Game Development Discussion: Beige Feedback

[Village]

Hey folks,

I’m back today after we heard some feedback about you guys about the upcoming beige changes, below I’ve listed a few ideas and things and provided a poll above to vote for your favorite. Please be sure to vote and post your thoughts below!

Goal

The goal of these changes is three-fold:

• Remove beige cycling
• Remove beige baiting
• Provide losers an opportunity to rebuild in beige and form some level of counter blitz, thereby ensuring wars are not won in the first round and are more competitive

Current Changes

The current changes are below:

• Every player defeated in a defensive war results in 2.5 days (30 turns) of beige.
• Every player defeated in an offensive war results in 0.5 days (6 turns) of beige.
• All wars that end from expiration result in beige for the defending party.
• Beige accruals are capped at 5 days (60 turns).
• Beige accruals do not begin reducing down until all defensive wars end.
• Expired wars do not damage infrastructure or give loot like normal beige does.

Proposed Replacements/Modifications

Idea 1

For the first idea, the current system remains the same with two small changes.

• The beige cap is increased to 7.5 days (allowing time to rebuild and a buffer to ensure an alliance can effectively counter-blitz together).
• Beige does not tick down until all wars are finished.

Idea 2

For the second idea, the current system is scrapped and replaced with four changes.

• The first war lost gives 7 days of beige, subsequent wars give no beige.
• Beige does not tick down until all wars are finished.
• Defensives resulting in expiry will result in 7 days of beige for the defender.

Additional Changes

Per moderations request, we will also be adding a anti-beige baiting mechanism alongside other changes.

• If you are beiged within x turns of declaring an offensive war, that beige does not apply until x (vote above) turns have passed since your last offensive war declaration.

Let us know what you guys think about each idea above, have a great day everyone!

[Lysander]

For idea two, would you mind clarifying? The first war lost - both offensive and defensive? Or solely the first defensive war lost, and losing offensive wars gives no beige?

Does beige not ticking down until all wars are finished includes offensives, unlike the proposed/tested system?

 

Also, this additional change:

 

• If you are beiged within 12 turns of declaring an offensive war, that beige does not apply until x (vote above) turns have passed since your last offensive war declaration.

This implies that if I’m currently slotted with three defensives and declare an offensive (maybe I can suicide ground or something to help an ally and haven’t been completely wiped), and then two turns later my three defensives all beige me; since your minimum option for x is 6 turns, doesn’t that leave four turns for my opponents to slot me again (since it won’t apply for those four turns) and then hold through beige?

If so, how is that going to apply to the beige timer depending on which idea gets added? Will the timers stop ticking, or keep ticking because the original defensives expired?

Edited July 13, 2023 by Lysander
Updated with another question

[KingGhost]

How does declaring new Offensives while having beige accrued work.

Im assuming all stored beige will be thrown out?

[BettaChecka]

Any form of having guaranteed damage-free beige from the defensive war expiry along with beige not ticking down till all wars expire just means any counter blitz its not possible unless not a single war is declared from the "losing" side at the initial blitz, if anything it completely has the opposite effect of the intent.  You can simply declare a war right before or just before the time out of the additional changes and extend your beige passed whatever those counter blitzing would be able to have. These changes are not taking into account what was learned during the test server tournament.

From Idea 1, I have suggested and support the extension of the beige cap to allow for proper time to build military and prevent the easier beige cycling which would have come from staggering the wars.  But that relies on beige not ticking down until wars are finished etc, this only provides an escape for the winning side from any counter blitz and would just result in even harsher losses on the losing side if they do try to militarise in beige. 

From Idea 2, Once again beige not ticking down has the problems mentioned above, as well as the guaranteed beige from expiry. Having the first war loss mean 7 days of beige also allows for the "winning" side to stagger very easily which is absolutely pointless if the intended use is getting rid of beige cycling. 

Additional changes: Beige baiting makes fighting losing wars easier, removing it is just going to make things harder and is easily avoidable + abusable by the winning side.

My propositions: To remove the "winning" side from being able to abuse the mechanics to dodge counter blitzes, instead of the defender getting guaranteed beige from expiry, make the nation with the lowest resistance get the beige. It still allows for the "winning" side to get beige in some cases but in the majority provided care is taken by the "losing" side will result in the "losing" side getting beige and being able to restock.

[Majima Goro]

Just make it so that beige doesn't reduce till all wars have defensive wars have expired. No need to make any other changes other than this really.

[Sam Cooper]

6 minutes ago, Village said:

If you are beiged within 12 turns of declaring an offensive war, that beige does not apply until x (vote above) turns have passed since your last offensive war declaration.

I'll look at the other ones in a bit but what kinda genius came up with this one?

why should I be discouraged from declaring wars just because I am already slotted and might get beiged in one of the wars?

you create a mechanic, we play by it, it occasionally puts some people in tough situations and now you are going out of your way to rewrite the rules back in their favour.

[Village]

13 minutes ago, Lysander said:

For idea two, would you mind clarifying? The first war lost - both offensive and defensive? Or solely the first defensive war lost, and losing offensive wars gives no beige?

Does beige not ticking down until all wars are finished includes offensives, unlike the proposed/tested system?

 

First war lost period, and it doesn't tick down until both offensives and defensives are finished unlike the current system.

 

14 minutes ago, Lysander said:

This implies that if I’m currently slotted with three defensives and declare an offensive (maybe I can suicide ground or something to help an ally and haven’t been completely wiped), and then two turns later my three defensives all beige me; since your minimum option for x is 6 turns, doesn’t that leave four turns for my opponents to slot me again (since it won’t apply for those four turns) and then hold through beige?

 

They would be able to slot you again, but then once that 6 turn timeout is up you'd be in beige with 7 days of beige that wouldn't tick down until those defensives are all off of you.

 

9 minutes ago, KingGhost said:

How does declaring new Offensives while having beige accrued work.

Im assuming all stored beige will be thrown out?

Yeah, just like present.

 

5 minutes ago, BettaChecka said:

My propositions: To remove the "winning" side from being able to abuse the mechanics to dodge counter blitzes, instead of the defender getting guaranteed beige from expiry, make the nation with the lowest resistance get the beige. It still allows for the "winning" side to get beige in some cases but in the majority provided care is taken by the "losing" side will result in the "losing" side getting beige and being able to restock.

Yeah that's a good thought

 

4 minutes ago, Majima Goro said:

Just make it so that beige doesn't reduce till all wars have defensive wars have expired. No need to make any other changes other than this really.

That still allows beige staggering and just sitting with your offensives, or very simply just never beiging your opponent and instead doing expire cycling instead of beige cycling.

 

Just now, Sam Cooper said:

I'll look at the other ones in a bit but what kinda genius came up with this one?

why should I be discouraged from declaring wars just because I am already slotted and might get beiged in one of the wars?

you create a mechanic, we play by it, it occasionally puts some people in tough situations and now you are going out of your way to rewrite the rules back in their favour.

Declaring wars with the intent to not fight and get beige is against the rules and has been basically forever. Moderation has been getting more and more cases about it and wants something to prevent the mechanics from encouraging rule breaking behavior, which is where that came out of.

[Rageproject]

Just stick to the original proposal. There will be gripes and perceived flaws with every iteration. But 5 days on beige uninterrupted is more than enough time to rebuild a full military to counter attack or be protected against future attacks. Nations who don’t build proper military defense (whether by under buying units or using sub-optimal builds) make their own choices in doing so.

[Franz Steiger]

The problem is that when the offensive side staggers beige, which makes the timings of when people are coming out of beige, not synced, it becomes problematic for the defending side to organize a proper counter blitz, since beige timers only tick down, when all wars have concluded.

Just now, Rageproject said:

Just stick to the original proposal. There will be gripes and perceived flaws with every iteration. But 5 days on beige uninterrupted is more than enough time to rebuild a full military to counter attack or be protected against future attacks. Nations who don’t build proper military defense (whether by under buying units or using sub-optimal builds) make their own choices in doing so.

 

[Rageproject]

I have heard about this. So basically just modify it to where someone cannot declare anymore wars once beiged in any war, and start the timer once all wars are expired. Leave the cap at 5 days beige. That should resolve everything, right?

[Franz Steiger]

Problem isn´t just the defensive side declaring wars, but also the offensive side beiging some people later than others. Basically they can control, when the beige timer starts to tick down, so they can choose, who to beige early and who to beige later.

[Raphael]

2 hours ago, Village said:

Current Changes

The current changes are below:

• Every player defeated in a defensive war results in 2.5 days (30 turns) of beige.
• Every player defeated in an offensive war results in 0.5 days (6 turns) of beige.
• All wars that end from expiration result in beige for the defending party.
• Beige accruals are capped at 5 days (60 turns).
• Beige accruals do not begin reducing down until all defensive wars end.
• Expired wars do not damage infrastructure or give loot like normal beige does.

So while I do support the idea that all wars end in beige, I bolded all the pieces I think detract from the idea. Offensive wars giving such little beige time is pretty silly, a nation losing a war almost always means they've lost their military and need time to recover. You don't even give a full update tick (12 turns) to recover a single buy of units for losing a war. Five days of accrual is not enough and this has been said since the very first pitch of this idea. Beige should start counting down from the time of war's end, people should be rewarded for being able to stagger wars and beiges. Finally, expired wars shouldn't have a disincentive as again that is a strategic choice. Expiry should fully beige people the same as a win. I see what the team is going for with these caveats, but I think they're overly simplistic and fail to address the issues they're aiming for.

It really feels like the team is overly worried about giving out too much beige and trying to half-implement this change. All wars ending in beige will change the meta regardless of the caveats, might as well fully embrace the change and flow with it instead of trying to stem the tide at every turn.

2 hours ago, Village said:

Idea 2

For the second idea, the current system is scrapped and replaced with four changes.

• The first war lost gives 7 days of beige, subsequent wars give no beige.
• Beige does not tick down until all wars are finished.
• Defensives resulting in expiry will result in 7 days of beige for the defender.

I see this as insanely exploitable. If we have an issue with slot filling and beige baiting now... jeez.

2 hours ago, Village said:

Per moderations request, we will also be adding a anti-beige baiting mechanism alongside other changes.

• If you are beiged within 12 turns of declaring an offensive war, that beige does not apply until x (vote above) turns have passed since your last offensive war declaration.

I don't want to sound overtly critical but moderation considerations are secondary to game features and balancing. This is a bad change and the fact that you didn't include an option to vote for "bad change" in the poll is disheartening. I voted for the least amount of time just because I wanted to vote on other pieces more than I wanted to abstain from picking a bad choice.

Edited July 13, 2023 by Roberts

[Village]

1 hour ago, Rageproject said:

I have heard about this. So basically just modify it to where someone cannot declare anymore wars once beiged in any war, and start the timer once all wars are expired. Leave the cap at 5 days beige. That should resolve everything, right?

Then can you still just remove beige at any time, meaning it's pointless to restrict you from declaring war once you've been beiged. That also doesn't solve any of the beige baiting issues or beige staggering issues.

Just now, Roberts said:

I see this as insanely exploitable. If we have an issue with slot filling and beige baiting now... jeez.

It is exploitable, and that's what the beige baiting change is for as well.

Just now, Roberts said:

I don't want to sound overtly critical but moderation considerations are secondary to game features and balancing. This is a bad change and the fact that you didn't include an option to vote for "bad change" in the poll is disheartening.

I don't want to not include a "bad change" vote, but the fact remains that beige baiting is and remains against the rules and moderation wants something done about it. We're more than happy to take other suggestions for a change, but at the moment I haven't seen any comments about this specific change beyond people being angry that they're not allowed to beige bait.

Just now, Roberts said:

It really feels like the team is overly worried about giving out too much beige and trying to half-implement this change. All wars ending in beige will change the meta regardless of the caveats, might as well fully embrace the change and flow with it instead of trying to stem the tide at every turn.

We're not trying to give out like 14 days of beige, we're trying to implement something once and leave it, that accomplishes the goals set out without overcompensating. No it's not perfect, but nothing ever is. That's why we're asking for feedback, to improve things.

[whiskerz]

How much "Beige baiting "? and "slot filling"? is actually happening during war ? This seems like we are addressing a minor problem with big changes. I can not recall ever seeing a case of either one.  I have had a few wars and have been here a minute.  Are we talking 5% of all wars or 25%? This matters.  It seems like you are trying to fix a minor problem with a hammer.

[Ketya]

Just can’t stop thinking how much cool new things you guys could have added to the game with all this energy 🙂 versus the tweaks that will just keep getting argued

[Sam Cooper]

4 hours ago, Village said:

Declaring wars with the intent to not fight and get beige is against the rules and has been basically forever. Moderation has been getting more and more cases about it and wants something to prevent the mechanics from encouraging rule breaking behavior, which is where that came out of.

multiple things:

1. every single alliance, including the ones that made you propose this, ask their membership to declare some wars just to gain more beige time when they are losing, what you are declaring to be against the game rules since forever literally has been a major part the milcom strategies in a 'losing' war, it is simply a byproduct of the war system that you have created.

2. how many reports do you get of this specific issues compared to the number of wars that are declared? what's the ratio? is it large enough to justify this blanket policy on all wars?

3. are we going to see a similar policy for slot filling? I can propose some policies that will match the theme-:

3a. if you have 2 defensives already, you can't be hit with a third defensive until you have declared all your offensives and it has been 12 turns since you declared your last offensive.

3b. you can't be hit with a defensive war at all unless you already have at least one offensive and waited 12 turns. (you'd love my genius)

3c. for every 2 offensives you declare, you can only be hit with one defensive and it has to be the alliance being hit, this would ensure all parties being hit get a fair chance to counter.

You didn't address my concerns at all so you are either not understanding the implications of this change or have been arm twisted by larger alliances into doing it anyway, I'll make one more attempt to explain:

Here's what my active wars look like

I know TKR nation is going to beige me in about 6-7 turns, my experience allows me to predict with above average accuracy so why am I being put into a perpetual cycle of counters for declaring raids before a war ends? let's say I hit an Eclipse before TKR beiges me, Eclipse reaches out to TKR and requests them hold beige to let their counter be ready first so they don't miss the 6/8/12 turn window. Would you call that unfair coordination? are you not creating another problem to solve one? only change you have made here is who gets affected by this; as always, pirates.

so who is the underdog here and what fairness does this policy bring to the game?

Instead of fixing the war system where tiering is supreme and individuals don't matter you are desperate to save these big babies from first minor inconvenience they encounter, it took mere 13 days from Alex reaching out to me about this and this being put into an official proposal.

[Benfro]

Glad to see a resounding rejection of Idea 2, this is begging for major exploitation. If there is no consequence for additional losses beyond the first, this will only further incentivize baiting and slot issues.

[Avatar Patrick]

I think we should keep the current changes and see how they work in a live server setting before jumping to make even more drastic changes. The average global isn't nearly as one sided as dnnla vs schlosers after all. And I disagree with the attempt to end "beige baiting" and I'm not even a pirate. It's not a very frequent problem and it requires some level of skill to pull off. Piracy has been nerfed enough over the years and I don't think it needs to be further discouraged by gameplay mechanics. Not to mention, what happens when someone unintentionally beiges at the wrong time? They lose any possible chance of rebuild as the dogpiling coalition mercilessly goes in for an early round 2.

[Zei-Sakura Alsainn]

Yeah I'm gonna be real here, if you think beige baiting "is and always has been against the rules" you 1. have no idea what it is or how it actually works and 2. have no earthly idea on this games actual history, moderation or wars.

Firstly, beige baiting only really works if they have a reason to do it. Only the absolute most clueless of players will beige you if you have no military and don't do anything.

Which is nobody to get beiged does this! Shocking, I know! So here's how ya do it.

Find your target. Less experienced players are better, so you'll typically look for maximum down declares. Your double buys are also a lot more dangerous to them (though with the counters that'll come it won't kill the lil guy if they're active) but it can cause them to panic and give them reason to beige you. Nukes work great too, and missiles in low tier if they don't have ID. 

If possible, you want to also select someone whose war history is filled with tossing out beige. 

Now if you're sitting here and thinking to yourself "Gee, isn't this behavior like... EXACTLY what eclipse was doing last war?" That's because it is. It's literally just routine down declare guerilla fighting and nuke turreting.

Or in layman's terms, it's a "Two birds, one stone" situation. 

Anybody who declares with nothing and does nothing isn't baiting for beige because there's no reason to give them any. They're just a muppet slotfilling.

Nevermind that this tactic and objective only exists because of beige mechanics to begin with, meaning of course if you fixed them, this tactic would, by nature if the fix is anything remotely good, not only be impossible, but also completely unnecessary.

And of course, the practice has been around since beige has. Nobody has ever been striked for it. Because, again, it's identical to guerilla fighting when KOd, since, as it turns out, you can actually pursue multiple objectives with one course of action. 

 

 

Tl;dr - If your changes actually work, beige baiting won't really be a thing anymore, because it won't be necessary. You literally don't need to do anything but the basic task the community already assigned for this one, just chill and focus on the rest.

 

Voted 6, because there was no "this is a laughable waste of time" option.

Edited July 14, 2023 by Zei-Sakura Alsainn

[Pascal]

Unsurprisingly the ones exploiting/cheating are the most vocal ones against it kek

Why change something that benefits you and that the moderation can do nothing about?

Edited July 14, 2023 by Pascal

[Sam Cooper]

47 minutes ago, Pascal said:

Unsurprisingly the ones exploiting/cheating are the most vocal ones against it kek

Why change something that benefits you and that the moderation can do nothing about?

sure pascal, any war mechanics that doesn't benefit you is an exploit and should immediately be rewritten to make sure you are always safe and secure, sure.

[Zei-Sakura Alsainn]

3 hours ago, Sam Cooper said:

sure pascal, any war mechanics that doesn't benefit you is an exploit and should immediately be rewritten to make sure you are always safe and secure, sure.

It's especially funny because I haven't been involved in a global in like 18 months, and he just was, and his side was literally referenced by me on how beige baiting is an objective paired with others in a single action, lol.

[TheDoom]

5 hours ago, Pascal said:

Unsurprisingly the ones exploiting/cheating are the most vocal ones against it kek

Why change something that benefits you and that the moderation can do nothing about?

If someone is cheating/exploiting the right way to approach it would be to report to moderation and let them decide. You will always find something not going your way as "cheating"

I mean if i get 3 guys to slot me when they have 0 mil just to nuke missile me and I use that to hit others.Right way to deal with it is to report-moderation points ,not to ask game dev to change war mechanics in a way as to not allow anyone with 0 military to declare war on anyone in future.

The proposed change will affect raiders disproportionately.It will make counters sitting on raiders more troublesome to deal with, in a 4 day raid cycle where i used to declare like 8-12 wars and used to loose to 3 counters now i will be loosing to 6 counters. So instead of loosing 36 % of what i looted i will now loose 72% in a 4days raid cycle

[Krampus]

I have said this in private and I'll say it again: I dont think its smart to make such all encompassing rules without testing your changes first. if anything, the test server is the perfect evidence that the initial changes the design team discussed ended up falling short of the goals, hence this need for this post in the first place. In a similar vein, the beige bait rule focuses on one aspect of how people use war mechanics, and will have unintended consequences. This isn't a well thought out rule. 

it will affect raiders more than everyone else, whereas in reality the rule is only being introduced because alex CBA'd to moderate slotfills during globals. it would make more sense to come up with a better definition or some sort of alternative, than seriously harm a valid playstyle for a fraction of a fraction of wars declared during globals.  

Edited July 14, 2023 by Krampus

[Pascal]

2 hours ago, Zei-Sakura Alsainn said:

It's especially funny because I haven't been involved in a global in like 18 months, and he just was, and his side was literally referenced by me on how beige baiting is an objective paired with others in a single action, lol.

I mean, don't take it the wrong way, but, I wasn't referring to you and didn't bother reading your comment.