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


Crymson

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So, I got this message from a nice member of the GPA today. This is somebody who, upon being attacked and anarchied, immediately sold off all of his troops and has been contenting himself with lobbing cruise missiles twice a day. I'm sure this issue has been brought up repeatedly, but,

needless to say, it's annoying that the guy's decision to NOT defend himself is actually REDUCING the damage that his nation takes in this war; instead of eating damage from six ground attacks per day (assuming three nations attacking him, which is currently the case), he takes only damage equivalent to two successful attacks. Thus, he is sustaining infrastructure damage in the amount of 40 per day, rather than the possible maximum of 120, for a differential of 80; were he involved in three offensive wars and three defensive wars, the differential between his actual damage sustained from ground attacks and the maximum would rise to an incredible 200!

It's very frustrating, and it makes a mockery of the war system.

The message:

I don't think I'll surrender to any alliance that would attack the GPA. The GPA has a perfect two year track record of never attacking another alliance... not even when it had danged good cause. It has never allowed any organized effort to even aid another alliance at war.

Yet here your alliance is, attacking us.

Surrender terms that involve leaving the GPA? That's like the cop asking you if you'd like to hand over your home and your children because you have 2 or 3 parking tickets.

No thanks.

I'll just sit here and let you waste money while you gain no tech in return.

Enjoy!

Of course, only the part in bold lettering is pertinent to the question at hand.

Regardless, I--and, I'm sure, many others--feel this needs to be addressed. The problem is that I don't know how it could possibly be addressed without a significant overhaul of game mechanics.

Let's brainstorm a bit.

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I'm not that knowledgeable of the current war system, so my statement might already occur.

What about destruction of infrastructure or tech upon deliverance of a defeat message? Might tip the economic balance against "turtling". Also seems to me that eventually "Turtling" would become ineffective and too taxing on an economy without a good deal of money to back you up. I'm not sure its worth the potential problems.

Finally, is this actually a reoccurring issue? Or more of an isolated event? This is the only time I've heard of it, although it makes sense.

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If he keeps himself in anarchy he's going to run out of money pretty quickly unless he had a huge bank saved up.

It doesn't matter. It means he can escape damage DURING that war. It shouldn't be so.

@WadofLint: if one turtles, one will receive one defeat alert per day. He or she will lose 40 infrastructure, 10 tech and some money, in addition to being thrown into anarchy. While this may seem like a lot, it is in fact only equal to two successful ground attacks. If one has two opponents, then one is dodging a bullet by doing this.

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I would support allowing more than one defeat message per day, and maybe lowering the damage to 30 infrastructure, 5 tech, and some money.

So there could still be an advantage to turtling, but it'd be less so. I am split on the issue. One way, I feel it is an effective war strategy. In another, I see it as a way to avoid fighting, and staying out of peace mode.

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Or just remove defeat alerts all together. Above 95% attack odds, or even 100%, you still get your two attacks in and get to loot their money, land, tech, etc. and destroy 20 infra. Just when one guy has 0 soldiers no one gets casualties. Of course, if they are below 20% soldiers after the battle it sends them into anarchy still, pulls home deployed troops, destroys planes and spies (IRRC like defeat alerts do), etc.

Edited by Azaghul
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"All is fair in love and war."

All I see in this is whining because you can't do damage in a war. So what? Yeah it's frustrating, but get over it. If you don't want to waste money... I dunno... stop attacking him? There's nothing the admin can do about this, you obviously realize that because you said so in the OP when you stated that the only way it could be fixed is with a "major overhaul of the game mechanics." Why should we close down the site, piss people off, and make them quit because they can't get on to play because you have to whine about someone taking advantage of a situation. To be honest, he was smart. He used strategy to turn his bad situation into a good one. He's doing maximum damage while receiving minimum damage. Isn't that the way you're supposed to fight wars?

Nothing is going to happen. Nothing will change. Stop whining about it already. Sheesh.

(I speak for myself and no one else in this post)

Edited by AdolfVonSippycup
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{in reply to PM Johns} ...Their conscience? :blink:

All joking aside, couldn't this just be construed as guerilla warfare? By doing this he also forfeits any opportunity to help his allies with direct attacks; if enough of them 'turtle' they just won't be able to be gain any initiative. Can you really win a war between alliances with pure defense?? I guess the numbers of nations involved will play a factor in how this affects a larger conflict. I don't really have a problem with there being some mechanism in the game that allows those who are greatly outnumbered to fight back with a small-moderate amount of effectiveness. I do agree with HordeofDoom, it seems ludicrous at first glance. Though this is a war....didn't Mao tell his disciples to,"Let them hit air??". The Scythians waged this sort of campaign, and the Russians vs. Napoleon; there are reasons to say it could be realistic. Though all of those examples had one common feature: A whole lot of land to disappear into. If the Admin could tie the effectiveness of this strategy to the land the defending country has, it might not require too much fiddling. Or maybe it would. :huh:

Edited by Mirreille
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The thing is, if one has no soldiers to defend your nation, that means that there are say... 30,000 enemy soldiers rampaging through your nation stealing and destroying your stuff. I think that it would be more then fair to have multiple defeat alerts, one for every nation attacking, and have it so technology and land is stolen with every alert, rather then just being destroyed. It is nonsensical for a battle to reap rewards for an attacking nation, yet utter invasion and occupation to reap nothing.

Edited by Straylight
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This guy is smart Just Send spies to disable his cruise misiles or Destroy some of his money reserves if that doesn't work just play the waiting game and you guys will win because he can only attack 2 of you one of you can send supplys or have other allies send in Foreign Aid a couple times a week or Pay someone with a Nuke to nuke him I think that would work.

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The act of 'Turtling' is a fine strategy in defending a 3 front defensive assault especially when going against a nation with over 4k+ infra than you. Sure it would be nice to destroy tech and infra in massive quantities when you're the one attacking, but wouldn't you want to stay in the fight longer if you were on the other side? Please don't argue by saying that he should go out and buy as many guys as possible to afflict a little more damage in a short period of time. In this situation you can do much more total damage in the long run by just hitting your opponents with CM's everyday. This balance is just a small reason why planet Bob is great place to live. Nobody likes living in a system built to over-support the aggressors. @ Reice---this post was not about the cost of attacking, but the lack of destruction that can be caused without a defending army. Also gl on finding someone who will accept money to nuke another nation.

forgot to use past tense in a sentence.

Edited by meagermice
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I hear, "wahh, I can't raid him"

I say, "yeah so?"

How would you feel if you were nuke and then hit with another 120 infra loss each day..?

For you the saving from that 80 infra is about.....

$19mil.

Per day.

He may be saving less $ but it is a perfectly valid tatic....

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Turtling is a tradeoff: you take less damage, but at the cost of crippling your own ability to fight back, or get out of anarchy. It might not make sense but it is a very good piece of gameplay balance to prevent a dogpile being instant ZI.

It is nonsensical for a battle to reap rewards for an attacking nation ...

You can stop right there ;). In the real world, war costs a huge amount of money; it's nonsensical that in CN war can be profitable at all. Things should be destroyed in all attacks, not stolen.

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I can't support anything that will make the weak even weaker no matter how illogical the current system is. The underdog already doesn't stand a chance so it's really bad gameplay to weaken them further.

I agree. Its a perfectly viable tactic. As annoying as I found fighting nations employing it, its all they have when they totally out-gunned in a 3 on 1 situation.

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Turtling doesn't help your opponent much. Neither has any CM's or Aircraft left, so you should now be able to take out 60 infa a day like that.

3 three other guys doing the same should rise that number to 180 a day. Then 40 from a defeat alert.

220 a day being destroyed. 5 days and he losses 1 thousand infa, which he can't rebuild in a hurry.

And besides, there are other underdog issues that need solving.

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were he involved in three offensive wars and three defensive wars, the differential between his actual damage sustained from ground attacks and the maximum would rise to an incredible 200!

Oh, come on. If he has zero troops there's no way he's attacking into three offensive wars for the sole purpose of losing infrastructure.

I think turtling is remarkably similar to what happens in real life. There are no troops, so no battle is fought. Hence, less damage is done. Fortunately, every leader in CN follows some version of the Geneva Convention, so your troops don't just go off destroying stuff willy-nilly when it's all civilian anyway.

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Turtling an enemy is a prime objective of a war

If he's turtled then he's not defending himself, not fighting back (other than the CM's) and not able to assist his alliance

a nation mounting a successful defence, rebuilding after each attack, fending off several of the attacks against him each day and attacking back is a much greater threat and problem

What your complaining about is that you can no longer rob him of his tech and lands,

However any nation that turtles before it's war chest is used up is a coward who is letting down both himself and his alliance,

Only thing worse is an alliance member that refuses to take his turn in launching the first attacks of the day against a nation that is defending, but waits for someone else to do the hard work of knocking the enemy down before putting the boot in

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well as long as the defender has no real chance to fight back, i see little need to change anything.

First you should keep in mind: what he does will in no way make him WIN this war. He only makes it as most expensive as he can, which is pretty valid. Do not forget that if you dislike the losses, you should just have not attacked him after all. It was YOUR decision to declare war on him and it was YOUR decision to create a scenario he can NEVER win. If we would see more "fair fights" out there, turtling would most probably not an issue. But since most wars are nothing more then just slaughtering a single opponent 10:1, you cant blame the victim of using the only tactic they have left to at least make it costly for you.

I agree that for realism purposes any nation who is not defending, should just lose the battle and suffer full damage. But only if you make warfare more fair for the defenders:

- disable 4strike-update blitzes. If you launch 2 ground attacks, your soldiers need to rest at LEAST 6 hours.

- limit attack range from 50-200 (current) to 66-150%

- limit defending warslots to 2

- give defending land area and infrastructure WAY more impact

- give the defender a 10% default strength bonus (patriotism)

THEN disable turtling totally.

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well as long as the defender has no real chance to fight back, i see little need to change anything.

First you should keep in mind: what he does will in no way make him WIN this war. He only makes it as most expensive as he can, which is pretty valid. Do not forget that if you dislike the losses, you should just have not attacked him after all. It was YOUR decision to declare war on him and it was YOUR decision to create a scenario he can NEVER win. If we would see more "fair fights" out there, turtling would most probably not an issue. But since most wars are nothing more then just slaughtering a single opponent 10:1, you cant blame the victim of using the only tactic they have left to at least make it costly for you.

I agree that for realism purposes any nation who is not defending, should just lose the battle and suffer full damage. But only if you make warfare more fair for the defenders:

- disable 4strike-update blitzes. If you launch 2 ground attacks, your soldiers need to rest at LEAST 6 hours.

- limit attack range from 50-200 (current) to 66-150%

- limit defending warslots to 2

- give defending land area and infrastructure WAY more impact

- give the defender a 10% default strength bonus (patriotism)

THEN disable turtling totally.

Once again, (DAC)Syzygy makes any further posts on this thread pointless. :awesome:

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