Struggling smaller cities

[Deleted User - 850238979]

I've had big cities before and have played extensively in the past as well as having cities on beta so I know what I'm experiencing can't be due to noob mistakes so I'm posting here in the hopes I've overlooked something or that others might be noticing the same thing.

My chapter 5 cities are really struggling to find their feet. The culprit imo is due to reaching ch 5 without first having gained full relic boost. So I'm parked up at the end of ch 5 while I work toward that magic percentage.

I had already tested city growth with this new tech tree on beta and don't remember struggling so much for...well, everything. I'm struggling to make enough goods, coins and culture to cover tourney and spire due to having to cater more than fight. I can't fight as much as I used to because I just can't get enough military boosters from the MA. This has been my experience across all of my cities.

To give some comparison, on beta two of my parked up ch 5 cities had about 750k of each good and only used 4 T1 and 2 T2 manufactories. All other goods came from event buildings. I never had issues gaining military boost buildings and even though those test cities are ch 8 I'm still placing military boosters I got when I ch 5.

It seems to me that the increased variety of buildings for crafting means less opportunities for (useful) military boosters combined with extended time at subpar goods boost is really hurting my city.

I know the new tech tree is supposed to make getting to ch 5 faster and it does but it bites you in the butt by leaving cities under resources.

 

[Iyapo]

I know the new tech tree is supposed to make getting to ch 5 faster and it does but it bites you in the butt by leaving cities under resources.

This is true. Used to be players met the Spire in chapter 3, the Spire was a cheap easy little baby. It took months to get to chapter 5 so players got to "grow up" with the Spire.

Now, It takes less than a month to get to the Spire and it shows up fully grown in all its awful glory before you even get your t2 and t3 Manufactory upgrades. It is a hard blow.

My chapter 5 cities are really struggling to find their feet. The culprit imo is due to reaching ch 5 without first having gained full relic boost. So I'm parked up at the end of ch 5 while I work toward that magic percentage.

This is just my opinion;

Move to chapter 6 as fast as possible. You can find a happy place in chapter 5 but it is easier to find your feet in chapter 6, imo.

To find your feet you really need to take a hard step back and focus on one thing at a time. First, Residence upgrades and Workshop upgrades(no one can help you with coins and supplies). Then culture, you gotta get your unboosted culture bonus over 125% and keep it there(EE spells are completely useless if you are below 125%). Then focus on manufactory upgrades. Once you get all of that done, then focus on military.

It is much easier for a little city to mostly cater, so lean into catering until you find your feet.

It seems to me that the increased variety of buildings for crafting means less opportunities for (useful) military boosters combined with extended time at subpar goods boost is really hurting my city.

Again, you are not wrong. You can not do anything about the MA. You can add more manufactories to compensate for the crappy boost%.

Every tournament your boost will grow and it will get just a little easier, you can delete some manufactories and put in training grounds and a mercenary camp and more armories. But until that boost gets to 700%, I recommend barracks only and focus on manufactories.

Also, keep your eye on the event buildings, with your boost below 700% pretty much all of the goods producers are better per square than your manufactories (not the Traveling Merchant in the MA those are just crap compared to most event buildings)


Edit: I know you are not new and some of this info you don't need but your post might attract new players because you are not alone. So I gave way more info about my work around than you needed.


2nd Edit: I run Elf Cities because I mostly cater and they are just better at that early game than human cities. The things I said might not be true for a human city.

 

[Count Rupert]

One of the problems with the streamlining of the research tree to speed new players through the early chapters quicker is it does nothing to speed the creation of city infrastructure. By reducing the time it takes to get through the research tree also reduces the number of events they see where they can get event buildings they may need and the time it takes to build/level the buildings that they're going need in the chapters ahead. It takes time. Speed them along early, they're still going to have spend that time or spend gems. In some ways we're only kicking the can down the road from having new players not liking the pace of play early in chapter 1 or 2 to later chapters.

 

[Deleted User - 850238979]

This is true. Used to be players met the Spire in chapter 3, the Spire was a cheap easy little baby. It took months to get to chapter 5 so players got to "grow up" with the Spire.

Now, It takes less than a month to get to the Spire and it shows up fully grown in all its awful glory before you even get your t2 and t3 Manufactory upgrades. It is a hard blow.


This is just my opinion;

Move to chapter 6 as fast as possible. You can find a happy place in chapter 5 but it is easier to find your feet in chapter 6, imo.

To find your feet you really need to take a hard step back and focus on one thing at a time. First, Residence upgrades and Workshop upgrades(no one can help you with coins and supplies). Then culture, you gotta get your unboosted culture bonus over 125% and keep it there(EE spells are completely useless if you are below 125%). Then focus on manufactory upgrades. Once you get all of that done, then focus on military.

It is much easier for a little city to mostly cater, so lean into catering until you find your feet.

Again, you are not wrong. You can not do anything about the MA. You can add more manufactories to compensate for the crappy boost%.

Every tournament your boost will grow and it will get just a little easier, you can delete some manufactories and put in training grounds and a mercenary camp and more armories. But until that boost gets to 700%, I recommend barracks only and focus on manufactories.

Also, keep your eye on the event buildings, with your boost below 700% pretty much all of the goods producers are better per square than your manufactories (not the Traveling Merchant in the MA those are just crap compared to most event buildings)


Edit: I know you are not new and some of this info you don't need but your post might attract new players because you are not alone. So I gave way more info about my work around than you needed.


2nd Edit: I run Elf Cities because I mostly cater and they are just better at that early game than human cities. The things I said might not be true for a human city.

This is a great response. Thank you.

You suggested:
"Move to chapter 6 as fast as possible. You can find a happy place in chapter 5 but it is easier to find your feet in chapter 6, imo."

I cannot imagine why ch 6, with its intro to settlement goods, would be a better move while being under-resourced. Can you shed some light on why you think this is better?

Your other suggestion of slowing down/ pulling back and focusing on catering the tourney has me grimacing. If I limit the spire I limit my rate of growth because it's the only place to get artifacts, genies, that bee thingy, loads of other resources that really help a city thrive. I get bored easily and the idea of spending months creeping along is highly unpalatable to me (and I get that may seem odd given elvenar is typically a slow progress game).

You're right about event buildings being a boost to little cities which is why I'm so disappointed in this current event (which I participated in already elsewhere ). There's just nothing worth placing imo.

 

[Iyapo]

I cannot imagine why ch 6, with its intro to settlement goods, would be a better move while being under-resourced. Can you shed some light on why you think this is better?

I run Elf Cities, so check the human tech tree to see when this happens for a human. In chapter 5 you get Superior T2 and T3 Manufactory upgrades and in chapter 6 you get T1 upgrades. Once those three upgrades are researched and rolled out my production smooths out and easily exceeds gold spire. Also you said;

So I'm parked up at the end of ch 5 while I work toward that magic percentage.

If you push through chapter 6 and park at the end of chapter 6 you will have all the room that you dedicated to your settlement empty. Plenty of space to max out your culture, throw down some extra armories or manufactories and build up your inventory while you build up your boost.

Plus I just really like how neat and orderly the dwarven houses are. It is so peaceful to the eyes!

1 really big drawback is Portal Profits. Right now you are getting coin and supply rains from the Spire and from event chests. Until you get your coin and supply production optimized you need those pretty desperately, so definitely dont move until you get your workshops, houses, and culture settled(or until you have a happy little pile of rains) because once you hit chapter 6 most of those rains turn into PPs.

If I limit the spire I limit my rate of growth because it's the only place to get artifacts, genies, that bee thingy, loads of other resources that really help a city thrive

I completely agree with this. But if you bust your city every week you will keep struggling.

I get bored easily and the idea of spending months creeping along is highly unpalatable to me (and I get that may seem odd given elvenar is typically a slow progress game).

Hold back for 1 full week and focus on your upgrades(houses, workshops, culture, manufactories). Do not step a toe into the lab, stick to 7-8 provinces and let your wonders rest.

You can do that easy. You know you can do that easy. You are struggling because you are pushing hard every week and you already know you don't have the boost% or the buildings for it.

So give yourself an easy week while you fix what you can.

Just my opinion and I cater exclusively so any advice I give is really slanted towards that approach.

 

[Deleted User - 850238979]

I run Elf Cities, so check the human tech tree to see when this happens for a human. In chapter 5 you get Superior T2 and T3 Manufactory upgrades and in chapter 6 you get T1 upgrades. Once those three upgrades are researched and rolled out my production smooths out and easily exceeds gold spire. Also you said;

If you push through chapter 6 and park at the end of chapter 6 you will have all the room that you dedicated to your settlement empty. Plenty of space to max out your culture, throw down some extra armories or manufactories and build up your inventory while you build up your boost.

Plus I just really like how neat and orderly the dwarven houses are. It is so peaceful to the eyes!

1 really big drawback is Portal Profits. Right now you are getting coin and supply rains from the Spire and from event chests. Until you get your coin and supply production optimized you need those pretty desperately, so definitely dont move until you get your workshops, houses, and culture settled(or until you have a happy little pile of rains) because once you hit chapter 6 most of those rains turn into PPs.

I completely agree with this. But if you bust your city every week you will keep struggling.

Hold back for 1 full week and focus on your upgrades(houses, workshops, culture, manufactories). Do not step a toe into the lab, stick to 7-8 provinces and let your wonders rest.

You can do that easy. You know you can do that easy. You are struggling because you are pushing hard every week and you already know you don't have the boost% or the buildings for it.

So give yourself an easy week while you fix what you can.

Just my opinion and I cater exclusively so any advice I give is really slanted towards that approach.

I think the tech tree is pretty much the same for humans and elf from what I can tell.

I appreciate your POV on my situation, certainly lots to consider.

 

[Silly Bubbles]

I started my big city after 6 months break because I got bored with my first city after playing it for two and half years and being at the end of game (under different user name). What I did second time around, I just focused on getting through chapters as fast as I could hoping that tournament and Spire will get easier as I progress. It took me a year to consistently get to the top of the Spire, year and half to start getting 2000 points in the tournament and two years to reach Ch19.

What I'm trying to say is that focusing on tournament and Spire too early has always slowed down the progress quite a bit. So it seems that we need to choose what is more important to us. I hope this helps a little bit.

 

[MaidenFair]

What I'm trying to say is that focusing on tournament and Spire too early has always slowed down the progress quite a bit.

Maybe if you are trying to reach the end chapters as fast as possible. However, I like to move through chapters fairly quickly (ch. 14 after 2 years) and I started getting 2700 tournament points after 3 months and topping the Spire every week after 5ish; both of those things hugely aided my city growth and capabilities, not retarded it. Of course, that was on the old tech tree, and I suspect new players will have to expect slower progress, more like your numbers, but that has certainly not “always” been the case.

I think it’s an unfortunate side effect of the new tech tree, as @Gordo the gassy points out. They may be seeing more player retention through the earliest chapters now but I can’t imagine that extends into long-term players, for all the reasons laid out in the OP. Instead of having their feet under them by the time they reach the guest race chapters, cities are now guaranteed to still be struggling with the basics, which means they’re going to put aside all the “extras” (Spire, tournament, events) as something reserved for only really old cities or ones with deep pockets. That means less game participation overall, and more players having angry feelings about all these game features they can’t afford to access. I suspect the “abandoning cities in boredom/frustration” stage has just moved from ch. 2 or 3 to ch. 6 now. If Inno’s data shows anything different, I would be amazed.

@Gordo the gassy , re: your new city struggles…there may actually be a slight disadvantage to being an experienced player starting a new city. I had (and have!) more trouble maintaining tourney scores and inventory in my second city (both old tech tree) than I did my first. I think that may be because while we avoid some obvious newbie mistakes, we’re also building toward certain things right out of the gate, while in our first cities we didn’t know where we were going or what to expect and were acting more on instinct.

It’s also possible it’s largely a function of which event buildings were available early in each city’s development. I know my first city‘s development has somehow lined up perfectly with almost every event; I start thinking “oh, I’m going to be needing this new resource soon!” and then the very next event magically provides a lot of buildings which focus on that particular resource. My second city has not had that serendipitous timing, and is struggling much more than my first ever did.

 

[crackie]

My chapter 5 cities are really struggling to find their feet.

I am observing this from an AM perspective as well as someone that runs FS with Spire requirements. I used to be able to take in new cities from chapter 1, get them Spire ready by chapter 3, and then be mostly done with hand holding because once they get the hang of climbing at chap 3, then they know how to build their cities to climb sustainably after that. That little city grows to be a fairly strong medium city and away we go.

Now if I get them at chapter 1, I'm a broken record telling them "build more factories" for 5 chapters. All the while, they're going to tell me "Nah, I have enough goods". Yeah, you have enough goods to twiddle your thumbs because there's nothing going on with tournament and Spire delayed in tech tree! Then chapter 5 and Spire are finally unlocked and then it's <wah wah>. All I hear is can't can't can't. Sad trombooooone. Remember how I said 50000000x that you needed more factories? It's super frustrating because they're not wrong. They're probably fine with 3 factories in chapter 3 and nothing else to do. Some will hunker down and course correct, but a lot more will just panic quit. And then I would have invested several months to have that player complete 0 Spires for our FS.

Yesterday, I learned someone in Woodelves didn't know what map provinces/encounters are. This happens because he came to us from one of those newbie fellowships with newbie archmages. I don't think they had a tourney requirement, but they were actively discouraged from doing the Spire. So yeah, with minimal demands, you can willy nilly your way through 9 chapters (!!!NINE!!!) and have absolutely no basic understanding of the game at all. Last week, he learned buildings have chapters on them. I commend the guy because he is really trying to learn how to climb now and he also understands there's so much more to the game he's completely missed. I just can't believe I have to hand hold a chapter 9 city, but it's because the game now rush them through the early chapters and routes them to play together in newbie fellowships. And if we don't take them in, then he'll prob just be another player that quits like all the black triangles from whence he came from. So from AM perspective, they are definitely showing up into later chapters with much weaker foundations than before.

 

[Iyapo]

What I'm trying to say is that focusing on tournament and Spire too early has always slowed down the progress quite a bit

Maybe if you are trying to reach the end chapters as fast as possible

Exactly This!!!!!!

I was trying to reach the end chapters as fast as possible in one of my cities. I was gold spire and 2k+ in the tournaments by the end of chapter 5. It was a struggle every single week!!!

there may actually be a slight disadvantage to being an experienced player starting a new city.

This!!! I knew what I wanted and exactly how to get there. So I pushed my city right to the bleeding edge of its ability and just lived there, the struggle in my case was self inflicted.

I backed off the racing in chapter 7 because it was less important to me than the gold spire and the tournament. I backed off from the tournament for a few weeks for the same reason. Gold Spire in that city was non negotiable.


@Gordo the gassy I think you are wise to pause your roll and take a few deep breaths while you focus on your boost%.
You can roll right back up to the bleeding edge any time you want too.(and since it is always expanding rolling up on it is the only way to keep track of it )

 

[Darielle]

I've had big cities before and have played extensively in the past as well as having cities on beta so I know what I'm experiencing can't be due to noob mistakes so I'm posting here in the hopes I've overlooked something or that others might be noticing the same thing.

My chapter 5 cities are really struggling to find their feet. The culprit imo is due to reaching ch 5 without first having gained full relic boost. So I'm parked up at the end of ch 5 while I work toward that magic percentage.

I had already tested city growth with this new tech tree on beta and don't remember struggling so much for...well, everything. I'm struggling to make enough goods, coins and culture to cover tourney and spire due to having to cater more than fight. I can't fight as much as I used to because I just can't get enough military boosters from the MA. This has been my experience across all of my cities.

To give some comparison, on beta two of my parked up ch 5 cities had about 750k of each good and only used 4 T1 and 2 T2 manufactories. All other goods came from event buildings. I never had issues gaining military boost buildings and even though those test cities are ch 8 I'm still placing military boosters I got when I ch 5.

It seems to me that the increased variety of buildings for crafting means less opportunities for (useful) military boosters combined with extended time at subpar goods boost is really hurting my city.

I know the new tech tree is supposed to make getting to ch 5 faster and it does but it bites you in the butt by leaving cities under resources.

When I started a new city some months ago, I found it far harder to get ahead, at first, than I did with Darielle. Of course I may not be remembering everything correctly, but it seems to me you are right.

 

[crackie]

This!!! I knew what I wanted and exactly how to get there. So I pushed my city right to the bleeding edge of its ability and just lived there, the struggle in my case was self inflicted.

Speaking of bleeding edge, as an experienced player in a new city, my strategy was to intentionally overscout. I want to max out relics ASAP so it was to open as many provinces as possible for tourney. I fought first 5 provinces, then catered everything else, including full Spire. Then I was able to ignore map provinces and contract my scouting a bit so it'll still be manageable without orc wall issues. My relics was already maxed before I hit settlements. I also know I over-expanded with the free expansions from clearing provinces and I used the space to build more factories than I need to I <3 FA cater with. Most of my troops were saved for when I hit Orc chap when I have enough provinces cleared to justify feeding Fire Phoenix and then convert to mostly fighting. But as an AM, I probably wouldn't advise new players that are new to the game to play this way. "Beware of the orc wall" is going to fall on deaf ears like "Build more factories". They wouldn't be able to know when to accelerate and pump breaks.

 

[Silly Bubbles]

Maybe if you are trying to reach the end chapters as fast as possible. However, I like to move through chapters fairly quickly (ch. 14 after 2 years) and I started getting 2700 tournament points after 3 months and topping the Spire every week after 5ish; both of those things hugely aided my city growth and capabilities, not retarded it.

It seems that your own experience shows that focusing on tournament and Spire earlier slowed you down too. There is definitely more than one way to play the game. It depends on what is more important to us, progress, Spire, tournament, events, just chilling. There is nothing wrong we either of our cities.

 

[Sathiru]

I have three cities on the international server, all catering. I started my city on the US server in January, and while I toyed with the idea of making a fighting city, I decided to use what I'd learned from my three cities and build a catering city from scratch. Until Monday this week, I'd been playing solo (did create a fellowship to take advantage of the tournament).

I'm currently at the end of Chapter V, with 14 provinces to complete before unlocking Dwarves. Having flown through the last two chapters (I didn't start focusing on the city proper until two months ago), I'm looking forward to moving into Dwarves because honestly? It doesn't feel like I've been *playing* the game. I chose to play solo after seeing that Tournaments unlocked in Chapter IV, and Spire in V. On that note, it boggles my mind that crafting is unlocked in Chapter III, but Spire has been moved to V. I can easily see new players burning through their fragments and catalysts once they unlock crafting, not realising they can't easily replenish them.

Playing through this new tech tree has been a frustrating experience. There's no breathing room to grow your city or to explore the new features you unlock in II-V. If you join a fellowship during Chapter II after you research the tech, you won't be able to participate in tournaments for two chapters; three for Spire. That's 2-3 whole chapters without the rewards from tournaments and Spire. You can do events, but given the speed in which you progress, you'll outgrow event buildings quickly, and usually said buildings give pitiful amounts for long production cycles, so you're better off just levelling your workshops/residences/factories. Scroll fragments and catalysts are hard to come by, and the two main methods prior to unlocking Spire both have their disadvantages. For a new player, it's so easy to see them disenchanting useful buildings/spells gained from events, tournament, Spire and seasons. For catalysts, until the MA is maxed, producing them takes a while and even at max, it is still a long waiting period.

On top of this, I've been watching various evo bases cycle through my MA, and so far crafted none, because I don't have the artifacts to evolve them. Artifacts I can only gain from crafting or the Spire. I dread to think how many new players have crafted evo bases, using their limited fragments/catalysts without realising they need artifacts to evolve them, or that RR are needed to keep it updated as they move through the chapters.

I have more thoughts but it's very late where I am so those will have to wait until tomorrow!

 

[Henroo]

This is true. Used to be players met the Spire in chapter 3, the Spire was a cheap easy little baby. It took months to get to chapter 5 so players got to "grow up" with the Spire.

Now, It takes less than a month to get to the Spire and it shows up fully grown in all its awful glory before you even get your t2 and t3 Manufactory upgrades. It is a hard blow.

I missed out on fully experiencing the cheap, chapter 3 spire. I moved through the early chapters very quickly since I started the game during the Covid lockdown era, so I had LOTS of time to play. I think I was only in chapter 3 for a couple of weeks. I was spending so many resources on doing upgrades and on unlocking tech advances, that there wasn't too much left for catering. So I went as far weekly in tournament and spire as my troops would take me. Which is not that far for a chapter 3 city. Back then I would completely exhaust my troop supply weekly. Once I ran out of troops, I might cater a few tournament and spire encounters, but I rarely had goods to do much. I think I was performing better in the spire in chapter 5 than in chapter 3, mostly because troop promotions and unlocking Sanctuary/Martial Monastery.

edit: I also tended to focus more on the tournament than on the spire in the early days. That is partly because in those days my 2 of my fellowships were starter fellowships, so group rewards at the end of the spire were not great. But also because if you are trying to maximize progress through the game as quickly as possible, the tournament is more useful. It offers KP and relics. And I was trying to unlock tech advances as quickly as possible, as well as to max out my relic boost as quickly as possible. So that I could make the goods to keep unlocking tech advances and do upgrades.

 

[crackie]

Also want to note that part of my over-scout early strategy is because you're piss poor early game with coins. Scouting wide gives you neighbors that give more coins from neighborly help than I can collect from dinky residences.

I dread to think how many new players have crafted evo bases, using their limited fragments/catalysts without realising they need artifacts to evolve them, or that RR are needed to keep it updated as they move through the chapters.

100%. I see this a lot too from players that join us that are not in Spire climbing shape yet when they join our group. Part of helping them shed the fat in boot camp is to sell a bunch of these lvl 1 evolve buildings. And nope. Have not had to tell anyone to sell a Gingerbread base yet because they're not in there!

I missed out on fully experiencing the cheap, chapter 3 spire.

Haha. In my 2nd city on EN, I sprinted to chap 3 to open Spire ASAP and then I hung out and sprinted that for a bit until they took Moonstone pieces out. Managed to snag 7 sets, but then found myself with a ton of chap 3 Moonstone pieces that need to gobble RRs to the end of time. Don't regret it!

 

[MaidenFair]

It seems that your own experience shows that focusing on tournament and Spire earlier slowed you down too.

I’m not sure how you arrived at that conclusion based on what I said, unless you’re setting the fastest possible dash through chapters as the benchmark compared to which everything else is considered slow progress. I’m comparing the speed of my progress to that of the average player, and by that measure, I seem, as far as I can tell, to be moving through chapters somewhat faster than average. Therefore, I don’t consider that “slowed down”. I discovered early on that I get bored quickly if I’m not making measurable progress in the tech tree, so I move through chapters as quickly as I can make the guest race goods (with very minimal portal profit usage so far), with brief pauses of 2-3 weeks between some chapters to upgrade buildings, and I have never been hindered in that pace by my tournament or spire activities.

There is definitely more than one way to play the game. It depends on what is more important to us, progress, Spire, tournament, events, just chilling. There is nothing wrong we either of our cities.

This I absolutely agree with. Everyone has different ways they prefer to play, from building solely for aesthetics, to having the highest tourney score every week, to finishing all the chapters in record time. Whatever makes the game fun for someone is what they should be aiming for! I wasn’t objecting to your playstyle at all, merely your statement that Spire and tournament are bad for progress, because in my experience, they’re not, and I don’t want any new players who might read this thread to come away with the wrong idea.

 

[Sathiru]

Now if I get them at chapter 1, I'm a broken record telling them "build more factories" for 5 chapters. All the while, they're going to tell me "Nah, I have enough goods". Yeah, you have enough goods to twiddle your thumbs because there's nothing going on with tournament and Spire delayed in tech tree! Then chapter 5 and Spire are finally unlocked and then it's <wah wah>. All I hear is can't can't can't. Sad trombooooone. Remember how I said 50000000x that you needed more factories? It's super frustrating because they're not wrong. They're probably fine with 3 factories in chapter 3 and nothing else to do. Some will hunker down and course correct, but a lot more will just panic quit. And then I would have invested several months to have that player complete 0 Spires for our FS.

Hah! Twiddling thumbs is exactly what I was getting at in my ramble when I said it didn't feel like I was *playing*. With the tournament and Spire delayed in tech tree, there's little to do outside of events. Even then, event progress is limited by RNG, hitting a difficult quest, running out of coins/supplies/goods/event currency. Tournaments and Spire can allievate some of these issues, but how many stay long enough to unlock either?

It seems that Inno expect a new player to join a fellowship in Chapter II, thus that fellowship then guides the new player through the subsequent chapters. The new tech tree makes the unlockable features feel like "traps". Crafting in Chapter III? Great!...except fragments and catalysts are practically a finite resource until you unlock Spire. You can craft evo bases, but they remain virtually useless until you gain artifacts; which can't be acquired outside of crafting, which require fragments, which prior to Spire are only available through disenchanting, the Moonstone set, or chest rewards in Spire, which is reliant on RNG and the current artifact in rotation being the one you need. Tournament in Chapter IV? Spire in Chapter V? Great! You can benefit from both without pushing your city capabilities to the limit. While "optional", how many new players exhaust their resources trying to fight and/or negotiate both each week? How many believe they must do both each week, alongside Seasons and events?

Even if someone manages to reach the end of Chapter V, I wouldn't be surprised if they quit after seeing the 100 province requirement to unlock Chapter VI. It's one of the reasons why my brother left the game earlier this year. He felt that for something advertised as a city building game, it felt less like building his city, more building an Inno city: "If you want to advance you better start playing how we want you to play". Seeing that number was the last straw for him.

Fundamentally, I think this is where the "too much stuff" complaints come from. While everything is optional, the reality is your progress is hindered if you ignore the Spire and tournaments, as you miss out on the individual and FS rewards. The Cauldron is now popping up in event quests, and Seasons you can complete by doing routine stuff. Likewise you can skip events, and I've done so in my three international cities, but I've regretted it, not realising at the time how beneficial an evo building or set could be. There's also an element of FOMO in events; you can gain missing artifacts by Spire, crafting and FA, but set buildings? Better play the event otherwise it's gone for good!

More rambly thoughts from me.

 

[MaidenFair]

He felt that for something advertised as a city building game, it felt less like building his city, more building an Inno city: "If you want to advance you better start playing how we want you to play". Seeing that number was the last straw for him.

Yes! This is a serious problem with the new tech tree. Now that they’ve made it practically impossible for new cities to get along without the quest rewards in the first five chapters or so, you really are reduced to having cookie-cutter cities until it’s almost too late to explore different strategies, and where’s the fun in that? :-/

 

[Mykan]

One of the biggest struggles I see with new towns is the tech tree is kinda backwards. The province SS issue is solved, awesome but then they give you techs and buildings you cant use for several chapters.

• Getting an MA which is a huge space in chapter 1 but only spire in ch5 means you have 1 expansion sitting there doing basically nothing for 4 chapters. quests encourage new players to build this, completely unaware of the dangers.
• Then you unlock FA but have no ability to make any badges that requires MA (lack of resources to use it), or tournament/spire (no tech)
• The lack of early tournament does slow one down a lot. Less relics for production boost and less kp to move through the techs

Having the techs so cheap that people don't build more factories with the sudden spike to spire and a "normal" tech costs will be compounding problems. I would expect experience to overcome this to a degree but I am not planning this town to follow a normal progression. Regardless as crackie said a new town just isn't going to listen when they think it is all running great.