Vegroovius

I've read what you and everyone else have said very carefully, but I am still not convinced this is for the benefit of the game. OK, I can concede that 20x was probably not a fair representation of what tech was worth, but the fact is that I and lot of other nations spent millions and millions of dollars in good faith that that was how the system worked. Those of us who were hit disproprtionately hard deserve to be compensated for that wasted money, not for any other reason. I still think you are wrong to be scornful of that idriveavw. As for yours and BFG's other arguments in favour of these changes: 1. Who are you guys to say we shouldn't focus on building NS? That was fun in itself. It is like a score, and it isn't easy to set up reliable tech trading partners in order to keep increasing it. It took me six months to get it right. 2. You are in any case wrong to say that building up NS counts for nothing - the ultimate reward would be a place on the top 100 map, which was my long-term goal. I knew that my entrpreneurial spirit would get me there in the end. 3. What's the big deal about the 10% infra upkeep reduction? Even if I had no reduction before, it would save me something like 160k a day. Not nothing, maybe, but hardly worth getting excited about when infra costs me 900,000 for 10 units! 4. How can you say that everybody agrees that the old system was deficient? Actually 52% of the people polled in this thread thing the tech changes suck! You guys are in fact in the minority. 5. I don't agree that the new rules drive people to make nations really stronger. The rule that you can only get five foreign aid slots (or six with a disaster relief agency) meant you couldn't solely focus on trading tech. I have always spent heavily on infra and land and worked hard in other ways to reduce my infra upkeep costs, increase my literacy rates, improve my environment rarting etc etc. The 10-day foreign aid rule was in my view a bit too restrictive, but it kept tech in its place. 6. When you say trading infra would be wrong because it would bring too much money into the game, who are you to say how the game should be played? It is fun to trade and wheel and deal. It is not cheating. I have never been interested in the military side of the game, although I wouldn't want the rules changed to undermine those who want to make war. I was delighted with the introduction of spies for instance. But these new rules have massively reduced the fun of playing the game in a way that was perhaps different to how you think it should be played. I'm sorry but I haven't read anything to make me go back on what I wrote previously. I think this is a massive blow to the playability of the game and I think something has to be done to rebalance it again. Compensation and infra trading would be one way. No doubt there are others. But you guys are kidding yourselves if you think these changes have made the game more fun. Not only are they unfair, they have partially spoiled what was so cool about CN. But do feel free to explain to me why I've got this all wrong. I want to believe you, but I doubt I will. Sadly V

Where do you get off being so rude, Idriveaw? The tech changes are worth more if you are into the military side of the game, but not otherwise. By all means set me straight if I'm wrong, but don't call me asinine!

The new change is completely wrong, as I've said elsewhere. I mean, I can see arguments for making adjustments, but it's far too radical and unfair to make it retrospective. I have spent much time and millions upon millions of CN dollars sorting out a good tech trading system only to find most of it has been wasted. I've lost nearly 20k NS, which is almost half of what I had! It's no way to treat people who devote little portions of their lives each day to the game. Those who disagree can shout as loud as they like, but the vote tells me they are in a severe minority. I have several suggestions: 1. Make the tech multiple 15 rather than 5 2. Make infra tradeable 3. Or, if you insist on keeping the changes as they are, compensate those nations who lost a disproportionately large amount of NS. I would suggest something like $3m for every percentage point of NS lost beyond the average, although this would have to be adjusted to take account of larger and smaller nations. So if I lost 45% of my NS and the average drop was 25%, I would get 20 x 2m = $40m, perhaps divided by 2 for nations under 3000 infra, 3 for nations under 2000 and 4 for nations under 1000. In my case this would allow me to buy two national wonders and enable me to just about forgive you!

The other thing that's really stupid about these changes is that you haven't actually made infra more attractive. For a nation of around 4600 infra like mine, it's still far better value for money in terms of nation strength to buy tech than infra. It's just that it doesn't pump me up so quickly. All you've done is to take a large amount of the fun of trading out of the game without making anything else more exciting in return!

The decision to reduce the value of tech by 75% seems extremely unfair. I am one of thousands of nations that have spent a fortune building up on tech, and you've retrospectively reduced the value of my purchases. How can you do that? I could understand if you maintained the NS levels attained and changed the rules for all subsequent tech purchases, but a retrospective change is very uncool and has made me wonder whether I want to keep playing the game. If tech is worth so much less in relative terms, I suggest you make it possible to trade infra and land. I'm really unhappy about these changes, and I'm sure many other nations are too.,