1.6 Anonymous Forces

[JettJackson]

Thanks BOB, just the thing I wanted to say as I was reading new posts on the thread.

You have vet traders with scouts on their racial galaxies warps. With anon scouts, hunter on his way for a vet trader wouldn't know whom he pinged, so I really don't see how that only favors the hunters.

Maybe I misunderstood the original concept we were going for in beta, but only passive forces should be anonymous (ie if a stack has scouts and cds, no name, but if it has even 1 mine = name).

Good point, I'm not sure either what was the final decision.

No no no no no lol. The way it is...if a trader scouts a warp, hunter comes in, pings that scout, SEE's he pinged that scout, trader parks, hunter waits 2 minutes to make sure he parked. New way, trader scouts a warp, hunter comes in, trader parks, hunter waits 2 mins to see said trader parked. OMG IT'S CHANGE!!!

This webboard is such a HORRIBLE place to try and get any kind of opinion on though because it's always the same 10 people arguing, so when I ask a question like, "How many people here would actually leave scouts out in a trader and risk having 0 scouts left after 2 days?" you'll never get an accurate answer from the player base. So all I can say is anon scouts would help me, and the majority of people I know trading exactly 0.000000000000000000000000000%. I make 1 ca run when I ship up a trader and that's it, with only 5 scouts there's no way I'm going to risk having to buy more every 2-3 days at a 40 turn round trip.

But dang I hope you have help on when you do make those extra CA runs in your trader and you ping those 5 anon hunter scouts leaving your gal and entering CA... lets hope none of them are sitting on the CPL cause well, then wouldn't you just feel foolish

However, this post is completely pointless because what, 4 people?, had their say on this and that's that.

the trader not needing to go to ca constantly is something i brought up also, i just feel that it benefits one side more than the other

[Siege]

Baalz if you leave your forces out they'll most definitely be shot by people because they'll say "I dont know who's this is, I have to kill it" where as now if I see a trader scout on my route I just laugh cause I know they'll have 1000 messages when they login.

Also, along with you leaving scouts everywhere hunters that normally don't want traders to know if they're hunting that area won't care, there will be 10's or 20's of scouts on all major ports, and either you use 12-30 turns on each port to kill them all and possibly die in the process or you just trade on them and probably die anyways. There will be no strategy in hunting, simply drop your scouts around the universe and wait. Don't even lurke, it doesn't matter.

I'm telling you it's easy enough for hunters with MGU and scouts the way they are now.

[Purify]

I dislike future tellers.

[drake]

I dislike future tellers.

and I dislike changing something for NO reason.. this isn't a change to bring more people in the game, make it more fun, or do anything to better the game. I don't post here anymore because of crap like this, you have what 4 entire people promoting this idea (of which none of you has a single decent argument to implement this change). You guys are going to do what you're going to do regardless of what anyone says here or anywhere else, so what exactly is the point of us wasting our time and effort to think out and articulate anything on this board?

[Purify]

It changes strategies...... it doesn't hurt noobs... and maybe it will make trading more exciting.....

That doesn't sound like 'NO' reason to me.... I in no way was involved with anything to do with this change... I just liked it when I heard it... saw its potential, and saw the risk of it being a disaster as low. Which was good enough for me.

I know sometimes it is perceived like we aren't heard on this board... but people do read the threads and take your thoughts into consideration. For example, look at '1.5' that could have been further developed?..... but people on this board thought it wasn't such a great idea..... who knows if peoples opinions was the deciding factor but they in no doubt were read and taken into consideration.

[Bonker]

ok after discuising this with few ppl who are in the know ive come to the conclusion that this is 1 of the arguments with 2 points 1 maybe bad 1 maybe good and it will never end

Trader wise well it will make them a hell of alot more alert it could be any 1;s scout on cpl so it would force them to be that mutch more carefull . Alot of deaths come from ppl lurking with scouts on route even if out of turns and posting them in theyre alliance chat still any 1 can come after you but most newbie / slacker traders dont expect. atleast with an anon scout then it could be any 1 so would force them to be warey lay more scouts and single on port to try and protect themselfs a bit more. so could affectivly make hunters lives a little bit harder if that is what the admins are trying to create.

Hunter wise yea it would make hunting a little easier providing what i said above doesnt occur slacker traders who cba to even try and protect themselfs trading will go pop but as for all the top hunters moaning and windging that its gona make theyre life easy well.... pffft ingame it doesnt stop them killing noobie players cause theyre and easy catch and it still doesnt stop them grabing a freind to help them out if theyre against another WB so imo any 1 who comes in with that argument are jus silly hypocrits.dont get me wrong im not saying ive neva killed noob players i have im not denieing it but something has to change in hope that Traders new and old can have more of a chance.

there are alot of deep thoughts that can come into this and im sure half u loud mouth forum whiners are gona critisize my post crack on but dont ditch an idea jus because u dont like it... put some thought into it all change is gona have upsides and downsides to what we are used to playing. If things dont work out well they can always be changed again nothing is perminant theyre not out to "kill the game" jus tryin to improve it in ways.

[Siege]

Were you drunk when you wrote that?

[Bonker]

i only drink on the days ending with a y

[Edgecrusher]

So, Bonk, you mean 'everyday'?

Seriously, I am the one who came up with this idea (well, actually I suggested invisible scouts, so you can only imagine the fuss that would have caused). The reason for this is simple: trading is, in my eyes, too simple. An experienced trader, taking all necessary precautions, cannot be killed. If you want to argue against that, then by all means name me the last time I was killed while trading. As a result, I kill a lot of newbies and the occasional vet with a browser crash at a convenient moment. Not because I am a newbie killer, but because hunting unkillable traders is a waste of time.

Anonymous scouts will change very little. Instead of shooting all scouts of hunters, traders will occasionally also have to shoot a fellow trader's scout. This will cost a few extra turns. On the other hand, traders will have the advantage that a hunter will ping him/her without knowing it. As to the argument that it is easier for hunters to go to CA than for traders: yes, it is, so you have to take a bit of a risk as a trader. booo. Besides, in our discussion in the beta-team we also discussed if traders should be able to buy scouts at racial hq, as it was in 1.5, but I'm not sure if we agreed on anything. I personally disagree with that.

Apart from making hunting more balanced (newbies will indeed be killed because they don't know how to properly use scouts, but they get killed anyway), anonymous scouts will also make alliance wars strategically more interesting, although that will only be in the start of a game, cause after a few weeks you'll have figured out who claimed what territory. Finally, it'll make fighting more interesting, as you don't know who is after you if you don't check cpl constantly.

Apart from these arguments, I think Siege and some other people are overreacting. The changes will be very small and even if they turn out to be larger than we expected, then we can fix the balance. If we aren't allowed to come with any decent suggestions that change the game, then how can we ever develop this game?

[B.O.B.]

Since CA runs seems to be a concern for some of you, let me address it for you:

Scouts at HQs for traders was considered one of the few good things in 1.5 and is staying in 1.6 last I heard.