Swedge

Which would be the most convoluted explanation possible: a bot capable of tracking hidden transactions (e.g. spy ops / purchases) / infra + land levels over time / domestic policies used when buying infra + projects / military replenished over time (with adjustments to price of said military units in line with changelog updates) / daily login bonuses / etc. etc. Orrrrr..... Occam's razor. The most simplest solution: There is an exploit. Now considering it's 100% accurate as of each turn change imma go out on a limb here and suggest it might just be the most obvious explanation. It updates each turn change.

^ 100% Truth Ridiculous. Assume you are talking about yourself? Real raiders are motivated by profit not oppressing people - there is zero interest in permarolling anyone; ironically the sort of behaviour you describe is far more likely to be carried out by those in conventional AAs.

Links detailed below. Nature of Violation: potential multis (incl. 3rd party transfers / concurrent wars) -- Summary: noticed an alliance with a suspicious number of nations with similar creation dates / seniority, ran multi check via locutus bot with an alarming number of positives. Specifics as follows: https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=185424 verified: false networks total: 51 Possible multis for: Bucket-ville shared networks: 2/2 ( 1 same day) 3rd party transfers: 16 worth: $50,391,960 https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=192359 verified: false networks total: 38 Possible multis for: 192370 shared networks: 10/15 - 31949578143277963308826297012: concurrent - 33760542278598758717579786005: concurrent - 1832445060186371908663487607: concurrent - 40127508436460428502398924320: unknown - 47063508967448249239609897386: unknown - 59952165941539741510332637595: unknown - 70021039746799817702056342330: unknown - 74044375804131247441535684501: unknown - 17242999077605166127942806624: unknown - 31588279655323555609617792828: unknown https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=186583 verified: false networks total: 12 Possible multis for: British Kingdom shared networks: 2/5 - 32369694510497935043663084378: concurrent - 46616541560435580621383288146: concurrent Possible multis for: Marina shared networks: 3/6 - 69546240482385692529080543022: concurrent - 32369694510497935043663084378: concurrent - 46616541560435580621383288146: concurrent Possible multis for: Auparti shared networks: 6/11 - 69546240482385692529080543022: concurrent - 32369694510497935043663084378: concurrent - 46616541560435580621383288146: concurrent - 30500950208030937366601041819: concurrent - 27343951141617737500052181980: concurrent - 18119825568635655972913674291: unknown shared wars: ( 691494,694930 ) https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=216593 verified: false networks total: 16 Possible multis for: 120441 shared networks: 1/6 - 18049709421524016968244260262: unknown https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=201878 verified: false networks total: 2 Possible multis for: Sword art online shared networks: 1/2 - 59806203198441913401039066459: concurrent https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=216274 verified: false networks total: 16 Possible multis for: MontgomeryBurnsCorp shared networks: 3/50 - 27765070951450827975670548690: 1w6h32m28s - 17299610220135250612341836207: unknown - 61115644246090856515570299316: 1w5d2h25m45s https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=206717 verified: false networks total: 2 Possible multis for: Kilmesy I shared networks: 1/2 - 73816673867607643612751123197: concurrent https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=221630 verified: false networks total: 10 Possible multis for: Hydro Colony shared networks: 1/1 - 8500316997491520141290502417: concurrent https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=173891 verified: false networks total: 4 Possible multis for: 178028 shared networks: 1/1 - 15518840221763959900015764387: concurrent https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=221886 verified: false networks total: 4 Possible multis for: Slavija shared networks: 1/39 - 51798208791718809217689681048: unknown Possible multis for: Fruzovan Republic shared networks: 1/2 - 51798208791718809217689681048: concurrent https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=184169 verified: false networks total: 1 Possible multis for: Heavenly Gate shared networks: 1/1 - 68098143881413525184815249656: concurrent https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=226313 verified: false networks total: 7 Possible multis for: Kudiland shared networks: 1/41 ( 1 same day) 3rd party transfers: 7 worth: $38,956,000 Possible multis for: united federations of earth shared networks: 1/18 ( 0 same day) Possible multis for: Damnation shared networks: 1/52 ( 0 same day) 3rd party transfers: 7 worth: $38,956,000 https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=203308 verified: false networks total: 2 Possible multis for: United Boris Haters shared networks: 1/1 - 26775501869028119992135874660: concurrent Possible multis for: WW2 country shared networks: 1/1 - 26775501869028119992135874660: concurrent https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=228439 verified: false networks total: 1 Possible multis for: Rosivia shared networks: 1/1 - 40996632929784658303788816648: concurrent Additional multi reports attached for the two with 3rd party transactions. Some could be entirely innocuous but just found it somewhat suspicious to get so many positives from a single alliance alongside 3rd party / shared wars. Also apologies for the wall of text... :/ Nation_of_Israel_multi_report.txt AeroSierra_multi_report.txt

Yeah... admin who implements changes without having a clue what impact its going to have on AA warfare. Seriously. Well since its pretty clear there is no point making any suggestions or commenting on anything: can I ask the community at large to give consideration to cancelling the global nap - two months is too long to wait before an inevitable curbstomp and the inherent flaws of recent changes become self-evident to Alex. Sad state of affairs when the input/feedback from the community at large seems to be completely worthless, but there you have it. Global war now and maybe there is some vague hope for rollback to a semi-balanced war system.

And my point is context is important: if you look at this in isolation your PoV makes sense. But if you look at this in the context of dialup: its understandable why t$ has grievances / feels this apology is somewhat insincere.

Unless you are a reroll, assuming you aren't aware of what went on during dialup. Basically the inverse of what you just described - IQ (incl. Camelot riding on their coattails) having no intentions of negotiating in good faith. So its interesting to see how the script changes now the tables have turned. That said, however belated this is; at least its a mild improvement over certain alliances still engaging in the gaslighting and apparently incapable of admitting any sort of wrongdoing during dialup.

The cost of war vs. the relative benefit of gaining a treasure essentially means that there is no incentive to pursue conventional war over a treasure. For example: most recent war Arrgh attacked Umbrella Corp. and did $1.2bn in damages - and thats in a 2 day war with a micro who was barely in the top 50; with wars involving larger alliances that number scales significantly. In short its just not worthwhile AAs pursuing war over treasures; furthermore if you buff treasures to the point where it is actually worthwhile the treasures themselves would need to be seriously OP. The issue is, you've just banned the main way treasures were being transferred. AA would sell a treasure for cash/res by losing a war; or alternately pirate would raid treasure and then sell it on via the same mechanic. Now because its 'illegal' there is little reason to see treasures changing hands unless it falls into the hands of an unprotected micro; and pirates wont go after treasures because you've made the subsequent transfer/selling of them against the rules. Effectively it just becomes an RNG mechanic. If you buff treasures to the point where they are worth whole alliances fighting over they would probably need to be buffed to the point of being OP. Assuming a revision of the rules is off the table, perhaps you would be willing to consider allowing people to trade treasures via in game mechanic; at least this way individuals can go treasure hunting + subsequently sell them on without breaking game rules.

Well put it this way: I wouldn't post a bug report if I wasn't 100% sure he was being taxed. I can get Ripper himself to confirm this and multiple other commodores who were periodically transferring his taxes out of the bank. Again, we have 0% taxes otherwise + all the other transactions are direct deposit/withdraw (i.e. the bank is kept at zero) so absolutely we would notice money going in when there is no corresponding deposit. Anyway I will speak to Ripper and get confirmation of dates he was being taxed from. Yeah ikr.

100%. I know he was paying taxes because we were transferring them out of the bank regularly (and all our transactions are otherwise just direct deposit/send so you notice tax going in when the bank is otherwise kept at zero). Is it plausible that deleting a tax bracket could delete the records? Only thing I can think of really. Overall not that big a deal: we can probably work out how much was paid in by going through the bank logs manually; its more just to highlight it, we run 0% tax most of the time so like I say not really a great concern but other alliances might find it more significant if there is an issue with the records.

Ripper (https://politicsandwar.com/nation/id=59307) And that's unfortunate :/

The war changes tbh its difficult to offer a analysis rn due to the bugs, so I'll come back to that later. In regards to the score changes (which imo is the most significant change of the lot) to address several points which have been bought up: The score adjustments are not 'minor' - if you haven't noticed that much difference its probably because you are running a high infra/military setup; for those of us running a leaner build the score change is massive (for example: I've gone from 1590 > 2640 overnight) The net result is heavy tier stratification; for the people who think this is inconsequential I would invite you to think back to the last global war: NPO operated a 'death tier' around the 20 City Level; the new scoring system effectively means that if you were in that range there would be no prospect of escape - ironically (given the score change has been partially motivated by people complaining about 'downdeclares') this would have resulted in a lot more people quitting. a global war, where someone with no military can be declared on by someone with max military at the same city level, offers little to no chance of staging a comeback (given the predominance of blockade cycling tactics); this results in a stale, predictable and boring war - whoever has numerical/military superiority will win for all the people complaining about the last global war I honestly don't see any issues with the tactics involved (and I say that as someone on the opposing side); the only reason why NPO was able to engage in a prolonged airstrike campaign was because they were printing money via GPWC - once the bans came in the NPO machine crumbled because they were no longer able to economically sustain the military campaign throughout the last global war there were numerous attempts to regain control over the lower tier; the lines shifted but periodically safe zones were established at certain score ranges (e.g. <1000, <1200 score etc.) - with the new scoring system this quite simply would have been impossible due the majority of people being stuck inside the NPO death zone running planes only is a valid tactic; I honestly don't understand peoples complaints with this - the solution is to run a lean setup where it costs them more destroy cheap troops (soldiers) than the damage inflicted - under the new system max military will become the new meta, so effectively zero tactics involved, again resulting in stale/boring gameplay And no, we don't need to 'wait till the next war' to see the impact these changes will have. Imo some sort of middle ground is vastly preferable to the new scoring system; personally I don't think changes which make global wars predictable and hand an unassailable advantage to the larger side are desirable or healthy for the game in general.

What were you doing (or trying to do): access tax records on AA bank/tax page What happened (describe thoroughly please): page delivers "There are no tax records to display." Link to page: https://politicsandwar.com/alliance/id=913&display=banktaxes Any other relevant information: normally we don't tax people so wouldn't have noticed if this was an issue previously; however over the past few weeks one member has been paying tax into the bank so we are currently unable to verify the total amounts paid in with the absence of tax records Screenshot:

Well from the raider perspective the changes to ground are overshadowed by the score range change: now people with max mil + comparable city count can declare on people with soldiers only = huge imbalance there are far far fewer inactives in range so we'll need to resort to attacking more active targets the pirate project won't be of much use as not enough inactives in range + you cant realistically attack 6 actives at once Effectively its very difficult to justify running full military as a pirate due to the costs involved; now people can rock up with maxed out ground/air/naval and you don't have a hope in hell of beating them - previously the score balance at least gave you a fighting chance ? Unfortunately the primary beneficiary is whales: previously raiding was the best way for a newer player to grow -> lower tier is fine but unfortunately above that its difficult to attempt to match whale income with the drastically reduced number of inactives. Given the history of orbis is undoubtedly richer for the presence of alliances like Arrgh I sincerely hope @Alex will reconsider the balance of the score range changes; even if the intention is to nerf raiding ( ?) the military element to score still needs to be rebalanced -> simply put it hands too much of an advantage to the side which is able to maintain max military, in global conflicts this sadly reduces the likelihood of a turnaround / underdog victory which imo is not conducive to a more balanced game. On a more positive note the +10 base increase as a means to nerf 0 score offshores is a very welcomed change. But the score range changes as a whole are unfortunately alarming to say the least.

Let's be clear here: The score range change does not accomplish 'fair play' - it pushes whales further out of range + empowers alliances which have a heavy tiering advantage to effectively dominate said tier. Neither of which accomplishes more equality in the game. Likewise the proposed rebuy changes will advantage nations with more cities. Again primarily benefiting whales. I would urge people to think very carefully about these proposed changes and to consider the bigger picture rather than your own self-vested interest. Personally as a raider yes I would benefit from some elements of this proposal; however, neither of these changes are good in terms of the overall equality of the game and nor do they address the actual issues with the war system. The current score range system is tbh mostly fine: the only change which actually needs to take place is the suggested base increase to nerf the 0 score offshores. What actually needs to happen is for the plane advantage to be addressed; the alum. cost increase didn't do that and tbh neither of these changes will address that either. Personally what I would like to see is the introduction of an anti-aircraft artillery unit to act as a counter in a similar way that tanks act as a counter for ground. This has been mentioned previously and I'm happy to make a new topic so this can be discussed in more detail. But leaving that aside: I should preface this by saying I do welcome Alex looking for feedback on improving the war system but imo this isn't the way to go about doing it - we should look to address the actual problem (i.e. the plane balance) rather than creating new ones.

Somewhere around $100k per city would probably be ideal imo (so $500k for a 5 city, $1m for a 10 city, $2m for 20 city etc. etc.) Res is irrelevant tbh because its beige loot + only a % that gets looted - the vast majority of your res will be intact regardless.

This. Alterations to the score range will exacerbate existing problems with the war system; the actual effect will be the opposite of the intended purpose. a) it increases the likelihood that heavy tiering (e.g. NPO) becomes untouchable; if there is a more limited range of nations which can declare on say an alliance with a heavy concentration at City 19/20 it hands an unassailable advantage to said alliance b) anything which dramatically increases whale score relative to smaller city nations will push the whales further out of range for the majority Neither of the above are healthy for the game. If you want to address the issues with the war system there are far better ways to go about doing it. Namely introducing some sort of counter to the advantage planes have (and no the alum. cost increase didn't address this at all; it simply made it more expensive to attempt to counter a plane advantage). For example: introducing an Anti-Aircraft artillery unit with a similar function to tanks (e.g. similar cost but anti-air instead of anti-ground) would go a long way to addressing the current issues with the war system.

Bro... soldiers are $5 each. Seriously if you want actual advice join an experienced raiding AA who will teach you the ropes. In the mean time since you are slot filled anyway I would recommend raiding the alliance who is attacking you some more; counters only exist to be trolled, you will learn to love them ?

As cute as this is, if you want some actual advice: stop caring about counters. Counters are just part of life for any raider worth his salt - you will always make way more money than the negligible amount of damage they inflict.

Just no on so many levels. Incentivizes war dodging, punishes activity, nerfs blitzes/updeclares, screws over pirates and further entrenches the dominance of whales. No thanks.

The only thing surprising about this is the people who were dumb enough to loan them money ?

The irony of IQ members talking about 'killing the game' when they have been waging a global war (funded by GPWC money nonetheless) with the explicit intention of getting people to delete over the past however many months. The only thing Alex can be criticized for here is the leniency of the punishment. Really IQ should be thanking him for not adopting more punitive measures.

The sheer amount of salt in this thread is just beautiful.

Now that's some A++ hypocrisy coming from someone who but a few weeks ago was on discord threatening to permablockade people until they deleted.

lol you'll be waiting for a while

The problem is tanks weakness should be planes. Adding AA ability to tanks isn't really keeping with realism or practicality; in RL its AA artillery which is used against planes + secondly, even if you did implement this you then run into the issue tanks being OP vs. both ground/air with no counter. Quite simply tanks should be vulnerable to planes; yes planes are unbalanced as things currently stand but this isn't the way to go about addressing it.