Live Q&A Dec 09 2022

[SoggyShorts]

Actually that is not the only objection

My fault for being unclear, I meant "only valid objection" I don't consider "programming time" or any issue that is solved to be a real issue.

To be more clear: programming time/difficulty only affects whether an idea can be done and when it could be done
vs
Player suggestions being forwarded to developers are about whether it should be done, which is the only part we can really address.

Additionally, with the teleportation of Evos, I believe the programming question has been answered.

And obviously, issues like the donated KP being lost if not recorded are non-issues since, as you pointed out, we solved it by only allowing rune-phase teleportation.

 

[SoggyShorts]

Having the tournament difficulty mirror the production wonders would be linear rather than not at all.

Sorry, could you expand on that? I'm not quite sure what you're suggesting.
I haven't looked that closely at CAL-altering options... or even the current formula really since there's not much of anything I can do about my CAL other than Not advance, Not expand, or Nuke wonders.

 

[Yogi Dave]

I am thinking once every so many weeks to teleport a large number of AWs, for a heavy push through your entire tournament provinces. Given the exponential nature of the calculation, skimping most weeks, and having one large push week may become a dominant strategy.

The exponential factor in the MinMax CAL equation is the number of non-optional techs you have completed. All other factors, including the number of AW levels, have a linear effect. This concept is confusing since one is usually changing several contributors to the equation as you go. Maybe the easiest way to explain is if you only do techs completing 1 multiplies the previous CAL value by a percentage, (almost 1/2%). Whereas increasing an AW level by 1 adds a percentage of the CAL. Adding to the CAL value has less than the effect of multiplying the CAL.

 

[Lelanya]

Yeah there is something we are missing, in the tech part of the CAL.
Now, please recall that I am  not a math gal, but I do know a lot about this game. I run multiple cities to get a feel for how things work. And here is what you are missing.

I find that Spire does get a lot more difficult if I push a lot of tech over a short period of time. However, if I only take one tech per week then this doesn't seem to hold true.

Perhaps this is what @Nightguest was hinting at, when he said MinMax's CAL was close but not quite correct.

 

[Yogi Dave]

Now, please recall that I am  not a math gal, but I do know a lot about this game. I run multiple cities to get a feel for how things work. And here is what you are missing.

I find that Spire does get a lot more difficult if I push a lot of tech over a short period of time. However, if I only take one tech per week then this doesn't seem to hold true.

Yes, one tech only increases the amount by 1/2%, so you won't feel that, but a chapter having 30 tech increases the amount by 17%. It just accumulates like compound interest. With a 30-year loan at 3% means you pay for the house 2.4 times what it would have been if you paid cash up front. For a 15-year loan it would only be 1.55 times the cash price. This is 0.45% so it only increases slowly. Whereas the linear factors have a more immediate effect, but over the long run the number of techs completed begins to become the dominate factor which increases the other factors effect. It all works together in what I think of as a rather perverse way.

Perhaps this is what @Nightguest was hinting at, when he said MinMax's CAL was close but not quite correct.

I don't know where she said this, but it is true his equation isn't perfect. It can't be, but it is very good. When I've used it, it's been off by a couple of troops, but less than 5. I doubt the game actually uses an equation, but the way it is coded matches his equation as good as it's going to get.

If you are interested in seeing some graphs about the equations I did back in March '21, here is the link. They were more about comparing the old method of using the squad size techs vs the new method.

But, these last few posts aren't about @SoggyShorts' thread and can be a distraction into an old hashed out topic. His topic seems to be a comment about things being passed on to the devs and they are under discussion by them and that's all we know about that end.

 

[SoggyShorts]

these last few posts aren't about @SoggyShorts' thread and can be a distraction

No worries, the whole point of the post was made early in the thread, if this (or any post I make) evolves into an interesting discussion I'm not against that. To be fair, imagine if I did have a fit about someone derailing a thread... How long would it take to dig up a few dozen I've taken off course?

I'd still like @Pheryll to explain a little more about how the formula could be tweaked to add a linear component to replace one of the exponential ones.

 

[BrinDarby]

Someone shoould pin the Devs down on WHY on god's green earth
are there tasks asking to buy KP..... Seriously, get a answer.....

Because the ONLY reason I can see is to force players to a point
where just that task alone forces players to spend/buy diamonds.

My guess is we, the playerbase will NEVER get a straight answer
on this subject , just like many other questions where the Devs/Mgmt
doesn't want to ever admit a feature is just a attempt to get revenue.

There are many ways to increase revenue and enjoyment of this game
that quite frankly, the Devs seem to say No, Never Ever, No .... and
we ( the devs ) won't say why..... Ever !!

 

[SoggyShorts]

Someone shoould pin the Devs down on WHY on god's green earth
are there tasks asking to buy KP..... Seriously, get a answer.....

They've answered before in a Q & A, and the gist of it is that buying KP is one of the least demanding quests provided a player progresses in the game (which obviously is something they are encouraging)

I've willingly bought from 5-15 KP every day* since 2017 and it's never caused my city any problems whatsoever-- it certainly hasn't "forced me to a point where I had to buy diamonds" (which I've never done). I even sat in a chapter for over a year of play and buying KP didn't hurt despite my productions/revenues not increasing. Just yesterday I was impatient waiting for the tournament and bought 500 KP to put into my tech tree without issue. I should also note that I have zero residences in my city providing me with coin revenues and yet still manage to buy KP consistently. If you are really struggling I'd suggest having a look at what you might do differently in your strategy rather than blaming a rather easy task that ultimately helps advance your city.

*aside from my 1-year hiatus where I didn't log in at all

 

[elvenbee]

They've answered before in a Q & A, and the gist of it is that buying KP is one of the least demanding quests provided a player progresses in the game (which obviously is something they are encouraging)

I've willingly bought from 5-15 KP every day* since 2017 and it's never caused my city any problems whatsoever-- it certainly hasn't "forced me to a point where I had to buy diamonds" (which I've never done). I even sat in a chapter for over a year of play and buying KP didn't hurt despite my productions/revenues not increasing. Just yesterday I was impatient waiting for the tournament and bought 500 KP to put into my tech tree without issue. I should also note that I have zero residences in my city providing me with coin revenues and yet still manage to buy KP consistently. If you are really struggling I'd suggest having a look at what you might do differently in your strategy rather than blaming a rather easy task that ultimately helps advance your city.

*aside from my 1-year hiatus where I didn't log in at all

I think my only complaint with buying the KP is that the prices don't reset like the Wholesaler does after 4-5 hours. If they started resetting the KP, I would be fine with the quest.

 

[Pheryll]

No worries, the whole point of the post was made early in the thread, if this (or any post I make) evolves into an interesting discussion I'm not against that. To be fair, imagine if I did have a fit about someone derailing a thread... How long would it take to dig up a few dozen I've taken off course?

I'd still like @Pheryll to explain a little more about how the formula could be tweaked to add a linear component to replace one of the exponential ones.

It looks like I misremembered MinMax's formula. As @Yogi Dave pointed out, the AW term is linear; so doubling wonder levels (when high enough) approximately doubles the goods, seeds, etc. required, so the wonders do not have to multiplicatively combo to be effective. The research term appears to be the only exponential, which works so long as the troop production (from level of barracks, mercenary camp, and training grounds) also increases in an exponential fashion. Before the latest chapters, they ended up failing to keep up with the quadratic squad size; but these latest chapters we just had may be an effort to accommodate the formula (rather than tweaking the formula to accommodate their progression) which may mean either that the increased training of troops will fail to keep up with the exponential expectations of research, or that the wonders (shrooms and dwarven bulwark) may have their benefits slowly fazed out (should enough chapters be released) as the armories will take over their roles by a much higher density training size.

 

[Yogi Dave]

which may mean either that the increased training of troops will fail to keep up with the exponential expectations of research,

While that is eventually true, I think what really hurts with troop recovery time is troop loss due to the increase of troops they bring to battle with prov and round instead of just round. I used to be that for all provs of round 1 they brought 85% the troops you bring. Now, it starts out real low, 12.6% but grows to over 160% at prov 23. In the past, only round 6 was 160%. A prov 5 round 6 would be the same as a prov 10 round 1. At least the Twilight Phoenix reduces troop loss by 5% when you have it active. Yes, problems with feeding it, but it's a building for us players with zero-cooldown time.

 

[SoggyShorts]

I think my only complaint with buying the KP is that the prices don't reset like the Wholesaler does after 4-5 hours. If they started resetting the KP, I would be fine with the quest.

Yes, you're not alone. For many years that has been the worry from everyone who worries about it, but in practice, it doesn't matter at all.
The reason is that your income grows so massively as you progress that the increasing cost of buying KP never catches up to bite you.

As an example, a chapter 7 city might feel that 5,700,000 is a lot of coins (a full main hall) but in chapter 17 that's barely 10% of a main hall.
Then in chapter 20 the capacity is 200,000,000! Yep, two hundred million coins!

And on top of that, you can use 3 different goods to buy KP. If you are still really worried, save 1 good type for event KP buying, and as you grow you'll see just how insignificant the price increase is compared to your production increases.

TL;DR: Worrying about the increasing cost of KP is like worrying about 10% inflation in real life if you got a 100% raise every year.

 

[SoggyShorts]

It looks like I misremembered MinMax's formula. As @Yogi Dave pointed out, the AW term is linear; so doubling wonder levels (when high enough) approximately doubles the goods, seeds, etc. required, so the wonders do not have to multiplicatively combo to be effective.

So can you or @Yogi Dave provide an example (perhaps using your own cities?) of your CAL before and after teleporting 4 or 8 military wonders?
(assuming a cost of 1 blueprint this would be possible once every month or 2 months)

 

[Yogi Dave]

So can you or @Yogi Dave provide an example (perhaps using your own cities?) of your CAL before and after teleporting 4 or 8 military wonders?
(assuming a cost of 1 blueprint this would be possible once every month or 2 months)

EDIT: I was looking at wrong figures when I posted my answers. So, I've deleted it and will post corrected values tomorrow. Sorry about that.

 

[Yogi Dave]

So can you or @Yogi Dave provide an example (perhaps using your own cities?) of your CAL before and after teleporting 4 or 8 military wonders?
(assuming a cost of 1 blueprint this would be possible once every month or 2 months)

Instead of the CAL, I'll be showing the base tourney squad size. The squad size for any prov/round is the product of the base size and the prov number plus the round number minus 1. So, prov/round = base * (prov + round - 1).

Chapter​	Expansions​	Base Squad Size​	Saving per Teleport​
15 - End of Elvenar​	101 Normal, 0 Premium​	647.9​	30.7​
15 - End of Elvenar​	101 Normal, 15 Premium​	714.4​	33.8​
16 - End of Embassies​	110 Normal, 0 Premium​	799.7​	37.9​
16 - End of Embassies​	110 Normal, 15 Premium​	874.3​	41.4​

• Chapter is the one just completed with no techs completed in the next one.
• Expansions is the number of normal ones and premium ones placed. The normal ones are the number needed to enter the next chapter plus the number from techs.
• Base Squad Size is for 300 AW levels. NOTE: The AW levels of 300 was just used to get a base squad size. It does not affect the Saving per Teleport. Using 200 would have had the same savings, but the base Squad Size would have been less.
• Saving per Teleport. This is the troop reduction for teleporting one level 30 AW.

Although for prov 30, round 1 the saving would be 931, 1014, 1137 and 1242, for me this isn't enough to make we want to teleport one. The only reason I'd teleport one is to see if it wasn't needed. I don't think I'd ever place it again, but I am loath to just deleting one at that level.

 

[SoggyShorts]

Saving per Teleport.

Ok, so this would be how much smaller your losses would be*, which looks like ~5% for teleporting a level 30 AW.
Yeah, I'm not worried about that at all now. The room for abuse is very minimal- > Just make the cost to teleport 1 blueprint and done.

*Not counting fights that you win with zero losses or fights that you lose (5% has no effect on 0 or 100% losses)

 

[Yogi Dave]

It doesn't seem like it would help me much even with my base squad size of 2,678. I make a tad over 977k troops a day and have 2 brown bears which I use around once a month. I have plenty of all the other stuff that goes into making battles easier (fire chicken, zombie making phoenix, timewarp/polar bear combo and 5d building along with the pet food) The pet food and 5d buildings seem to replenish as fast as I use them. That allows me to maintain an over 10K tourney avg and complete the spire each week. Oh, I also manual fight a good bit of the nosebleed provs and the 2 and 3-wave spire battles. They are fun.