'Turtling' (not buying troops, etc., during wars)

[Brotherington]

Cry me a river, hes still taking more damage than hes giving and he will never get out of anarchy. Turtling really isn't a serious problem anymore.

[Virillus]

Turtling is like decided to jump out of the 80th floor of a building instead of the 40th. Yeah, you live longer - But the end result is exactly the same. Turtling doesn't give you the ability to win, it gives you 0 advantage in a fair fight. Turtling is only useful in prolonging the inevitable destruction of your nation, and that's it.

If it somehow gave you an advantage (Like it did back in GWII) then I could understand your griping. But as it stands, this is just impatience. Think it's annoying that you can only destroy 80 infrastructure per day? Think about how he feels.

Oh, and as for realism. Soldiers don't destroy infrastructure in real life. That's a strict no-no. The only time that will happen is accidental collateral during a battle. (Now, what does that remind you of?) If there are no defending soldiers, then there are no battles, thus no collateral damage on infrastructure. And no abandoned military technology to "Capture." The way it is currently is perfectly realistic. As it stands in real life, the only way you do actual damage to infrastructure is through aircraft and cruise missiles. (Sounds familiar)

Edited March 3, 2008 by Virillus

[Weiss von Toten]

I think it is just a smart move on his part.

You can't be upset when a defender uses the system to his advantage just because you want to damage him more everyday. He is still going to die eventually.

[Smallfrog]

Cry me a river, hes still taking more damage than hes giving and he will never get out of anarchy. Turtling really isn't a serious problem anymore.

Now it often goes hand in hand with Bill lock it really isn't.

No-one can pull a VietFan anymore.

[Pete Mardle]

like many others you're missing the point and think this is about greed. It is not.

I'm more than willing to fight all teh way down to ZI when my time comes (again), infact the thought of turtling, even to my benefit boggles my mind. It makes zero sense, and even from the defender's standpoint, how much fun is it to not even try to fight back? Sure, i'll get my butt handed to me, but atleast I'll try to do some damage on my way down. The turtling tactic just means you last longer, not that you fare any better.

A nation should not benefit from refusing to defend itself.

...that is the point of this thread.

Why not? If a nation wants to hide in bunkers while it's land and infrastructure get pillaged rather than sending soldiers out to certain death while it's land and infrastructure get pillaged then so be it. If wars were a bit fairer (ie not swathes of 3-on-1 attacks) then maybe a nation might be more inclined to defend itself, but what's the point when it knows it's heavily outnumbered anyway?

Why don't you, on you own, pick a fight with a nation the same size as yours and see if they defend themselves? Until then don't be suprised if a nation that is heavily outgunned does try and drag out a war on the off chance that things may change politically to save the nation rather than standing up and taking a swift battering.

It is whatever the leader thinks gives their nation the best chance of survival, and the fact that we all have different opinions on that which affect our actions is what makes the game interesting.

Edited March 3, 2008 by Pete Mardle

[Homura]

In almost all of these 3 on 1 battles, the defender can expect to lose 220 infra per day using this tactic, with modification based on missile improvements. After a normal 8 day war, that amounts to at least 1,760 total infra loss, not to mention significant tech and money losses, and the inability to collect enough to pay bills unless you have a large amount of money saved up.

Someone who continuously builds soldiers can expect to lose 300 infra per day in the same situation assuming their attackers are all successful with ground attacks, which is a rather negligible difference, but the defender can still expect to stay in anarchy, and therefore be unable to pay bills unless they have the same large amount of money saved up.

In both situations, the end result is same, however.

[leprecon]

Actually, wars can reap plenty of benefits IRL. Consider the German invasion of Poland: while I'm sure it cost the Nazis considerable amount of capital creating their tanks, planes, and paying their soldiers they still gained massive amounts of land and the ability to essentially strip everything of value from the occupied people. Or even considering a city-state of 108,603 people, invading another city-state of the same size and pillaging everything of value would probably gather up a net gain. Especially if that city-state has no soldiers defending its lands.

Germany had panzers, poland had horsemen.

lets just put it in cybernations terms, Poland was not in germany's strenght range.

Just for reference, the thread should end after these point had been made:

I think it is just a smart move on his part.

You can't be upset when a defender uses the system to his advantage just because you want to damage him more everyday. He is still going to die eventually.

Let me get this straight - you're going three-on-one against a nation and you're complaining that they are making it difficult and going against the spirit of the game?

Grow up and get on with it.

Edited March 3, 2008 by leprecon

[eminemdre166]

I say one defeat alert per attacking nation.

[Mjolnir]

I don't know about you guys but I personally think we should "punish" users for refusing to fight back. Okay, okay, maybe that's a little bit too harsh but if anything, we should at least make it so that users fighting back have more benefits rather then the users sitting around and doing nothing, prolonging the inevitable, acting lifeless; "turtling" as the topic title states. History has served us with various examples of why this is just an extremely bad tactic, mainly because when you run out of an army, you lose. That's it. War's over. The attacking enemy gets to decide what to do with your country - occupy it, enslave it, or exterminate it. The game doesn't take it into account so here we are arguing about whether or not this is a fair tactic.

Furthermore, what would my post be without showing examples of penalties towards users without an army (aka soldiers)?

The penalties that I had in mind are as follows (keep in mind, this is just a general brainstorm):

-No soldiers means no military. This means you cannot control your airforce to prevent bombing runs or go on the offense, you aren't able to launch cruise missiles or nukes (since no one is there to press the big red button) and you are out of Sam Fishers and Solid Snakes. No spies on offense or defense.

OR

-Technology and money stealing is increased by 50%.

OR

-Additional happiness penalties, either -5 happiness or -10 happiness.

Either way, something should be set in place to prevent abusing the system.

[greenansatsu]

Why not have it, that if a soldier at some point of the day, day being defined as the 24 hours between updates has enough soldiers to launch a successful ground attack then that nation can use air, cm, and nukes during that same day and the next day. If a nation has gone 2 days without buying troops and mustering an attempt to gain the number of soldiers to attempt a ground attack then the ability to use nukes is taken away. if 4 days goes by they lose the chance at CM's and at 6 days they lose the chance of air attacks. This allows nations who were nuked and lost all their soldiers the chance to counter attack and defend themselves while it stops those purposely trying to turtle.

While I do see the benefits of turtling short term, long term i just see it as a way of cheating the system. The war system while flawed was based off ground attacks and I think it should remain the staple of war.

[Generalissimo]

Unfortunately turtling is the most effective strategy against technology raiders, there is little else a periphery nation can do against three aligned opponents. Removing or changing anything favoring the attacker would make the game unplayable for the nonaligned.

Edited March 4, 2008 by Generalissimo

[rand0m her0]

assume hes getting attacked by three people hes your only war. if he was doing a fair fight or whatever you want to call it he could possible dish out 100 infra damage a day to you while taking 300 himself.

on the other hand if hes turtling he can dish out 20 a day to each nation for a grand total of 60 infra lost and will take 220 infra damage from the air attacks etc.

its a difference of you losing 700 infra or 140 in a war and and him losing 2100 or 1540

You only get hit for 20 percent of the possible damage and he still gets 73% or so. Oh and then theres the fact hes in anarchy permanent like.

Yup your not being able to do ground attacks is unfair to you.

[SonOfHoward]

I would call this guerilla warfare.

[Noah Lee III]

Seems as if each individual involved in the war should get 2 automatic victories incurring the maximum damage available.

Just my .02....