dark fortress

[_mathias_]

would be nice if the aliance could attack the fortress, because my aliance has 18M soldiers and none of then can do something to that fort but at same time the aliance recive lots of gold when we take the first place

[Starbuck]

Hi Mathias


thank you for the suggestion
however, I'd suspect that this will only increase the gap between top players/Alliances and the more casual/independant players


Have fun,

[blanderson]

I would not want to allow alliance armies to attack the Dark Fortress.  This would make the alliances more powerful.   I am in realm 161 and we have an alliance called "SIMPLY_THE_BEST".  This alliance is 2x larger than the second place alliance and has millions of troops.  This alliance could easily get all of the Dark Fortress points and be come even more powerful.   Also, the "SIMPLY_THE_BEST" alliance cheats and does illegal stuff anyway.   They have recently had a number of players that have the red X icons next to them.   

[alander]

I would not want to allow alliance armies to attack the Dark Fortress.  This would make the alliances more powerful.   I am in realm 161 and we have an alliance called "SIMPLY_THE_BEST".  This alliance is 2x larger than the second place alliance and has millions of troops.  This alliance could easily get all of the Dark Fortress points and be come even more powerful.   Also, the "SIMPLY_THE_BEST" alliance cheats and does illegal stuff anyway.   They have recently had a number of players that have the red X icons next to them.   

About the dark fortress, I sended a mail to support about that, the rewards are outrages... http://prntscr.com/7uhbzh
even the personal rewards are outrages, http://prntscr.com/7wxzo8
it's spoils the whole competition in the game, like you invite all of your competition to win a era (they should also randomly place people into an alliance which they can not leave, so you won't have these medal hunters and 2 a 3 people bragging how good they are fighting against nobody).

...anyway they told me that it will be discussed soon, so I think you will hear about it soon

[yxcv]

Although i'll never be first place there, i don't think the rewards are too big. one lvl15 camp gives you more than the chest you have, and 200m gold for a whole union attacking all days isn't that much either. if all of my union would start attacks against our oppenents instead, we would probably 20x get nothing and 2 or 3 of us could raid those 200m with one wave of raids, if anything is wrong with them they are too small

[alander]

Although i'll never be first place there, i don't think the rewards are too big. one lvl15 camp gives you more than the chest you have, and 200m gold for a whole union attacking all days isn't that much either. if all of my union would start attacks against our oppenents instead, we would probably 20x get nothing and 2 or 3 of us could raid those 200m with one wave of raids, if anything is wrong with them they are too small

Don't be so greedy
All joking aside, you also know that there is a limit on donating and that the 200 million makes a huge difference when all of your members are at max.
you can raid as much as you want but it does not fit in the alliance treasure,
the difference between the competition is only growing apart, this is allthough a competitive game right? so why destroying the competition, then you can also just take lame tactics and invite the whole server, that solves all the problems,
maybe I sound offensive but I'm not, I'm just dissapointed that any form of competition will be destroyed by ourself and that we(ourself) don't try to fix it, that is what we can fix ourself, and if we can not fix it ourself we make suggestions towards IO whether they can fix it,
allthough this is jus my point of view and not all agree, all I stand for is a fair and good competition, that's what made these games good games.

[yxcv]

Since i had a different maximum in different unions, i thought it just depends on what the leader has set to max, at least in the union i'm atm not many have reached the maximum of 20%, especially if almost everything except gold is earned by taxes. For us, these 200m pay the union upkeep for less than one day, so it's nice to have but far from spoiling the game i think... and even if i had been at max, right now i could donate another 4 billion res after i left because i was angry and came back because i was convinced that things will change. of course you can't do that more than once, but... really? you think that changes game because all members have reached max donations, and it's impossible to increase max donations? hten i guess your members should make some more points instead of donating, even if that means you have less targets to attack

PS: OK, probably i should also mention, as far as i can say i play in a realm with some, but not many and not too excessive diamond buyers. The attacks against dark fortress are usually (not without exception) without diamonds, so the union with the biggest and most active armies get first place, not the union with the most money. So i think it's still competition and the biggest get most. Yes, that could just mean the union with most members, but the last months, we and our opponents had both of it in turn, so it looks quite fair, to me at least. I'm quite new to this game, but for me, it looks like mass>class here anyways in many cases, except wars.

If you know the way to win a realm with a handful of players. i'd really like to know how you do that. Wars without end becomes quite expensive during late game, i guess we would need much more than those 200m to declare one... and since the price depends on the networth points of both opponents, it's not that much cheaper if a small union declares war to a big one, or am i wrong with that?

PPS: and don't worry too much about beeing offending me, i respect your opinion, but that doesn't mean i'd care too much what you think about me, so it would be hard work for you to offend me
I'm just playing my first era in one single realm, i'd say i'm performing quite well, but i know there is still a lot of things i don't know. You seem to be quite experienced, and i'm always glad to learn from others

[alander]

I myself have been playing in many different alliances, 2 of the alliances I was in was gold an huge obstacle, the other alliances it was no big deal,
the difference was that the other alliances where financed by multi-accounts, accounts that joined, donated all and left to save up resources again, fixed battles and fixed trades,
this is purely from my experience in the different servers I played, this dark fortress takes away the struggle that fair alliances had to pay upkeep for the alliance army, that is ofcourse when played in a fair way, maybe IO wanted to cover that up by taking away the struggle, so the difference between fair and cheating will not be noticed that quickly.

Of course you can leave and re-join, but when you are in a certain position you take away the benefits you provide for your aliance, so it is not always a smart move, an alliance army is more then just a couple a million soldiers.

Some members don't have the ability to grow into a million point player, you can not blame them.

[yxcv]

I agree that gold is always or most times a problem, and now i know why we had a max of 20%: we had a caslte
To reach that 20% isn't as easy like 5%, even for smaller players, especially if gold is almost the only resource  donated like i said before. Now i know that my union made several mistakes in my opinion, the biggest was to donate army too soon during era. That we can take a castle after 3 months doesn't mean we should, when the era lasts 4-5 more months. Without a union army, gold still is a problem, but far away from beeing a big problem.

To get researches without donating resources except gold is another problem though, if you play in a small union. But i think that's one (maybe the most important) of the points where big unions are treated far better than small unions... the costs for research and buildings are always the same, no matter if you play with 5 ppl or 50. I'd like to see that changed, although it becomes easier for multi-accounters too, but i think the game mechanics shouldn't make it harder for fair players only because cheaters can also profit from a change, so research costs should become cheaper for small unions, and maybe more expensive for big unions. This might be abused, but as you said, leaving and rejoining isn't always the best idea even if you do it only once.

And i don't want to blame players who can't grow, but there is a difference in "can't" and "don't want to". If it's only about gold which goes direct into treasury or to players first, it seems to me more about not wanting to. if they can't raid enough to start a research/building at one day, bigger players can help. I gave several players the gold for the next central, especially if it's central 11 it's a much better investion than donating it to union, for the players and union as well. And then their possibility to donate is raised again
If they just don't want to grow... well, some don't want to donate either. Then it is the problem of the players and their union, not of any feature of the game.

[alander]

I still think the 200, this week 300 million gold per week due the dark fortress, can hold a way larger alliance army then the second alliance can,
that was my point basically, your not the number 1 alliance because it just happened, you became the number 1 because you have the best players from the server in it,
then the second best players are in the second best alliance, simple as it is,
but they get way less income from the dark fortress that they can not hold a competitive alliance army, so the competition is ruined.

When I'm at a leading possition I also wait till the last 1 to 2 weeks to go for a castle, and to have a minimum of 300 million gold and stone in the treasury,
you have to fight for a castle wich gains extra income to sit out the era and still be able to move the army all day long.
alliance units can be destroyed which gains wood and iron to the treasury, that's why you only need to donate gold and stone at the later state of the game,

investing in progress is always good, but it must pay out tho, with 3 weeks remaining you don't start cent 11 anymore, then it's just all or nothing.

[yxcv]

I see several mistakes here, or maybe i am wrong: union armies can't attack the dark fortress, so the players must have enough army to get #1 i think. And if that can maintain "a way larger army", well, depends on i'd say. If you have 1m union army then yes, you can support a lot more than this by getting first at the dark fortress. if you and your opponents alike have to support 10m elite units, it's little difference... especially because most likely your opponnents won't get much less, if their players have an equal economy. It's even possible to get equal or more gold when you are second, don't forget that the reward depends on the production of the union.

You could say that the dark fortress is an advantage for unions with strong economy, as long as they are able to get on of the first 3 places, but i don't see a big problem with that. Btw, we have been #1 at the dark fortress most often, and finished the era without a single castle. The reason we lost wasn't the amount of units in first place, but stupidity of commanders, but our enemies had the larger army in the end as well, although we had the stronger ecomony i think. So, this gold doesn't make you win easy at least

And you didn't mention that it still IS competion, your players must attack the df, the union with more active players with more army and better economy has an advantage. Little wonder, i'd say, but they don't get unbeatable by this. For the union ranked at 4, it's much worse than for the three first places, but i'd say they won't win anyways and have still the possibility to take one castle, so nothing really changed. That's also the reason why i actually don't care that much if there is or is not a df, for me it was nice because the day of df was quite relaxing... i was quite sure nobody who's able to would raid me, so i didn't have to save everything every time i didn't watch.
And i was also sure to get visited after it's destroyed to take the gold i got there