I’ve always preferred encouraging something rather than discouraging something.
Right now, this “numbers imbalance” has generated a discussion on ways to “balance” the sides by giving people “timeouts” to persuade them to switch countries or delay their return to the fight if the won't switch.
It’s pretty clear that switching countries isn’t a desirable outcome for lots of folks, particularly those in a squad. Nor do people want to sit around doing nothing waiting for a timer to run down.
To me, these are “stick” approaches to solving the problem.
So, here’s a “carrot” proposal. Take it for what it’s worth, just an idea. Maybe it’ll cause someone else to think and come up with a better idea.
Let’s say the three countries are X, Y and Z so we don’t offend anyone. Let’s say on Sunday night, Country X has 200 players. Country Y with 135 players is getting absolutely hammered by Country X. As usual, Country Z’s players are fight both Country X and Y, not really bothering X much and just adding to already serious problem for Y.
Country Y needs some help. It just doesn’t have the numbers to withstand this attack from both sides.
First off, give Country Y free perk planes. Yep, free. Not free all nite, but use HT’s formula or something like it to trip the switch on the “Free Perk Planes in Y-land” lamp. It might go on and off several times during the night. This gives Y players a bit of help using aircraft technology and something to interest other folks in switching sides VOLUNTARILY.
Now, accepting the assumption that some players “will fly for perks” (because we know there are some that don’t care about either perks or score), program a “perk awards” feature that will encourage Country Z’s players to hit Country X and leave Country Y alone for a bit.
This can also be triggered by HT’s formula. When Country Z takes a Country X base, all Z players are immediately awarded 5 perks. Heck, make it 10 intially; it can always be fine tuned as actual MA experience dictates. Or, to reward those actually performing the capture, give all of the Z players in the same sector as the captured base the perks.
This feature should encourage Z players to hit Country X instead of already beleaguered Country Y. In effect, you have brought more players to Country Y by redirecting Z’s attacks onto Country X. An alliance as it were. Again, this wouldn’t have to last all night. It would be turned on and off by player number parameters or even total number of bases per team.
Anyway, the thrust here is ENCOURAGING players to negate the numbers imbalance without the need for a timeout or semi-forcing folks to switch sides.
It’s just an idea to get folks thinking. Lots of room for improvement, so go ahead and improve it.
