Gold limit

Okay, first of all for the "What does pay-to-win really mean?" thing:

Obviously, pay-to-win games are always just "pay to get a significant advantage over others"-games. I've never encountered a game that features a button "Pay 20€ to instantly win this game!". So clearly, Travian does qualify as a pay-to-win game.

I wouldn't really call this kind of advantage "unfair" though. It is of course unfair, when you only look at it from the perspective of the ingame world. But from the outside, those players are basically paying for you to be able to play the game, so they deserve some kind of advantage. In other free-to-play games this advantage is solely cosmetic, but I doubt that Travian would be a profitable game with cosmetic stuff only.

Mailman#EN wrote:

most pay to win games (or should I say pay-for-unfair-advantage-games, since some other people in this thread just want to argue definitions) are team based games.

Sure, most pay-to-win games are team games, because pay-to-win is basically a multiplayer only thing and most (?) multiplayer games are team based I'd say. Pay-to-win in a singleplayer game wouldn't really make any sense

Mailman#EN wrote:

travian is one of the worst games in this regard, I personally can't think of another game that offers such a large advantage for people who spend a lot of money. I challenge you to name three other pay to win games that are more unfair than travian.

I agree that Travian features large bonuses for paying money. Especially the +25% ressource production, farmlists and NPC trader provide a huge boost.

Anyway, I think that the pay-to-win aspect of Travian is not a big problem because of the following reasons:
1) As stated in my previous post: Travian is a game where you never really fight 1vs1. So while an account using gold has a big advantage over an account that is played without gold in a direct comparison, that doesn't really matter in Travian. As long as the gold spenders are roughly distributed equally across the kingdoms, it makes no difference whether you play with gold or without. Of course, when another kingdom has significantly more gold spenders and is equally skilled otherwise, you will probably lose. But that situation is very rare. Most of the time the kingdom wins that has the most active and experienced players.

As you asked for a comparison to other games, here is one: I used to play a shooter called Crossfire years ago. In that game you could buy character models with smaller hit boxes which is a huge advantage and also you could buy better weapons. Those real-money-weapons featured relatively small advantages like more ammunition or being slightly less heavy allowing you to move slightly faster. But they also featured really big advantages like doing more damage when shooting through boxes. It happend pretty often that you died to an enemy sniper and realized that you (being sniper as well) did hit him before doing only 80 damage through a box and he hit you afterwards through the very same box but dealing 100 damage and thereby killing you simply because he payed 20€ for that better gun. I can tell you that such situations feel very unfair. You basically played better than your enemy because you hit first, but he won because he payed. Now when comparing this to Travian, I have never encountered a situation where I thought "Oh, that player won against me because he payed money." in the 10 years since I started playing Travian.

2) There is one thing, that is way more important than spending a lot of gold: Activity. If you want to be ranked high in the farmer of the week chart, you don't need a lot of gold. Instead, you need to click that damn farmlist every 5-15 minutes. You cannot prevent your neighbor from killing all your troops at home by using gold. But you can by checking for attacks 24/7.

3) The benefit of gold usage is heavily limited by diminishing returns. So yes, you can spend hundreds of euros, dollers or whatever your currency is. But at some point it does not give you a significant benefit anymore. For all 3 bonuses for the whole round you need 800 Gold (200 Plus + 200 crop bonus + 400 resource bonus) and maybe another ~500 Gold for the NPC trader. This makes 1300 Gold for a whole round. Given that a lot of hero items provide very little benefit at all, you can sell them. Depending on your luck, I'd guess that you can accumulate 100k silver in a round which gives you 500 Gold in return. So overall you have to pay 800 Gold which equals roughly 20€ or 25$ (if you buy during a promotion event). Compared to games that you have to buy before playing this is a pretty good deal I'd say^^

So overall, yes, Travian provides (big) advantages for paying money. But this allows the game to exist and (at least for me) does not make the game feel very unfair.

Greetings,

iTob

Mailman#EN wrote:

thanks for finally admitting it. that's why people don't like this game. read my posts more carefully next time and maybe you won't sound like you lack basic communication skills.

also I'm not a farm, I'm a top ranked player, because I spend money on the game. but its too expensive so I won't be playing again.

its funny how you can challenge me to spend 10k but I can't challange you to spend no gold because thats a suddenly a silly argument. sounds like you're too scared to try.

Pay to win =/= pay for an advantage, you're the one lacking communication skills here, if you can't even make out the difference between the two. Also I never said you get no advantage, but rather that the advantages become irrelevant, if you consider the whole kingdom and the whole picture, because TK is a teamgame, not a sologame. Talking about reading carefully.

You can't challange me, because your argument stays stupid. One player of the kingdom spending 10k € in gold but still being unable to influence the game victory significantly, is exactly what I say the whole time and is exactly what the relevant point is - you can't buy a victory. Catting someone to zero in a 1v1 is no proof of anything, even if you made it (let alone the fact that I can either snipe your cat waves or easily rebuild if you attack with one wave only), 1v1ing someone in a teamgame is just no argument, like, this never happens in the real world. I bet people like you are pissed in league because they get ganked and then scream childishly in all chat "1v! me man, damn coward" [moderator friendly chat sample]. xD

Be2-e4 wrote:

Pay to win =/= pay for an advantage

I do disagree with you here. Pay-to-win like you actually win (or are very likely to) when paying is just a very poor implementation of pay-to-win. In generell, I'd consider a game pay-to-win if you get a significant advantage and this is the case for Travian. Wikipedia does agree with me here.

To win the servers you don't need to pay even without money if you're good you win the same, I've always dominated Italian servers without ever spending € 1.

The real problem is what the TG does with your money, a part should invest it in the game but it is not:

- servers full of bugs for years

- app bad

- slow and not competent support

- players who cheat unpunished

- wiki not working

and I could still continue ... in a nutshell travian is a scam 😂😂

iTob wrote:

I do disagree with you here. Pay-to-win like you actually win (or are very likely to) when paying is just a very poor implementation of pay-to-win. In generell, I'd consider a game pay-to-win if you get a significant advantage and this is the case for Travian. Wikipedia does agree with me here.

I know wiki's definition. It doesn't say "significant" by the way, "any" advantage is sufficient to be pay to win according to them. But you certainly agree, that it lacks differentiation, as the range of p2w according to their definition ranges from barely-anything to e.g. buying unlimited stats for your rpg-char. This + that me (and probably most other people) associate pay to win at first thought with those more literal pay for victory type of implementations renders the definition kinda shit, impractical and misleading.

Be2-e4 wrote:

I know wiki's definition. It doesn't say "significant" by the way, "any" advantage is sufficient to be pay to win according to them. But you certainly agree, that it lacks differentiation, as the range of p2w according to their definition ranges from barely-anything to e.g. buying unlimited stats for your rpg-char. This + that me (and probably most other people) associate pay to win at first thought with those more literal pay for victory type of implementations renders the definition kinda shit, impractical and misleading.

Ofc there are different versions of pay-to-win. Anyway, that doesn't contribute anything to the topic here, so I'd like to settle that discussion.

Back to the original suggestion:
I don't think that a limit of 100$ per month is a good idea. As addressed in my previous post, gold usage in Travian is heavily affected by diminishing returns. You get most of the advantages that heavy gold spenders have by paying like 25$ per round (so <5$/month) if you are a little thrifty. And everything beyond 50$ is just compensation for laziness. So a limit of 100$ per month would make exactly no difference in fairness and prevent some players from paying for the meals of Travian's developers.

Mailman#EN wrote:

don't even bother trying to explain, Be2-e4 is trolling. i was very clear about what I meant by pay to win in my first post. and i tried to amend my language for him but he still doesn't get it. everyone else here understands that pay to win is common parlance for pay for a significant advantage and arguing definition isn't even the point of the discussion.

While I agree, that I can't take you for serious due to your attitude in previous posts, and that I respond a little trolly in general, disagreeing with your definition isn't what I would consider trolling per se. Or are you trolling by disagreeing with mine too?

I might be an extreme example, but I associate pay to win with extreme negativity and things like "pay 300 € to get a unbeatable weapon, well, unless you spend 500 € and get this real giga-unbeatable weapon 2000 to kill 'em all". This is obviously not the case with travian, like the guys before me explained nicely aswell. Since I play Travian since I'm 11 yo and back then I obviously couldn't buy much gold or even gold at all, I played several rounds with barely any gold. No auctions back then btw, so no silver -> gold conversion. I even played rounds without plus account for the majority of the game. Since now is almost 11 years later, two things to notice: 1) I really like the game, therefore I dislike spreading negative assoications with it, if they're misleading or easily misunderstood - which your definition of pay to win is, due to the gigantic difference between literal meaning and your definition. 2) I have lots of experience (obviously earlier versions included) when it comes to playing without gold aswell as the game in general, so I'm pretty confident in what I say.

If you want a serious discussion by the way, you also might consider replying to my previous post from June here, right in this thread, here: Gold limit

In case my point wasn't clear enough: Yes, people do spend a fuckton of money on gold, but the advantage over the people who don't spend a fuckton but only some reasonable amount is - assuming similar skill levels - negligible compared to the excess spending, if both accounts play actively. If you're done reading, also think about the auction system - players that don't buy much gold can make gold via selling items or trading intelligently, making it easier for non-buyers to compete, as the essentials that really do make a difference are very limited in cost.

Btw, I noticed a typo in my last post.

Be2-e4 wrote:

One player of the kingdom spending 10 € in gold

This is obviously meant to be a 10k €, not 10 €.

I edited for the sake of clarity.

PS: Have fun trying to twist my words to make a cool line or two without saying a word to the point at all, I don't expect any better from you, but at least I was trying to give you a chance for a discussion.

The only reason I'd ever consider spending money is so one can be active less.

Oh just play the game.You do not need gold to win or to be the best. Gold just makes things easier, so people who have a lot of real life work, can play equal quality as players who have a lot of time.

Just enjoy the game bro.

I'm wondering: how much do top players actually spend per month? is it like 30$-40$ a month?

paulie wrote:

I'm wondering: how much do top players actually spend per month? is it like 30$-40$ a month?

I'd say 30-40 per week. Especially on speed servers.

I have known people who spend over 100 per month and I've known people who performed just as good spend no more than 25 per month.