Sakit, SS and Xin just want to call it cheating or easy or whatever because people have embraced being able to have a more level playing field. People are taking advantage of something that pretty much the whole server can, so now they can't pummel us all into oblivion while they claim the top spots.

If you two want to prove how good you *actually* are (and that's honestly great about that NW record, xin), lower yourselves to the noob standard and show us all up. Then you'll be able to prove that you're the best under any circumstance, not just one crafted and exploited by yourselves.

Challenge accepted? Or do you need the extra crutch of internal trading? There's plenty of fish out there, just use your expertise to calculate the best grabs..

lol djbeif. it's boring and pointless. we know we can do it and there's no point in proving it to anyone.

http://www.earthempires.com/alliance/20/ranks

you honestly think we can't repeat that even with these "supposed" landtrading nerfs that aren't really nerfing anything?

lol

Grats on doing that a year ago :) Why not continue to dominate like you did then? The best have to stay the best, no?

Because it is boring.

yeah hands down laf can do it, but consistency is a different thing.

If it's boring and you just want to cling to the past, then you could just leave the forums as your input has no more validity in an evolving game.

How is bottomfeeding less boring?

farming established alliances, since a few can outjump the retals, apparently isn't boring...I think that's his point.

Who are you? I don't need to post spy ops, my credentials on being right are for all to see; 10 years of it.

Send me the info in a pm, arsenal. Vincey has taken number one several times, he doesn't need fa to do so. Maybe you're wondering how he beat chirod out with relatively similar stats? If that's the case, I know exactly how and it had nothing to do with fa :)

Why are you mad MD? because you are just second to TPA? lol. get over it you bunch of losers.

You're a very angry fella aren't ya? Always calling everyone names and saying so and so clans suck... not very friendly I must say...

A COUPLE OF THINGS:

DJ, I THINK YOU MISREAD SAKITSAPUWIT'S POST. IT SOUNDED TO ME LIKE HE WAS DISAGREEING WITH THOSE WHO CONSIDERED THIS TACTIC "DIRTY" OR "CHEATING".

OR MAYBE I MISREAD IT.

SECONDLY THOUGH, I'M GOING TO MAKE A FINAL ATTEMPT TO BETTER EXPLAIN THE POSITION OF THOSE OF US WHO ARE AGAINST GHOST ACRES. I WILL NOW ABANDON THE LETTERS OF POWER SO THAT YOU SIMPLETONS MIGHT HAVE A BETTER CHANCE OF UNDERSTANDING!

There has been a lot of talk on this thread about how those who don't like ghost acres are opposed to an "even playing field".

Nothing could be further from the truth. The field already IS even for all, without ghost acres. I - as well as most of the people who share my opinion, I believe - object to land being gained in vast sums without risk. Risk is what makes this game interesting. Reward is what compels people to take the risk of stealing the land of another country. And conflict... without conflict this game is just plain boring.

We enjoyed the competitive nature that this game once had. Granted, the alliance server has always been different in that regard, but now it is possible to avoid risk almost entirely, and still remain competitive at the highest levels. This should not be. It cheapens the game, and reduces it to barely more than a spreadsheet. There is no need for diplomacy, no need to choose targets carefully, no need to spend any time trying to outgain your competition.

I asked this question before and it was ignored, but I think it is a very valid question. For those who think ghost acres are good for the game, would you also think that a bonus points-based land gain system would be good? One where you could spend bonus points and gain a large number of acres, at the expense of some of your buildings? And if not, why not? How would this system be any different than land trading?

And one last time, just to be perfectly clear.. I don't think any less of anyone who land trades. The problem is with the mechanics of the game, not the players. The players are doing what they're supposed to do; making the most of whatever advantages they can legally give themselves.

HA!

SAM
CHAMPION OF THE EUGLAF DIVISION,
THE MIGHTY CLAN [DANGER]!

YOU STOPPED USING WORDS OF POWER THEREFOR YOUR ARGUMENT IS INVALID!!!


on a side note, man you netters have a lot of sand in your vagina...

don't think i could agree more with sam on this entire matter :)

especially that sig!

SoF getting butthurt still? I know it's been like 2 years of getting your ass kicked, but still.

I think pdm and evos original opt in list is the best of both worlds, honestly. As I mentioned before, it allows those who want to have a peaceful set be protected from grabbing, but still allows other who wish to to grab. The server has strayed away from that over the past few sets, however. Many alliances only want to sign a pact where individuals must contact before grabbing and give consent. I'm not really in favor of those types, to be honest.

An 80% l:l pact between opted in countries is best of both worlds, IMO.

can I just ask, how old are the people in the "Pornstar" alliance? Do teenagers still play this game?

bonus

I do not want to cling to the past. Far from that, I want to see the game advance. But not advance in this peaceful, diplomatic, low-risk high reward method/manner called landtrading. This isn't the game I want to play anymore. You'll find me on Primary server, because landtrading is impossible/outlawed there.

To be clear, if I want to go for a rank 1 spot today on Alliance, I will landtrade. Why? Because it is the path of least resistance. But I don't like it. Your argument is that I dislike change/cling to the past/not adapt, etc. That's far from true, every reset, there are changes that we adapt to, from warring changes to formula changes, DR changes, restart changes, everyone adapts.

There are changes I like, and there are changes I don't. Landtrading is one direction I hate to see the game go towards because it undermines the very basic tenets of game design, of the notion risk-vs-reward. I am not adverse to changes, but I am adverse to changes that break the game. A year ago, I pushed very hard for LaF to start landtrading, because I wanted to show qzjul how broken landtrading was because nobody would believe otherwise; LaF didn't want to engage in this broken game mechanic. And we succeeded, that reset, the top 33 countries in NW are _ALL_ landtraders, that prompted immediate game changes to nerf it.

A year later, it is still clear that landtrading is still powerful. Short of me pushing very hard for LaF to adopt internal landtrading in order to prove again just how broken landtrading still is (I honestly don't think this will ever happen, Eugene is very stubborn), there isn't really many ways to prove otherwise. Count the number of traders vs non-traders in the top 10, or top 20. It is broken, it undermines the spirit of the game, but everyone is praising it like the godsend it is that "it is newbie friendly, it equalizes the playing field", etc. How can people not see that it is just "Explore 2.0" with practically zero risks?

I'm not saying that landtrading does not take skill. It definitely does take skill, and top players that landtrade will mostly likely still outperform average and mediocre players that landtrade. But when mediocre players that landtrade start to outperform top players that don't landtrade, then it is broken. It is about balancing rewards so that it commensurate with the risks taken. But hey, weak players are just going to argue landtrading lets them perform better and thus "even the playing field". Sure, it does, but only until everyone starts landtrading and no other strategy is viable, and the weak players remain weak anyway.

I don't look down on anyone that landtrades, far from it. I specifically just dislike the game mechanic, and have plenty of reasons for doing so. People can argue all they want about how it is more "newbie friendly" because it doesn't chase new players away - this is bogus for 2 reasons:
A) The rate of player gain, loss and retention hasn't changed visibly ever since landtrading became common
B) Untagged countries are still going to get farmed, regardless of whether landtrading is rampant - it is free land for the most part, and farming these untagged countries is still the best way to gain land until you are sufficiently large and have the infrastructure to begin landtrading - you don't simply start landtrading from 5k land.


@Tellarion The opt-in thing is exactly what led to today, it wasn't ideal landtrading. People strove to make it ideal, and go to great lengths to coordinate for it.

Xin, say landtrading was nerfed out of existence. Would that really make landgaining in Alliance less fluffty?

In my opinion, yes. It has been that way for 10 years before EE.

I know it's not ideal, because you still have that risk vs reward aspect while retaining the friendly and competitive aspects. If people want to tone down trading but keep it viable, that's the way to go, imo.

And as I mentioned previously, qz has already been looking into more nerfs for trading. I'll have to bug him and see what's up...

it's still going on? i guess TPA winning really is a huge deal in this server..

I strongly disagree. It gets you land. Not in a perfect way, but in a better way than farming untagged players or having to go all-exp. Alliance politics make it so it's really only those choices or hitting one of the few weak alliances. All of those options are worse for the game than being able to grow through land trading.

And if you do nerf trading (I don't care, I don't trade), please don't fluff the other servers while doing so.

Also I don't know why someone could be accused of being aided (Vince) and not make his profile public to dispel the rumors. Come on... defend your rep bro.

xinhuan sucks at ee.... bonus

You'll have to explain this to me. They're better because they had the top country? MD could have easily manipulated the market and came out with the top country. We decided it was best to keep it legit on our end and come out with #2.

That being said if I had it my way that country would have been hit, and we would be going to war this set. (I would warn TPA first of course give them a chance to correct their mistake.)

"one of the best players around sucks at ee.... bonus"

You claim that Alliance politics makes it bad for untagged players, but

A) Precisely the point. This server is not meant for untagged players. It is meant for clan vs clan politicking, wars, etc. There should be little concern for untagged players - new players are encouraged to start on Primary, with the disclaimer that players should join a clan on Alliance.

B) The problem with Alliance server isn't so much so that untagged players can't find a clan easily. They most certainly can. The lack of growth is more because smaller clans cannot survive easily (again, caused by Alliance politics); there is a Leadership forum setup to try to help such small clans, but its mostly just talk, EE is a numbers game, the side with larger numbers usually wins, there is no good mechanic to equalize clan wars. Small clans eventually dissolve, merge or leave the game, it most certainly isn't due to players being farmed as an untagged - the advice given is to join a clan after all. If they are truly new and inexperienced, they will also get farmed on solo servers. Look at a tag like say HEROES, they most certainly get farmed just as hard as any untagged country. It isn't a untagged country problem at all.

C) Landtrading only exists on clan servers, yet again, because of clan politics. Here, everyone is claiming that landtrading is good for the game because it is better for the untagged players, but it is really just "bandaid" to a different problem. Why doesn't landtrading manifest itself on Team server? Or Primary, or Express servers? Viewing it in this way show that landtrading is an abuse of game mechanics, because the mechanics make it possible, but the environment to execute it is only possible on Alliance and FFA.

Dude, all that fluff shows is that the Alliance server politics are broken.

So it's the untagged countries' own fault. If everyone tagged up and the untagged players went away, how would that help landgaining on the Alliance server? It would continue to mean untaggeds and weak alliances get farmed, or people have to go all-exp. That's not a solution is it?

Average age 35

Landtrading is against the rules on solo servers, as you know. And in the case of the express server, it's actually not as efficient as other means.

As far as team, it just hasn't caught on yet, I'm guessing. The situation there hasn't exactly been conducive to trading. I mean, how long did it take for trading to really start up here? FFA pioneered it ages ago...

LAF bayot!

I declare this thread CIRCLE JERK

Acting tough guy huh? do what you want pride. I don't have to explain myself to you. And please, stop your claim of being legit in netting. We know what you are. Its in you. All i want is to congratulate TPA. Why butthurt? lol.

Thank you DespicableMe for the congrats. We appreciate it. But we also don't want this thread to start hatred between TPA and everyone else in Alliance.

We would like to say Thank you to everyone who make the set a memorable one. And to all who still doubt on Vincey, you are entitled to your own opinions.

To all who argues on how to make the server better, Thank you also. May QZ and everyone who is in charge hear you.

Let's all have another fun filled set :)

We come in peace. Contact Paolo for more porn.

+1 for Paolo's porn. They are POP PORN. :)

Because a FA-Top spot is not Legit.

THIS IS TRUE, ESPECIALLY WHEN WE HAVE IRREFUTABLE PROOF OF SUCH ACTIONS.

Who is Dino_Danger, and who is "we"?

Bombay

you do realise he has said he got no FA, and his profile is public.


Have a look if you like

No, it isn't public.

http://www.earthempires.com/alliance/26/ranks/454

Doesn't look public...

if a player plays all the other game servers it is best not to make your profile public to avoid cross server hatred. It is just me but i think its a smart decision.


congrats vincey, good luck with your wedding preparation. dont let ths guys/gals with no life ruin your plans. enjoy the vacation.

No life?

Ah ok, just going of a previous post, never checked myself.

I think you might have been thinking of my post iScode.

http://www.earthempires.com/alliance/26/ranks/1 is the link to my country, which is public. The only other public profile in the top10 list is Downsay's.

ah ok

Yeah Osso's is public.

Numbers don't lie...