The Carrot, the Stick, and the War Game

What's a Carrot?

Other than an orange-colored root people eat as a vegetable, a carrot is a reward used as a means of persuasion or motivation. In Simcountry, players are motivated to run successful countries to earn sim-cash. They are motivated to increase their score to earn gold coins as a part of rankings, and so on. Imagine if the game rules were changed and all CEO profits were surrendered to the game. Other than the out-pour we would experience on the forum, we would see less player concern with running successful enterprises.


What's a Stick?

Other than the "woody" piece of a tree, a stick is also the punishment or threat of punishment to force compliance or cooperation. A Simcountry example are the rules that force us to maintain some level of financial state in countries or they will be released back to a c3. Maintaining proper defenses offer no financial incentives but prevent the possibility of losing your country to war, is another example of compliance.


The War Game. Why we used to war.

The war game offers the potential to assume the assets of another player's country. This led to several different game dynamics. One is that players would see a need to be part of a federation that can protect them and in turn they would contribute to the group's overall defense. Another is that powerful players learned they could easily defeat newer war players and assume their assets for little risk.

Personally, I decided I was not interested in pushing around newer war players. However, since I made enemies that did attack newer war players many of my early conflicts were against what some called "game bullies". It was not necessarily something I did because I was a nice guy but it was in my interest to prevent my enemies from easily gaining resources (stick) and gave me the opportunity to make new allies (carrot).


The Current State of the War Game.

The war game is currently ailing because of the lack both of a carrot and stick. I believe the problem starts with the rewards side. There is nothing you can possibly gain from a pvp war that it is not possible to earn somewhere else. In addition, though you can earn gold coins from running a successful country, CEO, gaining game levels, and even warring a c3, for all its risks, you cannot earn gold coins from warring a player.

Good or bad, the limitations of war levels, in particular, have all but removed what some war player saw as the rewards on the war game, namely the ability of looting less capable war players. Even the world where the risks and rewards of the war game were supposed to be pronounced has seen many of the top rankings and even the Hall of Fame populated by players of insufficient war level to even experience the war game.


How do we fix the war game?

It is astounding to me that, in some corners, there are still calls that war is too expensive and if we only lower its costs we would see a much more involved and competitive war game. On another thread, I detailed 20, yes 20, different game updates that involved lowering costs of weapons, ammo, or made other changes to lower the costs of war since November, 2012. This has not been successful in reinvigorating the war game, which has only continued a decline since then. Until there are changes to the carrot or stick side of the war game, there will be only very limited application of this important aspect of the game.

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Good or bad, the limitations of war levels, in particular, have all but removed what some war player saw as the rewards on the war game, namely the ability of looting less capable war players.-aries<!-/Quote-!>

their are very few players with your skill, and determination. yourself, if you figure the number of players that can stand up to you, you can probably do it, and still cut off a finger or 2.

after the Mob war, which is largely considered the catalyst that created war levels, their was another war before war levels where implemented. i fought in both. the second, an entire federation, fired litterally everything they had at one of my countries, and only dented my reserve, after that, my allies clobbered them, 4 of us nuking and capturing dozens of countries, loosing none ourselves.

in fact, war at the time was redesigned, as a general rule, it was changed to cost the attacker 2-3 times the cost of the defense. Air wing repsonce was increase from 2 total wings, to 3, all defensive weapons where improved. max number of wars where decreased. their where some other ideas that where promised but never implemented.

all this was because many players, would rather quit, than start over. after spending several years building an empire, for it to just disappear in less than a week... most would rather quit than start over.

for those that would rather quit, war levels where created to offer them protection, not force them to fight if they didn't want to. and not force them to fight outmatched fights against highly skilled, exceptionally active players

at the time, i argued against war levels, very vigorously. now several years later. i must admit that the concept is sound. the main problem, was for a long time was skilled players bottom feeding at low WLs, now its a lack of players at the various levels, to offer sufficient competition.

removing war levels might solve the problem, but the chances are those players at WL2 would rather just find another game. For myself, i play WL2, so that i don't have to fight. I enjoy the game, but i can not commit war-player type time to it.

removing war levels, might cause me to revert to a single country. i'm sure i'm not alone in this thought. so you must consider that removing war levels, would cause a decline in the player base.

you need to go a different rout

the GM have mentioned "partial victories," that is a country might have a natural resource such as Oil, and during a war, the attacker might paint the location on the map that natural oil exsists. and when the war is over, the original country owner, would still own the country, but the attacker would control the oil.

if defense itself is improved to the point that total victory is not cost effective, so capturing key resources becomes the focus, you'd see different offensive and defensive concepts, centered more around controlling territory than total destruction.

further, the GM mention "monopolies," they weren't very clear, but indicated that monopolies of resources could pick their price. so several war players could set out and partially conquer dozens of countries, creating an oil monopoly, and charging exuberant prices to gas, aircraft fuel, and plastics corps. while another group can try to stop them, or counter attack, some how.

every one has something significant to gain, while not risking what they've spent years building

i'd recommend, leaving those alone that want to be left alone, and look a different direction for your revival.

I have not suggested removing war levels. I have suggested adding a mechanism to enjoy the war game in a fun environment where your country is not at risk and you earn rewards. Such as battlegrounds or something similar:

https://www.simcountry.com/discus/messages/8/24274.html?1435107663

There also needs to be a player option to participate in a larger conflict that war levels now prevents. This would be voluntary for the player who would only risk countries committed to the conflict. This is the idea behind the Total War idea, found here:

https://www.simcountry.com/discus/messages/8/24038.html?1434986948

I suggested rankings be introduced to recognize power levels of players, found here:

https://www.simcountry.com/discus/messages/8/24236.html?1426105397

I suggested that the decreasing costs and unit hard limits of weapons was making war increasing cumbersome. This is a particular challenge for newer war players. I suggested a war improvement in this area, found here:

https://www.simcountry.com/discus/messages/8/24775.html?1427724961


None of these suggestions remove war levels and only serve to give player choice and offer rewards for participation in the pvp game. I do predict a world absent of war levels would not be an unpopular world. I also predict, like every other game activity, unless there are incentives to participate in the war game, it will be a rare occurrence.

The problem is that war levels was a subtraction of the game experience but the hole that was left was too large and was replaced with nothing. In its place, was an opportunity to reshape a pvp environment that was enjoyably for the players that choose to participate in it. It is time that such an environment was available.

Look, bottom line:

Since the era Orbiter talks about and the introduction of war levels there has been no great revival of the player base. It didn't encourage people to join or stay, let alone war.

Neither have the 20 odd reductions in expense that Aries talks of increased war activity.

All war levels did was drive away the vets, (who nurtured the new players more than bullied them). This saw the demise of many a good federation. Chat died. The forum completely changed.

In short, the community died.

All these silly band-aid ideas I keep seeing are a waste of pixels. This is the way W3C chose to go, this is the game they wound up with. Maybe they like it this way huh, have you ever thought about that ? Really, it may be time for the detractors to try to find better. I consider these endless posts nothing but negative and destructive to what little community might be reading them.

In other words - Blow it out your ass !

so nice to be able to cuss in a forum again

well, based on what you wrote above, its understandable that i'd see a push to remove war levels. beyond war levels, i have no opinion on the war game, as i don't play it.

but like is said, w/o WLs, its unlikely that i'd have put the effort into space, that has actually created a space game.

one thing that i'd like to see, is space fighters, at least depending on how they are implemented. it'd seem that if your fighters and shuttles remain docked, they'd be safe, so their would only be action, when you try to do something, limiting space war to just when you are active.

they've talked about space blockades, space raiding, which would create another level of war, when players try to move hardware to a war, via space. given what i've done in space in the past, it'd seem that space is broken, with out some form of "space blockades" for my part, it'd be to my advantage to defend against raids and blockades, so i'd probably build a large fighting force to defend most space routs. if that was a possibility

but as far as country versus country, i'd rather stay out, so my only interest is some form of WL protection for peaceful players.

toe cutter, vets where leaving before that. the Mob war, was 8 players against the largest fed in the game, WGC.

at the time, WGC was number one in every category, players, countries, pop, standing military, everything, not only #1 on every stat, but where bigger than the #2-10 put together, but they had zero war playing experience.

it was a like a junior high dance, with all the boys on one side, afraid to talk to the girls.

at the time of the Mob war, it was said that those 8 players, where about 2/3s of the remaining war players. the lack of war skill, and experience happened before WLs.

Why are you so concerned about protection for peaceful players?

In the days of lore, you played peacefully and appeared reasonably active, had a fed and didn't smack talk people and you weren't targeted (in general).

Of course there were one or two rogues (Wendy *cough*, nix *cough*) who didn't respect the unwritten code but they were slapped down by the bigger players. There was a slight risk, sure, but it was advertised as a war game, or game with a war element.

Surely you know the real reasons behind the game changes Orbiter, a certain old timer, probably the oldest, not liking getting pwnd by LDI elements, and this player had the GMs ear. There was a lot of politics going on between GM and big players back then, you know it, I know it, Romeo Vicardi knows it. Dont know if Aries was around at the time... anyway. read previous post.

Maybe I'm going back before your Mob war orbiter. Wild, jason, etc etc and our own dear Laguna

yes, i'm aware of that, although, i was only on the fringe, at best, so i have an understanding, in fact, its a theme that continues, the GM have a tendency to... well, you know how that sentence ends.

i did fight in the VS/EBT war between (the original) Ares, L3, Wild, vs LG, KH. remembering LG getting spanked by Ares, and all wars stopped by the GM. Of course the GM had to allow the wars again, and the pause wasn't enough to save LG. I continued the war on my own after VS made peace. and learned more about war in a few weaks, than years of reading forum posts.

which is the thing that i always felt was the biggest obstacle to sim-war. players tended to congregate in large feds, being promised protection. how ever, no one was willing to risk what they worked so hard for, to gain a little experience. so when war was forced on them, they where woefully unprepared. And would often quit.

its very disheartening, to have weapons, but not enough trucks to deploy them. or not knowing the best units to create, and getting slaughtered. the first time you go against a player, you'd be over whelmed,

a safer way to gain the experience would seem to be the answer, WLs where intended for that, but they largely ended up becoming bottom feeder protection.

Puts on my thinking cap!

Here is a idea to revive the War-Game, imagine living your sim life in fear 24/7 never knowing if a insane nocturnal player is watching over your assets... waiting for the chance to dec and take your shit. Now imagine the only way for such a thing to happen is this... make waging war instant upon declaring!

No more waiting several game months allowing the prey or predator time to build protection/offense. See to survive in Simcountry one should already have a proper defense/offense ready for war at the drop of moments notice, with this cloud of fear hanging over vets and noobs heads, it will guarantee each player a chance at taking on a big or smaller adversary.

Doing this will definitely turn up the PvP scene for the better, it needs to feel more alive and dangerous to really make people waste their time and money in a game like Simcountry, esp with the current state of things.

Having the ability to strike anybody at anytime is the heart & soul of any decent PvP game. What do you guys think?

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Surely you know the real reasons behind the game changes Orbiter, a certain old timer, probably the oldest, not liking getting pwnd by LDI elements, and this player had the GMs ear. There was a lot of politics going on between GM and big players back then, you know it, I know it, Romeo Vicardi knows it. Dont know if Aries was around at the time... anyway. read previous post.<!-/Quote-!>

>_> Lets just call it the Pinktator rule.

sam, i was hoping you'd jump in, when i read that

josias

for the veiwers at home, the most powerful, and feared fed in sim country history, was the "Lacerta Defense Initiative," or LDI, they where always a small, highly skilled group, that thrived on daily communication. each member was a legend, in their own right, Sam Houston, Barney Rubble, Wildeyes, and of course PinkFloyd, being the most well known

LDI was a cute group. The members Orbiter mentioned were pleasant, and pillars of the community. But LDI was known as a defensive fed, not as a predatory fed. If you didn't bother them, they left you alone. Does that pleasant group sound like the most feared fed in Simcountry history?

The most feared fed was the Northern Star Alliance (NSA). They were warmongers on Fearless Blue, years before Little Upsilon even existed. That was a predatory fed.

Back then, there was no secure mode or war levels, and war protection boosters were not for sale. That caused real fear. There was no quarterly subscription fee. But players could extend game membership by using game cash to buy gold coins. NSA was predatory because it won many PvP wars motivated by its endless need for game cash.

Some members of NSA believed the best achievement was to play for free by using pure skill. The history of those times were described in a memoir.

Looool, LDI cute !?

Join the dark side.

All this history makes my case I think. Where the above past talks of clashing feds with multiple capable war players on each side, now only a few skilled war players exist in the entire game.

"a safer way to gain the experience would seem to be the answer, WLs where intended for that, but they largely ended up becoming bottom feeder protection."

This is what battlegrounds or something similar would be ideal for. A pvp environment that offers rewards with no country at risk.

Why ? It wasn't needed before. Whatever practice scenario you come up with is not going to be the real thing. War requires some risk by its very nature.

Anyways, we've been through all this for years, and it hasn't changed since I was last here. Good luck with your efforts Aries, but you are banging your head on a brick wall.

WL's are just a distraction. I've said time and time again it isn't that weapons are MORE expensive, they are cheaper as you stated but not when adjusted for the GC rates and the fact that you can no longer exchange cash for GC. GC's used to trade at 450-500B per GC, now it's 36B set by the GM's.

But far more than that it's that defensive weapons are far more powerful than offensive weapons. You used to be able to actually gain assets through war even against a decent war player if you did it right. Beyond that, there was no space or direct trading where it was so easy to move assets and cash into and out of a country. So, I don't know what assets I might gain if I take a country and I'm also unaware of what defenses I'll be facing. Look at my FB main or any of my FB countries for that matter, there are zero weapons in any of them. But, if I get a war declaration you'll be facing several hundred mobile units in each country (if not thousands) plus maximum garrisons at almost every location. Then, if something went horribly wrong, I could just yank all of it back out and all I lose is population but can keep all of my weapons and cash.

Trace back the end of the war game, you'll see it wasn't war levels. It was space and mobile units. For some reason the GM's figured out very early on that unlimited spending space and transfers into/out of a country created a lot of problems but they haven't figured it out when it comes to space. They also figured out early on that you actually had to make offensive weapons strong enough in comparison with defensive weapons in order to make people even want to fight, but mobile units and other tweaks to the war engine have killed that as well.

Not sure I follow where the inability to trade cash for gold coins has to do with acquiring weapons and ammo. I can see how visa warriors would be hindered by less cash per coin but they have plenty of opportunity to buy in space at a discount.

Some game changes have made better defenses possible but offense still has important advantages too. I believe defenses are being overrated by some players currently. A proper offense can take any country, last minute defenses included.

It is very difficult to move everything out before the lights go out. I have captured plenty of well-stocked space centers, though I am usually quite content in picking targets with enough population to make my effort worth it. My "Total War" idea however solves this issue.

All that said, I agree with what Josias said earlier. There is a lot to risk in the war game and an opportunity to gain experience for new war players with some level of rewards is needed. I still see an imbalance in rewards offered for pvp and other game endeavors that require similar effort and much less risk. A battleground-type environment as I suggested would be ideal to offer moderate rewards and giving players opportunity to test strategies in a pvp environment.

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The most feared fed was the Northern Star Alliance (NSA). They were warmongers on Fearless Blue, years before Little Upsilon even existed. That was a predatory fed.<!-/Quote-!>

Vicious spoke about NSA .Different time and different game.

Just like this is a different time and game from LDI.

However the idea that people are too attached to their imaginary simpeople lives on.

SC needs to find a happy medium so war can rage once more.

All I know is I contributed the stick.........my broom stick. I did my part. :P

Toecutter........are you Crafty? If so, good to see you back.

me is thick we don't get it!

Hey there, Chewy!!!! Long time no see. Hope all is well with you.

Aries was saying that the game consists of three parts, the carrot, the stick and the war game. I was saying that I contributed the stick, in my case, a broomstick, since I have always played the character of a witch.

Ughhh............ I think I fell short of trying to be funny.....ha ha ha ha end of a long day at work!! :P Dun mind me... ha ha ha