Version 1.39

[DeletedUser3032]

Say you have a player,, we`ll call them player A, and they have the AW placed, and are getting x amount of materials from the AW. They then use these materials to barter through new provinces, which in turn give more visits, so more materials, so more scouting, so more materials, and they end up with such a HUGE number of provinces scouted that they literally get 250,000 + Materials every day . This is what we mean when we say it became too strong.

I'm not being funny but if they are getting that many resources, they deserve them for visiting every single neighbour each day and it would take more than that in resources to complete a province if they are indeed getting that amount!

So here you have it. A table showing level of wonder / open provinces against 250,000 resources gathered each day! Would have scouted the entire world map!!!!

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1vrag5uX9WkW4ujbpMjhVOhWUKIXb1ii2OwuXtrp6-vg/edit?usp=sharing

Rank 2 - Level 12 (Eh no he doesn't get 250k!)
Rank 4 - Level 16 (Wahooo, but does he/she have 477 provinces open? doubtful) Would have 10 day scout times!
Rank 6 - Level 1 (Awww no KP either! Bonus! Not wasted any!)
Rank 8 - Level 9 (no chance)

Could keep going. But I doub't there will be many able to collect the amount you have mentioned without serious pushing. Which we know some do.

 

[Pauly7]

The thing to keep in mind at this point is that Marindor's original statement can effectively be stricken from the record. We collectively took each element of it apart and called Inno out on its inaccuracy. They have now, however, as good as admitted that these weren't the real reasons in yesterday allowing the mods to issue the revised version describing that they have done it because the AW was too powerful and too many people were taking vast amounts of goods that they didn't intend. This much I do believe.

Does it amount to lies to begin with? Yes. Is it, at this stage, something that they should discuss with us directly? Yes it is.

What I am driving at here is that it won't serve any further purpose to analyse the length of time the neighbourly help takes or the fact that this change happened before the change to the NH system was implemented because the fact of the matter is that this was never a real reason anyway as we are disregarding everything from that statement because it was untrue.

Yes I am sure that they would have been able to calculate the possible return that people could have achieved with spreadsheets, etc. It is also possible, though, that they were shortsighted enough to have thought originally "Hey, people right now are doing X amount of neighbourly help and if they continue with that then we will be paying out X in goods". It seems plausible that they didn't anticipate that what actually would happen is that the AW benefit would then lead to everyone giving neighbourly help to every person on their map every day and then scouting as many provinces as possible to increase it more.

It does, however, seem like a really shortsighted view of what would happen. All this is possible though.

If we accept all the above as true then it clearly won't help to berate Inno over the amount of goods that are now not being awarded... as this is definitely the whole reason that they have made the change and it only reinforces their position.

Given all that, I think it only really leaves the following still up for debate:

• Having now made the change, should 'compensation' be discussed? I think yes, definitely. People did build and upgrade this building based on the rewards it was promising, be they right or wrong. It would be a nice thing on their part if they perhaps designed a new unique building to award to all owners of the AW, that perhaps is better depending on what level your AW was on. That might be a nice touch, though some KP or diamonds is probably more realistic. What are they prepared to do to make amends?
• Having rebalanced the AW, should the numbers of KP required for upgrade in the future also be rebalanced?
• Should InnoGames be taking a serious look at how they communicate with players so that we don't get in this position again? Absolutely. Plus I think they should be promising a much more proactive involvement in this forum.

I still feel the pain for losing all those bonus goods, but I am just trying to be practical here about what it is possible to achieve out of this. With the possible exception of the above bullet points I know that I, for one, am ready to move on.

 

[Maillie]

I was informed yesterday by someone that she was now getting a LOT more from her Crystal Lighthouse. I asked how that could be and was informed that she had never visited her neighbors so she now gets more in her three chests from the fs. This is the player that is now being rewarded, the one that gives no effort. Those of us that do visit neighbors and do put some time and effort into the game get punished because some get too much. The balancing I can understand, rewarding those that do little and punishing those that work harder is not as clear to me.

There should be more than three chests, which can be obtained in the first page of fellowship member visits. There should also be chests for the neighborhood, perhaps one chest for each 20, or even 30, neighbors. If the chests contain 10 x the original amount it would cut our profit in 1/2 for 20, or 1/3 for 30. Taking away all of the profit from the entire neighborhood is just ... defeating. We worked hard to open provinces to get those neighbors and now the ones that don't bother to visit them get the rewards.

I have played a lot of great MMO's and MMOrpg's and have yet to find one that someone doesn't earn "too much", either fairly or not fairly. Punishing everyone else in the game because of them sounds like possibly not enough time was spent thinking this through.

 

[Kimelve]

Given all that, I think it only really leaves the following still up for debate:

• Having now made the change, should 'compensation' be discussed? I think yes, definitely. People did build and upgrade this building based on the rewards it was promising, be they right or wrong. It would be a nice thing on their part if they perhaps designed a new unique building to award to all owners of the AW, that perhaps is better depending on what level your AW was on. That might be a nice touch, though some KP or diamonds is probably more realistic. What are they prepared to do to make amends?
• Having rebalanced the AW, should the numbers of KP required for upgrade in the future also be rebalanced?
• Should InnoGames be taking a serious look at how they communicate with players so that we don't get in this position again? Absolutely. Plus I think they should be promising a much more proactive involvement in this forum.

7

Exactly. I invested in the lighthouse precisely because of the benefits that they have now removed. And beyond those direct benefits, I have also designed *my entire city* on the basis of the rewards I was getting via that AW - so I deleted factories because with the lighthouse fully functioning, I didn't need them. Now have to rebuild them, and that means I have to rearrange my city to accommodate them again.

I also agree that upgrade KP figures REALLY need to be reconsidered. If the AWs are worth less, they should cost less, and if we cannot invest in them with the security that they will not simply be randomly stripped of their worth at a a later date without consultation or warning, then we definitely shouldn't have to put so many KPs into them to upgrade them in the first place.

But beyond any of these issues is the fact of being blatantly lied to about the changes, why they were made and what they would mean. It is these LIES that are driving my desire to quit the game. Don't betray me by changing the rules so significantly mid-way through the game, offering no compensation at all, and then tell me (falsely) that I am better off because of the changes! That is disrespectful, deceitful and insulting.
.

 

[Timneh]

Having now made the change, should 'compensation' be discussed? I think yes, definitely. People did build and upgrade this building based on the rewards it was promising, be they right or wrong. It would be a nice thing on their part if they perhaps designed a new unique building to award to all owners of the AW, that perhaps is better depending on what level your AW was on. That might be a nice touch, though some KP or diamonds is probably more realistic. What are they prepared to do to make amends?

Yes i think players should get some form of compensation for paying hundreds/thousands of KP into a wonder that has had it's benifits so drastically slashed. Inno promised that they were going to make the AWs powerful and worth having (which they did) but now they have reverted them back and thie BS/CL in my opinion is no longer worth the space it takes up so it should be made smaller (like that will ever happen lol)

Having rebalanced the AW, should the numbers of KP required for upgrade in the future also be rebalanced?

Again i say yes. The AW no longer has the power it had so it no longer has the value it had so therefore should be cheaper to upgrade. Will i upgrade my BS further at the current cost in KP ? Not a chance but i still might get rid of it.

Should InnoGames be taking a serious look at how they communicate with players so that we don't get in this position again? Absolutely. Plus I think they should be promising a much more proactive involvement in this forum.

At the moment Inno do not really communicate with players at all. OK we get release notes and the odd comment from the CM (normally telling us nothing of importance and not answering questions that were asked). The proactive involvment from the Inno team is supposed to be provided by the CM (by his own admission) but like i just said he rarely shows up on the forum (doesn't even post the release notes anymore) and on the occasions that he does come on the forum he does not provide any real information.

I think it would be a good gesture from Inno if they put out an official statement appologising for the way they have handled this situation and for the lies they told at the start about the reasons for this change and to make some assurances that they will investigate how it happened and make sure it will not happen again in the future.

 

[DeletedUser3032]

Hmm. Extra 250k of goods per day? Too strong - not balanced?
How about 450k for negotiating tourney's one round 5 for the first 10 provinces? Not so strong?

Here's the computation
480 completed provinces (full ring 15) * 270 visits (all accessible cities in rings 1-16) * 1,7 (max level 25 of BS|CL) = 220320
546 (full ring 16) * 306 (all accessible cities in rings 1-17) * 1,7 = 283968

How many players will achieve these parameters in the foreseeable future?
Inno decided to limit the majority of players because of these several potential beneficiaries?

Moreover getting a HUGE amount of additional resources regularly also requires a HUGE efforts and time and it should be rewarded accordingly. Nobody will spend his time to help an non-responsive neighbors for the sake of the insignificant reward.

I'd probably say 90% of people who are able to get these huge amounts of resources at this moment in time, are pushing their main accounts with dozens of alt accounts. Even 1 known cheater hasn't even levelled his AW this high yet.

 

[DeletedUser3182]

Shamy quote: However, we can only work and function together as a team, if we work together.

This is a meaningless platitude, overworked and frankly displays a rather patronising attitude.

A team is a group of people who work towards a common goal. The devs are a team, the mods are a team. My various FSs are teams (plural, not singular) because they are in separate worlds, and necessity dictates that interaction is not possible. FSs in the same world don't act as a combined team - they help their neighbours and their fellows, that is the extent of their ability or power - they cannot combine with neighbours in separate FSs and act as a team.

The players have little or no input to the Dev's goals, strategy and certainly none in their decisions, which affect the players. There is no 'we' to work together, because 'we' the thousands of players, including all those who pay to play, do not get a say in what the devs decide; and we definitely do not get to know about it until it's been decided and is implement on Beta for the players to test. They do this willingly and in their own time, but generally it only gives a short period of advance notice of what is going to be done.

It can be defended by various mods, a CM, even a spokesman for the devs - but, ultimately we, the players, aren't on 'your' team. We are excluded from 'your' team by the very nature of how Inno keeps everything secret (I understand why, though don't always agree it's valid), until it decides it will dribble out some information on Beta. However, more importantly because 'we' aren't working for Inno and 'we' are not valued because of it.

This isn't my life, this isn't even a very important part of my life. It's a game, which I still enjoy. However, I don't know what your goals are as a team, I haven't a clue about the future strategy of this game. I haven't the slightest inclination of whether the changes will be good in the future or not.
I do know they haven't been thought out properly. I do know they haven't been implemented well. I do know that effective communication is completely lacking between Inno management, devs and players and that is entirely Inno's responsibility and failing.

So please don't claim I'm part of 'your team', because I'm not and the thousands of players aren't and never will be.

There is a correlation in real life for what happens when a management of a company or organisation doesn't communicate with its customers, doesn't think it needs to explain its decisions to said customers and then exacerbates that mess by first ignoring them, then putting out meaningless and worthless responses - to the uproar of its own making. In one word Ryanair.

 

[DeletedUser441]

Wasn't Ryanair cheap ?

 

[DeletedUser2233]

I'd probably say 90% of people who are able to get these huge amounts of resources at this moment in time, are pushing their main accounts with dozens of alt accounts. Even 1 known cheater hasn't even levelled his AW this high yet.

I agree ,but what is more .Inno lets them cheat ,and do nothing about it .The only way to help the normal playing gamers is a limit of accounts .For instance no more 3 or 4 .But this is also hard to prove ,since everybody can make just another e-mail as easy .I know that maybe inno should ask for the main e-mail limit per ip on witch you can have 2 accounts .But i know they wont since every acc is a possible money depositor .They rather let the whole game being destroyed and cut their losses then make an actual fair game.When the incentive is money first and gameplay meeeh not so much the game will suffer .And please people do not say every time cause they have to make money since they already do ,more then most of you will ever know .

This game is really expensive if you have to ask more money for every square every single time .And btw diamonds are now per 500 for 6,99 and they cut their offer of 19,99 .so now the best one of theirs is 27,99 for 2400 diamonds.

since i have to pay for my next expansion 1200 diamonds i can buy to be exact 1 expansion cause the next one will be higher yet again as well so for 28 bucks..i get 1 square .

Now mind me i like this game ,i love it too .But this is a gold diggers syndrome . on behalves of inno .Tell me if you going to pay 400 -500 bucks for a game you just pick up like that ... No thanks .... not at these prizes.

So that is where i am at the gold digger is digging its gold at the harm of regular normal players .It seems to me they have made there choice.

 

[Tonton-des-bois]

[...]Say you have a player,, we`ll call them player A, and they have the AW placed, and are getting x amount of materials from the AW. They then use these materials to barter through new provinces, which in turn give more visits, so more materials, so more scouting, so more materials, and they end up with such a HUGE number of provinces scouted that they literally get 250,000 + Materials every day . This is what we mean when we say it became too strong.[...]

This statement is wrong... no matter the amount of goods you produce or collect through the NH visits, you're limited by your scouting time... so the loop you describe has already a limiting factor about the provinces aquiring... And I reached that limit only by producing goods through factories... So gaining even 250k goods every day by the NH visits only mean you can have no factories (I'm producing 180k goods every day) and perhaps cater a bit more tourney encounters... but forget the unlimited provinces that would give more goods through visits circle, this process is already limited by scouting time very shortly, even without CL/GBS

But I agree on that : those visiting their whole NH were getting too much goods per visit that would prevent them for having any factories... a part of the game (1 wonder) shouldn't give an advantage that would prevent the player to use another part (numerous factories) that has a limiting purpose as surface eater...

 

[Timneh]

We are excluded from 'your' team by the very nature of how Inno keeps everything secret until it decides it will dribble out some information on Beta.

Yes and when something does come out on beta and a player then comes here to the international forum to share info about it Inno turn round and say that we can only talk about that change in a thread of their making and all posts in other threads about changes on beta will be removed. It is almost like them saying we don't really want you talking about changes on beta here but we can't realistically stop you so we will make you talk about them where we say so we can monitor it easily.
That is what happened to the original thread about this change, it was started by a beta player that wanted to give the live server players advance warning (and complain about the change) and when it started to get more attention Muf-Muf came along and locked it and said we do see more and more discussions on the forum on Beta-related topics (the changes discussed here do currently only affect the Beta market), and we will be hosting a discussion thread for everything Beta-related from now on.
We all know that beta changes will come here unchanged and as soon as they do we can talk about them in other threads so what is the difference?
This change to the BS/CL has caused uproar not only on the international and beta forums but on all the forums around the world (yes i have looked to check and translated the ones where i did not understand the language before i said thisto make sure of my facts). There are players all over the world saying that they will never buy another diamond and also a great number that say they have had enough and are quitting the game because of this change. If they all do as they have said this change must be costing Innogames a small fortune and i for one am glad if that is so as it might be a lesson to them not to treat their customers in such a diabolical manner (although i doubt it).

 

[DeletedUser1668]

Really you think this is a balance so I lose my rewards for visiting neighbours and then get a random chest which i have to take more effort to find. This game is going down the pan even quicker . please don;t say it is good because it most certainly is not .

 

[DeletedUser2233]

But I agree on that : those visiting their whole NH were getting too much goods per visit that would prevent them for having any factories... a part of the game (1 wonder) shouldn't give an advantage that would prevent the player to use another part (numerous factories) that has a limiting purpose as surface eater...

Is that not an easy fix . When you let the lighthouse/bellspire owners get the normal rate when they visit inside the fellowship .And gain 3 extra visits in the NH .You can up that to 5 or even 6 for outside the FS .It will be more an incentive to visit within you're FS Then display the few goods in a chest .So limit the visits outside the FS but don't disregard it all together .

So now the people have to visit within the FS to get the goods .And a few outside in the NH .seems a lot better to me .

I agree though we should not allow surface eaters .. so that will have to be limited .

 

[DeletedUser3032]

This game is really expensive if you have to ask more money for every square every single time .And btw diamonds are now per 500 for 6,99 and they cut their offer of 19,99 .so now the best one of theirs is 27,99 for 2400 diamonds.

will be cheaper last day of event i think costs over 140quid to get 3rd reward last time before they dropped price to 9.99. then it cost around 50quid

 

[EdwardTrunk]

It is not the changes being made but how the devs operate .

Exactly this!

If these changes to the AW have been made because, with the android App, the AW is considered to be too advantageous then whose fault was that? And surely Inno must have realised this prior to deciding on the way NH visits were going to work with the App.

And even if they created the android App without considering the ramification of the changes they'd made then all they had to do was reduce the amount of boosted goods per visit. Instead they have totally crippled the AW, making it next to useless.

Players built and upgraded the AW on the basis of what it was going to provide. Now that it's usefulness is greatly diminished some form of compensation should have been made, and at the very least we should have been able to delete it without losing all the KP that had been invested.

And lastly, as has been previously discussed, it's simply sophistry of the highest order to announce that most players would be better off when the exact opposite is true. The overall impression formed from all of this is that Inno treat their customers with disdain.

 

[DeletedUser3032]

Exactly this!

If these changes to the AW have been made because, with the android App, the AW is considered to be too advantageous then whose fault was that? And surely Inno must have realised this prior to deciding on the way NH visits were going to work with the App.

And even if they created the android App without considering the ramification of the changes they'd made then all they had to do was reduce the amount of boosted goods per visit. Instead they have totally crippled the AW, making it next to useless.

Players built and upgraded the AW on the basis of what it was going to provide. Now that it's usefulness is greatly diminished some form of compensation should have been made, and at the very least we should have been able to delete it without losing all the KP that had been invested.

And lastly, as has been previously discussed, it's simply sophistry of the highest order to announce that most players would be better off when the exact opposite is true. The overall impression formed from all of this is that Inno treat their customers with disdain.

What they should have done in regards to the mobile version is class it as it's own game/own server and kept browser and mobile apart like a lot of games do.

 

[Timneh]

will be cheaper last day of event i think costs over 140quid to get 3rd reward last time before they dropped price to 9.99. then it cost around 50quid

They can drop the price to £1 for all i care i still would not pay it. I am not paying another penny into this game.

What they should have done in regards to the mobile version is class it as it's own game/own server and kept browser and mobile apart like a lot of games do.

What ? you expect Inno to do something that actually makes sense ? Shame on you.

 

[DeletedUser4528]

And lastly, as has been previously discussed, it's simply sophistry of the highest order to announce that most players would be better off when the exact opposite is true. The overall impression formed from all of this is that Inno treat their customers with disdain.

Most players will be better off with the new system. This is an undeniable fact. I understand that people have their opinion , their beliefs, and there expectations, but the hard cold facts are that the overwhelming majority of players do less than 25 NH per day.

This obviously means that getting the equivalent of 30 NH is a gain.

 

[DeletedUser2233]

Most players will be better off with the new system. This is an undeniable fact. I understand that people have their opinion , their beliefs, and there expectations, but the hard cold facts are that the overwhelming majority of players do less than 25 NH per day.

This obviously means that getting the equivalent of 30 NH is a gain.

"but the hard cold facts are that the overwhelming majority of players do less than 25 NH per day."

If that was so ,then they would not have to change the mechanics at all . But this is not the case !!

 

[DeletedUser3032]

Exactly this!

If these changes to the AW have been made because, with the android App, the AW is considered to be too advantageous then whose fault was that? And surely Inno must have realised this prior to deciding on the way NH visits were going to work with the App.

And even if they created the android App without considering the ramification of the changes they'd made then all they had to do was reduce the amount of boosted goods per visit. Instead they have totally crippled the AW, making it next to useless.

Players built and upgraded the AW on the basis of what it was going to provide. Now that it's usefulness is greatly diminished some form of compensation should have been made, and at the very least we should have been able to delete it without losing all the KP that had been invested.

And lastly, as has been previously discussed, it's simply sophistry of the highest order to announce that most players would be better off when the exact opposite is true. The overall impression formed from all of this is that Inno treat their customers with disdain.

What they should have done in regards to the mobile version is class it as it's own game/own server and kept browser and mobile apart like a lot of games do.

Apart from those who play via browser and mobile, all they are doing is creating more players who will not come on the forums to suggest things and voice their opinions. Which leads me to this by @Shamy once again: Not everyone expresses their opinion on the forum They will just remove the game or forget about it, which makes another 50k inactive account. Mobile gamers are worse than those using browsers. Having 100k sole mobile users is useless for the game development period! Having them all joined in the same servers is gonna cause even more problems for us players. Wanna know why? I'll tell you why.

Because we are a 20 man/woman team voicing our opinions and suggestions (which get ignored) because there are 100k other players who say naff all and don't use the games community forums (Innos fault). But now there will be 200k players which include 100k mobile users, so there's more reason than ever now for Inno to ignore the players who suggest things etc. It's that simple.