GM Response requested on Problems forum

Quote from NERO....'The GM made a deliberate decision to allow these countries to exist and be used by players and there is no evidence to support the belief by some that the GM has been removing these countries from use by players.'
?????
GM is this to be true?
I hope not.....It Would send shivers down the spines of my soldiers knowing that their sacrifices could be in vain in the face of an enemy who is immortal!

Jonni ~ " We hadn't responded yet because this is complicated and we don't have a fix yet. We've been aware of this problem for a while and have in the past blocked most countries that have this problem from being used. This was not possible for countries that already had a president and we were not previously aware of exactly how many of these countries remained in control of presidents. "

IS that not the Gm's stating that they have tried to solve this, and are working on it when they hear of it?

Jack, no one needs to be 'punished' for this. Ideally, the best way to correct this is to make non-paintable countries beatable at least to some extent. How that can be made possible is up to the GM and the engineers to decide.

The fact that there are countries that can not be defeated is pretty comical. For some reason everyone keeps restating the obvious that this is nothing new... This has been a problem since painting began, but nothing has been corrected because there hasn't been enough noise about the issue. No time like the present to get something done.

Anyone with enough ammo can destroy thousands of forts, but not a single person in this thread can take a country that is not paintable. Anyone defending this might as well say that is acceptable for some players to be privileged and exempt from being defeated under normal circumstances of the war game.

@ alocien.

You quoted from Jonni's post earlier in this thread in which she wrote:
"We hadn't responded yet because this is complicated and we don't have a fix yet. We've been aware of this problem for a while and have in the past blocked most countries that have this problem from being used. This was not possible for countries that already had a president and we were not previously aware of exactly how many of these countries remained in control of presidents. "

I reject her statement which is not supported by the facts. Earlier in this thread, Kel posted a link to another post made by Scarlet THREE YEARS AGO which clearly listed the problem countries that exist on FB. This is the link:

https://www.simcountry.com/discus/messages/1/19728.html?

as a test, I selected the following countries not currently taken at random, "Barono", "Targon" and "The Republic of Alma" and found they were available for purchase or to dec on. I even went ahead and decced on them with no issues.
Jonni claims the GM is having trouble finding these countries. Yet THREE YEARS AGO a sim player found them, complained about them and listed them for the GM. One sim player can find them but the GM can't? That is not believable.I checked half the list at random and found that those owned by presidents were taken within the last 3 years and the rest not owned by presidents are available for deccing as my test proved. I didn't bother to review the other half of the list because I am more than confident all these countries are available. The GM simply has not cared about these countries and no player should be blamed for playing by the rules the GM creates.

@Kel, I haven't seen one posting defending the existence of these countries. The criticism has to do with the idea that one player, Gaz, is being labelled as some kind of cheater, but the others owning these countries are not? No one is cheating. This is the way the GM has set the playing field. No player should suddenly have different rules applied to them because they recognized an advantageous situation. You yourself have owned one of these countries. The fact that it is in secured mode as your main is irrelevant because you can still use it for war making if you decide to do that and you will have the same advantage Gaz had.

The GM has in the past made c3's unavailable for their own testing purposes. Why couldn't they have simply made these unconquerable countries unavailable years ago? The answer is obvious. The GM deliberately allowed them to exist.
Finally, let's not forget that if you run into a country like this in war time, you can even this GM created playing field against your opponent by simply taking an available special unconquerable country for yourself. They are all still out there for the taking.

All is fair in love and war. The saddest part to me is thee lack of PvP warfare in SC.

Nero, you need to reread Madoff and Jack's first replies to this thread, both of them are defending this situation as acceptable. Madoff defends it as a feature and Jack defends it as a tactical advantage. That is two postings right there defending it.

" No player should suddenly have different rules applied to them because they recognized an advantageous situation."

That makes it sound like you are number 3. No one is asking for rules to be changed for anyone, just expecting the same current rules to -apply to everyone-. Right now, the rules do not apply to certain countries that are not able to meet certain criteria for the war game. This is a game, and invincible countries due to map flaws should be considered unacceptable. Just because this has been an unresolved issue for such a long time does not negate the fact that something should be done.

As far as my tiny country on GR goes, I agree that the same rules should apply to mine as well. If I took it out of secured mode to wage war, my opponent should have every real chance of taking it from me.

Kel - Please get it right.

I did say I saw nothing wrong with anyone taking tactical advantage of anything that exists and I meant it. But I also said - I don't think there should be countries like that but the fact is they have always been there, we knew it and the GM was well informed they existed and took no action on it. -

It seems you were well aware of their existence too and saw nothing wrong with it. However you have obviously seen the light and now know this is wrong. Since you feel so strongly against this great wrong and unfair situation will you set the example and abandon your buggy little country on GR?

And for the record I do not have one of these type countries.

You and Nero seem so convinced that all of these countries need to be abandoned or stripped from people to make this work. Is it an impossible thought that they can be made beatable?

If there is no possible way to make this work, I could lose my tiny country and not lose any sleep over it. But there are other players like Chiwoo that have been in theirs for years and should not be uprooted.

Maybe there can be special conditions for tiny countries. Like when 100% of the paintable sectors have been painted, it will contribute the -minimum- 10 war index points required for painting. This way, tiny countries still maintain a strategic advantage by being hard to paint and only contributing to 10 war index points, and at the same time they can eventually be defeated.

Again, I could toss my country without looking back. It is a small 26m pop country that I hardly put any work in to. I am only hoping for a solution that will make things work they way they are supposed to work, while leaving countries the way they are. You and Nero being so combative about this is what puzzles me. Is it really that big of a deal to want all countries to be able to meet the same requirements needed for defeat?

Kel,

I never said these countries needed to be abandoned or stripped from anyone. Please quit twisting what was said to suit your purposes.

What I did say was "Let the GM decide if he wants to correct it and if he does he can make the appropriate reparations to those affected." I never said how he should correct it if he does choose to correct it which seems unlikely as they have not done it after all these years.

I am totally opposed to having these countries stripped from anyone even you. I am opposed to players who have these countries being labelled as cheats and using a "bug" to create an unfair advantage for themselves. Unless someone can show me a SC rule against owning these countries or that someone used a cheat code to create one of these countries then stop calling them cheats. Are you cheating by owning one of these countries? I don't think so although there is no good reason for the GM to ever create them or to not correct the problem once he was aware of them. It is what it is.

Any way I am finished with this topic. Just make your points without incorrectly citing my position.

Citations:

"He did what many people have done and found it knowing it would be a tactical advantage. It is no secret these type countries exist on every world. Yes it is a tough break if you are on the other side of the war but that is the nature of war. It is the defender's duty to defend his country using everything at his disposal including countries like this,"

That is your initial response to this thread, my interpretation from it is that you are defending this situation as acceptable. If that is twisting it, then I am sorry but you need to be more clear about what you truly mean.

Yes, your second response clearly states that you do not agree with the existence of these countries, but my reply about you and Nero was referring to your original response to this thread.

Jack: " Since you feel so strongly against this great wrong and unfair situation will you set the example and abandon your buggy little country on GR?"

Jack: "I never said these countries needed to be abandoned or stripped from anyone. Please quit twisting what was said to suit your purposes."

These are two contradicting statements made by you. Your argument is being buried beneath your own contradictions. Seems as though you are doing all the twisting.


Jack: "Unless someone can show me a SC rule against owning these countries or that someone used a cheat code to create one of these countries then stop calling them cheats."

I have never called anyone a cheat in this thread, or even the original thread in the problem forum. In fact, aside from citing the location of the problem I am having in the original thread, I have not even mentioned Gaz' name until now. Seems as though you are the one twisting things and incorrectly citing my position. I am only making my observations based on exactly what you say.

I do not have a problem with a player owning these countries. I do have a problem with a player having the expectation that their country cannot be lost in a war. That is the difference between being a bystander in a situation outside of the player's control and being a player that exploits an acknowledged game bug.

Until these are fixed in a way that the game recognizes their defeat, the GM should be prepared to receive an email from a player who has met reasonable victory conditions against one of these countries and end the war by transferring ownership.

@kel. You are misunderstanding everyone. I have been very consistent. The problem is you and Aires continue to look at this as a game bug. It has been my contention from the beginning of this discussion in the Problems section and General posting section, that this is not a game bug, but rather a deliberate decision by the GM to allow these countries, as I clearly demonstrated in my last post. As such, they are there for use for anyone who wants them. The mere ownership of one of these countries automatically offers the owner additional deterrence from attack.Kel, you own one of these countries.

I also posted early on that I don't believe any country should be unbeatable and that I myself complained to the GM years ago about these countries. But the GM knows of this issue and has done nothing about it. The playing field is still level because any player can take one of these countries for his or her own advantage.

You and Aires argued, that the GM should remove this country from Gaz's account. I disagree because as I wrote earlier, Gaz insn't the first one to own and use this type of country in war. Just ask "Roving Eye" whose country "Land of Horus" was totally and completely obliterated by Crazy Eye in a past war and Crazy Eye did not benefit from acquiring it. The GM didn't remove Roving Eye's country from his account. Why should GAZ lose his country? You can't arbitrarily say to one player, 'you can't war with your special country but everyone else can'. My point was that if the GM says this to one player, it has to apply to all players. If the GM takes away Gaz's country, they have to do the same to everyone else who owns this unconquerable type country. This is the second or third time I have repeated this.

As for you and Aires calling Gaz a cheat I cite these comments on the thread by Aires, which you, Kel did not offer an objection to:

Aires: "Gaining an advantage over an opponent by exploiting a bug does indeed break the rules"

Aires: "He (Gaz) believed his country was invulnerable to being conquered so when he declared war and launched attacks he was correct in assuming there was no possibility to lose his country. If he was aware of this, he was abusing a game bug was he not? Is the precedent here that players should benefit from exploiting game bugs?"

If you look up the words "cheat" or "cheater", in the dictionary, you will easily find that Aires description of Gaz's actions fall within the definition of those two words. I therefore stand by my comment that in both your arguments you unfairly imply Gaz was cheating.

Nero. I never called Gaz a cheat and you have pulled my second quote out of context. I ask readers to scroll up to put it back in context of which:

"He (Gaz) believed his country was invulnerable to being conquered so when he declared war and launched attacks he was correct in assuming there was no possibility to lose his country."

Was your argument (You said "That is exactly what I am saying"). Gaz has not made this point.

"If he was aware of this, he was abusing a game bug was he not? Is the precedent here that players should benefit from exploiting game bugs?"

Was my point. Again, if the expectation is that you can wage war and have no risk of losing your country to this bug, that is an exploit.

You question whether it is a bug. You said:

"However, you call it a game bug. I don't. A game "bug" is an unintended technical situation needing correction."

For which the GM said:

"We hadn't responded yet because this is complicated and we don't have a fix yet. We've been aware of this problem for a while...We're looking into the least invasive way of fixing this."

Looks like "unintended" to me. This meets your own definition of a bug.

So, stop mischaracterizing my position. So it is clear, here it is.

1. Owning these countries is not the players fault. This situation has existed for some time and it is reasonable for a player to own the country and assume that it is the GM's responsibility to resolve the issue since the problem is known.

2. It is a bug. The GM has acknowledged it needs fixing. The presence of these countries runs counter to the game documentation which states:

"If the index hits zero, the country has lost the war. It is not easy to get so far but possible if targets are all destroyed and many cities bombed with many casualties."

Did you see it? It says that reducing a given countries' war index to 0 is "possible". The game docs provide the promise that the possibility of winning any given war exists. This should not be in dispute.

3. If a player wages war from one of these countries AND has the expectation that there is no possibility of losing such a war than this is abusing a game bug. I have not seen Gaz cross this line. He did wage war. He has not stated that he believes that he should keep the country because of the bug. Instead you and Jack take the position that these countries should be immune from loss. If you two took it a step further and were actually in a conflict in such a country, your opponent met reasonable victory conditions, and then you rejected your opponent's appeal to the GM to fix an acknowledged bug then, yes, you two would then be exploiting this bug.

Errr, did Kel dec me first? I'm pretty sure he did.

It's a well know fact that these countries are very hard to take. But not to you's obviously. Or you's would'nt have wasted your time. The country name was a bit of a clue and the sf's where bait

I say very hard but not impossible. I've taken smaller countries than the 1 I have. I just know how to make it even harder to take.

It's 1 country in my empire. Has 20 mill pop. It's a piece of crap basically. How you's can see it as a threat is a bit of a joke.

The statment about now having to keep a constant defence it ridiculous. Dont dec me in the first place. Win or loose that country now you are gonna need a consatnt defence.

I was just minding my own buisness until some unkown ally of Aries dec's me for no reason other than to get me of first spot.

What had I ever done to him? I'd understand if there was assests to gain but there wasn't.

I'm the victim here not you's. Dec'd on by prob the stongest player on the game (asset wise) I had zero miltary assest except what I could buy with the spending space.

In effect you dec'd on a noob account and got shown up pfff.


I really couldn't give a shit about the country I'll derg it if that'll make you's stop whinning.

Gaz, you have done nothing wrong in relation to this bug in my opinion. I commend you for that.

In game politics, you have done plenty to make me your enemy, and you are likely to see my allies and I on the battlefield.

Aires, If you want to believe everything the GM says, that is obviously your right. However, because they say they are treating this as a bug means nothing. In this thread I have rejected the GM claim of trying to correct this issue. I have demonstrated clearly that they have done nothing to correct this issue. The GM is deliberately allowing the use of these countries as I clearly stated and believe proved in my earlier responses.
Their is absolutely zero proof the GM is removing these countries as Jonni claimed.

I will re-quote myself from an earlier post:

'It has been my contention from the beginning of this discussion in the Problems section and General posting section, that this is not a game bug, but rather a deliberate decision by the GM to allow these countries, as I clearly demonstrated in my last post.'

I have made several similar statements like this.

The GM would like you to believe this is a bug. I don't believe it. We both are premising our arguments on a different basis. You believe the GM and I don't.

I will once again restate my positions on this matter which I have stated over and over again throughout this thread.

1. There should be no unconquerable countries.

2. The fact that there are unconquerable countries existing today is not the result of a game "bug" but a deliberate decision by the GM to continue to allow them to exist and be used for ones advantage.

3. Using any of these countries is not "against the rules", "exploiting", or "abusing".

4. Game documentation says many things that are no longer valid. Example, game documentation still says the max number of forts a country can have is 100!

5. The GM claim that they have "blocked" most of these countries but can't find them all is completely unsupported by the facts.I could not find any blocked countries. The GM can start blocking these countries right now if they wanted to but for years have deliberately allowed their existence.

I am glad to see you clarify that Gaz did nothing wrong.At least we now both agree on that.

This is my last post on this issue. Let's see what the GM does.

one of the reasons i dont enjoy the game anymore ...happened to me many times and i complained to GM with no response in three different instances in the past. Matter of fact my last PVP was against GAZ in one of those countries destroyed everything 5 times over but could not get the paint points required. Take the fun out of things when someone declares on you and you cant go kick there arse.

It is not a bug, it is a feature.

Hardly a feature more like a flaw.

Jack, "destroyed everything 5 times over" is an exaggeration. Once maybe and that country was completly paintable. I was able to log in and fight in the nik of time otherwise you would have gotten it.

That's your choice Aries. But this issue your making a meal out of isn't that big of a deal if you think about it. What can I do from there that I can't do from any other country. There's nothing to exploit as far as I'm concerened.

Is Jock, Gazzers? If so, I dun like that name! lol I will have to think of something else to call you!

JockIsGaz.....ha ha ha ha ha ha I'm giggling. I will have to rename you. :P I might rename ALL of you after shoes!!!!

You can rename me Jimmy Choo then.

What are you going to name me, Jan?

I'm T.Wo.

lol I will call you Jimmy Choo and T.Wo., you will now be known as flipflop, cuz you always changing your name and ending with "I'm T.Wo." :P

Love you all!!!