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    Your Elvenar Team

Reconstruction Feature

dlaverenz

New Member
Hello, I think it would be amazing if there was a "reconstruction tab" like in Forge of Empires. You click on the reconstruction tab that is next to the sell and move tool and then you are able to take everything out of your city and rearrange, the kicker is you have to fit everything back in your city or it won't save. It is a really nice feature because you don't have to sell anything that you need/want in your city to make room for the other things you need/want.

Thanks
 

samidodamage

Buddy Fan Club member
@dlaverenz
Welcome to the Ideas & Suggestions Forum! New voices help keep things fresh around here!

There is a specific format required for posting ideas/suggestions in this part of the forum that is detailed in the Guide found here:
Ideas and Suggestions Forum Guide
One of the core components of this game is the 'sliding puzzle' feature where you must develop a strategy to move things around and make room to fit either new buildings or new sizes/orientations from upgrading existing ones. For that reason, there will not be a storage ability other than the teleport spells found in the Spire of Eternity.
The 2nd post in the Guide (link posted above) lists some things the developers have categorically ruled out and any form of temporary storage is one of them. I'm providing a link to that post as well as a copy/paste of the portion related to storage:
Ideas ruled out by the development team
  • Storing Buildings - Players can utilize the Teleport Spell, available through the Spire, to gain the ability to store buildings. There will not be a feature outside of the spell to store buildings.
Also, there's a significant number of posters on this forum who are opposed to making this game any more like FOE than it already is; many tried and hated that game. Just don't be surprised if you hear from those folks (though it's less likely in this part of the forum).

Keep the ideas coming!
 

SoulsSilhouette

Buddy Fan Club member
Sami, I don't know if you play FoE, BUT the reconstruction tool that has been suggested is amazing. There are a number of similarities between the two games even now. The latest quest line IS a replicate of the FoE events with the exception of the additional questline options. The reconstruction tool would help tremendously. The teleport spell is also an FoE replicate of the 'store' building. So is the resistance due to the mention of FoE or of the idea itself? I'm thinking the former.
 

samidodamage

Buddy Fan Club member
@SoulsSilhouette
I don't play FoE and never have. I am not personally opposed to FoE-like suggestions, but I have seen new posters attacked when they suggest making this game more like FoE and try to warn potentially unaware new posters. I don't want them run off as I view them as essential to this forum being both vibrant and relevant.
I have seen this particular suggestion made many times on this forum and any feedback we have received has indicated that feature is considered a form of storage. For many years, it didn't matter that we saw these same ideas/suggestions posted over and over again since we were just talking amongst ourselves on this primarily player-driven forum staffed with volunteer moderators. None of our ideas were ever seen by anyone with any authority anyway.
A volunteer mod put in a lot of time and effort to establish a path to the devs from this forum that has only existed since March 2020. I do not wish to see them regret doing this. I try to adhere to the requirements set forth by the devs to agree to even look at an idea from this forum and try to provide a link to the Guide that details those requirements. When relevant, I take the time to point out the second post in that Guide providing specific ideas that the devs ruled out while developing this pathway. I hope that over time my efforts will decrease the amount of time the mods spend cleaning up and archiving ideas they have specifically been told not to forward. I prefer they spend their limited volunteer time helping us polish ideas that have a snowball's chance of even being seen by anyone with the authority to implement them.
I have not expressed a personal opinion on whether or not I think we need other forms of storage as I view that as a moot point. I prefer to spend my time helping with ideas that might eventually be heard.
 

SoulsSilhouette

Buddy Fan Club member
The reconstruct tool is not storage. Your layout in your world stays the same. It just allows you to manipulate your city in another window and then set it for your city or discard it. Your builds stay in your city. Nothing is 'stored away' or teleported into your inventory. If I was more computer savvy I could show you, but alas, I am so not. To redo my cities, I use graph paper and labeled little buildings using the dimensions from the game. It looks like a manual version of elven architect and it is just as tedious. However, since you can't import your changes from that program directly into elvenar, I find my paper cut and paste has a much more visual ease of use when I'm rearranging. I have to delete optional builds on the regular in order to rearrange my cities. In FoE, I go in and change it and it directly imports it. I cannot save the changes until everything in my city is placed. So there is no storage as I said earlier.
 

samidodamage

Buddy Fan Club member
The reconstruct tool is not storage.
My understanding is the devs consider it a form of temporary storage since it gives more room in a city to re-arrange buildings and defeats the 'sliding puzzle' feature they consider a core part of this game. I'm sure @Xelenia will set me straight if I misunderstood ;)
 

Xelenia

Ex-Team Member
My understanding is the devs consider it a form of temporary storage since it gives more room in a city to re-arrange buildings and defeats the 'sliding puzzle' feature they consider a core part of this game. I'm sure @Xelenia will set me straight if I misunderstood ;)

You are very correct :)

Unfortunately, this is a concept that hasd been introduced in the past. Anything that will require " take everything out of your city and rearrange" is a form of storage, even though it may be temporary. Will the developers change their mind in the future, perhaps, but as of today...this is a no and I will not facilitate forwarding the idea.

Thanks
 

SoulsSilhouette

Buddy Fan Club member
they may not like an idea they've implemented with great success elsewhere, but to call it 'storage' is not accurate. Storage implies that it is removed from your city and put somewhere else and not used, like the teleport. What is suggested is not that at all. It is a way to rearrange in the game and then put that rearrangement into your city, that's all. You cannot delete or keep a build in there and not bring it back. Calling it storage is incorrect. It is not any form of storage, it's just a tool. But I am not surprised that the idea is shut down and shot down because, after all, they won't even give us tabs in the notifications (another highly successful tool in FoE)
 

samidodamage

Buddy Fan Club member
@SoulsSilhouette
Since the devs have provided their reason for considering it as temporary storage (provides additional city space defeating the sliding puzzle feature), perhaps you can explain how it can be done without interfering with that feature.
And, just so you know, I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm just trying to work within the boundaries that have been set for us. I've seen many players who agree with you (and I'm pretty much neutral on the subject of storage and the importance of the sliding puzzle). As of now, no one is going to see anything in this discussion except other players. I would welcome a way forward for this discussion that addresses those boundaries!:)
 

Frappuccino

Member
Best thing to do for rearranging your city is just to have some empty expansions and use some outside tools to help design your base before settling on the format. Whereas I think it would be an incredibly useful tool to have as a feature in the game, I think the easier methodology of getting your base design proper would be to first use an outside program like elvenarchitect. Although this method requires that you have some foresight when obtaining some new expansions the later on the in the game the more free expansions you'll probably want to help reorganize things.

Big brain play would be to come up with an evolving city structure that will be able to work with chapter progression but this would require a lot of tinkering, however what does anyone have in this game but a lot of time to think. The game gives you this very freely to construct ideas that can work.

1. Use Elvenarchitect(EA)
2. Place down all your current buildings -(minus)roads
3. Figure out the layout that you want given the expansions at your disposal.
4. Double check the population / culture tool provided in EA
5. Once you've settled on the design check your resources and see if you have enough materials to rebuild the roads once you sell them off.
6. CONFIRM THE NUMBERS. Doublechecking is important.
7. Sell off your roads and purchase the expansions
8. Shuffle your buildings according to your layout.
9. Replace the roads and your city is established.

Selling off your roads will cut off production momentarily while you reorganize your city however it does give you an abundance of shifting room to more easily facilitates redesigning a base.


For instance I'm relatively new into Ch. 3. but this is the intended new layout once I acquire 3 more expansions.


Current layout


59b706f69201997eaaa44af7aa0bc180.jpg

https://gyazo.com/59b706f69201997eaaa44af7aa0bc180
 

DeletedUser27062

Guest
@SoulsSilhouette
Since the devs have provided their reason for considering it as temporary storage (provides additional city space defeating the sliding puzzle feature), perhaps you can explain how it can be done without interfering with that feature.
And, just so you know, I'm not disagreeing with you. I'm just trying to work within the boundaries that have been set for us. I've seen many players who agree with you (and I'm pretty much neutral on the subject of storage and the importance of the sliding puzzle). As of now, no one is going to see anything in this discussion except other players. I would welcome a way forward for this discussion that addresses those boundaries!:)
There is a possible solution that accommodates both the devs and players position. If we were allowed to float a building/object whilst shifting another we could swap the position of two buildings as we're rearranging things. The problem, as I see it is that the game already limits space and to be efficient all space must be used which means rearranging often involves selling off things to give transitional space for moving objects. It's no longer a slider puzzle when there is no empty space to slide into. If the devs allowed floating then there is always a single open slot (albeit vertically) in which to place one object whilst repositioning another. Such a small allowance does not remove the challenge of rearranging an entire city, nor does not require storage that isn't already present (I can float a building now to see if it looks good in a certain spot or will fit).

I accept that the devs most likely won't go for this suggestion as it may impact on expansion sales (which I imagine is their primary reason for making it so hard in the first place given the outrageous price of expansions) but I don't think they can claim their refusal is to preserve the slider feature considering there is no requirement to keep an open space in the first place.
 

Kekune

Well-Known Member
I don't think they can claim their refusal is to preserve the slider feature considering there is no requirement to keep an open space in the first place.
I don't take the "slider" part literally. I interpret it more to mean that space is intentionally limited, and anything that circumvents existing space constraints is a no-go.

But then again, they did introduce teleports after a long time of saying "no storage!" and the teleport is very distictly storage. So obviously they change their minds sometimes. :)
 

Asterque

Member
I have a suggestion. ... why not simply make the Spire "Teleport Scroll" a crafted item in the Magic Academy menu? I'm saying, it really does help in terms of manipulating buildings around and making space when needed. The problem is, I seldom get the Teleport Scroll when I run Spire. I only get it every now and then.

Currently, I have come to an impasse where the "size"of my residents have changed with lvl 8. I'm too tight now due to the shroom farms to facilitate that size residence. I'll probably have to sell my steel and crystal manufactories. Otherwise, It'll take a long time to come up with 5-10 new expansion slots...that's how much bigger the residences are for this stage. And from what I'm seeing, they only get larger from here on and as one progresses through the game, the size of the buildings increase as well.

There are many beautiful cities on Ceravyn. One of the most beautiful I've seen is the city of player Gandolf Grey. I noticed that there were very few items or buildings from the stages I'm currently in, and the buildings are much larger in lot size. Maybe the real concept here is to not get too attached but to get rid of some items in order to place larger ones. I mean, I saw his planks manufactories, and they are nothing like the planks manufactories at level 19, but are totally different and take up an entire expansion, each one. He has huge steel manufactories, I have 4 puny lvl 13's.

But after seeing how great the steel manufactories become over time, I don't want to delete them. So I can see the future of things by looking at cities that are much greater and much more organized.

Although I'm stuck right now ... soon I will figure it out! ;)

I responded to this thread because I kept saying to myself as I deal with this impasse, how it would help to be able to craft a Teleport Scroll so I can keep my steel and crystal manufactories. I guess I'm not the only one stuck right now.

Crafting the Teleport Scroll may never happen, but it doesn't hurt to suggest it since this is the topic at hand.

Just my thoughts...:cool:
 
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