Just out of curiosity, how many ppl actually enjoy playing on alliance server in it's current state? Not if you enjoy your alliance or playing with ppl in your alliance, but actually playing the game itself given all the "rules" alliances have come up with, and why?

I stopped playing alliance regularly because the game is boring. I like to land grab and in this server you cannot really do that anymore. I know you can camp the news and try to beat 500 other guys to 25a grab one of 5 untagged players, but its not the same. And mutually benifitial land trading where you expect to get retalled isn't my idea of land grabbing either. All explore is boring and useless, just like the play on this server.

i love it!

I never played the game cause it was "fun"

I'll say straight up Primary > Alliance in terms of enjoyment of gameplay. But I still play Alliance since chatting on IRC with clan mates and watching them beat each other up in DOTA2 is well worth the past time. :P

lol ppl enjoy playing alliance?

I only play 1A because of MD and the fun / community we have as a group and on our site, not the game itself.

I think that is why we frequently go off and play other games together as well.

1a gameplay is so incredibly lame. Superlame.

for effective use of time at work I would rank things as:

eating>reading the news>working>toilet>primary>lecturing people>wikipedia chains>napping>alliance

I enjoy it although with certain groups trying to eliminate landtrading an ruin other's fun it is likely to be less fun. I'd also like to be friends with Sol.

Cloak how is napping not higher!?

i'm having problems enjoying playing anything. can't seem to stay interested. guess i'm getting senile. or just plain depressed.

PAY THE IRON PRICE LOCKET IN MY POCKET!

Steam Summer Sale. Go Now!

this game stopped to be fun about 10 years ago. i just play it cause of the alliance(s)/community

I only play it for my alliance mates and friends that I have established over the years. Primary is a much more enjoyable server to play on in comparison to alliance.

Seems to be the general consensus. Most ppl play alliance for the community of their alliance, not so much for the game. I feel like the game would be more fun again if we all just agreed to 1:1 retal policies, no crying about top feeding, bottom feeding, or stock grabs. Ppl would actually have spies/defense and the skilled players who can grab well and balance stocking & protecting their country/land will rise to the top.

Just my 2 cents though since it seems a lot of people don't enjoy playing the game itself on alliance.

Wipe out alliance and have everyone in one single community like on primary. The game will be more fun and so will the community.

This game def needs some changes, i dont love alliance, i love the alliance i am in.

The game in general is boring, but alliance > all other servers simply because the competition is too weak on other servers.

And before any people come on here saying primary is competitive, stop, because you're wrong.

+1 solidsnake

SolidSnake, can you explain what's so competitive about alliance server (aside from more players)? Are you referring to the competition of hitting untaggeds right when they come out of DR?

the alliance server is like a good relationship, steady boring routine mixed in with really hot and heavy passion on occasion. the clans or alliances are why most of play the game anymore. i personally would love to see the dissolving of all pacts and a free for all world war on here but i am crazy and have been told this.

The alliance server consistantly becomes less fun to play as time and game changes continue.

lol. I'm still trying to figure out how to download the 2 free games that xbox gave me. well, suppose I'm trying to figure out if i actually want them first. then I'll have to run home to mommy and borrow some bandwidth.

have you tried ffa?

You think FFA has more competition than alliance? The one set there I top 10'd fairly easy and the competition seemed kind of bad. I'd say it seems like primary has a lot of good players though. I'd think SS would love that too.

that depends set, if major tags or 1 of those wars then there's room and ffa has changed since you were last there. elysium will be back on next set so time to show your skills.

Primary is competitive.

No one's hanging around this game from 14-15 years ago because of anything but Alliance.

If Primary has top notch players, odds are they're originally from alliance and still playing alliance. You might have a hand full that aren't, but it's the minority. For every one top notch primary player not playing alliance, there's a dozen from alliance not playing primary.

Valid points Son Goku, but I don't think it answers LATC's question of whether ppl enjoy playing alliance server nor does it mean primary isn't competitive. The two servers have completely different strategies. There are many top alliance players who can't make top 15 in primary due to the differences in how the servers are played.

I like the community of my alliance, but that's the only reason I play alliance. TBH the game play of alliance is not all that enjoyable.

Its the retal policy. Just one alliance needs to step up to the plate and say we are going back to 1:1, 2:1 for allies, and escalating retals from there.

This game of top feeding, L:L policies are just ridiculous. It ruins grabbing and the game here.

Someone take a stand!!!!!

Heck let's make a new alliance w/ all the ppl who want reform! We do strict 1:1 for all grabs both ways. No crying about TF, BF, or lost stock. I'm sure a lot of ppl would be on board for this

Actually, nobody would be on board for it. GDI on Alliance doesn't work like on Primary, which is the only reason why 1:1 tends to be upheld in Primary.

ttt

Thuryhfdtjmgfr. +1

Fact of the matter is that alliance server is sucky and boring, except for the friends you chat with in your clans.

In primary it is more competitive because you cannot hide behind your tag and run the perfect efficient stockpiling strat. You have to work at having a country that gets ahead and stays ahead and can't be retalled. Plus the gdi system and 1/4 humanitarian level adds a whole new level of strategy when it comes to grabbing. With everyone trying from the get go, it is competitive all set long, not just the last few days.

Everyone should try the new primary, its the closest thing to how earth was in the good ol days. Basically how most of you want alliance to revert to.

The strategies that the top players use on alliance/primary are quite similar. Albeit maybe with a different government. It's the strategies that the crappy players use that change.

The only good players on primary are the good players from alliance, obviously the inverse is not true. Hence why alliance is more competitive.

I enjoy it

I play alliance for MD, primary for my fun :)

Actually SS, the strategies on Primary and Alliance are quite different. On Alliance, you get to use tag protection and stay really low in NW (eg, 1m turrets on 50k land). This vastly changes stocking.

On Primary, you do not have this luxury, you'll need at least 20-30m turrets. This affects your strategy greatly, so much so that -expenses is the most useful Bonus, unless you go over 70k-80k land or so where then -building cost is better. This obviously has changed last reset where -building cost is considered better now with the new construction costs. Since you're on 30-50m turrets by the time you start stocking, this again vastly changes your stocking options - you're over 40m NW and you cannot use government changes, the last time you can use government changes is usually before your land goes past 20-25k when your NW is still below 12m. There's no such thing as a Theo destock - you have to be Theo all the way to use this.

Another example, on Alliance, you can build 380 CS first, then start your grabbing. No such luck on Primary, if you do this, you'll be so far behind the top indies that once they start bottomfeeding you on day 8 of the reset, you're not getting out of the hole without extreme market conditions (eg $70 food). The better way is to grow gradually and build 20 CS a day instead.

To be competitive on Primary, the goal is never to look land-fat, and not to fall too far behind and get bottomfed. To be competitive on Alliance, the goal is quite different, it is literally "get fat the fastest" followed by some stocking and destocking. Even the grabbing style is different - you want to maximise your gains on Primary from over 100 available targets to choose from (this means you judge their retalling capabilities, humanitarians is 1/4 on Primary), whereas on Alliance you want to maximize your gains by attacking at the right time (when DR exits) and when humanitarians is 1/12, you really don't have to worry about retalling at all.

On Primary, GDI works differently, so to be safe from suicides, you want to hit every country no more than once, so every country you hit, you don't want to hit it again in the future. This affects target selection, by the end of the reset, you'll have hit about 60-100 countries exactly once each, so maximizing your country is about choosing when to hit each country (hit it now? or hit it next week - you want to keep the countries that are same strategy as you to be hit later when construction costs are exponentially higher) as opposed to farming a few countries multiple times until they hit 7 or 9 DR on Alliance.

Even if your country is in the top 20, if you look landfat, newer players that don't understand that bottomfeeding is usually more efficient (since getting retalled and getting land gains from the 1:1 exchange is worse due to high construction costs) will topfeed you.

The strategies applied are different on alliance/primary, but the core mechanics of how to run a good country that maximizes production are the same. The optimal way to reach there is very different on each server though.

You've never tried to play Primary before, you wouldn't understand this - at least Eugene tried a bit though he didn't really try at all because he had the same mentality that it is an inferior server.

I'll repeat this again: The core mechanics on how to run a good country are the same, but the _journey_ to top 10 is very different.

Actually I played primary once, was the top country along with bakku (think we were both about 15k ahead of the next closest guy), and eventually 3 guys ran a coordinated suicide on me for no reason, so when I wasn't going to win I stopped. (Hadn't read that I couldn't join gdi after making an attack)

All it was is all reset WR, just means I do it for two months rather than a week - 10 days.

Still different.

Not joining GDI is considered a newbie mistake - one that very few people, if any, makes twice.

The fact that you concluded it is "all reset WR", a situation which doesn't occur on Alliance, makes it a very different strategy and playing style. 10-day WR on Alliance means you jump up in defense until the retal window expires, after which you safely sell down. This doesn't happen on Primary, retal windows are the entire remainder of the reset, again a big difference in strategy. For a 10-day window on Alliance, it is ok to sacrifice some country production efficiency (for eg, double or triple selling techs) for turrets until the retal windows are over, you can't do this on Primary, losing the 3 or 6 turn bonus on Primary is significant.

An example of a strat that only happens on Alliance but not Primary is Landtrading, because it is inefficient to trade land at 30m turrets, on top of that, ccoordinated landtrading is against the rules (coordination is against the rules on solo servers).

Its alliance all the way

tag up dude

what is WR?

Will Retal (A status you can set alliances to in Boxcar).

WR-feeding means you are attacking alliances that are marked WR, and you are specifically doing this and outrunning retals. This is better known as mid-feeding. All-reset WR is what we're mostly doing on Primary, because humanitarians is 1/4, so midfeeding and bottomfeeding are really close to nearly the same thing.

imo primary and alliance are somewhat equally competitive. but for different reasons.

left to their own devices in an average set I would guess that there are twice(or greater) as many people capable of a t10 finish on 1a as in primary. the trade off atleast half if not more will war in 1a whereas in primary only a handful will war.

Individual skill is a lot less important for a high finish in alliance where politics take over.

this is my last set in alliance

FFa and team now

I used to, but now not so much.

I only play alliance so if I leave here, I am done with Earth.

bonus