Greetings devs and people,
First of all let me start by saying i'm a fairly new player (just lvl 32) and have a very difficult taste when it comes to games. However i have liked Settlers a lot so far for many reasons and hence i 'd like to see it grow and flourish.
I have recently jumped into adventures and today i did my first "group" one.
People told me the extra slot is there as a "lootspot" only, which means that it somehow makes the adventure lose its group aspect.
One way to give an incentive to players to begin practically playing together is to impliment bonus features for:
- Defeating an adventure in less than a given amount of time.
For example, Dark Priests has a set time of 2 days to completion, however if you manage to do it in less than 4 hours with a friend of yours you could get a bonus. The bonus can either be doodads or decorative stuff (i'm all game for that, doesn't destabilise the game balance), buildings or materials.
note: there can be a limit of generals in the game to avoid exploiting, like for example max 1 veteran and 2 normal generals.
- Defeating an adventure with less than a given amount of settlers
This will be quite challenging for those who enjoy finding the best possible combination or strategy for a given sector or adventure altogether. It can give meaning to using a variety of units instead of just 2 types and also should be rewarding for the player since he managed to complete the adventure without losing an extreme amount of units. Good practise for/if/when pvp comes out too.
note: the type of reward for this challenge should not be something game breaking so it's fair for all kinds of players in the game. Decorations and funky buildings might be just fine.
- Begin adventuring earlier
I think it needs to be possible by lvl 20, or new players might not stay in the game long enough to experience it. I 've heard plenty of people in global chats say how bored they were and how fast...
Like friend Cough said, the lack of social interaction is the one thing this game needs to avoid.
Those are my ideas for now, looking forward to feedback from whoever feels like it!
Cheers,
Makedon