A serious and constructive discussion on recent change in staff involvement

[Constantine]

This message is written not to bash anyone but to voice real and legitimate concerns of mine.

The staff has been actively trying to influence the course of the game for the longest time.
And for the longest time it was done through introducing new rules (or rather restrictions) as indirect incentives to nudge the playerbase in the direction admins (not the majority of players) envisioned.
Those incentives proved to not be very effective. Because the overwhelming majority of players do not want to play the game this way. And restrictions can not influence human behaviour outside the very specific facets of gameplay they pertain to.

Now we are increasingly witnessing admins directly taking the steering wheel out of players' hands. I believe that this godmoding is absolutely terrible for a social/political game no matter how noble the motives are. And I will argue that motives may also be misguided.

With admins basically dictating to players which wars they are allowed or not allowed to fight, which part of the political game is now actually left to players' own agency?

Please give this question serious consideration.

And now to discuss the motivation behind these latest actions performed by the staff as I understand it.

People hate losing. People get upset when they're backstabbed. Or when the fight feels unfair (due to overwhelming odds). When opportunists flock to the battle, like birds of prey. I get upset about that too as a player.
Still I'd never ask admins to forbid other players play the game the way they want to play as long as it is within the rules.

I like BM because it is a simulator of both politics and military strategy. Where diplomatic blunders may have devastating consequences or bad things just happen out of the blue and you need to try and recover or take the L. That's how great stories are forged.
I never wanted to play a "fair play" simulator. Who wants that in BM? Why?

I hated so much when the entire North pummeled on Perdan, while former allies betrayed it one by one. Prevailing in that conflict was the experince of my entire time here. Even if we lost there, it would be sad but still a crazy ride.
If Northern realms were just told to stop fighting Perdan by the admins, what would that story be like? There would be no story, just punting the ball across the river with Eppy and maybe Sirion. It is simply painful to think how this could rob everyone of incredible amounts of suspence, fun and community building opportunities.

The real problem of BM was never unfair wars. It was always stagnation. It is realms and alliance blocks potentially staying the same way forever once an equilibrium is reached.
To bring up once again my previous example, I was really bitter at the time when everyone piled up on Perdan. But I never thought it was bad for the game overall. What I thought was bad for the game was the stalemate we have found ourselves in for 2 consequtive rl years. The North was fighting a war that could go on forever and that they could neither win nor lose. That was my only problem. It made everything boring as it left no place for new opportunity and conflict.

Now admins are artificially doing exactly the same thing.

The war declaration system is great. It makes wars dynamic and does not allow the continent to fall back into stagnation. This is the best change in a long time. When you can wage and conclude a war in a clean and relatively quick fashion, you can then go to the next thing, shift alliances, change the map, etc.
Alliance limit idea is also good, although not very efficient, because game mechanics-wise alliances are not as important as personal connections between characters, specifically leaders. 
But When wars have clear and modest goals, why mess with the diplomacy manually? Why allow an agressor to steamroll a weaker realm if he has three times as much nobles, but make it harder for the agressor if he has a similar advantage due to diplomacy and smart foreign policy?

What is being done is not a feasible answer. You can forbid a realm to participate in a war and coerce into allying with someone admins want instead. But what problem does it solve? Weak realms or realms without allies get to not lose as hard? Why is it preferable?
This takes real politics out of a political simulator. This takes real political agency out of players' hands. This makes political game non-existing really because it ends up being beholden to ooc considerations where no one has to feel bitter or lose really hard.

This can ultimately make BM no longer appealing to people most interested in intrigue and political aspect of the game.

Thank you for your attention and looking forward to hearing more constructive opinions.

[Gildre]

Whew. That is quite the exposé Constantine.

First, I just want to say I appreciate your constructive arguments.

Second, I will be completely honest, I agree with a fair amount of what you said.

The staff has been actively trying to influence the course of the game for the longest time.

This is actually the one big thing I don't agree with, and I think it is important to note. The Titans and Admins are not wanting to interfere or influence the game. I want to assure you, or anyone else, of that.

Those incentives proved to not be very effective. Because the overwhelming majority of players do not want to play the game this way.

The is the other point I disagree with. Not because I think you are wrong, but because I don't think there is an accurate way to gauge this. I certainly haven't been in communication with the majority of players playing this game. Vocal majority does not necessarily equal the game majority. This is a project I have been undertaking personally, as I personally believe that it is incredibly easy for any of us to accept what the majority of people on Discord say, and the opinions of players not on Discord is not heard. I have been trying to reach out to players in positions of power throughout the game to seek out their opinions and open dialogue with them.

On to the things I agree with:

Now we are increasingly witnessing admins directly taking the steering wheel out of players' hands. I believe that this godmoding is absolutely terrible for a social/political game no matter how noble the motives are. And I will argue that motives may also be misguided.

There are certainly problems, and I am unsure whether it is growing pains we are experiencing or whether the system might straighten out as it moves forward. I do think it is a little to early to tell though.

With admins basically dictating to players which wars they are allowed or not allowed to fight, which part of the political game is now actually left to players' own agency?

Very little in that instance. However, players are allowed to choose which wars they fight or don't. It is only the extreme left and right that we are seeking to influence

I like BM because it is a simulator of both politics and military strategy. Where diplomatic blunders may have devastating consequences or bad things just happen out of the blue and you need to try and recover or take the L. That's how great stories are forged.
I never wanted to play a "fair play" simulator. Who wants that in BM? Why?

This resonated with me deeply. I have often called BattleMaster a political sandbox. It is what pulled me in, filled me with intrigue, and kept me interested for years. It is honestly insane how (personally) torn I am on this subject. On one hand I love the cut-throat, no safety net, every pirate for themselves sandbox that BM can be. On the other hand, I understand that it is in no way an uncontaminated system. There is meta-gaming, OOC motivations, and things of that nature. These are an ever growing concern as OOC communication systems continue to evolve. Last, I also feel for players who are on the recieving end of horribly overbalanced conflicts. That being said, we are in no way preventing realms from losing wars or from being destroyed. We just want it to be worked for, rather than being a steam roller. Not perfectly realistic in a political setting, but I do strongly believe this is the best way to spread fun to the most people.

The real problem of BM was never unfair wars. It was always stagnation. It is realms and alliance blocks potentially staying the same way forever once an equilibrium is reached.

I couldn't agree more.

I can confidently say that the Admins/Devs are completely open to discussion, contribution, and suggestions.

So that leads me to ask:What exactly can we do about it? What can we do to fix it?

[Ketchum]

I happen to share same experience with Constantine here. Granted in the past we can see realms rise and fall. Now we seen realms fall not because of war, but because of density issue imposed. So realm merge into another realm, become even bigger realm.

I used to be in Fontan where we faced outnumbered odds against Perdan, Sirion and Westmoor. Then Caligus joined in and thumbed their mighty noses at Fontan by holding Fontan city. I still recalled with giggles that our Prime Minister of Fontan begged Caligus King Dobromir blessed his player, for return of Fontan city. Those were the good times.

So Thalmarkin got a little help on Belu not to die by admin and then Caligus got the same help albeit different one on East Continent not to die. Other players got eyes see these events you know?  ::)

Nivemus faced outnumbered odds against Shadowdale. No admin help coming. Nivemis faced outnumbered odds against Perdan. No admin help coming.

Playing outnumbered war is a good experience for players in the past. Why change now?

[Herland]

It has been a long time since I visited the forum, but I think this occasion warrants it.

A couple of my characters have been part of some annihilated realms, and each one was a unique experience. A realm could be destroyed by many realms at once, by great calamities, or by a single powerful empire, as long as its enemies have a valid casus belli. The annihilated realms are fertilizer for new ones, or potentiometer for small realms that become powerful by feeding on the noble refugees. It can be said that I have lost more times than I have won in BM. However, it does not seem unfair to me, these adversities are what create good RP material.

This was a feature of BM for a long time, and is now being censored. An important path of the game is being lost.

[Zakky]

I think people are overlooking the fact that what unlimited freedom has brought to the game.

Continental wars that last way too long. Constant dogpiling that seem to never end. Every war trying to end with another realm's destruction. And players straight up leaving after seeing their realms die.

It doesn't matter if it was a feature of the game before. It was badly implemented. The current system despite its imperfectness, is a way to train ruler players on what kind of wars are justified.

The biggest problem is the dogpiling issue where rulers who have nothing better to do get involved in their ally's wars so they get something to do. If you are a ruler, you have the responsibility to create something to do for your realm. If you can only do so by joining your ally realm which is already winning, then you have a problem.

Wars are fun when both sides are evenly matched and at least as close to it as possible. As you all know, they are often not despite having the same # of nobles or gold since there isn't really an indicator telling you how many active people are in the realm.

Also, let's not lie about how long this has been a thing. The new war declaration is a relatively new feature. Some are calling it a form of censorship but it is more of oversight. Once people get used to the new system, you will most likely see less of admin/titan involvements.

What they want is quite simple. Make wars enjoyable for both sides which people have failed to do so for many years. We've been seeing cases of people antagonizing other players oocly due to IC grudges. Hopefully this new direction will reduce that and make the game more healthy.

But yes, it would be better if we get more stuff to war over and more stuff seem to be coming to the game in maybe 2~3 years.

[Anaris]

It has been a long time since I visited the forum, but I think this occasion warrants it.

A couple of my characters have been part of some annihilated realms, and each one was a unique experience. A realm could be destroyed by many realms at once, by great calamities, or by a single powerful empire, as long as its enemies have a valid casus belli. The annihilated realms are fertilizer for new ones, or potentiometer for small realms that become powerful by feeding on the noble refugees. It can be said that I have lost more times than I have won in BM. However, it does not seem unfair to me, these adversities are what create good RP material.

This was a feature of BM for a long time, and is now being censored. An important path of the game is being lost.

There is no prohibition on destroying realms.

There is no prohibition on uneven wars.

There is no desire to remove adversity from the game.

For any war to be won, someone must lose.

All we are trying to do is remove the pointless gangbangs and unbreakable island-controlling alliances that destroy people's funâ€"as they destroyed Atamara.

[Ketchum]

Stuff

If you really want to correct an unbalanced war as you say.

Why the most nobles realm can declare war on the most lesser nobles realm? Should lesser nobles realm get help from another realm to balance the scale of war?

Even when you limit it by alliance. Even when you limit the war on one realm in this Caligus, Yssgard the supposedly ally of Caligus showed up nowhere in Eponllyn and Nivemus lands and got beaten and send back home.

Right now you say you include another "dont want old conflict". Yet Perdan want to travel to Nivemus lands via Eponllyn lands. After that long staring contest at Kalmar city with scouts sent here and there without any breakthrough. Eponllyn being ally of Caligus want to help Caligus, but then Perdan declared war on them. Yes, for passage right. Shadowdale is already beating Caligus to Fontan city. Then Perleone joins against Caligus. Yssgard wasted their golden chance to make thing right to balance the war by Yssgard attacking Eponllyn and Nivemus lands instead.

Why not you limit the war as well? Say "you can't fight that realm A because you at your limit density for war." Since we already doing nobles density for region and realm alliance density limit, why not nobles density for war?

Then there will not be continental war that last long time or many years.

[Constantine]

Anaris, I get that. But I think it must be absolutely excrutiating for players when the game plays a certain way and incentivises certain behaviours and then oocly players are ordered to play against their best interest.
The issue is a huge discrepancy between how the game plays and how admins want people to play it.

For example, I am absolutely convinced that Sirion and Nivemus have an unbreakable alliance not because they are all huge frends ooc, are powergamers or whatnot. But because the density rules made all conflict between them meaningless, as they were both very large realms with poor density.
You can tell them to break up their "unbrekable alliance". But it won't mean anything, because the in-game circumstances stay the same. They are still incentivised to stick together and have absolutely no motivation to be hostile to each other.
Does it makes sense?

How it seems to be happening now: It is lucrative to play a certain way, but people are pressured ooc to not play that way.

How it is in my opinion supposed to be: It is lucrative game mechanics-wise to be opportunistic. But it is also equally lucrative to stay out of a war or to aid the udnerdog. Importantly, it has to rely more on incentives than on restrictions. How exactly? I dunno. Realms collecting an equivalent of "honour" which boosts their gold production or whatnot when joining a weaker side and losing honour when joining a gangbang. Whatever. Same with alliances, larger alliances taking a toll on the economy. Etc., etc. It has to be a part of the game, not metagame.

I understand that you guys are coders, not professional game designers. But that's not how political simulators can be tampered with. When perfectly legal political decisions are slashed because Delvin and Vita said so in an ooc channel, in my opinion thats more dangerous for the game's health than all the bad decisions themselves.
Personally, I think we're fine at this point with war declarations. But even if further "fine tuning" had to be made, it can not be "manual". You need to introduce real numbers, tangible in-game consequences which players can quantify and take into consideration when doing diplomacy.  Decisions have only to be made because players actually see they have merit according to the game's own internal logic.

[Zakky]

If you really want to correct an unbalanced war as you say.

Why the most nobles realm can declare war on the most lesser nobles realm? Should lesser nobles realm get help from another realm to balance the scale of war?

Because Nivemus has a lot of cities but not enough people. Perdan has a lot of nobles and want to carve out a colony. Why not war Nivemus? Nivemus also has friends. They can help Nivemus if they wish.

Even when you limit it by alliance. Even when you limit the war on one realm in this Caligus, Yssgard the supposedly ally of Caligus showed up nowhere in Eponllyn and Nivemus lands and got beaten and send back home.

Why would Yssgard, friend of Caligus, show up in Eponllyn and Nivemus side to help them when Caligus is burning? Also, allies don't have to help each other if they feel helping them will cause more damage.

Right now you say you include another "dont want old conflict". Yet Perdan want to travel to Nivemus lands via Eponllyn lands. After that long staring contest at Kalmar city with scouts sent here and there without any breakthrough. Eponllyn being ally of Caligus want to help Caligus, but then Perdan declared war on them. Yes, for passage right. Shadowdale is already beating Caligus to Fontan city. Then Perleone joins against Caligus. Yssgard wasted their golden chance to make thing right to balance the war by Yssgard attacking Eponllyn and Nivemus lands instead.

You want Perdan to go through a choke point. Perdan doesn't want to. It is as simple as that. Perdan's war has nothing to do with SD and Caligus. I don't know why you are keep bringing them up.

Why not you limit the war as well? Say "you can't fight that realm A because you at your limit density for war." Since we already doing nobles density for region and realm alliance density limit, why not nobles density for war?

What? Why do you want the noble density to affect wars? If your realm is dense, then you usually get people who want to form their own realm. Who do you war? One with low density and lots of regions. Nivemus has 4 cities and 13 nobles. Nivemus will be fine with 2 cities and 3 less regions.

[Zakky]

...

What Anaris means by "unbreakable alliance" is what North had or something like what CE formed on AT. He doesn't want a large mega alliance that goes on forever. You can still have an unbreakable alliance but only under your alliance limit. He doesn't want you to circumvent that by establishing a guild like Alliance of Free Nations on Dwilight. If you want a certain realm to be your ally, then ally them. All realms that are not allied to you are not your allies. It is as simple as that.

If realm A + B are fight realm C + D, instead of jumping in to attack either AB or CD, you should go for realm E or F or others.

If you introduce number sand tangible in game consequences, people will just find a way to circumvent them. It doesn't matter how well things are coded. You cannot block every hole. That is why things are kept somewhat vague.

[Ketchum]

I read Constantine latest post and I have some ideas want to throw out.

I have throw out my two cents OOC at a Rulers channel in East Continent.

Constantine, I understand you get that Nivemus and Sirion are unbreakable alliance. Coming from Nivemus, our players there also kept calling Perdan evil for years and this latest war just proved that, not only to Nivemus, Sirion, Eponllyn and Caligus.

Personally I attempted to shake things up. I even appointed new characters as lord in Nivemus. I not sure why I need to provide a book called "How to beat Nivemus in 30 ways and form your own Colony" here. You can take a leaf out of a Perdan character named Zelgius. He should know what are the weaknesses of Nivemus. He was in Nivemus for sometime and he was Duke of Nivemus capital, Banker to boot. If your colony team can go in Nivemus and have enough nobles number to form colony, why not? My character at one point considered two possibilities left: Merger with Eponllyn before your war declaration postponed it indefinitely. And another to give Shadowdale a place to form a colony. Nivemus need noble number, what's better way than to shake the realm from within? Zelgius did rebel against Brock no? He did not have number to form a new colony. Perdan now has.

Also you need to take into consideration. Perdan is fighting as you say IC against the vast resources of Nivemus. How that vast resources come from? From peace time and not fighting. So in some character progragranda you all pointed to wealthy Brock. We do have infiltrator class aye? Why not use infiltrator take Brock out? Brock the so called leader of military cobbled up last minute to fight is out wounded cold. Then nobody can transfer gold. Wait, why am I showing you?  8)

Also have you ever considered breaking down the alliance between Nivemus and Sirion? Influence Nivemus to join your side. Perdan Ruler never talk to Brock, I recall this clearly well. My character Brock word of congratulations is ignored. So how you can convince someone you not talking to abandon Sirion?  :(

Brock had good relations with previous Perdan King Kay, that why Nivemus not join North versus South war at later stage of the war. So why not make full use of this relations and build upon it? Not by saying to Brock Dukes privately that you want their lands straightaway? Then when privately fail, try Brock next 😜

If yes, then we have reached characters relationship. You have to realize by now why Duke Malius of Kalmar duchy stood by Brock all these time in Nivemus. Not because he is current Nivemus Judge. He was not even a Judge in Nivemus when he first joined. He was former Obsidian Islanders Emperor and he chose to join Nivemus. Brock charisma then. Of course Brock charisma could go wrong way as in Zelgius case who was Duke of Nivemus capital.

Also Nivemus alliance is not made with Sirion before Perdan declared War. We did not even discuss this matter within Nivemus. So how your war declaration make this thing happen? Simply put, Perdan has highest nobles count compared to Nivemus. Of course we feel like we are being bully by big kid at school, excuse the pun. So we have to find an almost similar size built kid to balance the scale ???

All in all. I think we may have to emulate Colonies island example where Colonial Senate had restricted each realm to one city each before the change recently. If one realm hold more than one city, everyone else attack them. We need to do our players reset ourselves.

[Ketchum]

Stuff

Unfortunately I don't think you get the points made. I say Yssgard helps Caligus, not Yssgard help Eponllyn or Nivemus.

Also if you attack someone weak, as I say being bully by big kid example, then you have to expect one day that small kid stand up or that small kid find his bigger brother. The point here you made just show us all why Nivemus ran to ally with Sirion in the first place. Why it is North versus South again? Precisely because of this.

The developers have helped to develop the game, I am thankful. They even limit "something I cannot say here", hello I am talking to wall now? So I need show someone how to steal from my home now. The point is chokepoint can be beaten. If you dont know how to beat it, then obviously there are some factors you haven't counted on when assaulting a strong point. And I am not going to destroy current Nivemus players fun for the sake of showing you. Sorry.

[Zakky]

...

Yssrgard not helping Caligus is entirely their choice. Why do you expect them to do so?

Nivemus is allied to Sirion. Sirion decided to help. That is fine. Nobody is criticizing that.

Perdan is attacking Eponllyn to get to Nivemus. That is also fine. Since Perdan is the aggressor, Nivemus and Eponllyn are fighting together.

I don't quite understand what you mean by "show someone how to steal from my home now".

Perdan could have taken a different route but why do that when there is an easier road?

Delvin Anaris already made it clear.

You can still destroy a realm.

You can still help your allies.

You can still bully another realm.

But you can't dog pile unless there is a really good justification like the realm getting dog piled provoking every realm that is attacking them.

Also you can't try to circumvent the diplomatic limit through a guild. If you are not allied to a certain realm then you are not allied. Yssrgard can't come help Nivemus since Yssrgard isn't Nivemus or Eponllyn's friend.

[Anaris]

For most of its

How it seems to be happening now: It is lucrative to play a certain way, but people are pressured ooc to not play that way.

It is lucrative for a store to secretly charge your credit card an extra $100 every time you visit.

It is lucrative to invite people to invest with you and promise them a huge return on their investment, then run off with the money.

But we have rules against these things, because they are not good for society as a whole.

Similarly, based on our own observations of player behaviour, we have decided that certain things are not good for the BattleMaster game and community as a whole, and are, through various means, including but not limited to new rules, working on preventing, disincentivizing, and banning them.

I would love to find more good ways to mechanically incentivize these things, and I'm working on some in the background. But there's no simple way for the game to detect, for instance, that a realm declared war with a goal of making their target ban a Royal Dukeâ€"an impossibility, and it carries a massive risk of an open-ended war where the targeted realm has no way to say "look, we give up, you win, we just want out" beyond dissolving the realm entirely.

Throughout BattleMaster's history, there has been a tension between two basic forces among its players: the desire for strong roleplaying, and the desire for strong strategic combat.

Over the past few years, Vita and I have been coming to the conclusion that we really need a third force, that stands above both of those. You speak of BattleMaster as a "political and strategic simulator", and to some extent it is; it is a number of different things, in varying degrees, but the one thing it absolutely is, 100%, to all the people involved, is a game, and the one thing a game must have to succeed is fun for all the people playing it.

The changes we've been making have been aimed at that goal, and we know we've been far from perfect about it. Even designing a brand-new game from scratch, it's hard to make things fun for such different groups of players, and when we're changing things on the fly, that's 100% guaranteed to make some people madâ€"mostly the people who have benefited most from the status quo. We appreciate and invite constructive criticism and, especially, more ideas on how to actually create incentives that lead to the goals we've articulated (smaller wars; smaller, more temporary alliances, etc) without hard rules.

[Matthew Runyon]

I've weighed in on my feeling that it's not large alliances that are the problem, as much as it is stagnation that is the problem, and I think there are some ideas about a new alliances system that will help fix that.

But I have to say that I share the concerns about the political/intrigue side of the game getting devalued, and let me illustrate that with an example.

Let us say that I am the Ruler of a realm, and I am planning on fighting another realm.  They are larger than my realm, and have more CS and an ally.  So I spend months wheeling and dealing, working out favour trades, building up relationships, and get several realms together that have promised to back my efforts.  This involves a great deal of engagement, and is all something the other realm could have been doing as well.  But either they did not, or tried and failed, or maybe I've got better Ambassadors, or a couple of key connections to Council members, who knows?  But when push comes to shove, all of my friends show up to the fight, and they and their ally are outclassed from the moment the first sword is drawn, and the war would be short and utterly one-sided.

Under the current rules, this would not be allowed.

However, let us say that instead, I keep my realm from fighting.  I build up gold.  The one ally I have also doesn't fight, and they build up gold.  We can build up a massive pile of gold, and expand all our recruitment centers, so we have enough and troops to fund a campaign of all of our nobles at max recruitment for a couple of months on end, while the realm I want to fight is instead constantly fighting.  Sometimes winning, sometimes losing, but they don't build up much of a gold reserve, and their nobles have to get by with just their estate income.  I carefully wait for them to finish their latest war, so that I'm not dogpiling, but their regions are not in a great place, they have no gold, and their army is scattered.  We recruit up using our massive gold hoard, declare war, and immediately seize the city on our border and stuff it full of militia because we don't actually need the gold from the city.  Without their largest gold producer, and exhausted from the last war, suddenly we're creaming a realm half again our size because of superior preparation.

Under the current rules, this would be allowed.

To me, the only difference I see here is what type of preparation was done, and how much fun it was for different playstyles.

I would vastly prefer a setup where two things happened:

First, the density rules were either not enforced, or much more stringently enforced.  If they weren't enforced, then people would have pretty strong incentives to keep expanding.  If they were more stringently enforced, then realms would end up losing regions over time if they could not create fun for their nobles or attract new characters, and would start going out of their way to make sure they kept or enticed characters.

Second, I would rather focus the rules or mechanics on preventing the same characters (or families) from being in the same positions.  It is difficult to work on new conflicts when the characters and people are all the same, and right now, in most continents there is no real way to end that.  Even if you could destroy a realm, the density rules mean that the people in charge of that realm could move to another realm, bide their time, and launch a colonization effort.  Realms can be reborn all the time, and since there are no longer any age penalties and no effective way to kill almost all nobles, very rarely does anyone ever get removed from the playing field except by the player getting bored to (the character's) death.  This, to me, is the biggest problem.