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[FAQ] Help, I am being plundered!

  • Thread starter DeletedUser8152
  • Start date

Algona

Well-Known Member
Me? I'm only in Progressive. But in the fifteen months I've been here, I've met your type repeatedly.

Yeah, sorry. I have a job and a family, and community obligations (and even other hobbies *gasp*) that I choose to spend the bulk of my time and money on. This game is a minor distraction for me. I spend around 30 minutes a day on it. It was certainly more at first. I think I've maybe put $20 total into it during all that time.

You already used coiners and plunderers. Now with the 'I've got a life' thing. Add in the 'i'm unlucky in my hood placement' and you've hit the Grand Slam of excuses bad players use. Is there a soccer metaphor that would work?

Seriously, as I advised before, put down your pride, admit you don't get it, and ask for advice from those who know the game better than you or me. There are some very good players who spend a lot of time on this forum and are very generous with their time and advice. All ya gotta do is ask. You've put hundreds of hours into the game, why not put a few hours into learning how to play the game effectively?

My original complaints and suggestion still stand.

No, not really. Your poor play is the problem.
 

cbalto1927

Active Member
Me? I'm only in Progressive. But in the fifteen months I've been here, I've met your type repeatedly.



You already used coiners and plunderers. Now with the 'I've got a life' thing. Add in the 'i'm unlucky in my hood placement' and you've hit the Grand Slam of excuses bad players use. Is there a soccer metaphor that would work?

Seriously, as I advised before, put down your pride, admit you don't get it, and ask for advice from those who know the game better than you or me. There are some very good players who spend a lot of time on this forum and are very generous with their time and advice. All ya gotta do is ask. You've put hundreds of hours into the game, why not put a few hours into learning how to play the game effectively?



No, not really. Your poor play is the problem.


Well said :) Finally someone had a guts to say it.
 

DeletedUser12359

I guess we're still on the "I suck as a gamer" theme. Very well...

The problem is that you guys can't understand that anyone would want to play this game in a slow, methodical, peaceful way. It apparently doesn't compute with your method of play which is hard, fast, and aggressive.

The creators of this game have created it in such a fashion that you don't have to be aggressive to advance. In fact, you don't have to really fight at all! But with the sports analogies I've seen on here so far, it seems that's the only way some players understand to play it. Or at least find enjoyment in playing it. Fine, play it your way. But don't get after me for enjoying it the other way it was designed.

You look at my issues and judge (incorrectly) that it's because of "poor" gameplay on my part. Not so, my city is constructed very deliberately based on the resources I have and choose to have at my disposal. I'm sorry if it doesn't fit into you're there's-only-one-way-to-play-this-game-correctly concept.

The point is, I have fun playing this game. It's a good game. The only game I've stuck with for this long. By-and-large, I get what I want from the game. But there are two aspects I would like to see changed. Please don't dismiss them as poor gameplay.

In my view, all others have done is wasted time, energy, and likely money to try overcome the imbalance these two issues create. I am unwilling to do so, and instead would like to see them changed. If you argue in favor of keeping these imbalances I'm guessing that you've already committed your energy into overcoming them and would hate to see that effort go to waste; OR you are using them to your advantage over others. Either way, I find those weak positions to argue against crappy defender AI and ridiculously long plunder windows.
 

DeletedUser10415

I am the king of slow and methodical, spending 2 months in each age, give or take a week or two. In general, my play has been peaceful. I do fight the continent map, because I prefer spending my goods on the tech tree, great buildings, and GvG. I donate goods to GvG and fight for my guild in GvG because I like the benefits gained from being in a level 54 guild. My neighbors have little to fear from me. As long as they make sure to show up in my event log as having tried to aid my city once or twice per week, I am happy to aid them instead of attack them.

Clearly, I understand slow and methodical, so again your argument is flawed.

You're in Arctic and have only 5 GBs and very little real estate. You waste space in your city with barracks for some of the worst units in the game Drummers, CE missile, Tomorrow ultraAP, Tomorrow AM range, Future sat spotter. You waste space in your city by facing the longer dimension of buildings to road. I'm glad you're having fun, but your city cannot be considered as anything but an example of poor gameplay, and because your argument against the inane city defense AI and the large plundering window is that these are hardships for you, your lack of efficient and effective city building is relevant.

As stated by myself and others, these two aspects of the game are easily overcome without throwing money at them. As for time and energy, I'll admit that it's possible that one might not be as successful in the game if they're only spending 30 minutes per day in the game. If you consider spending any more than that a waste of time and energy - Well, here is a classic example of getting out of something what is put into it.
 

Algona

Well-Known Member
Afraid ya also got me wrong. I have not plundered in over a year. I've been Progressive since Winter Event helping my guildies and catching up on some development, kinda plan on stayin' here for a few more months, I wanna be sure to be ready when I resume Progressiveing. And it's a fun Era.

I <3 you play slow, it's your methodology that sucks.

This is a thread originally made to help folk who don't like being plundered. You complain about being plundered. You want changes to the game because you are being plundered.

As it turns out the reasons you are getting plundered are based on your choices of how you play the game.

It strikes me as rather self centered to want changes to the game to support the way you choose to play, especially when those choices are sub optimal.

You also complained about coiners having an advantage in special buildings when those buildings are reasonably available to everyone. You have only yourself to blame for a lack of watchfires; there have been a lot of opportunities you chose to forego. Why complain about Rogue Hideouts? You've got a couple, if you had chosen to build a Traz (I wonder how many Arctic players don't have Traz?) you'd have accumulated hundreds if not thousands of Rogues. What other special buildings? SoKs? Why? You have progressed up the tech tree, and you forego your own GB development. What would you use masses of them for?

Tying your shoelaces together then complaining because others are faster than you so you want the rules of the race changed... Sigh.

Always look on the bright side of life! /me whistles! You are a shining example of novice players reading this thread on how not to play if they want to avoid being plundered three years into the game.
 
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DeletedUser12359

I am the king of slow and methodical, spending 2 months in each age, give or take a week or two. In general, my play has been peaceful. I do fight the continent map, because I prefer spending my goods on the tech tree, great buildings, and GvG. I donate goods to GvG and fight for my guild in GvG because I like the benefits gained from being in a level 54 guild. My neighbors have little to fear from me. As long as they make sure to show up in my event log as having tried to aid my city once or twice per week, I am happy to aid them instead of attack them.

Clearly, I understand slow and methodical, so again your argument is flawed.

You're in Arctic and have only 5 GBs and very little real estate. You waste space in your city with barracks for some of the worst units in the game Drummers, CE missile, Tomorrow ultraAP, Tomorrow AM range, Future sat spotter. You waste space in your city by facing the longer dimension of buildings to road. I'm glad you're having fun, but your city cannot be considered as anything but an example of poor gameplay, and because your argument against the inane city defense AI and the large plundering window is that these are hardships for you, your lack of efficient and effective city building is relevant.

As stated by myself and others, these two aspects of the game are easily overcome without throwing money at them. As for time and energy, I'll admit that it's possible that one might not be as successful in the game if they're only spending 30 minutes per day in the game. If you consider spending any more than that a waste of time and energy - Well, here is a classic example of getting out of something what is put into it.

Ahh. A reasoned response. Thank you.

However, I don't understand you're first paragraph. You mention slow and methodical, but you also attack other players. What's the purpose of this? Do you plunder after a successful attack? If so, don't you use these resources for your own benefit? And if so, for what benefit? Progressing your own civilization? Doesn't that allow you to advance more quickly?

I choose not to plunder at all. I find it unpleasant. Which is also why I don't play other attack-based games. I feel it undermines another's efforts and diminishes the value of the time they've spent on the game. I would rather use my own efforts to advance my city than steal from others. If I really wanted to play plundering games, they're a dime-a-dozen on the app stores.

As for my choice in buildings, the military buildings are there to provide the bonuses to attack for when I battle on the continent map. I don't use them for their units. In my opinion, they're the cheapest way to get those benefits. If you know of a more efficient way of getting those without spending significantly more time or resources I'd be happy to entertain them. The reason I don't have more GBs is because of the expense in time and resources to construct and level them, which further decreases the rate at which I can progress through the ages.

I've rearranged my city's layout countless times, and it's due for another one, but oftentimes space constraints limit the amount I can rearrange. That's part of the charm, though, isn't it. However, this isn't poor gameplay. It's just gameplay. Maybe it's not how you would do it. But it's how I do it. And how I want to do it. Spending more time and resources isn't intriguing to me. And you said it well in that I should expect to get out of this game what I put in. For the most part, that's true for me.

I've made conscious decisions to play the game in the manner in which I do, and the game not only allows me to, but feels designed to specifically accommodate it. But all of this banter doesn't address the fact that either the AI is specifically geared to heavily favor the attacking player in PvP, or it's lacking in intelligence as myself and others have repeatedly pointed out, for which there really is no good excuse as it seems to be intelligent enough in other areas. The "poor gameplay" argument is a "straw man" argument being used to distract from the legitimate question/issue: poor defense AI.

So let me ask a straight-forward series of questions:

1) Do you believe the defense AI is lacking in intelligence compared to non-defense AI?
2) If yes, do you believe this is a flaw or by design?
 

cbalto1927

Active Member
1) Do you believe the defense AI is lacking in intelligence compared to non-defense AI?
2) If yes, do you believe this is a flaw or by design?

By now i realized that Defense AI for PVP is weak compared to Attack AI. True i believe this is by game design. I have noticed that when you play by Continent maps, AI there are more challenging than the AI played at PVP. Again it more likely by game Design.
 

DeletedUser10415

Ahh. A reasoned response. Thank you.

However, I don't understand you're first paragraph. You mention slow and methodical, but you also attack other players. What's the purpose of this? Do you plunder after a successful attack? If so, don't you use these resources for your own benefit? And if so, for what benefit? Progressing your own civilization? Doesn't that allow you to advance more quickly?
All of my responses are reasoned.

Why do I have neighbors in my neighborhood? For the use we can be to one another. If they're not being useful to me of their own accord, I make them useful through attack and plunder. It's not like I don't give them a chance either. I'll aid a new neighbor daily for a couple of weeks before I'll start attacking them for not reciprocating even once. As for what I use the goods for (yep - goods is all I'm interested in, or power from HoFs) - I use them for the benefit of my guild, either by donating them to the guild treasury (when your guild is #1 on most every map, you can never have too many goods in the treasury), or helping out guild-mates who might need such goods. I'm not interested in advancing quickly. I'm interested in advancing slowly so that my goods-producing GBs fill my inventory with more than enough goods to cover all of my needs.

As for my choice in buildings, the military buildings are there to provide the bonuses to attack for when I battle on the continent map. I don't use them for their units. In my opinion, they're the cheapest way to get those benefits. If you know of a more efficient way of getting those without spending significantly more time or resources I'd be happy to entertain them.
Of the military buildings you have that I mentioned, only the U-AP and the drummer schools are giving you bonuses on the continent map. You have other more useful barracks with attack bonuses, but that disconnected STC is giving you no bonus while it's disconnected. Defensive bonuses from barracks are only applied to your city's defense units. As the STC takes 1400 less population and is smaller than the U-AP barracks, and has the same +4% attack bonus, if you're only using these for the bonuses, it would make more sense to have 2 STCs instead. Heck, find a little more pop somewhere (1x1 pod houses maybe, that you can stow anywhere once built) and you could maybe have 3 STCs.

The reason I don't have more GBs is because of the expense in time and resources to construct and level them, which further decreases the rate at which I can progress through the ages.
You like the unplunderable goods you get from your Lighthouse and St. Mark's? Do you find that useful? If you had more goods-producing GBs, then that would increase rather than decrease the rate at which you can advance. Especially since you don't plunder, you need all the goods-producing GBs you can get. Also, don't put your own forge points into your GBs. Get a trading partner and put your FPs into their GBs and they put theirs into yours. That way both of you get FPs, medals, and blueprints back, which increases the rate at which you can progress.

The Chateau Frontenac is a particularly useful GB, as at level 6 all quest rewards of coin, supplies, medals, goods, and diamonds are increased by 100%. Every recurring quest will eventually cough up 20 diamonds (or 40 with a level 6 chateau). You should use these diamonds for the diamond expansions. If you had a Deal Castle, not only would it aid in your city defense, but it also produces medals - something else you're probably in short supply of since you don't do PvP. Medal expansions are good.


1) Do you believe the defense AI is lacking in intelligence compared to non-defense AI?
2) If yes, do you believe this is a flaw or by design?

1) Yes
2) Design
 

DeletedUser9433

I choose not to plunder at all. I find it unpleasant. Which is also why I don't play other attack-based games. I feel it undermines another's efforts and diminishes the value of the time they've spent on the game. I would rather use my own efforts to advance my city than steal from others. If I really wanted to play plundering games, they're a dime-a-dozen on the app stores.
Finally you admit you choose to play the game in the manner you prefer yet you wish to force others to play the same way! Life doesn't work that way my friend unless you wish to develop your own game. You state that you don't wish to play in a plundering game yet you are and have been for years, does not compute. Since changes to the plundering system are on the "Do not suggest" list you are just typing to hear yourself speak, the game is the way it is and quite likely to remain that way.
 

DeletedUser12359

All of my responses are reasoned.

Why do I have neighbors in my neighborhood? For the use we can be to one another. If they're not being useful to me of their own accord, I make them useful through attack and plunder. It's not like I don't give them a chance either. I'll aid a new neighbor daily for a couple of weeks before I'll start attacking them for not reciprocating even once. As for what I use the goods for (yep - goods is all I'm interested in, or power from HoFs) - I use them for the benefit of my guild, either by donating them to the guild treasury (when your guild is #1 on most every map, you can never have too many goods in the treasury), or helping out guild-mates who might need such goods. I'm not interested in advancing quickly. I'm interested in advancing slowly so that my goods-producing GBs fill my inventory with more than enough goods to cover all of my needs.


Of the military buildings you have that I mentioned, only the U-AP and the drummer schools are giving you bonuses on the continent map. You have other more useful barracks with attack bonuses, but that disconnected STC is giving you no bonus while it's disconnected. Defensive bonuses from barracks are only applied to your city's defense units. As the STC takes 1400 less population and is smaller than the U-AP barracks, and has the same +4% attack bonus, if you're only using these for the bonuses, it would make more sense to have 2 STCs instead. Heck, find a little more pop somewhere (1x1 pod houses maybe, that you can stow anywhere once built) and you could maybe have 3 STCs.


You like the unplunderable goods you get from your Lighthouse and St. Mark's? Do you find that useful? If you had more goods-producing GBs, then that would increase rather than decrease the rate at which you can advance. Especially since you don't plunder, you need all the goods-producing GBs you can get. Also, don't put your own forge points into your GBs. Get a trading partner and put your FPs into their GBs and they put theirs into yours. That way both of you get FPs, medals, and blueprints back, which increases the rate at which you can progress.

The Chateau Frontenac is a particularly useful GB, as at level 6 all quest rewards of coin, supplies, medals, goods, and diamonds are increased by 100%. Every recurring quest will eventually cough up 20 diamonds (or 40 with a level 6 chateau). You should use these diamonds for the diamond expansions. If you had a Deal Castle, not only would it aid in your city defense, but it also produces medals - something else you're probably in short supply of since you don't do PvP. Medal expansions are good.




1) Yes
2) Design

Glarg, I do appreciate the time you've spent analyzing my city and providing feedback. However, some of the information you've provided is incorrect. Other suggestions I've already used and found them tedious, boring or counterproductive. I've already admitted that my city needs a restructure. But, to be perfectly honest, it really doesn't bother me that much anymore. I'm just trying to get through this last age and call it good.

All of this, though, is distracting from the real issue, which you've provided an answer to - or at least your opinion. You feel that the bad AI on defense is by design. I disagree. I believe it is a flaw that is being exploited. Much like the fact that I used to exploit the poor AI on the continent map (that has now been improved). When the 2 were consistently bad, I figured that's just how they've designed it. But they've actually fixed it for one scenario. And now there is a disparity. I'm simply asking that it be fixed for the other, now, too.
 

DeletedUser12359

Finally you admit you choose to play the game in the manner you prefer yet you wish to force others to play the same way! Life doesn't work that way my friend unless you wish to develop your own game. You state that you don't wish to play in a plundering game yet you are and have been for years, does not compute. Since changes to the plundering system are on the "Do not suggest" list you are just typing to hear yourself speak, the game is the way it is and quite likely to remain that way.

I'm not sure how you've arrived at that conclusion. I don't wish to force others to play this game how I play it. And I think I've been pretty clear about that. It's true, that the way I play the game, would benefit from less of the social component. But I'm not asking for it to be removed. I'm asking for one of two revisions to be made. One that I perceive to be a defect, and the other a design change (unless it's also a defect, which wouldn't surprise me). These changes would affect gameplay a bit, yes, but wouldn't remove any features of the game. You would still be able to attack and plunder other players. What it would do, in my view, is restore some balance to what is perceived by some to be an imbalanced system.

By the way, I don't believe this is a "plundering" game. I believe this is a city building and exploration game that happens to have a plunder component. Other plunder games have plundering as a major component. While you may think this is just semantics, it's actually important to gamers like me that don't enjoy plunder games. "There are dozens of us. Dozens!"
 

DeletedUser9433

I arrived at that conclusion by reading your posts. You seem to internally justify your position as wishing to correct "defects" but that is obviously a false premise. Otherwise why would the Devs "Change not correct" the AI in one spot and not the other? You believe they don't know how it functions? Who are you trying to convince? Yourself? Because no one else is buying it. And why would the 24 hour plunder be a defect? Someone had to choose a timeframe, they could have chosen anything but they set it at 24 hours. Your perception of imbalance is actually integral to gameplay, the 24 hour window forces you to do one of three things:
1. Collect on time
2. Risk being plundered
3. Come on the forum and complain
You chose the most difficult and useless choice. It is one of the many ways you are encouraged to spend more time in the game, that can't be that hard to see can it? Zero chance they will do anything to make it less likely you login which is exactly what you are seeking.
 

DeletedUser12359

Afraid ya also got me wrong. I have not plundered in over a year. I've been Progressive since Winter Event helping my guildies and catching up on some development, kinda plan on stayin' here for a few more months, I wanna be sure to be ready when I resume Progressiveing.

Kudos.

This is a thread originally made to help folk who don't like being plundered. You complain about being plundered. You want changes to the game because you are being plundered.

True.

As it turns out the reasons you are getting plundered are based on your choices of how you play the game.

It strikes me as rather self centered to want changes to the game to support the way you choose to play, especially when those choices are sub optimal.

Only partially true. I'm not sure anyone plays this game just so others can have fun. We all play it selfishly, I'm pretty sure. I don't really care how you play the game. But the way I play the game is affected by what I perceive to be a defect that I would like to see addressed. The choices I've made seem "suboptimal" to you, but they've been very deliberate for me. Everything is a trade off. I've made choices that have given me benefits I've wanted but the result is losing out on other benefits. I'm at peace with how I've arrived at where I am. But that doesn't mean I still wouldn't like to see a defect fixed that is affecting my gameplay.

You also complained about coiners having an advantage in special buildings when those buildings are reasonably available to everyone. You have only yourself to blame for a lack of watchfires; there have been a lot of opportunities you chose to forego. Why complain about Rogue Hideouts? You've got a couple, if you had chosen to build a Traz (I wonder how many Arctic players don't have Traz?) you'd have accumulated hundreds if not thousands of Rogues. What other special buildings? SoKs? Why? You have progressed up the tech tree, and you forego your own GB development. What would you use masses of them for?

Instead of watchfires, I've opted for other buildings to facilitate my advancement through the different eras. GBs are, for the most part, tedious and delay my progress. I've lived with the consequences, which I actually enjoy. I'd rather be in the Arctic Age and getting plundered every once in awhile, than still be in the Progressive Age and have all the watchfires and GBs to help keep me from being plundered.

Tying your shoelaces together then complaining because others are faster than you so you want the rules of the race changed... Sigh.

Always look on the bright side of life! /me whistles! You are a shining example of novice players reading this thread on how not to play if they want to avoid being plundered three years into the game.

So players like me, in order to play this game "correctly", need to spend countless more resources and time to workarnd a defect in the system? And you expect people to swallow that line of thinking by attacking their gameplay if they don't?
 

DeletedUser12359

Then why are you here complaining about being plundered?

I'm not. I'm complaining about a defect in the plundering system. Which perpetuates the perception that plundering is unfair. In all likelihood, I would still be plundered if the defect were fixed, but perhaps not as much and definitely not unfairly. I would have the satisfaction of realizing that the game was balanced and that my deliberate city building choices don't need to be completely reworked to accommodate an imbalance.
 

DeletedUser9433

I'm not. I'm complaining about a defect in the plundering system. Which perpetuates the perception that plundering is unfair. In all likelihood, I would still be plundered if the defect were fixed, but perhaps not as much and definitely not unfairly. I would have the satisfaction of realizing that the game was balanced and that my deliberate city building choices don't need to be completely reworked to accommodate an imbalance.
It is not a defect, it is a feature. Just because you call a dog a cat doesn't make it transform into a cat.
 

DeletedUser12359

It is not a defect, it is a feature. Just because you call a dog a cat doesn't make it transform into a cat.

Do you have proof of that, or is that your opinion? If it's just your opinion, then I disagree. If you have proof, kindly direct me to your source, and I'll address with that source instead.
 

DeletedUser26154

Which perpetuates the perception that plundering is unfair.
Plundering is just a myth, an old-wive's tale, folklore. No one really gets plundered in this game. It's far more beneficial if everyone polished and motivated each other. We all know this.
 
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