Minimizing Angst from Being Attacked

I've been giving a lot of thought regarding the biggest issue I see affecting game play and player morale:  the repercussions of being wiped off the map or reduced to one cell in perpetuity.

It seems to me that one of the biggest heartbreaks for players wiped out or reduced to one cell is the amount of time they have spent researching technology to whatever point they were at when they were destroyed.  To suddenly have to take that hero and start from the tutorial level is not only daunting, it is discouraging.  Especially if one is half way through the 6 month session for example. 

Toward that end I have a suggestion and would love to hear thoughts from others as to its viability.

What if, when a player gets wiped or taken to one cell (and remains there for a week with no activity, say) the player can start that very same hero (not a new hero or that wiped hero with a new name) from an era at or  near to where he or she was when wiped.

For example.  Hero A, despotism gets wiped off the map and has researched into Renaissance.  Rather than making Hero A start over on the map at the tutorial, what if Hero A was permitted to start again in Medieval, either the beginning or the end.  That way the dwelling will require building up from Medieval.  I'm not sure how, exactly, this would work and if the person would even get a dwelling as opposed to just starting a new town somewhere on the map.  In any event, all resource production facilities and buildings would be started in the era the person is downgraded to which, as anyone who has started a town in medieval or renaissance knows, is very expensive resource-wise.  Buildings rendered obsolete in the downgraded stage would remain obsolete and the promoted versions built from scratch as applicable. The same would apply to replacement buildings. 

This scenario involves a penalty for losing one's domain and being destroyed, but does not put the person back to the beginning.  In any event, depending on the time the wipe occurs the player probably won't achieve a victory in any case.  And the penalty could be two era levels rather than one or half a level, depending on developer discretion of course.

I do think if players do not have to restart their wiped heroes from scratch it might go a long way to making them less demoralized if they are taken down. 

I am sure there are cons to this suggestion as well as pros and I'd welcome any commentary and discussion about it, good bad or indifferent.  :-)

This will be very uneven towards "fresh" players who start without such bonuses.

I know it's not perfect but the fresh players (I assume you are talking about lower era players just starting out) have novice protection for one and this would apply to those instances where someone has researched beyond or well into classical and spent a couple of months playing only to be wiped out and have to start over somewhere else.

If you  are referring to the relocated hero landing near the new players, I think the time and expense of starting your domain at a higher level might balance out that concern but am looking for commentary about the idea as a whole.  :-)

I guess the part I do not get in this is that you bring up stripes. Since the only way to get them is to attack higher age players, they really invalidate your argument.Or are you saying stone or classical age attacking medieval brings on protection also?

Stripes are not a consideration for what I'm proposing. That is another thread.

Starting out in higher age than neighbors is an extreme advantage no matter how you look at it.

My main consideration is with the players who lose all that research time and feel not only defeated but demoralized and may not return because starting over from scratch is too daunting.  I'm trying to see if there are options that would mitigate that result.

moved my post to the correct thread sorry.

Players that are being destroyed or "relocating" lose everything if the delete their hero. If they want the 2nd wind package or their carried over artifacts, they have to wait at least a week to get them. Time that they are not able to play, with out forfeiting the goodies.

How about if they could go ahead and start their new hero and when the other hero has deleted, they could move those items to the new hero? They would have just come out of the starters novice protection and would really appreciate having it.

I know this may be easier said then done, but I hope you will consider it.

I would not want to wait. I would want to get back into the game right away.

Can this thread be revived?  It really is demoralizing to be destroyed and have to restart.  I would love to discuss possibilities to minimize the frustration...

Can this thread be revived?  It really is demoralizing to be destroyed and have to restart.  I would love to discuss possibilities to minimize the frustration...

Not only the loss of time, but also the loss of real money used to buy Enkord power ups and speed ups.  There are patient people playing the game that do not spend any money, but I'm sure they are in the minority.  So when you are wiped out, you may be a person who has reached your budget and can't justify the expenditure just to possibly get wiped out again.  The Devs major objective is to make money on his game.  If you can do anything to keep people in the game and playing, minimizing the emotional and financial distraught, it behooves you to not only consider it but actively pursue ways to correct what appears to be a major flaw for players in the game.  This forum, CC, and Facebook are riddled with complaints and expletives about being wiped off the map and that they are leaving the game.   

This is an interesting possibility - as someone who has indeed been wiped or reduced to one cell on more than one occasion; it is heart breaking.  I also appreciate Bers point that those restarting as River suggested would have an unfair advantage over the genuine new heroes ...

So my suggestion is to have a new continent which is solely inhabited by the restart heroes .... but there would have to be a entry qualification of hero being level 10 plus or Medieval plus to have this advanced re-start.

I personally have met several new players that I would love to see continue playing and become a part of our community, instead of losing them because they are totally frustrated by some of the game's less desirable circumstances, such as poor hero placement.  Maybe separate continents for peaceful players and/or separate continents for war victims is not considered a viable solution to ease the frustrations described here and in other posts. In fact, that specific (separate continents) suggestion has been rejected on several levels. Also rejected is the idea that we not be placed so closely together, therefore making it impossible to grow in any direction without harming a neighbor. So ... I am asking if there might be any line of thought or idea that would be considered?  Or is the entire concept of "ease the pain" being rejected?  

One of the issues I would like to address is the amount of time & patience it takes to start over again - through the tutorial, etc.  I've done that so many times it's almost automatic for me.  I think it would be nice if, once a person has restarted a certain number of times, if there was some kind of fast forward or automatic setup.  Another major frustration, which has been stated in this discussion before, is the loss of research and building time and Enkord cash from the lost hero...  I actually don't have any ideas about what to do about that, but I'm sure someone else does! 

So ... I am asking if there might be any line of thought or idea that would be considered?  Or is the entire concept of "ease the pain" being rejected?  

Excellent question. 

I simply don't understand why there are no strategic games (real strategy, not FB city builders) for peaceful players. This game would be great (with the quests and story) if there were no fighting among players. Give me a solitary island and leave me alone :). I had a bad experience where my neighbor told me to abandon my hero and stop playing because he "needed space". He then destroyed my second city, now I play only with one city and when he destroys that too I will stop playing, because I'm not going to start over to get destroyed again in a couple of weeks.

I'd like to address the idea that allowing someone to start over at a lower (not from the beginning) gives the player too much of an advantage.  

As we all have experienced, making a town in higher techs is VERY expensive and gets more expensive as the tech level increases as it should.   However, we all have storages, and possibly multiple towns, to help supply the new town with resources to enable faster growth and ease the pain.

If someone is starting over, from classical let's say, after having been wiped out they won't have those towns with storages to supply themselves.  All production spots will be built at level 1 of whatever tech they are dropped to and those are expensive to start and upgrade.  Builds (not promotions) are also more time consuming, so I don't think someone starting from scratch in classical or medieval, for example, would be able to build up as fast as someone in stone age but at least they wouldn't lose all of their tech. 

Their buildings would take much longer because of expense and really, aren't they already at a disadvantage by being wiped and having to start over? 

The point is a player getting wiped has to redo the tutorial and start from scratch so if there is a way to bypass that I think it would be worth considering.

Just my thoughts. 

My suggestion would be to make all the players who choose Collectivism to be un-attackable. It's a very simple solution. 

Based on the players around my area all of us chose Collectivism so it's pretty clear that a lot of us want to play this game without being attacked. 

So all the players who choose to fight can happily go around bashing each other over the head, while the rest of us can play in utter contentment without fear of losing everything. 

My suggestion would be to make all the players who choose Collectivism to be un-attackable. It's a very simple solution. 

Based on the players around my area all of us chose Collectivism so it's pretty clear that a lot of us want to play this game without being attacked. 

So all the players who choose to fight can happily go around bashing each other over the head, while the rest of us can play in utter contentment without fear of losing everything. 

Sorry, but that would allow collectivism players build towns as they want and no way to prevent it. 

With no way to damage collectivism player, it's culture war and despotism players won't like that, I think.

What do you mean? They could build towns as they want?  Nothing would change except for making Collectivists un-attackable. We would still have to build just like the fighters. Same quests etc