Get rid of Nukes

[Sweeeeet Ronny D]

If you are talking about health and longevity of the game, how does removing the best way for a losing nation to do damage to a winning nation hurt the health of the game.  If anything it helps keep the balance. 

 

You remove the ability to do damage to your attacker when you are losing, you are going to quickly see a super tier of alliances/nations form because the cost of war is so cheap, and they know if they roll in with the advantage they are going to take almost 0 damage.

 

Or you will see a ton of high end raiders cause absolute havok, because they know the cost of war is so low, because raiding the top tier is super lucrative, (Fenney proved it when he raided the top 10 a few months back and made something like 90-100 million dollars.) at least the threat of nukes keeps them honest.  I know some people would prefer to see that, but you are going to get a lot more people quitting the game because of that than with the current status quo.

Edited February 16, 2016 by Sweeeeet Ronny D

[seabasstion]

 

Again, explain what the game play value is of having them.  The reason not to make them OP is to keep the game playable.  Which is a very legit reason for Sheepy to not make them OP and getting rid of them would remove the constant drive people feel to force him to make them so.

 

 

 

That is fair enough.  I do however "get" basically all the other components.  Nukes seemed flawed at their core.  IE. if they "worked" then the whole game would revolve around having and using nukes to the exclusion of all other aspects of the game.  This seems devastatingly dull.  Why then does this component of the game exist at all?  Nobody has answered me as to why they should be a thing in game.

 

 

at the risk of potentially sounding insulting (which isnt my intention i assure you) perhaps nukes just do not fit the model of the game that you are trying to create. political sim games like this you get what you put in. there are no right or wrong ways to play games like this. that doesnt mean there arent more effective ways than others. but a game like this is about creating an experience

 

with all available information there were 286 (14%) nations that found it valuable of some sort to get an NRF. there haven't been any changes to to the NRF/nuke system for quite some time so i feel this is indicative that the game as a whole does find a reasonable value in nukes/nrfs at its current state at a reasonable rate. if the game as a whole truly did not find value in nukes then i think this number would be much lower. if nukes were unimaginably overpowered the rate would be much higher. should everyone have them? that isn't for me to decide but i think 15% of the game being NRF capable isn't by any means driving the game to a halt with unrealistic nuclear end game armories. 

 

i dont think having a required metric of 'revolving around the game' as the indication of nukes working or not is a good test to their value to the game. If anything, i quite like that some people find them beneficial while others do not. to me this creates questions. are the naysayers right - are nukes really useless? or are there certain situations where nukes create value and opportunity? do these nations know something we dont or have analyzed it a different way?

 

in some definitions i would agree with you...nukes arent ideal. in fact they are quite poor. in other definitions i would disagree with you and i feel they have their place. i think this creates a more dynamic equation to the game. it is a variable that is not only polarizing but depending on who you talk to is over/under powered. i think removing them from the game to reduce the formula to soldiers tanks and planes could have the effect you describe to make the game more dull. sure there is a smaller debate about planes vs ships, but planes are widely regarded as the 'best' attacking military in the game. is it better for the game long term to reduce the formula into who has more planes?

 

you yourself say nukes dont work yet people are rostering them. dissension of opinion on the subject i think is all the evidence it needs to satisfy the claim that they have their place. could it be changed? yes of course it could 

 

i am not saying this since i am one of the early adopters of the nuke heavy build that wishes to keep my investment relevant. at that time (which is still mostly true with relative small changes to the overall war mechanic) i found it advantageous to go nuke heavy and pitched the idea to several other people. so i guess what i am driving at is nations like me demonstrate that they have their place in this game.

 

to directly answer your question why they are in the game? i can't speak for everyone but my thought was that an overnight 3 person blitz on a nation will leave them with very little recourse to 'fight back' unless there were a significant number of allies you had to provide a counter. at that time i did not have a significant number. i was in a small member count alliance that was paperless. i experienced an overnight bliz one evening from VE/tS i believe and i was done, even with a 5000 tank army which was good for #4 in the game at that time. i had no recourse other then sitting back on my mlp and firing 1 missile a day at my opponents that only hit every other day do to the iron dome.

 

here i was with what i thought was a strong army. i was 10 cities with max conventional army and i woke up with literally zero soldiers, 9m of my 10m warchest stolen, and a daily buy limit that prevented me from approaching the strength of not even one of my opponents.

 

"how nice it would be to have about 10 nukes right now and create some destruction" i thought to myself. so that is what i did. i saved the 70m in cash and resources to buy my NRF and the 6M for each of my nukes. so for the next war that came around i had an NRF with a 25 nuke army at the extremely expensive cost of 220M. when the battles finally took place i got crushed. i lost 16k of my infrastructure. but i took out 32k in the process which was good for number 1 in the game at that time   

 

look at my city creation dates and you will see that i went almost 6 months without buying my 11th city. it was a sacrifice i had to do to play this way. it was a different way from most other people but more importantly, for me, it was fun    it was very cost prohibitive though but i felt it worth it then, and i still do now. 

 

do i want the game reduced to a 'who has more nukes' formula? no. likewise i do not want the game reduced to a 'who has more planes' formula. conventional warefare is very dependent on numbers. it isn't the ultimate factor but it goes a long way. for someone in a 20 person alliance and not treatied out the wazoo this provides an alternative way to bring some defense/firepower to the game. im not very social by nature, and i recognize i will not typically have a large reserve of allies to come to my aid. if i did not think nukes worked for my political landscape i would not use them. again, the fact that there are nations like me serves to the point there are, it just may not fit the picture you are painting for yourself in this game that may be more aggressive and political based. i would much rather have varying opinions on how to best play they game then having something that serves as a default weapon/mechanism, and i hope sheepy does now. that is why nukes should be in the game - it allowed me to play the game differently (and hopefully smarter - but only time will tell on that!)

[LordRahl2]

If you are talking about health and longevity of the game, how does removing the best way for a losing nation to do damage to a winning nation hurt the health of the game. If anything it helps keep the balance.

 

You remove the ability to do damage to your attacker when you are losing, you are going to quickly see a super tier of alliances/nations form because the cost of war is so cheap, and they know if they roll in with the advantage they are going to take almost 0 damage.

 

Or you will see a ton of high end raiders cause absolute havok, because they know the cost of war is so low, because raiding the top tier is super lucrative, (Fenney proved it when he raided the top 10 a few months back and made something like 90-100 million dollars.) at least the threat of nukes keeps them honest. I know some people would prefer to see that, but you are going to get a lot more people quitting the game because of that than with the current status quo.

I did not remove the best way for a defender to defend after they lose their army. I said missiles are well balanced and should remain.

[LordRahl2]

Every unit in game is less effective than planes. Why have ships? It's not the best let's get rid of it. Soldiers are weak and put your enemy into beige. Let's ditch those to. What good is tanks without soldiers. Bang we only have planes. Missiles are pointless because they don't give enough bang for the points it costs. Nukes at least keep up with damage done in wars. 3 people nuking 1 guy can smash in less than 5 days. 3 peeps attacking even with planes will take longer. Plus as the war goes on my infra is cheaper where my nuke is smashing full cities, at least until you run out.

 

If you don't like them, don't use them. As an aspect of the game(much like any other unit) and I can explore/exploit it as I see fit.

 

"Blah blah it's not the best way to grow or fight. How are you going to win the game or be best at it?" Actually right now I am doing the best, best at nukes launched. If for nothing else it allows me to play the way I want to.

 

I can bounce numbers around to help make the nuke cause financially responsible also. It's all in the total strategy not just the nuke unit.

 

Hope that cleared it up

I answered this about the other units. Your slippery slope argument is interesting but a falicy. Hope that clears that up.

[Captain_Vietnam]

I always love how much time and thought is put into your posts.

doubt he put that much time in like that. doesnt capitalize his letters if he was aiming to make high levels posts i think he would. maybe just super smart???!

[jaguar]

doubt he put that much time in like that. doesnt capitalize his letters if he was aiming to make high levels posts i think he would. maybe just super smart???!

He never capitalize letters

[seabasstion]

ive never really thought about my lack of formal punctuation online. when i do more formal things like write reports or official emails for my employer i will make it look professional but anywhere else i usually just bang on the keys and hope something meaningful comes out.

 

interestingly enough (and by enough i mean probabaly not in the least) when i write things out by hand i use ALL capital letters, but that is purely for legibility since i have the penmanship of a 4 year old. penchildship 

[Captain_Vietnam]

ive never really thought about my lack of formal punctuation online. when i do more formal things like write reports or official emails for my employer i will make it look professional but anywhere else i usually just bang on the keys and hope something meaningful comes out.

 

interestingly enough (and by enough i mean probabaly not in the least) when i write things out by hand i use ALL capital letters, but that is purely for legibility since i have the penmanship of a 4 year old. penchildship 

do you do grammer on alliance annoucements???

[seabasstion]

im usually gramatically correct except for those harder rules like not ending sentences with a preoposition for example that i cant be bothered to learn, but yes it appears i did capitalize my letters for the majority of announcements. one thing i personally dont like of my writing is i will use an excessive amount of parentheticals many of which are not needed. i'll usually rewrite them when i finish. i did it twice in this reply :/

[Magnanimus]

Just for the sake of suggestions, is it possible to make the effect of nuke to change from Beige to the Government Type going to Anarchy.

 

We can keep a new government type of Anarchy which is selected only during a nuke damage and can be removed only after 5 days.

Anarchy reduces the citizen income and increases crime and disease.

[Fox Fire]

Just for the sake of suggestions, is it possible to make the effect of nuke to change from Beige to the Government Type going to Anarchy.

 

We can keep a new government type of Anarchy which is selected only during a nuke damage and can be removed only after 5 days.

Anarchy reduces the citizen income and increases crime and disease.

No sir, this will simply be criticized by everyone from every corner for everything. Apparently. 

[Andrezj Kolarov]

Just for the sake of suggestions, is it possible to make the effect of nuke to change from Beige to the Government Type going to Anarchy.

 

We can keep a new government type of Anarchy which is selected only during a nuke damage and can be removed only after 5 days.

Anarchy reduces the citizen income and increases crime and disease.

Shameless (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) copying

[Lord Bagel]

Shameless (That terrible game that is totally irrelevant and I shouldn't be bringing it up anyways) copying

my thought exactly

[Phiney]

Sorry rahl I think the way you worded this topic was your downfall. He's not actually saying get rid of them, he's saying don't change them as any change will make them OP, he would rather see them removed than altered to be OP and ruin the rest of the war system

[Sweeeeet Ronny D]

I did not remove the best way for a defender to defend after they lose their army. I said missiles are well balanced and should remain.

300-400 infra damage every 16 maps is balanced?  maybe if you have 6-7 cities... I do 500-550 damage with 1 airstrike.

[LordRahl2]

300-400 infra damage every 16 maps is balanced? maybe if you have 6-7 cities... I do 500-550 damage with 1 airstrike.

So you think a losing nation should be able to do as much or more damage than a victorious one? I do not.

 

3-400 distributed across the top infra of two cities seems damn pretty reasonable actually.

[Sweeeeet Ronny D]

infra damage, yes I do, and even if you take as much infra damage, you aren't taking the resource damage that they are, you wipe out 15k tanks, you have just killed over a month worth of steel from a guy.  When that war ends, your ability to continue to wage war is still much higher than your opponents.

[Delyruin]

infra damage, yes I do, and even if you take as much infra damage, you aren't taking the resource damage that they are, you wipe out 15k tanks, you have just killed over a month worth of steel from a guy.  When that war ends, your ability to continue to wage war is still much higher than your opponents.

 

 

I remember well when Germany devastated the US in March 1945.

[LordRahl2]

infra damage, yes I do, and even if you take as much infra damage, you aren't taking the resource damage that they are, you wipe out 15k tanks, you have just killed over a month worth of steel from a guy. When that war ends, your ability to continue to wage war is still much higher than your opponents.

So winning is losing irt infra? No.

 

It is balanced well enough that a defender can continue to do some damage to a victorious set of attackers. There is zero reason or argument that a defeated player should do the same or more infra damage then his successful opponents. That is silly.

[Sweeeeet Ronny D]

I remember well when Germany devastated the US in March 1945.

yeah and it was a good thing that France and England took 0 damage to their infrastructure during that war too.

 

Rahl, I just fought a whole bunch of wars against guys with nukes who I beat and not a single one did more damage to me than I did to them in infra.  So I guess I will pull the famous Mensa line, maybe you should learn to fight better.

 

This guy came the closest, and I would take this result every time.

 

              infra        soldiers     tanks     planes        cash

Calondia 5,161.95      77,621   5,497     276          $16,815,568.16

Jewidia   3,795.58 1   11,687    4,094     60            $0.00

Edited February 17, 2016 by Sweeeeet Ronny D

[LordRahl2]

yeah and it was a good thing that France and England took 0 damage to their infrastructure during that war too.

 

Rahl, I just fought a whole bunch of wars against guys with nukes who I beat and not a single one did more damage to me than I did to them in infra. So I guess I will pull the famous Mensa line, maybe you should learn to fight better.

 

This guy came the closest, and I would take this result every time.

 

infra soldiers tanks planes cash

Calondia 5,161.95 77,621 5,497 276 $16,815,568.16

Jewidia 3,795.58 1 11,687 4,094 60 $0.00

SRD, I am trying to keep our personal differences from impacting my reply (your reference to my alliance is out of place on this board and in this debate).

 

Please read what I wrote. I said that missiles and nukes should not cause more infra damage then losing a war. I did not say that they do so.

 

This is the core of my argument. You won a war and as such should not lose more than you opponent. Pretty self evident no? Hence my desire to avoid all talk of making Nukes OP. And yeah missiles even vs iron dome are a fair enough reply for a nation that has lost already to make some reasonable damage against an agressor.

 

I am glad you pasted that particular data point though:

 

The fact that a nation completely defeated in war came close(ish) to matching you in infra damage makes me think that nukes are almost too OP as they are right now. So maybe we need a topic about how to nerf them. Or back to my OP, we could just get rid of them.

[Desertfalcon]

The fact that a nation completely defeated in war came close(ish) to matching you in infra damage makes me think that nukes are almost too OP as they are right now. So maybe we need a topic about how to nerf them. Or back to my OP, we could just get rid of them.

 

I mean nukes are kinda OP in real life as well and can still be launched by leaders who are badly losing a war. My suggestion would be to make it so players can't develop nuclear weapons if any nation at war with them has ground or air control. They could still launch the ones they had stockpiled (if they didn't get spied away) but once those are gone they are out of luck.

 

Or the NRF could be a treated as a "targetable" improvement by airstrikes. The airstrikes wouldn't completely destroy it, but they could render it in operational for 1-2 weeks unless the victim is willing to shell out serious money to immediately repair it.

[LordRahl2]

Rl =/= game

[Sweeeeet Ronny D]

Fair enough LR, if you want to keep politics separate, I will as well. 

 

But you WANT to take damage in a war, you really do.  If you can deal out significant damage and not take any in return, you will find yourself quickly out of people to fight.   Fighting a war, with no one to declare war on is the worst. 

 

You and I also know that all infra damage is not created equal.  when two equal nations fight, and the winner does 3k infra damage thru conventional attacks, and the loser does 3k damage thru 2 nukes.  The infra the loser lost is significantly more expensive than the infra the winner lost.  The winners 3k damage is spread out across all of the losers cities, and the loser's damage is only on the 2 cities that he hit, and 500 of that 1500 infra per nuke will cost maybe around 1-2 million to replace.

[Ayayay]

Nukes not only do less infra damage than airstrikes but the infra cost damage they deal is worth even less.