Closing Islands ?

[Anaris]

Yes and then some people will just build a moat around their entire realm.

That would be counterproductive. They wouldn't be able to do anything. The best-case scenario there is permanent stagnation.

The worst-case is infighting that leads to the entire realm being blighted.

[Telrunya]

A very defensive chokepoint would still be problematic, like ensuring the only way you can get in or out of the Realm is through a City or a Townsland. Something like allowing travel through the Blight, but having those regions absolutely useless would counter that.

[Miriam Ics]

I did not read the last posts so If I am saying something that was said recently I apologize.
I just don't want to lose what is in my mind (again).
I spend some time yesterday thinking about this and my conclusion is that no matter what we do we will have one problem left, even in smaller or reduced number of continents and this is that knights cant pretty much do nothing.
They can train units or themselves and I can tell, this almost make me leave the game.
If I were not at IRC, if I haven't talk daily with other people, I would had left after 3 month playing.

So, what I think we need is more activities for knights.
Does Tom have any plan for this? Does he agree with improving something like growing food for example?

[Kwanstein]

There is a way to merge islands, retain their histories, fix the character/region ratio and at the same time attract new players to the game. It would take some work on the part of the devs, but it is totally viable.

Step 1:
Rather than merge islands by plopping two right next to each other, create an entirely new island, it's shape indicating natural  tectonic movement. The tectonic plates that the islands are on are moving towards each other, causing islands to be pushed up between them, as stepping stones for them to fight or travel over. This creates a more aesthetically pleasing look than the prior suggestion, and allows for meaningful and fun interaction between the two previously separate groups of islanders.


http://s21.postimg.org/l9w2s1ic7/bm_islant.jpg

Step 2:
Since this is an entirely new map, rather than two old ones shoved together, the regions will have to be remade and the realms re-set up.

Redrawing the regions is straightforward and even provides an opportunity for improvement (which I will get to in step 3).

Remaking all of the old realms, in order to retain their histories and such, is more complicated. They could simply be made as blank templates, like the ones in Dwilight were, and the transferring players could attempt to remake them themselves. But that would ruin character continuation and would provide potential for failure.  The realms could be set up in a more detailed manner, with all of the transferring characters retaining their positions as rulers, dukes and such, but that would be a lot of work.

This is a tricky step, and there is no perfect way of doing it. Something is bound to be compromised here, whether it's continuity or simplicity.

Step 3:
When redrawing the regions, combine some of the minor ones in order to fix the character/region ratio.

Step 4:
Such a significant event, with such potential for novelty and fun, could attract new players or retain old ones. It could serve as a positive PR event if played right.

Anyway, it's a lot of work, but it would be beneficial in the long run, as it would alleviate many existing problems and reinvigorate a drowsy and shrinking fan base.

[Chenier]

Another option to consider is removing the 1 lordship per character rule. If some characters are allowed to stack titles, then that means less to share around, thus leaving more knights again, and allowing a somewhat greater viability for realm that are otherwise successful (diplomatically or militarily) and are stuck with low nobles/region ratio. It would also make regions with atrocious stats after the economy rebalance not force anyone into poverty (which is boring for everyone) by allowing the lords of the crappy wastelands (be them actual wastelands or rurals/woodlands) to get a few lordships to compensate.

[Gustav Kuriga]

Another option to consider is removing the 1 lordship per character rule. If some characters are allowed to stack titles, then that means less to share around, thus leaving more knights again, and allowing a somewhat greater viability for realm that are otherwise successful (diplomatically or militarily) and are stuck with low nobles/region ratio. It would also make regions with atrocious stats after the economy rebalance not force anyone into poverty (which is boring for everyone) by allowing the lords of the crappy wastelands (be them actual wastelands or rurals/woodlands) to get a few lordships to compensate.

Short answer: No.

Long answer: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO... there's already enough characters that have a near monopoly on power without any turnover without resorting to this...

[Vita`]

I'm inclined to agree with Gustav, but to fancy Chenier's idea...

There would need to be a balancing effect, similar to estate efficiency, in that a lord of multiple regions has increasingly less effective production/control/morale/loyalty for each additional region, especially for highly populated or geographically larger regions.

[Chenier]

Short answer: No.

Long answer: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO... there's already enough characters that have a near monopoly on power without any turnover without resorting to this...

Are there really too much power hogging? From my observations, there are more people with titles in general than without them, and I suspect they may even be more lords than non-lords. All I see, all the time, is a bunch of region elections going up with no one bothering to even utter a word to get elected, no candidate for75% of the referendum's duration, and then at the end only one candidate. Do these people really deserve a lordship? Not in my opinion.

I'm inclined to agree with Gustav, but to fancy Chenier's idea...

There would need to be a balancing effect, similar to estate efficiency, in that a lord of multiple regions has increasingly less effective production/control/morale/loyalty for each additional region, especially for highly populated or geographically larger regions.

Of course, there has to be something to discourage one guy being ruler, duke, and lord of all of the realm's regions and getting all of their taxes.

Isn't there a limit already to how many peasants an estate can represent, at least indirectly? One could go with a "a character may not have estates representing more than X population". I'd rather go with a near-limitless binomial system of diminishing returns, though, where one can get a bunch of regions but where estate efficiency lowers with population and area.

[Tom]

If you don't want AI, then say you don't want AI,

I don't want AI.

Most of the fun and complexity and pleasure of BM comes from fighting human opponents. People who are not easily calculated (and humans are crazy good at spotting the patterns in even the best AI) and who can be talked to and reasoned with and threatened and all that.

We tried an AI invasion once, and it was probably the least memorable.

That is why I think the effort required isn't worth it, because BM is not and should not be a PvE game, so an AI should always have a minor role.

[Tom]

I like the idea that Tiridia posted and others elaborated on. It needs some work, but the basic idea of introducing an entity that will destroy(*) a part of the game world, while giving players control over which (but not if) is good and I've had similar ideas myself.

Eliminating parts of islands instead of whole islands make shrink the game in a way that is acceptable to many more people.

A minimum distance between "explosion points" could ensure that a) no entire realm gets completely destroyed by them and b) a realm can not surround itself with destroyed regions as a protection measure.


And the "spawn a time-bomb" idea makes sure that the AMOUNT of destruction is controlled by GMs (basically, the amount of "bombs" we spawn) while the location is controlled by player actions.

[Chenier]

I don't really like the idea of bringing in more blight, personally, unless there's a limit to the vastness of the blight and that it can be undone/moved elsewhere. Rogue spawners remain PvP if players are the only ones capable of moving the spawners around and influencing their might.

[Anaris]

I don't really like the idea of bringing in more blight, personally, unless there's a limit to the vastness of the blight and that it can be undone/moved elsewhere.

The whole point of more blight—whatever the means of applying it—is to reduce the number of available regions.

So assuming we did something along these lines, yes, there will be a limit, but it will be carefully controlled and monitored by the devs, and increased as necessary. If it can be undone, it will not be easy, and it will only be possible if it is balanced by a corresponding additional blight somewhere else.

[trying]

People would just blight the regions that have terrible stats. I expect Skezard on EC to be one of the first to go.

[Anaris]

People would just blight the regions that have terrible stats. I expect Skezard on EC to be one of the first to go.

And...I'm not at all sure that would be a bad thing. Solve me a rebalancing problem real quick, that's for sure!

If the players are told, effectively, "You get to pick which 10 regions get blighted," and then they collectively do so, that may be more likely to produce results the players are willing to live with than if we just did it arbitrarily.

[Forbes Family]

I would prefer the idea of having Lords be able to hold more regions. For instance say you want to gain the region of another Lord you and your knights go to war with that Lord and their knights.

It would actually give a reason to have knights again.