Aurvandil's War Machine

[Vellos]

What mainly happens is constant investments from a variety of players who have Lordships on other characters. Constant investments into our capital with a high number of nobles and high tax rate. Plus a single-city realm has cheaper recruits.

Thought for discussion:

Maybe frequent investments by the same character with no family contributions should suffer penalties/diminishing returns just like requests for family gold?

I want to be clear I'm not making an accusation of abuse. Heavy investment, IMHO, is not abuse. I'm just wondering what people would think of placing the same or similar restrictions on family investments as we do on family gold.*

*Especially as investments are an infinite loop. If all recipients of taxes reinvest in their family, it generates more gold, for more investments next time. This can be continued ad infinitum to allow a small realm to accumulate large sums of gold. With, say, a 5% return on investment (not counting if you raise productivity from below 100% and thus gain food output for sale), it would take about, what, 15 investments to double your money? If you ran 1 investment every 4 days, you could double in 60 days? If a whole realm did that, you could double your realm's effective income in a couple of months, provided you didn't spend any of the excess gold and had perfect coordination.

[Shizzle]

I think it's difficult enough to reach such a level of cooperation... And people who can pull it of, should be rewarded for it?

[Anaris]

I think it's difficult enough to reach such a level of cooperation... And people who can pull it of, should be rewarded for it?

The problem is, some people don't pull it off by attracting good, active players to their realms the way most of us have to.

Some people pull it off by having a group of OOC friends they can call on to join a realm who they know are able to be online almost any time of the day, and who can always be counted on to log on at least 4 times per turn. 

This can be particularly true of groups of people who come to BattleMaster from other online games, where the advantages you can get from being online almost constantly are generally significantly greater than they are here. There are clans of 100+ people in some games, where they can be certain of having dozens online at any given time, and more available to come online if they get a call asking them to.

I don't think Aurvandil is quite as bad as one of these latter cases. However, we have to consider the possibility that it's one of the former, because that's not the kind of thing that's good for BattleMaster. It gives realms run by such a group an unfair and unmatchable advantage over other realms of similar size. Furthermore, such groups by their very nature (even if they don't specifically intend to do so) tend to be more willing to communicate with and accept into leadership positions members of their own group. This shuts out other players from enjoying that realm to the fullest, and it keeps the players in the group from enjoying the BattleMaster community to the fullest.

In short, when OOC groups calibrated to maximum efficiency come to BattleMaster and try to take over places, everyone loses.

[Creed]

Is Aurvandil cheating I dont know but I find it kind of fishy for a realm of their size and gold output CS to go up so high. Though they do have pretty much double the amount of nobles as most realms.

Though I find it funny that all the nobles in Aurvandil came from Thulsoma and the other realms that declared war on the SA realms and got crushed.  We realms in the north sent them running all the way down south now you get to deal with them and they are destroying you. I feel a request from the south for a SA crusade lol. Would be funny to see a army of 50k + to come down to the south to bail out the southern realms from the might of Ayrvandil.

[Hyral]

In short, when OOC groups calibrated to maximum efficiency come to BattleMaster and try to take over places, everyone loses.

I don't think limiting the rewards for legitimate dedication is necessarily a win for everyone, though. 

From my understanding, whether or not a clan is considered abusive is not so much about what they're doing (working together efficiently) but how they do it (by excluding everyone else). If a clan is excluding the community then it makes more sense to me to punish the actual abuse (excluding the community) rather than limiting how successful *anyone and everyone* can be with the features clans could unduly profit from (anything from elections to armies to investments). BattleMaster is a team-oriented game, there need to be rewards for working together well. And I don't think we should curb those rewards because there exist people who cheat.

[Anaris]

I don't think limiting the rewards for legitimate dedication is necessarily a win for everyone, though. 

Oh, certainly not. I have no intention of doing so, and honestly, I can't see any reasonable way of doing so without simply breaking the game.

From my understanding, whether or not a clan is considered abusive is not so much about what they're doing (working together efficiently) but how they do it (by excluding everyone else). If a clan is excluding the community then it makes more sense to me to punish the actual abuse (excluding the community) rather than limiting how successful *anyone and everyone* can be with the features clans could unduly profit from (anything from elections to armies to investments). BattleMaster is a team-oriented game, there need to be rewards for working together well. And I don't think we should curb those rewards because there exist people who cheat.

This is absolutely the case. The only way to discourage abusive clan behaviour is to a) state upfront that we don't like it, and it's bad for the game, b) watch for situations that appear to be abusive OOC clans, c) inform them of our distaste for the behavior, and d) if they don't change it, start applying appropriate punishments.

[Archbane]

This is absolutely the case. The only way to discourage abusive clan behaviour is to a) state upfront that we don't like it, and it's bad for the game, b) watch for situations that appear to be abusive OOC clans, c) inform them of our distaste for the behavior, and d) if they don't change it, start applying appropriate punishments.

I think it's prolly bout ethics, it ain't against the rules, but nobody likes it if a clan comes in and take down a realm with almost no chance against them. If this was a smaller island, the northern realms would already have seriously considered marching south, to set things right in a way. now as it is, the travelling times are a bitch, so I doubt anything concrete will happen against them IC, unless they try Fissoa or Barca next.

I doubt anyone can come up with a fair rule against such clan powergaming.

[Indirik]

Umm... you really think that the SA realms would march south to save Madina? Madina was part of the coalition of realms that declared that SA was the Great Evil that must be stopped at all costs. Sorry, but we're laughing at Madina. (In an IC sense, of course. OOC, I have sympathy for them, because I know what it's like trying to fight these people.)

[Geronus]

Yeah, they're fun. Can't say I'm terribly upset to see them tearing up someone else's backyard for a change, though I have to say they do keep things interesting in their neighborhood. I could tell Madina was in trouble when all those quiet, nearly unknown Averothian nobles who paused right after Valkyrja fell suddenly started turning up in my dungeons while trying to sneak south. That was about a month or two ago.

You know what's really ironic though? I believe that the ruler of Madina who organized the whole League of Free Nations schtick appointed the duke who seceded, then followed him in the secession. Which means that Madina got stuck with the blame for something that the nobles of Aurvandil actually organized. Priceless. 

[egamma]

Do food sales count in the realm income statistics? Because I know that Aurvandil (and Madina) sold food, not only to D'Hara, but to the Zuma as well. And at the prices the Zuma offered...a 1000 bushels could get them 800 gold.

[Vellos]

Do food sales count in the realm income statistics? Because I know that Aurvandil (and Madina) sold food, not only to D'Hara, but to the Zuma as well. And at the prices the Zuma offered...a 1000 bushels could get them 800 gold.

No, food income is not included.

[DoctorHarte]

Do food sales count in the realm income statistics? Because I know that Aurvandil (and Madina) sold food, not only to D'Hara, but to the Zuma as well. And at the prices the Zuma offered...a 1000 bushels could get them 800 gold.

We have never sold food to the Zuma, only to D'Hara so far. As I said, constant investments. Not by the same character, but by multiple characters every so often

[Jhaelen Irsei]

I remember when Morek fought Thulsoma and the Saxons used the exploit. Some people considered it irritating and frustrating, personally I enjoyed that war as it was a real challenge. Moreover I never saw Morek players focus so much on the game and improve their effort so in the end, it's good that the exploit has been solved (and that we won the war of course) but in gaming temrs I'd see this as an exciting challenge if I was a player of Madina or of the Moot.
Fighting a clan standing in a regular realm with not-so-active players from different timezones (and perhaps with a real life to take care) it's more rewarding.

[Feylonis]

The situation between Auravandil/Madina could be compared to RL China and Taiwan. It's a question of who's legit when X has the land and the name but Y has the people.

[Velax]

I remember when Morek fought Thulsoma and the Saxons used the exploit. Some people considered it irritating and frustrating, personally I enjoyed that war as it was a real challenge. Moreover I never saw Morek players focus so much on the game and improve their effort so in the end, it's good that the exploit has been solved (and that we won the war of course) but in gaming temrs I'd see this as an exciting challenge if I was a player of Madina or of the Moot.
Fighting a clan standing in a regular realm with not-so-active players from different timezones (and perhaps with a real life to take care) it's more rewarding.

I'm sure it was very fun for you, as the result was never in doubt. All the other side's cheating and OOC clanning allowed them to do was resist you for longer than you expected. I'd say it's a little bit different when the sides are relatively even, but because one side has a clan they steamroll you.