Whats with the new SCIENCE

[CCanes420]

I'm unsure how anybody thinks it is OK that you can off/on remember ~10% worth of your military's effectiveness (for bounces, etc)... Nobody sees anything wrong with that? That can be applied to other areas of science, but I figure that example alone should be enough to end this age prematurely. This is a joke.

[Thunder TA]

Actually goodwitch you probably havent been playing as long and sure not much longer if that. It would be impossible but thats beside the point. Your complaining about the random factor.Could that be changed yes but over all the science isnt that bad to use.Most people probably have alot more this age than they would the old way.

Change is good sometimes.You have a added advantage over some people and not over others. there is no difference to that then any other age where some put gc into science and some didnt.

It does stop alot from sitting and pumping the crap out of it for a huge bonus over everyone else tho.

[Goodwitch]

Actually goodwitch you probably havent been playing as long and sure not much longer if that. It would be impossible but thats beside the point. Your complaining about the random factor.Could that be changed yes but over all the science isnt that bad to use.Most people probably have alot more this age than they would the old way.

Change is good sometimes.You have a added advantage over some people and not over others. there is no difference to that then any other age where some put gc into science and some didnt.

It does stop alot from sitting and pumping the crap out of it for a huge bonus over everyone else tho.

If I meant to complain about the random factor, that is what I would have said. I indeed in the past have done so. My concern is that this science is lazy, apparently perfect for players that don't want to do anything to improve their provinces and instead like things handed to them.
But whatever :) if you enjoy it obviously so must everybody.

For the record I really appreciate all the ones that actually explain why they like the science without overinflated egos invalidating all opposition in a patronizing fashion.

[kendy]

For the record I really appreciate all the people that actually explain why they like the science without over inflated egos invalidating all opposition in a patronizing fashion.

This is the interweb. Mostly flames. Duh! [oops was that a flame? ]

I like the new science because of all the abducts I do. I used to do learns, but I like getting a full prof with a funny name.

The new science has changed one thing for me, I now have to BURN gold or suffer PLUNDERS.
Past ages I would just up the books purchased and gold magically disappeared.

Now I release 500 Brutes or Strongarms and immediately retrain them to burn my extra gold. Few mates need my gold but I do ask first.

After our first war I left eowcf with 2 Million gold and a fully pumped army. Being Halfer I had little fear of rob my vaults.
I kinda forgot plunders. I can think of no other way to use my extra gold, if no Dragon is in the pipe, so I burn it or get plundered.

[Thunder TA]

I did explain why, you missed it like normal sadly and the person right above me posted also why. because a change isn't as you like you think no one does which as normal isn't the case . People can only explain that it takes more skill now than before so many times

[Ethan]

People keep claiming it "takes more skill". This is not a fact, this is your opinion. Back it up with arguments.

I'll knock down a few I know are coming. Like "you can swap around science to bounce a hit or buff your ops". That's called *activity* and it doesn't have much of anything to do with skill. If I were on or could be called in for 12+ hours a day, I could do silly stuff like that too. Yes, there is a bit of skill and experience it timing a bounce... but the vast majority of people don't do that because of a lack of time, not a lack of skill.
Particularly bad example - if you want to be optimal, you should probably be swapping all of your income into crime, and logging in *every single hour* to put it all to income for the 2 minutes it takes to tick. Will ruin your health to never sleep more than 55 minutes at a time, but hey, that's a "skill", right?

How about "it is much harder to get, that makes it require more skill"? A winning lottery is really hard to get too. Those "skillful" winners must be so much better than us, right?


"It does stop alot from sitting and pumping the crap out of it for a huge bonus over everyone else tho."
Great, now I can sit and *not* pump. That is so much fun! Look at me *not doing anything in the game because there is no beneficial action left*.

You know why I used to have much better science? All that time other attackers were mostly wasting hitting each-other, I ran slightly lower DR and pushed science with the gold. I'd come into wars a little flat... and then I just wouldn't run down, cause I had econ, and I had sustain, and I wasn't drafted as stupidly high as possible. Go ahead and try and chain cause of my extra pes (standard theory for why low pes)... my science increase mocks your attempt. Go ahead and op though my better T/M defense... it'll work, sure, but now 2 other of my kingdom mates didn't get shelled cause you had to keep working on me. And letting me bloat never went well for the enemy, cause I'd actually grow into it.

Know what we all should be doing now with that gold? Decide what is most important to spend it on, where the best value is? Nope - push DR as high as you can, trash your econ as fast as possible, and now you spend all the gold on troops, and no longer make any more. How hard is the decision to balance military vs. econ? Simple, higher DR. If you aren't overpop, simply pump higher DR. Econ exists only to destroy itself as fast as possible.

It really is this bad: I need two pieces of info to give you strategic advice on the "grand interplay of military and economy" that we've always had. Are you/your kingdom T10 on any charts? No... are you an attacker... yes? Great, get higher DR.

For over 2/3rds of the people in the game, one of the greatest complexities the game had has been replaced with tic-frickin-tac-toe! Just play in the center, done.


I don't think I can (reasonably) overstate my dislike and contempt for the new science. I am very seriously considering leaving the game at age end, as it is the worst change I've *ever* seen. Please bring happiness back instead, at least that was simply stupid instead of this.

[Madchess]

@Ethan

It forces you to play your province diffrently if you are just playing as you used to then you are loosing out on the changes, to adapt to the changes takes skills, thus the new science system takes skills.

Personly I solved my extra income problem by investing in a systematically abduct strategy and I've hardly ever done learns before, I've also had the resurces to do more build swaps than ever before + if I get to a point where I don't need to grow or train, and science is already maxed I'll simply raze some banks which will free up space to other building types. I've not increased my draft rate from previous ages, and I've never been plundered this age, the worst thing that happened so far was when I experimented with homes then scrapped them in my warbuild and got trapped on to high draft for almost a week as our agreed war did not happen, so I would disagree that drafting higher is the best answer to the new challenges.

I've seen stupid stuff like 0 abducts way late into the age so not everyone figured the basics out yet, I've also seen Undeads run 80% draft with 20-25% homes and rest banks and some gs, those guys had impressive offenses true, but when I hit regardless they simply did not have the ecconomy to engage in retals but just to rebuild after the hit I made.

[Bo To]

@Ethan

It forces you to play your province diffrently if you are just playing as you used to then you are loosing out on the changes, to adapt to the changes takes skills, thus the new science system takes skills.

The point he did was that activity <> skills and adapting is not skill based.

@Ethan - you can always do what strato is doing ;).

[Madchess]

And my point is that not everyone learn to adapt equally fast, or good and therefore their activity is secondary while adaptability takes real skill. Just like in evolution.

It is of course to bad that we will have some people quitting over the changes, but has it not always been so? others will find that the changes are a reason for them to start playing again.

Personly I've never quit over changes but always considdered them a challenge.

[Madchess]

I'm sure if I had tried to play the game using only 5 guilds and 30% towers all age I would also complain about how low and inconsistent the training of wizards was, but maybe, just maybe I should realice at some point I'm playing it wrong and that I need to adapt. No amount of activity put into the game would change that fact right?

The low spawn rate of scientists would be equal to run 1-2 guilds all age.

What I see as the main critisism of the new science system is 1 it is random, and 2 I can no longer play the way I did before, that is if boiled down as much as possible.

My answer is if it is random that some ends up with 45 and others with 80 professors then it takes skill to adapt so the 45 scientist province can make up for the diffrence and still beat the 80 scientist province either by getting more via abducts or beeing better at distribution and building their province.

To the opjection that they can no longer play their province the way they did before my answer is find a new way of playing it, this in my oppinion takes more skill than playing your province the way you have always played it.

I don't care how many crowns someone got or how many top kingdoms they boost of playing with, if you can not adapt to new changes then you can go sit in the corner along with all the other dinosaurs and cry your eyes out. We all know what happened to the dinosaurs in the end.

[Bo To]

My answer is if it is random that some ends up with 45 and others with 80 professors then it takes skill to adapt so the 45 scientist province can make up for the diffrence and still beat the 80 scientist province either by getting more via abducts or beeing better at distribution and building their province.

No you can't. I'm t/m with 50 scientists 0 lost from abducts I can't abduct and nothing can change that. I will always be behind in def, BE and income. I either have to play a/t/m which is forcing me to play a different type than intended or stay where I am. No skills are involved in both cases.

It used to take skills to build UB t/m. What you are saying is either attack or you can't adapt which means you don't have skills...

[Iceshimmer]

I think we need to pay the scientists or something

[Madchess]

But you can still build your province strong enougth to land ops endlessly on an attacker like me right? it may take a few more guilds and td's but it is not like +100% effectivity makes me invincible or anything in that regard which is my point when I say build your province to make up for the lacking science, this is what takes skills to do.

I know with abducts it favours attackers to get to maxed science, but maybe it just needs some tweaks here and there. I'd much prefer a suggestion to ballance this out to gooing back to the old science system. The change is one of the most major mechanic changes for years, so it is not likely to be rolled back after just 1 age. If I come up with a suggestion to ballance things out better I'd write it in the suggestion forum, if you comes up with one I'd likely support that suggestion wholeheartedly too, but wanting to go back to happyness or utility or boats or whatever does not solve the imbalance in the new science system.

[Bo To]

I know with abducts it favours attackers to get to maxed science, but maybe it just needs some tweaks here and there. I'd much prefer a suggestion to ballance this out to gooing back to the old science system.... but wanting to go back to happyness or utility or boats or whatever does not solve the imbalance in the new science system.

I'm not arguing about going back to the old system and I never said it. I don't want it to be less random just the difference to be smaller than it is now. Some t/ms in my KD have 20 scientists more than me(40% more) and they were abducted few times. Which means there are pure t/ms in other KDs who also have much better sci than me and it's not my fault it's just luck. I'm ok with being random and favoring attackers(just like honor is favoring t/ms).

I'm arguing about does it take skills to actually use and 'pump' sci with the new system. It's hard to be competitive t/m with bad sci/honor.

[Ethan]

...The change is one of the most major mechanic changes for years, so it is not likely to be rolled back after just 1 age. ...

And that is why I am considering leaving the game. I know, no matter how much I (and a number of others) really hate this decision, they simply *can't* abandon it. Not in human nature, especially not where there are people arguing the other side of it. (Near age end we should run a poll, at least for curiosity.) {addition to respond to Bo To post - I *am* arguing to go back. I know I'll lose, but that is my position.}

While I don't love the randomness, dislike the interface, and think true hot-swapping is bad... these are details. We can fix these, we can live with these, we'll mostly all adapt fast enough - no biggie, just growing pains to a new system.

My issue here is that I have a fundamental problem with the fact that you *can not buy science*. Any suggestion I'd make starts with bringing back the old science with the ^.5 and the same costs. It worked, it was tested, it was balanced... except one little problem with the way it impacted the T10. To fix that problem for maybe 200 or so people, we ruined many of the things I considered good in the game for everyone.

I can make a suggestion to prevent the "wall of science, you can't join us" problem we had. I grant it was real, I grant it wasn't good and should be fixed. But that suggestion *always* starts with throwing out all the science changes this age, and working from last age's starting-point to fix it. And it simply won't happen.


Relating to adaption: yes, it is a "skill" (heck, activity is partly a skill - most things are). I'm (most) interested in "pure" skill, the type you find in things like Civ or chess. There is a reason I play turn based or "stutter time" (Sim City style) games so much - being faster isn't that fun (and I'm not that fast - so I play at a handicap), but feeling very smart or perceptive is super addictive. To see deeper into the game, and know the ways to force the to your will by your wits alone... that is why I play.
(Heck, even D3 has a surprising amount of thinking to it, though it's prime role is clearly different.)

Adaption as a skill will matter much less in 2-3 ages (unless there are more huge shake-ups). Interpersonal communication is clearly as skill, and helpful, as well. They are important for the player, but are not effective to "balance". The strategy part to this game is looking at "cost benefit analysis and consequence prediction, to make correct decisions" skill, which is what I (and others) have often implicitly meant by "skill" or "pure skill". It really only makes sense to emphasize that skill in a strategy game context, now that I look how restrictive it is... but that is our context here, at least for me.


@Bo To - only reason I haven't left the game already is because I've found a good kingdom. (Skilled, fun group, still casual enough that I don't have to stress or set alarms more than maybe 2x an age.) If I leave this kingdom, I leave the game. Strato's kingdom hopping is fascinating, but way more work than I've ever wanted to put into it.
In fact, having been in the same kingdom for a brief bit... he's almost the perfect opposite to me in many ways, and it baffles me why he is even remotely good... but I know he is (quite good). I just can't understand why!