Administrators Popular Post Alex Posted May 9, 2018 Administrators Popular Post Share Posted May 9, 2018 Following the lowering city cost discussion, I've been doing some considering about how to help new players catch up in the game and ease new player growth, which I know has been made a lot harder since I scaled back the effects of resource and commerce improvements about a year ago. This is a pretty simple plan that doesn't involve lowering city prices, and should basically only affect new players. Step 1: Eliminate New City Timers to City 10 (From Current City 5) This is pretty straightforward. Right now, you don't need to wait for your city timer for buying cities 2-5. I'm proposing to expand that to cities 2-10. This should make new players' growth faster, so that they can catch up to a point where they are relevant in the game, which should improve player retention by reducing feelings of impossibly slow progress. Step 2: New Player Income Bonus This part involves adding a new bonus to the game for new players. This bonus would not exist past a nation being 60 days old, or having 10 cities, and would diminish as a nation bought additional cities. The idea is that new players are awfully poor, and it's hard to invest in growth at really low levels. By increasing their income, they can invest into themselves and grow faster initially, without impacting later growth. This bonus would be a 100% gross income bonus for nations less than 60 days with 1 city, and would decrease by 10% for each city added. For nations older than 60 days, there would be no bonus regardless of number of cities. This bonus scheme should not really encourage people to sit at low city levels to collect the bonus, as the benefit of adding another city always outweighs staying at the current bonus level. It's honestly a pretty modest increase, but I think it will help new players find their footing and not be so strapped for cash in the beginning of the game. Here are some numbers I ran, the Average Daily Income figures are the averages currently in the game per city count. What isn't shown is how players using the New Player Bonus would build additional infrastructure, etc. boosting their income beyond just the bonus amount, etc. Take it all with a grain of salt. So, what I'm hoping is that everyone will kind of like this modest suggestion, and then I can throw it in the new game, we'll improve new player fun and retention, and everyone will win. Feel free to use the Upvote/Downvote option the forum offers to indicate your favor/disfavor, but please do consider the merits of the suggestion before blindly voting the way someone else told you you should. And of course, offer your feedback, and if you think you have a better idea, please just create a new topic/thread so we can keep the discussions separate. Thanks! 28 Quote Is there a bug? Report It | Not understanding game mechanics? Ask About It | Got a good idea? Suggest ItForums Rules | Game Link Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Buorhann Posted May 9, 2018 Popular Post Share Posted May 9, 2018 I posted my thoughts in the other thread, but another option I could see helping new players would be to separate the Project and City Timer, that way friends/alliances can help establish new players quickly, and get them involved into the community of the game ASAP. 2 10 Quote Warrior of Dio https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfPCFQfOnLg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sketchy Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 While I'm still not super confident about whether growth is a key factor with retention, this will help to dig the newer players out of the "hole" they start in and be at least reasonably more self sufficient. Growth for the really new players has been a pretty large issue for awhile now, as it takes a huge investment on the part of the alliance to make them decently profitable, at a high risk, and that player is unlikely to be able to sustain themselves without that aid. This should help mitigate that issue. 6 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Justin076 Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 (edited) Decreasing the timer is good. The revenue boost is a better alternative to decreasing city costs. However I still doesn't see how this helps with retention. The retention issue is because people don't join alliances or if they do, they don't join established ones with programs and institutions in place to help them grow. Increase the cost to make an alliance and/or suggest they join established alliances upon joining the game. By established, I mean ones that aren't micros and have established governments. Edited May 9, 2018 by Justin076 5 Quote Chief Financial Officer of The Syndicate Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Buorhann Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 Just now, Justin076 said: Decreasing the timer is good. However I still doesn't see how this helps with retention. The retention issue is because people don't join alliances or if they do, they don't join established ones with programs and institutions in place to help them grow. Increase the cost to make an alliance and/or suggest they join established alliances upon joining the game. By established, I mean ones that aren't micros and have established governments. Theoretically it'd help with retention by allowing players to feel like they're contributing more early on, and it would reduce the risk alliances take into growing nations early on. 1 Quote Warrior of Dio https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfPCFQfOnLg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Alex Posted May 9, 2018 Author Administrators Share Posted May 9, 2018 2 minutes ago, Justin076 said: Decreasing the timer is good. The revenue boost is a better alternative to decreasing city costs. However I still doesn't see how this helps with retention. The retention issue is because people don't join alliances or if they do, they don't join established ones with programs and institutions in place to help them grow. Increase the cost to make an alliance and/or suggest they join established alliances upon joining the game. By established, I mean ones that aren't micros and have established governments. Obviously you are correct, a huge part of player retention is that people just quit right away, and that won't change with this suggestion. However, for those that do decide they'd like to play a game like this, I think slow/impossible growth can be a barrier to retention, and I think that any lowering of that barrier should improve retention, even if it's only a subset of player retention as a whole. 2 Quote Is there a bug? Report It | Not understanding game mechanics? Ask About It | Got a good idea? Suggest ItForums Rules | Game Link Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Theodosius Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 This should help new player growth and mitigate the current high risk/low returns of investing into them. Of people already staying, that is. However, in order for new players to better capitalize on this, there must be something that will improve retention more directly. For example, a stronger "campaign" in tutorial and ads stressing the importance of joining an established alliance in general, thus increasing the chance of players connecting with the community and in turn actually staying to play. 9 minutes ago, Buorhann said: I posted my thoughts in the other thread, but another option I could see helping new players would be to separate the Project and City Timer, that way friends/alliances can help establish new players quickly, and get them involved into the community of the game ASAP. x2 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Revan Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 I feel like another important solution to improve player retention would be to overhaul the tutorial like people said in the other thread. 1 5 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Alex Posted May 9, 2018 Author Administrators Share Posted May 9, 2018 Just now, Theodosius said: This should help new player growth and mitigate the current high risk/low returns of investing into them. Of people already staying, that is. However, in order for new players to better capitalize on this, there must be something that will improve retention more directly. For example, a stronger "campaign" in tutorial and ads stressing the importance of joining an established alliance in general, thus increasing the chance of players connecting with the community and in turn actually staying to play. x2 I do agree, and someone made the suggestion in the city cost discussion about offering Credits as payment for new game tutorial videos, which I think is a great idea. I think I will pursue efforts to have players build guides and tutorial videos for the game, but I figure if I'm going to change the new player mechanics anyway I might as well wait to do it so that any new player tutorials factor in the New Player Bonus, change in city timers, etc. But yes, as a whole I do agree with your sentiment and that is definitely something to be improved upon. I think we've made a lot of progress over the years as-is, but there's always more to be done, and if you have any specific great suggestions for this, feel free to shoot me a PM. 2 Quote Is there a bug? Report It | Not understanding game mechanics? Ask About It | Got a good idea? Suggest ItForums Rules | Game Link Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shiho Nishizumi Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 (edited) What about increased raw production bonus, alongside or instead income? Income is reliant on pop, which is directly related to infra, and at those levels they won't be having that much infra, thus reducing the effect of the income coefficient. Plus, raws would require them to sell it on the marketplace for the cash, adding a step of interactivity that would give them a(nother) reason to log in daily. Edited May 9, 2018 by Shiho Nishizumi Typo 2 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WISD0MTREE Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 39 minutes ago, Justin076 said: By established, I mean ones that aren't micros and have established governments. Doesn't the tutorial send you to the alliance recruitment tab? There could be a ranking limit there to encourage new players to join established alliances as opposed to all these disbanded/micros when I looked. 32 minutes ago, Darth Revan said: I feel like another important solution to improve player retention would be to overhaul the tutorial like people said in the other thread. Sheepy, if you need any help writing text/objectives for the tutorial, I'm sure the community would help. (At least I would.) 5 minutes ago, Shiho Nishizumi said: What about increased raw bonus, alongside or instead income? Income is reliant to pop, which is directly related to infra, and at those levels they won't be having that much infra, thus reducing the effect of the coefficient. Plus, raws would require them to sell it on the marketplace for the cash, adding a step of interactivity that would give them a(nother) reason to log in daily. And this would also help Sheepy's design of young nations producing raw resources, mid-tier nations making manufactured resources, and whales doing commerce. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Who Me Posted May 9, 2018 Popular Post Share Posted May 9, 2018 You might want to think about changing the protection against being raided. Extend the period they can't be raided, make it apply regardless of color as many new people change their color before they read any of the tutorial and open themselves up to being raided, get raided to death and say screw it and leave. Make it so you don't lose the protection before the timer runs out unless you declare a war but have a very strong warning that by declaring a war they will lose the protection and be open to being raided. All making it easier to get cities will do is open them up to bigger better raiders and drive them out of the game faster. 1 9 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thalmor Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 3 minutes ago, Who Me said: You might want to think about changing the protection against being raided. Extend the period they can't be raided, make it apply regardless of color as many new people change their color before they read any of the tutorial and open themselves up to being raided, get raided to death and say screw it and leave. Make it so you don't lose the protection before the timer runs out unless you declare a war but have a very strong warning that by declaring a war they will lose the protection and be open to being raided. All making it easier to get cities will do is open them up to bigger better raiders and drive them out of the game faster. A lot of people do quit after the first time they've been hit. I can get behind this suggestion. 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Epi Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 (edited) 551 Edited February 16, 2021 by Epi Raiding Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sean289 Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 You should have exceptions for nations in alliance. Or nations that have a large military or score. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Alex Posted May 9, 2018 Author Administrators Share Posted May 9, 2018 1 hour ago, Shiho Nishizumi said: What about increased raw production bonus, alongside or instead income? Income is reliant on pop, which is directly related to infra, and at those levels they won't be having that much infra, thus reducing the effect of the income coefficient. Plus, raws would require them to sell it on the marketplace for the cash, adding a step of interactivity that would give them a(nother) reason to log in daily. That's a good point. The bonus could be extended to resource production as well. 1 hour ago, WISD0MTREE said: Doesn't the tutorial send you to the alliance recruitment tab? There could be a ranking limit there to encourage new players to join established alliances as opposed to all these disbanded/micros when I looked. Sheepy, if you need any help writing text/objectives for the tutorial, I'm sure the community would help. (At least I would.) And this would also help Sheepy's design of young nations producing raw resources, mid-tier nations making manufactured resources, and whales doing commerce. It probably would be a better idea to have a stronger qualifier to show up on that page; the trouble is I created it with the considerations of those smaller alliances in mind, many of whom hate the idea that all the new members go to big, established alliances. But I do agree that realistically that is a better outcome for new players than joining the average micro-alliance. 2 Quote Is there a bug? Report It | Not understanding game mechanics? Ask About It | Got a good idea? Suggest ItForums Rules | Game Link Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Administrators Alex Posted May 9, 2018 Author Administrators Share Posted May 9, 2018 1 hour ago, Who Me said: You might want to think about changing the protection against being raided. Extend the period they can't be raided, make it apply regardless of color as many new people change their color before they read any of the tutorial and open themselves up to being raided, get raided to death and say screw it and leave. Make it so you don't lose the protection before the timer runs out unless you declare a war but have a very strong warning that by declaring a war they will lose the protection and be open to being raided. All making it easier to get cities will do is open them up to bigger better raiders and drive them out of the game faster. I think that's a really good idea too. One thing I ought to do is remove "Beige" as a concept, and just add a "protected status" instead. It would be more intuitive. 1 Quote Is there a bug? Report It | Not understanding game mechanics? Ask About It | Got a good idea? Suggest ItForums Rules | Game Link Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tank Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 26 minutes ago, CandyShi said: It'd have to be balanced so that increasing city cost won't decrease your revenue though.. 12 coal mines per city (600 infra min) produces quite a bit of income for lower tier cities, and if adding 12 extra mines isn't going to add more coal revenue with the bonuses... well then that'd be kind of dumb.. How is that different than the income bonus though? If you have 5 cities with 12 mines each, adding another city (and 12 mines) increases your coal output by 20%, whereas your loss in production bonus is only 10%. Going from 9 cities to 10 cities would be 108 mines to 120 mines, an 11% increase, more than the 10% loss of an additional city, etc. It's exactly the same as the increase increase/decrease trade-off of adding a new city. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darth Revan Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 16 hours ago, Alex said: Step 1: Eliminate New City Timers to City 10 (From Current City 5) This is pretty straightforward. Right now, you don't need to wait for your city timer for buying cities 2-5. I'm proposing to expand that to cities 2-10. This should make new players' growth faster, so that they can catch up to a point where they are relevant in the game, which should improve player retention by reducing feelings of impossibly slow progress. I've had a bit more time to look at this proposal at think it through. While this change would allow people to build more cities and theoretically catch up to every else at a quicker pace in terms of city count, I do not think it will happen in the way I think people are assuming and people will still be waiting substantial time to get to city 10 although it may be shorter than what it is currently. Cities 2-10 cost about $72,250,000 (without the manifest destiny bonus and assuming my math is right) and the costs balloons even more if you begin to factor in infra, land, and even resource stockpile requirements that most alliances have and this number easily gets above 100 million. Alliances aren't going to hand players 100 million right away because new players have some risk tied to them, and if those players leave or go inactive that is 100~ million down the drain. That total number can easily add up quickly if its more than 1 failed member. I don't think we'll see most alliances buying every member their first 10 cities instantly unless they know for a fact that they won't go inactive. We won't be seeing fast growth for new players, at least not in the way it was prob envisioned with this particular change. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sweeeeet Ronny D Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 The downside to this is the resource cost to train new members on how to fight. Its significantly cheaper to learn to fight with 5-6 cities than 10. Then again I dont deal with new members so whatever you guys want to do, knock yourselves out! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shiho Nishizumi Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 (edited) 38 minutes ago, Sweeeeet Ronny D said: The downside to this is the resource cost to train new members on how to fight. Its significantly cheaper to learn to fight with 5-6 cities than 10. Then again I dont deal with new members so whatever you guys want to do, knock yourselves out! AA's won't be funding people 10 cities right away due to risk factor. Lifting the timer simply means that AA's have more freedom on setting their own timetables for city grants, and can exercise flexibility with it. We'll still see them boosting u to 5 cities and have the member stay at that range for a bit, whilst he gets accustomed to the overall feel of the game and it's mechanics. Once he is likely (or guaranteed) not to quit, they will fund the remainign 5 at whichever pace they decide to go with. Edited May 9, 2018 by Shiho Nishizumi Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kastor Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 I think this is another bandage rather than treating the infected wound. The game isn’t setup to help or encourage new players, while these suggestions hell, it still hurts and doesn’t fix the problem. 1. I think we should remove city timers altogether. If a nation wants to build a bunch of cities, why should the game stop them, even in war that’s a ton of money. 2. Decrease city costs for cities 10 and under. Make it easy to rank up to 10 without an alliance. 3. Emphasis the importance of joining an alliance and contributing to the game. 4. Have events(plagues, earthquakes, etc) which is something to do day-to-day. 5. Add an in-game world assembly, similar to Nationstates, that allows member nations to vote on issues. Also give them a 5% nation boost to joining. You could comdemn nations, provide aid to other nations, etc. This is an idea that could really be fleshed out and used by the community. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Codonian Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 I know this was touched on further up but i'd like to suggest it again so it has definitely been seen. Split the project and city timers into 2 different timers, Perhaps even extend the project timer to something like 15 days. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Micchan Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 Timer from city 5 to city 10 = 5 days Split city and project timer Nations less than 60 days old can't be taxed more than 50% 3 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J Kell Posted May 9, 2018 Share Posted May 9, 2018 This is directly aimed at new nations, so I think it is a good addition to the game. Quote Listen to J Kell's new single: About The Author An early member of Roz Wei in 2015, J Kell went on to stay within the paperless world of Empyrea before signing with Soup Kitchen while scoring a record deal in 2019. J Kell went on to release multiple Orbis Top 40 hits. In 2020, J Kell took a break from Orbis. He's back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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