "oh well, not the devs problem" attitude?" If every single time a prov was chained in a war the standard response was to start plundering oow, that would just be bad luck as well?

Yes my opinion would still be the same, we get the game we deserve, it's as simple as that. But as I said, enable effective chaining and the problem will go away, this was never a problem when you could simply razekill small provinces in war(not saying we should return to that exactly because getting killed is boring but something needs to be done to enable the disabling of provinces for the duration of a war).

I personally think the ball is squarely in the devs court on this one, they are the ones responsible for tweaking the numbers that relate to gains when hitting under X circumstance. They've made hitting in to or out of a war for acres almost pointless as the damage done is minimal, same with razes, learns indeed any other attack type, seemingly except plunder.

I disagree, there is the same -75% gains for hitting in or out of war on both regular attacks as well as plunders and learns etc. it's just that tm gains in war will be better out of war because obviously there is no -75% gains in war, same things with learns plus they won't change the outcome much anyway, but resources such as runes and gc are typically scarce in war and therefor it can be profitable to hit out of war despite the -75% gains(but the -75% is still there make no mistake about that).
Your problem relates to something completely different, namely the fact that chaining someone will tend to give that prov really great sci(if he had decent sci and size before the war) and if the chainee is an orc who already have 30% extra gains built into the personality you can get pretty close to negating the penalty of hitting out of war. This once again relates to the complete and utter inability to disable or at least kill the offense of a chainee in war.

Which is precisely why the coding needs to deal with the problem on a macro scale rather than a case by case instance seen to by a dev who are, as you pointed out, in short supply.

I'm sure that the devs have access to automated tools that can detect suspicious patterns in a war. But I still disagree that your problem is something that needs to be dealt with by ingame code. There is the same 75% penalty to all attacks in or out of war.

The community rarely rises over anything. It does happen from time to time, I'll grant you that. But we'd be talking about maybe once an age, and generally only when high profile people/kd's are involved. Do you honestly mean to say that every single time a prov hits oow from within its own war that we should all rise up and raze them out? Do you really see that happening? ever? Particularly when the kd's involved are unknown, tiny and ghetto like? I just don't see it personally.

I don't entirely agree, most well publicized "uprisings" follow that pattern yes but I've seen a lot of quiet cases where kingdoms join in to help curb this sort of behavior. Make some friends with other kingdoms, spread your contacts and if something like this happens ask them to send a few razes on that prov, it doesn't take much effort to razekill a 100a province from outside of war when you can easily quadtap it.[/QUOTE]

The solution is absolutely to limit interactions with the outside, which is what the devs have been steadily trying to do all along. Almost every age there is a tweak relating to hitting in to or out of war, generally aimed at those who like to powerplay and throw their weight around at the high-mid/top end of the game. But that doesn't mean it doesn't happen at the lower end of the spectrum as well and this needs seeing to just as much, if not more than the top end. Those at the lower end out numbering those at the top by many many times.

The game intentionally allow despicable/foul play, it's been that way since the game was started and it's not something I think we should change, the game allows you to hit into war because there are situations when you might feel that it's warranted/necessary, for example last age a bunch of smaller kingdoms ganged up on another kd that was repeatedly plundering/stealing into eowcf by simply hitting into the real wars that kd were having.

The only recent changes I remember to anything like this is instituting a cap on the meter first at 200 points and now recently moved to 150 points, this in fact benefits the bottomfeeders and powerplayers, not the other way around. Also implementing that kd relative nw protection is removed if a kd gives 50 meter points to another kingdom, again benefitting the bottomfeeders, that's the even moderately relevant changes and they don't benefit the little guy, quite the opposite in fact.

I'm really not sure what you mean by meaningful chaining, are you trying to say it can't be done now? It's not good enough now? I'm stumped by that statement, I see no severe problem with chaining mechanics at all personally.

Yes there is a severe problem with chaining, the only thing you loose by being chained is defense and peasants. Your offense will remain relatively intact and as long as you keep bringing in acres it'll stay that way because troops out on attack doesn't defect due to overpopulation. This means that the chainee will keep quadtapping other smallish provinces and can LL basically any province in the opposing kingdom and it will keep on being a general nuisance until the war ends, stop them from retaining their offense and you also stop them from plundering out of war.

[Bishop]

The little guy wont ever touch 150 points, let alone 200. The meter change only affected active kingdoms.

We could just allow only tm/raze in or out of war after 24 hours.

[Elldallan]

The little guy wont ever touch 150 points, let alone 200. The meter change only affected active kingdoms.

We could just allow only tm/raze in or out of war after 24 hours.

Active kingdoms yes but that doesn't preclude the possibility of bottomfeeding or powerplaying.

Fix chaining instead and this problem goes away, it is also desirable for several other reasons as well.
Besides, I think this is as much of a legit tactic as plundering or stealing into eowcf or intentionally farming out in spite, so I don't think a specific fix is necessary.
Make overpopulation include troops out and this problem will go away by itself, it also has the added benefit of enabling a wider set of strategies because it would enable a kingdom to effectively take provinces out of war without directly killing them(they can be reexplored after the war is over) since killing would be an undesirable outcome because ppl will eventually quit because of it.

[Bishop]

Active kingdoms yes but that doesn't preclude the possibility of bottomfeeding or powerplaying.

Fix chaining instead and this problem goes away, it is also desirable for several other reasons as well.
Besides, I think this is as much of a legit tactic as plundering or stealing into eowcf or intentionally farming out in spite, so I don't think a specific fix is necessary.
Make overpopulation include troops out and this problem will go away by itself, it also has the added benefit of enabling a wider set of strategies because it would enable a kingdom to effectively take provinces out of war without directly killing them(they can be reexplored after the war is over) since killing would be an undesirable outcome because ppl will eventually quit because of it.

I'm not sure i follow you about bottomfeeding and the meter - it makes no difference to the majority of kds as they cant ever max it anyway, those that can can handle themselves anyway.

[Elldallan]

I'm not sure i follow you about bottomfeeding and the meter - it makes no difference to the majority of kds as they cant ever max it anyway, those that can can handle themselves anyway.

It was just meant as an argument that "Almost every age there is a tweak relating to hitting in to or out of war, generally aimed at those who like to powerplay" simply isn't true. But we're getting offtopic with this line of comments :P

[Felixier]

Since my other thread was basically an answer to this thread, i will just post it here too:

Someone creates a new prov, if the prov is not accessed after 24 hours while still in protection, the province is automatically removed. Helps all sub 20 prov kds get new active members in a much quicker rate, instead of waiting 3 days + killing them off. Also helps remove small provinces from vulturing on inactive farms.

The fact that this isn't already done is pretty stupid. Anyone can make a log in, jot down the name and location, return three days later, and a 2 mil, 2500 def point, 0 thief protection farm is there for the taking. Not removing the inactive farms before they come out of protection makes absolutely no sense. 24 hours is more than enough time for anyone with an interest in playing time to come back.