Game 5684

[Brekk]

LY --> AN

A village is fine, looking only for fleets.

LY--> UN
To answer your question about trades, some people worry a lot about control, the reality is I watch for people enamoring my region and since they should all be hostile its easy to see an invasion from most. It used to be a far more common thing back a few years ago when I started playing. That said I would not give a town in the water to ANYONE as that then could become a HUGE issue for me later, any town or village on the shore is easily recovered when/if war breaks out for either of us. Someone who insist on holding a town in the water would be considered at war right off the bat (Typically this is a Dupont/Pirates move .
Earlier you asked how to move everyone quickly, a small trick is move everyone to your capital then move the capital (Which is not range restricted on a move) to a PC in range of your enemy and flood them the following turn.

You didn't tell us how many UN agents were training! Lowering the cost to the minimum will flood you with gold, trust me, just do it...

[Strylian]

The option to make an order a standing order for characters is in abbreviated (yet another abbreviation), but visually obvious, form.

The player just clicks the S.O. box (visually obvious, though new players may not just automatically make the connection that S.O. stands for Standing Order.




Why is it important to make this aspect of the Standing Orders equation visually obvious, but not have a similar visually obvious visual cue right out in the open of the Alamaze Online Order System for players to automatically know which Standing orders that they have already issued on previous turns?

For experienced players, it's a non-issue. Their first-hand experience is their guide, so they don't need a visual cue. New players lack past first-hand experience, and the lack of visual cue for Standing Orders previously issued places them at a disadvantage.

The more intuitive that a game's interface is, the better your chances are of winning over new players in greater numbers. Each little item or area of confusion/uncertainty collectively adds up. The more intuitive the game interface is, the less that has to be explained to new players. And the grand objective is to GAIN and RETAIN a lot more new players for Alamaze. Increased intuitiveness in the game's interface can help to offset part of the complexity of the overall game design.

I don’t think it is a non-sense issue at all. There are changes that are coming to the interface and this is something to could be addressed. I would think an easy fix would be that orders that are standing remain checked and on the order input page until they are cancelled. They just carry over from turn to turn. 

But that is not something that can be fixed overnight. 

The feedback is great. This is stuff Brek will need to make the game even better in the future.

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I usually leave it as a standing order and build the guild. You can cancel the order and use him to steal food or gold if it takes a few turns to build?

Can't build the Thieves Guild, as one must build a Bazaar, first. (Boo! Hiss! Hiss!)

I wonder why the UN5684Setup.html file didn't mention either a Bazaar or a Thieves Guild, as that's fairly relevant information, provided an Underworld player doesn't want to end up behind the 8-Ball on the training of its agents to higher levels. The end result is that now, my Level 9 agent will have to not train to a higher level for two turns. Not exactly a motivator. This is a good example of how to generate a loss of interest in players.

Let me see what I have available. I have not uncovered all of that area yet

[uncledarkseid]

Another great concept Mr. underworld, the FT (Free Traders) has ships in the sea of sorrows. Sabotaging them is a way to raise agents!

[Maximus Dominus]

If you have a standing 500 order, then issue a 53 order, for instance to counter-espionage (CE), or a 350 order to move, the CE or move order will go through, the 500 order will fail.  However, next turn if you issue no orders for that agent, the 500 order will still take effect.

Well, in spite of your clear advice, I managed to bungle it, anyway. I followed your advice, here, specifically - but then after the fact, I kept fiddling with my turn orders, making various changes here or there, and then I promptly forgot - and paid the price, this turn.

If you have a standing 500 order to train, and you issue a 900+ order to steal or whatever, the 500 order will go through, and the steal order will fail.

Let me go ahead and add my first-hand confirmation of what Jon Deaux said, here.

Which is why I changed my turn orders, to accommodate the fact that the turn order that will be processed where a standing order for a character has already been issued, will be the lower order number of the two. This underscores the difference between awareness and remembrance.

[Maximus Dominus]

LY--> UN
To answer your question about trades, some people worry a lot about control, the reality is I watch for people enamoring my region and since they should all be hostile its easy to see an invasion from most.  It used to be a far more common thing back a few years ago when I started playing.  That said I would not give a town in the water to ANYONE as that then could become a HUGE issue for me later, any town or village on the shore is easily recovered when/if war breaks out for either of us.  Someone who insist on holding a town in the water would be considered at war right off the bat (Typically this is a Dupont/Pirates move .
Earlier you asked how to move everyone quickly, a small trick is move everyone to your capital then move the capital (Which is not range restricted on a move) to a PC in range of your enemy and flood them the following turn.

It is difficult at this stage of the game to afford enamoring the region that my kingdom starts in, much less yours (or anyone else's).

Your tip about moving the capital (I'm sure that comes at a steep cost in gold, though I'll look it up to be sure) is a choice piece of advice. If memory serves me correctly (and it may not, in this particular instance), somewhere in the back of my mind, I think that Middle-earth PBM or Fall of Rome provided a mechanism for moving groups of characters about, together. It wasn't something that U was looking to do, last turn. I was just trying to confirm whether there was a more efficient way of moving multiple characters about.

You didn't tell us how many UN agents were training!  Lowering the cost to the minimum will flood you with gold, trust me, just do it...

No, no I didn't. I did plainly state, though, "The figures listed above don't include data for my own kingdom's training of agents, of course."
SOURCE: https://kingdomsofarcania.net/forum/show...2#pid84972

I'm at enough of a disadvantage, as it is. Besides, I thought that I was being rather generous, providing the turn-by-turn on the eleven other kingdoms in the game that were training (or hiring) agents. Let's not be greedy, Brekk.

[Maximus Dominus]

Another great concept Mr. underworld, the FT (Free Traders) has ships in the sea of sorrows.  Sabotaging them is a way to raise agents!

I don't see any ships in the Sea of Sorrows, Darkseid. In fact, I still don't see what are probably most pop centers in the region that I started out in (Zamora). Moving army/troop/legion groups around is proving to be a slow, tedious, hit-and-miss affair.

[Maximus Dominus]

I don’t think it is a non-sense issue at all. There are changes that are coming to the interface and this is something to could be addressed. I would think an easy fix would be that orders that are standing remain checked and on the order input page until they are cancelled. They just carry over from turn to turn. 

But that is not something that can be fixed overnight. 

The feedback is great. This is stuff Brek will need to make the game even better in the future.

Thanks. The more obvious that everything is, the more intuitive a game's interface becomes.

I don't expect anything to be fixed or to change overnight. And some things may always remain as they are, now.

People do not always like, nor appreciate, my articulations about what I encounter, or what I feel when I encounter this or that, but if I feel a given way, other newcomers may, as well. Not every player is going to take the time and make the effort to explain what they like or dislike, or what they think is broken, obscure, confusing, or otherwise off-putting about the game. If only they would.

[Maximus Dominus]

The Training of Agents by Kingdom for Turn #1
Ancient Ones = 1
Dark Elven = 3
Deathknights = 2
Elementalist = 1
Free Traders = 3
Giants - 2
Halfling = 4
Lizard Men = 1
Lycans = 6
Red Dragon = 1
TOTAL = 24


The Training of Agents by Kingdom for Turn #2
Ancient Ones = 1
Dark Elven = 2
Halfling = 5
Lycans = 4
Lizard Men = 3
Giants = 1
TOTAL = 16


The Training of Agents by Kingdom for Turn #3
Ancient Ones = 1
Dark Elven = 1
Halflings = 1
Lizard Men = 2
Lycans = 4
TOTAL = 9


The Training of Agents by Kingdom for Turn #4
Dark Elven = 2
Lycans = 6
Lizard Men = 2
Sorcerer = 1
TOTAL = 11


Total Training of Agents (minus the Underworld) to date (as of the end of Turn #4):
Ancient Ones = 3
Dark Elven = 8
Deathknights = 2
Elementalist = 1
Free Traders = 3
Giants - 3
Halfling = 10
Lizard Men = 8
Lycans = 20
Red Dragon = 1
Sorcerer = 1
TOTAL = 60

[Maximus Dominus]

Lowering the cost to the minimum will flood you with gold, trust me, just do it...

You've trained agents no less than 20 times, already, and this game is only now at the end of Turn #4.

So, while I am sure that my Underworld kingdom would definitely be more likely to gain a very noticeable increase in gold, due to other kingdoms training agents more (due to a reduced cost of 2,000 gold that you seek), my starting region also borders your starting region. Plus, too, isn't your Lycan kingdom scheduled to receive some Lycan reinforcements, next turn? For all that I know, you are training all of those agents to come after me.

[Maximus Dominus]

Bumping the previous message, below, since I didn't see a response to them, already.

QUESTION: When the Underworld issues order #994 - Set Agent Training Cost, do I have to issue it in increments over multiple turns, to raise it from, say, the starting 5,000 gold cost per agent that trains, up to 8,000 gold, the maximum allowed?

QUESTION: When raising the cost to train agents, if I were to raise it to 8,000 gold, does it then cost the Underworld 8,000 gold, also, to train agents from then on out?

QUESTION: Even if the Underworld changes the cost of training agents to 2,000 gold, does the Underworld still receive the same 1,500 from other kingdoms per agent trained, whether the cost of training agents is set at 2,000 gold or 8,000 gold?