After much deliberation, considering various options, Slagpit, Pangaea and I have decided upon implementation of two ideas by Slagpit and myself;

1) Gaining of 50% buildings grabbed; Building -> land "conversion".

Basic idea:

Originally, if there were two countries, A and B, with 10kA each fully built, and a 1kA grab was made by A on B; A would gain 1kA with presumably 1k of B's buildings (in theory, i'm not sure we coded that bit write to start);

Thus you would end with 11k and 9k, fully built; 20k land, 20k buildings, 40k "total" (in theory).

In this new implementation:
A grabs B for 1kA; he gets 500 of the buildings, which are tacked on as extra land, and 500 buildings are destroyed; hence you end up with 11.5kA w/ 10k built, and 9k fully built; 20.5kA, 19.5k buildings, 40k "total".

So the land+buildings total remains constant, however buildings are "converted" to land.

CS:
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CS, however are not grabbed, so there will be slight discrepancies from this, BUT CS *will* now be destroyed in the grab at a rate randomly from (1/5th to 1/15th) of the Land Grabbed percentage; (ie if it rolls 1/5th and you grabbed 15% of their land, it will destroy 3% of their CS; if you grabbed 5% of their land and it rolled 1/15, it will destroy 0.33% of their CS).


This change is primarily to make land-grabbing LAND POSITIVE; before, if alliance A hit alliance B, and Land:Land retals were made, after numerous hits, the *AVERAGE* land between the two would stay the same, with many buildings & jets having been destroyed; hence it was land neutral; this discourages land-grabbing. Being land positive will mean that at least one side will benefit, even with Land:Land retals. Ideally this would return us to some sort of beneficial land-exchange, of the sort we haven't seen since 2001...

The 50% building destruction, and CS destruction was implemented in the hope that land trading between two individuals would be detrimental enough to discourage the practice.




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And now for the second idea...


2) Reduction of damage to smaller opponents; aka "hidden ghost acres".

Basic idea:

There has been alot of bottomfeeding in the last... decade almost? in this game. We realize bottomfeeding is probably not going to go away, yet we recognize the detrimental effect it has upon smaller players, especially new players. Some have gone so far as to say it's what's been preventing new players from joining.

Our intention is to reduce the amount of damage being done to smaller players; this will do two things: it will allow the player to keep playing more easily; and also, by reducing the damage, allow more of the small players to remain viable targets, thus spreading damage out more evenly.


The basic implementation is thus: When you attack a target that is smaller than you, the amount they lose is the amount you gain times (1+target_nw/attacker_nw)/2, while not reducing the amount the attacker gets (EXCLUDING THE ABOVE BUILDING BONUS).

ie. DEFENDER LOSSES = ATTACER GAINS*min(1,(1+target_nw/attacker_nw)/2)

Thus if you attack an opponent larger than you, they lose exactly what you get. In theory, if somebody was 0 nw and you could attack them, they'd lose 50% of what you grabbed.





Now, to give an example of the two combined;


Country A
1000 land
1000 buildings
10k nw

Country B
1000 land
1000 buildings
10k nw

we'll ASSUME 10% gains FOR MATHEMATICAL CLARITY (this is not a realistic percentage)

A --> B for 100A
100*(1+1/1)/2 = 100
A sees news that they captured 100A and 50 buildings, and destroyed 50 buildings;
B sees news saying A took 100A and 50 buildings and destroyed 50 buildings
News reports 100A grab

Country A
1150 Land
1050 Buildings
some NW

Country B
900 Land
900 Buildings



Scenario II:

Country A
1000 land
1000 buildings
10k nw

Country B
1000 land
1000 buildings
1k nw (1/10th that of A)

we'll ASSUME 10% gains FOR MATHEMATICAL CLARITY (this is not a realistic percentage)

A --> B for 100A
now... 100*(1+1/10)/2 = 55A
A sees news that they captured 100A and 50 buildings, and destroyed 5 buildings;

B sees news saying A took 55A and 50 buildings and destroyed 5 buildings
News reports 100A grab

Country A
1150 land
1050 buildings
--- nw

Country B
945 land
940 buildings
--- nw




The minimum, however, remains a 10A grab, and that is ALSO the minimum on the reduced damage; this averts impossible land kills and such things; Thus if you attack them for 13A, they will still lose 10A, you'll grab something like 3-6 buildings, and the rest will be destroyed.




These changes will be rolled into all servers as they reset.


Thanks! Feel free to post comments here; hopefully you understand the goals we are trying to achieve, and hopefully these will work towards those goals :) We'll see in the upcoming sets, Council, Alliance, and Express; (though I personally look forward to Council the most).



Thanks


qzjul, and the rest of the Earth Empires team!

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Please note the CS loss has since been adjusted downwards somewhat