Also, those in KGB (FSB) should create a sexy centerfold spread:

http://www.nydailynews.com/...on_of_maxim_magazine.html

Maybe the reason people don't grab is because there are few targets, and if you grab excessively then those few countries will get fed up and start a war. If you want to stay in game A, it's easier if you don't have to fight off a war with several people that you farmed.

The random teams was more of a second thought after seeing that draft thread again. It doesn't seem popular at all, so let's just drop it.

But what about a tournament of sorts? any interest there? It would still be with the same group of players you have currently, just given a more specific goal for the set.

Ah, and another separate idea related to a draft. Have a pool of players who are interested in going into a draft, have "top" players be on different teams and then draft their new teammates one by one. We could have a thread with people posting a small blurb such as "typical C/I, plays aggressive blah blah blah" and then each team can be picked such that they are well-rounded. Might help everyone meet a few new players and bring a little new life to the game.

Everything open for criticism. Have at it.

Well... on the alliance forums there has been talk about netting vs warring etc etc, and since team server is a bit smaller, would any of the teams be interested in doing a tournament of sorts? Probably lasting a few sets. We could do a round robbin of team vs team, where the two teams involved decide if they would like to war it out, netgain, or a combination of wargaining with acres farmed accounting for some portion of a "win".

If we have several teams involved, then it would be a large enough chunk to help police from too much outside interference and would at least give some higher purpose to the server. In some sense, it would be a league of champions, and with 5 vs 5 it would be on equal footing. It's long term, but if two teams decided to net vs each other then it wouldn't really be too different anyhow. Of course if two teams wished to war each other, it would give an actual reason for war and they could agree on whether to have a set time or even have an outside alliance randomly pick a date, and then give the teams notice only 24 or 36 hours prior, etc etc.

Really it's totally open ended, but considering the server is smaller, and we already have equal sized teams, it could be really fun to see who the "best overall" team truly is. Any takers? Any other ideas to make it better or more enjoyable? We could have a three set round robin if we have 4 or 8 or 12 teams, then a champions league set where the winners of each "group" face off.

In fact, we could even have a 1v1v1v1 etc just to see how teams take advantage of each other when they know another team might be lurking to hit them after DR wears off, etc.

So if nothing else, that should give us a lot to talk about!

Wouldn't it be easier to implement some sort of only 40-50 attacks a day limit like with spies? I'm sure people wouldn't be too happy about it, but it seems a lot less contrived.

In the mean time, the devs each have to run 10 countries on alliance with various build "personalities".

My two min take on the matter without really delving into the historical perspective as some have.

Netters tend to contain the players who most farm untags. Thus they are bad for the new players who don't quite know what is going on. Typical rebuttal: this is an alliance server, "untags have no rights"

The warring alliances want to war, usually doesn't even matter whom. When they decide to blind side netting alliances, the most likely player to lose interest in the game is the more veteran netting type, maybe they are knowledgeable about warring, but are too busy in RL for organized kill runs or to be online when under attack. Typical rebuttal: if netters want the right to net in peace, they have to be willing to secure it with blood, etc etc.

Wow, that's extremely lame. Every alliance farms him, he does legitimate SS/PS only, most are retals, but a few are grabs, and then people kill him off? That's the silly type of fluff that ruins the game.

This forum and this server seem relatively quiet... Where did Veng go? Also, is everyone all-x these days? I'm a fan of not farming, but now it seems... dare I say, too quiet.

@llaar, Just curious, but why not look at more alliances for how many top 100s? I would assume that most of those that score well in ANW should have quite a few top 100s. Specifically, evo looked like it had the most top ANW, so how do they fare for the top 100? Also, you looked at LCN for ANW but not top 100. I assume it takes more time to look over all of the top 100, but it might be enlightening to see how that compares with ANW.

To be fair, I'm waaay too lazy to check myself, so I understand if you don't either, but just think it might be interesting.

They are implementing this already, it's called facebook....

I had one that had a word upside down as well, I just skipped to the next image

I noticed on team that the prices stayed pretty similar in the beginning, probably because not everyone knew about the change, but then increased to $39+ as max mil tech demos were making profit.

Also, what servers did this go out on? I didn't notice it for any of my most recent startups...

I'm just curious, but on a side note, when people say L:L that typically does not include ghost acres, correct?

Oh, could we also make it so that when we start building res/ent that it automatically changes the tax rate to be the most efficient? That'd be great, thanks. =P

Just curious, but does this discussion have any practical significance on the server? It was my understanding that no one accepts cross tag retals, and everyone agreed it was super lame when 4 Veng tags ganked DBD for hits that DBD2 made. It was doubly wrong because 4 on 2 on a first strike is pretty silly, but more so because they were cross-warring now. It even seemed like people hoped or expected that RD would be the server police and bring holy retribution on Veng for it (but they didn't).

So I guess my question is, which tags are actually playing as one unit? And furthermore, what does that mean to them? Basically full defense/offense pacts with each of the other teams?

It's basically the same as if the 5 biggest alliances on alliance server FS'd and destroyed one other alliance. Is it within the rules? Probably. Does it ruin the game and drive off players? Definitely. Would it even be fun? Doubtful. Why play in an environment that isn't competitive?


Hmm, to answer my own question, I guess FBI/NSA/CIA or whatever is the only multi-team tag now?

The "previous countries" list tells you the networth of your current countries as well, so if you looked at it prior to the end of the set, it could be different.

Or perhaps, diez is right and there is some lag time in the scores update and the actual end of the set. Maybe even a combination of the two.

Either way, ETFT looked pretty good. Hopefully next set DBD will get to net and there'll be a little more competition between everyone.

It stopped working for me for 3 days, but like Marshal, has started working again on its own.

I think the three turns penalty isn't too much of a penalty when people truly need their goods. I think the better penalty would be to have a time delay. If it takes 4-5 hours to put them on the market, then it should take at least 2-3 hours to get them all back. That way wallers can't get their goods immediately, and destockers are limited on how much they need to keep on hand and how much should be kept on the market.

#23 for me =P

I'm pretty sure locket is in LaF

diez is a beast. Grats to all!

Your use of the term gay is horrendous...

Normally it doesn't bother me, but the other day selling tech I was kicked out by the captcha after I had carefully considered all of the prices based on the changing market and average prices. It was a sad sad thing, because then I just sold them again undercutting by hundreds and hundreds of dollars in my angst.

I assume the worry is that bots will stay connected for 24/7 and never have to answer the captcha again, but does that even happen? How big of a deal would it be, if you were never kicked out for it?

It could still be an issue (though minor) depending on when the corruption is actually calculated.

That's fine and simple, but the issue is that then, once you do log in, it checks the number of turns and anything you have over 120 is stored, and then you get the other bonus turns for not playing for 12/18 hours.

This just means you can only get 132 for one country, assuming you log in after 18 hours and then once logged in, do all of the bonuses before the next turn change. Is that how it is supposed to be? It seems strange that you would have to sacrifice 132 turns for exploring on other servers you play, and choose only one that can get it. Especially when most servers have similar restart dates, and you might be playing mass explore strats on several of them.

Yeah, is there any reason you have the code switch extra turns to stored on log in? Why not just on the turn change. Otherwise, we can only get the +6 +2+2+2 turns for one country on one server.

Being on a small team here my first set back, I know two new players who stopped playing EE entirely after being killed by Rag and then later by RD. Saying that team server is dying is no excuse for causing more people to leave.

Isn't that how markets work? Obviously most people who grab are serious about it and provide their own oil.

Maybe the easier fix would be if you just produce a little more oil than you need and sell it for $200; then you make profit and the people who really need it will have it available. Then everyone's happy!

Hey, sky just had a lot of non-english speakers so it seemed like there were more of us than there ought to be. =(

I miss the good ole days when people posted pages of discussion on strategies... or even just random math problems.

How is that out of whack? You were 4m+ larger than him, so your gains were less than when he hit and you were only .5m different. The closer the two networths, the greater the gains.

I think this is another display issue. I was trying to play on IE6 with some advice from others, but the screen never seemed to update. AKA, I explored, and it told me I gained acres and food, but then I went to build, and nothing had changed, I was at the same turns, money and food. So I explored again, and I got a new acreage and different food lost, yet the main menu and building screens had not updated that (nor the header that lists turns/money/food).

So there's no hope for IE6 users? I'm traveling, and the hostels mostly have only IE6, I can't see below the status screen on the main page, so I can't see any news. On the Building page, it cuts off halfway down so I can't build construction sites or even press the button (though enter works).

It's pretty much unplayable like this. If you're not planning (or it's not worth the effort, seeing as how IE6 is no longer officially supported), could there be an option that reverts the view back to the old style (which I assume works)? At least in the short term? My turns are storing up =P

On the topic though, I've logged in before when it said 18.1 and 18.2 hours since last log in, and it only gave me three turns. I felt very ripped off.

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.

Well that was lame. You said we could perform retals, so we did. Your player logs in to see he has lost 3x the land he gained from us and then goes nuts and starts ABing.

According to what you told me, he thus loses tag status. When we AB him to the ground for his acts of war, 5 Rag players from 3 tags all with NW 5x larger than us start the kill runs. Way to cheapen the game. A legit group of small players using retals according to YOUR rules then gets tag killed for being successful.

What is the point of team server if it is just going to be bully alliances vs 3 players anyways? If I wanted that, I would have joined a small group on alliance server. What a joke.

[This is a few days late, but logging into the forum was giving me sql errors for the last week or so.]

That has happened to me before too, I'll send you the details by PM, but it has happened on most defends, though when I am the ally, it shows my losses, so I assumed it was a display bug rather than a calculation error.

Okay, well I'll tell my guys no more special attacks, but this also happened today:

2010-07-20 03:01:28 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 36A (93A)
2010-07-20 03:01:26 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 45A (118A)
2010-07-20 03:01:13 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 47A (120A)
2010-07-20 03:01:09 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 48A (122A)

So there may be some retals headed your way. Thanks for the discussion.

RD isn't quite on the same Alliance policy as most =P

Plus, how are non-alliance players supposed to learn? When I send a retal, I'll send a message, but for farm tags, no one tells them what is or isn't acceptable and the big guys multi-tap everyone into oblivion until they quit anyways.

Acts of war in Alliance server, but honestly so is 6 tap, or at least with escalating retals it might as well be. In team/primary/tourny, smaller players do not know the netiquette and often can rely only on special attacks to defend themselves. =/

The simple solution would be to count everything as the networth it is worth and have a separate war networth. Technically you could do it without any extra information which could somehow be reverse engineered. Networth before the attack, then after. The database then just adds it up and you could have it tracking for individual players even, so there could be individual and alliance ranking for it. Too simplistic?

It would be funny to see which alliance has the highest War ANW, aka literally the most destructive alliance. Though depending on land gains, some of the big farmers might still be pretty high up there.

Ah, I think you may be missing out on the first part where Rag 6 striked one of our members to begin with.

2010-07-13 02:48:23 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 12A (31A)
2010-07-13 02:48:23 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 19A (50A)
2010-07-13 02:48:22 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 19A (50A)
2010-07-13 02:48:21 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 24A (64A)
2010-07-13 02:48:20 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 25A (65A)
2010-07-13 02:48:19 SS IDrinkYourMilkshake (#28) Ragnarok Blablabla (#181) xRFx 25A (67A)

Then the next 6 strikes in 36 hours.

2010-07-17 18:36:47 SS Top Cat (#82) Rag2 Imagination Land (#180) xRFx DH
2010-07-17 18:36:22 SS Top Cat (#82) Rag2 Imagination Land (#180) xRFx 64A (131A)

2010-07-19 01:34:41 PS Top Cat (#82) Rag2 Imagination Land (#180) xRFx 107A (229A)
2010-07-19 01:33:09 SS Top Cat (#82) Rag2 Imagination Land (#180) xRFx 92A (197A)
2010-07-19 01:32:54 SS Top Cat (#82) Rag2 Imagination Land (#180) xRFx 95A (201A)
2010-07-19 01:32:29 SS Top Cat (#82) Rag2 Imagination Land (#180) xRFx DH

All of our attacks have been provoked, and 6 attacks is a lot more an act of war than a failed GS/BR from someone new to the game trying to figure out how it works.

I think they would still get that chance to learn, because this is just the most basic introduction. Plus, they can still build however they want to build, they don't have to follow the adviser, but it's the typical advice given even in the wiki, but more focused so they will not have to spend several days of reading just to know how to spend their first turns.

It's like when you first learn cooking, you start with a recipe, and when you get more experienced you can change things to your taste and eventually create your own. However, if you just start throwing things randomly together, maybe you'll have fun, but it is doubtful you'll ever arrive at anything palatable.

But I do understand what you're saying, and maybe it's not a good idea for EE, but I thought I'd throw it out here to see what people think so thanks for getting the ball rolling.

Oh additionally, the reward could be something that leads into the next learning phase. Maybe reward them with 100 tech beneficial to whichever strategy they chose to follow. Then it could be mentioned that technology is good, and they should produce it or better yet buy it if they are not specialized for research.

And after their first defend, some small notes could be mentioned about that being a part of the game and different ways to prevent it (more defense, higher networth/land). If there was an automatic attack as part of that, which they could then spy and retal, that could be a great additional learning tool, though that may present some programming difficulties.

I know that EE is looking to get into the Facebook market and there will be lots of new players. I know in other games I have played which are looking to increase their market, they made the game more friendly by implementing a challenge quest in the beginning which would teach some of the basic concepts and perhaps give goals and/or rewards for small accomplishments.

There could be some companion on one of the sides that makes the suggestions like: building CS, specializing (maybe have them choose farmer, casher, indy and then give them realistic goals), exploring, attacking, selling on the market (public/private), etc... all the things that experienced players know to do, but without making them have to search the wiki. It doesn't need to be perfect, and it doesn't have to be turn by turn instructions.

For example, have the companion (make it earth related somehow, a top adviser?) suggest that by turn 99 they should have X CS and Y Farms, make mention that protection will be gone after that and they should prepare defense. Show that they can sell on their private market for cash in the beginning. I'm sure the different alliances who have trainers could easily come up with a few different scenarios, and then at the end, give them a small bonus such as cash/turns/increased production.

If primary server is going to be where most new players are sent, you could have it just there, at least for testing purposes and see how it goes. I think this way new players will easily learn some of the basics and be more enticed to stay and learn the more advanced topics.

We have an issue with one of your members, if you could post contacts here or message me in the forum, thanks. (no icq unfortunately)