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Goods strategy is under powered compared to military

edeba

Well-Known Member
Inno mentions balancing issues so often, but to be clear, you absolutely can not adopt a goods based strategy and compete with a military based strategy. The cost of goods for the higher provinces to cater is so high and the increased goods from the aureate is utterly measly in comparison to the power of extra attack or military boost. I went for aureate because I decided I wanted to just be able to cater, but you essentially end up with one collection because unless you set a timer, you miss the second collection. I get 2634 from a marble without a polish and 3504 with a polish. So even though it boasts 300% increase, because it is on the base goods collection amount it is only giving 33% more goods and I seriously only get one collection about 90% of the time. So that works out to about one day collection for one manu if you have about 15-18 manus (3 boosted collections = one collection so assuming 5-6 collections in a day it is the equivalent of one day of collection for 1-2 manus for most people). It is utterly marginal in extra help and if you are lucky enough to have enough pet food to use daily, well, it is like having one extra manu, but I don't get that many at all.

So using daily is going to give you maybe 6% more goods, The need for goods increases so drastically through the tournament that's only going to get you a few extra provinces. 50% more attack is going drastically improve your ability to win through 3 levels of all provinces.

The more I look at it the more I think the 300% increased goods was supposed to be on the actual collection amount, not the base amount. That is the only way the goods strategy could even compare to the military strategy.

We haven't seen any of those manu boost things that showed up for a while that changed the collection time from 3 hours to 1 hour and that was seriously a 200% increase in collection ability and we got these things for a day, and they compounded with using MM, and aureate does not. So the boost with the MM compounding was massive, and it gave the potential in the range of 400% increase, or like 4 free days of collection when also boosted with MM and that is in the range of 60-70 times more goods in day compared to using a pet food daily.

I used up all of the extra goods from one of those things in just 2-3 tournaments because the cost of catering is so high for strong tournament playing.

There is no higher authority for considering balancing issues in the game development and repeating that this is the purpose of the development team doesn't make it true and going on with this nonsense means either it is a lie or they don't actually understand what they are doing because there isn't balance and you can not work to develop a strong game with a chosen strategy. It is only military strategy that makes a strong game.
 

Deleted User - 81190

Guest
It is only military strategy that makes a strong game.
Catering approach in tournaments was dead for a long time - probably around mid-chapters it just couldn't compete with military approach. I don't think even 3x goods production would change that much, as catering requirements just go exponentially up if you go even a bit deep in the tournaments.

Map negotiation and the Spire still work well with pure catering though.
 

edeba

Well-Known Member
I agree, 3x goods increase applied to what you normally collect for one or two collections like the Aureate is set up wouldn't change that much. When they had those massive increases to the manufacture special days, like collect every hour, I probably managed 20 super boosted collections. I used MM on them and made the MM 3x more effective.

That was pretty close to giving a full extra week of goods.

What they've given us with Aureate is like an extra hour of goods collection, It is only 33% and you can fit in two collections so maybe I should say 2 hours of extra goods collection. You miss out on that if you go to a party or a dinner or lots and lots of reasons that you are an hour later on collecting.

They gathered all of that data with those manufacturer special days that allowed us to triple our our fully boosted collection that was further boosted with MM and then they gave us an ability to collect an extra 33%, twice if you really watch the time, and it is so stingy, it isn't worth rearranging your time to watch for it. I think that's why I mostly miss it because I was diligent about getting those extra collections in on those manu special days.

Those special manu days allowed us to collect 300% of boosted, which is 800% of base, so each collection it was 2400% of base and with MM multiplying that effect, it was 3600% to 4800% of boost depending on Elvenar Trade Center level, all day... .

I think they applied that data where the 300% increase was all of those extra collections, but they didn't want the ability to use an MM boost and instead of applying to to what you actually collect they applied it to the base. It is the only thing that makes sense when you look at the numbers and then consider how stingy the time is on the Aureate. I've just looked at the goods requirement for province 22 level 1 and I could not even finish catering a province with the extra goods collected unless I manage to collect twice. At level 30 if I manged 2 collections it would enable me to cater one level on one province... 30 points... And you are competing against 10k scores from strong military players... Seriously, if it only translates into an extra 30 points per pet food (but only if you do a better job at collecting than I do and manage to get 2 collections in), and I do look at the numbers at a medium high level province (province 30). At level 40 I could not complete a tournament province with goods collected, even if I managed to get that second collection.

I just had a look at the number if instead it was 300% of what you actually get and that would give the goods to complete 2 provinces at level 40 and I guess 4 if I was motivated to get that second collection, and I actually think I would be setting a timer for it. So then if you used a pet food daily or 6 days per week well that would complete 4 provinces for all 6 levels and translate into around 1000 points for the tournament versus 60 at around province 40 for catering goods. I don't think that competes with the military strategies, but it probably brings that cater only player that runs out of goods at province 15 to 20 or something like that,

It never competes with a military but it would give the aureate some merit. I wanted to switch my game to a cater intense game, but the Aureate is beyond impotent in performance.

Catering approach in tournaments was dead for a long time - probably around mid-chapters it just couldn't compete with military approach. I don't think even 3x goods production would change that much, as catering requirements just go exponentially up if you go even a bit deep in the tournaments.

Map negotiation and the Spire still work well with pure catering though.
 

DeletedUser1657

Guest
well there never was a good only approach. It appeared that way due to an early quest but was likely poor translation. It has been clear from the start that a balanced (goods and military) option is expected. Personally I view goods only in the same view as a 1 factory option, both possible if you know what your doing but both have limits.

If we are talking the phoenix pets specifically, I think the player base called from the start the non-fire birds as weak by comparison. It's a shame they haven't adjusted these to be more viable pets, the scary thing is if they change anything it is unlikely to be the storm or aureate phoenix. ;)
 
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CrazyWizard

Well-Known Member
I have never seen the tournaments as a Fighter or Negetiotor thing but always as a combination of 2.

If we are talking the phoenix pets specifically, I think the player base called from the start the non-fire birds as weak by comparison. It's a shame they haven't adjusted these to be more viable pets, the scary thing is if they change anything it is unlikely to be the storm or aureate phoenix. ;)

Problem is there is more in elvenar than the tournaments, when you make the "other" birds "all powerfull" you don't only influence the tournaments but also the tech tree and other possible elements en a huge way.

It seems that th elvenar chapter for example was based on a slow progression. but what if you make a bird thats insanely more powerfull then you can again sleepwalk trough any chapter, no matter how much goods you throw at a research. and of you balance agains that powerbird then every other player gets screwed over.

The influence over goods has a much bigger impact on the game, combat is a much less integrated part of elvenar.
 

edeba

Well-Known Member
Seriously, if you don't use goods in the tournament, you have massive, massive, massive goods. So a combo play has always been the strongest play, but there design is such that there is zero balance between wanting to not do military, and military for strong players is probably in the range of 90% of their score. I don't think you can even get half way there with a good strategy.

But supporting and balance doesn't have to be just more goods. It could be the benefit is a reduction in required goods to cater in the tournament. In my notes on the second level at province 35 I would be able to do one encounter, 6 points, with the goods collected from a polish. There would a little bit left over, so maybe 1.2 or 1.3 encounters, 10 points maximum...

There is no way to play smart and stack benefits with Aureate. So, I ran out of military and I did one polish of a bear and used some time instants and I replaced my military. I used one 100% supplies instant as well. So I did use quite a few other resources, but if I used the time instants on manu I wouldn't have even gotten enough goods for a single encounter with time instants for what I got with military. I finished 45 provinces and I was able to also polish a fire, which I have now built because of how insanely unbalanced this whole thing is, and use health and attack 5-day pieces, so that military was exceptionally strong. I don't think I catered any provinces. I have practically the military I started with.

A goods strategy would be making it so both the other bears could be stacked to reduce the required goods. So then you plan for how to use your MM, collection times and cater times to max performance. If each gave say 30% goods reduction, and then stacked is a 30% of what's left, well, stacked that would be a goods cost of 49% and then with the modest extra collection given, well, now a goods strategy has balance. You'v have to use a pet food for every level with the crummy 3.5 hours the aureate has and I don't even remember what the other had. I only have the aureate, but this kind of idea would allow a cater strategy to the game.
 

Arthus

Well-Known Member
If players can have 4-8 brown bears to feed them and have +200% up to +400% bonus army production (+simia bonus) and then use time-shorteners from spire to have 5000+ army squads easily...
They also have +50% army power phoenix.
Meanwhile economy players have evo builings with 9k of goods per 24h when 1 fight in tournament can cost like 40-80k at higher levels.
Army player will make multiple of such provinces with little or no army lost.

There was a lot of suggestions of jade phoenix with bonus feed effect "reduces cost of tournament negotiations" but all ignored.
 

CrazyWizard

Well-Known Member
Seriously, if you don't use goods in the tournament, you have massive, massive, massive goods. So a combo play has always been the strongest play, but there design is such that there is zero balance between wanting to not do military, and military for strong players is probably in the range of 90% of their score. I don't think you can even get half way there with a good strategy.

But supporting and balance doesn't have to be just more goods. It could be the benefit is a reduction in required goods to cater in the tournament. In my notes on the second level at province 35 I would be able to do one encounter, 6 points, with the goods collected from a polish. There would a little bit left over, so maybe 1.2 or 1.3 encounters, 10 points maximum...

There is no way to play smart and stack benefits with Aureate. So, I ran out of military and I did one polish of a bear and used some time instants and I replaced my military. I used one 100% supplies instant as well. So I did use quite a few other resources, but if I used the time instants on manu I wouldn't have even gotten enough goods for a single encounter with time instants for what I got with military. I finished 45 provinces and I was able to also polish a fire, which I have now built because of how insanely unbalanced this whole thing is, and use health and attack 5-day pieces, so that military was exceptionally strong. I don't think I catered any provinces. I have practically the military I started with.

A goods strategy would be making it so both the other bears could be stacked to reduce the required goods. So then you plan for how to use your MM, collection times and cater times to max performance. If each gave say 30% goods reduction, and then stacked is a 30% of what's left, well, stacked that would be a goods cost of 49% and then with the modest extra collection given, well, now a goods strategy has balance. You'v have to use a pet food for every level with the crummy 3.5 hours the aureate has and I don't even remember what the other had. I only have the aureate, but this kind of idea would allow a cater strategy to the game.

If your stocked with goods and don't like the to fight there is another game element for you, it's called "The Spire of Eternity" here you can fight or negotiate but in the higher levels negotiation is far superior to fighting.

So pick you poison ;)
 

DeletedUser1953

Guest
300% increased is bad, i think it is better to reduce gathering cost and change with era, the problem begin at sorcerer, i think the coefficient go from /1.3 sorcerer to construct/elvenar /10.
And why not give to the ressource bear, a new active function like -50% gathering cost.
 

DeletedUser332

Guest
So long as I have to click 6 times per (auto) battle compared to just once in order to cater, I'm fine with things the way they are. I feel even worse for the ones who have to fight manually.
 
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