Mercy vs Pulse round 2.

[TheRock]

For a great example of what I think flogger / prot is saying refer back to Mercy vs Pulse round 1.

That thread was started about the upcoming conflict, in wanders a ghetto cat player and says something to the effect "well maybe I should make a withdrawal"

There are a number of different levels of play for war in utopia - the ghetto level where a monarch spends most of his time begging someone to show up and make a hit, the kingdom with better activity is probably going to win the war even if there was no rhyme or reason to their kingdom setup.

The next level of play is the level where ghetto cats spends most of their age warring at - They war kingdoms without perfect activity or setup, and again the winner is determined by and large by how determined one kingdom is to come out with the WW. It's easy for a kd of slackers to active up over a 48h hostile, but then real life gets into the way of these "weekend warriors" and activity drops out. Playing in these kingdoms are good strategists and so often they set up their kingdom much like a "superkingdom" the problem being they dont tailor their strategies for the activity / knowledge level that their player base provides. You can see how this has played out in some of ghetto cats wars this age - the other kingdom will often start off way ahead in land. But due to the fact ghetto cats actually have a setup that they know works for their activity requirements after the first few days the war often swings in their favour do to the fact they are not only willing, but planned to have a longer engagement.

At the top level of play you have this age atleast two kingdoms like Mercy / Pulse. Warring superkingdom vs superkingdom it is assumed activity will be perfect (an easy way to figure this out is to count the uniques in a war, if you take duration of war, divide by attack time, multiply by attackers you get a unique count #) These kingdoms plan to hit or exceed that perfect unique number by waving army in / out and using spare offence.

Although I know these are broad generalizations, warring at the superkingdom level is very much a game of chess where the war strategists from one kingdom come up with a number of different scenario's thinking through the likely response, counter, response etc.

In kingdoms like that there will be a specific plan for each province. Having a third party kingdom with no affiliation come in and steal 75-100% gold from one single province basically immobilizes that province / player before the game even begins.

And that is what is truly frustrating for top level players when they know other kingdoms are just sitting there, waiting for threads like this to pop up, and then going and stealing from whichever one they aren't cf'ed with or dont like more.

After taking some time off, I was surprised to see these threads about kingdoms at war. On one hand I thought they were great as it provided a chance for the community to smack talk and then follow the kingdoms as they went through the war, but it seems really all these threads are doing is providing notice to vulture kingdoms that know is the time to swoop in and begin stealing, forcing a cf from these kingdoms at a time they are most vulnerable.

There's a reason I don't let my kingdom make these threads :)

It's a product of the Notice culture in the game. Notice has never meant Hostile, so all it does is announce that a kingdom's in prep mode and should be messed with. This has gone on much longer than Ghetto Cats has done it, and I honestly don't see why that shouldn't be the case.

The broader issue is the balance between 1v1 and global competition. Kingdoms would like to fight each other in a vacuum, with no outside interference either way. However, we play a game where there are other kingdoms, where they have the same rights that you do and where past actions can come back to haunt you. We fought Inzzolence this age in a fight where we had 3 provinces at 2000, 1850 and 1800 acres, while their 4 killers were 2000, 2100, 2100 and 2300. Right after our wave, a Dwarf we'd hit when he had no offense hit us for 200a on a killer, and hit us again 12h later. It sucks, but it's part of what makes the game great - it's not enough to just be a strong individual kingdom or to play a good province, you need to get the rest of the world to play fairly with you and make deals with you as well. Simians also plundered us for ~50m gcs (with some encouragement from Pulse, from what I've been told) before our conflict with Pulse last time, but we'd robbed them a bit before. How could I complain about that? It is what it is. We weren't hostile with Pulse, we were preparing.

There's a line between protecting a fair hostile and trying to afford yourself extra protection. I disagree with the idea that kingdoms doing things through normal relations should be penalized or outlawed based on community rules.

[Korp]

Try, just ONCE, playing for a crown, then come back to me and say CFs and notices aren't necessary.

Imo you should try to crown without CFs/notices deals

[DHaran]

Imo you should try to crown without CFs/notices deals

As long as there is one kingdom who will CF and dice/sci pump early age away, everyone else has to do the same, because the game doesn't allow fair competition by playing it any differently. That's what I meant by the game needing change, not the kingdoms style of play.

[goodz]

As long as there is one kingdom who will CF and dice/sci pump early age away, everyone else has to do the same, because the game doesn't allow fair competition by playing it any differently. That's what I meant by the game needing change, not the kingdoms style of play.

cant you just not CF said KD?

[Korp]

As long as there is one kingdom who will CF and dice/sci pump early age away, everyone else has to do the same, because the game doesn't allow fair competition by playing it any differently. That's what I meant by the game needing change, not the kingdoms style of play.

What kind of sheep mentality do you have? you're not forced to do anything. Just dont CF and try to crown its not harder than that. The game dont need to change its people like you that need to change,too afraid to do something different.

[Palem]

tell me about it :p

[DHaran]

What kind of sheep mentality do you have? you're not forced to do anything. Just dont CF and try to crown its not harder than that. The game dont need to change its people like you that need to change,too afraid to do something different.

Of course it isn't hard to TRY something. You can try all you like, but you won't succeed. Why would I try an inefficient method when there is another proven method being used by everyone else, making my success virtually impossible? In typical Korp fashion, you're arguing for the sake of arguing, when you know exactly what I'm talking about.

[Palem]

Just because a tactic isn't popular doesn't mean it's inefficient.

If you're prepared to fight your way to the top, there's no reason CF'ing everyone has any advantage over CF'ing no one, especially considering all the crying that goes on the forums anyway whenever someone gets their toes stepped on.

[DHaran]

Just because a tactic isn't popular doesn't mean it's inefficient.

If you're prepared to fight your way to the top, there's no reason CF'ing everyone has any advantage over CF'ing no one, especially considering all the crying that goes on the forums anyway whenever someone gets their toes stepped on.

Sanc fought to the top. Sanc cannot compete for a crown because of that route.

[Palem]

ummm LOL what a terrible example...

Sact got DEMOLISHED by Ghetto Tag 58, who is one of the two kds competing for a crown, super early. Given how massive of a setback that war was for Sant and the fact that they're in 3rd and not THAT far behind Mercy and GT58 (but yes, still definitely out of the race) that's more a testament to how well warring your way up the chart works.

[gergnub]

uh oh. them things be changing.

[Syntico]

If anyone can do it without CFs, it's Absalom..

[Korp]

Of course it isn't hard to TRY something. You can try all you like, but you won't succeed. Why would I try an inefficient method when there is another proven method being used by everyone else, making my success virtually impossible? In typical Korp fashion, you're arguing for the sake of arguing, when you know exactly what I'm talking about.

Stop being scared of trying something new, people in utopia havent advanced through the ages cause they thought "Hey this method works lets stick to this one and never change to anything else" they adapt, you dont know the outcome of things before you have tried so either you realize you wouldnt have a shot or...

[DHaran]

ummm LOL what a terrible example...

Sact got DEMOLISHED by Ghetto Tag 58, who is one of the two kds competing for a crown, super early. Given how massive of a setback that war was for Sant and the fact that they're in 3rd and not THAT far behind Mercy and GT58 (but yes, still definitely out of the race) that's more a testament to how well warring your way up the chart works.

So are you arguing that if Sanc won that war they could have continued warring and still been competitive late? If that's what you're saying, then all I can do is chuckle.

Stop being scared of trying something new, people in utopia havent advanced through the ages cause they thought "Hey this method works lets stick to this one and never change to anything else" they adapt, you dont know the outcome of things before you have tried so either you realize you wouldnt have a shot or...

They adapt to game changes. Nothing about the game has changed to make CFing and sci-pumps unnecessary to crown. I'm still waiting on you to suggest a way to compete with another method.

[Elurin]

Be better and whine less.