Itinerate old one: Game progress review

Well being between jobs I decided to check out Simcountry again. I happy to report that I'm not strangely irritated, and having strange urges to feed Andy to a pack of feral mountain lions. I even spent some money, which is weird.

I never liked the new war engine with units, it always seem awkward and unrealistic, same with the space game. Having finished a war level two war, I had some thoughts. War level 1 is too easy, but I'll give it the benefit of a doubt since I'm more than passingly familiar with the war game.

I've left several times because of game changes, including the war engine. Unfortunately I can only convey how I've felt, since I don't really remember many details of changes over the years. I am happy to conclude it's a passable game now.

I still think that size of the military units should be variable according to quality or other factors, since obviously a country like the USA can field far more weapons at a time than say Saddam's Iraq. But in anycase the war game is far more dimensional than it has been.

Of course there will always be problems with this game because the creators cater to too many silly whims.

We shall see,

Kudos to any Old ones still here...

-hymy

Welcome back.
Be careful now or I will feed you to the lions....

As to the units, we plan to make it possible to set a percentage, per unit, to make them smaller if you want to.

You will be able to set it to say: 50% and it will resupply to that level only.

hymy, there's a name i haven't seen in a very long time. stick around this time, keep your expectations low, don't invest a lot of money or time here and it'll much more fun. oops that sounded bad, hopefully andy won't feed me to the lions.

Hey Aaron,

Do I know you by another Moniker, your willing to share?

Additional Thoughts:

Why are weapons and ammo factories still not a profitable venture? War is still too expensive as well.

I hoped Secured mode and war protection would go away too. That implementation destroyed the community around here because it became easier to a)troll, and b)be a hermit. In the old days people banded together to deal with trolls and defend themselves. It was more fun, even if there was the occasional lower primate invasion or starwars themed thugs caused problems.

War levels and war protection need some changes. I have suggested a few and agree with your main point that it deters the need for community.

About war being too expensive, I don't understand. Not from ignorance but I don't believe anyone has made this point clear. What is being compared?

Most players who own any considerable game assets have them because the wars they won against C3's have yielded them much more than the cost of weapons and ammo used. Against players, they have the same costs you do. Making weapons and ammo cheaper simply means more weapons and ammo needed to defend yourself, as your opponents get the same discount.

Hey Aries,

I can't really speak to the issue of plundering C3's as a way to get ahead. I also wish I could remember who coined the word C3. This strategy has been around longer than me. The reason I can't speak to it, is that I've never understood it. Part of me thinks, there must be some misunderstanding of the economics. Part of me knows that's not true, and there really is something I don't get. Either way, I don't think it's fair or reasonable to allow players to benefit from conquering C3's and stripping them before deregistering them.

In regard to building an empire, it seem that isn't as lucrative as it once was because countries just don't make as much game money as they used to. the best reason to conquer C3's should be to build a defensive federation airforce, and protect the borders of your primary from ground invasion. But war protection.....

What I thought was funny is I just got a teach message saying my conquered 10M pop country needed 6 - 10K fighters. The military line item cost to maintain that would crush my main country, and it has a population of 20M. That's what I was trying to convey. The cost of maintaining even the reccommendd equipment and units will quickly bury a country that's not clearing more than 10B a month. But you know w3c want's people to buy game cash, so.....

-hymy

Hehe, 6-10k fighters. First, be careful with those teach messages. Players will give better advice, especially on matters of war.

Second, your position is similar to mine on raiding. I am econ at heart and made suggestions to curb raiding, which seemed unnatural. I ended up influencing a reduction in the rewards for it after I took up raiding myself and posted my results. It still remains the primary means of most players to generate large amounts of cash, however.

Third, the reason you would need a large number of weapons in defense is not because of the cost of the weapons or ammo themselves but because of the availability of methods to make large amounts of cash, like raiding. You must find one of those methods yourself and repeat it, many times, to add to your country income to be effective in the game. I know of no player who has any significant game power because they buy game cash. Game skill in war and econ trumps it every single time.

Well most people who start out buying game cash never figure how to play the game and get tired of blowing cash, that could me used for alcohol.

I'd say there is always the risk that people who know what they are doing will use that feature in some new a creative way to cause grief. So don't write it off.

Say didn't we used to have spies... I remember spies, but don't recall what happened to them.

-hymy-

back in the day when they started war levels, they combined 2 ideas, one of a staggered difficulty for C3s to assist players in gaining skill, and one idea for the actual war level/skill/asset segregation.

during that time, i fought for the profit in C3 raiding, with the concept that if some one lost a war, if it took them a 1 or more RL years to rebuild, they'd probably just quit.

at the higher levels, where players have put in years, and/or put in hours a day, C3 raiding shouldn't be an issue. at the lower levels, that should be less intense, it also, shouldn't be a problem.

the problem, is players that spend hundreds of hours raiding, or attack allot of players, should be higher level, so those that want to play more casually, can still enjoy the war game.

instead, the whole thing ended up protecting bottom feeders, which was the opposite of the original goal

thing is, their are players that want to spend hours raiding to gain an advantage, take that away, and after a length of boredom, will they still be here?

with space, you can't really make a "no-rading planet," as the weapons needed for a mega-war horse can be shuttled in less than the 48 hour waiting period, i know this, because i've done it, but you'll need over 200 shuttles, and even with SMUs, you'll use up over 100

honestly, the best solution, isn't really to dry up raiding profits, but to force the more aggresive/active players up in war levels, so they face up with players of the same skill/asset level. where the players that want to kick back and enjoy the game based on their countries monthly profits, can feel safe at a lower, more casual, war level

no i have only gone by aaron doolavay for probably 10 years now.

I checked the size of military units.
This was some time ago and I forgot.

When setting up a military unit, or any time later, you can set the number of weapons of any type in the unit.

If quality is very high, you can make the units much smaller and it will remain as you have specified.

The default unit size is the largest size it can have but you can also shift between weapon types.