Brainstorming Future Updates

[Keegoz]

This thread is to just throw out some ideas I have on potential warfare updates, they are light on detail because I don't want to go too in-depth with a proposal that is universally diskliked. These will be military themed mostly, as we've just completed a econ related update. I'll outline some of the issues I think the game is facing with each idea.

Idea 1

This is a simple one, make naval warfare better. Blockades are 'okay' but ultimately a weak bonus to war given how costly ships are.

So a couple of potential ideas, to fix this issue. Allow ships to kill both ground and air units, much like ground can kill air after multiple successful attacks, allow ships to do the same but to a lesser amount for both air/ground.

Alternatively, give ships different attack types, like planes have and allow them to focus other units.

 

Idea 2

The game needs more investment avenues, especially for players reaching the late game. The game needs to shift from cities being the only meaningful way to 'gain' a military edge (it also probably needs to be the same on the econ side but that's for another day). 

The idea is to allow players to research army modifiers making their units more powerful.

• You can upgrade each military area (navy, air, ground) to have an increased modifier
• Each investment would improve one area by 0.1% in effectiveness
• The upgrades would gradually increase in cost and would require resources/cash giving the game a new resources sink

This idea is probably going to be tied into a naval buff, otherwise I cannot see many players buffing their navy.

 

Idea 3

Probably my most controversial idea, and the least fleshed out, but basically the game needs more to potentially do other than war/farm. Raiding has always been a good way for players to do something, however the playstyle can be off-putting for some and it is difficult to balance war mechanics where raiding isn't either buffed too much or nerfed too hard.

The idea is to make raiding its own thing, with its own units and the removal of it causing infra damage to your or the opposing nation. This would require some changes to warfare as well, essientially ending looting from wars (at least any resources from beiging someone). What this would look like, I'd probably need some feedback from the raiding community but it is probably the only way the game can feasibly balance both the war side and the raiding side of the game.

It could also allow players to do more during wars, as you'd be able to potentially do raids on opponents as well as the normal wars.

 

As I said, this is me basically spitballing. Feel free to let me know if you like any of the proposals or have any ideas that could perhaps improve upon them.

If anything seems to take the communities interest then I'll chuck it to the design team to have a more detailed proposal later on.

[MinesomeMC]

18 minutes ago, Keegoz said:

This thread is to just throw out some ideas I have on potential warfare updates, they are light on detail because I don't want to go too in-depth with a proposal that is universally diskliked. These will be military themed mostly, as we've just completed a econ related update. I'll outline some of the issues I think the game is facing with each idea.

Idea 1

This is a simple one, make naval warfare better. Blockades are 'okay' but ultimately a weak bonus to war given how costly ships are.

So a couple of potential ideas, to fix this issue. Allow ships to kill both ground and air units, much like ground can kill air after multiple successful attacks, allow ships to do the same but to a lesser amount for both air/ground.

Alternatively, give ships different attack types, like planes have and allow them to focus other units.

 

Idea

I agree with navy killing air. And ground Units only makes sense in a Naval Bombardment attack type. Also when air units attack naval units you should lose some air as naval ships do tend to be equipped with antiair

[Sweeeeet Ronny D]

Navy kills infra, lots of infra, that is its job.

[Keegoz]

41 minutes ago, Sweeeeet Ronny D said:

Navy kills infra, lots of infra, that is its job.

Expensively and inefficiently which in this game is as good as useless.

[Kohai Ky]

2 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Idea 1

This is a simple one, make naval warfare better. Blockades are 'okay' but ultimately a weak bonus to war given how costly ships are.

So a couple of potential ideas, to fix this issue. Allow ships to kill both ground and air units, much like ground can kill air after multiple successful attacks, allow ships to do the same but to a lesser amount for both air/ground.

Alternatively, give ships different attack types, like planes have and allow them to focus other units.

Adding a separate attack type to naval would be interesting given ground can kill air in great numbers.  But it is only realistic if irl military just you know left all their aircraft chilling unmanned.

Navy ships in real war literally do artillery bombardments of battlefields to soften up the enemy and depending on the source, time reference, weaponry/ship class, country. Naval artillery can be used on ground troops and armored vehicles effectively at 20-106 miles away.
A commonly known example is the American invasion of Okinawa, firing 300,000 shells and over 1 million 105 mm howitzer rounds.

Less affective would be naval on air unless you’re making ships=aircraft carriers.  Besides that, there is a substantial amount of surface to air missiles as well as ballistic missile defense systems on American fleets. Effectiveness is definitely less than air on air irl and in game. And definitely less effective than ground on air in game.

All in all, I 100% support this potential update as long as it doesn’t completely outweigh air. At a minimum I think naval on air casualties should be 1/2-1/3 of air on air in an IT role if unchallenged by navy.

Ground on the other hand could realistically be put as if you got the unopposed air v tank or air v soldiers, but combine the statistics to be 1/2 of each as in comparison to air on ground.
A possible caveat being that 2 successful navals on ground could end ground superiority?
And make it where when naval attacks ground, air could defend, destroying some ships, but no matter what artillery will cause ground units to be destroyed

[Sweeeeet Ronny D]

1 hour ago, Keegoz said:

Expensively and inefficiently which in this game is as good as useless.

big numbers are fun.  Big navy brings big numbers.  Plus that is what warchests are for.

[Hwan]

Ideas 1 and 2 mainly buff whales, although 2 is laughable because 0.1% is nothing. The ship change will effectively do nothing except deal some unit damage when on the way down, which is the only case when you use your ships. (Unless you buff ships so that they become the only viable option in which case we'll be playing battleships)

And 3 just sucks and is uncalled for. How will the playstyle stop being off-putting when you essentially do the same thing but with "different units"?

[KindaEpicMoah]

#BringBackPerks

[SleepingNinja]

For the umpteenth time.

1. Propaganda Bureau 2.0, make it affordable for everyone with only requirement being having Propaganda Bureau itself. And there's a few different ways you could do this, just copy/paste PB more or less OR make it so it's super powerful but needs some extra steps for it to work.

Example : PB2 or what I thought up 'Emergency Conscription' would be a project that effectively lowers the amount of days (by 1) to max out military but it only works while a nation is in beige, that's important, once your not in beige it won't work anymore so things aren't unfair while actually fighting others. Again this is just a quick example of what could be done as an alternative to just "X project 2.0 raises rebuys by Y percentile" Also maybe, perhaps, it could include a discount to military units to make rebuying military more cost effective to allow nations losing in wars - like a 20% aluminum discount to planes or ships costing 25k per ship instead of 50k. To add incentive to AA's for rebuys to be a legitimate way to conduct losing wars.

And again, it's very important that if a project like this comes into existence that it's cheap and most of the player base has easy access to it, it's not meant to be a project to give specific nations an advantage, it's meant to provide an alternative to lobbing nukes & missiles.

2. Spy ops change : if a nation is in beige they cannot spy other nations or get spied in return. Spying while in beige will remove you from beige just like declaring war. 

[Sketchy]

6 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Idea 1

This is a simple one, make naval warfare better. Blockades are 'okay' but ultimately a weak bonus to war given how costly ships are.

So a couple of potential ideas, to fix this issue. Allow ships to kill both ground and air units, much like ground can kill air after multiple successful attacks, allow ships to do the same but to a lesser amount for both air/ground.

Alternatively, give ships different attack types, like planes have and allow them to focus other units.

Hmm. I am unsure whether or not opening Navy up to hit other units is a good or bad thing. Game already is very rock paper scissors, units feel interchangeable.

Perhaps it would be better to make them actual viable infra killers? Reduce costs to operate and build, and make them more specialized towards dealing infra damage. Perhaps give them special attacks for breaking controls? Like for example, 6 or 8 maps to break ground/air control.

Something that gives them a more unique style, rather than becoming Planes 2.0 but less cost effective.

6 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Idea 2

The game needs more investment avenues, especially for players reaching the late game. The game needs to shift from cities being the only meaningful way to 'gain' a military edge (it also probably needs to be the same on the econ side but that's for another day). 

The idea is to allow players to research army modifiers making their units more powerful.

• You can upgrade each military area (navy, air, ground) to have an increased modifier
• Each investment would improve one area by 0.1% in effectiveness
• The upgrades would gradually increase in cost and would require resources/cash giving the game a new resources sink

This idea is probably going to be tied into a naval buff, otherwise I cannot see many players buffing their navy.

I don't mind this idea. As long as the costs and bonuses are scaled properly, which would presumably be something that is hammered down later. I think small incremental amounts would be ideal, so 0.1% seems right. Obviously I assume they'd be a bit cheaper than cities. A 10% bonus to military (which it seems would require 100 upgrades) would be pretty significant, especially since I assume it would scale by city size.

I think the main issue, is like cities, this needs some sort of soft or hard cap, and to prevent things from getting out of hand.

6 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Idea 3

Probably my most controversial idea, and the least fleshed out, but basically the game needs more to potentially do other than war/farm. Raiding has always been a good way for players to do something, however the playstyle can be off-putting for some and it is difficult to balance war mechanics where raiding isn't either buffed too much or nerfed too hard.

The idea is to make raiding its own thing, with its own units and the removal of it causing infra damage to your or the opposing nation. This would require some changes to warfare as well, essientially ending looting from wars (at least any resources from beiging someone). What this would look like, I'd probably need some feedback from the raiding community but it is probably the only way the game can feasibly balance both the war side and the raiding side of the game.

It could also allow players to do more during wars, as you'd be able to potentially do raids on opponents as well as the normal wars.

Oh boy.

Yeah I've been an advocate of doing something like this for awhile. Raiding and War are two mechanics that have in many cases opposing priorities. Having to consider how changes will impact raiding, every single time a war change is discussed, has held back both from evolving as mechanics.

Separating the two out allows both to be worked on and improved.

[Alastor]

10 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Idea 1

This is a simple one, make naval warfare better. Blockades are 'okay' but ultimately a weak bonus to war given how costly ships are.

So a couple of potential ideas, to fix this issue. Allow ships to kill both ground and air units, much like ground can kill air after multiple successful attacks, allow ships to do the same but to a lesser amount for both air/ground.

Alternatively, give ships different attack types, like planes have and allow them to focus other units.

Not bad, flesh this out more though. It would be nice to see this get more creative rather than become another poorly balanced part of the "rock, papers, scissors" thing.

My thought would be to give navies a drop down list of operations (like planes) that give the player choice and utility:

 

1. Blockade (Reduces resistance but avoids a large naval battle, lower casualties than normal)

2. Break Blockade (in my opinion it should be easier to break a blockade than establish one)

3. Soften defenses (give ground units a significant buff to attack)

4. Airspace control (give attacking planes a significant debuff)

5. Shell coast -- reduces infra at a more efficient rate than planes. Big number go up. (Reduces resistance)

6. Direct naval engagement -- fleet vs. fleet, kills boats at a higher rate than the current naval attack. (Reduces resistance) 

 

Notice how only some options reduce resistance. Turtling and utility plays should be a thing. Also note the word "significant" because naval actions take 4 MAPs and reduce the most resistance other than nukes and missiles. These should be powerful options to reflect that you spent 33% of your daily MAPs.

 

You could come up with more but the point is navies are extremely powerful tools irl. PnW has long neglected that fact.

 

10 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Idea 2

The game needs more investment avenues, especially for players reaching the late game. The game needs to shift from cities being the only meaningful way to 'gain' a military edge (it also probably needs to be the same on the econ side but that's for another day). 

The idea is to allow players to research army modifiers making their units more powerful.

• You can upgrade each military area (navy, air, ground) to have an increased modifier
• Each investment would improve one area by 0.1% in effectiveness
• The upgrades would gradually increase in cost and would require resources/cash giving the game a new resources sink

This idea is probably going to be tied into a naval buff, otherwise I cannot see many players buffing their navy.

Pretty solid idea just don't timelock it like cities.

10 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Idea 3

Probably my most controversial idea, and the least fleshed out, but basically the game needs more to potentially do other than war/farm. Raiding has always been a good way for players to do something, however the playstyle can be off-putting for some and it is difficult to balance war mechanics where raiding isn't either buffed too much or nerfed too hard.

The idea is to make raiding its own thing, with its own units and the removal of it causing infra damage to your or the opposing nation. This would require some changes to warfare as well, essientially ending looting from wars (at least any resources from beiging someone). What this would look like, I'd probably need some feedback from the raiding community but it is probably the only way the game can feasibly balance both the war side and the raiding side of the game.

It could also allow players to do more during wars, as you'd be able to potentially do raids on opponents as well as the normal wars.

 

As I said, this is me basically spitballing. Feel free to let me know if you like any of the proposals or have any ideas that could perhaps improve upon them.

If anything seems to take the communities interest then I'll chuck it to the design team to have a more detailed proposal later on.

Respectfully, return to the chalkboard here.

I think what you're describing would fit better as an espionage mechanic.

Edited October 3 by Alastor

[Shore]

13 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Idea 3

 

 

Probably my most controversial idea, and the least fleshed out, but basically the game needs more to potentially do other than war/farm. Raiding has always been a good way for players to do something, however the playstyle can be off-putting for some and it is difficult to balance war mechanics where raiding isn't either buffed too much or nerfed too hard.

The idea is to make raiding its own thing, with its own units and the removal of it causing infra damage to your or the opposing nation. This would require some changes to warfare as well, essientially ending looting from wars (at least any resources from beiging someone). What this would look like, I'd probably need some feedback from the raiding community but it is probably the only way the game can feasibly balance both the war side and the raiding side of the game.

It could also allow players to do more during wars, as you'd be able to potentially do raids on opponents as well as the normal wars.

 

As I said, this is me basically spitballing. Feel free to let me know if you like any of the proposals or have any ideas that could perhaps improve upon them.

If anything seems to take the communities interest then I'll chuck it to the design team to have a more detailed proposal later on.

Absolutely not. 

[Sketchy]

4 hours ago, Alastor said:

Respectfully, return to the chalkboard here.

I think what you're describing would fit better as an espionage mechanic.

In the 8 or so years I've played this game, one of the consistent impediments to changes that improve the war system is how those same changes would impact raiding as a mechanic.

Actual substantive progress on improving war mechanics, held back because of conflicting priorities.

Seperating the two mechanics creates an opportunity to improve both without making the other worse.

[Keegoz]

37 minutes ago, Sketchy said:

In the 8 or so years I've played this game, one of the consistent impediments to changes that improve the war system is how those same changes would impact raiding as a mechanic.

Actual substantive progress on improving war mechanics, held back because of conflicting priorities.

Seperating the two mechanics creates an opportunity to improve both without making the other worse.

Yeah, people that like raiding may actually get buffs if we separated it. 

[Keegoz]

11 hours ago, KindaEpicMoah said:

#BringBackPerks

People need to drop this, or straight up design it without breaking the game lol. It was a nightmare the first time around and the different elements probably means it would take a year on its own to potentially code, another year probably rebalancing. Perks would be the last update the game probably would ever get, and I just don't feel like it was ever worth it.

 

10 hours ago, SleepingNinja said:

For the umpteenth time.

1. Propaganda Bureau 2.0, make it affordable for everyone with only requirement being having Propaganda Bureau itself. And there's a few different ways you could do this, just copy/paste PB more or less OR make it so it's super powerful but needs some extra steps for it to work.

Example : PB2 or what I thought up 'Emergency Conscription' would be a project that effectively lowers the amount of days (by 1) to max out military but it only works while a nation is in beige, that's important, once your not in beige it won't work anymore so things aren't unfair while actually fighting others. Again this is just a quick example of what could be done as an alternative to just "X project 2.0 raises rebuys by Y percentile" Also maybe, perhaps, it could include a discount to military units to make rebuying military more cost effective to allow nations losing in wars - like a 20% aluminum discount to planes or ships costing 25k per ship instead of 50k. To add incentive to AA's for rebuys to be a legitimate way to conduct losing wars.

And again, it's very important that if a project like this comes into existence that it's cheap and most of the player base has easy access to it, it's not meant to be a project to give specific nations an advantage, it's meant to provide an alternative to lobbing nukes & missiles.

2. Spy ops change : if a nation is in beige they cannot spy other nations or get spied in return. Spying while in beige will remove you from beige just like declaring war. 

Thanks for reminding me of this idea. I did mention it a while back about allowing beige to rebuild units quicker. You could potentially have the rebuy be one project and the discount be another?

The spy op change was also on my radar. I do really like these ideas.

5 hours ago, Alastor said:

Not bad, flesh this out more though. It would be nice to see this get more creative rather than become another poorly balanced part of the "rock, papers, scissors" thing.

My thought would be to give navies a drop down list of operations (like planes) that give the player choice and utility:

1. Blockade (Reduces resistance but avoids a large naval battle, lower casualties than normal)

2. Break Blockade (in my opinion it should be easier to break a blockade than establish one)

3. Soften defenses (give ground units a significant buff to attack)

4. Airspace control (give attacking planes a significant debuff)

5. Shell coast -- reduces infra at a more efficient rate than planes. Big number go up. (Reduces resistance)

6. Direct naval engagement -- fleet vs. fleet, kills boats at a higher rate than the current naval attack. (Reduces resistance) 

Yeah, I did mention that one option was to allow ships to have their own drop down menu. I quite like the ideas as well to make them a bit more unique.

 

As always guys, I will only be recognising those that give constructive feedback. The pearl clutching from some, towards even the idea of change is tiresome and I will continue to ignore it. It's fine if you don't like an idea but either come up with a better one, alter mine so you do like it etc.

[Uriah 'the Fox']

12 hours ago, SleepingNinja said:

2. Spy ops change : if a nation is in beige they cannot spy other nations or get spied in return. Spying while in beige will remove you from beige just like declaring war. 

Personally think spyops in general need an overhaul to become more relevant in the current meta before considering if spying in beige should pull you out of beige.

Edited October 4 by Uriah 'the Fox'

[Panky]

scratch the 3rd idea and all good 

[Ketya]

Funny how the #bringbackperks is the most upvoted post  maybe, there is some meaning behind it 😲

[KindaEpicMoah]

17 hours ago, Keegoz said:

it would take a year on its own to potentially code

This is basically true of a major content update for a game with a coding team this small, and especially true for any update in PnW.

17 hours ago, Keegoz said:

another year probably rebalancing

Also true of any major content update.

17 hours ago, Keegoz said:

I just don't feel like it was ever worth it.

Though I feel like the perks system/the perks themselves needed further changes/rebalancing/a full on redo, the idea itself is still both fairly popular and a way to diversify player strategy. Even if the mechanic was greatly simplified (like the original idea here), which I think would be the way to go, it would still provide something for people to experiment with and wouldn't be a massive coding burden. If it works out, the system could be fleshed out more over time. 

[SleepingNinja]

17 hours ago, Keegoz said:

Thanks for reminding me of this idea. I did mention it a while back about allowing beige to rebuild units quicker. You could potentially have the rebuy be one project and the discount be another?

The spy op change was also on my radar. I do really like these ideas.

I personally think it's kinda important to keep the quicker rebuilds and "cheaper units" together as one project, I'm not trying to get a project in place for cheaper units in general but cheaper for those that are losing. Uhh it's also probably fine if it's 2 projects if you keep them connected like that and it's easier to code but I'll just stress one more time that it's very important that if a project(s) like this comes into existence that it's cheap and most of the player base has easy access to it, it's not meant to be a project to give specific nations an advantage, it's meant to provide an alternative to lobbing nukes & missiles.

Maybe to expand on what I mean by most of the player base has access to it I mean a C20 should be able to easily fund the project(s) through their own income, like cheap and even players as low as C10 could technically have access to it. I don't want this to be some kind of whale or dolphin gate.

[hidude45454]

tl;dr Sheepy has abandoned meaningfully coding the game, all the new devs suck too much to write, test, and push code in a reliable and speedy way, everyone else argues too much in circles to ever come up with anything interesting, and we are never gonna have any more interesting game content that means anything significant beyond pressing like 2 extra buttons a year

PnW is cooked

Edited October 5 by hidude45454

[Aaron JT]

I feel like Idea 1 would go over well and can possibly be a game changer during war, but I feel like naval already has a purpose as if you do a naval attack, you are going to cause a large amount of infra damage to your opponent

I would like Idea 2 to have each investment to improve one area by like 2-5%. 0.1% is a laughably low number and makes the improvement not worth it in the long run, unless the cost is also artificially low.

I do not like Idea 3 at all and everything about that needs to be scrapped.

Edited October 5 by Aaron JT

[Stanko1987]

Please do not go with idea 3 as this would completely kill off raiding and many people would just end up leaving after. If anything, we should look at introducing new projects that can bump up raiding as well as farming, whilst also altering current projects and improving their functions. Also raiding should be more encouraged as pirates actually keep the game alive and forces players to remain and stay active. We should look at brainstorming ideas on how to improve both raiding and farming, forcing players to engage more in the game, allowing for more conflicts, dramas, alliance wars and global wars becoming more frequent and more common. We shouldn't turn politics and war into farmvile.

[Exalts]

On 10/3/2024 at 2:17 PM, Keegoz said:

This is a simple one, make naval warfare better. Blockades are 'okay' but ultimately a weak bonus to war given how costly ships are.

So a couple of potential ideas, to fix this issue. Allow ships to kill both ground and air units, much like ground can kill air after multiple successful attacks, allow ships to do the same but to a lesser amount for both air/ground.

Alternatively, give ships different attack types, like planes have and allow them to focus other units.

If ships can kill ground and air, then people will keep ships in peacetime, and I generally don't think it is healthy for units to kill so much stuff. I have been complaining a lot about tanks killing aircraft before, how it dumbs down a lot of wars to "downdeclare, spam ground, kill everything."

Giving them multiple attacks might be a better balance, since ships are essentially useless right now.

On 10/3/2024 at 2:17 PM, Keegoz said:

The game needs more investment avenues, especially for players reaching the late game. The game needs to shift from cities being the only meaningful way to 'gain' a military edge (it also probably needs to be the same on the econ side but that's for another day). 

The idea is to allow players to research army modifiers making their units more powerful.

• You can upgrade each military area (navy, air, ground) to have an increased modifier
• Each investment would improve one area by 0.1% in effectiveness
• The upgrades would gradually increase in cost and would require resources/cash giving the game a new resources sink

This idea is probably going to be tied into a naval buff, otherwise I cannot see many players buffing their navy.

I see, so everyone will invest in ground and air then. I'm not sure how problematic that would realistically end up being, it depends on the costs I suppose. I think if this goes through, attackers will need to know how much of an advantage (or disadvantage) they are at when pulling off attacks.

[Stanko1987]

If we are going to make the game become more fun, interesting, engaging and keeping the game alive. Also to keep player retention we will have to buff up both Raiding and Farming, not nerf raiding or making raiding become more difficult as 30% if not more players practically just raid.

We should look at increasing ground loot to 10% and adding alliance bank loot by 5% for Pirate Economy. For Advance Pirate Economy Add an additional 10% ground loot bonus for Advance Pirate Economy increasing it to 15% for ground loot bonus whilst increasing the alliance bank loot from a defeated nation by another 10% bringing it to 20% for alliance bank loot with the Advance Pirate Economy.

 

Also i propose adding two additional projects for farming, allowing farming to also get a little bit of a buffing up

 

1. Farming Economy (Increasing food productivity bonus by 10%, increasing raw material production by 5%. whilst increasing Aluminum, Steel, Gasoline and Munition production by 10%.

2. Advance Farming Economy (Increasing Food Productivity Bonus by an additional 10% whilst increasing raw material production bonus by an additional 10% and 5% more bonus for Aluminium, Steel, Gasoline and Munitions) You need Farming Economy to build Advance Farming Economy. 

 

Pricing for these two projects you decide Keegoz.

 

Also I propose we go back to the proposal by adding experience points for Soldiers, Tanks, Air and Ships as proposed by Alex in the past, that units that have experienced in both victory and defeated wars end up gaining experience points, whilst you can also lose these experience points if the older units are wiped out, we should look at implementing that also or it least trial it out on the test server, i can't find the thread for the proposal or else i would have added it here as a reference to something we could go back into and looking at it. 

 

 Also we should look at adding Drones and testing it on the test server, as having drones can change the dynamic of how wars are being fought and conducted, since now in modern times, drones in real life are being more commonly used and becoming more mainstream. 

 

Also i would also like this to be considered and reviewed since it's never got enough attention in the past so i thought i'll add this in as well.