It is surely not a fair competition unless all contestants are treated equally?
It is surely not a fair competition unless all contestants are treated equally?
The 220 general would indeed give this competition a level playing field
even this up somehow BB , make it a balanced and fair competition
1) the 220 general is not a huge advantage and only available for people buying the new starter pack, which won't be the majority of the servers that have the option available.
2) the difference in percentages can not be explained away by small advantages/disadvantages but have their origins in either
a) fundamental levels of participation in the event
b) issues with core statistics used to calculate the percentages, mostly definitions of active players on a server (some have remarked that the servers doing well are servers that are locked for new players, so maybe have a more stable active population over the 30 days than servers that are open for new members
The way i understood the event to work is that they use 2/3 of the active players lvl 26 and higher to calculate the 100% baseline (meaning if 2/3 of the players labeled active play the adventure 2 times, you will hit 200%) However, either servers have huge numbers of players labeled active or the calculation doesnt seem to work that way. If 200 adventures were completed in the first day of the event, and this being 6%, this means an active population of around 5000 lvl 26+ players on the server. Is 200 a high or low estimate of adventures completed? dunno, some played 3 or 4 and obviously many played zero but all in all the percentages so far are disappointing- across all servers
Nanzi
Whilst the 220 general may not be a huge advantage, it is an advantage nonetheless. It reduces losses thereby making the process of recovery from each adventure quicker and allowing people more opportunites to complete the adventure.
A lot of players without a veteran general are not taking part as they are baulking at the cost in terms of time and resources to complete the EOTW adventure. The reduced losses given above would encourage more people taking part thereby addressing your second point
The fundemental fact is that not all servers have the access to the same generals and therefore to apply the same criterion for success to all servers is a fundamentally flawed concept
Nanzi
another factor to take into account for disappointing figures is that since the event started some players are receiving a crash message from BB and cannot get back into the server. I have two members min from my guild of 94 not able to log in since after the start of the event. One at least would have completed 4 a day. Take this across the board and maybe we have an answer as to why the figures are not adding up.
I am happy to see that there are those who are willing to do there bit for the team which also benefits the server but the calls of unfair are getting old about the 220 general.
If anyone who baught the settlers online pack available in stores and online makes it unfair does that mean anyone who baught a vet general with gems is being unfair? its not like BB have hidden this pack from people or didn't want some people to buy this item. I see a lot of people saying EOTW adventure cant be done with 200 generals well little ol' me didn't use any guide and sent 3 battle hardened generals in and only useing the battle calc beat every camp i hit with one hit.
some may say well im a big bad level 38 player my response would be lmao hardly my troop count is never overly high as i refuse to spend all my life at a pc playing A GAME again like i did with evony which if anyone is interested in finding out what its like to play a game where the game makers really don't care about the players i suggest a look.
so these guys may make mistakes (i didn't like the route mapping on EOTW) but atleast they are trying to improve the game and add new things to keep things moving forward. im sure there are some complaining who do have genuine reasons but for most part 'unfair' is just people who don't get things there way, well welcome to life it is a painful lesson but get over it.
Uh Oh... all you haters are going to be banned. lol
I agree with Mortallicus and Fat_Taff concerning the uneven playing field this general represents.
As to the event itself:
I started this event as a lvl 37 player with a decent army, having prepared for the event by building up recs and bowmen, as well as stocking up on settlers in my star menu and turning on a drill plan for the first troop rebuilds. I also went into the event with 15k+ bread for building new settlers and at least 10k brew, as well as plenty of sausages for new troops and good levels of bows and bs.
More than 24 hours later, I finally managed to crawl to the final camp on my first EOTW, with 3 of my 4 generals recovering. I have built hundreds of bowmen and recs, gone through all my bread and bought 10k more (at exhorbitant event-inflated prices) and got down to the last dregs in the brew barrel.
Do I feel like it was fun? No.
Do I think the rewards justify the level of resources spent and troop losses incurred? Emphatically not.
Am I ready to start a second EOTW? Most definitely not - lots of rebuilding is necessary before I can contemplate that.
So what could have made this event more enjoyable?
IMO the pathing on the event island forces battles which must inevitably result in non-veteran generals being injured and rendered unusable. It is clear that those with veteran generals can get through all combats without being injured, thus resulting in a dramatic reduction in time expended. Not only does the loss of a general mean a delay on the map, it will eventually curtail the player's ability to ship new troops to the island, thus further extending the time required for completion. You can have all the troops you need to fulfill the quest sitting at home in barracks, but if you can't get a general back to pick them up, they might as well not be there.
OK, I made one "greenhorn" mistake - because I was trying to do combats while at work, I hastily read a 30/30/100 camp as 30/30/50 and sent the wrong troop mix, resulting in the loss of another general plus, crucially, 40XB and 144B. So if I hadn't done that, I may well have taken an hour or two less to complete. However, I am sure I was not the only one making a silly error like that.
How could this adventure (and hence the whole event) be improved?
1. Allowing pathing which could cut out even one of the suicide wave camps for non-veteran-owning players would help a lot.
2. Reducing the amount of veteran generals players could use to, say, a maximum of one would probably help prevent an imbalance.
3. Making the adventure 2 player, if left as tough as it is, would help a lot and allow involvement of more lower level players. Please don't imagine that just being weapons factories for higher level players in one's guild is letting lower level players enjoy an event.
4. Perhaps making bows and bs or drill plans or Mr Myers-type buffs temporarily available in the merchant at fixed prices, or in the guild merchant would help players with lower levels of resources take part.
5. The Christmas Feast map had two setups for different level players, so surely that could have been done for EOTW?
6. Since ultimate rewards for servers in competition is clearly going to be based on numbers of EOTWs completed, it seems extremely likely that the servers with more veteran (or veteran-like, ie 220) generals available across a wider percentage of the population are going to win. That is simple mathematical probability. I wasn't even aware there were servers locked to prevent new players joining, but since that seems to be the case, though not a betting man, I would place my money on one of them being the ultimate winner.
OK, that last point is less a suggestion than an observation, but I think I have made my point. If you're going to make this a competition, make it accessible to all.
Last edited by Krepotsky; 12.12.12 at 13:39.
As I see it, the whole event is heavily weighted towards those players who spend a lot of money on the game - whilst I know bb need people to spend, this sort of thing does dishearten the less well off players. Us small players may spend occasionally, so dont turn us away from the game!
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