A number of mechanics suggestions

[goodz]

I like the tops inability to get away totally from the top 20. makes things more interesting to watch.

[jdorje]

I like the tops inability to get away totally from the top 20. makes things more interesting to watch.

Yes, that's the main focus of my proposed changes. Having one war should not put you 15k acres behind with no way to make that ground up.

[goodz]

Its fun now though because kingdoms making no effort to grow can still hit the top. I have not dice once all age, I have not explored, I have maybe hit for land oow 10 times and not for a month. But just war growth leaves my kd average around 3k acres. A KD currently can war and even if you just get stalled and experience limited growth you still end up close enough, losing 2k acres a day of dice growth for 6-7 days in most cases.

[TheRock]

I made a separate thread explaining why this thread shows why most people should be ignored and only a certain few extremely good players should be listened to.

http://forums.utopia-game.com/showth...ggestion-board

Unfortunately, if Moderators decide they don't like your Suggestion, they have the power to make you stop talking about this. Blatant abuses of power aside, this thread shows why people like Dorje, who understand the game extremely well, should be making the changes, and most people should not be.

[DDodge]

I made a separate thread explaining why this thread shows why most people should be ignored and only a certain few extremely good players should be listened to.

http://forums.utopia-game.com/showth...ggestion-board

Unfortunately, if Moderators decide they don't like your Suggestion, they have the power to make you stop talking about this. Blatant abuses of power aside, this thread shows why people like Dorje, who understand the game extremely well, should be making the changes, and most people should not be.

palem JUST BARELY got the lockdown on your other thread before i could drop by and plant one of these cool thumbs ups

[Palem]

I made a separate thread explaining why this thread shows why most people should be ignored and only a certain few extremely good players should be listened to.

http://forums.utopia-game.com/showth...ggestion-board

Unfortunately, if Moderators decide they don't like your Suggestion, they have the power to make you stop talking about this. Blatant abuses of power aside, this thread shows why people like Dorje, who understand the game extremely well, should be making the changes, and most people should not be.

Knock it off TheRock. The suggestion board is for actual suggestions. Not a playground for you tell other people that their suggestions are bad and promoting jdorje's suggestions.

[TheRock]

Knock it off TheRock. The suggestion board is for actual suggestions. Not a playground for you tell other people that their suggestions are bad and promoting jdorje's suggestions.

This is an actual suggestion. You may not like it, but it is not against the rules. I haven't made any personal attacks or flamed, just gave an honest suggestion.

Be less cranky :)

[Palem]

Stop telling people I abuse my powers when I hardly ever use my powers.

[TheRock]

Stop telling people I abuse my powers when I hardly ever use my powers.

Stop closing legitimate threads that do not break the rules, flame other players, attack the game's creators or would otherwise warrant closure and I won't say that you close threads that shouldn't be closed :)

[DHaran]

If you have an issue with something a mod does, contact another mod. Now get back on topic.

[jdorje]

The problem is that the vast majority of people, including most top players, do not understand the ramification of proposed changes. The developers listen to proposals made by committees, and the result is consistent backward movement in the quality of gameplay. This has been most evident the last two ages, with exploration removed last age [1] and war removed this age [2]. The result is that these have been the two most boring ages of utopia in recent memory.

Most of the responses I've seen to my proposed suggestions follow this same pattern. Opposition ranges from "that's just stupid" to "but I like being in range of top kingdom's chained provinces, please don't change that" to "it's not fair to let you propose changes, because you'll sneak something in that you can take advantage of". (In response to goodz - you are not in range of top provinces. Dicers are all 6k by now. You are in range of chained provinces in top kingdoms. This would not change under my proposed change, particularly when your ghetto province would be able to dice for 10 acres/hour if you wished.)

There is no reason that one set of rules cannot encompass both top play and regular play. Making the top be something to aspire to rather than something that midlevel kingdoms try to avoid because of all the politics required to maneuver through the game's crappy growth mechanics, would be good. In fact, it would be more than good.

[1] Again, the changes to exploration last age had the effect of doubling exploration costs. This was done after people complained about cows being too strong. The result is that now only cows explore. I would be surprised if there was a single province on the server doing significant exploration that's above 1000 acres and below 8000. This is a perfect example about how the vast majority of players cannot follow through the ramifications of a proposed change. While most kingdoms avoided cowing, thinking it would be too expensive, mine adapted to the changes and ran an unstoppable cow that was able to explore all age on 20% draft because nobody else was close to her range. My point is that the results of this change were very easy to predict.

[2] My own kingdom has spent about half the age at the #1 spot, without a single war. We have given the button to several kingdoms, who declined to use it. Not a single kingdom has given us the button. One kingdom did slow us down by waving us from below declare range. Even after dropping 20k acres and keeping 30k barren acres we were unable to get into declare range on them. Most other top kingdoms have been slowed down by a similar amount, with repeated "waves" from kingdoms attempting to abuse declare range. The next logical step is for top kingdoms to farm out to each other to drop into declare range of smaller kingdoms that wave them. This age, being in the top is not something anyone would aspire to. More than ever before, it is about diplomacy. The one top war so far this age ended with both kingdoms netting -15k acres out of it and falling out of their top spots.

[Scavenger]

The result is that these have been the two most boring ages of utopia in recent memory.

I've seen more top 5 wars/coflicts in the last two ages than the 10 before that. More wars overall too. Seems rather exciting.

[TheRock]

The problem is that the vast majority of people, including most top players, do not understand the ramification of proposed changes. The developers listen to proposals made by committees, and the result is consistent backward movement in the quality of gameplay. This has been most evident the last two ages, with exploration removed last age [1] and war removed this age [2]. The result is that these have been the two most boring ages of utopia in recent memory.

I support this statement.

[jdorje]

I've seen more top 5 wars/coflicts in the last two ages than the 10 before that. More wars overall too. Seems rather exciting.

You haven't been watching then.

However the current overall growth mechanic has stood for a long time - ever since dice was changed to make it really really easy, and really even before that. Some ages everyone happens to get slowed equally. Other ages someone gets a cf and just dices away and you never see them again. Last age there were pretty even stoppages, with a well-balanced top, while many other ages the top has been dominated by either abs or anti-abs and nobody fights. You should not consider balanced alliances (which is a separate goal that players should have) to be a mitigating factor toward the imbalancing dicing/growth mechanics, however.

[TheRock]

You haven't been watching then.

However the current overall growth mechanic has stood for a long time - ever since dice was changed to make it really really easy, and really even before that. Some ages everyone happens to get slowed equally. Other ages someone gets a cf and just dices away and you never see them again. Last age there were pretty even stoppages, with a well-balanced top, while many other ages the top has been dominated by either abs or anti-abs and nobody fights. You should not consider balanced alliances (which is a separate goal that players should have) to be a mitigating factor toward the imbalancing dicing/growth mechanics, however.

You should mention that thing about how dicing remains at the same cost while exploring doubles in price, which hurts the ability of kingdoms who explored their base during the age to keep up with the dicers and also hurts kingdoms looking to grow via attacking since the acre cap for randoming is so much lower.