Add a delay for Hero xp.

    Quote from lylai#TR

    you are not getting the point, it's not about loosing troops, mehhhh, i am tired of trying to tell something to BM guys, your hatred is too strong, just good luck and have fun.

    Of course it has EVERYTHING to do with it.


    Where was this thread when your meta cleaned out the biggest hammer on the server at the time with this exact strategy?


    If your troops didn't die this thread never happens.



    My opinion on this is keep it or take it away good players will always adapt. I'm neutral on this particular suggestion but I think this thread is very hypocritical regardless.


    I've played since Travian was a brand new thing, there have always been different strategies using the mechanics that seem "gamey" and we as players have largely just accepted it.

    I do think 'scouting' a hero's whereabouts by looking at if their experience increases when they kill a single scout is pretty gamey though. How the game mechanics should work is that either 1. the scout goes undetected and sees the hero home, or 2. the scout gets stopped and you get no information. You now manage to game the system and get information when you shouldn't. The fact that you can easily get around it -your troops including your hero really shouldn't be home until just before you need to send anyway- doesn't mean that it's not a lame way to cheat the system.


    It's also weird that a non-scout troop gets anything in terms of experience when they had nothing to do with the 'battle'. If a hero attacks scouts, he kills them. If he defends against them, he really does nothing - it's the defending scouts that do the work. If the scout could do damage and could be seen as an incoming attack, it would be different. I can see why you could call this a bug right now. The solution is obvious, don't give XP to the hero for defending against scouts, it's not a battle he's participating in after all, just like the rest of the troops other than scouts.

    I understand your point of view, but if the enemy actually manage to scout you 1 second before you're supposed to launch, it's not by chance that he scouted you at that very moment. At the end of the day it's a troop that dies in your village, and just like any other troops that your hero kills he gets experience from it. About non participating, the bonus def of the hero isn't applied to defending scouts when they reject a scouting? If not, I could agree that without being involved at all they shouldn't get experience out of it.
    This being said, this is no where near being game breaking or anything anywhere near that. It's something that can be used as a tool for both sides of a conflict. Up to each side to know how to use it best. I don't think that by removing little things like this, which make the game more interesting, that the game will improve.


    EDIT: Agree with Eartheater, just like spiking, which in theory shouldn't be allowed, we all agreed upon leaving it a possibility for small players to have tools to fight bigger players, etc..


    EDIT 2: From the looks of simulators, heroes aren't involved at all in scouting defense, so getting experience out of it is a bit weird indeed. Devs words on this is the final take.

    I quite like this strategy but I still feel the game would probably be better off without it. Sure it has some counter play and only works well in certain situations but I feel there are 2 key things missing here.
    1) There is no risk involved from the scouter
    2) Using scouts this way goes against what the scouts are supposed to be doing and feels wrong and gamey


    One could say these are the same complaint but the second point is more of an thematic point while the first regards gameplay.
    My main gripe is that the action costs essentially nothing but gains extremely valuable info which means the only limiting factor is how many potential launch times you wish to research and land scouts to check. This makes the thing high reward - low risk action which tend to be not very good for the game. We could add that's it's also high effort action and certainly has some skill involved but again it distinctively lacks the risk factor. If you fail or miss time the scout you essentially lose nothing.
    Moreover what I fear the most is not the mechanic itself but rather the mechanic becoming part of the "meta game" making it "mandatory" and I just don't think anyone would really benefit on that in the satisfaction level. Using the strategy is tedious number crunching (someone will probably just make a bot to do this for them at some point) and since the expected value of the action is so high you might as well do it every time it's applicable.
    One the defense side the counter play exists (especially against non perfect scouts) but against perfectly timed scout there isn't much you can do (outside of not attacking with the hero of course). Of course you can just run operations where it's naturally harder to guess the time to target and hence land the perfect scout. You can of course vary the time it takes to the target as well but that's largely countered by sending several perfect scouts on few different timers. But if the scout succeeds the main thing that is left to the players mouth isn't the feeling of being out played but rather the salt that the enemy guessed right. "Real" scoutings feel much fairer when they breach and feel good if they don't. You can feel good about yourself when you defend normal scouting because the enemy actually had to take a risk . From the defenders point of view it's like playing poker where if you win you get nothing but if you lose you lose hard. You are essentially forced into taking the evasive actions against an invisible enemy that might or might not even be there, if you get hit by it you lose everything, if not you don't gain anything so it ends up feeling bad.


    Counter play to this of course exists, you can soft counter the strategy in several ways and nearly hard counter it by simply doing chaotic attacks. That being said even though the counter play exists the risk-reward-effort balance to the players involved in both sides just don't match up and the entire interaction just doesn't seem satisfying to me


    Likewise the entire thing just feels wrong. I just don't think the stats or scouts should be used like this. It just goes against the feel of both systems and seems wrong to me on that level.


    There are of course positives. It clearly does work better against zerg strategies and it could be said it does favor small kingdoms over big ones. Sorta semi unrelated to this I don't thin the "it counters metas" to be a strong argument because I would much rather have entirely different mechanics do that but yes it does counter metas to some extent.


    It's definitely not a bug and clearly allowed within the rules of the game so crying about that is indeed pointless. But like say the "treasuries in wonders" strategy I just don't feel this one offers much healthy gameplay. The intentions of both the systems in play are good (immediate stats are good, hero gaining experience from defending scouts is good) for all players but combine them and you get an unhealthy mix that really doesn't benefit anyone if everyone stats using it.


    tl;dr: Not a bug, counterplay exist and you have no one but yourself to blame if you fall for this strategy and yet the mechanic probably isn't healthy and devs should look into it.


    Just my thoughts on the subject

    Quote from Curtain

    That being said even though the counter play exists the risk-reward-effort balance to the players involved in both sides just don't match up and the entire interaction just doesn't seem satisfying to me

    I don't particularly agree, I mean the effort is really on both sides, being under hundreds of attacks and being able to use that while knowing that since it might not work you need to spend time on other stuff to make sure you're covered anyway. The other side knowing the threat of it needs to adapt their selves. I get your point, but then would it be healthy to use the hero equipment as a data? Or off points of the enemy? Or anything really like top10 raiders etc..
    It's one possible tool people have, it has been used against me, we used it against other people, I have no problem with it, I even find it exciting to have such a tool available that anyone can use.

    Quote from Mayo

    I understand your point of view, but if the enemy actually manage to scout you 1 second before you're supposed to launch, it's not by chance that he scouted you at that very moment.


    And if it was an actual scouting, I would have no problem with it and would congratulate you on a job well done.


    Quote from Mayo

    At the end of the day it's a troop that dies in your village, and just like any other troops that your hero kills he gets experience from it. About non participating, the bonus def of the hero isn't applied to defending scouts when they reject a scouting? If not, I could agree that without being involved at all they shouldn't get experience out of it.
    This being said, this is no where near being game breaking or anything anywhere near that. It's something that can be used as a tool for both sides of a conflict. Up to each side to know how to use it best. I don't think that by removing little things like this, which make the game more interesting, that the game will improve.


    The only difference between an average game and a good game is a lot of tiny steps, "little things" as you call them. It's not important whether or not this is a big deal or not (I don't think it is) or whether it's a good tool against metas or not. I would actually argue it works against a bad opponent only, regardless of size...So it is indeed more likely to work against metas, but doesn't have to work in your favor if the meta was good. In fact it would work against you since it's much easier to put 1-second scouting attacks on timepoints and places with lots of people doing the sending. More importantly, it's about whether or not it should be in the game or was just a design oversight. Spiking, sending reinforcements to and attacking inactives are clearly meant to be part of the game, they follow normally from normal ingame actions. Getting information from a dead scout by means of hero experience does not. I don't agree that these two things are similar.

    I will absolutely not go through and read all of these posts. This isn't and never should even be a discussion.


    IT IS NOT A BUG OR FLAW.



    Let's say a kingdom does perfect fakes and everything when attacking, then the defending kingdom literally has to play a guessing game on where to defend.
    This scout thing that has been in the game forever is the defending kingdom's only chance to possibly figure out where the attacks are going.


    If the attacking kingdom wants to be sure it's fakes are flawless, move your hero.


    STOP COMPLAINING about a great strategy that kingdoms have to use to try to find the real attacks.

    or you can realize that this is another great strategy attackers have to take into account and move you hero!


    Trying to change things to make the game easier is absurd.


    I'll let you know again and make it bold for ya so you can read


    SOLUTION:


    MOVE YOUR HERO

    and don't come to the forums to cry and take away defender's strategies.


    Defense playbook is much much smaller than the offense playbook.

    Quote from lylai#TR

    liking your own post is literally pathetic :(

    ITS A BUG!! THEY NEED TO CHANGE THE ABILITY TO DO THIS NOW!


    It is severely affecting the forums.


    See, now i sound like you :) lol


    The only way to combat you automatically disliking every single post is to like my own post.


    Just like the only way to have a perfect offense plan is to take all defensive strategies into account and MOVE YOUR HERO

    "This isn't about com7"


    I just went through your post history, how come if this was such a big deal before com7, you never tried to change it or let everyone on the forums know about this huge bug?


    Sounds like someone is just salty they lost their hammer. Time to rebuild and come up with a better strategy of attacking instead of mob mentality attacking. So many wasted hammers, RIP.

    Hey together,
    we're always happy to hear your opinion and listen to your feedback, however it has to follow some netiquette rules so that everyone can enjoy a nice discussion and provide constructive criticism in a polite manner.
    The forums are place for everyone to exchange knowledge and ideas and should be kept free from insults and harrassment. Please make sure you're following the forum rules when communicating with your fellow players and treat them as you would want to be treated. I would very much dislike having to delete your comments again, something that happens very rarely on this forum


    As others have already mentioned - this isn't a bug but a game mechanic that allows you to make an educated guess based on publicly available information. But still - your thoughts on the matter will be forwarded to the game center for consideration as usual :)


    Thank you for your understanding!
    Georgi

    So mush hate here. I was not referring this "thing" as a bug i was saying it is "abuse of game mechanic". In my option it is to easy to scout. I wrote it as it was first time I encounter it in com7. For example if I'm a new player and lose a hammer like that for sure i would not start the next server I would feel cheated (and no i did not lose my hammer to this method). The problem about this is that you don't see scout incoming.
    Different suggestion if you have a rally point higher lvl then you see incoming scout attack similar as with troops.

    Quote from Ammanurt

    And if it was an actual scouting, I would have no problem with it and would congratulate you on a job well done.

    Maybe we did some real scoutings in between, or maybe we did something else in between. Also real scouting or not depends on the means one can have, due to other decisions ones take. If you take a certain decision it might affect other stuff and you have to deal with it as you can.

    Quote from Ammanurt

    Yes, these are normal, public information where you get to through normal routes.

    Watching the statistics is the equivalent of watching hero experience, it's part of the statistics offered by the game, no?


    But none of this is the point of it, the real point is whether the hero should receive the experience from a failed scouting or not. In my opinion it should receive the experience because of what I said previously, in your opinion it shouldn't because the hero isn't involved in the battle between scouts even though the hero itself is present in the village where the fight happened soo I understand your point of view but I still think it shouldn't be changed.

    Mayo is just trying to convince everyone so this won't be removed. The More i think about it this could be one of the reasons he had huge success in this game.


    Let me explain how broken this could be it's hard to accomplish but lets look at extreme case.


    Lets say we have 2 kingdoms that are in a war. One has 10 offensive players other plans to defend 10 targets. I would say this is similar condition in most offensive operations. Other attacks/fake are just for numbers and a good team can guess probable targets quote well.


    Offense send 3 attacks, rest are fakes. Lets say all make perfect fakes to all 7 targets.
    To scout where is real attack you need only 100 scouts after you see the first attack you choose 10 most probable targets and send scouts to enemy offensive villages. You just need GT tool to calculate when offensive player will launch hes attack (most people know where is offensive village) and scout should arrive 1 second before the launch time. If it done perfectly you know where attacks are coming. You can say it hard to accomplish, but you don't have to do it solo 10 players can do a trick just chose one offer (and I'm sure if this thing get popular there will be bots that do all the hard work). You can say there is more players involved then 10 on 10 but you can scale it easily.


    Just imagine that everyone is using this perfectly. No need for fakes then. (I'm not saying it will be unless the person uses bots)


    Now lets look how to counter it? Send hero away before attack? Well it doesn't work as get scouted 1 sec before sending time. Ex scroll maybe it can be easily seen. Don't send hero? Well it works but if i can't send my hero with my attack why do we have it in first place?


    This tactic is especially good whit TK as here the distances are much smaller and it's easy to have a village near the enemy borders that scout everyone there. Only few scout and even with no upgrades.


    Ok i know I gave an extreme case but i hope you understand me why i think this is huge game abuse. It was not used a lot as not a lot of people knows about it so it gave advance to some old players. I will make a guild about it so it would be fair and I hope if most players will use this cancer tactics it will be removed. (everyone or none).


    One said that it makes easier to make educated guess, I would say it's more like peeking what card your enemy has in a game of poker.


    I liked 2 easy fixes.
    1. Don't show hero XP or round it. As msot players doesn't care precise amount of xp.
    2. Hero doesn't get xp from scout as he is not in the battle.

    I think this is a bit of a moot point tbh, even if you couldn't do it with scouts you could do it with other troops. Granted, you could see the attacks coming and therefore they would be easier to dodge, but with a bit of data analysis and careful thought it would be still be possible to estimate enemy send times to within a few seconds. Therefore using precisely timed single unit "scoutings" as a method to determine hero position would remain perfectly usable as a defence tactic. Likewise, it is and always has been avoidable, as emphasised in earlier comments.


    Secondly, this is a game of strategy; the rules are laid out for all to see and everybody has the same opportunity to consider them to their advantage. The way to win anything is to find a competitive advantage and use it, that's pretty much like the definition of winning. I don't think it's appropriate to remove exploits such as this when they don't give unfair advantage to a dominant group, it keeps the game progressing and ensures it remains challenging for players of all levels. Personally i welcome the finding of such methods, especially when they don't involve spending any gold lol.


    In conclusion, i think we should just be thankful it has been discovered by the sort of people who share all their most successful tactics on the public forums; a place where anybody who plays the game can learn about it and enter the next server better equipped to compete and therefore more likely to keep playing. ;)


    And on a bit of a tangent; Believe you me, no matter what they do to this game Mayo will continue to dominate - I know a lot of very experienced and capable players and his analytical and strategic skill make most of us look like Sunday drivers.

    Quote from Zoo Keeper#EN

    To scout where is real attack you need only 100 scouts after you see the first attack you choose 10 most probable targets and send scouts to enemy offensive villages.

    Maybe the plan isnt good at all if the enemy is able to guess the targets?


    Quote

    Now lets look how to counter it? Send hero away before attack? Well it doesn't work as get scouted 1 sec before sending time. Ex scroll maybe it can be easily seen. Don't send hero? Well it works but if i can't send my hero with my attack why do we have it in first place?


    As you said. Just dont send the hero.
    Why you have it in the first place? Its a perfect distraction to hide your real attacks :)


    Besides: Even if you do this perfectly you only know where one hammer per player is going to. But most offers have 3-4 or more hammers.