The future of the game: Outlook not so good.

[Prefontaine]

The game is in a bit of trouble, and that trouble is missiles, and eventually nukes. Before I get into the meat and potatoes of the post I want you all to realize making missiles weaker makes alliances vested in them weaker. Guardian has by far the highest percentage of missiles in any major alliance, almost all of our members have them. What I'm suggesting will weaken my alliances position in the game, so please understand that when reading this. I want to fix something, and in doing so it makes me weaker, but it needs to be fixed. Badly.

 

Missiles are too powerful. They also make fighting boring once you get them because 90% of your actions will be missiles if you have the missiles to do it. They also increase your strength by 10 for each missile, so I can be a 600 strength nation with about 1k infra in each city, buy 20 missiles and just about reach the top nation in the game. His infra costs much more than mine, so I can just blow is up, sure he can blow up mine but 0-1200 infra costs almost the same as 1200-1300 infra. He'll lose lots more money than I will in fighting. This will be the way of the political wars in this game, the weaker alliance can snipe the stronger alliance and take lose damage. Both sides lose, one side loses more. Then the side that was beaten down will lick its wounds and restock missiles, but not rebuild that silly infra so high, so they can in turn snipe the people who beat them last time. This is how it will continue. No one will build infra high, because it's too easy to lose. the ROI and risk is not worth it. 

 

We need to fix it, and fix it now. So how do we do that? Ideas have been suggested that nerf missiles, or remove them. I don't think that's the answer. Currently damaging lots of infra isn't that doable without missiles, but missiles will take all your action points. Make missiles be separate from a war, like spies, but have a military range. The can do a reasonable amount of damage to a city, they can destroy land, and blow up an improvement. The second two are important as there's no ways to do either well at the moment. You also have a number of defensive missile slots per day, like spies. But this number but this number should be 1 higher, and Iron dome reduces that total by 1, and reduces 25% of the damage to infra and land. 

[Kastor (Old Account)]

Why not lower the price of Infra? 

[Keegoz]

I agree largely with this. I think missiles should be more strategic than just a big bomb to be launched every now and then. I also like the idea of losing land and improvements.

 

Note I just bought missiles myself but even I think that they are leading the games stagnation in the war area between larger nations.

[Prefontaine]

They should also hurt some units. Tone back the infra damage to something near 50, land damage near the same, blow up and improvement, kill a barracks worth of soldiers, factory worth of tanks, hanger of planes, shipyard of boats, some amount in that unit range. (3k soldiers 250 tanks 18 planes 5 boats max based on the military buildings you have in the city hit) Still very good, but not the only thing used in a war.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Prefontaine

[Ashland]

Having them destroy those numbers of units would officially render tanks useless. Quickest 250 steel you ever blew through lol. I liked what you said til you got to the units bit. That's too much.

 

Why don't we just reduce the infra damage for now? That would address the problem you brought up. Why add a bunch of new bells and whistles that haven't been tested at all?

 

Just asking because I didn't see a reason why.

 

As it stands it seems to me like you're making them more powerful because they debilitated the enemy's capacity to make war and will give the side starting the war an even bigger advantage than they have already. Because, what, if you start the war a minute before the update how much of their military can you just wipe out instantly provided they're offline for two hours, which is what happened in the Marionette War.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Ashland

[WISD0MTREE]

Why not lower the price of Infra? 

Then everyone in the game right now would be at a disadvantage to new players. 

[Hysteria]

Cant see why Sheepy cant make it so that you need a well rounded army so there is some need for other units in the late game other than missiles and nukes.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Hysteria

[Prefontaine]

Having them destroy those numbers of units would officially render tanks useless. Quickest 250 steel you ever blew through lol. I liked what you said til you got to the units bit. That's too much.

 

Why don't we just reduce the infra damage for now? That would address the problem you brought up. Why add a bunch of new bells and whistles that haven't been tested at all?

 

Just asking because I didn't see a reason why.

 

As it stands it seems to me like you're making them more powerful because they debilitated the enemy's capacity to make war and will give the side starting the war an even bigger advantage than they have already. Because, what, if you start the war a minute before the update how much of their military can you just wipe out instantly provided they're offline for two hours, which is what happened in the Marionette War.

 

Tanks are a messed up unit balance wise to begin with, I've always said that. Working around a messed up variable doesn't effect this issue, just because tanks are messed up doesn't me we should manage a solution to another problem to account for the messed up variable. I bolded the parts where you're grossly wrong. It doesn't fix warfare being boring. Even nerfing them to 50% they're still the most damaging attack, and will be used 90% of the time. Boring war system, no one wants to use it. Removing them from the MAP equation allows for interesting war to occur. Making them weak enough to not be your only attack moves them to being a worthless project. My solution makes them a viable compliment to warfare. And I'm making them more powerful? So you'd rather have 3 wars against 3 nations with missiles currently where you could lose up to 2800 infra in each war, versus a war where you could take 150 extra per day (so 750 infra total) plus the 300-400 you'd lose if they only didn't bombing runs? Military units are cheap to replace versus infra. So please, I'm not making them stronger, that's simply asinine.

 

They should kill some units, the number can be debated, the variety all of that. But they should kill some amount of infra, land, 1 improvement, and some units. Enough numbers to be a project-worthy compliment to war without making it the only thing usable in a war while not making damage obscene.

Cant see why Sheepy cant make it so that you need a well rounded army so there is some need for other units in the late game other than missiles and nukes.

 

Because there's no way to make missiles weak enough for that to happen without making them a worthless project, unless you remove them from the MAP system.

[Kim Jong-Il]

How about we just have the missiles destroy infra based on levels, just as they are with purchasing infra? To hit a 1300 infra city, it would destroy maybe 50 infra, but the equivalent would be hitting a 1000 infra city, but destroying 200

[Clarke]

They're not really over powered, lets look at the facts

1) You can defeat your opponent in war and prevent yourself from receiving more than one missile. 

2) You can spy missiles away and destroy them

3) You can blockade your opponent to make it difficult for them to purchase missiles

 

Those tactics actually work well enough.

But on the point missiles add a balance to the top nations, if the top nations did not have to fear missiles or nukes then they would take minimal damage and will solidly outgrow everyone else. Missiles are a way to bring top tier nations back to earth.

So the chances that a top tier alliance will benefit from missiles being weakened is 100% certain, they care about their pixels and numbers. 

 

And a missile isn't cheap, each one costs about 400k when combining all the values.

I fired a missile today and barely covered that cost, well I covered it by decent amount but not by a lot. 

I don't want to reference other games but I think there is examples where 1 bomb shaped object is very cheap to buy and can destroy up to over 1 billion worth of infra, tech and land in a single press of the button.

This type of bomb is common in most games and as far as it goes Politics and War have it fairly balanced. 

 

 

And one more point, a maxed out nation military wise would take virtually no damage in a war even if that nation is only able to barely hold it's ground in it's wars. P&W war system allows to opponents to stagnate when fighting each other which will occur more often as the game develops. 3 nations fighting 3 other equally strong nations equals no real significant damage being done to any one. Missiles answer these issues and make war meaningful, minimizing missiles extends wars and causes more people to leave the game due constant war and boredom. 

Edited February 24, 2015 by Diabolos

[Keegoz]

They're not really over powered, lets look at the facts

1) You can defeat your opponent in war and prevent yourself from receiving more than one missile. 

2) You can spy missiles away and destroy them

3) You can blockade your opponent to make it difficult for them to purchase missiles

 

Those tactics actually work well enough.

But on the point missiles add a balance to the top nations, if the top nations did not have to fear missiles or nukes then they would take minimal damage and will solidly outgrow everyone else. Missiles are a way to bring top tier nations back to earth.

So the chances that a top tier alliance will benefit from missiles being weakened is 100% certain, they care about their pixels and numbers. 

 

And a missile isn't cheap, each one costs about 400k when combining all the values.

I fired a missile today and barely covered that cost, well I covered it by decent amount but not by a lot. 

I don't want to reference other games but I think there is examples where 1 bomb shaped object is very cheap to buy and can destroy up to over 1 billion worth of infra, tech and land in a single press of the button.

This type of bomb is common in most games and as far as it goes Politics and War have it fairly balanced. 

Problem being that the top tier all know that and it is leading to a very stagnant political front between the top alliances.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Keegoz

[Clarke]

Well we already had one war where there were missiles and it wasn't an issue, and making missiles redundant isn't going to make people grow a pair.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Diabolos

[Phiney]

I've been saying missiles are OP for months now, but this seems like a decent solution to the issue. Diabolos, that's rediculous. I did the calculation a month or two ago and worked out being in a single war would set you back over a month, now its probably even more than that. That's crazy and is what is making no one want to war ATM. Its not the lack of incentives, its just how damaging they are. Its crazy.

[Clarke]

In Alpha no one was warring either much other than small conflicts for months, in fact the current game has seen more significant wars than Alpha in a shorter time period and than was when there was no missile available and pixels were supposedly meaningless because they were being reset anyway.

One cannot exactly claim missiles are causing nothing to happen when in previous examples missiles were not present and nothing happened anyway for a long time.

The first real war since the last reset took almost 3 months to occur, it's now 2 months since the last war and that is fault of missiles? The trend seems to be missiles are being blamed for the way in which Politics and War operates with or without missiles.

 

Logically speaking a single war should only set you back a lot if you're at a significant disadvantage going into the war, I already mentioned tactics that can be used to limit exposure to damage from missiles. And lets be clear the only people really concerned about missile damage are going to be the people attacking when they have the advantage. The alliance being attacked isn't going to care so much because if they're not damaged badly with missiles then the war against them will just last longer until they take the same significant damage.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Diabolos

[Alex]

They should also hurt some units. Tone back the infra damage to something near 50, land damage near the same, blow up and improvement, kill a barracks worth of soldiers, factory worth of tanks, hanger of planes, shipyard of boats, some amount in that unit range. (3k soldiers 250 tanks 18 planes 5 boats max based on the military buildings you have in the city hit) Still very good, but not the only thing used in a war.

 

Missiles do destroy units (in fact, in the amounts you estimated unless a nation isn't at its cap) when they destroy military improvements. For example, if you have 3 barracks and 7,500 soldiers and a missile destroyed one of your barracks, you'd lose 1,500 soldiers. If you had 9,000 soldiers, you'd lose 3,000. Same goes for all units.

 

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On to the issue of Missiles, here's what I think would be a few acceptable tweaks:

 

Let's double the % of the Iron Dome to block missiles. Instead of 25% of missiles, how about 50%. That means that nations that have or choose to invest in the Iron Dome are going to see a lot more tangible benefit from it, and it's a "softer" nerf to missiles.

 

We can lower the damages slightly, but I'm not sure that's necessary. I think that for the cost of the missiles, the amount of damage that they do is acceptable.

 

This has been proposed before, but I still believe Missiles shouldn't be launchable if your opponent has Ground Control, Air Superiority, and a Blockade on you. If you're losing all three fronts of a war, you shouldn't be able to just launch missiles at your enemy. That will shift the focus back towards conventional warfare considerably. It will put you at a significant disadvantage if you're losing all 3 facets of war and can't launch missiles, but if you're losing on ground, air, and sea, I think you deserve that disadvantage. This mechanic would serve a lot less as a punishment to those that are being crushed, but as an incentive to build stronger ground, air, and sea armies to avoid this scenario at all costs (which really shouldn't be *that* hard to not lose on at least one of those fronts).

 

---

 

I think that those 3 changes would make missiles a lot more fair, and they're relatively simple changes. Lastly, I would like to point out, that air forces can still do incredible amounts of infra damage depending on the number of planes you're sending. It scales with each aircraft, so a large airforce can really shred a city's infra, and you can do a lot more air attacks than missile attacks. That's just some food for thought.

[Clarke]

Those are solid ways to fix it minus the reduction of missile damage, that's not really necessary. 

[Ashland]

Good fix, Sheepy. I think we can call this a wrap.

[Alex]

Those are solid ways to fix it minus the reduction of missile damage, that's not really necessary. 

 

And I think any reduction at all would be very minor, but I agree that the damage amount doesn't need to be nerfed.

[Phiney]

I disagree that these changes will make anywhere near enough difference. Making iron dome stronger you might as well just make missiles half as good as everyone will just get iron dome so it won't make any dif apart from making everyone get it. I don't see how that makes war anymore interesting. Just another cookie cutter change, forcing everyone down one avenue. Making missiles unlaunchable when they have all 3 superiorities is good, but only serves a very specific scenario and will be very rare. Missiles are still 10x as good as the next best unit unless you have 300+ aircraft I'd presume (I've never seen 100 AF do more than 4 AF when the opponent has no AF) which makes them the only unit to use in war, making war inherently boring.

 

Edit: yes missiles need to be nerfed, but the real problem is they make war so boring and as pre says, that can't be fixed without a big change.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Phiney

[Donald Sterling]

The problem is not in the missiles, but it is in the ground attacks.  Ground attacks are pointless right now, they steal little to nothing, and you get little from winning.  You should incentivize  winning a war by stealing land, and making land more pricey.  You could add an alliance war system that allows victories to count towards a triumph over an alliance.  The problem isn't that missiles are over powered, but that everything else is under powered. 

[Magicboyd25]

The problem is not in the missiles, but it is in the ground attacks.  Ground attacks are pointless right now, they steal little to nothing, and you get little from winning.  You should incentivize  winning a war by stealing land, and making land more pricey.  You could add an alliance war system that allows victories to count towards a triumph over an alliance.  The problem isn't that missiles are over powered, but that everything else is under powered. 

 

I pretty much agree with this. I think if we give a bit more power to ground troops and other troops maybe add some dynamics to aircraft we could have more enjoyment with fighting without missiles.  

[Phiney]

I pretty much agree with this. I think if we give a bit more power to ground troops and other troops maybe add some dynamics to aircraft we could have more enjoyment with fighting without missiles.

Sorry but I don't see how making other attacks 'a bit' stronger would make a difference since missiles are 10x as good. Missiles will always be the only option.

 

Backing up a bit, sheepy said missiles are quite expensive, this is pretty much rubbish, considering at my level for example, they do around 8 mil damage, that means they cost less than 1/16th of the damage they do.

 

Christ, when you put it like that, in less than 2 wars ATM I would take 80 mil in damage.

Edited February 24, 2015 by Phiney

[Kim Jong-Il]

The problem is not in the missiles, but it is in the ground attacks.  Ground attacks are pointless right now, they steal little to nothing, and you get little from winning.  You should incentivize  winning a war by stealing land, and making land more pricey.  You could add an alliance war system that allows victories to count towards a triumph over an alliance.  The problem isn't that missiles are over powered, but that everything else is under powered. 

 

What usually wins wars irl? The most meaningless unit in the game: the militairy

[Magicboyd25]

Sorry but I don't see how making other attacks 'a bit' stronger would make a difference since missiles are 10x as good. Missiles will always be the only option.

 

Backing up a bit, sheepy said missiles are quite expensive, this is pretty much rubbish, considering at my level for example, they do around 8 mil damage, that means they cost less than 1/16th of the damage they do.

 

Christ, when you put it like that, in less than 2 wars ATM I would take 80 mil in damage.

 

Well then how bout raising ground damage and lowering missile damage? I am a low tier nation, so I may not see some of the points on missiles as I dont have that capability, however I do think it might be a good idea to raise the abilities of the other parts of military.

[Ashland]

Phiney makes a valid point. And missile damage should be reduced.