Verified:

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Jul 18th 2010, 17:18:04

Now you will get a bonus of 20A for logging in once per day!

cool eh? :)


- qz
Finally did the signature thing.

Requiem Game profile

Member
EE Patron
9536

Jul 18th 2010, 18:14:26

Should be 50 acres for 12 hours and 100 acres for 18 hours ;)
Req,
- Premium Patron Member

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Jul 18th 2010, 18:17:13

lol... no this is the opposite, that's a bonus for staying logged out, this is a bonus for logging in every day.... ;)
Finally did the signature thing.

Requiem Game profile

Member
EE Patron
9536

Jul 18th 2010, 18:21:00

Ahh I get you.

I'd agree more logging = better :p
Req,
- Premium Patron Member

llaar Game profile

Member
11,317

Jul 18th 2010, 21:42:19

enabled for all servers starting now?

funfun!

snawdog Game profile

Member
2413

Jul 19th 2010, 0:04:51

Aww..Looky..
3.6 mins ago
You were given a daily bonus of 20 extra acres.
ICQ 364553524
msn






qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Jul 19th 2010, 3:07:32

yea, all servers starting now
i needed the new news system to do this... welll didn't neeeed it, just way easier
Finally did the signature thing.

snawdog Game profile

Member
2413

Jul 19th 2010, 3:11:31

Thanks for all the work ya'll are doin'...
ICQ 364553524
msn






Akula Game profile

Member
EE Patron
4114

Jul 19th 2010, 12:34:30

*humpage*
=============================
"Astra inclinant, sed non obligant"

SOL http://sol.ghqnet.com/
=============================

Detmer Game profile

Member
4287

Jul 19th 2010, 15:18:52

Can I turn off my free acre bonus? I hate logging into free acres =P

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Jul 19th 2010, 15:35:44

uh why do you hate logging into free acres? i suppose we could make it so you could turn it off....
Finally did the signature thing.

Detmer Game profile

Member
4287

Jul 19th 2010, 15:45:56

Originally posted by qzjul:
uh why do you hate logging into free acres? i suppose we could make it so you could turn it off....


It makes my life complicated. Maybe I could set it to if I login every day for five days I get 100 acres? =P I just hate having to consider how to deal with a small amount of acres. I can't in good conscience drop them, but they aren't readily usable in one turn unless I want to inefficiently build a partial BPT (or if it is like day two of the round)... then I have to figure out what is most efficient... like do I want to spend several turns exploring to deal with them? Do I carry them for a few days? Clearly the answer depends on what I am doing with my country at the time.... It's just a huge pain that I was happy to do away with =P

Also for stonewalling/warchats it was a pain to log in and drop right away =P

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Jul 19th 2010, 15:50:07

Originally posted by Detmer:
Also for stonewalling/warchats it was a pain to log in and drop right away =P


Heh i thought that was part of the fun

but yea we could put in some options; i dunno about letting them collect i'd have to discuss that with strategy people
Finally did the signature thing.

afaik Game profile

Member
502

Jul 19th 2010, 17:19:39

Might it work if you make it so you are awarded 1-turn-building's worth of acres? So whatever your bpt is you get daily?

This would encourage higher bpt's, which would help reduce the impact of land-loss on newer players and increase the total land in each server considerably.

It would also remove the difficulty in deciding what to do with scraps of land and add a new element to the bpt calculations...

It might skew strats too much though... I'm happy with the new free land either way... just an idea.

bore Game profile

Patron
385

Jul 19th 2010, 17:57:32

3k bpt!

afaik Game profile

Member
502

Jul 19th 2010, 18:09:46

Yea, while 3k is not feasible, I think it would skew strats too much - it'd reward the landthin startups which would probably endup penalising new players more than it helped them.

Detmer Game profile

Member
4287

Jul 19th 2010, 19:49:22

I was going to suggest a bpt/day BUT...

it is broken...


A theo farmer without any tech (or population) which only sold on the public market for $35 would be able to afford all of it's buildings by building one bpt (minus 77 CS) and then 77 CS with the rest of its turns. I didn't factor in that the first couple days would require some exploration... in the grand scheme of things that won't alter the fact that this country could build all of its free land (over 43k acres) and have enough money to spend at the end of the set to jump 37M NW (with normal prices).

Now this country would have to buy defense which would be expenses, but this doesn't include income from population, or TECH, which would make this the best strategy in the game (theo free land acquirer... I didn't bother to figure out if casher or farmer made more sense)

Slagpit Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
5081

Jul 19th 2010, 19:55:21

You guys make everything so complicated.

Detmer Game profile

Member
4287

Jul 19th 2010, 20:01:49

Originally posted by Slagpit:
You guys make everything so complicated.


Confirmed.

Shinigami Game profile

Member
685

Jul 19th 2010, 20:57:46

Oh goodie... I can't WAIT to see how many n00b wallers login and forget to drop the free acres!

llaar Game profile

Member
11,317

Jul 19th 2010, 21:04:00

make it 100 acres, and make it noticeable somewhere, like when you first create country, it lets you know that you gain 100 acres for logging in daily

15/20 or whatever is just pretty insignificant

make it 12 and 18 hours maybe, 100, and 50 acres. so more often logging in = better

"your people appreciate your constant attention and have rewarded you by exploring an additional 100 acres!"

and reverse the turns given too. 6 turns for 12 hours, 3 turns for 18, no turns if its been over 36 hours not logged in.

"you gained no bonus turns due to the lack of attention you are giving your country"


something along those lines... ;)

llaar Game profile

Member
11,317

Jul 19th 2010, 21:04:20

or should this be in B&S, forgot what forum i was in :P

Detmer Game profile

Member
4287

Jul 19th 2010, 21:05:24

Originally posted by llaar:
make it 100 acres, and make it noticeable somewhere, like when you first create country, it lets you know that you gain 100 acres for logging in daily

15/20 or whatever is just pretty insignificant

make it 12 and 18 hours maybe, 100, and 50 acres. so more often logging in = better

"your people appreciate your constant attention and have rewarded you by exploring an additional 100 acres!"

and reverse the turns given too. 6 turns for 12 hours, 3 turns for 18, no turns if its been over 36 hours not logged in.

"you gained no bonus turns due to the lack of attention you are giving your country"


something along those lines... ;)


I like that idea.

de1i Game profile

Member
1640

Jul 19th 2010, 21:40:42

Makes checking for stonewallers great :)

Requiem Game profile

Member
EE Patron
9536

Jul 20th 2010, 1:41:54

I think I got the bonus twice today?
Req,
- Premium Patron Member

Dragonlance Game profile

Member
1611

Jul 20th 2010, 7:22:14

your an evil man shini

silverbeet Game profile

Member
96

Jul 20th 2010, 9:09:38

I dislike it, but it should be 50 acres, even more. Make it a part of the strats. Twenty acres is 1.2k land growth which is more of a pain in both netting and war. If it's even 10k land that's a good lot of growth to work strats around.

I like the 18hrs, coz I like to do otherstuff and only really want to play once a day when I need to. Puts pressure on how you war save for those turns or not. I wonder what it'll be like if this was increased ;OD

These are both ways that will subtley spread out the skill of players, and increase networth scores. Those six turns make a difference and all our strats are based around those extra turns of play.

What if it was 10 turns over 24 hrs?
A daily decision to decide free land or turns...

trainboy Game profile

Member
760

Aug 3rd 2010, 22:34:20

lol why would you give away 10k in FREE land, it would kill land grabbing cause you could get to 30k all-x so why bother grabbing/making all that effot for someone to just login for it,

yeh dont get me wrong if u grab to 30k you know get 40kall good but building costs converting etc its probably not worth it even if you get there alot quicker,
it also powers up all-x techers who stock all set on 10-12k acres too much in my mind.
1.2k is more than enough free land
50 acres gives like 3k which aint too much in my eyes tho but again why just give land...

Eric171 Game profile

Member
460

Aug 5th 2010, 1:51:38

Originally posted by de1i:
Makes checking for stonewallers great :)


:)

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Aug 5th 2010, 2:13:00

it's just a little land to grease the wheels, and some encouragement to login every day
Finally did the signature thing.

BobbyATA Game profile

Member
2384

Aug 5th 2010, 2:53:40

you should allow players an option to decline the 20A. Its annoying as fluff to drop 20 acres every day when you are a tmbr.

Also get rid of 12 and 18 hour bonuses...this would allow skill to be an even larger part of game. Last set I honestly did not log in to landgrab a few mediocre targets b/c I would lose bonus turns (for example I had 1 hour left before 18 hour bonus...)

Tertius Game profile

Member
EE Patron
1649

Aug 5th 2010, 6:03:15

But then the turn bonus becomes part of the skill? You have to know when to take it and when to leave it.

Also, the more dedicated you are, you can get extra turns by logging in every 18 hours exactly and not just once a day.

enshula Game profile

Member
EE Patron
2510

Aug 5th 2010, 6:18:46

id be interisted to slightly reduce the turn bonus's but also to make 18 less preferable to 12

silverbeet Game profile

Member
96

Aug 5th 2010, 8:15:24

I like the 18hr, it gives me time to do other fluff in the day and still give me some chance of keeping up. Keeping to our circadian rhythms would be nice. If this game is about NW and rank, it's for people that can play at least once a day. If you want more players you don't want new players to realise they need to play twice or even three times a day, or they may simply move on to something quicker.

I'd like turns to store longer.

enshula Game profile

Member
EE Patron
2510

Aug 5th 2010, 8:29:24

they dont need to play more often, id just like to see it penalised less rather than encouraged

for example we could have a 6 hour 2 turns bonus and 12 hour 4 turns bonus

double sales still matter for commie indy a bit, especially in team, and non commie indy in other servers, and techers to some degree

BobbyATA Game profile

Member
2384

Aug 5th 2010, 13:26:16

yes bonus turns also affect the market in that a techer or indy double selling will sell his first batch at low prices so he can log in 6 hours later with all his tech sold, sell his second batch and log in 18 hours later to 6 bonus turns. This is bad that these bonus turns are affecting the game in such a way...

enshula Game profile

Member
EE Patron
2510

Aug 5th 2010, 13:33:09

hell why not make it 6 turns/24 hour pro rata

as long as you login once every 24 hours or close to it you get max turns

ive been thinking for a while that the first bonus of the reset should be pro rata'd within 18 hours to make it equal for everyone

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Aug 5th 2010, 15:04:27

hm but then it would be best to login 2x at 12 hours; i still think we want the game to be aimed first at people who play once a day;

I'd be open to making it an 10 hour 3 turn bonus and 18 hour 6 turn.....
Finally did the signature thing.

enshula Game profile

Member
EE Patron
2510

Aug 5th 2010, 15:39:36

its a bit of a philosophical question

originally bonuses were designed to penalise playing constantly for server load reasons, basically money

whereas now you want to focus more on making sure people play every day for activity reasons, and ideally once a day i guess

so the 20 acres and 6 turns are could for people who play once a day, if you ever play 24.1 hours apart at the wrong time you miss 20 acres though

and the 18 hour turns create a slight advantage to having a crazy schedule, i used to try and hit bonuses as quickly as possible so i could sell mil as fast as i could when i ran indy start, it was a bit of a pain but could get a significant sale price advantage

even if you just made it pro rata between 12-24 hours that could be good, so 12 was 3 turns, 24 was 6 turns, and you got carryover turns for anywhere not an integer

or make bands, like tax brackets

so 24 is 6, 18 is 4.5, 12 is 3, 0 is 0

then you could make everything fair and simple while still discouraging slightly playing a lot but not making it as harsh and gameable as currently

could change 24 to be more than 6 and make 18 6 if you prefer i just dont really want to see bonus turns go up a huge amount more

also on the subject of bonus turns, why not make them scale based on turn speed

so rather than 54/48 78/72 102/96 366/360 it was more linear

BobbyATA Game profile

Member
2384

Aug 5th 2010, 16:19:56

qz if you are seriously playing techer you ahve to log in two times a day. Indy as well. There are still two other strats (casher/farmer) that don't require logging in more than once a day.

If you want to make all strats equally competitive for players playing once a day you would need to make far more radical changes than something dealing with bonus turns.

I'm really not sure where this playing one time a day thing comes from btw. Think of all the walling, etc. that war clans do. This is not a one time a day game if you want to be a great warrer, and certainly not if you want to be a great NGer.

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Aug 5th 2010, 16:23:04

well, server load is still a consideration, though not as big a consideration.

hm the turn speed is interesting

and for express we could make lower brackets....

interesting ideas ;)


Here's one thing I *don't* really want though:
Two of my HS buddies played.... planetarion I think... anyway it had ticks every 30 mins that you had to play; and if you didn't play the tick you lost it or something... anyway they set their alarms to go every 30 mins and played like that for weeks, ended up controlling half the (game? server?) that way... but got like no sleep...

We would like to encourage people to sleep occasionally :) and not have to play during work etc ;) most of us have RL jobs and stuff and that shouldn't necessarily take a huge amount away from being able to do well.

I often hear people say stuff about those with "skill" doing better by logging in more often. I think that "more time" != "skill" and that people with mad skillz but only once-a-day sort of time should be able to still do just as well
Finally did the signature thing.

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Aug 5th 2010, 16:25:15

Right Bobby; And I'm not suggesting making all strats equal for once-a-day; though i would like strats to be similarly competitive ;) that way you can pick one for you ;)

War is a bit of a funny situation; 'cause for normal warring you just login once a day; unless you're being hit; but that's usually a couple-times-per-warring-set occurrence, and can be a special thing i think hehe
Finally did the signature thing.

BobbyATA Game profile

Member
2384

Aug 5th 2010, 16:29:03

heh I have a RL job too btw:P Anyways...the major "skill" in this game is grabbing correctly, and you certainly get way better targets if you can log in multiple times a day and hit people right as they come out of DR etc...As the number of targets (I'm talking alliance especially right now) has decreased the "skill" has been more and more linked to just ability to log in multiple times a day I agree

BobbyATA Game profile

Member
2384

Aug 5th 2010, 16:31:59

I get what you are saying with Planetarion but its a bit of a failed slippery slope analogy in my opinion. Also consider that Utopia was similar to the Planetarion system in a way in that you could improve your country most by playing every hour. Yet fwiw, Utopia at its prime was way more popular than earth ever was. Obviously I can't make the claim that this was b/c playing every hour was a component to success at the most elite levels of Utopia...but I can make the claim that creating a game system where to say top ten for example, you simply must a minimum play twice a day, does not necessarily make your game a commercial failure...

enshula Game profile

Member
EE Patron
2510

Aug 5th 2010, 16:35:00

well there's unlikely to ever be an incentive to play more than once a day like this

even the 18 hours feels a bit like that to me though, which is why i like the idea of pro rating, you could also change the 20 ghost acres to be more about logging in, than logging in during a particular 24 hour day, but the way its set now probably has something to do with people who play 24.1 hours apart usually getting all the bonus just missing the very odd one

as to skill and logins the main problem with that is DR, it will always be better to camp targets and lose bonus turns unless you make the penalties much harsher

and if you do that you run the risk of messing up de stocking, and making indy and techer a real pain, since those are the only percentage sale limit things

do you remember when we all used IRC bots counting down countries coming out of DR and it was a race to hit them the second it expired? my heartbeat used to go crazy sometimes

right now its usually better to get the sales, and just take bonus's every now and then, when you sleep for example

i wonder if DR could be a bit softer, so rather than disappearing all at one second it disappeared 10% each second for 10 seconds or something lol, that's more of a joke but if dr lasted full for 18 hours then wore off linearly over the next 12 hours it could make for an interesting change

BobbyATA Game profile

Member
2384

Aug 5th 2010, 16:42:43

"as to skill and logins the main problem with that is DR, it will always be better to camp targets and lose bonus turns unless you make the penalties much harsher"

Not exactly. My whole point was last set there would be targets who say were already in some DR but I could get 60 A from in a hit. If I was an hour from 18 hour bonus I would wait to log in and hit and often lose target in that hour of waiting. This frustrated me...

"do you remember when we all used IRC bots counting down countries coming out of DR and it was a race to hit them the second it expired? my heartbeat used to go crazy sometimes"

I remember one target that was camped by 5 people this set. That was fun, especially when there were only like 8 people seriously grabbing untaggeds early set.

"i wonder if DR could be a bit softer, so rather than disappearing all at one second it disappeared 10% each second for 10 seconds or something lol, that's more of a joke but if dr lasted full for 18 hours then wore off linearly over the next 12 hours it could make for an interesting change "

One of the most fun things IMO when camping targets and there being a 3+ second difference between the last hits on it is knowing when a target is a real hot item and multiple people might be camping it that you should start farming once the target has 1 or 2 DR left instead of waiting until the target come all the way out.

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Aug 5th 2010, 19:21:04

I hear you on the 24.1 hours thing enshula; you'd suggest some sort of fudge factor to fix that; though technically that would only happen if you actually play right at 00:00 GT heh... though i guess that's around prime-time for east coast players -- i'll think about that -- make it so if you login within an hour or two of the 00:00 that you still get it for the previous day? so you'd get 40A?


Hm the non-linear DR *might* be interesting, it'd make it more complicated for sure, but might be nice from the less-camping POV

I do agree with Bobby that the camping can be really fun :) I remember camping a year or two ago with IRC open and some LaFfer started hitting like 3 seconds too early, so i pumped in my 5 hits before he or he or anybody else, still got the majority of the returns....

I can only imagine it's horrible for the person being hit though lol
Finally did the signature thing.

enshula Game profile

Member
EE Patron
2510

Aug 6th 2010, 9:22:41

a little overlap would provide tolerance, for the person that say logson every night when they get home only plays for 10 minutes, but gets home 15 minutes later about every third day and happens to play at just the wrong time

if i was in a timezone where it was an issue id try to play at a differant time of day, but would be good to make it as friendly as possible

could do a check so if your login time isnt within say 30 hours you arnt eligible for the double bonus though

also i think ive got an option to encourage once a day play while not penalising the 25% stras

enshula Game profile

Member
EE Patron
2510

Aug 6th 2010, 9:34:08

we could simulate the effect of multiple selling using in essence a 'sell order'

instead of doing a normal sale manually after login you could do the first sale normally

then make an order to do another sale, which would only happen if certain conditions were met, basically if the first lot sold

it could use more turns than 1 like recall if you want

could be entered like a normal sale but drop down "delayed sale" menu choice

then it could trigger either only when such a sale would be possible (including waiting for turns), when a preset time is reached or when a certain percentage of the sale would be possible

perhaps when you get a certain amount of cash but im not sure about that

could put in protection for how much cash and food you need to leave on hand, as in the next cash and food you get pays off the debt first, even charge interest if it amuses you

or just make it risky

or perhaps a simpler option, make a special sale where you can put up 25% then another 25, or even a third for 44% or 58%, then the
first lot would sell normally and the rest would go on the market only after either some or all sold

total possible to sell could drop if stuff on hand drops or stay the same, whichever is preferable

you could have all hidden on market at the start if you like but id consider it an extra change that doesnt need to go together

the first option would imply the choice of a second price, the second implies that both batches sell for the same amount

qzjul Game profile

Administrator
Game Development
10,264

Aug 6th 2010, 18:26:21

hehe sell order... i like it... might get complicated though... and some might object to automating the game... but at the same time, it sure might be cool....
Finally did the signature thing.