When can we stop pretending GBG is balanced?

[67Sage101]

This is a hugely long thread.

What is not balanced is the reward system in the game for Quests, GE, GBG, GVG, Settlements and PVP arena. If it was balanced then you would see players shifting to one or the other as they get uber bored with one aspect. Turns out the very analytical types have found that GVG and GBG are most rewarding. That leaves all other activities largely in the dust with player saturation in GBG, GVG where their cities have been tuned over years to achieve ONE goal. Since there is no good way to retune a city in this game, player saturation will be the unfortunate side affect of these imbalances.

 

[Boulevard]

Offset of the timers would make it more difficult to keep a checker pattern. I still love the unknown guilds with the same colors. And hopefully the matching of the guild per members will be fixed soon. There are so many great ideas posted in this thread. We all know that GbG has a major flaw that hopefully soon will be corrected.

 

[WinnerGR]

We all know that GbG has a major flaw that hopefully soon will be corrected.

I don't know that GbG is majorly flawed and umbalanced - I know is not flawed and balanced. I love GbG and I don't want it to change anywere near as druasticly as some of the ideas in this 42 page thread.

 

[Ebeondi Asi]

I agree with WinnerGR that GbG is fine the way it is. The one small issue of playing the same few Guilds season after season is being addressed. Otherwise this thread is a whiner's woad.

 

[Agatha 793 the Savior]

Well as long as Inno is aware that their matchmaking system leaves much to be desired then I'm happy. I'll be even happier if they could actually fix it

I think the best way is for your guild to be matched against guilds who performed in the same placement as you. If you come in first place on your map, the next season you will be placed with other guilds that also won on their map. With this type of matching it will be impossible for guilds to stay in diamond. And I’m saying this because the GBG has gotten boring, even in diamond, there is no reason to WIN, and there should be.

 

[Reese7990]

I think they should put a guild size minimum for Diamond league of 60. If you want to be a diamond guild you need to have 60 members. If a guild is struggling in Diamond they can downsize under 60 to compete in Platinum. Under 40 to compete in Gold..etc. I feel like this would make more balanced competitive matches.

Also would encourage guilds to merge with other guilds to form more competitive guilds.

Let's face it a Diamond guild of 30 members has very little chance against a guild with 70 plus. There is just not enough attrition to go around.

If a guild has 60+ members and still can't compete then the issue is more of a strategic or motivation problem. Not an insurmountable numbers issue.

 

[Ironrooster]

I think they should put a guild size minimum for Diamond league of 60. If you want to be a diamond guild you need to have 60 members. If a guild is struggling in Diamond they can downsize under 60 to compete in Platinum. Under 40 to compete in Gold..etc. I feel like this would make more balanced competitive matches.

I think a better way would be to just group by guild size within league. The biggest 8 play each other, then the next 8 and so forth. That way any size guild can compete in the diamond (or other) leagues.

 

[RazorbackPirate]

I think they should put a guild size minimum for Diamond league of 60. If you want to be a diamond guild you need to have 60 members. If a guild is struggling in Diamond they can downsize under 60 to compete in Platinum. Under 40 to compete in Gold..etc. I feel like this would make more balanced competitive matches.

Also would encourage guilds to merge with other guilds to form more competitive guilds.

Let's face it a Diamond guild of 30 members has very little chance against a guild with 70 plus. There is just not enough attrition to go around.

If a guild has 60+ members and still can't compete then the issue is more of a strategic or motivation problem. Not an insurmountable numbers issue.

Why should my rewards be limited by the size of my guild? If we're good enough to make it to diamond league, we're good enough to earn the rewards of being in diamond league.

Why should any guild's achievements be limited by size?

 

[Tony 85 the Generous]

I think they should put a guild size minimum for Diamond league of 60. If you want to be a diamond guild you need to have 60 members. If a guild is struggling in Diamond they can downsize under 60 to compete in Platinum. Under 40 to compete in Gold..etc. I feel like this would make more balanced competitive matches.

Also would encourage guilds to merge with other guilds to form more competitive guilds.

Let's face it a Diamond guild of 30 members has very little chance against a guild with 70 plus. There is just not enough attrition to go around.

If a guild has 60+ members and still can't compete then the issue is more of a strategic or motivation problem. Not an insurmountable numbers issue.

Not to mention that guild size does not equate to member ability.

You would put a 80 member guild with the an MMR range of 1k-1M up against an 80 member guild with a range of 30M-300M?

What do you do with the 15 member guild with an MMR range of 200M-300M?

Grouping by guild size alone just swaps one problem for another.

 

[23skidoo]

Guild Battlegrounds – gameplay assessment

Definition - Gameplay “The totality of player experiences during the interaction with a video/computer game.”

In the early days of computer gaming, Strageic Simulations, Inc. dominated the wargaming market with releases like Panzer General (1994). The company president, Joel Billings, was keen on gameplay enthusiasm from his customers.

After meeting Joel at one of the first-ever computer gaming conventions in the Disneyland Hotel in 1983, a friend of mine and I ended up beta testing games for him for a couple years.

His first interest? – gameplay assessment from us. Then it was balance, and lastly bug reports.

Relating that experience to what I’ve observed with the exploits of the guild battlegrounds algorithm, it is clear that, for dozens of the top guilds in Tuulech, this factor is missing.

Now it may be low on the development time table to address this or some other consideration, but I haven’t really seen an answer from a company official after two hours of seraches and reading this forum.

Scores of expenienced players have commented, with vehemence, about having a battlegound map in front of them where the main activity is watching superguilds, X,Y and Z auto-battle at near zero attrition for 10 days, swapping tiles every four hours as though the remaining contestants didn’t exist.

So, whatever priority is given to this condition in the minds of the provider of this entertaiment, it would be considerate of them to also provide an answer from the perspective of gameplay.

 

[Johnny B. Goode]

I'm really coming to the realization that Inno isn't concerned at all about gameplay. They have introduced so many unbalanced elements into the game in the past 6 years that it is hardly recognizable as the same game that I started playing back then. Exploits rule the game, from the Arc to GBG and beyond. Every day I try to remember the enthusiasm I used to have for this game, but the sheer drudgery of trying to play it gets to me and I now find myself frequently going a couple of days without even showing up to collect. I've tried playing just a couple of worlds, I've tried playing every world, and almost every configuration in between. I've deleted more cities than 99% of players ever even start. I'm on the verge of deleting some now.

I remember Panzer General, it was one of my favorite games. Then it went the way of the rotary phone. In retrospect, I should have kept a computer that ran Windows95 just to play CD games. Oh, well.

 

[23skidoo]

I'm really coming to the realization that Inno isn't concerned at all about gameplay.

I remember Panzer General, it was one of my favorite games. Then it went the way of the rotary phone. In retrospect, I should have kept a computer that ran Windows95 just to play CD games. Oh, well.

Understood, Johnny. I reasoned it to be worth pointing out using the earlier comparison.

As far as Panzer General and other DOS games, the DOS emulator works very well with Windows 10. I used it (free) to play a couple of scenarios of Panzer General a few months back. And then also some Age of Rifles. It was fun - gameplay the old way.

 

[DevaCat]

Any of you do SPWAW? I hear the beardless wonders talking about strategy and tactics (as if they knew the difference) and just have to laugh

 

[23skidoo]

I played Steel Panthers when it first came out in 1995. What's the difference with Steel Panthers - World at War?

The first engaging computer game I ever played was Eastern Front (1981). Used an 8-bit Atari, the TV as a monitor and a joystick to move the cursor.

 

[CDmark]

Now it may be low on the development time table to address this or some other consideration, but I haven’t really seen an answer from a company official after two hours of seraches and reading this forum.

I watched the FOE facebook video, on Tuesday. At 8:45 into the video, this is brought up as a question and Kurt said they will be looking at it.
facebook .com/ForgeofEmpires/videos/2828746104107869
The question asked is about matchmaking, the response was "later this year" and "soon". So, I consider that the official response.

Back when GBG started, there was another video
facebook .com/ForgeofEmpires/videos/431470330860909 Dec 5, 2019
Go to 25:28, a question about attrition comes up but Marcel goes into more, how they expected players to play GBG.
"battlegrounds is not a feature that is supposed to be played all day long" and "battlegrounds is a feature you play on the side, there is a distinct limit" are 2 comments I find interesting, now. Farming has made those high attrition levels a non-factor. In fact, the only ones that would see that high attrition would be the smaller guilds on ring 4 that have at most, one siege. Funny the way it played out, folks in the top guilds got very smart and very fast. By season 3 or 4, palaces were gone and siege camps took over.

 

[23skidoo]

I watched the FOE facebook video, on Tuesday. At 8:45 into the video, this is brought up as a question and Kurt said they will be looking at it.
facebook .com/ForgeofEmpires/videos/2828746104107869
The question asked is about matchmaking, the response was "later this year" and "soon". So, I consider that the official response.

Back when GBG started, there was another video
facebook .com/ForgeofEmpires/videos/431470330860909 Dec 5, 2019
Go to 25:28, a question about attrition comes up but Marcel goes into more, how they expected players to play GBG.
"battlegrounds is not a feature that is supposed to be played all day long" and "battlegrounds is a feature you play on the side, there is a distinct limit" are 2 comments I find interesting, now. Farming has made those high attrition levels a non-factor. In fact, the only ones that would see that high attrition would be the smaller guilds on ring 4 that have at most, one siege. Funny the way it played out, folks in the top guilds got very smart and very fast. By season 3 or 4, palaces were gone and siege camps took over.

Thank you, CDmark.

I appreciate your instructive reply.

Smart gamers will work out algorithm exploits. I recall in Civilization 1, domination was guaranteed with the selection of Ghengis Kahn going on all-out attacks from the start with the first military units.

BTW, this appeared in today's FOE update announcement:

"The Guild Battlegrounds' matchmaking should no longer be sorted by Guild IDs, from now on the matchmaking should be random by leagues."

 

[qaccy]

Take out the personal rewards and you'll see that zero-attrition sector swapping stop immediately. Not even kidding. Of course, that'll be because everyone will stop playing it, but that's beside the point!

 

[23skidoo]

Take out the personal rewards and you'll see that zero-attrition sector swapping stop immediately. Not even kidding. Of course, that'll be because everyone will stop playing it, but that's beside the point!

But you make the point - no game is no game.

 

[MJ Artisan of War]

"The Guild Battlegrounds' matchmaking should no longer be sorted by Guild IDs, from now on the matchmaking should be random by leagues."

--Yes class... wording does matter... LOL

 

[Reese7990]

I didn't suggest that it be ranked by size alone. Only that there would be a size minimum.