Jan 28th 2014, 19:34:35
Originally posted by ingle:
Originally posted by Xinhuan:
The 60% bonus is part of the problem that contributes to it. The reason why Commies are so strong, as you said, is because "commies can stock enough to cover their entire destock without going into corruption". And why is this? Because finishing NWs are so low on this server. There is only 1800 turns per reset, about half the number compared to other servers! Change this to be in line with other servers and you will see Commies no longer dominate.
Again the reset of 1800 turns is the problem because it is too fast paced - even if you kept the pace of turns at 1 per 4 minutes, and doubled it to 3600 turns (and each reset is 10 days), it would go a long way towards solving the problems, you have double the time to stock, double the time to catch cheaters, double the time to police the market, etc. The finishing NWs will more than double, and high expenses and such considerations then come into play.
I don't agree with you Xin. Having 1800 turns is not a problem because Tourney also has 1800~ turns (however, they have bonuses since it spans a 30 day range - expenses/turns/booms bonuses are all available).
Round 19 and onwards, 13 Rep Casher, 7 Commie Indy, 4 Theo Techer, 2 Demo Techers, 1 Demo Casher (courtesy of oldman):
http://www.earthempires.com/...014%29-14135?t=1388559843
Commie Indy does NOT dominate as much as you'd think. I'm sure Blid will also point out that the top networth record belongs to h2o (commie indy).
The top finishing networths typically range from 30-35 mil nw, similar to Express. However, land is more scarce and the market/competition is much smaller.
imo, it's not the total # of turns giving commie the advantage, it's the total # of turns you can have on hand at one time. Being able to run 360 turns at once makes it much easier to destock in 5 minutes at EOS while in tourney, if you wanted to cash out 360 turns, you'd have to do it 5-6 days in advance (56 + 6 bonus turns/day).
The point of express is to have a fast paced game with a short turn around. If you get wrecked/war or forget to join GDI, you don't need to wait 1-2 months before starting up again.
As TDA has pointed out, Commie indies rule Express, because of the fast pace of the server. While Tourny server also has 1800 turns, the slow paced nature of it means the markets do not swing as wildly, people price their goods more conservatively to make sure it sells, and market transfers are much harder there. On express, you can price less conservatively, worst case, you just recall 45 min later and price again.
In fact, not only do Commies win far more often, if you look at all the top 10s, the most popular strategy is usually CI on Express, usually taking up 3 or 4 of the 10 spots. Of course, statistically, if you have more people playing Commies, then proportion-wise, there would be more Commies in the top 10, but if more people playing Commies aren't actually weakening the CI strat (I mean, they are still so many CIs in the top 10 compared to other strats), then CI itself is just a very strong strat.
"it's not the total # of turns giving commie the advantage, it's the total # of turns you can have on hand at one time." - This is part of the problem as you have identified - the fact is that the turns come in so fast, the server is forced to let players pile up that many turns. I had suggested nerfing the turn limit to 180(180) in the past so that players are required to login twice a day on Express (instead of once a day) to not lose turns.
Again, the fast paced nature of the server is causing a lot of problems that otherwise don't exist. The Commie 60% sell rule exists only because you can't otherwise run the bulk of turns that come in so quickly - an indy must sell once every ~50 turns if it is limited to the original 35%. But even my 180(180) max turn limit suggestion and the 60% sell rule, all these are bandaid fixes - the root cause is still the fast pace of the server.
I definitely get that the whole point of the server is the fast turn around, you don't have to wait 2 months for the next reset. But in exchange, you get about 10 other problems.