General Information:
What are you suggesting?
A change to the rules of what causes godly protection to end.
Currently, godly protection ends if you:
* Upgrade a town hall to 5 (or 7 for premium)
* Colonize a second city
* Attack another player
* Go idle
My suggestion is to change it as follows:
* Highest barracks level and highest shipyard level add up to 4 (Your highest barracks OR shipyard reaches level 4 on premium)* Go below a certain island donation threshold
* Attack another player
* Go idle
How will it change the interface/gameplay/battles/system?
Players that simply don't enjoy PvP can ignore it as long as they're active and don't leech.
What if a player currently under godly protection has a level 32 barracks? I wouldn't want a player to be punished without fair warning. If, at the time this changes, a player meets the old criteria for keeping protection but not the new criteria, then they should keep the old rules for it. If they ever meet both sets of criteria, they get automatically transferred to the new set of criteria. Once no players are remaining on the old set of criteria, this special case can be safely removed from the code.
Why barracks level 4? Making a huge hoplite army under this protection, then suddenly breaking out of it feels to me like something that could be exploitable. Hoplites require barracks level 4. If you disagree with this part of my suggestion, but agree with the rest, then please say so! We could simply switch town hall for barracks, making it so upgrading a barracks to level 5 (or 7 for premium) is what breaks godly protection.
What is this donation threshold? This threshold variable would be per island the person has cities on. At the start of each day, the city's town hall level would be looked at to determine the amount to be added to the variable. If there are multiple cities on the same island, that island's variable for that player gets added to by each of those cities. If, at the end of the day, the variable is higher than their total donations to that island, their whole kingdom loses godly protection. The minimum to add before the day ends to keep godly protection, if the number is not yet met, would be displayed when you click on something on the island that you can donate to.
If the donation threshold is not met, but there is nothing that the user can donate to... (Let's say the island's wonder is already at level 5 and both the saw mill and quarry are upgrading...) Then the user does not lose godly protection, but still needs to make up the difference for the following day to continue to keep it. (This way the user isn't penalized for something beyond their control.)
How would this threshold function for a brand new player who doesn't have the infrastructure yet to handle it? Since the threshold is added to only at the start of each day, the day that the user created the account would have a threshold of 0. Additionally, the tutorial would have the user donate enough to their saw mill to last for one week of Town Hall level 1. If they upgrade their Town Hall higher than that, they'll need to donate sooner, but they should still get at least a few days out of the tutorial's donation. If the saw mill is upgrading at the time of the tutorial, the interface should show the post-upgraded saw mill instead, as the upgrade's difference is not going to make any difference to the brand new player anyway and doing so will prevent confusion.
Wouldn't a new city on a new island suffer from this? If the player picks a far away island to colonize, does so late in the day, and only sends the minimum resources that the new colony needs, then it might. They will still have at least 24h1s to get a small donation into the new city's island, so I feel like it's still reasonable though. After all, the day that the new colony is founded will have a threshold of 0, so it's the first FULL day of having that colony that they need to donate within.
What if they didn't meet the threshold, but they're no longer on that island either? This is another edge case, and personally I'd be fine with allowing them to keep the godly protection. If they were on the island for a while, then they must've been donating regularly to get this far, and if they weren't on this island long, then this was probably just a mobile for the piracy minigame, so no harm done really.
What about vacation mode? You can donate future days of resources in advance, so that should cover this at the minimum. The town halls adding to the threshold could also simply be disabled during vacation mode. I'd leave this call to someone else.
What if they lose their godly protection due to inactivity and/or lack of donations, but then log back in and donate enough? If this first suggestion is accepted, then I would submit this as a second suggestion. Attacking another player should definitely drop the protection permanently, and I could argue either way for amassing a large military... (Someone could just want to attack barbarians, after all) ...but it makes sense to me to allow them to regain it if the issue was donations/inactivity as long as they rectify the difference. Their godly protection would not be reinstated, however, until that day reaches its end.
You only talked about one type of leeching. What about temple leechers? I'll be honest... I haven't actually bothered to build any temples, so I'm not as familiar with how this part of the system works, but you're right, there should probably be something in here for this as well. Sure, some of the wonders seem useless to these pacifistic players (Ares, Colossus, Hades, and Athena), but I could see them finding others useful enough to want to build a temple (Poseidon, Hermes, Demeter, and even Hephaistos for fighting barbarians).
Based on the wiki, it seems that once you build a temple, your town hall's maximum population is added to the wonder's population total, and each priest covers only 5 of that total population. The temple's size also determines the number of priests you can have. Building a temple after your town hall reaches 32 could cause a significant dip in the wonder, but you do have to go through level 1 to reach level 2 and so forth. The best I can think of for this is to add the following way to exit godly protection:
* Having less than 100% of your own city's faith covered by your own priests, and either not upgrading your temple for one full week or having fewer than the maximum number of priests your temple can handle.
I'd like to see someone more familiar with the temple/miracle system suggest a better version though.
Suggestion Reason:
Why are you suggesting this? What will it solve/make easier? Think carefully about this one, most suggestions will get heavy critical feedback. Make sure you give a detailed reason and your suggestion solves the issue that you think there is.
Different people like different aspects of games. Some enjoy combat heavy games with lots of PvP. Some just enjoy building and resource management, and find such battles to be in the way of their fun. This would allow both groups to coexist without stepping on one another's toes.
Render/Image/Screenshot:
Do you have a picture/render/screenshot of what it might look like? A visual aide always helps an idea come to life.
I'm more of a code guy than an art guy, sorry.
Special Notes:
Anything else you want to add.
Nope. That's all.
What are you suggesting?
A change to the rules of what causes godly protection to end.
Currently, godly protection ends if you:
* Upgrade a town hall to 5 (or 7 for premium)
* Colonize a second city
* Attack another player
* Go idle
My suggestion is to change it as follows:
* Highest barracks level and highest shipyard level add up to 4 (Your highest barracks OR shipyard reaches level 4 on premium)* Go below a certain island donation threshold
* Attack another player
* Go idle
How will it change the interface/gameplay/battles/system?
Players that simply don't enjoy PvP can ignore it as long as they're active and don't leech.
What if a player currently under godly protection has a level 32 barracks? I wouldn't want a player to be punished without fair warning. If, at the time this changes, a player meets the old criteria for keeping protection but not the new criteria, then they should keep the old rules for it. If they ever meet both sets of criteria, they get automatically transferred to the new set of criteria. Once no players are remaining on the old set of criteria, this special case can be safely removed from the code.
Why barracks level 4? Making a huge hoplite army under this protection, then suddenly breaking out of it feels to me like something that could be exploitable. Hoplites require barracks level 4. If you disagree with this part of my suggestion, but agree with the rest, then please say so! We could simply switch town hall for barracks, making it so upgrading a barracks to level 5 (or 7 for premium) is what breaks godly protection.
What is this donation threshold? This threshold variable would be per island the person has cities on. At the start of each day, the city's town hall level would be looked at to determine the amount to be added to the variable. If there are multiple cities on the same island, that island's variable for that player gets added to by each of those cities. If, at the end of the day, the variable is higher than their total donations to that island, their whole kingdom loses godly protection. The minimum to add before the day ends to keep godly protection, if the number is not yet met, would be displayed when you click on something on the island that you can donate to.
If the donation threshold is not met, but there is nothing that the user can donate to... (Let's say the island's wonder is already at level 5 and both the saw mill and quarry are upgrading...) Then the user does not lose godly protection, but still needs to make up the difference for the following day to continue to keep it. (This way the user isn't penalized for something beyond their control.)
How would this threshold function for a brand new player who doesn't have the infrastructure yet to handle it? Since the threshold is added to only at the start of each day, the day that the user created the account would have a threshold of 0. Additionally, the tutorial would have the user donate enough to their saw mill to last for one week of Town Hall level 1. If they upgrade their Town Hall higher than that, they'll need to donate sooner, but they should still get at least a few days out of the tutorial's donation. If the saw mill is upgrading at the time of the tutorial, the interface should show the post-upgraded saw mill instead, as the upgrade's difference is not going to make any difference to the brand new player anyway and doing so will prevent confusion.
Wouldn't a new city on a new island suffer from this? If the player picks a far away island to colonize, does so late in the day, and only sends the minimum resources that the new colony needs, then it might. They will still have at least 24h1s to get a small donation into the new city's island, so I feel like it's still reasonable though. After all, the day that the new colony is founded will have a threshold of 0, so it's the first FULL day of having that colony that they need to donate within.
What if they didn't meet the threshold, but they're no longer on that island either? This is another edge case, and personally I'd be fine with allowing them to keep the godly protection. If they were on the island for a while, then they must've been donating regularly to get this far, and if they weren't on this island long, then this was probably just a mobile for the piracy minigame, so no harm done really.
What about vacation mode? You can donate future days of resources in advance, so that should cover this at the minimum. The town halls adding to the threshold could also simply be disabled during vacation mode. I'd leave this call to someone else.
What if they lose their godly protection due to inactivity and/or lack of donations, but then log back in and donate enough? If this first suggestion is accepted, then I would submit this as a second suggestion. Attacking another player should definitely drop the protection permanently, and I could argue either way for amassing a large military... (Someone could just want to attack barbarians, after all) ...but it makes sense to me to allow them to regain it if the issue was donations/inactivity as long as they rectify the difference. Their godly protection would not be reinstated, however, until that day reaches its end.
You only talked about one type of leeching. What about temple leechers? I'll be honest... I haven't actually bothered to build any temples, so I'm not as familiar with how this part of the system works, but you're right, there should probably be something in here for this as well. Sure, some of the wonders seem useless to these pacifistic players (Ares, Colossus, Hades, and Athena), but I could see them finding others useful enough to want to build a temple (Poseidon, Hermes, Demeter, and even Hephaistos for fighting barbarians).
Based on the wiki, it seems that once you build a temple, your town hall's maximum population is added to the wonder's population total, and each priest covers only 5 of that total population. The temple's size also determines the number of priests you can have. Building a temple after your town hall reaches 32 could cause a significant dip in the wonder, but you do have to go through level 1 to reach level 2 and so forth. The best I can think of for this is to add the following way to exit godly protection:
* Having less than 100% of your own city's faith covered by your own priests, and either not upgrading your temple for one full week or having fewer than the maximum number of priests your temple can handle.
I'd like to see someone more familiar with the temple/miracle system suggest a better version though.
Suggestion Reason:
Why are you suggesting this? What will it solve/make easier? Think carefully about this one, most suggestions will get heavy critical feedback. Make sure you give a detailed reason and your suggestion solves the issue that you think there is.
Different people like different aspects of games. Some enjoy combat heavy games with lots of PvP. Some just enjoy building and resource management, and find such battles to be in the way of their fun. This would allow both groups to coexist without stepping on one another's toes.
Render/Image/Screenshot:
Do you have a picture/render/screenshot of what it might look like? A visual aide always helps an idea come to life.
I'm more of a code guy than an art guy, sorry.
Special Notes:
Anything else you want to add.
Nope. That's all.
