My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Dear diary,

For some weird stroke of luck, after a couple rounds break I managed to wander to Planetarion pages and noticed round had just started couple days ago... Bit late, but still... I signed up as random planet and randomly picked Cathaar to be my race to be.

Ok, going random isn't exactly ace plan, doing that as cath even less so.

My first galaxy!
Gal chan on irc did exist, not registered tho... I don't recall ever seeing more than 2 ppl there at the same time.

I exiled when I came out of protection and landed in a far better place.

Galaxy had a chan and even @P! But @P was quite boring chap, no sense of humour at all... and @P sucked balls at arranging def.
I stayed there a couple days, there were at least some people online occasionally, and even on irc (lo bavaria), even helping each other.
With some help, I was lucky enough to hold on to my precious <300 roids.

Ok, this was definately improvement from the previous one, but I'm such a pussy I decided to try my luck elsewhere.

First glance at new gal: bigger than previous one, I'm only planet online, gal has several incs. There is gal chan on irc -
no @P - nobody.
Couple ticks later, I get incs also... No chance of defending I launch 3 fleets out to attack.
I get roided 5 ticks, I roid 2 ticks - 250 roids left, and 6th inc on me catches my returning attack fleet. It's a small fleet,
no big deal, accidental fc I think...

To be continued...

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Planetarion has to hate you ....

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Lesson of the day: The @ in "@P" is an indication of its op status, it is not actually part of the nick name of the bot.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

PA Team decided they didnt care about new players so screwed every random/new player in the game.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

This isn't true, there are some newbies that are doing just fine. I have 3 virgin PA newbies in my gal and all three have managed to hold their roids so far, and one even landed an attack! Quit posting in absolutes Light, it really doesn't become you.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

I was briefly in your gal Leknu, but I left as well.
As gal was super inactive. I signed up late and random and as Cath. :p
Doing pretty well though considering its 1st rnd back since Rnd12.

Good luck with the rest of the round Leknu. :)

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

public or private gal?

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Blame [Dreamz]. He has your shippies.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

I hope for next round that more people will go to random gals rather than making shit priv gals with people they dont know.

New players need experienced players around them...

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Public of course, that would be a real feat, finding three virgin PA newbies and getting them to join your private galaxy!

I would also like to point out there are several public galaxies still in the t10. While they may or may not be there still at the end of the round, and certainly the primary reason they are there is because of their large number of players, they can't all be doing badly.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Whilst she's obviously being melodramatic and all (it's Light), she does have a point in that random gals are obviously so much worse than private ones.
I went random and exiled around quite a few times (my exile cost is now extortionate) - I've landed in a gal with a couple of semi active players and we've had incs every day. It's been 7 days since the round started and I've had 15 hostile inc fleets so far, only one of which was a teamup (2 person). It's worth noting that I have only gone over 400 roids once this round (lasted under a day).
As it is, almost all random gals are the "farm gals" that we'd have in regular rounds where "top players" (hi Sjor/Pommeh) pick up cheap/easy roids.

I wouldn't pin this directly on the introduction of private gals though, I'm inclined to agree with wishmaster that it's due to all the decent/active players going for private gals with people they don't know over going random. There aren't enough experienced/active players to make decent random gals. Sure there may be one or two random gals doing ok now but the vast majority are just dead.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

The introduction of public/private galaxies has been a big mistake, the potential for abuse and unfair tactics is huge. Not to mention the fact that newbies are all lumped together, and surprise surprise are not doing well. This is part of the reason I went public, so that at least one galaxy of newbies would have an experienced player to help them out. Honestly it's been fun so far, but I can totally sympathize with the plight of leknu, and there are many like him. Most of the current players don't remember r6 when this system was last tried and what a disaster it was.

I have never been a proponent of public/private galaxies, and I have demonstrated to Cin/Appoco how the existing system can be abused to give a single ally a hugely unfair advantage. I have yet to publish my finding on this for fear that some ally will actually use my plan and ruin the round.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Yeah, newbies being completely ignored is a new thing :rolleyes:

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

it wouldn't be so bad if allies would man up and attack each other instead of farming newbies.
so i don't think that ALL the blame goes to PAteam.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Some certainly are. However how can people pass up the opportunity for cheap roids? I don't think it is fair to expect people to not attack those they think they can get free roids from. Hitting other allies is always higher risk, since the chance of defense is much greater then with newbies. This has always been true, and will be true as long as the universe has alliances and newbies. All that can be done is limit the amount of bashing that can be done, which is normally handled by the bash limit. However for the first week or two of the round the difference in value between newbies and active ally players is small and so the newbies get roided. This is life, this is PA, for better or worse. No way around it without inventing a totally new game imo.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Yeah, random gals do seem to be farm gals.
It's funny when you see your gal which is like 65th in the rankings being mass attacked with team ups. Im not new, but I haven't played for awhile. But I can feel for the new players who are trying to learn the game, and then just getting bashed into oblivion.

Good way to attract new players into the game...

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

See if more people had gone random instead of getting a private gal for the sake of going private there would be far stronger public gals with more scope for newbie involvement. Lets face it, there are dozens of private gals that are, quite frankly, shit.

If there were fewer private gals (ie. only groups of 8 actual friends/people who know each other made private gals) public gals would stand a far greater chance. It's not exactly the system's fault, it's the playerbase's.

Light; you're part of the problem. You are in a private gal with people you don't know very well (in fact I bet they all hate you). Quit bitching.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Sooo.. You're saying someone should choose to go into a random farm galaxy with people they dont know and dont even know that are playing? Instead of joining a private galaxy with people who are experienced, know how to play and will play the round active?

Im not following the logic? as going private still looks to be the way to go?

Again, how is it not the systems fault for making private galaxys the obvious and only choice if you want to play active? The community and playerbase will always go with what they think is the best tactic, introduction of private galaxys make going private the best choice.

Its like making one race extremly overpowered then blaming the playerbase for the lack of diversity in races as everyones gone one race. Private galaxys are extremly overpowered when compared to random galaxys, people dont want to spend a round in a galaxy with inactives if they can help it and so they will go private.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

This is exactly why the whole concept of public/privates will never work. One or the other will always (yes I know I just used an absolute) be better then the other, and the player base will react accordingly. It is impossible to perfectly balance it, the best compromise anyone has ever come up with is buddypacks with randoms, the system PA had been using for the last 20 rounds or so? So unless someone comes up with a truly brilliant idea of another way to do things I fully expect us to return to buddypack galaxies for next round.
This is actually wrong, public galaxies are much more powerful then private galaxies, but ironically only when most of the active player base agrees with you and goes private.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Just a quick thought - what about private gals and small buddy packs in otherwise random gals? Leaves you the option to go with friends or try and train up to what, 10-15 support planets for your bp during the round. Might be an incentive to go for the random gals as the possible gain sounds interesting.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Right a hybrid. The problem is how do you balance it? How many planets per private gal how many per public? It is in my mind impossible to balance because the balance depends on the choices players will make, which can never be accurately predicted ahead of time. Invariably one or the other (public/private) will be the better option and will therefore attract the majority of the active player base and thereby render the other option a poor choice.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

I actually think the two options here are fairly different, so it might, with some luck, sort of boil down to a matter of personal choice rather than flocking up. Quite frankly, going for a random galaxy in the scenario is some sort of gamble. You can be lucky and have actives and newbies with potential, you can be unlucky and spend your round with rather bad galmates.
With a private galaxy, you know what you got. You can predict the activity, and make a good guess on your chances for the final ranking.
Certainly buddy packs in random galaxies need some luck and invest alot of work to actually make the galaxy function together and to train the newbies.

As to balancing the numbers, luckily for now we can sit back and watch how this round developes. While there are random t10 gals right now, it will be interesting to see how far up they can stay. The final outcome should allow some educated guess about the balancing.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

hmm i quite like rul3r's hybrid idea.
i mean let's face it.. a majority of the private gals were made up of approx 3-4 friends and some other people thrown in to make it a full gal. obviously this varies for some people but i was just making an example. if they had 5player buddypacks that could go into a random gal, i think there would be a lot of people to choose that option.
i actually only knew one person in my private gal, and i've enjoyed getting to know the rest of my gal, but being in a private gal, or a buddypack with randoms would be pretty much the same for me.
also having buddypacks in a random gal would hopefully give some of the newbies a chance. if they're active and willing to learn, the bp should take them under their wing, if they're totally inactive, well, sucks for the gal but wouldn't really affect the bp.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

I was in a random gal that got farmed to hell in round 6 and really enjoyed my round, as did the other (few) semi-active people in my galaxy. It inspired me to actually make friends with some and form our own private galaxy for round 7 along with some other terrible players I met in a random round 4 galaxy. I'm curious as to your qualifications to deem it such a "disaster"?

From that awful round 7 private gal I made contact with better players in negotiating my planet not to be destroyed by in-cluster attacks and moved into my first real alliance. All these things have been gradually removed as apparently they're bad for new players.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

If not, they will after this round! After several THINLYVEILEDTHREATS

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

If there were fewer private gals, there'd be more experienced players in the random gals. You would get galaxies with 14+ experienced and active players able to actually compete with the private gals (and having a number advantage as well as the extra 3-4 not so active/newbie planets). Even if you weren't shuffled into one of these, you'd be able to exile into one with experienced players.

I've probably explained quite badly so if someone can paraphrase it more eloquently I'd appreciate it.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

As I said many, many times before: Remove galaxies.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

this is similar to what i suggested pre-round (link).

could replace the "public alliance" part with the old system of 4-5 man buddy packs + randoms. that way you're restricted to being in a private galaxy of only your alliance members, or a random galaxy with a handful of chosen people + randoms like old school.

i'm not sure how i would size them in relation to each other though if you still allowed late sign ups, galaxy disbands, and such.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Why? You don't want any geography in the game at all? You don't want anyone but your allies to be able to defend you? I don't understand. In general people prefer to have a tight nit community to play with. Consistently in human history those who team up with those who offer them the best advantages do well. Whatever PA does should foster this basic human instinct to play on teams.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Listen to Heartless, he´s german!

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

I never said that I don't want any geography at all, nor did I say that I don't want people to play together. I suggest you read this thread on Planetarion Suggestions, specifically this IRC log attached to it where mz and me discuss an alternate universe layout.

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

The private/random galaxy system is not nearly as big a revolution as everyone seems to think it is. The only thing it changes is time. Last round, it took a couple of hundred ticks before the good galaxies got all the players they wanted and started to dominate. This round, all the good galaxies were already fully formed at tick 12 and could start farming less active galaxies right out of protection. This is really the only difference between this round and last and I don't think it actually changes all that much.

The real reason the current system doesn't work is that private galaxies have something random galaxies don't, while the opposite is not true. That thing is "more active players in the galaxy". No random galaxy has 6 or more people online at least once every day. Almost every private galaxy does.

While it's possible to roughly balance the two (we don't need 'perfect' balance, Monroe), there is still no actual difference between the two. In fact, if the two were more or less balanced, most of the really active players would (and should) go random, and hope they end up in an above-average galaxy, because random galaxies (due to the impact of luck and size) will always have a larger standard deviation than private galaxies. After all: being lucky takes very little effort.


Rob's suggestion (private galaxies without and random galaxies with intag defence) would work much better because the two are truly different. Private galaxies get a lot of active players ingal, but they can't get alliance defence. Random galaxies get fewer active players ingal, but potentially have an almost unlimited alliance defence pool.

A while ago I thought Rob's system would discourage recruitment, I have since come to the realisation that this is not the case. In Rob's system (we need a better name for it), private galaxies will be comprised mostly of hardcore players. These would be the only people for whom being allianceless could work out, because they are the people with the connections required to stay off of targeting lists, as well as the only people active enough to send defence not once, but several times a night. Not coincidentially, these are also the people least likely (in the current system) to recruit total newbies to their alliances, because of their high entry criteria.

On the other hand, less active players could not afford to be allianceless, because they have neither the connections nor the time to stop large incomings and, naturally, they are also more likely to recruit other people who feel the same way, namely the few new players PA gets.


Rob's system also happens to be one of the two systems that attempts (though only partly, and perhaps not intentionally) to address the issue of the clash between galaxy and alliance interests. It does so by ensuring that the hardcore part of the player base, for whom galaxies are most important and who are thus the ones who are most often confronted with conflicts of interest, no longer have to take alliance interests into account. Of course, random galaxies would still have to deal with it.

The other being the no-galaxy system as proposed by Heartless and me. (I just reread the log, god, we are so clever.)

Re: My thriumphs, my mistakes
 

Just as an FYI, this assumption is false, public galaxies are better then private galaxies in a universe that is mostly private galaxies. My gal has 12 people online in the gal channel yesterday at one time. Right now there are 6 people in my gal channel. Public galaxies can be more active then privates.

I will address the rest of this topic later when I am more awake and can take the time to think it through.