Do long term empires destroy the game?

[Zambaman]

If you want nukes to have a fearsome reputation, just uncap the GRL. I've been advocating that for months.

Ahh, but GRL affects everyone equally so it'd just slow down everybody's growth. If you instead implemented a local radiation system (affecting the nuked only) in combination with GRL then they'd be potentially devastating, at least economically. If it had a delay until the radiation was gone (perhaps giving a new bonus to the Radiation Clean-Up bonus resource by allowing it to halve the length of time) of say half a month then it'd really be quite nasty to be nuked consistently (if every nuke received subtracted 1 happiness from total happiness for a period of 15 days). Combine that with proportional damage and there's your true super-weapon that everyone fears and would escalate the danger of war.

Of course, if that happened then the game would probably revert back to the early days when firing off a nuke could land you with ZI.

[Cairna]

If the resource was scarce enough and desirable enough, the result would be the larger alliances in the game turning against one another, which would definately make the game more interesting and reduce stagnation.

The trick would be making the scarce resource desirable in some way without giving those who own it a huge advantage.

My fear would be that this would overcomplicate things for the average player. That would result in even more stagnation. Most of CN's grunts aren't that interested in making their game much more time consuming, in my experience.

[Grand Emperor Brian]

My fear would be that this would overcomplicate things for the average player. That would result in even more stagnation. Most of CN's grunts aren't that interested in making their game much more time consuming, in my experience.

True, but it could also have the opposite effect of getting them more interested in the game, due to the fact that they'd have a goal. A goal of "Get as much of this as possible" is much more attainable and less ambiguous than "Become the best in the game."

Plus, the effect on the political scene would likely be so great, that it'd bring in more players who're interested in the politics and community.

[shahman]

My fear would be that this would overcomplicate things for the average player. That would result in even more stagnation. Most of CN's grunts aren't that interested in making their game much more time consuming, in my experience.

CN grunts fight. Whatever amount of RESOURCE the grunt captures goes into alliance treasury. Alliances will become like RL countries, in such that whatever money I gain, it goes to the government(alliance).

The hard part is knowing what to make the resource. If its something that when you have it, negates negative effects, and if only very few have it, most won't care. Same if it engages positive effects. It cannot be something that increases growth.

Maybe something like tech, but w/o the economy modifier. Tech's war modifier allows you to get more tech, therefore, more tech equals better at wars.

But then we hit a wall. What if people don't care about war? Then the War Betterment resource is absolutely useless.

therefore, I come to the conclusion that the modifier, if you lack it, would make it impossible for you to grow. It would be impossible to pay bills, thereby, after a few days, making it impossible to buy infra.

[Grand Emperor Brian]

CN grunts fight. Whatever amount of RESOURCE the grunt captures goes into alliance treasury. Alliances will become like RL countries, in such that whatever money I gain, it goes to the government(alliance).

The hard part is knowing what to make the resource. If its something that when you have it, negates negative effects, and if only very few have it, most won't care. Same if it engages positive effects. It cannot be something that increases growth.

Maybe something like tech, but w/o the economy modifier. Tech's war modifier allows you to get more tech, therefore, more tech equals better at wars.

But then we hit a wall. What if people don't care about war? Then the War Betterment resource is absolutely useless.

therefore, I come to the conclusion that the modifier, if you lack it, would make it impossible for you to grow. It would be impossible to pay bills, thereby, after a few days, making it impossible to buy infra.

I think he was talking about the unaligned and/or uninterested people who spend 10 minutes a day on the game just collecting taxes.

The resource can't have a huge effect on national growth or war prowess, unless admin wants to make some major changes to the game mechanics.

[atrophis]

If you want nukes to have a fearsome reputation, just uncap the GRL. I've been advocating that for months.

I support this suggestion. Along with secret aid that can only be found by spying the sender, the game would get much more interesting.

Edited March 1, 2009 by atrophis

[Caliph]

No. Secret aid would be a terrible idea. Yea, sure, it would hurt the NPO because guerrilla groups could be funded. But it would make large alliances no longer accountable for their actions. Why fight a costly war yourself when you can fund proxy wars with no one knowing? Helping the little guy does not help a game! It has to be balanced. For instance, tech scarcity is great, because how cheap tech is for young nations is balanced by old nations desire for it. Forcing alliances to be held accountable (like having trading public) keeps inter-alliance conflicts real, and game changing.

Furthermore, enemies need to be able to be crushed. Trust me, use NS as an example, if war has no meaning, things cant change, and change is what your after. Once again, just trying to overthrow the NPO is not really what your looking for, and beware to not use long term harmful practices to achieve short term goals

I do like the idea of limited land. Wars are usually fought out of desire for limited resources. Hence, most of conflicts have roots in senate seats. Currently, land is an unlimited resource. What if land were treated like senate seats or tech? Just limiting land would simply give another advantage to big alliances. What if land got more and more expensive, not by the more you bought, but by how much land was owned in a color sphere total, would give small alliances in empty spheres lots of easy growth, while making larger dense alliance need to push out for more room.

I disagree. Large alliances already do this to an extent by helping their smaller allies get part of the reparations, or by agreeing to aid them to help in the war.

This would help the "little guy", alliances like FAN, like Vox, and whoever the target is for the next 20 on 1 alliance tech raid to be able to fight back in true guerilla war fashion.

That is desparately what we need here. Part of the stagnation is the fear that if you make the large alliances mad, make any Continuum or their allies mad, that you'll be finished. If you make NPO mad enough they'll sentence you to PZI, that means you will be attacked in every nation you create. even ZI, where you will be attacked my many nations, as many as it takes, where they will all receive aid to fight you and you will receive none because anyone sending you aid gets ZI'ed as well.

That practice is hurting the game. Forcing all aid to be public will make wars more interesting, and will breathe some life into this game. It will create the potential for having an alliance who has friends but who has made the establishment mad be able to fight back. It will make it so that alliances can covertly aid others for whatever purpose they devise of. This happens in real life. Just look at how much money the US and Saudi Arabia poured into the Mujahideen in the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 80's.

We need to have ways in which large alliances keeping the smaller guys down would not be a 1st solution because of the potential effects of that. Secret aid could be 1 way to make it easier for people with friends to be able to stand against a beat down.

Of course nothing would stop the powerful from "secretly" aiding whomever they felt like, even each other in wars that their alliance isn't officially a part of, but that won't change the outcome. If funds are needed allies will provide them. Just look at how much money TOP gave to the NPO during the Initiatives war with FAN.

I support this suggestion. Along with secret aid that can only be found by spying the sender, the game would get much more interesting.

Agreed. Secret foreign aid should be able to be found out by succesfully performing a spy mission on the sending nation.

[Veritas]

@ Grand Emperor Brian the problem with making it so that aid can be uncovered by spying on the receiver is that it makes it far too risky for the senders. The risk vs reward is far too great I risk my nation and entire alliance to provide some nation with the ability to slightly annoy my enemies. If anyone is going to be willing to take that risk the odds of the latter happening need to be extremely lower than the odds of the former. On the other hand if you can only uncover secret aid by spying on the sender as long as I'm am good about hiding my hatred they would have to just happen to find my nation in a random sweep in order to discover me.

@ Muffasamini making it so large alliances are not accountable for their actions is exactly the point! The effect of 3m is insignificant to many nations in the game so it's not like this will allow huge wars to drag on for long periods of time ultimately even those being funded will only be able to attack the noobier nations. If necessary the amount of secret aid that can be sent could be lowered to perhaps 2m or so that it could be less damaging but again we have to take into account risk vs reward we are talking about very high risk for rather low reward. This idea of secret aid is also more realistic. Just the other day in my history class we were talking about the Thirty Years War and how the french Catholics were aiding the Protestants in secret in order to weaken the power of the Holy Roman Emperor without involving their military in the war.

Also tech deals are very bad for this game they make it virtually impossible for smaller nations to catch larger ones. For example if a new nation were to be created today and have every single aid slot filled with free 50 tech it would take it nearly 1.5 years to catch me assuming i never did another tech deal in my life. When you consider that of course i would continue dealing tech the fact of the matter is I will never be caught. In order to reverse this we need to discontinue tech dealing by making it so that tech cannot be aided and create a way to get rid of the tech advantage the older nations have, such as making a very nice wonder set that costs 1k tech per wonder to purchase. So that while larger nations could potentially hold onto their tech for the advantage the nations willing to drop the tech in order to get the wonders would have a significant economic bonus that would at least give them the possibility to catch up.

I can assure you that if i were to discover cybernations today there is no way i would play the game. I find enjoyment by trying to become the top dog in a game, in cn it is no longer possible for a newcomer to do that.

-Veritas

Edited March 2, 2009 by Veritas

[Grand Emperor Brian]

Ah, I see your point, now.

[Fenrir69]

A reset is the absolute worst idea that hes ever been proposed in the history of CN.

You're the worst idea that has ever been proposed in the history of CN >.<

nah-nah-nah-nah-poo-poo

[Electron Sponge]

I know you don't speak for Vox Populi, but I would be very dissapointed if you truly believe what you just said.

Basicly the plan is to remove one regime to simply replace it with a regime that uses the same means vox is always saying it fights againsts?

No, that's not what I said at all.

[Corinan]

No, that's not what I said at all.

That's not what you said but anyone with two brain cells to rub together knows that's exactly what would happen. These things are really very predictable. We in Pacifica will continue to fight the good fight, however. Fear not, Planet Bob!

[Electron Sponge]

That's not what you said but anyone with two brain cells to rub together knows that's exactly what would happen. These things are really very predictable. We in Pacifica will continue to fight the good fight, however. Fear not, Planet Bob!

How can these things be predictable when NPO has dominated the game for three years, give or take a month of rebuilding in 2006? There's no prior action to base your prediction on. What are you using, chicken entrails?

[shahman]

Real Life, More than likely. Also, RL is based off Oracle Bones

But he's correct, After the Greek Empire, came the Romans...Skip forward, after Brits came the Americans

Its inevitable

[greatmagnus]

Real Life, More than likely. Also, RL is based off Oracle Bones

But he's correct, After the Greek Empire, came the Romans...Skip forward, after Brits came the Americans

Its inevitable

The problem with comparing this to real life is that in real life you had guerrilla tactics and such to rely on to get out a stronger aggressor, here the second you do anything your name is automatically known, and as such you get roflstomped.

[Grand Emperor Brian]

It doesn't really matter if the game mechanics aren't like real life, the politics are. No matter what happens, there will more than likely always be one alliance on top.

[Galapagos]

Why not simply create an alternate universe? Some games get around this problem by creating a second permanent game to run alongside the original. the old players who have invested too much into this game to let go, and understandably so, can hold onto their nations and keep playing here. Meanwhile, the potential to increase the player base will explode with a new universe where the political landscape would be entirely different.

My two cents. Apologies if somebody already suggested it.

[dejarue]

We need a way to compete over resources. A way to change what resources your nation has. This would accomplish the introduction of scarcity, the problem with being hamstrung from day one with crappy resources, and it would give people something to fight over constantly.

[Grand Emperor Brian]

We need a way to compete over resources. A way to change what resources your nation has. This would accomplish the introduction of scarcity, the problem with being hamstrung from day one with crappy resources, and it would give people something to fight over constantly.

Not a bad idea. Instead of introducing something completely different to the game, we could just create scarcity within the current resource system and allow people to switch resources with conquered nations.

That wouldn't really effect the large-scale situation of the game, though, because I doubt alliances are going to go to war for the sake of changing a few nations' resources. It'd definately make things more interesting, though.

[dejarue]

If you made it somehow sphere-based. If you figured out a way to make it beneficial for groups to control a specific asset.

[General Specific]

This already is a game of scarcity.

Courage, good/intelligent leadership skills and player activity levels are just three of many resources in short supply.

It is no coincidence that alliances with an abundance of even just one of those three scarce resources rise to the "top."

[RobertFitzy]

Its impossible for a game to really be ruined by an empire because they are not permanent, every group becomes de facto evil in the eyes of people once they are big and inevitably destroyed no matter their personality by external people (sometimes their own allies) and/or internal people that themselves subconsciously want to see it destroyed even if they feel compassing and patriotism for their empire.

This internal destruction usually happens not because they hate there own empire, its when not enough changes in the environment of that society to satisfy the human desire and NEED to seek out new, its when instinct kicks in (flight or fight) and people escape/leave to satisfy it, resulting in diminishing numbers of the empire, or in the back of their minds plot its demise in hopes of a rebirth of the environment while not even realizing they are doing it. If a group has enough fresh change in a reasonable amount of time they are usually safe from that, but if the ways stay the same, even ways that have worked out for years, there biggest enemy becomes them selves.

[shahman]

But everyone is too afraid of the current de facto group to do anything about its ebilness. Its just too powerful.

As for internal destruction, the active members will leave, but the 5 minute-a-day grunts care not.

[Doitzel]

It doesn't really matter if the game mechanics aren't like real life, the politics are. No matter what happens, there will more than likely always be one alliance on top.

This isn't true. I had a lengthy discussion once with someone from another country who plays political sims in a different language; the prevailing trend they described was that everyone was always ganging up on the guy at the top. The games were Francophone.

It's the prevailing attitude. If people will break free of the chains this game's society has shackled them with then we'd have a more dynamic gaming atmosphere with powers rising and falling all the time. It's possible, it's just that everyone is too afraid of losing this or failing at that. Such fears are perpetuated by punishments that can be imposed by others in the game, but those punishments can be circumvented. The real obstacle is ourselves, and our unwillingness to submit to and affect real changes.

[Grand Emperor Brian]

This isn't true. I had a lengthy discussion once with someone from another country who plays political sims in a different language; the prevailing trend they described was that everyone was always ganging up on the guy at the top. The games were Francophone.

It's the prevailing attitude. If people will break free of the chains this game's society has shackled them with then we'd have a more dynamic gaming atmosphere with powers rising and falling all the time. It's possible, it's just that everyone is too afraid of losing this or failing at that. Such fears are perpetuated by punishments that can be imposed by others in the game, but those punishments can be circumvented. The real obstacle is ourselves, and our unwillingness to submit to and affect real changes.

I meant there will always be one alliance on top, not necessarily the same alliance, though. After NPO falls, another alliance will take its place. It'll be very hard to end up with the polarity that we had in the old days.

In a roundabout way, I'm basically saying that the game will cycle through empires and that after the NPO there'll be another evil empire ruling the game, it doesn't matter if we don't have the ability to use guerrilla tactics or secret aid.