Winyandor: Vacancy Watch

[DeletedUser61]

The dreaded Tax Collector just swept past my village in us2:Winyandor, which is near ring 160 of 280 rings, at about 3:15.

I'm using Chrome, so the Ctrl+MouseWheel allows me to zoom out to 25% which is a very handy view for wandering around the map to see if there are any interesting patterns.

• Near ring 62 there's a narrow band of vacancies, which I'm assuming is the second pass for sectors that have previously been vacated and refilled.
  (Update on 1/28/2016: This zone has now been filled with new immigrants.)
• Near ring 165, just outboard of my village, there's a band of vacant cities, about 4 rings wide, that runs all the way around the map. I'm assuming that the ring 165 band is sectors that were recently vacated, for the very first time.

I'll be charting the deadband zone for the next couple of weeks, and reporting my observations in this thread. Hopefully I'll be able to discover a bit more about exactly how the vacancy replacement algorithm works.

Landmarks	Corners	Score
Malfiore	Exact Center	574
bianca27272727	1 o'clock corner	15
killerspruill99	3 o'clock corner	22
sweettea215	5 o.cliock corner	19
chimeradragon	5:45 spiral end	19
coolgirl101ej	7 o'clock corner	22
suhaylaho	9 o'clock corner	15
RedneckRich	l1 o'clock corner	486

If you would like to locate your OWN us2:Winyandor city on the world map, you can visit any of the above landmark cities, click on their World Icon, and drag the map just a bit to get a blue arrow that points back to your own city.

• Start in the exact center of the map, that's Malfiore's city, to find out which radial (clock number) you're on
• Use the adjacent corner cities to triangulate how close you are to the center of the map.

 

[DeletedUser61]

We're using the same Excel supported map, and the same pointy-topped hexagonal rings, that we're using to track scouting costs over at https://en.forum.elvenar.com/index....e-and-number-of-trades.1827/page-2#post-12084, because that's the point of view that actually matters to individual users.

We'll be providing tablized data, and commentary, as the red highlighted band of vacant sectors moves through the charted area, towards 4 o'clock. If you wish to look at the us3:Winyandor map, and help us follow the action.

• Katwijk is the leftmost city on the chart
• sexysex7011 is the city in the exact middle of the chart
• drjones8482 is the rightmost city on the chart

 

[DeletedUser1621]

The scouting costs and city placement have a large negative impact for those of us players on the edge of the map :/
It doesn't make a lot of sense to keep scouting/expanding into areas where there aren't any neighbors to discover, but the farther away we move from our home base, the more expensive the scouting costs, and the more challenging/costly the provincial battles/negotiations.

 

[DeletedUser61]

the farther away we move from our home base

But even if you were running a Bakery, you'd have a soft cap on your customer base, because of delivery costs. The further away they are, the more expensive they are to service.

Hopefully we'll be able to mitigate the impact by better understanding how it all works, but I don't think the soft cap will, nor should, go away. I just want folks to be able to plan accordingly.

 

[DeletedUser61]

We've picked up another half dozen vacancies today, they're highlighted, but we have not yet seen any new immigrants.

Current Name	Date	Previous Name
Vacant 02	1/24	Vacant 02
Vacant 03	1/24	Vacant 03
Vacant 05	1/24	Vacant 05
Vacant 07	1/24	Vacant 07
Vacant 08	1/24	Vacant 08
Vacant 09	1/24	Vacant 09
Vacant 10	1/24	Vacant 10
Vacant 11	1/24	Vacant 11
Vacant 12	1/24	Vacant 12
Vacant 22	1/24	Vacant 22
Vacant 23	1/24	Vacant 23
Vacant 24	1/24	Vacant 24
Vacant 25	1/24	Vacant 25
Vacant 27	1/24	Vacant 27
Vacant 28	1/24	Vacant 28
Vacant 29	1/24	Vacant 29
Vacant 30	1/24	Vacant 30
Vacant 32	1/24	Vacant 32
Vacant 33	1/25	wyruby
Vacant 34	1/25	Mirrorized
Vacant 43	1/24	Vacant 43
Vacant 44	1/24	Vacant 44
Vacant 45	1/24	Vacant 45
Vacant 48	1/24	Vacant 48
Vacant 49	1/24	Vacant 49
Vacant 50	1/24	Vacant 50
Vacant 51	1/24	Vacant 51
Vacant 52	1/24	Vacant 52
Vacant 54	1/24	Vacant 54
Vacant 62	1/25	clau
Vacant 63	1/25	Halfbeard
Vacant 67	1/25	LadyMorraine
Vacant 70	1/25	Cocoline
Vacant 75	1/25	lornaforbes

The vacancies are numbered in accordance with the most likely sequence when the sectors were ORIGINALLY created using a clockwise hexagonal pattern to fill the map, as discussed in more detail over at https://en.forum.elvenar.com/index.php?threads/trader-range-and-number-of-trades.1827/#post-11810.

The area that we're watching is just below the 3 o'clock radial, about halfway out, so the vacancy band is running top to bottom, parallel to 3 o'clock to 5 o'clock edge. We're carefully watching WHERE new immigrants are landing, so that we can differentiate several possibilities that may be influencing the selection pattern.

• The original creation sequence
• Is there a mandatory vacancy delay
• A sparse map (fill empty areas first)
• A clustered map (fill empty areas last)
• The level of the nearby players
• And several other parameters that are lurking in the background

If you have some ideas about who is buying the real estate, and what's important to them, let's hear about it. It would be a pity if we were to fail for lack of imagination.

 

[DeletedUser61]

We've seen a dozen new vacancies in the past 24 hours, so we're monitoring an (in)active area. Today I've included the Excel Trace Dependents/Precedents arrows, to illustrate how effective they are when I'm moving back and forth between the map and the related table. Once some immigrants start showing up I'll flag their sectors as green cells, and at that time I'll attach a zipped copy of the spreadsheet.

Current Name	Date	Previous Name
Vacant 62	1/25	clau
Vacant 63	1/25	Halfbeard
Vacant -4	1/26	LaurieAnneLove
Vacant 65	1/25	maxime
Vacant 46	1/26	billbh99
Vacant 66	1/26	Celene
Vacant 67	1/25	LadyMorraine
Vacant 69	1/26	Chester53
Vacant 70	1/25	Cocoline
Vacant 33	1/25	wyruby
Vacant 34	1/25	Mirrorized
Vacant 75	1/25	lornaforbes

 

[DeletedUser1809]

Wow! Kudos for a truly heroic mapping and also for sharing.

 

[DeletedUser61]

Our first wave of 10 immigrants has arrived, and they all bought property on the most interior of the rings, as indicated by the green sectors.

The following list includes all of the city sectors that have changed in the past two days, ordered left to right, top to bottom.

Current Name	Date	Previous Name
Renmazuo	1/28	Vacant 02
Vacant 62	1/25	clau
123456messi	1/28	Vacant 03
Vacant 63	1/25	Halfbeard
iandak	1/28	LaurieAnneLove
CiesaWillRise	1/28	Vacant 05
Vacant 65	1/25	maxime
Vacant 46	1/26	billbh99
Vacant 66	1/26	Celene
nakirsd	1/28	Vacant 07
Vacant 67	1/25	LadyMorraine
djpooper	1/28	Vacant 08
Darkmano	1/28	Vacant 09
Vacant 69	1/26	Chester53
AmieHeidi	1/28	Vacant 10
Vacant 70	1/25	Cocoline
SouthernGem	1/28	Vacant 11
betoche	1/28	Vacant 12
Vacant 33	1/25	wyruby
Vacant 34	1/25	Mirrorized
Vacant 75	1/25	lornaforbes

For your convenience here's a repeat of the landmarks.

Landmarks	Corners	Score
Malfiore	Exact Center	574
bianca27272727	1 o'clock corner	15
Katwijk	165 Dead Zone	25,772
killerspruill99	3 o'clock corner	22
sweettea215	5 o.cliock corner	19
chimeradragon	5:45 spiral end	19
coolgirl101ej	7 o'clock corner	22
suhaylaho	9 o'clock corner	15
RedneckRich	l1 o'clock corner	486

 

[DeletedUser61]

The zone that we're monitoring on us2 Winyandor lost another diagonal of vacancies today. Our population is actually the second highest of the US worlds, so most of the immigrants are settling elsewhere.

We've also determined, to our satisfaction, that the basic map, and the trading partners instance, are created piecemeal using a fairly simple algorithm that's only concerned with the 6 relic sectors that are immediately adjacent to a new city, plus the 6 cities that are once removed. The consequent City IDentity pattern is detailed in the Piecemeal tab of the attached spreadsheet, and there's a comprehensive discussion at https://en.forum.elvenar.com/index....e-and-number-of-trades.1827/page-3#post-12633

As a consequence, we've abandoned the rhomboid that we had been showing, and have rather indicated a flat-topped global hexagon that covers the same number of cites as the pointy-topped hexagon that's used to determine scouting costs. Note that the distinction between a pointy-topped hexagon and a flat-topped hexagon is merely a matter of convenience, rather than an important difference, and in both cases the pattern is emergent, rather than anything that the program regards as important.

To the human eye, however, the emergent pattern IS meaningful. To us it's obvious that the new vacancies are on a diagonal that's parallel to the 3 o'clock to 5 o'clock edge of the flat-topped hexagon that emerges, even though the map filling algorithm is simple and local. Being human, we're aware that these cities WERE at the edge of the map about 2 months ago, when they were originally settled and, for our particular sample, we've kept 16 of the 70 cities that are in play which is a 23% retention rate for the first wave of settlers.

Landmarks Corners Score Malfiore Exact Center 574 bianca27272727 1 o'clock corner 15 killerspruill99 3 o'clock corner 22 Katwijk 165 Dead Zone 7,752 sweettea215 5 o.cliock corner 19 chimeradragon 5:45 spiral end 19 coolgirl101ej 7 o'clock corner 22 suhaylaho 9 o'clock corner 15 RedneckRich l1 o'clock corner 486 Current Name Date Previous Name Vacant 83 2/3 helf Vacant 85 2/3 makmike4 Vacant 87 2/3 Ducarius Vacant 88 2/3 Brettspooner Vacant 89 2/3 jones123 Vacant 90 2/3 Swankcapone47 Vacant 91 2/3 michelasfour Vacant 92 2/3 bigkuntry123 Vacant 93 2/3 shelby65 Vacant 94 2/3 bella01 Vacant 95 2/3 MackLoki Vacant 96 2/3 CAF1022

 

[DeletedUser61]

We've filled another ring with 11 new immigrants.

Landmarks Corners Score Malfiore Exact Center 574 bianca27272727 1 o'clock corner 15 killerspruill99 3 o'clock corner 22 Katwijk 165 Dead Zone 7,752 sweettea215 5 o.cliock corner 19 chimeradragon 5:45 spiral end 19 coolgirl101ej 7 o'clock corner 22 suhaylaho 9 o'clock corner 15 RedneckRich l1 o'clock corner 486 Current Name Date Previous Name BC5958 2/5 Vacant 22 donbrasco 2/5 Vacant 23 MsMichelle 2/5 Vacant 24 bfguisdft 2/5 Vacant 25 Luciferr666 2/5 Vacant 27 dink5150 2/5 Vacant 28 RUMSAL 2/5 Vacant 29 rhondaann 2/5 Vacant 30 hellshock 2/5 Vacant 32 Invincible222 2/5 wyruby sapphire2452 2/5 Mirrorized

 

[DeletedUser61]

We have another 13 vacancies, which sounds like a lot but we're in the fat part of our sample now, so it's the 80% cull that's typical of a first pass.

Current Name	Date	Previous Name
Vacant l02	2/5	sunshine9
Vacant 84	2/5	tonicusbonicus
Vacant l04	2/5	wyomingelf50
Vacant l05	2/5	HamelinGraphix
Vacant l06	2/5	suri
Vacant l07	2/5	legolas345
Vacant l08	2/5	paddy613
Vacant l09	2/5	ifihadahifi
Vacant l11	2/5	ploc
Vacant l12	2/5	siralric
Vacant l13	2/5	playman
Vacant l15	2/5	Furiee
Vacant l16	2/5	1mincrafter

 

[DeletedUser]

Kay, you do know that Inno has this game out on GPT (Get Paid To)/Rewards/Survey websites? Where they pay 30-50 cents to people to register and play to 150 points to get paid? My son and his college friends probably have dozens of accounts scattered across whatever world(s) are set as default for new users,. All cities abandoned after they hit just over 150 points and got their payouts? So, if my kids and his buddies are doing it, I can assure you hundreds of other people who use those site are also creating accounts, then abandoning cities and leaving them inactive. Get used to it. My kid says the game is stil up on those sites. So the abandoned cities will be culled, refilled, culled, refilled on and on, and perhaps one or 2 of those folks may stay to play free. For a short time. *shrugs*
Nice work on the detailed mapping though, interesting to see the patterns and notice how the map is similar to a Koch Snowflake, sans triangles on the flat sides. Fractals, everywhere fractals. Which also use complex algorithms for generation and rendering, and degeneration and reverse rendering in mathematical programs like Apophysis.. Just a thought...

 

[DeletedUser61]

I can assure you hundreds of other people who use those site are also creating accounts, then abandoning cities and leaving them inactive.

15% retention is pretty typical for FtP Browser Games, and we're actually doing better than that. http://www.gamesbrief.com/2011/11/retention-rate-churn-and-duration/ is an even broader look at the churn/retention issue.

I'm happy to let marketing worry about ad placement and targeting techniques. If somebody never looks at the game in the first place, they won't have an opportunity to look around.

InnoGames abandoned the various "do this to earn some Diamonds" tie in sites, but the various GTP sites actually work. See https://us.forum.elvenar.com/index.php?threads/people-leaving-game.1026/#post-6753 for one such example.

Googling "GPT Elevnar" turns up several hits, but 50 cents per hour isn't much of an incentive unless you're actually looking for something to do with all of your spare time.

 

[DeletedUser]

Lol! My kids tells me 50 cents/hour is actually the average rate of pay for most GPT sites. Above that is all bonus. (As he sits here watching 2 minute videos on his tablet for a single penny). Yes, some people who came from GPT sites will stay, some may even shell oit for the initial Stater Package. But the retention rate of those joining from GPT sites will be far lower than those joining because they like the game concept, the game company or just have free time and money. My kid and his buddies are college students, with little time and inflexible schedules to work a "regular" job and maintain high GPA's. They earn their pennies, get their $25-50 a month and use it to buy pizzas, lol! But for overall rankings, putting a game out on a GPT site has always made good sense. Rankings/ratings for games and game companies is almost always based on the number of registered users for a game or games offered by that company. No distinction is made between active and inactive, paying or free players. Just how many e-mails are registered for the game. The purges here wipe the cities off the Maps. But the accounts still exist, and are rarely purged. Purge inactives completely from the system, and your registered user numbers drop, dramatically. I have not played Greppo for almost 2 years. I went back to see if I still had an account even though my cities are long gone on every world I played on. And yep, I can still log in with the same email and password, and start a new world it f I choose. I'll pass, but I was not surprised.

But... you were looking at the pattern of how the inactive purges were happening. And I saw the hexagon map as a fractal. And was reminded how fractal generation programs render fractals, since the first days of FracTint. You seem to like mathematics and mentioned the algorithms used to determine who gets purged when. Think outside the box and look at it like a fractal algorithm, pure logic that results in sometimes seemingly random images and placements. But if it is code, it is pure logic. Look at the pattern in the way the purely logical computer would look at it, not the way a programmer would. I can write illogical code, and the machine may try to work it, But most often, if i has a break in logic, the machine will tell me to pfffffffffth and try again, or will decide how to fix it for me. Logically. Which explains Google Translate fails so well. As well as game glitches.

 

[DeletedUser61]

If you take a look at https://en.forum.elvenar.com/index....e-and-number-of-trades.1827/page-3#post-13027, over in the EN forum, I've demonstrated how the hexagonal spiral patterns that we see are emergent from a very simple, local algorithm that simply creates a table, without any awareness of the consequent structure. It's similar to fractal generation, but somewhat more primitive.

You are, quite literally, filling in the blanks. You have NO knowledge other than

• A City IDentity list which you seed with your Home City, and then append with each new city as it's assigned
• An index that allows you to walk down the list in City IDentity sequence
• The ability to locate the 6 city sectors that are once removed from your current city,
  at 1 o'clock, 3 o'clock, 5 o'clock, 7 o'clock, 9 o'clock, and 11 o'clock
• The ability to skip a located sector that is already in the City IDentity list

So long as we're being mathematical, the tessellation primitive for the world map is a 9-bar of relics, which is staggered, with every 3rd row a city row rather than a relics row

During the past 15 hours we've seen a dozen immigrants in our us2 sample area, a dozen new vacancies, and another dozen immigrants

Landmarks Corners Score Malfiore Exact Center 574 bianca27272727 1 o'clock corner 15 killerspruill99 3 o'clock corner 22 Katwijk 165 Dead Zone 7,752 sweettea215 5 o.cliock corner 19 chimeradragon 5:45 spiral end 19 coolgirl101ej 7 o'clock corner 22 suhaylaho 9 o'clock corner 15 RedneckRich l1 o'clock corner 486 Current Name Date Previous Name BC5958 2/5 Vacant 22 Vacant l02 2/5 sunshine9 donbrasco 2/5 Vacant 23 brookejuedes 2/5 Vacant 43 MsMichelle 2/5 Vacant 24 Kailynn 2/5 Vacant 44 Vacant 84 2/5 tonicusbonicus Vacant l04 2/5 wyomingelf50 bfguisdft 2/5 Vacant 25 Tari Elendil 2/5 Vacant 45 Vacant l05 2/5 HamelinGraphix tiburoncin 2/5 billbh99 Vacant l06 2/5 suri Luciferr666 2/5 Vacant 27 Vacant l07 2/5 legolas345 dink5150 2/5 Vacant 28 Jumangui 2/5 Vacant 48 Vacant l08 2/5 paddy613 RUMSAL 2/5 Vacant 29 Couch Dragon Lair 2/5 Vacant 49 Vacant l09 2/5 ifihadahifi rhondaann 2/5 Vacant 30 Luhta 2/5 Vacant 50 mekatox 2/5 Vacant 51 Vacant l11 2/5 ploc hellshock 2/5 Vacant 32 canteencup 2/5 Vacant 52 Vacant l12 2/5 siralric Invincible222 2/5 wyruby Vacant l13 2/5 playman sapphire2452 2/5 Mirrorized keltice 2/5 Vacant 54 Vacant l15 2/5 Furiee Vacant l16 2/5 1mincrafter

 

[DeletedUser61]

• Another 2 dozen immigrants arrived, and half of them moved into sectors that were vacant for less than 48 hours.
• We only have 11 vacancies left in our monitored area, and they've all been vacant for less than 12 hours.
• chimeradragon is still at the end of the spiral, but at this rate we'll be adding folks to the outermost ring before the SuperBowl.

 

[DeletedUser]

" ...I've demonstrated how the hexagonal spiral patterns that we see are emergent from a very simple, local algorithm that simply creates a table, without any awareness of the consequent structure. It's similar to fractal generation, but somewhat more primitive."

Now, I do so wish there was a huge Facebook style thumbs up smilie for that.Fractal, fractals, everywhere... just like Fibonacci sequences. It did remind me of the very primitive algorithms used in the original FracTint program, many, many, many years ago. And a good explanation of how it works. If you understand algorithms, and how they work,

Perhaps a more simplified explanation in the Help section, one that those with no advanced math skills or time to do the mapping and work the equations can understand? Would help many people who are curious about this, but who do not understand the abstruse language and compoarisons you often use? Most gamers are not rocket scientists...

 

[DeletedUser61]

I've done quite a bit with Mandelbrot sets and chaos theory, but other than some of the shrubbery fractals are not a core element of Elvenar. We don't have much of anything that has a high polygon count.

The game actually works pretty well if you just muddle through.

To your point, I rather enjoy understanding exactly how things work, and that's sort of City Builder 101. The Elvenar model has enough depth to be quite interesting. If you want to swim in the deep end of the pool, then ya gotta get wet. We have some remarkably adept folks in the InnoGames community, and full out geek mode lures them out of the woodwork.

Once we're satisfied that we understand what's going on, then we'll be make some useful summary statements along the line of "XYZ is worth some extra effort." I'm never going to trivialize the game by "giving away the secrets." At the moment, for most people, it's like the automatic transmission on their car. They only have a vague notion of how it works, but so long as it works well, they don't really want to know much more about automatic transmissions.

 

[DeletedUser61]

All of the vacancies on the us2: Winyandor map have been filled and the outer ring has advanced from 5:45 to 8:00. The list to the right includes all of the cities that have changed hands during the past two weeks. Landmarks Corners Score Malfiore Exact Center 574 bianca27272727 1 o'clock corner 15 killerspruill99 3 o'clock corner 22 Katwijk 165 Dead Zone 25,981 sweettea215 5 o'clock corner 19 GroovyBaby1962 7 o'clock corner 98 Cristal De huckleberry 8:00 spiral end 42 suhaylaho 9 o'clock corner 15 RedneckRich l1 o'clock corner 486

Current Name Date Previous Name Renmazuo 1/28 Vacant 02 BC5958 2/5 Vacant 22 jaybee1022 2/5 clau Mathewsjp 2/5 sunshine9 123456messi 1/28 Vacant 03 donbrasco 2/5 Vacant 23 brookejuedes 2/5 Vacant 43 reaper05 2/5 Halfbeard wolvemetle 2/5 helf iandak 1/28 LaurieAnneLove MsMichelle 2/5 Vacant 24 Kailynn 2/5 Vacant 44 carla04 2/5 tonicusbonicus Eowyn13 2/6 wyomingelf50 CiesaWillRise 1/28 Vacant 05 bfguisdft 2/5 Vacant 25 Tari Elendil 2/5 Vacant 45 Ilovesexygames 2/5 maxime barb13 2/5 makmike4 Moodywizard 2/6 HamelinGraphix tiburoncin 2/5 billbh99 poochoo 2/5 Celene cfmckeen 2/6 suri nakirsd 1/28 Vacant 07 Luciferr666 2/5 Vacant 27 Pgnmmy 2/5 LadyMorraine Oso3 2/5 Ducarius username4lyfe 2/6 legolas345 djpooper 1/28 Vacant 08 dink5150 2/5 Vacant 28 Jumangui 2/5 Vacant 48 Fuhred 2/3 Brettspooner petcat 2/6 paddy613 Darkmano 1/28 Vacant 09 RUMSAL 2/5 Vacant 29 Couch Dragon Lair 2/5 Vacant 49 Gracey12 2/5 Chester53 MOMMA57 2/5 jones123 lolliltay123 2/6 ifihadahifi AmieHeidi 1/28 Vacant 10 rhondaann 2/5 Vacant 30 Luhta 2/5 Vacant 50 Sam The Killer 2/5 Cocoline coolcat997 2/5 Swankcapone47 SouthernGem 1/28 Vacant 11 mekatox 2/5 Vacant 51 imfine4m3 2/5 michelasfour no5lalalee 2/6 ploc betoche 1/28 Vacant 12 hellshock 2/5 Vacant 32 canteencup 2/5 Vacant 52 comptech10 2/5 bigkuntry123 Megzy 2/6 siralric Invincible222 2/5 wyruby yamida 2/5 shelby65 Cupid1977 2/6 playman sapphire2452 2/5 Mirrorized keltice 2/5 Vacant 54 Mac1000 2/5 bella01 Getsomenow 2/5 lornaforbes Queen Sara Beth 2/5 MackLoki Squonk44 2/5 Furiee pattimae 2/5 CAF1022 mortisha05 2/5 1mincrafter

 

[DeletedUser61]

We've accomplished our goals, and we're confident that we understand the current methodology for dealing with inactive cities. We'll check back every few weeks, and we'll post if we spot anything that's interesting.,