Problems for new players in ghetto kingdoms

[MulletSmurf]

I understand this will probably get me flamed because most of you really don't give a crap about ghetto kingdoms and seem to think it's our fault for being in one and not making it better.

Ghetto kingdoms almost always have less then 20 players with at least 5 of them being inactive or only active every couple of days which makes them basically useless. The way I understand it if your kingdom has 20 or more provinces it does not get new players they just go to the kingdoms with less then 20 (which there always is.)

In my experiments this age I have found that relocating gives you a good chance to land in a decent kingdom but joining as a new player does not. I'm not against people attacking ghetto kingdoms and using them to further your own ambitions as that is part of the game but the way this is going is making it very difficult to establish any sort of core for a kingdom. People get frustrated immediately and quit when we are unable to effectively war, retal or op bigger kingdoms without being destroyed.

My current kingdom has managed to avoid war but just barely and we lose a lot in the process. Suiciding undead and orcs feed on us without fear of retal because the rest of their kingdom would chain us. We've even had large kingdoms make suicide hits on us with small land fat provinces trying to get us to retal. Nobody in an established kingdom runs a 1300 acre province with 91 NWPA unless they are trying to start trouble. Currently I have a kingdom more then 50% bigger then us picking on us and claiming we are running tons of spells and ops on them with no proof. My kingdom isn't even organized enough to fireball a hot dog stand.

So my question is do all new players go to kingdoms with less then 20 people? I have about 7 or 8 people who actually play and the rest is a revolving door of new players. I get that this is part of the game but you think some new players would benefit from playing in great kingdoms with established players. But I suppose that would put a crimp in your quest for the crowns if you had a little dead weight to deal with. As in the real world ghetto's remain ghetto's and get picked on. Should my advice to new players just be to jump kingdoms until they reach a decent one? I would actually rather not get tons of new players all age as all it does is add more NW to allow bigger kingdoms access to us. 10 barely active or inactive players can be around 600K NW or more which pushes you up the ladder. From what I've seen this age the game is literally eating itself alive now.

[WhenWeCollide]

If you as a new player want to get into a better kingdom, or any new player for that matter, usually it only takes going to the recruiting forums or hanging out on IRC. I know several of established KD's who are willing to teach people if they want to learn.

As for the specific question, yes new players random in to KD's with 20 or less.

[The Real Bonny]

There is a good suggestions thread about lowering province numbers in kingdoms which would probably help this across the board but is being ignored to them knowing better than us, unfortunately you will spend your age killing players coming into your kingdom and around 15 memebrs does sound like a good number all round which could help more kingdoms grow and develope instead of wasting every age on those last 5 inactive spots that get filled..


At this time your best bet is to get those 7 players out of that revolving garbage called utopia and merge with another kingdom in the same boat as yourself, its sad to say but its your only hope or you will find yourself in a perpetual black hole with the game trying to fill you to 20 provinces or eventually like we know people quit the game and it just gets worse....

[Palem]

For the love all that is holy, lowering kd sizes does not fix ghettos. Get it through your heads people.


You want a good kd? You have to build one. Go recruit.

[MulletSmurf]

Sigh, you guys have just been playing this game so long you don't understand. I'm not a great utopia player, its hard for me to teach new players especially with the limited amount of resources and information there is to give them and a lot of it is very confusing as not everyone understands it. I don't want a good KD, I want to be able to play in a KD without worrying about being constantly bombarded by established kingdoms. Who the hell am I going to recruit? More noobs to get farmed by good players? Sure maybe I could leave the KD and jump to one that will teach me but get it through your thick skulls. Not everyone plays on a pc, uses irc or even responds to ingame messages or checks forums. Utopia is a very elitist game and I'm not really interested in getting to the top as I know I am not a good enough player. It's not all about crowns or wars, some of us just want to be able to hold our own. Maybe we could at least make it that the bottom 50 KD's in NW are not reachable by anyone in the top 200 KD's? Sort of a ghettoland where people could at least establish a KD before moving up into the real war zone? The gap from the bottom to the top in skill and organization is MASSIVE, beyond anything I dreamed of when I came back. That kingdom you are in now Palem and were talking about how noob it is? I was playing there earlier this age and that is one of the better ghetto's I've been in this age.

I think a fun idea is next age should be the age of mass reset. Monarchs stay in their current kingdoms and everyone gets shuffled to a new one. You want to try and kill off your new kingdom and invite all your old players then by all means do so. Yeah I know it will never fly but I just don't understand all the talk of the game fading when it refuses to give new players a chance. You can tell me all day long that this is how the game is played but you can't tell me I am wrong. I think an age or two in ghettoland would be good for the elitists.

[Palem]

I didn't say anything about how "noob" it is. I made a post in our forums and shared it on here pointing out how mismanaged (or completely unmanaged in most cases) diplomacy can cause kds to lose weeks of their own time accomplishing nothing.

You know who gets ghettos into bad situations where they can't have any fun? The ghettos themselves. They don't have someone with a sense of leadership to handle the kd and get them on a non-failing path. Lowering kd sizes does nothing to fix this and neither does creating a "ghetto safety zone". Learning to play doesn't mean that you're some utopia allstar, it just means you know how to handle yourself and/or your kd and MOST players don't.

[Thunder TA]

and a mass reset wont help the ghettos either. It will finish killing the game actually.As much as i dislike the wiki. try reading there or asking questions in irc. you can learn alot just by asking questions .

[Spahrep]

My kingdom isn't even organized enough to fireball a hot dog stand.

First you win forum quote of the day with that one.

2nd the best thing for new players to do is look around the recruitment board or jump on the recruiting irc channel.
irc.utonet.org / #recruiting

Starting in a ghetto is no good for new players, you learn nothing if not bad habits and if you want to learn the game, you need to get in to a decent KD.
A lot of good KDs will gladly take a player who is new to the game who wants to learn how to play (including diplo) and teach them.

[MulletSmurf]

So how are we supposed to learn if we get pounded every age and have a revolving door of a roster? How are we supposed to "lead" people that never interact with the rest of the KD? And then when you finally do get organized and move up just a little bit there is tons of hungry KD's just itching to wave and war you over and over. You are assuming that most of the players are open to advice and will follow orders but many of them are not and are just experimenting with the game. It is just such a huge handicap for ghetto's to receive all the dead weight in the game and have to try and do something with it. And all it takes is one or two people making hits or retals into the wrong KD and our age is over.

There is nothing to handle in the ghettos, its a bunch of randoms difficult to organize. I just don't understand why there is threads asking for suggestions to get new players and blood into the game when all you do is shove them into ghettos and destroy them then tell them it's their problem and they should figure it out. Why does creating a ghetto safety zone do nothing to help ghetto's get more organized? I get that this is the way the game is played and nobody wants to change it but for the love of pete the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. I like utopia, it's fun to play even with all the crap but I cant even imagine how frustrated brand new players are when they come into this game.

[Korp]

So how are we supposed to learn if we get pounded every age and have a revolving door of a roster? How are we supposed to "lead" people that never interact with the rest of the KD? And then when you finally do get organized and move up just a little bit there is tons of hungry KD's just itching to wave and war you over and over. You are assuming that most of the players are open to advice and will follow orders but many of them are not and are just experimenting with the game. It is just such a huge handicap for ghetto's to receive all the dead weight in the game and have to try and do something with it. And all it takes is one or two people making hits or retals into the wrong KD and our age is over.

There is nothing to handle in the ghettos, its a bunch of randoms difficult to organize. I just don't understand why there is threads asking for suggestions to get new players and blood into the game when all you do is shove them into ghettos and destroy them then tell them it's their problem and they should figure it out. Why does creating a ghetto safety zone do nothing to help ghetto's get more organized? I get that this is the way the game is played and nobody wants to change it but for the love of pete the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result. I like utopia, it's fun to play even with all the crap but I cant even imagine how frustrated brand new players are when they come into this game.

Building a kingdom is a harsh and hard job, you have to weed out the unwanted people. You have to build it up slowly with people that you find trusthworthy. Or just take the easier path and just trade yourself into a already established kingdom. This game is harsh and has a steep learning curve that might scare off people but whats the solution? Im pretty sure most of us "Old timers" started in ghettos, I know I did.

Utopia is a very elitist game and I'm not really interested in getting to the top as I know I am not a good enough player.

Also this, talent is not necessary in a top kd enviroment activity is, rest is easy to learn. So im sure you would fit in in a "top kd" as well ^^

[Hell Fire]

have built my share of ghettos, i enjoyed the challenge

these are few things that worked in my experiences:
number one is set a standard on inactivity and if a prov becomes inactive past the standard remove them and do this relentlessly , they will only serve to further drag you down, actions to improve your kdm also helps you to keeping your active provs in the kdm.

be active in chatting make jokes,discuss strats , heck go crazy talk to yourself if nobody else will , have fun with it and always stay confident and positive attitude(is a must), and just stay relentless , it takes a few ages to accomplish , takes work from a positive leader , if honestly want it ,it can be done.

will always be bullies gonna pick on your kdm,even the bullies get bullied from time to time, is how the game goes , learn how best to keep damages to a minimum and move on , just something you learn to accept and deal with best u can and stay positive always.

ghetto life always push your kdm to be preparing to search targets for wars with kdms your size , wars create activity , teamwork and is how best to learn the game , post orders for wars even if not followed like u wish , always post the orders and after war a discussion thread in the forums is a great tool for improving your kdm.

hope this helps , enjoy the game and your kdm m8s ,and ALWAYS POSITIVE ATTITUDE :)

[Chappy]

Disclaimer: This is my very first age, so take what I say with a grain of salt. On the other hand, I've practically memorized most of the formulas in the guide, so I kind of have an idea of how Utopia works, and I've asked a lot of questions on IRC about similar topics.

At this time your best bet is to get those 7 players out of that revolving garbage called utopia and merge with another kingdom in the same boat as yourself, its sad to say but its your only hope or you will find yourself in a perpetual black hole with the game trying to fill you to 20 provinces or eventually like we know people quit the game and it just gets worse....

This is EXACTLY what our kingdom did. Our monarch contacted another kingdom that had about 5 core players in it, and they accepted, so our monarch went to the Shop, bought 5 Kingdom Invitations, and invited the five core players into our kingdom. Now our kingdom is kind of decent, and we don't get picked on NEARLY as much any more. (It looks like we're going to be ending the age on rank 60.)

My current kingdom has managed to avoid war but just barely and we lose a lot in the process. Suiciding undead and orcs feed on us without fear of retal because the rest of their kingdom would chain us. We've even had large kingdoms make suicide hits on us with small land fat provinces trying to get us to retal.

Of course, getting picked on by bullies is ALWAYS a problem. The solution that we've found is thus: When in a war people attacking you from outside get only 25% gains, and when in fort they get only 50% gains, so bullies'll generally get bored and go away if you're in one of those two states. If you find yourself getting picked on, quickly search around, sending mails to monarchs in KDs near your NW asking for war.

One other tip: A lot of Utopia at high-level play is mind games, (attempting to APPEAR intimidating so other KDs fear you and let you do what you want. One of the reasons KDs wave Out-Of-War is to appear scary.) and you need to refuse to get sucked into their pace.

If you DON'T retal, your bullies have no reason to go away, and they're going to keep feeding off you. (Because free hits! Why not?) So retalling only makes them MORE likely to go away. They're not going to stop attacking just because you don't defend yourself. They cannot declare war on your KD unless you've attacked them at least 8 times, and you've attacked them more than they attacked you, so don't worry about being sucked into a war accidentally, unless your KD is very careless...

[Red]

Utopia is a team game, so this means you need to feel like a team. Winning like a team and losing like a team.
How can you get the feeling of becoming a team: talk to each other, get on IRC or KD chat, get to know each other, post funny stuff in forums, games in forums, be friendly to each other and so on.

How do you learn the game: not by running away and avoiding all conflicts. This is a war game, so fight back together. Get into wars or hostiles with KDs in your range. Losing is a part of the process to get better. After war, just ask the opposing KD what they think you did wrong or could've done better. Learn to adapt.

About the KDs or 'suiciding' UD/Orcs hitting you: for one they are probably not suiciding but run low def as an attacker should do. An attacker needs offense to be scary, not defense cause you will be breakable anyway.
Also those provs attacking you from established KDs are looking for free acres, so if you run with your pants down they get what they want. In stead fight back, retal. It makes them lose time and they usualy dont like to lose time. If they're bigger, game mechanics give you the advantage that the smaller KD has better gains.
If the situations gets you to war after all. Try to work as a team and see how far you get. You'll prolly lose wars and conflicts but you'll learn a lot from it.

If you try to establish a KD with more players: get into contact with other KDs in similar situations. Try to merge with them (at end of the age you get free invites to be able to get those together, so now is a good time to start looking for a merger since age will end soon - don't spend money on invites at this point imo). Since you merge 2 KDs and both had 1 or 2 leading, you will have 2-4 leaders after merging and will be able to discuss with them on strategy and you can devide the work.

Set a target each age. What do you wanna reach? How many wars do you want to get? Don't aim to win all wars, be modest and aim for 1 war win in the first age or aim to get into 4-6 wars even if you lose all. But your main aim should be: have fun with all your KD mates and make sure they want to fight for the KD since they feel a connection.

Be silly and enjoy :)

[Milkman]

What esteblished players often fail to grasp is that you need experiance, knowledge and leadership skills to build a kingdom. If you don't have that you will stay in the same situation. Any new player that is serious about playing the game should go to the recruitment section of the forum as soon as they make their account. You're far better off getting into a kingdom that is semi competent and kind of knows what they are doing then in a total ghetto. It's more fun to play if your kd can handle itself :)

[StratOcastle]

Milkman is correct. Kingdoms in need of recruits are everywhere. Just look at the rankings page and some even tag themselves recruiting. Don't be afraid of being under qualified; in many cases they're willing to teach and may even prefer a new player who isn't damaged goods.

If you have 7-8 good players you might as well explore merging requests from kingdoms who are bringing their active core to the table as well.