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    Your Elvenar Team

Knowledge Point Clubs - an analysis

DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

[Ancient Wonders will open up a new arena for cooperative ventures. In this thread I'll be accumulating what we've been told, mostly in https://en.wiki.elvenar.com/index.php?title=Ancient_Wonders, what we've actually tested and verified, and the guesses that we're making based on extensive experience with the very similar Forge of Empires Great Buildings.

Our testing, in Beta, indicates that BEFORE you can participate in the AW portion of the game, you have to unlock the Elven Ancient Wonder Tech. It's at the end of chapter IV in the tech tree. We won't need to worry about push accounts.
  • Opening the chapter IV AW tech allows you to contribute Knowledge Points to ANY Ancient Wonder. There's no restriction regarding fellows, discovered neighbors, nor the chapter of the Ancient Wonder.
  • If you're one of the top few contributors, when the AW levels, you'll win a few Knowledge Points AND Rune Shards for that particular AW. The shard count shows on your build menu.
  • If you conquer a province, you'll ONLY see Rune Shards for which you've unlocked the technology.
With average luck, you'll need 9/9 + 9/8 + 9/7 + 9//6 + 9/5 + 9/4 + 9/3 + 9/2 = 16.46 Rune Shards of the proper type for the first 8 slots in the Rune Shard ring, so at that point you'll also have 8.46 broken shards. Consequently 2 more shards will either directly finish your ring OR they'll fill up the broken shard bar which will allow you to fill the final slot. So unless your luck is simply AWFUL, you'll never need more than 18 Rune Shards of the appropriate type to complete a ring.
  • You'll need Rune Shards to open level 1 and level 6 (and maybe, just maybe, every 5th level?)
  • You'll need Knowledge Points, swaps would be nice so that you can win awards, to complete each level.
  • You'll need Relics of all three types to open levels 2-5 and 7-10. (And your production boost will suffer accordingly.)
  • Once you open your chapter VI tech, then you'll see one of FOUR types of shards when you conquer a sector, even if you have already built both of the earlier AWs, but you'll need them anyway to open level 6 in the AWs you've already built.
In subsequent posts we'll also be discussing the various types of KP Clubs, and their strengths and weaknesses
  • Straight Swaps, 40% yours, 40% your partner's, 20% cattle call
  • Rotation Clubs, and the robustness of an Eight Days A Week model
  • Variable KP Clubs, and the high profit margins that can be attained when using a spreadsheet supported approach. I'll be promoting a LARGE spreadsheet supported KP Club that's based on an approach that we've been using in FoE > Brisgard > LOD for the past year.
HOWEVER, we're going to take a shot at using a thread in the Arendyll World forum, rather that trying to jam everything into address group messages. If we're wildly successful, and everybody wants us to quit spamming the forums with multiple messages every day, THEN we'll ask the Community Manager for a private User Group (see https://xenforo.com/help/user-groups/) that's only visible to the specificed members of the group. Note that exactly the same approach would be entirely appropriate for creating private fellowship forums. Note also that private group forums would still need to abide by the Forum Rules if we want them to be supported on the InnoGames domain.
 
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DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

[Based on very limited testing data, the Knowledge Point payouts seem to be similar to the Great Building payouts in Forge of Empires.

The KP awards distribution pool is somewhere close 10% of the total KPs in the level, distributed as follows:
  • 1/2 for 1st place, rounded to multiples of 5 units
  • 1/4 for 2nd place, rounded to multiples of 5 units
  • 1/8 for 3rd place, rounded to multiples of 5 units
  • 1/16 for 4th place, rounded to multiples of 5 units
  • 1/32 for 5th place, rounded to multiples of 5 units
  • If there are enough points in the pool, the top positions will get a greater portion of the awarded points than will the lower positions, but we do not yet have enough data to precisely determine the sizes of the distribution pools, nor the exact methodology for rounding up, nearest, or down to 5 units.
We've not seen any means for storing KP packets, so presumably they go straight into the Knowledge Point bar at the top of the screen when an Ancient Wonder levels, as do KPs from subsector on the World Map, and if the bar has accumulated more than 10 points, there will be no further hourly accrual. (We're watching this closely as it may well be that there is, or needs to be, some sort of "do you want to collect your reward" popup.)

We've only seen 1 Rune Shard per payout, so far, but based on FoE we expect that the total Rune Shard payout will equal the number of levels, and that it will be apportioned in the same ratios but rounded up only to the next integer value, so the Rune Shards should be more evenly distributed.
 
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DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

[This is the first release for Ancient Wonders and, while we have the buildings themselves,
we anticipate that additional support infrastructure will provided by the time that we need it.
  1. A history of the contributions to the previous AW levels, hopefully with a Date of Completion. We need the history so that we can reliable return contributions in kind. This is a necessary feature for managing any sort of KP Club.
  2. A means to accumulate the awarded KP packets, so that they don't interfere with (block) the hourly accumulation of Forge Points.
  3. An Ancient Wonders roster, with functionality that's similar to http://www.forge-db.com/us/us2/gbs/?server=us2&world=Brisgard
 
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DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

[The Ancient Wonder award slots provide us with an elegant game of AW Chicken. Assuming that only the top five contributors will win awards, and further assuming that the awards are allocated 1/2, 1/4, 1/8. 1/16, 1/32 as is the case for the FoE Great Buildings, then you can win 1st place if you are the first player who posted in a pattern of 20%+20%+20%+20%+20%, or the first player who posted 50%+whatever. There's a wide range.

The formula for capturing an award slot is JUMP = Half of (the remaining points minus your lead or plus your lag). For example, if there are 100 remaining points, and you're 20 points behind, (100 + 20 ) / 2 would be 60. Only 40 points would then remain in the level, and you would have an insurmountable 40 point lead. That is to say, your opponent won't be able to contribute MORE than 40 points without leveling the AW, game over.

The Chicken part come into play because the longer you wait the fewer points you'll need to block your opponent, but of course he knows that too, about you. What he DOES NOT know is how willing you are to lose this round, and thereby save your points for the next round.

This dynamic leads to organized Knowledge Point Clubs, and we'll describe the three common types of KP Clubs.
  1. Swaps
  2. Rotations
  3. Spreadsheets
Swaps
The most common form of a swap is simply when an owner mostly levels their own building, and then advertises for a KP swap of 100 or so points. Each of the partners thereby places first in the OTHER Ancient Wonder, and perhaps they'll then advertise the cheap awards that are available right at the end, because the partners can't win 2nd-5th place anyhow.

40%+40%+20% is the most effective variant of a swap, if you can find and/or develop a reliable partner.
  • You and your partner may contribute any number of KPs at any time, divided EQUALLY between your AW and his AW.
  • The swap is self documenting and self pacing. One of you will always be ahead by the same amount in both AWs. The only cap is how far you're willing to get ahead of your partner.
  • Once the owner gets to 34% and the partner gets to 34%, in either building, then only 32% of the points are available to a 3rd party, so your partner is GUARANTEED a first place win.
  • 40% "sounds" much better than 34%, as you can then advertise that a 10% contribution will grab 2nd place.
  • If nobody shows up, then you and your partner would simply continue to 50%+50%
  • You can typically level a building in a couple of weeks, so the periodic return on your investment will be about 4% every two weeks.
Rotations
There are a dozen forms of rotational clubs, including
  • Never Ending KP threads (contribute 5 KPs to the last person who posted in the thread)
  • Fixed Rotations (Contribute exactly 10 KPs to Jim on Monday, Joe on Tuesday, etc, skip your own day)
  • Minimum Contribution Rotations (Contribute at least 10 KPs to Jim on Monday, etc, skip your own day)
  • Eight Days A Week, which we'll describe shortly.
The fundamental problem with all of the rotation concepts is that they're SLOW. On average, all of the AWs will be half full, and there's no effective way to hurry things along in order to level your AW. Somebody is always jumping the gun, just a bit in order to place well, which causes a lot of fights, and when somebody flakes out you're likely to lose your invested Knowledge Points.

You're not going to make any decent profits in a Rotation Club, because you'll have too many KPs tied up for too long, typically for several weeks, so rotational clubs are mostly about simply getting your AWs leveled.

The Eight Days A Week approach is quite interesting, and it's fairly easy to manage.
  • Each member of the club, other than the organizer, is assigned a day of the week, and EVERYBODY contributes to them on that day.
  • On their OWN day, each member contributes their allotment to the organizer
  • So the day of the week members, in a 10 point club, will receive 70 KP on one day per week, 10 from each other members
  • So the daily member, typically the organizer, will receive 10 KPs EACH day, from the current owner, and 7*10 also equals 70 KPs per week
  • Managing the group is surprisingly easy. Looking at the organizer's AW will tell you, at a glace, when somebody has fallen behind and needs to be skipped or replaced.
Spreadsheets
Spreadsheet clubs are rare, but they're remarkably effective. We'll describe the mechanics in more detail in the Arendyll World Forum, which is where we'll be posting our daily targets, and lobbying for a Restricted Forum that's only accessible to the KP Club members mostly to cut down on the spam for everybody else.
  • There are no daily minimum nor maximum contribution requirements,
    although an average 6 KPs per day (25% of your daily KP allowance) is a convenient threshold.
  • A single club can have dozens of members, each with a different, usually uneven, variable contribution rate.
  • Your Targeting Points are your contributions to OTHER KP Club members, minus THEIR contributions to you.
    Note that, within the club, the total FROMs always equal the total TOs,
    so the Targeting Points, within the club, will therefore always sum to zero.
  • Your Goal is half the remaining points in your designated Ancient Wonder.
  • When your Targeting Point total exceeds your goal, your building is Targeted,
    and we'll jump on it and level it IMMEDIATELY, usually within a few days
  • The rate of return on your invested KPs is very high, because you're only investing in ONE AW at a time, and staying on it until it levels, and you can immediately reinvest your KPs and thereby compound your earnings TWICE per week.
Your credit limit is the most important metric. We track the date when an AW actually levels, and the sum of your EFFECTIVE contributions during each week, taken as an 8 weeks moving average, is your Credit Limit.
  • An established KP Club member will operate on 50% cash and 50% credit. Their Targeting Points will therefore slowly rise to plus a half level, whereupon we'll jump on their building and rapidly drop their Targeting Points to minus a half level. "The KP Club" has zero assets.
  • Smaller AW levels will be targeted more frequently than larger AW levels, but the frequency also depends on the owner's contribution level so the variation is not as great as you might suppose.
  • When somebody wants to join the KP Club, they're expected to contribute to targeted buildings for a couple of weeks and, once they've established that they understand the system, they'll be included in the KP Club and we'll immediately designate and target one of their smaller Ancient Wonder levels.
We also use a Profit Sharing plan, whereby all KP Club member profit equally, in proportion to their contributions.
  • The total club awarded KPs, divided by the total club contributed KPs, is the equitable FP Club Payout ratio for that level.
  • If you got MORE than you earned, you'll already HAVE Excess Profits, which will be deducted from your Targeting Points
  • If you got LESS than you earned, you'll get a Shortfall that will be added to your Targeting Points
  • Low level contributors will seldom win any of the awards, BUT their AWs will level with fewer points 100/108=92% of solo.
  • Note that for each level of each AW the total Excess Profits will exactly equal the total Shortfalls.
    so the Targeting Points will still always sum to zero.
The astonishing feature of a spreadsheet supported club is that SEVERAL people will immediately jump on a particular AW once it's targeted, and they'll stay on that same AW until it levels. So the club member's invested KPs are only tied up for a couple of days, and they can reinvest their earnings, at least TWICE per week, for an astonishing periodic return rate of at least 8% per week BEFORE you compound your earnings.
 
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DeletedUser626

Guest
thanks Katwijk, for putting all this info in one place to find. well done :)
I also like the idea of dealing fair in profit sharing to all the kp club members in proportion to their contributions.
 

DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

[It's like learning how to ride a bicycle. There's only so much advice that's actually useful, until you ride around the block a few times.

But you're more likely to NOTICE the important little details, that you might otherwise overlook.

Equally important, a vague notion of what's possible, the Tour de France in our analogy, allows you to be a well informed spectator.
 
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DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

[If you're not interested in the underlying mechanics, it gets pretty simple.
  1. Contribute KPs to one of the targeted AWs
  2. When you've contributed enough points to cover (half of) your own level, YOUR building will be targeted.
  • Your Targeting Points will climb slowly (it's just you), and then drop rapidly (when several people pile on).
  • You'll be able to reinvest your 10% earnings, compounded weekly
 
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DeletedUser43

Guest
I don't have a clue what you are talking about. Compounded weekly? Huh? Reinvest earnings? I understand these words, but I don't understand a word you are saying. I don't know what a targeting point is. I am completely baffled.
 

DeletedUser1053

Guest
Thanks for the info Kat. Right now, only one of my fellowship has an AW on one world, and only I do in the other, but this will help immensely when our fellowship gets enough members with them. and before that, I can always do the 2-person partner swap.
 

DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

Compounded weekly? Huh? Reinvest earnings?
It's like any other Cash Flow analysis where you consider compounded interest. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compound_interest
If you start with 100 points and earn 10% per week, reinvesting the earnings gives you a compounding series.
  1. 100 + 10 at the end of the week
  2. 110 + 11 at the end of the week
  3. 121 + 12 at the end of the week
  4. 143 + 14 at the end of the week
  5. 157 + 16 at the end of the week
  6. 173 + 17 at the end of the week
  7. 200 + 20 at the end of the week
So in seven weeks, reinvesting your earnings has gotten you an extra 100 Knowledge Points. Everybody else in the club is doing the same thing, the Ancient Wonders are "paying interest" and giving out free Rune Shard, so the club member's OWN Ancient Wonders are leveling twice as fast as if they were playing solo.
 
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DeletedUser594

Guest
If you're starting up a spreadsheet trading system count me in.
 

Deleted User - 107391

Guest
  1. Contribute KPs to one of the targeted AWs
How? I have no option that tells how I can do this.
......
Okay, I went and tried it. BUT THERE IS NOTHING IN THE GAME THAT SUGGESTS DOING THIS!

If you have KP that you can afford to give, go to another member of your fellowship, click on one of their AWs and you get a donation menu.

And apparently, like NH, there are benefits to you in return.

But Katwijk, you are being waaaaaaaaay too technical for most of us.
 

DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

The PRIMARY hazard is that your points will just sit there and rot in somebody else's Ancient Wonder, that's NEVER going to level because you've already locked down first prize and nobody is willing to "waste" their Knowledge Points unless the 50% awards are still available.

Too technical? City Builders are ALL ABOUT micromanaging your economy but, yeah, most people will happily muddle along at 80% of best practice, and the game does a good job of allowing that style of play. Squeezing that final 20% out of the game is a lot of extra work.

To your point, I'm a full six months ahead of the curve. This is a white paper whose purpose is getting folks thinking about the "right things." As I indicated early we're actually DOING all of this stuff in FoE. Here are some current 8 week moving average contribution numbers from FoE > Brisgard > LOD > FP Club B+C, just as an example.

44 bazzi00
237 Bondo Ma
87 columbia
420 coolstee
271 Cykosis
0 DemonMas
0 demonmon
0 Grummond
16 guillaum
80 heureuxp
320 hptrump
209 Jama Doo
158 JimmyG
467 Kawijk
330 kugin
10 liamsosk
183 Lord Ayv
80 lustly b
14 Lylak131
126 Marife
108 mccowar
141 mcjomar
277 meanbob3
208 nemesis8
70 p157704
295 plinkert
133 Pulseloc
510 Reaphelt
84 rthompso
124 sallymae
240 sewerurc
165 shizzane
486 Stew
79 SugaRush
136 TansCN

We know whereof we speak. The numbers ARE honest, btw, as there are a variety of special event items in FoE that generate extra Forge Points and a few of the Great Buildings, the Castel del Monte for example, directly generate FPs.
 
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DeletedUser43

Guest
This isn't a club you are talking about it is a gang of thieves. You want to get a bunch of people together who go around and steal all the bonuses from the wonders. I just experienced it in beta. I had been giving to one person for a week and I was the only person going to get a shard from helping. But, as it close to the end, a gang of thugs came in and they all gave so much so fast that I was screwed.

I am miserable and furious that happened to me and I don't EVER want to do that to anyone. There is plenty of war and pillaging and treating people terribly in the world. Why would I want to do that in a game? I wanted a nice peaceful kind game where you can just be nice to people.

I absolutely never wanted to play FoE. I don't like war games where you gain joy from harming people. There is plenty of that in the world. I think those disgusting kind of games contribute to the warring attitude in society. People are so so so quick to want to go to war and to kill people these days and I personally think it is partly related that they kill each other as a game all the time as entertainment. I hate that we are bringing over the same type of pillaging and hurting people thing from there. If you aren't part of a gang of thugs you have no chance in this game?

I don't like this at all.
 

DeletedUser61

Guest
Short and Simple? Don't contribute to an Ancient Wonder until the owner has covered a third of the points.

Don't camp in the middle of the freeway. I very much doubt that they were picking on you, nor that they even noticed. You just happened to have a few stray points sitting there when the owner's turn came up.

If a club member has designated a building, the other club members are going to jump on it as soon as the owner has contributed enough points to get a turn. It has nothing to do with whether, or not, there were some stray contributions to one of the club's designated Ancient Wonders.

It's very easy for anybody to lock down an award slot. The formula is
  • Contribute = Half of the ( Remaining Points - your lead or + your lag).
If you only contributed 50 KPs to a 350 point level, that leaves room for 5 other folks to contribute 60 points apiece, which is more than you contributed so you'll get bumped.
 
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DeletedUser43

Guest
I am sure they could have cared less if I was there. At the same time, they didn't want to jump in and all contribute until they could be assured they would get their bonuses. Yes. I understand. You swoop in and steal all the bonuses and only do so when you know you will get them. Gangs of thugs work much better than single snipers. I hate this whole thing. I don't want to be a sniper. I don't want to be a gang. I don't want my actions to harm anyone and that is how the wonders are set up. Some get everything and others get nothing.
 

Deleted User - 107391

Guest
This isn't a club you are talking about it is a gang of thieves. ...

I am miserable and furious that happened to me and I don't EVER want to do that to anyone. There is plenty of war and pillaging and treating people terribly in the world. Why would I want to do that in a game? I wanted a nice peaceful kind game where you can just be nice to people.

I absolutely never wanted to play FoE. I don't like war games where you gain joy from harming people. There is plenty of that in the world.... If you aren't part of a gang of thugs you have no chance in this game?

I don't like this at all.

I am sure they could have cared less if I was there. At the same time, they didn't want to jump in and all contribute until they could be assured they would get their bonuses. Yes. I understand. You swoop in and steal all the bonuses and only do so when you know you will get them. Gangs of thugs work much better than single snipers. I hate this whole thing. I don't want to be a sniper. I don't want to be a gang. I don't want my actions to harm anyone and that is how the wonders are set up. Some get everything and others get nothing.

BRAVO! BOBBYKITTY! Thank you.

I too am playing a game for a nice peaceful experience, as well as a small amount of (peaceful!) interaction with other players, the 'thrill' of discovery, and really pretty graphics.

I don't play FOE; I won't play FOE; I'm not into confrontation and one-upmanship. I like this game because it is challenging, makes you feel like you've accomplished something, and doesn't cause issues for other people.

I'm not happy with people who jump on a return NH every time you gift them, so that they collect the supplies and you don't.

This issue is a SERIOUS DRAWBACK for this game.
 

DeletedUser43

Guest
Kat, I understand that your club will treat each other well. But what about the others? You said yourself that the single player has no chance against the group because you will all swoop in and get the bonuses and stop the other player from being able to get anything. Your very words were "don't camp in the middle of the freeway" . If I am minding my own business and just trying to help someone I am a chump, a moron, an idiot who would camp in the middle of the freeway while a busload of people run me down.

What if I don't want to be in the bus and running people over, and I don't like being a sniper where I lay in wait and pounce and try to steal the bonuses from the person below me? I could ignore all these stupid wonders, but you keep saying that they are going to be paramount to playing this game and without them I cannot progress.

These wonders have greatly changed the dynamic of this game and made it very much like FoE. I don't like FoE and never wanted to play it. I don't find joy in running others over. I feel awful now donating to people's wonders. If I donate in my fellowship, then I am helping some people and hurting others. Should I only go outside of my fellowship? (I believe you suggested something to that effect). If so, that means that you know you are hurting people and you want to make sure you don't hurt your fellowship members. Well, I think of us all as one big Elvenar fellowship and there is no way to do well without hurting someone.

A win lose model seems like a very odd choice for a game advertised as an Elven utopia.

What is my other option? Take a year or more scouting provinces and collecting rune shards? I can't even just choose to get the Dwarven shards any more, now that they have made it mandatory to get the Elven/human wonders done first. You figured you need roughly 20 provinces to get the shards you need for one wonder including all the breakage. Now I have to scout 80 provinces to get all the shards for one particular wonder. It takes 2 - 3 days to scout a province. So gee....240 days? My option is to be at a huge disadvantage goods wise for this whole year or I have to turn into either a sniper or a gang, um, club member?

It just doesn't feel good inside to me to do this whole Ancient Wonders thing. I feel terrible. So, it makes me sad.

Frankly, I think you are setting up the best way to do well in this game by being an organized club. I am not saying you are being illogical or ineffective. I think you are probably being very effective. It saddens me that this is what it takes now to be effective in this game.
 
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