HQ Troop Changes (routes and scaling)

[Garrett]

Ok The other 'official' thread wasn't going anywhere and I didn't like my original post that had poor formatting. Now I'm not promising this formatting is any better, but I will attempt to use code tags and then c/p my excel sheet....

Basically I see for HQ's to be needed in order for this game to grow. It is my intent to bring meaningful units and developments to the HQ so they can be used for defending, obfuscating and all out war. I would like to see the HQ's economy redone and make it more of an integral part of alliance play. I will attempt to suggest these changes in stages as it's easier to tweak parts and let the idea flow and take shape rather than force you all to adhere to my idea from start to finish. (which wouldn't happen anyway).

*** A BIG SUGGESTION FOR TROOP ALLOTMENTS AND COST ***

I did an analysis of the current round all the way down to and including round 20 of the top alliance final value and the rank 5 alliance final value.

I found on average (doing all calcs with every listing and then some dropping highest and lowest) that the rank 5 portalling alliance is only 8.83 (dropping highs and lows) to 11.02% (raw/unadjusted) the size of the 'winning' alliances value.

With this in mind and looking at HQ troops, I suggest that HQ Max Troop count for the Top alliance is only 35% of the base max. And that any alliance rank 5 and under has a 65% reduction in cost for units. (so basically the top alliance and the rank 5 alliance would pay the same for max, just the lesser alliances would have more troops). I can post my calcs in a different post or later if people are interested/want to check mah maths.

OK NOW ON TO PROPOSED UNITS! **** 3 'routes' - no power or init included, however, prices, class, targetting all there. Base Troop max too. i want to generate discussion and then all the init/power stuff can be added later.

Offensive												
Name	Class	Type	Range	T1	T2	T3	ETA	Flags		base unit cost	base troop max	total cost for max
Privs	LET	Kills	close	LET	ALL		4	HQ		75,000	10,000,000	750,000,000,000
Off	LET	Kills	all	LET	ALL		4	HQ		150,000	5,000,000	750,000,000,000
Comm	LET	Kills	all	LET	ALL		4 {2}	{S} HQ		250,000	2,500,000	625,000,000,000
PD	LET	Kills	r/m	LET	ALL		3	HQ		725,000	1,500,000	1,087,500,000,000
TAS 	LET	Kills	all	LET			4	{S} HQ		680,000	1,500,000	1,020,000,000,000
Tanks	LET	Kills	all	LET	ALL		4	HQ		2,125,000	1,000,000	2,125,000,000,000
WP	LET	Kills	r/m	ALL			5	HQ		35,000,000	100,000	3,500,000,000,000

Defensive												
Dogs	LET	Kills	close	INN	ALL		2	HQ		32,000	15,000,000	480,000,000,000
CGN	LET	Kills	all	LET	ALL		**	I HQ		165,000	5,000,000	825,000,000,000
FE	LET	Kills	all	LET	ALL		**	I HQ		235,000	2,500,000	587,500,000,000
HumV	LET	Kills	all	LET	ALL		2	HQ		580,000	2,000,000	1,160,000,000,000
PK	LET	Stun	all	ALL			3	HQ		535,000	2,000,000	1,070,000,000,000
DB	LET	Kills	all	LET	INN	ALL	**	I HQ		2,325,000	1,000,000	2,325,000,000,000
ODP	LET	Kills	r/m	ALL			**	I HQ		40,000,000	75,000	3,000,000,000,000

Intel												
E	NLT	Disables	close	ALL	INN			HQ		45,000	10,000,000	450,000,000,000
MI	NLD	Distracts	close	NLD	NLT	INN		HQ		53,000	5,000,000	265,000,000,000
EV     NLT	Disables	all	LET	INN	ALL		HQ		175,000	2,500,000	437,500,000,000
SDoc	NLD	Distracts	all	LET	ALL			HQ		230,000	2,000,000	460,000,000,000
CT	LET	Kills	all	ALL				HQ		2,700,000	500,000	1,350,000,000,000
Thermal Sensors	Cons	Stealth +1 reveal						I HQ				
data scrambler	Cons	Bad hax/spy						I HQ

*CRY* damn long names

 

[Garrett]

Again the formatting didn't come out quite right. I guess I will try to find a way to link my excel sheet, but below are the full names.


Privates
Officers
Commandos
Predator Drones
Tactical Assault Squad
Tanks
Weapons Platform

Defensive
Attack Dogs
Camoflaged Gun Nests
Fortified Encampment
Humvees
Peacekeepers
Defensive Batteries
Orbital Defense Platform

Intel
engineers
mis-informants
Espionage Van
spin doctors
cyber terrorists
Thermal Sensors
data scrambler

 

[moorer]

I fully agree that more use could and should be found for alliance HQ developments and troops.

I am sure you have more to post on your suggestion but my initial thoughts are as follows:

i) Will alliances be able to develop all the routes or have to choose 1/2 of the routes with the other routes then subsequently closed off? I suppose it could be possible to say that the alliance can develop both the intel/distractor route and one of the unit routes of their choice. If all routes are open to development then I rather doubt that smaller alliances will ever raise the funds to do all developments within a round (or at best will only complete them towards the end of the round) unless the dev costs are set at a much lower cost than HQ devs currently are.

ii) Will the offensive units only be useable against other HQ's or will they be able to attack player ID's? If they can be used against player ID's I fear they may give the better alliances a bigger edge against weaker ones. The smaller, less active alliances, will take longer to raise the funds to develop whichever units they choose and buy meaningful numbers of them. Whilst you say that the number of troops the top alliances will be able to buy would be capped this will still give them an advantage against the weaker alliances prior to their "catching up" with HQ developments. I could only really see the top 5 or so alliances getting the full benefit out of the troops.

iii) What would be the benefit of attacking another HQ besides "the thrill of the kill" as it were? Do you envisage a form of bounty for HQ battles?

iv) Will an alliance simply lose existing HQ troops if it pulls away from smaller alliances and the "cap rate on troop levels" increases or will the troops go into some sort of reserve pool (to be released if the alliance score falls back) or a cash refund given?

 

[Garrett]

thank you for reading and giving some good questions!

i) cost for smaller alliances is definitely something I am trying to keep in mind, thus my suggestion on cap and price changes depending on alliance. There will be some sharing of the low level techs, (like everyone has hips/yobs), but like your account, once you start down the dark path, forever will it dominate your destiny. so everyone might get some privates dogs and engineers, but if you want to get predator drones, you give up defensive batteries and spin doctors. (you pick 1 route and then follow that path).

ii) I want HQ troops to be able to attack individuals. However, I believe that they should be used to attack only allied targets.... Now before saying 'they can find out solos that way', i intend for hq troops to attack individual targets after war is declared. so you can only hit members of an ally you are going to war with.

Also another reason I say that there should be a sliding scale on prices and troop count maxes is exactly what you are talking about. Another thing is that the troop counts I am suggesting would not be able to win a war all on it's own, but should help turn the tides of a close battle. And the bigger, more well funded alliance will always have that funding advantage. The game really can benefit agressors if they know what they are doing. You can't defend your way into a win unless you are on top already.

iii) i want the economy of an hq to be different and for the hq to actually set cap limits on things depending on how developed the HQ is. I want the HQ to possibly have acres. If you steal another HQ's acres to add to your own HQ then you may gain more capacity for other buildings/troops without having to purchase. But those are things to discuss later I think as talking about revamping the HQ as a whole is major. (or at least the direction I would love to see HQ's go)

iv) If I had the rank 2 alliance and fully stocked HQ, then thru a fortunate turn of events I ended up at #1 - I would keep my current count, but would not be able to replace until my losses took me under my NEW cap as rank 1.

 

[Dark_Angel]

I think this is right?

Don't know if you want to incorporate this into your first post?

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With this in mind and looking at HQ troops, I suggest that HQ Max Troop count for the Top alliance is only 35% of the base max. And that any alliance rank 5 and under has a 65% reduction in cost for units. (so basically the top alliance and the rank 5 alliance would pay the same for max, just the lesser alliances would have more troops). I can post my calcs in a different post or later if people are interested/want to check mah maths.

This sounds about right, and is something I agree with entirely. It would be nice to see a drastic difference in the availability of "HQ Power/Strength" between the top' alliance and those below it. We can't bring in a kickass HQ redesign and have the new strength allocated to the winning alliance as well. This addresses that.

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Another thing is that the troop counts I am suggesting would not be able to win a war all on it's own, but should help turn the tides of a close battle.

Agreed. The prospect of this idea helping aid this is extremely promising.

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iii) i want the economy of an hq to be different and for the hq to actually set cap limits on things depending on how developed the HQ is. I want the HQ to possibly have acres. If you steal another HQ's acres to add to your own HQ then you may gain more capacity for other buildings/troops without having to purchase. But those are things to discuss later I think as talking about revamping the HQ as a whole is major. (or at least the direction I would love to see HQ's go)

Very interested in this idea - HQs having land that is. Are you talking about HQ generated income (purely for new devs, units) *as well as* donations or would donating be removed as part of this plan?

Also, could we consider (as part of this more "stand-alone" HQ idea) buildings developed being vunerable to attack? I.e buildings having a set number of 'hit points' (that perhaps replenish over time) - with each AHQ attack buildings take damage and if destroyed, you lose the ability to develop this unit until you rebuild the structure. Just a thought. I may just have been playing AoE too much lately

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What is "cons"? (Unit type)

 

[moorer]

Also, could we consider (as part of this more "stand-alone" HQ idea) buildings developed being vunerable to attack? I.e buildings having a set number of 'hit points' (that perhaps replenish over time) - with each AHQ attack buildings take damage and if destroyed, you lose the ability to develop this unit until you rebuild the structure. Just a thought. I may just have been playing AoE too much lately

I would be wary of adopting this as I can see a scenario where big alliance takes out smaller alliances eta 5 view dev at outset of war and basically hamstrings the smaller alliance - war over. Maybe certain crucial HQ devs could be protected from destruction (the hardened bunker scenario) to avoid such major issues. That said the idea has merit and offers the options of donations to speed repairs etc.

Another question I have is how will the suggested HQ changes enhance the game for all alliance players?

Until this round the only people who controlled HQ devs/troops were the officers of the alliance. I know this round the introduction of security levels etc has meant that this can be extended to more members of an alliance but will an alliance leader want "all" members to be able to send/recall troops and start devs. I suspect not. If not then those who are not given those options really won't get much "enhancement" to their game experience. It will be great fun for a select few in that event. It would be nice if the changes could involve all alliance members in some way and thus enhance everyones game enjoyment.

Not wishing to be negative just trying to bring all potential issues out sooner rather than later.

 

[Dark_Angel]

I would be wary of adopting this as I can see a scenario where big alliance takes out smaller alliances eta 5 view dev at outset of war and basically hamstrings the smaller alliance - war over. Maybe certain crucial HQ devs could be protected from destruction (the hardened bunker scenario) to avoid such major issues. That said the idea has merit and offers the options of donations to speed repairs etc.

I can see what you're saying. Yeah I imagine vital buildings should be made invulnerable in this scenerio.

Another question I have is how will the suggested HQ changes enhance the game for all alliance players?

Well you've to look at the bigger picture here. This HQ redesign will essentially give an alliance a very powerful attack force in addition to the 20 members it already has.

This extra strength, used correctly and fully, will benefit the entire alliance as what might at the moment by the impossible/highly unlikely, will become that much more possible with the aid of a powerful HQ that has the capacity to massively bolster an alliance's attacking force.

I for one would feel much more confident attacking a much larger opponent if I had at my side a powerful and "technologically" sophisticated attack force (HQ) involved in the war.

 

[Garrett]

Moorer, as far as an enhancement for all, I have to admit I was thinking that getting it rebuilt is just a welcome addition... however as my ideas take shape, I will keep that in the back of my head.


DA, Cons = Construction... it's going to be something you can build but is not a unit. I put it with the units under intel to show that you might be sacrificing troops but you get other enhancements.

Both - As far as the HQ. I hadn't so much thought of attacking to destroy other HQ buildings... but my idea currently that I've not posted yet would incorporate the HQ acreage into How Many techs/buildings you can have (no you would not lose anything you've tech'd if you lose the land) AND also it would have a small governance over your troop max (so you wouldn't lose a valuable expensive tech, but maybe you can't get as many doggies et al now)

but as people haven't had an issue with the units, then I'm going to work on my tech tree to show people ok as you do this tech, this other one turns off, how long it will take to tech all the way up as well as the cost.


something I've always been keeping in mind is that lesser alliances don't make as much money. don't worry, i'm not going to lose sight of this (or try not to) so as appropriate I will probably use other 'dynamic' scaling to try and balance the HQ from top to bottom.

 

[Matthew]

I really like it. Got nothing to ask or add to the thread but if you support something it is better to have your voice heard!

 

[Alcibiades]

Aye. I'm not very good with units/stats and all that, but this looks great so far and i'll support just about *any* improvements to the HQ.

As we discussed Garrett, some of the unit names and stuff we could alter; but as far as the units themselves and routes go i quite like the look of them.

Well done sir, keep the good ideas rolling.

*Alcibiades stamp of approval*

 

[septimus]

Like Matthew I don't have anything to add, but I do like the idea, so for what it's worth I thought I'd add my support, anything new and interesting is good in my book