Best Of

Re: Game Balance

Timequakes are fun and all, but they happen too frequently and take too long. I think there is a better idea than for 4 hrs in a 24hr time period, people will be stuck releasing an anomaly. That doesn't sound like fun conflict, even if the extra steps were taken to make it interesting, it isn't rewarding. For example, Magnagora has reached the peak of its research, the anomalies that we have left will just go to funding citizens archpower, but that basically meant most of us were not using archpower until we maxed out the entire research tree. So all those powers were mostly unused for months outside of timewind or immaculate control. That is just another conflict mechanic that was min/maxed and created a hostile environment for the losing side that snowballed into other areas.

Quick ideas on making Timequakes better: shorter, less frequent, or all participants of the winning side get 5 archpower to encourage more usage of research powers. Really none are ideal, but I'm not the best on ideas so hoping someone else can branch off of something.

Revolts and Flares - with the introduction of feelings, this was sort of an attempt to mirror the Domoth mechanic while not making it mechanically impossible. I think that was the correct path to take. I'm honestly not sure if revolts and flares are what helps lead to the avalanche, but once the other side starts snowballing, the revolts/flares are the first thing to go. Once one side starts dominating the villages/revolts, that should be your canary telling you to get out now because something is wrong. And when you do "Politics" and see all the other side, that could be morally crushing.

We should also recognize that the snowball effect in Lusternia is not a unique problem. It is a problem that exists in almost every game, there are wikipedia articles detailing the snowball effect, I don't think I've ever played a game that didn't have snowball mechanics that make it easier for one side to completely dominate. Add in the fact that we can switch sides at any point with our character and/or an alt, it helps further the avalanche. There are things that should be done to mitigate the snowball effect while still making it rewarding to participate in the avalanche.

And finally, at one point I heard the last competitive mode that saw any kind of competition was Orgcredits, yet since that comment, Ironhart has came in 1-2-3 place every single year. Perhaps the issue is not mechanical related at all since any area where competition has been in the past few months has been conceded, even ones that were not mechanically overbearing as PK.

Silvanus

1

Re: Game Balance

Silvanus said:

Quick ideas on making Timequakes better: shorter, less frequent, or all participants of the winning side get 5 archpower to encourage more usage of research powers. Really none are ideal, but I'm not the best on ideas so hoping someone else can branch off of something.

So I know I don't do timequakes, but theoretically - in addition to these changes, what if multiple anomalies could be present/spawn at once?

Edit: Please pardon the awful formatting, ugh

Jolanthe

2

Re: Game Balance

Xenthos said:

Okay, you're deleting on-topic posts now because you don't like them?

I'm removing posts that are continuing a topic I said it's time to move forward from. You were sent a message explaining this.

Orael

1

Re: Game Balance

Kali said:

I think an underlying issue that causes a lot of problems is that people fight to win. They will garner every advantage they can, be it cheesy strategies or calling in reinforcements. This isn't a critique on a particular side, as I've seen both sides do it without hesitation whenever they can or need to. People aren't as interested in fair play and even fights as they are in winning at any cost, and it's not really a mindset that can be avoided as it is a competitive game, so it kind of is what it is.

To some extent, sure. The point is not to tell people they aren't allowed to try and win, but to shift the motivations away from 15 vs 5, or to give those 5 some other way to compete. Both in pk, or in improving the org.

Kethaera

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Re: What are you listening to at the moment?

Tyrus

2

Re: Game Balance

Kethaera said:

Xenthos said:

Kethaera said:

Xenthos said:

Yes- delete the "winner takes all" mechanics. Incentivize trying; if you try, you get something portion of it (kind of like wildnodes, but even then it's only generally 2 orgs that get anything instead of all participants). Work on addressing the so-called snowball effect (the more you have, the easier it is to get more right now- it should function the other way). Lots of little details and such that can be gotten into, but we've even written envoy reports to try to address some of it that are on indefinite hold.
An actual alliance mechanic system could also be leveraged to share earnings from events.

I like the idea of this, but not sure how this would work for things like villages and flares. I think I or someone else suggested at one time the idea of making it harder to capture villages the more you have, with the idea that no one likes huge empires.

Yep! That was a report we put forward in the last report cycle.
Other options include things like: An organization doesn't claim a village / flare, but an alliance does. Thus, everyone in the alliance gets some of the commodities / power / output, etc. Make things really a group effort in which everyone is rewarded. If you focus on and nab one, then you all prosper.

Eh, but that sounds like it would force alliances to be static. If one side is always going to be winning, I'm not sure this would help. I don't remember the details of the report, but I agree with the spirit of it.

It would be quite dependent upon alliances that are roughly equal in participation-interest, yes. It's not so great a solution Right Now, but one would hope that someday things will be somewhat less divided. It also suffers from cementing the "us v. them" divide because it's likely to be exactly 2 sides, unless it gets capped at only letting 2 orgs be in an alliance at once (which comes with its own downsides / issues).

Either way, that's definitely a very Long Term discussion.

Just working on the snowball effect in the short term would be a good place to start, and theoretically a whole lot easier.

PS: The relevant report is REPORT 169. It was a shot at trying to chip away at the overall process. Best solution? Possibly not, but at least it would be an improvement over what we've got now.

Xenthos

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Lamb to the Slaughter

This is a follow up meeting with @Vylasse several IG years after the log she posted here:

https://forums.lusternia.com/discussion/4136/magnagora-nil-and-joining-lantras-order

There were some letter correspondences between us which are linked here:

First my letter inviting her to Nil.

Her letter in response.

After not catching each other in person for awhile, I sent another letter.

Finally we were able to meet, with @Sapphira @Vella Zau Sereth and Sutekh.

This is the log of the tour of Nil and the proverbial lamb to the slaughter.

Uzriel

10

Re: Game Balance

I do like the idea of non-comm ways to help, like influencing villagers in-between ways. Only... actually make it effective. Generally, maybe a push toward conflicts that require/encourage setup that anyone can do? With conflict currently whoever has the most people logged (or can be dragged in from discord) is going to win nearly all the time. If there was something else that could be done to prepare, maybe it'd encourage people not to just wait for those pings.

Kethaera

1

Re: Game Balance

I can't see that really helping in terms of things, because it'll just mean the same five people making up death squads and that excludes people.

There's probably a ton of small things we could do to make conflict less 'urgent' such as each org having one village that is always naturally aligned with them and it's only the others that go up for conflict. It would less pressure to try and secure something and making them less screwed when they don't/can't.

I love combat, but I think timequakes are the -best- way to get that combat itch scratched and we could and should look at other mechanics that are less numbers mean all for the overall enjoyment and health of the game.

Yinuish

3

Re: Game Balance

Yeah, just want to emphasise that no one here is expecting IHC to 'fix' things. I think there's always idle thought of 'what can we do to help address this imbalance.' It's why I made Yinuish in the first place because I saw they needed people. I think it's one of those cases where there will be a point where things will click and things will improve but I think with the CURRENT state without people stopping logging in and if no one alts etc, it's going to be delayed and there won't be any fight on either side.

Yinuish

2