v3 you can still make top 10-20 if your lucky without production bonus. the bonus is only 10hours of your production so if I play better than you and have 2x your production I will still grow more than you even with bonus. In Classic realms I have finnished top 25 in rankings without credits and that was when I 1st played.
ofc you are right if you have 2 equal players the 1 with creds will win. But as you say the prize is not that big so it's not really worth getting upset over. Alot of us have been waiting to play NI again lets not start getting upset over a game alot of us love to play and compete in.
Well i believe i'm doing just fine especially because this is my first time playing nomads. I don't agree with you that out of 2 equal players the one with credits will win. Unfortunately the stage is set that you can take above average player with credits against the best in nomads (as far as i could read in forum that's Tiger) and above average will win with no problems. Even if he makes few mistakes he can always buy him self way out.
This 10h bonus is A LOT in fast realm especially when you know what next attack would be. I can see players flying with points only because they can buy some extra resources for that next research or fort lvl or army.
But i have nothing against that to be honest. That's the way imperia function.
As i already wrote before, what made me to upset is Imperia misleading me to believe ALL players would be able to use 10h production. (or none i don't care as long as everybody is equal and only player skills - strategy is determining who is the best.)