Most people cater...

[BrinDarby]

This is technically correct.

"technically" is in Italics, convey'n emphasis of some kind....

Most ppl use this phrase in the following way.......

Player 1 wants a soda from a vending machine and asks Player 2,
"do you have a quarter ?", the answer is "No" ......
"Technically thats correct", cause Player 2 has only dimes/nickles,
because we know Player 2 has 25 cents he could give, just not an
actual "quarter".

What usually is meant is the following...... "while semantically correct,
the statement is false considering context/intent of speaker".

 

[Maplestone]

My original plan when I started playing a year ago was to be a pure pacifist and do no combat. But I quickly ran into some quests that asked me to fight and at the time I didn't know the consequences of avoiding a quest, so I gave up the dream. Over time, I found a mixed strategy felt more efficient, fighting when I was confident I'd win, then catering when the outcomes started to become doubtful. Now that I've started doing the spire all the way to the top most weeks, I\ve been able to afford dropping dwarven armories more often and the balance has tipped even further towards fighting.

( When I first started dipping my toe in combat, I misread how combat works and my first few attempts were costly disasters ... it's not trivial to figure out what in the world is going on from just the mobile interface )

 

[Aritra]

I've heard many players prefer fighting, and hybrid is very common, but I suspect that there are far more pure caterers out there than people realize.

I've been playing for a hair under two years, still purely catering. First city is on the cusp of chapter 12 into 13, second city on cusp of 6 into 7 (third city is solo and just entered chapter 3). I consider my cities stable and successful. No struggle or regrets. For two larger cities, weekly tourney of at least 2500 (exceptions occasionally exist) and clearing second floor of spire (larger city beginning to clear third floor more often but not regularly yet).

 

[Moho]

Based on actual numbers of encounters completed in the World Map, Spire and Tournament, many more are completed by catering.

Most, but definitely not all, competitive Tournament players fight or do a hybrid fight/cater combo.

The number of competitive Tournament players is dwarfed by the number of casual Tournament players. A lot of people choose Elvenar because they have no interest in fighting.

Based on my hunch, I would have said the same thing about each aspect discussed here. But for some reason people prefer statistics and actual numbers to my opinion.

 

[mucksterme]

But for some reason people prefer statistics and actual numbers to my opinion.

83.4% of College Educated Americans believe that statistics can be manipulated to say whatever you want.
The other 24% said "Huh?"

 

[Iyapo1]

Over time, I found a mixed strategy felt more efficient, fighting when I was confident I'd win, then catering when the outcomes started to become doubtful.

Hybrid cities are definitely the best way to go. Part of the reason I cater exclusively is because so many players told me I couldn't do it effectively past chapter 3. And then when I did it they started changing the definition of effective and extending my fail chapter. Currently I am in chapter 9 with 7k a week in the tournaments and gold spire weekly. I want to see how far I can take it!(5k is my usual tournament average the 7k is only possible because I am between chapters and my guest race area is full of manufactories- it wont last)


@Aritra, 13...sentient goods in the spire and tournament!!! They worry me! Good luck!

 

[Flashfyre]

Considering that the App version doesn't allow you to actually manage your fights (since there is no map to deploy troops on to), I don't fight as many encounters as I would like to. The auto-fight is sorta ok in its end result, but there are times when I think human direction would have actually won a battle that the AI loses for me.
So Inno should clarify their statement by telling us what percentage of fighting is done in the browser version and what percentage is done in the app. Then we'd have a better understanding of the statement, if this shows that more catering is done in the app due to the crappy AI auto-fight restriction.

 

[The Unbeliever]

Considering that the App version doesn't allow you to actually manage your fights (since there is no map to deploy troops on to), I don't fight as many encounters as I would like to. The auto-fight is sorta ok in its end result, but there are times when I think human direction would have actually won a battle that the AI loses for me.
So Inno should clarify their statement by telling us what percentage of fighting is done in the browser version and what percentage is done in the app. Then we'd have a better understanding of the statement, if this shows that more catering is done in the app due to the crappy AI auto-fight restriction.

The inability to manual fight in the app is almost certainly massively skewing results in favour of "cater only", since the battle AI is beyond pants-on-head slowed & barely functional... I only use it because the actual manual fighting is an even worse interface!
Basically, the devs are pre-disposing themselves to their own biased results, because they've built a dysfunctional mess of a battle system, which most people hate, and then claiming that as "proof" that only a minority of players enjoy fighting. >.>

On the other hand, if the devs gave a damn, and worked to build something other than a raging dumpster fire of a battle system, that was more fun & intuitive vs. clunky & slow, while also addressing the massive early game imbalances, more players would probably enjoy mixing some fighting + catering vs. the current situation where too many players get frustrated by auto-loss after auto-loss and say, "feth this, just cater!"

Hybrid cities are definitely the best way to go. Part of the reason I cater exclusively is because so many players told me I couldn't do it effectively past chapter 3. And then when I did it they started changing the definition of effective and extending my fail chapter. Currently I am in chapter 9 with 7k a week in the tournaments and gold spire weekly. I want to see how far I can take it!(5k is my usual tournament average the 7k is only possible because I am between chapters and my guest race area is full of manufactories- it wont last)


@Aritra, 13...sentient goods in the spire and tournament!!! They worry me! Good luck!

You will begin to find problems as soon as Ch.10 when Mana is thrown into the pool of possible catering resources.
Orks resource is headache enough to manage, but at least boyz *can* be over-produced with enough event buildings - it takes a really loooooong time to build up 2.5-3 million+ boyz!

But as soon as you hit those decaying resources, you're basically forced to change to hybrid format, since it's just too hard to keep ALL the decaying resources massively over-stocked all the time...
Sure, one week you might get lucky and get a decent spread of resources, but then you *will* have a week or three hit and it'll seem like damn near every single negotiation is demanding the same decaying resource.

 

[mikeledo]

"most" is that like 51 out of a 100 or 4 out of 5?

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

"most" is that like 51 out of a 100 or 4 out of 5?

Since helya said it is based on number of encounters and not the number of players, if there are 5,000,000 encounters solved in a week, then most would have to be at least 2,500,001. Though that is really just a majority and not what people would normally call "most". My personal definition of "most" is at least 60% of something, but I know there is not a set amount for what is "most".

 

[Aritra]

Hybrid cities are definitely the best way to go. Part of the reason I cater exclusively is because so many players told me I couldn't do it effectively past chapter 3. And then when I did it they started changing the definition of effective and extending my fail chapter. Currently I am in chapter 9 with 7k a week in the tournaments and gold spire weekly. I want to see how far I can take it!(5k is my usual tournament average the 7k is only possible because I am between chapters and my guest race area is full of manufactories- it wont last)


@Aritra, 13...sentient goods in the spire and tournament!!! They worry me! Good luck!

Seeds and Mana in the Spire have been manageable, and sentients haven't been required yet. We'll see how that goes....

I usually limit myself in tourney to 2500-3000 or so not because I can't go higher, but to avoid unnecessary depletion. I'm in an active fellowship so there is plenty of contribution to hit our goals. There hadn't been goals beyond ten-chests so it wasn't a big deal. We're starting to pick up 11th regularly so I'm feeling a bit of pressure to up it, and yet, I don't need to, yet. I contribute plenty but as the FS as a whole claims more, I'm reassessing my personal goal quota. As bits of resource surplus builds up, I can have have spike weeks in both tourney and spire (unpredictable, varying frequency).

 

[Deborah M]

@Aritra I have sentient goods all the time in the spire. I’m pretty sure that has been the case since the spire came out.

 

[Aritra]

@Aritra I have sentient goods all the time in the spire. I’m pretty sure that has been the case since the spire came out.

I just meant that sentients haven't started in my spire yet.
At the moment, T1 sentient is all I have so maybe it will start in ch.13? All I know is it hasn't yet but I know it will come.

 

[Sprite1313]

I just meant that sentients haven't started in my spire yet.
At the moment, T1 sentient is all I have so maybe it will start in ch.13? All I know is it hasn't yet but I know it will come.

Yes; they normally start to appear for catering in the chapter after you gain them.

 

[Aritra]

You will begin to find problems as soon as Ch.10 when Mana is thrown into the pool of possible catering resources.
Orks resource is headache enough to manage, but at least boyz *can* be over-produced with enough event buildings - it takes a really loooooong time to build up 2.5-3 million+ boyz!

But as soon as you hit those decaying resources, you're basically forced to change to hybrid format, since it's just too hard to keep ALL the decaying resources massively over-stocked all the time...
Sure, one week you might get lucky and get a decent spread of resources, but then you *will* have a week or three hit and it'll seem like damn near every single negotiation is demanding the same decaying resource.

Orc productions have been just fine. My seeds and mana haven't been a problem at all, even though they decay. My concern with sentient decay is hearing complaints from players in higher chapters about how long it takes to accumulate what they need to get through the chapter and I would experience a greater strain because I would be using them to cater, thus taking even longer to accumulate. However, call me naive but I am not deterred.

 

[Henroo]

Huh, so my guess that it was based on number of encounters and not number of players was right? Cool.

But I think it would have to be both. A serious, high level combat player might fight 30 or 40 provinces in a given tournament. And the vast majority of these encounters are likely to be combat only. They might mix in a few caters when a bad enemy line-up presents itself. A less advanced, more casual player might only do 10 provinces in that same tournament. And their encounters might be a more even mix of fighting and catering. So it would take multiple of the casual players to outweigh the 1 hardcore player in terms of total number of encounters.

 

[Henroo]

My seeds and mana haven't been a problem at all, even though they decay. My concern with sentient decay is hearing complaints from players in higher chapters about how long it takes to accumulate what they need to get through the chapter and I would experience a greater strain because I would be using them to cater, thus taking even longer to accumulate. However, call me naive but I am not deterred.

You can make a large number of sentient goods fairly quickly when you combo Magical Manufacturing spells with a decent level Elvenar Trading Center. And this can be further enhanced by feeding a Storm Phoenix. I also think Boblin's Express is going to end up being more important to cater based players because they will have greater need of the extra MM spell every day than fighting players.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

I also think Boblin's Express is going to end up being more important to cater based players because they will have greater need of the extra MM spell every day than fighting players.

You aren't into ascended goods yet. In chapter 18 and 19 I have used tons of MMs to make ascended goods and they are not used in any catering. Every MM is good to stockpile.

 

[SoggyShorts]

even though my provinces are now all "Very Easy", I still find myself clicking the Cater button.

Negotiate/cater = 1 click
Autofight = 7 (or 8 clicks if using non-barracks units)

I've been a "pure fighter" for years, and just recently ran the numbers for catering. It turns out that I collect almost enough T1-3 goods from my sets and Evos in one day to cater 6 provinces 6 times. If I logged in every day I could cater ~15x6 sustainably.

The tournament is now ~90% faster.

 

[Henroo]

You aren't into ascended goods yet. In chapter 18 and 19 I have used tons of MMs to make ascended goods and they are not used in any catering. Every MM is good to stockpile.

Kind of sounds like a repeat of the initial sentient good chapters. When sentients were being introduced in ch 12-14 it took insane amounts of them to unlock techs. I kept MM spells on my sentient manufactories constantly. This is the only point in the game so far where I was using MM spells quicker than I won them. Ch 15 and 16 have not nearly been as bad with regard to sentient goods. I have not used nearly as many MM spells doing them and my stockpile is growing again.