an alliance is too big if they can war the rest of the Server and win.

every post has political meaning.

if sof wasn't approaching 100, then this post would not have been made.

To deny the political undertones is to lie.

If some alliance hadn't been approaching 100 members, this post wouldn't have been made. Let's not pretend SoF is special in that regard.

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

ya... SoF isn't special -- I remember discussions around alliance size back when there were 2-3 large alliances and a number that were a significant amount lower in total members. But this is the first time in quite some time we'll see a single alliance with a MUCH larger membership advantage over even the 2nd biggest (barring recruiting, which will likely narrow the gap somewhat) so it makes sense to discuss it.

PS. Odd that Helmet calls me a woman for bringing logic to a discussion ;-)

"We lack the 16-17 year olds who used to be like us -- we enjoyed playing & leading, and actually had the time to do it :p" -Pang

This is an excellent point by Pang. As he noted in the WSJ I think, we are generally a bunch of washed up 20-50 year olds. Our prime Earth days are behind us mainly b/c most of us have jobs and that real life thing heh:P.

As to the point of this thread, its a good question Tertius but I think after thinking about it over the weekend that no size is too big relative to the size of the server. I think the problem of a "too big alliance" is a self correcting one. Maybe for a set or two one alliance dominates so handily that it takes away from the game and we even lose a few players, but eventually their power will wane. Great question tho IMO...its one I was thinking about too before you posted this thread.

SOF may have been a little defensive at first, but they did make a good point too. They have recruited a bunch of old vets. They should be commended for this!

and pang why didn't you convince TIE to join LaF instead of LCN? this is what happens when you try to be all righteous and try to "balance the game".

maybe you think too much from a dev standpoint ;)

i can completely see it from an alliance leader standpoint. if for instance SoF wants to merge into LaF (not that they would, but this is just purely theoretical) and form this gigantic 160 member super alliance, i wouldn't be turning them down. but obviously it will ruin the game... but from an alliance leadership perspective the angle is a bit different... you'd probably figure once you bully enough alliances the other guys will recruit/merge back/form a coalition/etc. to fight back.

it only gets bad if like the top 5 alliances merge to the point where they can FS every single alliance at once and still win. then the game would be completely dead ;P i don't think we're at that point yet...

Pang: The only problem is you didn't ask Rage specifically to answer what criteria they made their decision based on. You said something like "I wonder if Rage considered the balance..blah blah blah", which I don't see any reason why it's not logical for me to post my opinion. If your question was for Rage only, logic would say you'd private message them. It's not logical to post on the AT and not expect others to respond.

hanlong: I think if Evo, Monsters or Laf had over 100 members this point would have never come up. You'll never see us saying the game is unbalanced because we don't have enough netgainers. heh

"It's not fair, (insert netgaining alliance here) have too many high scores. It's unbalanced." I can't see that happening.

Back in the old days when we were at the high point in ICN we had some 180 members.

But in my opinion there is no upper limit on when it gets too big. Its just something that makes the coordination a lot harder for whomever leads it.

Kudos to whomever manages to get a big alliance work efficiently really. Personally Id guess it starts getting pretty difficult after about 150 members though but I could be wrong. :)

that's because if netting alliances had 100 members, they wouldn't blindside FS random alliances. somehow netgainers don't necessary want the most members to also have a chance to win ANW as well as TNW because the double crown is what those alliances aim for, while war alliances usually want more members so they can dish out more hits/more powerful FS/etc.

but i'm giving you guys props by asking for a war civilly on AT. we all know that at 100 members a well prepared blindside SoF FS will annihilate the average netgaining alliance, and i think all sides agree we don't want less alliances/members in this already dying game =)

Wow seriously? well theres the problem with the game and getting more people to play right there. Netting alliances don't want more members so they can win ANW TNW? that saddens me.

hehe chevs i meant they want members but not at the rate of war alliances :P

they would take 1 rank 100 country over 2 top rank 200 countries. but no way a war alliance would do that. obviously all alliances want to take as much members as they can, but the rate which they will accept members is lower...

i'm just saying that's why you typically see the war alliances having more members.

well then why are people from netting alliances crying and saying war alliances are too big (what a coincidence - just like this post!)

i dont understand how you expect to have it both ways. I was under the impression until your last post that every alliance wanted as many members as they could. You can teach people how to play, its not a hard game.

there are of course exceptions....there are some 0 iq people in SoF I will not lie.

I agree with you Chevs. I thought every alliance wanted new players at this point. If you teach the player to net or war, they're likely to stay with you for a while. I think almost everyone would take a 1-3 set hit in ANW to teach a new guy the ropes.

When there are tons of players, maybe some alliances will only want only the "best," but I don't see that happening for quite some time here.

i don't think i cried that SoF are too big ;P and i already said earlier that if i was SoF i'd do the same, so i'm not the one that needed convincing.

i'm just pointing out the truth. when i meant the ANW hit, i don't mean "complete n00bs pull down our ANW". check LaF's tag and look at the bottom guys if you want to know what i'm talking about.

we do accept complete n00bs, especially if they are friends of a current alliance member, or they pass our interview (it's the mindset that we're looking for, not past accomplishments exactly). i'm not going to lie and say that LaF accepts all members into its ranks with no regards, we have a few requirements (like they need to be active, no cheating, willing to learn and follow rules, etc.) we don't want "only the best", but we definitely people who "want to be the best", even if they aren't currently.

for example, if a war alliance has someone who's very hotheaded and/or goes against the grain a lot and/or doesn't want to learn minmaxing because its boring (which is a requirement for netting) and just wants to hit the explore button all day and do war hits when asked, it is ok. but for a netting alliance his mindset is wrong (he wants to start wars, he never wants to improve his networth so one day he would be a high quality netgainer and help train the next generation, etc.)

however, the reverse isn't true really. if i love minmaxing my networth, as long as i promise i do war hits and be active in wars (which i do), i would actually be a very valued member in a war alliance no? (because i can be a good breaker, etc.)

that's what i meant when "the ANW/TNW chase" makes netgaining alliances take in less members. and the biggest alliances aren't usually netgaining alliances, and from my firsthand experience this is why i'm seeing this happening.

its not that we go "oh we don't want to be the biggest", but a more selective recruitment process probably doesn't help matters if you really want to be the "biggest alliance".

just ask RAGE when they hit 500, they accepted anyone with a heartbeat pretty much.. no netgaining alliance will ever do that...

I didn't see anything wrong with what you said originally. A netting alliance isn't nearly as motivated to increase it's membership as a war alliance.

for the record, sof was around for years outnumbered by opponents and only recently has that kind of shifted.
If sof had more members than all the other alliances combined then it would somewhat game breaking but it's nowhere close to that point.

and i know SoF is stereotypically not a "recruit members at all costs" type of alliance either.

you guys value quality also. that's why historically you guys were never the biggest. quality and quantity historically don't go together (you need to boot the low quality ones that are around for a few resets and still don't learn, can only take in at the rate which your training staff can teach, etc.) mergers (like RAGE/SoF) usually change this quite a bit, because you get a quick injection/influx of already skilled vets who aren't going to tax your training pipeline.

LaF has historically optimized its training program to try to allow it to be as efficient as possible when bringing new members up to speed, which is why LaF has always been amongst the largest of the netgaining alliances. and that's why i do see the value in size, but as i have indicated, there's no way a netgaining alliance will ever reach the size of a war alliance

there were many sets when LaF actually outnumbered sof:P

I think in terms of the amount of mentoring/supervision required in a netting tag it makes it too much effort to run a really large tag.

another reason i forgot to add why netting alliances have to be more careful/selective while recruiting is that you need to recruit guys who will stick around when war does come. it hurts more when people leave/tagjump when you are in war because they want to net, than people leaving when you are netting because they want to war.

See... this is what drives me nuts... you guys in Alliance complain about having alliances with 100+ members... and us folks in Free For All complain about not having a sizable player base to recruit from.

The player base in Free For All needs to get larger otherwise, it's going to become monopolized as it was in Earth 2025.

The group is only as strong as it's weakest link.

I think that held very true in the old days, as well as now.

actually Helmet: 4 or 5 resets ago when LaF was the largest allinace in the game (at about 75 members) people did complain about us being too big and being "bullies" etc.

I think those type of complaints are going to occur regardless of the circumstance. So long as there is more than 1 group there will be a group doing better than another. And so long as there is someone doing better than someone else, people are going to feel the need to complain about the injustice of it.

accepting everyone with a heartbeat doesn't work.

TRUST ME

lol

At around 200 members, SOL started to kill my social life :P

more than 10 members is a hassle

When an alliance FSes itself it is getting too big. And if they have RD in their name then one country is too big for that alliance.

Looks like SoF won't hit 100+ members :P

yeah wtf slackers where did they all go...they got bored of netting and left i guess :(

Is alliance shrinking? Seems that way

I want to know who are the people who are playing in evo this set just to war sof. somehow they went from 33-46 members hehehe.

Most are old vets who got texted to join for the war...a couple of them are new members.

ahh, i just remember a bunch of people saying they would want to be on the other side vs sof.

Didn't I predict this earlier in the thread?

-Fooglmog
Guy with no clue.

they are returning vets that kingjohn got to play.

I really don't know this thread is like 3 months old who was the buttplug who ressurected it

TIE was over 160+ members when we warred IX + SoL and I'd say we had a blast and it was easy to manage the membership, so it is doable. FA was a whole other story though lol.

With that said, for this current environment, I think clans with 100+ members is too much, however I don't think they should be made to split into smaller groups because of their positive effort to get to such a size. If they do it on their own through recruiting then good on them. I would actually love to see WoG come back, if someone can make that happen then please do so; the more members the better.

Pang is correct on TIE's merger into LCN. I was the one who brought up the idea to merge TIE into LCN as opposed to LaF, and one of my main reasons for doing so was taking the balance of the current environment into consideration. LaF with TIE in it would have put LaF at around 100 members and I felt that would have made LaF too dominating. Both LaF and LCN are very close allies to TIE and I felt TIE strengthening LCN to make them a dominant force was the better route to go. Of course we didn't force our members to join LCN and some chose some of TIE's other close allies such as SoL, however the majority came to LCN and we are having a blast in LCN right now.

Natural and organic growth are always good though... if the 100members are tight community where people are more like friends and mates than just gamers..then it makes sense.

What we really need is to figure out a way to get a few new alliances off the ground,

Wings of fire is a start....


We really need is 2-3 alliances of 20+ members a reset,
over time the good ones will keep around and grow...

I think we are near the end of alliances ending.
the smallest are PDM Monsters and Monsters are very stable at this point.


We need adventurous souls, meaning 19 yr old college freshmen kids, who are will to go find new players in other servers, and build...its hard, but If I hear of such a person, I'll do all I can to see them succeed including fighting good people to surround them with.