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Discussion Release Notes version 0.28

DeletedUser

Guest
To start with, thank you Muf-Muf for such complex and constructive reply. It finally feels that we are listened and these issues are being discussed more or less.

Regarding the idea that was described by you:
Muf-Muf said:
We proposed to our development team to create a solution where there are no empty holes on the map in the gaps where players would normally be. Instead, in every space that is currently empty when there is no player to fill it would be filled with an 'NPC City'. This would be a city that is run automatically, by the system (computer-controlled). The city does not need to grow, and can consist only of very few buildings: actually just a Main Hall would, in theory, be enough. This building can be helped by neighbors multiple times already, so it does not need to be changed mechanics-wise (limits developer time needed to implement). If a player were to become available that would normally be put on the spot of the NPC City, this player should get priority. So, the NPC City should be deleted and the Player City should be put in its place. This would also go the other way around: when a player is deleted, an NPC City should be put in their place straight away.
Click to expand...
personally I think it would be the best soulution possible at the moment especially if you say it shouldn't be too hard to implement. So we can only hope now that this or similar solution will become live.
 

DeletedUser1388

Guest
Unfortunately this is just a treatment of the symptoms, and not the cure of the sickness...
 

DeletedUser

Guest
Empty Cities are useful for getting coins only (not even supplies as they are not going to return back favors to us) ... The idea mentioned by @Muf-Muf is not a bad one ...but then a empty city would never return back any favors ... Neither can we get any other benefits from it except those coins in every 24hrs ... I feel apart from the above mentioned idea another easier option to implement IMO is to allow players to get friends in the game ... Other than the Neighbors and fellowship there can be an option where the players can become friends with each other ... Same style as in the other Inno game FOE... that would make a lot of things easier and IMHO players will not be much bothered about empty neighborhoods ... There can be a set number of friends a player can have like we have in our fellowship or maybe unlimited friends ...that i would leave it to the game management to decide ....but if its a set number then I think it should be slightly higher than the fellowship members, to compensate missing neighbors for some ....Also giving out the KPs to Ancient Wonders of any person playing the game as it is now doesn't sound right to me ... It should be within the known circle only - thats either within the fellowship, neighbors or to a player in their friends list ... But this can be done only provided the players have an additional option of making another player a friend...

About the frame on the map I am yet to understand the use / reason of it .... seriously there was no issue with the view before ...only the lags in full opening of the map and the relics not being visible on undiscovered provinces... other than that i don't see any complaints or suggestions to make changes to the map view ... and i really don't understand why something cannot be reverted back to its original state if the changes are not feasible ... What would have happened if the current changes had crashed the game or had created some major issue in the game play ?? even then the dev's would not be able to revert back to its previous state?? Looks to me more like they don't want to change it back than not able to. Maybe they feel that the work they have done to do these changes will be wasted ...and that reason can be understood ....but then they can always introduce it with the said modifications at a later stage ... Why persist with the current one now which has been only getting negative feedbacks from everybody (well almost all of them) from the day its been introduced ....Atleast till then the players be allowed to play the game without having to put up with this pathetic map view currently in the game.
 
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DeletedUser867

Guest
We could call the NPC cities "Destination Resorts," where folks go for a vacation but don't actually own the property. Initially we could use the current Main Halls with a variety of levels but then, as time becomes available and as a low priority task, the Graphics Design Team could provide a nice variety of visually interesting resorts that would only need to have one interactive element.
 
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DeletedUser651

Guest
I like the idea of the NPC cities. That would solve a lot of problems in the short term. It doesn't solve all of them, but it is better than it is now by far. I don't know how difficult it would be to implement, but it if isn't too completely horrible, then how about adding a code that says for every X number of NPC cities visited the player would get their main hall bonus number of supplies? That would help balance that out a bit too.

Thank you for hearing us and letting us in on the process of making this game better. You are so right that we all share that goal.

The only part I am still confused about in your message is that you say that you can't redesign the map so quickly and easily...ok...get that part....and you hear that we all hate the border...ok ...get that part....thank you!.....and you are going to work on it...great!....but then you say you are going to consider redesigning it with a smaller border. If it takes a redesign to change it, and it takes a while to work on that redesign, can't you just redesign it with no border?

I think we are all terribly confused about this border thing. Why does it have to have any border at all? Is that border doing something we don't know about? Does the border hide something? Does the border affect functionality? Why can't we have no border as we used to?
 

DeletedUser

Guest
Team Elvenar above:

"...we only want to give you the best gaming experience possible.."

I'd like to take this at face value. As a newbie, someone please let me know how it's "best gaming" when there's less and less to play? "Best gaming" when, if they don't have sufficient task content developed, they remove tasks we basically invent because we like playing the game? So that, "best gaming" becomes not really gaming much at all.

10 minutes every three hours is about all it requires now. Wow. I could occupy more time than that on HayDay.
 

DeletedUser283

Guest
the NPC-city solution is elegant and smart
I understand that it would take quite some work in the background and that it would add load to the servers, but it can be considered under 2 different branches :
-1. when a player is deleted, create an NPC city at this place, this is just an extension of the current code that monitors player activity to remove inactives after a given timeout;
-2. creating NPC cities to replace already removed inactive players can be handled by a process working in the background, and it does not even need to be made all at once, this operation can be spread over days, weeks ... (maybe not months because some of us would grow impatient ;) ), thus reducing its effect on server playability :)

now about the map :
if changes are to be made to the way the map is handled by the game, then so be it;
what I see (I already assumed this in a previous post) is a "quick fix" : "let's reduce the visible area of the map so that it uses less memory and we're good"
unfortunately, this solution greatly impedes map visibility and the playability of whatever is done via the map (helping neighbours, getting to solve encounters in remote provinces, finding a new province to scout;
what we need more urgently than ever is a minimap or a zoom facility or any combination of both !
 
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DeletedUser

Guest
The easy solution when it comes to programing, must be leaving the unaktive players where they are, and then replace them with new players as they come.
So this is what is needed to be done in the program:
When a player is due for deletion, the program should just make the city into an NPC city, and detach the player from it, or the program should just make the city of an inactive player replaceable by a new player, the last thing would most likely be the easiest when it comes to programing.
 

DeletedUser762

Guest
with regards to inactive players... Why don't you introduce a merger, something similar to FoE,, but slightly different, hy don't you "condense" the map from time to time. For example, I have a few players around that i can see, but they are a bit too far from me, no way i can fight my way there any time soon. However they are not too far. Remove empty spaces, moving those neighbours closer to us. When you delete inactives just shift actives a bit closer together.
 

DeletedUser118

Guest
The problem with that are the surrounding product provinces. Three of them say which boosted goods you have, so you cannot just place a player whereever you want on the map.
 

DeletedUser1388

Guest
Katzenprinz said:
The problem with that are the surrounding product provinces. Three of them say which boosted goods you have, so you cannot just place a player whereever you want on the map.
Click to expand...
You almost could :). There are 9 different hex-combinations only on the map in total (= 9 kind of bonus combinations). You could not exchange any city, but you always could find a city place with the same surroundings.
 
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DeletedUser613

Guest
Well, the idea set forth in Muf-Muf's thread is elegant and simple although it does not cover all the needs posed by the absence of active players on the world map, it might be helpful if you could trade coins for supplies at say 20 coins per supply (you get 10 coins per supply when helping someone who has helped you)
 

DeletedUser1314

Guest
The NPC option is a good and easy option indeed to end the 'disbalance per random' in coins due to where your city is. This is something which should be implemented as soon as possible, because its a huge difference in coins, also for starting people, to have cities around him or not.

Solving active versus inactive players is something which cannot be solved by the developers, because its up to a player to log in and maybe do some neighbourly help. Unless the design is changed in which helping eachother doenst give more resources, but the design is in the game because it might spark more activity and interactivity so i dont see that happening. :)
 

DeletedUser

Guest
In my opinion the team's idea explained by Muf-Muf goes a long way to solve the problem of missing neighbours! :)
I'd be in favour of it, especially since it proved impossible to move players from emptier areas to the more crowded places, which would've been an even better solution as you'd be playing around real people then and would have real interaction.

@ddevil: yes, a friend system would make things easier - for some. And yes, friends will reciprocate favours and help with trading, which npc's won't. At least I'd hope they will :p.
However, as there is no friend system (yet?) I don't think I'd like to dismiss this idea so easily as you seemed to do, simply because npc's are no real players. I know what I'd take, given the choice between an npc-city or an empty spot on the map. At least I would get something helpful with an npc-city, and I rather take just coins then nothing at all. They add up and can be used to buy the goods that you didn't get by trades.
Besides: although you claim that people might not be bothered with neighbourhoods if there was a friend system, I quite disagree. There are plenty of players who play by themselves, or have just a handful of friends. This idea that Muf-Muf explained will help everyone, not just those who have lots of friends, so to me it sounds much better. :)
 
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DeletedUser613

Guest
There is a glitch on the population total
I have 10 level 17 houses, 31 level 16 houses and a Hallowed shrine which should give a population of 24400, yet when looking at the population, it is registering 24280
 

DeletedUser

Guest
Barrie98 said:
The NPC option is a good and easy option indeed to end the 'disbalance per random' in coins due to where your city is. This is something which should be implemented as soon as possible, because its a huge difference in coins, also for starting people, to have cities around him or not.
Click to expand...
*nods* That's the most important and urgent thing at the moment. It doesn't solve all the problems, but it's a good point to start with.
Second thing that to be considered after implementing the NPC idea (hopefully very quickly and as described) should be how to help players surrounded by NPC cities to upgrade theirs Ancient Wonders. These cities would indeed balance the coins issue but they won't donate any KP to our wonders.
 

DeletedUser338

Guest
@Tengorn Everyone can help your wonder, even if they aren't neighbors or fellows, so I don't think that's a huge problem right now. Pretty sure people are going to help fellows' wonders before a neighbor's wonder anyway.
 

DeletedUser651

Guest
Tacking on to the idea of the NPC.....What about the idea that you get the bonus supplies if YOU visit a neighbor two days in a row vs. your bonus supplies being dependent on your neighbor's action? That way, everyone would be in the same boat. Those with active neighbors and those with NPC. It would be up to YOU to take those actions every day and if so, great, you get those bonuses. If not, it is your own fault, you don't get a bonus.

It would solve a few problems:
1. Players would be more likely to give NH every day because they wanted the bonus. More neighborly help is good, it brings the community together.

2. Players wouldn't get so angry when they help someone and they don't get helped back. Happier player play the game longer and thus Inno has more opportunity to sell them things.

3. No players on the map would have a greater advantage over others. Again...leading to happier players.
 
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