Feedback Fort Balancing Actions

[Syntex]

Howdy Cowboys and Cowgirls,

Please share any feedback here about our Fort Balancing actions!

Yours The West Team

 

[darthmaul99174]

Will the fort balancing actions be taken in other worlds and not just Colo in future?

And what will their role be doing in the future and how will it be carried out?

 

[Azeul]

What my concern was, regarding players being allowed to impact in-game decisions, was the detriment of players outside that special club being openly disregarded.

It goes without saying, that I'm personally a fan of balanced, exciting, strategy-rich battles, but not to the point of handing the keys to the game over to a select group of players.

CO has a rich history of outstanding activity, power shifts and the, unfortunately, subversive game-altering updates. There's unlikely a happy middle ground that will suit ALL players, but I'd rather it be open to all, then catering to the vocal minorities or the in-power veterans. Some just want to participate and grow in their love of the game too.

So, I thank mods for stepping in and pumping the breaks on this intolerable breach of gameplay as FFs continue to get worked out and hopefully towards a higher plateau.

I do have a question regarding the Fort Balancing Team. How many positions are you hoping to fulfill for this? I was under the impression the direction headed was for more of a public round-table discussion rather than directing players to become community members.

Thanks for your time!

 

[szycopath]

What my concern was, regarding players being allowed to impact in-game decisions, was the detriment of players outside that special club being openly disregarded.

If players can't have a word about ingame decisions, we're left with a bunch of outsiders pulling updates. That went really well in the past. It's literally how they effed up the whole game. Some random >whistle< inno employees decided how it will be.
It's one of the rare cases where the SpecEd folk and the MereMortals have the same interests. If they also have the time and find the will in their heads to work on it... why not?

 

[Azeul]

If players can't have a word about ingame decisions, we're left with a bunch of outsiders pulling updates.

Having a word, on the forums or within support tickets, is not at all what I meant by that statement. Players having the ability to pull goober/john aside and decide what they would like the upcoming battle caps to be, is not okay. And like I also said, same interests only pertain to the group you subscribe to.

 

[Goober Pyle]

I was under the impression the direction headed was for more of a public round-table discussion rather than directing players to become community members.

How do you picture that working with the existing mechanics of the game?

There are world forums on every world. There’s one on Colorado.
In fact there’s a post from
Feb. 2 on "Colorado IA Forum"-> "[important] Current battle caps"
"""Per counsel agreement we will be leaving Medium caps at the defaults for now (96:80) but will begin seeking to find a balance in larges where we can let more people in and avoid some of the issues that have been coming up over ranking decisions on oversubscribed battles."""

Pretty much everyone complaining about this is on the User List for that thread but there were no replies.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on how to the implement the round-table concept

 

[szycopath]

Having a word, on the forums or within support tickets, is not at all what I meant by that statement. Players having the ability to pull goober/john aside and decide what they would like the upcoming battle caps to be, is not okay. And like I also said, same interests only pertain to the group you subscribe to.

Yes, but no. It's literally everyone's interest to have good battles. What a good battle is is quite objective, in 100 vs 20 battles no one's getting what they went there for, not the 100, not the 20. How battles are fixed is irrelevant. If they put in an update because goober took a drop too much acid and god whispered the solution in his ears, and it works, why would you mind that?
I don't even see how any of this could be abused. Only xy alliance will get xp because they paid goober off? Or... ? I'm clueless, sorry

 

[Goober Pyle]

Yes, but no. It's literally everyone's interest to have good battles. What a good battle is is quite objective, in 100 vs 20 battles no one's getting what they went there for, not the 100, not the 20. How battles are fixed is irrelevant. If they put in an update because goober took a drop too much acid and god whispered the solution in his ears, and it works, why would you mind that?
I don't even see how any of this could be abused. Only xy alliance will get xp because they paid goober off? Or... ? I'm clueless, sorry

Well, I can definitely see how things _could_ be abused if the person making changes had a personal stake and or interest in benefiting one side or particular players.
If, say,
-only requests by certain players were approved while others were denied without a consistent principle
-tweaks clearly benefited only one side or town or players and when the other side was down tweaks weren’t made

I agree that there was a perception/transparency/communication problem that let it appear a single person was playing god or working at the whim of a select few rather than the reality of a team of representatives who actively sought input from others to represent their towns, alliances, and others working together for the interests of the community at large. My personal toon has regularly moved sides and/or urged my home town to move sides to help with balance and those involved in the discussions knew and trusted my willingness to act against my personal interests for the betterment of the community, and that I made great pains to get mutual consent before taking action

Alas, for various reasons, particularly logistical/technical, much of that was not out in the open.

 

[Azeul]

Yes, but no. It's literally everyone's interest to have good battles. What a good battle is is quite objective, in 100 vs 20 battles no one's getting what they went there for, not the 100, not the 20. How battles are fixed is irrelevant. If they put in an update because goober took a drop too much acid and god whispered the solution in his ears, and it works, why would you mind that?
I don't even see how any of this could be abused. Only xy alliance will get xp because they paid goober off? Or... ? I'm clueless, sorry

CO does not see 100 vs 20 battles, and you know that. I get that alliances can take a stand and boycott/not attend battles when things go awry, but that is not the case. CO sees overwhelming attendance numbers that putting caps in place limits the chances for players to grow in their own appreciation of FFs, thus preventing future growths in the game. We can't expect the same players to stay in the game and invest what they do. Too many have come, burnt out and disappeared from existence. I could fill a page with elite CO battle leaders that are forever gone. So, the point is to create a space that garners future outcomes, not play to the advantage of those that are stuck in the mire of today. I'm not clueless. 11.5 years in CO would prove that.

 

[Azeul]

How do you picture that working with the existing mechanics of the game?

There are world forums on every world. There’s one on Colorado.
In fact there’s a post from
Feb. 2 on "Colorado IA Forum"-> "[important] Current battle caps"
"""Per counsel agreement we will be leaving Medium caps at the defaults for now (96:80) but will begin seeking to find a balance in larges where we can let more people in and avoid some of the issues that have been coming up over ranking decisions on oversubscribed battles."""

Pretty much everyone complaining about this is on the User List for that thread but there were no replies.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on how to the implement the round-table concept

I would ask that the channels which certain, key elect persons were given to discuss and manipulate the game were made public. I'm still unaware what these channels were that alliance leaders had to discuss these matters. Was it a secret forum, a discord or what?

My gameplay is severely impacted by RL lifestyle and the past year (2022) I spent a year of inactivity, basically. When I returned, the fort caps implemented by the game were confusing to keep track of, but I was unaware it was being imposed by a Fort Battle Strategist that could implement such changes on the fly. Granted, that's my own undertaking of personal gameplay, but it still serves to show a grander misunderstanding of what is occurring. Current comments like that of MsTata in "I, for one, do not understand any of this. You may as well be speaking Klingon. I don't like all the changes to fort fighting. This is just not my opinion, it has been expressed by many at fort fights. Please let it go back to the way it was to begin with and let the leaders make the changes. No offense intended, just my honest opinion," spoke well enough for me not to weigh in. It becomes very unclear what is being manipulated by players/player-mods and what is being designed/designated by developers.

When it comes to quick, in-game decisions being decided by a select counsel of players, I have concerns about game-play and thus the apparent roll-back by mods to discontinue such actions. I've also repealed some of my feelings towards your actions, Goober, as I do see the good sense of trying to improve a situation that seems out of control and what limits you have to do so. What I challenge is, statements like, "but will begin seeking to find a balance in larges where we can let more people in and avoid some of the issues that have been coming up over ranking decisions on oversubscribed battles," and then LIMITING the number of players that can get into large fort battles. That to me is a complete contradiction of the stated goal.

 

[Mrs Sam COlt]

Bring back the drops after the battle. Participating in a fort battle often requires the player to dedicate hours to building HP before the battle, and then sometimes hours after the battle. This is a substancial effort sometimes.

The drops should be of a higher value, or be hard to obtain, unsaleable quest itwms, or unique items. Suggestions include: Frida, Siringo, Lucky Clover, new Waupee items, Energy box, and bond envelopes.

 

[JWillow]

I guess Colorado will be seeing if one sided slaughters will keep players coming after the event, as there is nothing given for signing up to losing battles until the clover event starts.

Council already admitted it can't find balance. I just hope the weak side stops taking forts to keep things going. One sided slaughters is not going to keep players coming, all one has to do is look at battles before fort battle strategist came on the scene, there were 2 to zero on the supposed too big to fail world. Happens once it can and will happen again.

Also, if you could not notice the changes in caps, then you can't have been paying attention. When mediums were overfilling there was constant talk of going to larges but how to do it without giving the stronger side all the power and to keep competitive battles. I am not even able to access forums and even I knew of the talk among players at large. If you didn't see then you obviously didn't care to notice.


Let the one sided slaughters, I am sure the slaughtered won't get tired of it, right?

 

[szycopath]

CO does not see 100 vs 20 battles, and you know that. I get that alliances can take a stand and boycott/not attend battles when things go awry, but that is not the case. CO sees overwhelming attendance numbers that putting caps in place limits the chances for players to grow in their own appreciation of FFs, thus preventing future growths in the game. We can't expect the same players to stay in the game and invest what they do. Too many have come, burnt out and disappeared from existence. I could fill a page with elite CO battle leaders that are forever gone. So, the point is to create a space that garners future outcomes, not play to the advantage of those that are stuck in the mire of today. I'm not clueless. 11.5 years in CO would prove that.

While I'm sure some people left the game because they couldn't get in to a small def on lvl 19, it'd be pretty great if new players would be leaving because of that.
In my experience, new players are disappointed by the following, in no particular order:
- spending more than 5 minutes reading the saloon chat when aby and/or foscock are present (no offense. and other names could be added too,yes, I'm sure mine on a bad day as well)
- asking a nub question on saloon and either getting roasted or be explained that they're just someone's multi trolling, go eat sh*t
- attending a FF, getting a private rank (why? it's not like they'll push anyone around with their 19 ldr) and not being able to ask what to do, because roasting/being ignored/getting annoyed responses/"who's multi are you?"
- 250 levels, growing is almost impossible unless you are willing to spam 15s jobs in the best gear. A lot of new players don't have friends here, just join towns on the blackboard which towns are usually not the greatest in terms of helping new ppl. When it takes you 2 days to go from 31 to 32, the 150 or 250 looks rather intimidating
- on lvl 15 they lose their speed bonus. The game forces them to buy stuff for quests, walk to pick it up at the other end of the map then walk back, 7 hrs spent on watching your toon walk. Almost as fun as building church
- people who do have friends will get a nice construction set and their first 6-8 months in the game will setting 9 hrs of church. Very exciting gameplay. They can, of course, opt out but that also means slow leveling or spending 24 hrs spamming 15s jobs
- While this forum frowns upon duelers, a lot of people would actually like it. Low level players are effed, the dlevel system is an outrage with no other purpose than defending b*tchin' berrypickers
- Guys who decide to give leading a try get talked down on before the battle even starts. Someone will always be unhappy with the lead (regardless of the outcome) and most of said unhappy people will find the nastiest way to express that unhappiness of theirs. Also, effed ff formula means that depending on which side the leader was, their chance to win was already close to 0. Absolutely no sense of success doesn't help people stick around
- While a battle can (should...) be just fun, the amount of toxic b*tching happening in 90% of the cases is my main reason I've dropped battles. I usually don't even attend at events anymore, with the current event being an exception
- Forced balance means a lot of players are forced to play with people they genuinely dislike. Some might even hate. While some people and towns will put a foot down and flat out refuse to join the side with this or that person/town in it, others will say nothing, just silently push the delete button. This is something I've seen so many times. It's the result of completely ruining the FF system by 2013 or so, and people slowly started to fade away as a result. All these "balancing" and whatever ideas ain't gonna undo that, but what's done is done I guess
- Every 2 months there is a new "the best" gear you're most likely only getting if you pay some irl money for it. Not everyone is able and/or willing to

My list is nowhere near complete and ofc it mostly just covers things I was told/my personal experience. I just genuinely don't think that the main issue with the game or Colorado is that goober or whoever else is allowed to touch battles. I do wish that was the case, because that would be an easy fix. They way I see it tho, the game is too high effort for a low reward. Those of us here for 10+ years will find peace in chatting with our buddies, but new players don't even get that. So out of 100 new accs, 3 will stick around and I think that was a rather positive number from me here
/offtopic (a bit)

 

[RaiderTr]

associated with that alliance, that often tell their players to not come to forts. all the leading figures of those towns are clueless. no need to mention names

i want to also point out the public writing in fort chat or alliance. cry in the fort chat all the time and say: "oh we should send them another town" every fort fight for months, set topics like "go build church".

and yes hwga is stronger, but it's stronger versus an alliance that self sabotages with the lead and cooperation of complete idiots

Always fun to see beef being nice and kind
(inb4 he changes sides again)

 

[Lyrinx.]

(inb4 he changes sides again)

Nah he can't, nobody wanna play with him on that side.

 

[Deleted User - 4139925]

it's ok raider maybe one day you can come back and play on colorado with your friend lyrinx that messed up another alliance

 

[Lyrinx.]

it's ok raider maybe one day you can come back and play on colorado with your friend lyrinx that messed up another alliance

You're welcome mate

 

[Mr.anonymus]

I think Here We Go Again needs more towns. They still aren't winning all their attacks.

 

[Clever Hans]

I guess Colorado will be seeing if one sided slaughters will keep players coming after the event, as there is nothing given for signing up to losing battles until the clover event starts.

Council already admitted it can't find balance. I just hope the weak side stops taking forts to keep things going. One sided slaughters is not going to keep players coming, all one has to do is look at battles before fort battle strategist came on the scene, there were 2 to zero on the supposed too big to fail world. Happens once it can and will happen again.

Also, if you could not notice the changes in caps, then you can't have been paying attention. When mediums were overfilling there was constant talk of going to larges but how to do it without giving the stronger side all the power and to keep competitive battles. I am not even able to access forums and even I knew of the talk among players at large. If you didn't see then you obviously didn't care to notice.


Let the one sided slaughters, I am sure the slaughtered won't get tired of it, right?

I 100% agree with you.

From what Syntex wrote, it seems they will spend a considerable amount of time to define multi digs etc.
My question for both Syntex and Goober is, which worlds are currently affected by multies?
If I´m not wrong, most of the smaller worlds don´t even have the regular daily digs and it´s hard to find enough town hats that can dig a fight.

Also, regarding what Willow wrote, will there be any measures taken to prevent one dominant alliance from hording all the forts?
And, will there be anything done to prevent the transferring of forts, once all of them got captured, to pseudo 2nd alliance (e.g. few players from dominant alliance leave, create a new town and accept the forts and then they keep digging each others instead of balancing the sides).

I do commend Goober for his efforts with the event digs and glad to hear that FF team with get some reinforcement soon.

 

[Syntex]

Thank you very much for sharing your thoughts on this.

Of course, we totally see and understand that the communication could be improved between the Fort Battle Strategist and players, and our main focus is also on improving on this. That is why we opened the application process and looking forward to work with more of you together. Maintaining constant communication with a large amount of players is very time consuming, therefore it would not be possible by only one person - therefore the first step is to establish a strong ground in our end, people who can react in timely manner to all questions and requests.

After we have this background, we will create dedicated forum section here, where everyone can comment and see the discussions going on. So there will be no changes which are not discussed and announced here, on the public forum. Please accept our apologizes, if you have felt that some of you were left out of this discussions in the past. As soon as we become aware of this instance, we have discontinued it and now working on better ways of communication.

The discontinued actions are discontinued only until further notice. They may be implemented again, if the community wishes to - however we received more complains in the last days about the use of it, so we had to stop it until we create more understandable policies and transparent communication regarding it.

I also understand very well your frustration about unbalanced battles. As you can see, rebalancing the battles is also on the focus of our developers, as we have already made some changes to the formulas in the past weeks, and we are looking forward for your feedback regarding these changes.

Other than that, as we have communicated last year, The West International Team has committed to make more enjoyable and balanced battles to the point of what is possible with Community Managerial tools. I would like to highlight the fact that what we are trying to do, is 100% done for your benefit and we really do it from passion for our community. Therefore, while I can understand still some of the frustration, I would really appreciate if you could formulate your feedback in a more constructive way, as the International Team is doing their best, more than generally would be required, and I believe that instead of trying to find someone or something to accuse of, better we try to focus on bringing out the best of the current situation.

Personally I see 2 possibilities: or we discontinue everything regarding rebalancing fort battles on the level of Community Management, or we work all together as a community in finding the best solutions and compromises to aim for better quality fights. The decisions is up to you.

Also, fortunately, currently there are no spam battles, however in the past we observed more, and we would like to make steps to do not repeat it. Also, with more people dedicated for rebalancing, we also hope that we can have more battles on smaller servers, where we can play with lower limits. We will see.

Thank you for your time and understanding! We are looking forward for your suggestions on what and how would like to see these rebalancing actions implemented in practice. Until then, I wish you a great weekend!