Purpose of "Regular" Culture Buildings

[NightshadeCS]

How many of you have come across a quest in a guest race chapter to build some sort of culture building and groaned because you have to find space for a useless building that you will immediately sell after fulfilling the quest?

We have spent a lot of time complaining (with good reason) about the imbalance of T3 goods, but what about the imbalance of culture buildings due to so many events and so many wonderful event buildings? I hate to be the person who looks a gift horse in the mouth, but I find myself completely unfamiliar with most of the culture buildings in the Elementals chapter because I have not built any (despite being nearly done with that chapter). I get all of my needs met (and more) by the event buildings.

Artists spent good time and money developing culture buildings to go with the theme of the guest races, and they are all sitting idle in the building menu since few of them compare to the event buildings. I would love for it to be worth my while to bring more of my city into the aesthetic of the guest races.

Does anyone else see this as a problem? And what would be some good ways to solve this problem without hobbling ourselves or creating too many problems for Inno?

 

[Ashrem]

I think it's probably good to have enough variety that no two cities will end up alike. It's unfortunate that some of the tech-tree-constructed buildings are just not worth building. I feel like every time we decide whether or not to build something, or which one to build, it should be a difficult decision. Having the event buildings so obviously better is an error. Other than grand-prize buildings which are limited to one per account, anything else you get in events shouldn't be markedly better than something you can build with resources.

 

[DeletedUser2207]

The game needs to remain playable for people that are unable/unwilling to play events, tournaments and/or spend a lot of time checking the magic academy's limited crafting selection. That's important not just to cater to those players but also to provide greater flexibility in playstyle for other players - for example, that supports those players that want to spend all their event currency and spell fragments on instants

Meanwhile, the event pure culture buildings do have to be nice enough to entice people to actually want them in their city. Otherwise what's the point of offering them?

 

[Ashrem]

If everything is balanced, then people will decide what to place based on which art they like. Art is critical to Elvenar's appeal, and they can't afford to have too many buildings which are the obvious choice, or it will all start to look the same.

 

[SoggyShorts]

My best free chapter building gives about 500 culture per square, the current event building gives 29,000 in 25 squares and can be buffed. Everything in crafting gives about 1,000 per square.
If you go for something like Venar's Rocks III or cozy farms this event you will likely hit 170% culture without needing any of those.

Chapter culture buildings are crap.

 

[NightshadeCS]

I wonder if limiting event buildings to one per city would be feasible? This probably should have been done before they provided the dubious "fix" for buildings in inventory to be disenchanted for spell fragments.

I understand that they need to provide good inducements to play the events, or make them seem worthwhile. We already see a plethora of complaints that events are too hard and the rewards crap (I personally do not feel this way most of the time). Limiting everyone to only one of every reward building may have created enough of a gap that you would have to fill in with regular chapter buildings.

 

[DeletedUser2207]

My best free chapter building gives about 500 culture per square

Minor quibble: D027-h "Archive" gives 633 per square, which isn't hugely better than 500/square. But I've seen a few of them around in cities, and there weren't even any quests asking to build one


Offering former grand prizes that were only available to diamond purchasers as daily rewards is an issue It's one thing to offer them again, but letting people grab multiples of them is going too far IMO

 

[SoggyShorts]

I wonder if limiting event buildings to one per city would be feasible? This probably should have been done before they provided the dubious "fix" for buildings in inventory to be disenchanted for spell fragments.

It would have made the problem far worse. the majority of buildings offered are mathematically inferior to other options and we don't have room to place everything so our inventories would be flooded with unplaced buildings.

More importantly, players would hate it. Since you can only win one of each, it means you should spin almost every days that you don't finish the event with thousands of unspent currency. This means loads of us would have either very little currency for that one prize we really wanted or waste a bunch.

 

[Gath Of Baal]

There are a few of them that I just really like the look, like the Pond Of Recreation, Wayfarers Tavern and Temple Of Holy Flame..

I would have these out in all my cities if they had the stats of the chapter you are currently in.. To bad the RR spell doesn't work on them to increase their stats to reflect the current chapter..

I really love the art from the Snail Palace and have thought about purchasing it several times, no matter what the stats for it are, just to have one in my city

 

[SoggyShorts]

Minor quibble: D027-h "Archive" gives 633 per square, which isn't hugely better than 500/square. But I've seen a few of them around in cities, and there weren't even any quests asking to build one

Ah, I figured the best was on the final page. Still, 633 per square, when 17 crafting recipes offer better culture, is not really worth placing.

 

[Deborah M]

I don't have any "regular" culture buildings. In fact, I only have a couple of event & premium ones that are not culture + pop, mana or seeds.

 

[NightshadeCS]

It would have made the problem far worse. the majority of buildings offered are mathematically inferior to other options and we don't have room to place everything so our inventories would be flooded with unplaced buildings.

More importantly, players would hate it. Since you can only win one of each, it means you should spin almost every days that you don't finish the event with thousands of unspent currency. This means loads of us would have either very little currency for that one prize we really wanted or waste a bunch.

Could this possibly be an additional problem? Too many event buildings are offered? I often find it annoying that Inno plays the trick of offering three buildings that are nearly identical but with increased attributes, the third being the best, i.e. Venar's Rocks. If you grab one early that looks good, haha, got you! There's a better one in 5 days!

 

[Deborah M]

Could this possibly be an additional problem? Too many event buildings are offered? I often find it annoying that Inno plays the trick of offering three buildings that are nearly identical but with increased attributes, the third being the best, i.e. Venar's Rocks. If you grab one early that looks good, haha, got you! There's a better one in 5 days!

That is frustrating sometimes and I'm in a position now that I wish I had saved more sun flares until the last 1/2 dozen dailies. The thing is that this is a game so I'm not complaining about it being just that, a game. If nothing is left as a surprise than how boring would it get? I know from experience that the only way to guarantee you get every prize you want is to spend real $$ at the beginning & if necessary the end of the event.

 

[Ashrem]

Practically gone from collective memory are the days when games would just let you accumulate event currency and buy prizes with it, instead of forcing you to gamble, because gambling is addictive and leads to spending money.

 

[Pheryll]

My best free chapter building gives about 500 culture per square, the current event building gives 29,000 in 25 squares and can be buffed. Everything in crafting gives about 1,000 per square.

Either you are referring to your current crafting selection or looking at a minimum. The lava codex and the frozen tree stump magic closely trail the great auction.

 

[DeletedUser20951]

The only feasible solution I see (which may be because I simply love the idea), is the suggestion to make every tech culture building linked to your chapter level when constructed and closer to the craftable items in culture per square. Can you imagine the greater variety suddenly available to you without shooting yourself in the foot efficiency-wise? Some of the earlier culture thingies are absolutely beautiful and I'd be extremely pleased to keep 'em in my city permanently.

 

[Ashrem]

The only feasible solution I see (which may be because I simply love the idea), is the suggestion to make every tech culture building linked to your chapter level when constructed and closer to the craftable items in culture per square. Can you imagine the greater variety suddenly available to you without shooting yourself in the foot efficiency-wise? Some of the earlier culture thingies are absolutely beautiful and I'd be extremely pleased to keep 'em in my city permanently.

To be balanced, the buildings would need to have a different recipe for each chapter, which is a whole new mechanism. We can't be building something for 500 coin, 500 supplies, and 500 planks in 30 minutes that has stats relevant to someone in Chapter 12.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Depending on the chapter, some of those quests for building a culture building were around long before all the newer, fancy event buildings came along. So Inno really should just remove/replace those quests.

As for culture buildings in general, I never put out pure culture buildings, no matter where they come from. If I had for some reason gotten the Auction building daily prize, even with it's 27k culture where I am in chapter 14, I would still just disenchant it.

 

[SoggyShorts]

Either you are referring to your current crafting selection or looking at a minimum. The lava codex and the frozen tree stump magic closely trail the great auction.

Rounding. If craftable buildings are 82% better or 117% better does it really matter? The point is reg culture buildings are nearly pointless.

 

[Crowella]

As for culture buildings in general, I never put out pure culture buildings, no matter where they come from. If I had for some reason gotten the Auction building daily prize, even with it's 27k culture where I am in chapter 14, I would still just disenchant it.

The one potential downside I see to this strategy is that pure culture buildings give more culture per square than culture buildings that also do other things (such as population). They are therefore much more efficient when boosted with neighborly help. It seems like it might be an effective strategy to have one or two large pure culture buildings that were regularly boosted by friends, more easily achieving a culture bonus.

I know people are dubious about the benefits of culture bonus in general (my goal is to be at 150% with neighborly help on a fairly consistent basis or at least when I collect my coins). But I wonder whether a combined strategy of having a couple large pure culture buildings along with culture plus buildings might be more efficient overall, given fairly reliable neighborly help.

Has anyone tried this out or run the numbers?