WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

[dan_da_man]

Is it just me or do you not think its funny how we have less members in each ally, yet amazingly we have less allies then ever before.

where is the logic in that

 

[Maxi]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

* 986 IDs have been active in this world in the last week.
* 17 Alliances, 15 members. 225 Alliance players, if even that. Oh yeah, almost 4/5 of the game is solo.

Too much solo's, Imo. And too strong, Imo you shouldn't be able to get top 50 solo. Solo should just be an 'option' or temporarily used to switch between alliances.
It's related to the loss of members each round, aswell. Playing in an alliance means social interaction and more fun, possible making 'friends', which means people stick around a little longer. Even new players should join an alliance (*points to the old random alliances suggestion*), if they can talk to other players on politics it'd help them be more interested in the game, and possibly learn it easier and faster aswell. If they stick around a couple days and get over the learning curve, they won't leave for a couple more rounds. I'm even tempted to say just remove the darn Pure Solo option - back to a slick, smooth, and basic fun game with the upcoming 'Age'.
Yes, I think Bushtarion should be primarily an alliance based game.



Did that spark the debate? I sure hope it did! How many Psolo-ers will get mad at me now? Half the game? :roll:

 

[Garrett]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

record low sign up and participation. there is about 1199 id's right now. 986 active in the last week and only 783 active in the last day.

So pretty much only about 800 people playing in various stages of caring and activity.

Not to mention there are so many prissy players (read any recruitment thread that says, i will only play for a winning alliance... well you can't get into a winning alliance until you get in there do the work and help them win...) that if they aren't on top so they can rest on their laurels and go inactive while saying they are #1 - they run, delete, stop playing.

The other players that try to take up the slack for the prissy ones in their alliance get burnt out because they are putting in so much extra time trying to make thier alliance work.

Then you have the ever popular mass. You have to have help to bring down the top. However, anymore, the top gets attacked with overwhelming force so it's never a good fight. And then it's mass wave after wave until they have nothing left, giving them no chance to get back into the fight. Removing them from #1 isn't enough anymore. Or you get no one that cares enough to launch on the top and the early leaders never get challenged and then everyone whines about how hard stuff is.

This game has become very polarized and very predictable and is no longer the wide variety of fun, tactics and war it once was.

Any questions?


p.s. maxi makes a good point. most allies don't attack unless they have a wing of solos. solos that are difficult to attack because of AR. They suicide themselves on each other to keep AR high, they trigger for each other and generally send pissy mails and have poor attitudes.

 

[Chewie]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Try 70% of the game :/ it is beyond a joke how many solo's their are now.

 

[Elderveld]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Hmmm maxi, u convinced me of being FOR removing p-solo, it makes complete sense!
solo's should be nerverd :evil:

 

[Kariko]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

What is to blame is the lack of competition in the lower ranks and social collapse to involve friends in bushtarion life. While there is life in this game, the slow diminishing fact that no one wants to express controversial attempts, such as sister alliances anymore. I'm bored because people are too boxed up in their own alliance. To make the game more interesting is to maximize the alliance player limit to me 8)
.

 

[BlackWolf]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Not too long from now will first solo post something along lines "If this game goes for alliances only I will quit." or something.
I'm so tired to these posts and people making posts for and against em.
This has been talked 1000 times and there has been 1001 suggestions. Azzers decision is that this is both solo and alliance game, Azzer has decided what is alliance size and that no random alliances exists. All of those have been debated to way and to another for numerous of times. There has been insanely good suggestions and none of those have been accepted. So what is the point of these posts?

I could actually do quote here:

Search the Forums

Also, before posting a question or problem, please use the search feature in the forums to see if your question has been answered or your problem has been solved before. Again, this helps the other members a great deal. Since they all strive to ensure that nobody's questions in the forums go unanswered, answering your own question through searching will save them time. So, doing a little work beforehand to try and answer your own question is a huge help and is appreciated.

Yeah i think im done with my debating for this game.

 

[Maxi]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

None of those have been accepted, aye? Seems to me the debating does get us somewhere. A prime example would be the following quote from Azzer himself, and why not use his whole topic while we're at it, with most changes/suggestions coming from forum debates and creator's day?


Azzer's Summary

8/9: Solo Play/Anti-rape
* Make AR easier to receive, but the AR modifier drop faster.
* (still just a hope, no solid ideas) FInd a way to automatically prevent/negate/reduce the effects of intentional AR triggering.
* (possibility, no definite) Increased injury return rates when being pwned by lethal AR units?
* Remove "pure solo" mode altogether. Just solos that can re-join allies if they like.

Thumbs up, Azzer.

 

[BlackWolf]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Yeah right.
So what is changing? Nothing.
This game has gone up and down and up and down with alliances and solos and ARs and injuries and then again alliances and solos and ARs and injuries. Nothing has changed. Player count has been dropping, alliance count has beend dropping and people dont even bother to actually suggest things anymore.
Buuhuu, you get what you order. Since i joined this game i have seen so many good suggestions and ideas, some have been very radical some have been a bit less. Yet all of those have sounded so big changes to ideas of this game and the way this game is played that im sure would have saved a lot of players, if not even made this game to shine.

Say what ever you want but i see that Azzer has done smeg for this game in last years. He has not listened to playerbase and has not made the changes to this game it needed to flourish yet to survive. He is still stubbornly trying to think game on current markets can be based on both solos and alliances, yet no game without graphics can do that.

You people seem to think that age 5 is going to save us all. Well for some reason i dont share your opinion. I see it as same BS with new cremes on top. Itself game is not going to change AGAIN any way. We are not AGAIN gonna see bigger alliances or only solo play. We are not AGAIN gonna see any changes to how abusable this game is. and yet AGAIN people will start whining of same things as they have whined so far and playerbase will keep dropping dramatically after very short peak.

Like it or not but if you go to read age 5 forums you will very fast realize actually nothing of actual game is changing. Nothing that actually matters to people and how they experience this game is changing. There is nothing new in that cake. Bad cake will taste bad even you put fresh creme on top of it.

Thats it.
Flame on.

 

[Maxi]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

If you think all of that is not going to help, then what is, in your opinion?

Flames off, you mean.

 

[Mattheus]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Quoting one of Polo's posts here, as its one of the most insightful and best made arguments in favour of removing pure solo imo

I think the main point here is allowing players to switch between solo and alliance play more easily. Currently, if you plan on playing solo, you'd be crazy not to hit pure solo but that means for the next 3 months you're stuck as a solo unless you restart. And if you plan on playing allied, you can't then play solo else you'll be disadvantaged by the lack of the pure solo benefits. I think pure solo was one of the main points that caused the amount of alliances in the game to decrease. Some people seem to think this is all down to pure solo being very strong, especially in the hands of a good player. However, the fact that you cannot then join an alliance also removes a lot of players from allied play. I remember in the past alliances would spring up during the middle of the round as it was so much easier to recruit, you could quite easily persuade some solos to join you. Now, said solos would have to restart to join the alliance but not many would want to throw away what they've accomplished so far. I know I've considered restarting just to join an alliance when I've played pure solo but decided not to as I liked my current account.

I think just removing pure solo would be great for the game. Normal solo would probably need a few buffs to compensate but it's still not too weak.

 

[BlackWolf]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

What is going to help? I dont even know anymore, I have some idea what might have helped in the past, but now I have no idea. I know that changing the course of this game requires a lot more than fixing few routes, adding couple of buttons and calling it age 5.
Maybe could start from old forums by reading all suggestions/posts/ideas from Sordes and Polo.

Ohh whatta hell lets be radical.
Reduce amount of brances to 3. So there is exactly and only 3 routes. Then open up alliances for unlimited amount of players and make some kind of country system where each player gets in country at the beginning. People in same country cant attack each others so there would be alliances over alliances.
That should change game enought.
Or dump like half of the routes and make this game pure solo game.

Forget ARs and stuff, maybe boost injuries to 40%. Bring game back to what it is good at. With less routes it should be way more balanced for easier game lay on where you get the fun of playing from doing it with others. After all it seems some games are doing a lot better with 1 route than bushtarion is doing with zillion.

 

[Steve_God]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Combo of a few things:

1) Having less members.
It means its harder to keep a 'semi-active' alliance doing well - as at any one time there will be less members on, and therefore less defence, and more successful attacks on the alliance.

2) Solo triggering abuse.
Many Doro members are constantly triggering on each other, and however much this 'illegal' tactic is, there is no enforcement to stop them doing it, even when its reported to ID1.
And because solos are doing so well because of this abuse, ally players see how well solo players are doing in comparison, and go solo themselves.

3) Less players.
Only a small factor, but nevertheless, its there.

 

[weedman]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

yea its pretty sad to see no alliances... the funny thing is that my ally just disbanded because we kept getting waved by a bunch of solo's...

 

[Max]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

This is indeed a sorry state of affairs.

I have another reason to put it down to though, when bushtarion was at its height most of its active playerbase were in their teenage - low 20s. As time has progressed, these players have found other commitments that take precedance, but they don't want to leave the game, therefore they take their inactivity to a life of playing solo.

Meanwhile, the new players are probably seduced by the evils of World of Warcraft and their like Curse the lure of graphics and the death of imagination!!! xD

On another note I cannot wait to play Azzer's RPG when it's ready Perhaps that will attract a much larger playerbase to toy with mwhahaha

Let's hope that when the new age dawns the advertising is a wonderful success and the infrastructure is in place to treat alliances with the respect that they deserve. I am all for the removal of pure solo because I have always seen it as a option for those that want to play with less activity / contactibility / stress and believe it should remain that way. But then I've always had slightly more suicidal tendancies

Perhaps, like Polo suggested, remove pure solo but give normal solos the -1 return eta and the injury increase. I believe that these two factors alone would be enough to compensate.

 

[BlackWolf]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

So MAX all those people who have joined games that have been made after bushtarion which atm. have like 200k players are not suffering of this problem of people getting old?

 

[Max]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Different games will have different surges in their playerbase at different times. We have passed that time in bushtarion now and therefore the playerbase is, as a whole, getting older and developing more outside responsibilities. I believe this is contributing to the number of solo players in the game.

Clearly, other games are as popular now with a younger audience as they've ever been! I'm just focussing on this one.

 

[Sekishi]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Bushtarion's Situation has been predicted and foretold by more then a handfull for a very long time now. People bashed all who said it, saying "No it wont happend like that, no how can you know that ? Your just being foolish" There are tones more of responses simular to this that has been made to all that for ages has tried to warn about the decline before its reached critical levels. Most new changes now are just as Blackwolf said, "Cream changes" some age 5 Changes are however good. It brings the game into a "New Age 3", the only problem with Age 5, is that it stil does not offer any new gameplay options.

No new Routes (adding a single new route or branch is to more hassle and trouble for its worth) Replacing a few units can happend but the game cant go on with the current unit, route and devolopment structure anymore. The current playerbase are majority players that has been around since later parts of age 3. And since then they have experienced really all the routes, because face it or not. Rounds are decided by a handfull of routes so learning those kinda gives you the overall view of the game. And honestly rebuilding routes and units from scratch is not a hard thing. Azzer goes on about ballance being the issue. But if he would leave a "Few current units" intact in the new structure. Ie Shock Troopers, Gardeners, Terrorists or perhaps a few other "Key Longterm" units. And use them as referance, hell getting overall firepower etc listed on a aceptable level for each unit aint hard. Espesialy when a new unit structure (i did suggest one yes) combined with a new targeting system (suggested that also yes no need to mention it.) The ability to differance and ballance units would be alot easier then it is today. And instead of trying to fix whats broken really beyond hope, its much better to build something up from almost scratch. And go at it from a logical approach.

If i where to take this further i could use the Unit and Route structure i was making that never got a offical response as base for a good approach:

5 Routes: Each route would have a Special Trait, in my suggestion Military Stood for Agression, Crime for the Thievery, Diplomacy for "Nonviolence", Robotics for Protection and last Terrorisim stood for Dirty play. Generaly each route would be based around their theme much more so then today. And when ballancing them in one would start from this perspective: The game is based around Alliances, so its asumed all Alliances has altest 1 of each route in their alliance so Ballance is based around teamwork. The rock paper scissor except in this case it would be based in a Square. Military strong vs Robotics, Robotics strong vs Dipomacy and Diplomacy strong vs Terrorism. Crime is not part of the square as its in the center, its both weak vs all. But able to support all other routes aswell. Basicly its not a standalone route and is generaly weaker then the others but got alot of support options for other players and the alliance they belong to. Using that Square format is much easier to ballance then our current 17 long line of uneven rock, papers and scissors. So ballance aint the hard part, no the hard part is making Azzer decide "It needs to be done" and make him also realise he aint the right person for the job. He can code like a Master in my eyes, but he cant ballance if his life depended on it. In this game its his fatal weakness, its good he has however listened to alot of player opinions on this over the years, but towards the end of Age 3 he started wanting to do it himself again and things started going downhill again. Most good changes now are not his, but player imput so its good he is listening again.

 

[atsanjose]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

Meanwhile, the new players are probably seduced by the evils of World of Warcraft and their like Curse the lure of graphics and the death of imagination!!! xD

:nworthy:

 

[Garrett]

Re: WHERE HAVE ALL THE ALLIES GONE?

so at least for visible allies there is a possible 225 players max? over 1k solo players.... solos could rule the round :/