Serios suggestions from an old school player

[Beermeister]

Hello peeps,
having been away from the game now for almost 20 rounds there have of course been many changes in PA. Some good,some bad but some im just gobsmacked at. Ive talked to old admin friends who said post here so here goes.

1. Self Exile - Good idea to an extent but needs to be seriosly looked at. In this round ive been in two gals where the GC has just vanished overnight without warning. This caused the first gal to dismantle and the other a nightmare which,luckily, we recovered from. Trend is people see the GC hoof it and they follow if the gal itself is not already `ubber`. However we lost our GC and MOD in one night and 4 more followed the next day. We regrouped and luckily some good people joined BUT it almost caused me to self delete. These people,only a couple weeks from the end of the round,dumped on their `fellow players` in search of a top 10 gal.
Plus theres the other angle. Dont bother trying for first couple weeks then self exile like hell until your in a great gal...much easier than working hard.
Suggestions - At least limit peoples ability to self exile to once every week to stop people `glory gal searching`. When your small you have plenty of resources and can self exile very cheaply many many times.
If someone is going to self exile have something come up on overview that warns everyone they are leaving. Give the gal 24 hours warning so if its a GC things can be sorted before they dissapear.

2. The above leads me to counted score. When people join a galaxy their score isnt added. However when someone leaves your gal they take the score away from your gals counted score. Surely theres something very pear shaped with this and totally unfair on genuine players.
Admin have done this to stop people exiling noobs off to get in better scores so i understand that part but quite simply why not leave the counted score behind of a self exile?? The gal helped them create that score didnt it?We had so many self exiles our counted score is half our real score...not our fault. But this made us a popular target as we pop up nicely on tgt searches.
Also , just a thought here, but scores arent what they used to be. Why not increase the scores given. Gives people more inspiration to keep playing and trying harder if they have nice score. With the fleet and roids i have atm 20 rounds ago id be a 10 mill planet now instead of 2 mill. Feels a bit pants.

3. XP - Not a bad idea tbh...gets people active and attacking etc..stops noob bashing. First month i didnt even know what it was! Just played the old school way of getting roids the easy way(ye..1:1,noob bashing etc),making a fleet and digging in due to a late start. How wrong i was..seems XP is a huge part of the score system. Theres a lot of work in the game so maybe some more credit for all the research and construction would be nice. Plus the def XP..after all ive sent def over 20 times but attackers only landed twice. Not my fault but no points..mbe summin to cause a recall would be nice. Just share some points between defenders...great to force a recall so lets get summin for it.

4.ALLIANCES. Last time i played pa admin were upset at alliances controlling pa and wanted to out them to an extent. However now you HAVE to join an alliance. Bring back eta variations for all as standard and let alliances do their own thing. The mystery of what alliances were up to was laways a good thing. Now it seems if you have a few people in your gal from top alliances you will end up in top 20 gal. Bring back the oppurtunity for a galaxy to work together and do some gal raids together. Most are in a gal with everyone doing their own thing which makes a galaxy a bit pointless. If anything enforced cluster alliances would be good imo cos then all in a gal are on the same side. Bring back the community spirit!

Anyway i could go on all night but theres many improvements to help the people that struggle a bit but i believe pa could be the best game on the net. Some fine tweeks i think are needed and not beyond the capabilities of our wonderful admin team

[Antjie]

Good valid points, i must add, i prefer the old golden days when a galaxy still came first and ya ally second... At least the MOW had something real to do and it was not just an honorary title.

[Fatrick]

Indeed, points well made, especially the counted gal score point. Exiles have shafted my gal too

[Mistwraith]

Originally Posted by Beermeister

4.ALLIANCES. Last time i played pa admin were upset at alliances controlling pa and wanted to out them to an extent. However now you HAVE to join an alliance.

i have met many who have made this mistake about that part of the quests, it should be clearer, you only have to APPLY to join an alliance to complete that part of the quests.

[Beermeister]

For the quest i made an alliance then deleted it

[Jamie_Omac]

Good suggestions, keep them coming.

Jamie

[booji]

I like the idea of getting xp for forcing recalls since so few attacks that get def against them land (why should they if they are going to lose alot) however it seems to be part of the way that there is very little gain out of defending unless the attacker crashes and you gain salvage from it. The 300 xp you get divided between defenders in no way compares to the amount of xp U can get from attacking and the defenders have sacrificed their possible opportunity to gain roids that day to defend, the salvage from forcing a recall could well be just the same 300 divided in the same way?
when you are in an alliance this can be on the expectation of getting defence in return later, however everyone knows that there are alot of ppl in alliances who get given rather more def than they send out in return.
it all seems to be part of the bias towards attacking that is caused by prelaunches, better xp for defending would help alter the balance a bit.

[ArcChas]

Sadly, xp for recalls is open to abuse (attack - defend - recall ...... rinse & repeat). And we all know that if it can be abused then it will be abused.

[Beermeister]

Couple points i forgot...whats the point in preset launches if they can be detected? I was pleased to see a preset but gobsmacked to see someone can scan themselves and know in advance of incs...whats that all about? Still the ones that can stay up all night and do manual launch that will do well.
I think the ships should still use E aswell...this slows down the bigger guys which it seems is what pa is trying to do.

[booji]

using e would only really be an option if it was not used for building ships (or perhaps only half so much as the other resources) as there would never be enough e roids to go around, would encourage farming.

and yeh ArcChas perhaps it would have to be only recalls at eta 4 or below so that it is more difficult to abuse.. or more takes longer to abuse

and Beermeister there is a whole thread devoted to all the advantages and disadvantages of prelaunches and how they could be changed, best not to recover all the old ground again!

[Wishmaster]

I find myself disagreing with all your points, or atleast parts of them.

let me start

I think the current selfexile system is expencive enough, maybe start out more expencive, or double to costs for BP members to do their first selfexile.
They have to be the foundation in gal, make them work for it to work.
Forcing people to stay a week after exiling, in a dead gal, will just ruin a round for you though. -no way-. I can also see the point in giving galalxy 24hrs notice, atleast for their first selfexile, from their original galaxy. 24hrs in a dead gal would also be too long.

2. If people leave a gal they did it for a reason. Galaxy shouldnt be rewarded for sucking, hence loosing players. Instead it should bea s mentioned above, more expencive to do your first exile.
Your point about u being a nice target because of lower counted score.... COME ON!?!?!? who the **** cares about counted score whn looking for a target? its real score and value which matters when it comes to that.

3. You get xp each tick for defending. This is already too much imo, and is already being "abused". We should be looking at reducing the importance of xp and not increasing it.

4. The universe is too smal and the rounds too short for this to work. This would mean that ALOT would have to change. Not being able to def vs fi/co from alliance would just be crazy with current game engine.
I would like to see a total change though, and with more players and going back to def 6hrs, attack 3hrs and fleets being launched when u launch them, and not when it ticking and no prelaunches: this would be doable and imo great fun.

That wont happen though.

:edit: About using E as fuel, could just make it cost as much M, C and E. MEtal for repairs and launching ramps or whatever.. Crystal for paying the crew ( whatever ) E for fuel. PA doesnt make sence anyway.. But I would like to discourage send,recall, resend tactic - atleast make it cost some.

[Mzyxptlk]

1. If I choose to self-exile, that's my choice. If your gal collapses when one person leaves, you're probably doing something wrong. Use the buddypack feature to create a solid core for the galaxy from the get-go.

2. I agree that score accumulated by a planet should always stay with the galaxy it was in at the time. As for your "I want more score" whine, just no.

3. I've always thought it a bit strange people can get XP for failing to achieve the goal of defending. For this reason I wouldn't mind seeing defence XP on landing removed entirely. However, any scheme that rewards recalls is highly abusable, and if there's one thing the game doesn't need, it's more arbitrary rules in the EULA.

4. I would personally like to see the tag limit removed, but there's nothing wrong with the relationship between alliances and galaxies. People prioritise their alliance because the people they're in a galaxy with are often simply randoms. It's perfectly natural for people to want to associate more with people they already know.

If you want to play more galaxy oriented, BP with likeminded people from your own alliance (ignore any limitations the alliance imposes on you), use the late signup slots to get further people from your own alliance, and work from that. People who say that you need a fence in order to do well have been proven wrong time and time again.

[Wishmaster]

Originally Posted by Mzyxptlk

People who say that you need a fence in order to do well have been proven wrong time and time again.

Yet the Fencegals wins 9 out of 10 rounds?

hate to say we are posting in agreement on most issues lately mz. its weird

[Vladel]

Originally Posted by Antjie

i prefer the old golden days when a galaxy still came first and ya ally second...

Not in any good ones

[willd]

I would like no capping on ally number and a larger BP or even private gals to come back

[.Disc.]

With changes to Planetarion, there is a fine line, this fine line is the difference between a failed change and a good change imo.

I think part of the reason why Planetarion has very few new customers is because its hard for the new players to integrate well into the community, where as R1-10 it was much easier to do so. This is partly due to Planetarions fault of making Planetarion Alliance based, rather than galaxy based, i don't think exile should be a valid option, I think scrap BP's, scrap private gals, completely random, that way its make friends quickly with your galaxy, or suffer the consequences of a lacklustre galaxy. Ofcourse its also harder for people to integrate into the community, because the community is 6-7-8-9years old now, people have their close group of online m8s, and people hang out in private channels rather than public channels, long have gone the days where there used to be alot in #fury, take #denial or #conspiracy, very few hang out in there!

I'm bloody awful at putting my point across but i'll put the main points in bullet form.

.Get rid of the ability to exile.
.Get rid of BP's, 20man Random Gals ftw
.Maybe lower cluster ETA's
.Make planets more dependable on the galaxy, so with it being random, greater friendships are born, which will last and grow, rather than just "thanks for exiling into my gal, cheers for the score gain"

im not sure what im saying, so im going to stop

[Alezzar]

1) Make ally limit to 60
2) Get back lower eta for defense in cluster
3) Make self-exile for someone in buddy pack double charged
4) Counted score as the way said above
5) Limit members per gal to 10

In that way we will have more alliances...atm we have 5 allies with 75 members...If limit is 60 we get another ally full of good guys and second smaller ally with around 40 good players. Ya know..kinda funny, 2 more allies. With lower eta there will be much more fun with arranging in cluster def etc. Self exile for bp..its obvious tho. Counted score its just too wrong atm. And the galaxy limit.. Everybody whining bout universe being too small. i think gals with 10 peeps max would be awesome. Much gals, easy to have an active gal and still hard to get top gal, cuz u r not the only one active...

[HaNzI]

Originally Posted by Alezzar

1) Make ally limit to 60
2) Get back lower eta for defense in cluster
3) Make self-exile for someone in buddy pack double charged
4) Counted score as the way said above
5) Limit members per gal to 10

Its like you discussed this with me and we agreed on everything

ive been saying lately we need to face the fact we have less players.
Ill comment some of ur points

1) capping alliances to max 40 playing members and have an additional space for scanners of totally 15 slots. This will lead to a huge challenge in establishing new alliances but we will be rewarded with a closer race for top10 allies not top 3! giving a warning 1 round in advance for such a change is a given.

2) Thats a followup on my wish for smaller allies, making cluster and galaxy a bit more important. -2 eta for cluster defence like round 22 worked very well for my cluster. we didnt use it too much because people made gal and ally a priority but it led to 50 people idling in the clusterchan getting to know eachother. Bringing the community together is the main reason why i want lower cluster ETA

3 and 5) make 5 people buddypack and cap the gals at 10 members. Random players will be put in a gal with 4 or 5 buddypack-members, and once it reaches 10 members its full. One of the things i hate about the system today is all those players who sign up and log in 1 time! keeping the gal waiting for 72 ticks beore they can exile them out, only to recieve a new one, or getting one of those who sign up to see how its like and log in once a week.

i basically think exile should be removed if this is realised.
although i still think that latejoiners from pt336 and on should be able to join a buddypack. but cap it at 1 latejoiner for each gal.


And there is something else which i had in mind with making scanners an addition to the tag, and not a part of the tag like they are now. Players can dictate their alliance saying they will leave tag if they dont do as they say.
this can easily be avoided if the alliance does not lose score for kicking a player. Here is when everyone scream "this will be abused"

i really dont see the problem kicking this player and let the score stay in tag. sure you will be able to recruit a new member who will contribute score on TOP of that score, but the played who just got kicked would probably have contributed the same score anyways so the difference is 0 or very close to it.
This gives the "40-member" ally some balance in my oppinion as they can kick a member without losing score but they would also need to "poach" a member from a different ally to regain the score the kicked player would have contributed, which will be harder when the alliances are smaller.


And maybe maybe can we remove XP!!???

[Gate]

Where do hanzi and alezzar expect the new techies, scanners, officers and HC to come from?

Evidence from previous rounds shows no difference in the number of allies when we've had 60 member counts to when we've had 75 membercounts.

Eg: R17 had 17 competent alliances and 4 competitors for top spot. Last round had 15 competent alliances and 4 competitors for top spot. There were 100 more available alliance slots in the round with the larger alliance limits, allowing more people to play.

Every 'standard' competitor ally needs raids every night, DC coverage every night, scanners every night.

If I were ND with 40 member limits I'd split ND into (at least) 3 tags. Other alliances would likely copy that. That isn't going to add much to the game.


Unless you know of a way we're going to sprout new DCs/BCs like we never have before, all you're going to do is kick 130 players out of their alliances and make it much harder for newer players to find a home. I'm convinced that smaller memberlimits only quickens PA's death.

[Mzyxptlk]

YEAH ALL THESE ALLIANCES WILL JUST APPEAR OUT OF THIN AIR

Gate, stop being an unbeliever, you're ruining everything

[HeimdallR]

actually i have to agree with gate on this one.

[Monroe]

I also agree with Gate, there is a critical mass that must be maintained in order for an alliance to function. If that limit is cut back allies will either adapt to a wing structure or die. It is hard enough with the current ally limits to find enough HC/BC/DCs/Scanners as well as fill up raids, even for the top allies. Cutting the limits back any further would simply make it that much harder. The problem with the few number of competitive allies has much more to do with the size of the player base then it does the size of individual alliances.

[HaNzI]

less members means less work for HCs BCs and DCs aswell as scanners.

i didnt say it would be easy but less work means you need less of everything. only problem i see really is techies, so if the PA-team finds a solution on supplying alliances with decent tools an ally depend on, this is doable.


With tools good enough to claim attacks and run defence on, aswell as a scanbot in place what more do you really need. Scanners can easily be partly replaced by some sort of ally-scan where the HCs can access and build amps/scans from allyfund. lets say amps gets built eta8 or 9, so high-ampers will still be usefull.
just a suggestion i picked up from an other player

start to see some solutions instead of wasting your time ranting on others suggestions and have nothing to offer yourself

[Monroe]

Originally Posted by HaNzI

less members means less work for HCs BCs and DCs aswell as scanners.

i didnt say it would be easy but less work means you need less of everything. only problem i see really is techies, so if the PA-team finds a solution on supplying alliances with decent tools an ally depend on, this is doable.

Did you by chance play the game back when alliances were unlimited? It was a heck of a lot easier to find DCs then, then it is now. Also I don't see lots of potential HCs whining on the forums about how they can never find enough folks for their allies because all the other allies are taking them. If anything there is a shortage of good HCs, not a glut, if there were they would be forming new allies today!

Even if your right on command staff you still have the problem with getting enough active folks to run full raids, especially now that most attacks require a teamup to be successful. What you would see happen is allies would be forced to attack together in order to cover raids, thereby eliminating a big chunk of the reason for making them smaller in the first place.

[HaNzI]

all my suggestions are tied together as one. i also said that galaxies should be capped at 10 players so that an active 40-player ally can cover 2 gals while a less active one can cover 1 gal.

I have been here since r2 ty, and if you want to compare prepax with round 28 and on, you need to pull out atleast 10k more players. Only thing you can be sure of is that we are never getting those players with the conditions we play with now.

[Monroe]

Originally Posted by HaNzI

all my suggestions are tied together as one. i also said that galaxies should be capped at 10 players so that an active 40-player ally can cover 2 gals while a less active one can cover 1 gal.

I have been here since r2 ty, and if you want to compare prepax with round 28 and on, you need to pull out atleast 10k more players. Only thing you can be sure of is that we are never getting those players with the conditions we play with now.

10 player galaxies is not a good solution because it would then require new galaxies to be continually created as in past rounds. This lumps the new players together and does not often give them a chance to meet experienced players and thereby learn the game. Limiting the number of players has been used in the past, and the current solution, while certainly not optimal is better for players.

I do however agree that the game does need to change significantly for us to see large player numbers back in PA.

[HaNzI]

a brand new player only needs an account to test its features, not instantly run to irc, getting an alliance, and know all the strategies instantly.
next round when he signs up at tick 1 he will end up in a gal with all the others who signed up at tick 1

[ArcChas]

Except that he's not going to sign up for the next round. Not after spending a few days in a dead end galaxy with no one to give him a clue as to how to get any enjoyment from the game.

Admittedly, plenty of new players get a raw deal under the current arrangements - but (if they're active) there's at least a chance that someone will try to show them the ropes.

As for the "reduce alliance size" suggestion - I wish we could (for once) approach the start of a round without having to go over all the same reasons why that's an appalling idea. For those who can't remember the reasons there are plenty of (old) threads on the subject.

[Gate]

Originally Posted by HaNzI

start to see some solutions instead of wasting your time ranting on others suggestions and have nothing to offer yourself

I've already offered solutions...

- remove the support planet rule
- increase alliance member limits
- remove alliance member limits

Take your pick.

This will increase the total number of available slots in alliances, allowing more people to try the game and encourage more players to stick around.

You argue that smaller allies need less officers, that's true. But when you increase the number of members in an alliance and want to maintain the same level of average def/att output, the marginal cost in terms of officers is very low. The number of alliance-slots-per-officer is much higher for higher member limits.