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Originally Posted by
Realistically the manual needs to be shorter. The first thing you see is just [url=http://game.planetarion.com/manual.pl
a wall of text[/url]. You have to be able to explain the game quickly, nobody wants to read a ****ing book to find out how to play a stupid browser game.
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I agree that a new player needs a quick summary of all the basic features to understand the basics so potential or new players can either determine if they would like the game or how to get started. That only requires short explainations for each feature and an overall concept of the game.
That said
Over time (one, two, however many rounds) a player picks up a lot from other players and eventually from an alliance. That doesn't fill all the voids for information. Certain things are learned by experience but some things are discovered by accident. That discovery might well be for a subtlety that is important but overlooked by more experienced players because they know it.
I used to tell employees not to expect everyone to have the background and exposure to a job that they had and just assume the other person knows something. Just because their experiences taught them certain aspects of a job doesn't mean everyone has had the same exposure and thus the same knowledge.
The same holds true here or anywhere else. A more detailed explaination of any or all aspects of the game can be quite valuable to players wanting to live, eat and breath PA. Not everything is obvious. Give the more dedicated players more information.
Naturally this leads to one very serious issue, detailed information becomes very out of date fast for any activity with constant change like PA. If the manual can't be maintained and kept up with the game then it is more a liability than a help. I'd love to see more information about features (that I generally find out about by accident) of the game, realizing that tomorrow it will likely change and what I read may actually hurt rather than help.
Give us an overview. Give more information where possible but only if updated as needed. Wrong information is a lot worse than no information. Unfortunately if we don't know what we are missing then we don't know to ask for help on what we are misssing.
People who don't know that they don't know are dangerous.