My "Great Compromise" idea to fix the strat game. Opinions wanted.

[LCADolby]

There was a really good fire burning, but some pig pissed on it.

[bustr]

You gents design excellent strategies for 2 sided death matches.

Honestly I don't understand why you aren't in the AvA going at it. I bet the CM staff would be willing to put up a two sided death match LWMA style arena with everything enabled on both sides if it would pump up the player base. Thats what the more strategic minded ultimatly are asking for with their game change designs.

I suspect the AvA CM staff can modify the arena so strategic bombing and other strategies will have the capability to cripple the other country into submission with well designed and orgnised master strokes unless diligently defended against. I'm not sure how you will force players to stay in that arena once the master stroke puts the writing on the wall that their ability to wage war has been castrated.

Rule #1 in the LWMA 3 sided matchup is:  The ability to wage equal war at all times.

Pick your whizzing match with Hitech. He created it.

[Tilt]

Rule #1 in the LWMA 3 sided matchup is:  The ability to wage equal war at all times.

Quoting this continuously does not make it valid.....................

[Nathan60]

Quoting this continuously does not make it valid.....................

True its rarley 3 sided  most the time the bish n rooks are gagning up on the Knights.

[Lusche]

True its rarley 3 sided  most the time the bish n rooks are gagning up on the Knights.

lol

[Nathan60]

lol

Of course that before  6 pm est the n it goes to  Rook n Knigths on bish

[bustr]

Quoting this continuously does not make it valid.....................

Holding your fingers in your ears and going nanananananananananana won't make it go away.

Nor does trying to find ways to slip 2 sided death match strategies in under the guise of making the strat game meaningfull for lone bomber pilots. So far all of the strategies enable some species of country wide or regional denial of resources as a punishment for the population of that country not spending their whole time logged in on bomber raid alert versus having the fun they are paying for.

The majority of players don't play this game to have to worry about who is sneaking around in their backfeild getting ready to deny them the next hour of fun they are paying for.

Except for killing the strat 100% then the HQ 100% right after that  to achive the 6 hour country wide ressuply delay Hitech built in to the game. Nothing in the game when destroyed impacts other than the local destoryable object's sphere of influence. This is so no small group of players can disproportionately effect the ability of that country's larger population from waging equal war in return. Thats why it takes a hoard to win the war or have any lasting effect to the country you are attacking. 

This would only get worse if in fact the bish and rook squads really are agreeing to pick on the knights and had a mechanism to castrate that country at will built into the game. At that point knights would jump to the other sides or log off along with players voting for other games with their credit cards.

You guys are only designing for yourselves and not for the survivability of the game once you allow the lunitics to run the assylum.

Ask the AvA CM's to setup a 2sided LWMA that mirrors all of the aircraft, vehicals and their perk structure but, place a handfull strategic knock out functions into the map. Then see how many players want to play in your MA when they can't compete on equal terms against you after you knock out their P51 factory, spit factory, Tiger factory, radar factory, fuel factory, ammo factory, ords factory, and global feild regeneration for several hours.

It kind of looks like a mini special events snap shot with imposed marching orders and consiquences for not following them once it's a two sided affair. Versus the MA which is an unstructured free for all with minimal impose order and no one shot way to kill the fun. And where do the majority of players vote with their credit cards?

[Lusche]

Except for killing the strat 100% then the HQ 100% right after that  to achive the 6 hour country wide ressuply delay Hitech built in to the game.

That must be a brand new feature... 

[bustr]

Lusche, I've heard it described several ways over the years.

I'm still not sure which way it works. I've never seen it accomplished or the effects there after. My memory of it is you take down the strat 100% then the HQ 100% and for (2 or 6) hours that country globaly has a slowed regeneration time for regeneratable objects. Or something along this line of reasoning.

Since it's never been accomplished that I can tell, even I have a fuzzy memory of how it works. Once in a long while during these game remodeling fests Hitech has jumped in and reminded us the function is there and how to accomplish it. So far it appears no one was listening or cares to expend the time and effort to find out what happens when you take down the strat and HQ 100% collectively. It's possible the proximity of 163's and the low perk price of 163 has killed any interest in the process. Hitech may be doing that on purpose...

They mostly want some kind of a shorter time investment strategic knock out blow that multiplys their personal effort and results on a regional or global scale to the affected country. And they want it to reduce that county's equal ability to wage war as a consiquence of allowing them to do it.

[Lusche]

The HQ has no impact on any resupply whatsoever. I don't even know where anyone could have gotten the idea from 

The (theoretical) supply chain is as follows:

City->Factories->Bases. (The HQ is outside this supply chain. It's just for country dar)
The City has a fixed 6h downtime. The factories from 45 minutes to 3 hours, depending on City status. The base items 45minutes up to 3h, depending on the corresponding factory/City status.

I called it 'theoretical', because currently the factory downtimes are broken, they only stay down 45 minutes no matter what.

[bustr]

As I said it's been so long since Hitech has explained it in these discussions, or that anyone that I can remember has ever accomplished it, or that very few have knowlege of how it realy works.

You are describing the only process available to bombers to globaly impact a country at one choke point object. But you are also describing something that does not allow a minority to dictate to a majority in spirit. Time and effort evens out how long a small number would have to work at it to succeed becasue of the number of trips involved and chances of 163 interference.

It's easier to use a large group effort to roll the map when a group is so inclined. But, that means placing the future of the endevore in a visible majories hands versus one press of a button by a player sneaking around in the back feild while everyone else has logged in to wage local combat for the evening. The equal ability to wage war at all times and expected fun is then controled by an individual or minority of players. And we know just how intoxicating it is to stick it to the largest possible number of people with the least amount of effort. Human nature is about taking away each others fun with no thought to the consiquences.

The microcosim example of this is how the 2 sides furballing between a carrier and an airfeild suddenly loose a tacitly accepted fun furball after 2 hours to a single bomber pilot with his middel finger on the release button. Often thats the end of the fun for the night and players loose interest and logoff for the evening. Simply scale that up to a country sized scenario and you have the real gist of many of these game change constructs over the years.

So how many players do you know, who know's how Hitech has setup the strat's underlying cause and effect if they can 100% destroy it? How many do you know who are willing to expend the copius amount of effort to achive the 100% destruction to reap the global reward effect on that country? And how many of these plans do you see that want the effort shortend and the rewards and effects made greater as the goal?

Equal ability to wage war at all times or players jump countries or log off. Then vote with their credit cards.

[M1A1]

Is it me or does he like the long winded diatribes? Ranger I like the idea as long as it can be worked to keep the game flowing.
As for the pig dude you keep saying equal ability. When has this game or any other game been about equal ability? No rule ever written has been about equality, in actuallity rules in games are no more than the best compromise for keeping a game close to fair. I have played this game for over 3 years and have never seen a "FAIR" fight nor ever seen a country win a map fair and square. For it to be equal and fair each side would need to have the exact same amount of players on at the same time and all would have to be matched equally according to skill. The game simulates war and war is NEVER fair.
 Equal ability to wage war is achieved by setting said system up so that all 3sides can do the same thing to each other and then letting them go. Just as the game is now all 3 sides will come up with different approaches to try and acheive the very same outcome which is victory. Your equal ability  argument lacks sense since all 3 sides will have the same tools,equipment and ability to inflict the maximum amount of damage on it's 2 opponents.
 I also find your over-inflated use of the english language to tell us what Hi-Tech is thinking quite annoying in the least. While I must admit your grasp and use is quite impressive I must say you do convey your thoughts in a very condescending way which never wins hearts nor minds, but then again what do I know as an uneducated blue collar kinda guy who drinks his beer form a bottle....

[bustr]

M1A1,

Thats OK my job in life is not to win any popularity contests. I don't give a hairy rats kester. Once you give up your soul to the popular collective you are one offended borg cog away from mob justice.

I've been playing AH since April 2002. Only an inanimate brick would fail to catch on over 10 years to how the 3 country game works in the MA. Unless HTC decides to impliment strategic choke points into each country to allow a minority of players to dictate the flow of the game to the majority of a given country. I cannot see how to change the primary rule in the MA that gives subscribers the confidence that when they logon any time 24x7, it won't be into an imbalanced no-win heck hole.

Equal ability to wage war at all times right up to the very last contested base needed to win the map.

HTC has changed many things in the last decade. But, I've not seen them touch this as of yet. So far no one that I can remember has asked why HTC won't specificly change it. Why not ask them yourself M1A1 and lets see what they say.

Any change thats been rolled out in the last decade I've willingly adapted to including building 4 PC to overcome the change. In my experience HTC has applied a consistant sound judgment almost all of the time to how they change the game. They have also shown a great propensity to learn from mistakes. I've worked for heck hole companies when it comes to not owning up to and not repeating mistakes with their code.

Personaly I bought those beer glasses you see in the Samual Adams commercials. They really do improve the flavor of beer over the bottle.

[M1A1]

Your the guy who kept sharper image in business aren't you??

 Well for all the scolding you have done how about you put that head of your into the pot and help make it a little more involved and fun. What is your answer to making the startegic level of the game a bit more indepth. After all we had a saying in my unit and that was " If you aren't part of the solution then YOU are the problem" I would truly be interested in what you feel would be a better balance than what we have now.

By the way if you are drinking American beer there is nothing that would ever make it tatse better, glass stein or plastic bucket it all tastes like crap anyways...If you want good beer go to Amburg Germany and try their local brew..For the life of me I can't remember it's name but it is tmade by the smallest brewery in Amburg ..Straight form the bottle that weisse was pure sunshine... 

[bustr]

Ask the AvA staff to setup a 2 sided LWMA duplicate with input from yourself and anyone else who wants HTC to change the game by introducing 2 sided death match war strategic choke holds. Make sure there are strategic targets that a minority of players can kill to impact the flow of resources and materiel to the global targeted country and all of it's players. That will be the polar difference between the MA as is and the MA changed into a strategic war arena.

Set it up so the first reward for a sucessful destruction of a strategic object is a total reduction in war fighting ability by 1/4-1/3. Then so forth. It becomes a domino effect from there on and the outcome is no secret. Being no secret players will jump countries or logoff. New players logging on will asess the situation and either join the winning country or find another arena until the inevitable end is reached. All strategic choke holds accomplish is a shortcut to winning the map without having to bring manpower numbers to accomplish the job like you currently have to do in the MA. Thats why all capturable bases are the strategic objects with an equal value towards winning the war. Which means you have to be good at inspiring a coalition to win the map instead of using a single finger to short cut the process.

You cannot force paying customers to login to a castrated country over run by superior forces, with no real expectation of a fair fight, and have them stay in the arena to have their teeth kicked in. 6 or 7 years ago that was called JSO. 300+ players in one country swamped the 2 other countries ability to wage equal war and rolled the maps. Thats how we got ENY.

As is the game is balanced towards the majority of paying customers expectation of being able to login 24x7 to a non castrated country with the equal ability to wage war.

The honest thing to do is directly ask Hitech to place strategic choke holds into all three country's so that small groups and individuals can shortcut the coalition driven war winning process by destroying them. When you reduce the concept of high value global effect strategic objects to their simplest form in any game, they are short cuts to winning the war from 2 sided death match scenarios.

No one will be satisfied even if a gazillion points are awarded for bombing the factory or the HQ in an attempt to make it more meaningful. That would be a simple one line wish. It's forever large complex constructs that if reduced to a one line wish is always the same wish:

Hitech please add global effect strategic choke hold targets to the three country's so a small number of players or individuals can impose a reduction in the general war fighting ability of the targeted country as a punishment for letting us do it.

M1A1 put that in the Wishlist forum and see if Hitech respondes to it. It's a much more honest request.