I'm getting tired of fighting against you. I'm very close to joining your crusade to mess the game up so badly that everyone starts quitting.

Stop strengthening suiciders. Of all the stuff you guys could change, deciding that suiciders are too weak and need a boost is pretty much the last thing to do. Yet its what you seem to think is best.

Do you really need us to demonstrate to you how you're breaking the game before you try to fix it?

You could fix spy DR, or fix offensive allies on solo servers, or fix untaggeds on alliance servers. But instead you think its best to make restarting much less painful. Its great to know that when you kill a suicider, to know that he'll be back in 2 days with 500k+ networth without even being FAd.

do some research before you start spewing this fluff on the people that the ONLY reason we are able to play Earth at all.

They are in the process of a BIG over haul to war/killing.

There are a lot of other ways to get around suiciders rather then just killing them as quickly as possible, I just hope the EE team has buffers against people who kill their own countries just for the restart bonus.

You mean on the same level of overhaul as the attack throttling change they tried?

I see where you're coming from but the restart thing wasn't *intended* to help suiciders and I think quite a bit of work has gone into it and maybe after a couple resets it will get straightened. New features need a little time being tested before they get right.

Though I agree, every solo set I hope is the last set with offensive allies existing at all, and with tech leeching not blocked somehow.

There was nothing about strengthening suiciders; perhaps the restarts have made that slightly easier, that is not its purpose however.

Instead of fluffing, perhaps provide some constructive feedback?


The attack throttling wasn't done with proper vetting or testing.


In case you didn't notice, we've put in lots of anti-suiciding measures, such as the inability to drop land for 24h after grabbing; that stopped most suiciding as it is.

The inability to drop land for 24 hours after grabbing has done very little to stop suiciders. If you think that change has stopped most suiciding, then you are extremely out of touch.

http://forums.earthempires.com/...ned-strikes-need-changing

http://forums.earthempires.com/...nge-to-research-alliances

http://forums.earthempires.com/...;z=addition-to-luck-bonus

http://forums.earthempires.com/...ove-the-build-costs-bonus

http://forums.earthempires.com/...23782519&z=express-dr

http://forums.earthempires.com/...ans-based-on-max-networth

http://forums.earthempires.com/...-tanks-are-manned-by-civs

Yes, and lots of those are good suggestions; but none have to do with suiciders.

I don't think we've been fighting you or vice versa at any point.


As for restarts: that has to do with war, not suiciders; there will be a bug-fix at some point soon to eliminate the extra 72 turns being given out on restart creation;



Spy DR is one thing we're considering changing; though I wouldn't label it as broken. Offensive allies on solo servers is another thing we're considering -- but that one is slightly more complicated to do, we can't just magick them out of existence as easily as we can change many other things. What is broken about untags on alliance...? The fact that they can get farmed really easily?


As for suiciders: if they're only 500k nw, how are they harming you? Perhaps you should get defence? I presume you're referring to FFA?

Hey hey y bring ffa into this lol

I think you could just magick OA's out of existence on solo servers and 90% of top players would say thank you.

qz whats is decent defense?


once again you show your lack of understanding of ffa.


it doesnt matter if u have 1k turrets/troops or 2 million, a suicider with 16 restarts will break thru that without even trying with current restart changes.

It sounds like you're thinking you need some kind of big or complicated change to remove OAs but you don't, there's already already PS with 50% offensive bonus, if I felt like it I could probably top feed the #1 guy in every server at any time, even if he's got big DAs and I have no OAs.

is it a code thing with allies? Because no serious player is going to miss OAs in solo servers.

Hm; having restarted here in alliance, we're finding it difficult to even get within humanitarian range of LaF/SoF


How is it with organized restarts & FA &etc we still can't get into humanitarians range, but you guys are being wiped out by restarts?

its not problem to get in humas range, problem is to have enuf military to break something else than other restarts w/o fa and not getting killed after has hit.

I'm pretty sure you could remove O allines in solo servers quite easily...

Don't quote me.

Removing the code allying code might be hard. Qz said it is hard.

But disabling the ability to request/accept Offensive/tech allies should be exceedingly easy.

yes.

one cache function, a server variable, and an:
if (!allies_allow($serverid))
return false;
added to like 3 game functions should do it :p

I wholey support removing allies from solo servers so I've thought through the flow to do it before. But it is not an opinion shared by many others on staff for their own good reasons. I'm not very active atm, so I respect their decisions.

However, what I would rather discuss is how to replace the current ally system on solo servers with something that is better for the solo server experience -- maybe something better for making connections with new players, rather than benefiting those who play in an organized fashion. Approach the problem differently!

Oh, I didn't realize removing allying code would be hard since Tourney did it.

Pang, I just want to speak up real quickly, like Boltar did in his thread, for the def ally. It's good to help counteract the PS 50% bonus, AND it's good because it makes land grabbing a bit more involved than just 1 spy and attack. Plus it's not as clear an abuse as off/tech leeches. It's off/tech allies that mess up the solo play. I would leave it how it is, or maybe max it at 50% instead of 100% of your defense. The overhaul you're talking about could be great, it's hard to tell, but just removing o-ally and possibly r-ally could be done in a snap and would be a great fix!

What is the cause of disagreement from the other members of the staff? Do they play the solo servers actively? Those of us who do have this discussion almost every reset and are 80%+ in agreement as far as I can tell.

well disabling all of them would be fairly trivial; doing just off would be a little harder; i think *just* disabling off allies might be a little too unbalanced towards the defender though no? also I'd like to find some alternative to research agreements....

in general i agree, but i'd prefer to modify/balance rather than just strike them out completely

maybe making things favour the defender on solo servers is appropriate? :p

and if we do it for tourney already it should be a server variable and have the flow I already mentioned coded in... so even easier :p

I don't think it would really favor the defender. If I have 10m turrets and have two allies with 10m turrets, that's 5m turrets, or 50% def, added. Exact same as the PS bonus.

But, if you think it might favor the defender, try asking for feedback in the Primary forum and see if people have concerns. From past discussions, I don't think there's much concern but you can scout it out for yourself to be sure. :)

And yes, I agree on research agreements... an alternative would be interesting. I believe one of Rockman's old threads had some ideas.

A PS can negate defensive allies + you have weapons tech. Breaking will still be doable but defending will also be possible. In the current state you cannot stop a guy who has 3 O allies and for a solo server that's a problem. An overwhelming majority of people who play solo serves like Primary support the removal of Offensive allies. So you can disable it for a set, let it go and see if any issues come up?

I don't see a problem with that. One thing to also keep in mind is solo game play is different than alliance.

I've suggested this before qz, about tech allies:

http://forums.earthempires.com/...way-to-change-tech-allies

"Whenever I spend a turn to tech, none of my tech allies gain tech. Instead, I gain 10% of my allies TPT (limited to 10% of my TPT)."

Example given in the linked thread.

Do this, then disable Offensive allies, that's all. I believe you can keep Spy and Defensive allies.

While you're at it, remove Trade pact allies from servers that have FA disabled as well, you can't actually do anything with it and I've seen more than quite a few newbie countries have trade pacts but not realize it is useless.

I like it!

It'd be nice if research alliances helped more than *just* techers though no?

That's kind of tricky because it's different across different servers, right? In an individual game, it's way too easy for someone not teching to snag a tech ally and get free tech in exchange for nothing. That obviously is a problem and what the suggestion is aimed at fixing. In a team/alliance/ffa game though, I could see giving someone a leech being part of a clan strategy. But, if they lost that ability, would it be a major loss? I'm a solo player so keep that in mind, but I think the change would be a net plus for the game.

No.

What if say 1/10th your tech points counted towards their tech levels? rather than sharing TPT and teched stuff and all that

We want fairness. That matters far more than anything else. And we know better than to ask you to do some change making tech alliances useful for all strategies. We don't want what we'll get if you try and do that. Because we know you'll find a way to mess it up.

Jeez Rockman, so negative.

As far as that suggestion, qz, I don't like it too much... It sounds pretty fair, but it just means good players with high tech will ally each other, and become better. And it would probably be more helpful to strategies other than techer, and make techers sell lower volume. It also just doesn't seem to work in a very interesting way. If that's how it works, it would be just like giving everyone a 30% tech bonus.

Lot of crying on this thread.

I have a great idea. Once per round, for one random country only, an Admin can deposit a random amount of a random item inside that country. Call it a "Gift from the gods" or something.

Sounds better than the whining I see in this thread.

If you did this, then you are buffing everyone but techers by 30% tech points. Tech volume sales will be lower as everyone but techers needs less tech points.

People of the same strategy would want to tech ally each other (with the same type of techs needed).

Blid is correct, it is uninteresting as well.

KISS, just remove RAs.

careful blid u might get banned for 24 hrs for agreeing with me against pang.. but all seriousness. the reason evo and company (im am not flaming) couldnt get in humanitarian range was the farming and grow of countries.. i pissed and moaned during warchats about getting to fat, to hit the enemy.. ask any lafer and some sofers who were there.. i pissed and moaned daily, so for the restart change its faulty in the aspect u restart with a fluffload of cs and land.. making ur nw high enuff to farm oop without getting FA... ... as for the solo servers.. a 0 offensive ally 1mil jet country sends the power of 1.5mil on a PS.. the 0 defender needs 1.5mil turrets. making his/her expenses much higher. hence why the 1 or 2 defensive allie where it could only give u 50% defense strength not doubled like it can potentially be now. would make it a even field.. the better country would win that LG skirmish..