I'm given to understand there's been some issues regarding DR recently.

If I understand that correctly, this involves:

1) player A attacks a bunch of people
2) said people retal many times, putting player A deep into DR
3) player A may now topfeed/attack fat countries without fear of losing the land during said DR period.

I'm assuming in this case player A is probably a jetter of some sort.

The solutions proposed are:
- exempting a person that was hit by player A from DR (abusable for land feeding pyramid/trading scheme) ?
- ???
- My own: shorten the DR period by... half?


Thoughts, suggestions, etc?

Yes, exempt his ass, also make GDI voided if you hit same target 3x... THAT would be awesome, THANKS for the great work, qz!!

If country A attacks Country B, then country B gets one DR free hit on country A.

This would do 2 things:

1.)Eliminate the current DR abuse potential.
2.)Allow countries to retal a country who was missled/ABed/GSed.

Hello qz, thanks for coming here with this issue. I think it is definitely a longstanding problem, as it's just silly for someone with low/no turrets to be able to hit you for thousands of acres, while you have no recourse in terms of retaliation solely due to DR that has nothing to do with you.

I think DR is short enough here on Express, so I wouldn't tamper with that more. I also don't think shortening it by half would always solve the problem - what if I'm in 75 DR and there's only 24-36 hours left in the game?

So, I'd back the first solution, allowing anyone who has been attacked by a country they have not hit to take a retal without DR coming into play. I think that solves the issue pretty completely. As for your concern, land trading/pyramid schemes are ALREADY possible here (right? why wouldn't they be?), so this change wouldn't exacerbate that one bit. Moreover, those things are not effective in Express server anyway.

Not sure if it helps, but in terms of coding, the information required to identify which attacks qualify as "DR-free retals" already exists in the game. For example, if a country has hit you, you can still attack them during the last six hours, so I know that is already tracked. And I know if you hit a country for a SECOND time, you break GDI, so I know that is tracked as well. Therefore, everything you need to make the first retal DR-free is available to you as is.

Have you been hit by this country? Yes/No
If yes:
Did this retal break GDI? Yes/No
If no:
No DR

And since only one retal is DR-free in this solution, that severely limits the possibility of land trading (which I wouldn't be too worried about anyway, but if you did have concerns).

thanks qz!
here is a suggestion from the other thread:

mFrost
Member

167

Jun 5th 2015, 18:16:47
it's pretty simple in my mind

1. if a person owning Country B is retaling a LG made against them by Country A, and they never attacked Country A then the only applicable DRs are LG DRs. (this handle a country at war taking advantage of their own DRs against countries having nothing to do with their war.)

2. if a person owning Country B is LGing country A in heavy DRs and said country A never attacked Country B then all DRs apply. (this handles LGing or taking advantage of a country at war, or other players taking advantage of a player who may have been suicided on.)

3. if country A uses GS/BR/AB against country B then any subsequent LG made by Country A against country B is calculated at full DR. (this handles countries that would suicide on another country over a LG, expecting full land after making multiple war hits... they could still do their LGs first to get land, and then the war run.)

mFrost

Why does mFrost's proposal exempt landgrab DR from being removed? That means qz could go through the work to put in new code, and someone could still run a jetter that gets landgrabbed 50 times and then go off topfeeding. So he's complicating the simple proposal (first retal is totally DR free) while actually offering a more flawed solution...

The easiest solution is that one has been already made ( it just needs to be added ):



Sources:
http://earthempires.com/...omment-15332?t=1376854014

if you keep changing the game to eliminate butthurt you will end up with a boring game.

I agree with ford.

I got drilled for over a thousand acres from a country so heavy in DR that he never came out of it until there was like 6 hours left in the reset, so I never took a retal.

It was annoying, but its also part of the game. There was no coordination involved and i went on with my game.

Sometimes stupid fluff happens. Go to war or buy more turrets (like I should've done).

just my 2 cents :)

I disagree pretty strongly with that. It's a flaw in the game design that the designer is considering correcting. I think it's common sense that it should be corrected. You talk about a boring game but we're talking about fixing one limited issue here. There will be no significant change in the game, just the closing of one exploit that nobody likes being on the receiving end of.

ya and game unpredictability is a large reason player numbers have dwindled. if someone puts time into their country, they should have some reasonable expectations about being able to finish a set. it's one thing for all of us who are part of the community to suck it up and play again next week, but I think new players are much less likely to do so if they have a really unpleasant first round experience simply due to random topfeeders in DR.

imagine if in chess someone could press a chaos button and just wreck the board halfway through the match because they were losing? i think chess would be a much less popular game :p

why not just remove DR from special attacks? then we can farm those that go into war.

How about:
DR for a PS = 1DR
DR for an SS = 0.5DR
DR for GS, AB, BR = 0.08DR

or we can just simplify the whole thing and do 1:1 retals with no DRs and without breaking GDI

so if a country B hits country A 3 times and country A has not hit country B 3 times then whatever the difference is between the countries is what is owed in retals

A = 0 -- B= 3 then A gets 3 DR free retals
A = 1 -- B = 3 Then A gets 2 DR free retals
A = 2 -- B = 3 Then A gets 1 DR free retals
A = 3 -- B = 3 Then no retals either way are owed
A = 4 -- B = 3 Then B is still owed one more DR free retal

Make it so the count is valid across the entire reset, unless someone has a good reason to limit the counts to a 24 hour period.

Downside .. this can potentially be used to trade land .. lesser of 2 evils ? The GDI break would occur for any country exceeding a 1 difference count.

ie.

A = 1 -- B = 0 Then B can double tap without breaking GDI -- however A can do the same thereafter without breaking GDI
-- if either country triple taps then GDI is broken
or
-- If A = 2 and B = 0 then GDI is broken

I am open to suggestions or modifications as needed...

@blid -- I had not considered a country being in heavy DRs due to landgrabs, but then again said country may be attacked or heavily farmed because they are new to the game, and eliminating their DRs may not be the best thing. I do however agree an all jetter or no def country using the LGs made against it to minimize its own land loss over time is an abuse of the mechanics. The question being how do we define such a country, and when do we consider it a true abuse of the mechanics?

75% jets vs. available defense? -- 0 def or when do we consider the def on hand is inadequate... do we create a min def vs land or min def vs networth the latter to take into account low def with high tech numbers. perhaps some hybrid formula to calc a min def needed, before high DR#s are considered abusive? --- This could come with a warning to countries running low def, and help new players understand they are a prime target. It could however penalize netters who would prefer to run with very low defense, the advantage though is this netter cannot abuse their DRs to take advantage of other players. If said netter wants to play it all-x, bot only, or retal only as needed they would be fine, attacking innocent countries would take their advantage away.

just adding some thoughts...

mFrost

Buy more turrets and quit whining.

DR doesn't stop anyone finishing a set unless they get nerd rage.

the main reason for the above vs. just applying a single retal being dr free is an all-jetter in heavy DRs will simply adapt and triple tap their target.

the logic behind the triple tap is one at best the player will get half their land back and two a second or third retal would break gdi. So its a safe play to simply triple tap, and leave a netting country in a conundrum of destroying their own reset and going to war or not.

objective being a netting country is not forced into making such a decision they have a recourse against those who would drag them into an unwanted war. of course the country can always simply break gdi get some land back and then kill the country if it truly has no def.

this game is as much political as it is about war or netting... taking advantage of the wrong players, can and will get the game mechanics changed, especially when this advantage is being abused ;)

buy more turrets is not the answer, a properly run country is going to balance their def vs off strength, whereas an all-jetter at a lower net worth can easily match the balanced def in a PS.

2 mil turrets
2 mil jet
net = 2.4 mil

1.35 mil jets
net = 810,000

a country a third of its size can LG and succeed -- what do we do with countries that are @ an equality in networth? i.e 4 mil jets with the capacity to attack countries in the 7.2-10 mil net range. there are just so many turns and countries can only get 2 maybe 3 times ahead of the rest of server. If I were to replace my def with just jets I could hit any country on the server I want including T1 with impunity, that is until they decide to waste turns and kill my country.

mFrost

exactly how many turrets does the top country need to buy to stay out of an all-jetters path?

If we're really lucky we can neuter everything so we can play the exact same set everytime.

All changing the DR rule to disregard for a hit will do is mean you get more set ruining RoRs. It won't make sense for the player to top feed multiples, he'll just pick one of you and keep hitting you. Think of the butt hurt then

another alternative to the 1:1 and single retal out of DR can be applied in a manner where the single retal would hurt more if there are multiple taps having to be accounted for. Keeping GDI rules intact i.e. a second attack breaks GDI

however if country A never attacked country B and country B is the aggressor then

A = 0 -- B = 1 then A gets 1 retal with no DR * 1 on the returns
A = 0 -- B = 2 then A gets 1 retal with not DR * 2 on the returns i.e. if the normal hit returns 1000 acres then * 2 = 2000 acres gained. -- this resets the counter for both countries to 0. (to avoid situations where an RoR would be used to force a break in GDI)
the multiplier is whatever the number of attacks made is over the top of the 0 count.

just throwing ideas out, I'm sure the admins will find best solution overall.

mFrost

Yeah, do that, the 'late set retal you trash nUB!!!' messages will be superb if there's a double multplier and you can put in a single hit for 3000+ on Saturday morning

see latest idea, if you were to do this then a single retal against an offending country having made 10 land grabs on an innocent country could potentially kill the aggressive country ;p

i.e. country has 10k acres or even decides to be stupid farm an innocent country for 10K acres and drop land to 2K the retal is land gained * number of hits ... change the ghost acre formula to account for and include dropped acres and voila the country you were hoping to hurt is made whole and your country is land killed.

I guess double tapping and/or triple tapping countries would carry one hell of a risk :p

If I ever get triple tapped or RoR'd the offending country is going to get my boot placed deeply in their rectum. If everyone quit being pussies new DR rules would work just fine :)

I think primary and express and tourney(solo servers) should have country-country DR though. Someone's about to get raped but they are so deep in DR starting a killrun is kind of pointless. Hurray for spies :)

what kind of c-c dr?

All DR, spies, special attacks, land grabs etc. Cheaters would be uber easy to spot

Ok- so after DR gets changed- what's next? What about players who LG and lose 5x their land 2 days later. Are you going to lobby a nerf to that too?

My point is- just leave it as is. You're not going to always have a 100/100 LG/recovery situation every single time.
I'll just keep posting it:

2015-05-31 14:11:19 PS GLHF (#8) Gamma HydroxyButyric Acid (#36) 3252A (4614A)
2015-05-30 01:51:50 PS GLHF (#8) Nocturnal Rough Winter (#72) 390A (481A)

No DR involved. Are you going to try and nerf this too? Come on ppl just leave it alone.

Jesus christ Cellphi you already brought up that "example" which make no goddamn sence because it is a RETAL and since as you say no DR involved then Gamma can easily attack back if he wants to which makes it ENTIRELY DIFFERENT [IRRELEVANT] IN OTHER WORDS. Why the fluff do you keep posting that? #iwtbywah

The DR thing is not a "STYLE" issue of "I like to bottom feed" or "I like to top feed" it is an outright loophole in the games mechanics where one country can steal land from others while being near immune from losing land theiyreself.

Breathe. Think. Attempt to translate your post into english.

My next start I'm gonna try out is low tank/low cs/asshole/farmer. Gonna be epic

First my post is perfect clear. Second you need to reconize your limitations and defer to other people some times. Ok? When everyone is banging they are head on the wall you should say "Maybe its me"

😊

Perfectly clear? That's like 4 run-on sentences in one.

I like that one :) If i'd read it i'd forgotten it; it is slightly more complicated though.

No DR for a retal within 24h if no previous attacking could work? would have to do some fancy search for that perhaps.... hmm

@qzjul:
If you post the DR formula I'll write the PHP script. :P

uh oh, celphi and his codes...again

I really think you guys are making this way more complicated than it needs to be.

^^ +1

Agreed. There are some "simple" (for qz) changes near the top of the forum that would be good starting points. I wouldn't complicate it with a time frame in which to retal or variables.

mFrost has some good suggestions in his earlier posts, and I like Martian's as well, except for the 5 hits in his 'Change #2'. The could be less as far as I am concerned...like 3.

Thanks for taking a look at this qz, but keep it simple. Simple for yourself. All I would like to see is player B having a fair chance at regaining the land which he lost in player A's attack...1:1, no time limit.

yea;i'll def mull over the possibilities

shake the game a little brada qz!

its getting boring for us long time playas.. :/

1. if we remove DR or reduce the decay rate.. will it impact the killrun turns ? nerfing dr will allow quicker kills.

2. lost of GDI ? isnt that in play now ?

is it possible to nerf the attacking range, target based on nw or acres ?

But my solution to the problem would be to have a unique DR count for each country. i.e. exclusive DR.

So if A is in DR cuz of B, A attacking C to abuse DR will not be applicable as retals by C will not be affected by DR caused by B (or minimal).

i.e. we would have 2 types of DR. Longer DR that is being practiced now and an exclusive DR between countries.

i hope that its not complicated.

or you could use this stupid idea i just came up with!!

just punish the suiciders your DR is reduced by offense/defense ratio, so if you are all offense no more DR at all for use as a defense? if you are 50/50 then DR is normal, 60/40 then DR is only 80% effective, 70/30 DR is only 60% effective etc etc meaning even if you only have 10% defense to 90% offense your DR will only be at 20% effectiveness. Only way around this is all tanks which is horrible way to suicide :P

and the vice versa of it would be if you are 100% defense your DR is 200% effective.

@ drkprinc ?
but i didnt wanna be in DR in the first place :/ why you punish me for someone's impulsive move..

so i take advantage of it if the program writer doesn't wanna change it :)

where this will really sting is if someone gets suicided on, then that DR is discounted for a retal


A hits B once
C bombs the life out of A putting him deep in DR
B hits A with no DR penalty and no defence left because C wiped it out. Free land.

Suck it up and buy more turrets.

Therein lies your original problem.

This seems fine to me. Player B hits A and A can get his land back. If B is truly wrecked by war does he really care??? Does he realy have much land left to take? Its fine. But your idea as a newbie new member, buyinmg more turrets will not help anything

Oh i've been around a long time.

More turrets = fewer hits. It solves plenty.

Why should B automatically get land back whatever the scenario. It's part of the game, sometimes you're not able to take back everything you lose. Tough fluff. You might as well take the hits out of the game and just go all x for everyone

It is not automatic. You have to be abble to break back.

Meanwhile More turrets does not stop a jetter in DR. Hes jetter with heavy jhets 1.5 PS bonus. easy for him to attack you. but such player should be broke easy because he is jetter, but instead he has DR. which is a flaw.

your not smart

Every post in your post history said "Buy more turrets:" I think your a retard troll who likes to fluff people over when your in DR.