Changelog 0.25 Discussion

[DeletedUser]

Ragu betrayal? spoiler!!

 

[DeletedUser]

Only one issue encountered thus far and that is the pop up window to select my army before i attack my neighbour. This I understand may be helpful to some but it slows you down considerably. If I am constrained for time just before the tournament ends this could cause me not to get the points that i need to win.
So for those reasons i am against this change hopefully this will be altered back soon. I doubt that it will though as it probably will have some better purpose when the new PvP system is implemented.
~ddrd1981

 

[DeletedUser]

I m mostly waitin for bug fixes and little improvements.

 

[DeletedUser]

Only one issue encountered thus far and that is the pop up window to select my army before i attack my neighbour. This I understand may be helpful to some but it slows you down considerably. If I am constrained for time just before the tournament ends this could cause me not to get the points that i need to win.
So for those reasons i am against this change hopefully this will be altered back soon. I doubt that it will though as it probably will have some better purpose when the new PvP system is implemented.
~ddrd1981

Bug discovered with new attack army selection window;



This bug prevents me from selecting my army correctly as this information screen keeps on appearing across the screen.

~ddrd1981

 

[DeletedUser5647]

It is just like the friend request. Once it detects you from the same residence you lose any and all donation capabilities for great buildings.

You may see it as a flawed solution but with the amount of stupid people out there trying to create multi accounts to boost great buildings then getting their great buildings deleted as penalty this was the next best option. This way I nor other staff have to worry about dealing with those people in the future.

But if you have an even better idea feel free to put it in the ideas section of our forums Always happy to hear peoples ideas so long as its not free diamonds

Frankly, I don't have a solution but this comes to mind:

Suppose for a moment that I live in a multi-occupancy building like a block of self contained flats where each person is provided with a shared access to a big satellite dish or cable to the building as well as a managed CAT5 socket such that each flat has a different IP address with bandwidth at an agreed capped level. My father lives in exactly these circumstances, and so do very many students who live in student accommodation blocks. Now suppose I introduce my real-life neighbours (from different flats in the building) to the game of Forge of Empires. What this patch does is say 'thanks for introducing new money spenders to the game but your reward is ZERO diamonds and, by the way, don't bother making a guild with your friends because you won't be allowed to help each other.'

Talk about shafting the good guys.

There are three people in my building who share an internet connection and we are now stuffed.

Until this is removed do not expect any of us to spend any more money on this game.

 

[DeletedUser5026]

Now that the patch has been rolled out, here are some of my thoughts, and responses to comments:

1) I like how the new PvP tower rankings are now shown in the event history overview. It saves the trouble of having to open the continent map and opening up each individual tower. Having said that, I would have like it better if all the towers could be viewed from there, rather than only those towers that you have participated in so far. Time to churn out an idea template, methinks.

2)

In the "build armies" popup, the portrait has been replaced with one of General Grivus.

I could not find any "Build Armies" popup, so I was a bit puzzled by this change. After a while, I notice that the portrait shown when the new event popup appears is that of Grivus; formerly it was Ragu. I hope that the developers don't take it the wrong way, but they should work on how each sentence in a changelog is phrased, to avoid confusion. Of course, I could be wrong, and there is a "Build Armies" popup with Grivus in it.

3)

Only one issue encountered thus far and that is the pop up window to select my army before i attack my neighbour. This I understand may be helpful to some but it slows you down considerably. If I am constrained for time just before the tournament ends this could cause me not to get the points that i need to win.

I think this was the result of an idea that was suggested here: (click me). Personally, I think this is a great idea, which serves 2 purposes. It allows players to make changes to their troop lineup on-the-fly, particularly useful if a player suffered casualties and wants to replace them for the next battle. It serves as a confirmation button, ensuring that a player does not accidentally click on the attack button and cause a diplomatic incident. As for time constraints, perhaps you could start your attack run earlier; besides, the delay is 5 seconds at most, so even with a full (79) neighbourhood run, the extra time would amount to only 6.5 minutes.


Cheers,
L.R.

 

[DeletedUser5647]

Here is another thought on the subject of cheaters:

Let us say for a moment that I were able to get a free proxy server on the internet to hide my IP address. This is so easy to do as all the proxy providers want in return is to answer a few questionnaires. You know, the advertising kind - just like the ones you answer to get free diamonds! Now suppose I were a sneaky cheater and decided to set up a bunch of proxied alternate accounts. Remember, this is incredibly easy to do, even 12 year olds can do it, any cheater is likely to try. Now using these alternate accounts (only hypothetically of course) I could then do the boosting of Great Buildings in the manner that the devs call cheating without the devs being able to detect. Still remember - this is easy to do.

You can never fully remove cheaters without either sophisticated parsing or using a human.

The applied solution is not workable as the people the devs are trying to target will just find another way - and it is an easy way.

And yet another thought:

What about Syria?

Syria has a very small number of IP addresses (84 if I recall correctly) and if there are players from that country then the chances are high that they may be on the same IP. Does this mean Syrian players are not allowed to help each other?

It took me less than 2 minutes to find this little addon for firefox users (also works for IE and Chrome with a bit of tweaking)
*edit by blacksmith

dont post links to sites that you think may help rule breakers.

Fail.

 

[DeletedUser]

Here is another thought on the subject of cheaters:

Let us say for a moment that I were able to get a free proxy server on the internet to hide my IP address. This is so easy to do as all the proxy providers want in return is to answer a few questionnaires. You know, the advertising kind - just like the ones you answer to get free diamonds! Now suppose I were a sneaky cheater and decided to set up a bunch of proxied alternate accounts. Remember, this is incredibly easy to do, even 12 year olds can do it, any cheater is likely to try. Now using these alternate accounts (only hypothetically of course) I could then do the boosting of Great Buildings in the manner that the devs call cheating without the devs being able to detect. Still remember - this is easy to do.

You can never fully remove cheaters without either sophisticated parsing or using a human.

The applied solution is not workable as the people the devs are trying to target will just find another way - and it is an easy way.

We have multiple ways of detecting cheaters, and putting it simple....you can use as many proxies as you want. This will not stop us finding them.

It took me less than 2 minutes to find this little addon for firefox users (also works for IE and Chrome with a bit of tweaking)

Link removed

Fail.

The only fail here is that post. Same as above, use it if you wish...but if you have multiple accounts, a ban will be handed out. Oops...end of story.

 

[DeletedUser]

About Pteropto's, the player doth protest too much, methinks. +1 to the anti cheat fix. If you are in the same building as your buddies, go play football or something with them and play this game with the guys in Syria who can't play with each other (like you mentioned).

 

[DeletedUser5647]

The forum spelling checker has removed the o-r-g domain after mozilla. and replaced it with stars. Just google anonymox.

 

[DeletedUser5647]

We have multiple ways of detecting cheaters, and putting it simple....you can use as many proxies as you want. This will not stop us finding them.

That suggests that you should you should use those ways instead rather than penalizing those people who have no choice about where they live.

The only fail here is that post. Same as above, use it if you wish...but if you have multiple accounts, a ban will be handed out. Oops...end of story.

The post was valid. If your comments are a veiled threat regarding my private messages to support which you still have not responded to then you, Sir, have no honour.

I have never had and have no intention ever of having multiple accounts for Forge of Empires because I stand by the essence of fairness embodied in the rule to block same IP accounts. What I am trying to impress upon you is the unfairness in the manner in which that blocking has been carried out. I have illustrated that it can be circumvented, and be assured it can be. The implementation is flawed.

I stand by my assertion that blocking purely by IP is grossly unfair to those players (small minority they may be) who through no fault of their own are unable to have separate IP addresses.

 

[DeletedUser5647]

About Pteropto's, the player doth protest too much, methinks. +1 to the anti cheat fix. If you are in the same building as your buddies, go play football or something with them and play this game with the guys in Syria who can't play with each other (like you mentioned).

Your comment is naive. Do you have any friends in real life who live elsewhere from you but also play Forge of Empires? If that is true then maybe you should go and play footie with them rather than play the game? Perhaps we could take your logic to an extreme - every one playing the game should play footie instead. Your logic is flawed.

I want to play FoE with my friends just like you do. It just so happens that my friends live in the same building with each flat having a hardwired internet connection through a shared IP address and the landlord will not permit any changes.

It also means that if you visit your friends or they visit you, as a previous post suggested, and whilst there you do a quick collect and retask on your city then suddenly you are all treated as multi-accounters even if you live in different places.

It makes a nonsense of the 'Invite your friends' button at the end of the neighbourhood bar.

The essence of what the devs are trying to achieve is right - I agree with it. The implementation is wrong.

 

[DeletedUser]

I have 6 members in my guild who are all in the same family. Is the idea of a mmo playing family inconceivable to you guys. I can't put forge points on my family's buildings. What is the point of spending all this time building up our accounts for us to not be able to help each other now. There should be a method where players can e-mail the game to prove someway that they are seperate people.

 

[DeletedUser]

Please refrain from double posting. You have done so multiple times. Simply edit your post and add an additional comment should you want to add to your statement.
Also, you've been promoting cheating and been suggesting ways to cheat, yet you claim to stand for fairness.

As for this implementation, it prevents much much more cheating than it harms the few players that for some reason somehow gotten the same IP and can't donate to each other anymore.
If those players are family and or friends who share a connection regularly, they are to refrain from donating points to each other anyway, as this falls under the same rules of account pushing which is stated in the Game Rules.

- L

 

[DeletedUser5647]

I have 6 members in my guild who are all in the same family. Is the idea of a mmo playing family inconceivable to you guys. I can't put forge points on my family's buildings. What is the point of spending all this time building up our accounts for us to not be able to help each other now. There should be a method where players can e-mail the game to prove someway that they are seperate people.

I have a suggestion for how this could be achieved - a teamspeak session with a dev or community manager so that they can hear your 6 different voices and each one linked by their e-mails to the TS server.

 

[DeletedUser7939]

SOLUTION I Hope

I have a suggestion for how this could be achieved - a teamspeak session with a dev or community manager so that they can hear your 6 different voices and each one linked by their e-mails to the TS server.

I like this idea ... this way you could see the IP address of each player through teamspeak (No Mic Needed) and confirm that each one of them has a different IP which is the same as a recent login to game. It could be done where they are all logged into the game and Teamspeak at the same time, so the IP addresses can be compared. The problem with this as mentioned earlier is PROXY servers for fake IP addresses... but as Archangel Snail said earlier, they have ways of finding out. Surely isn't this a solution for the good guys?

 

[DeletedUser]

The post was valid. If your comments are a veiled threat regarding my private messages to support which you still have not responded to then you, Sir, have no honour.

If you feel like i put a "veiled" threat in there i am sorry, i don't think i did but oh well.

We receive a lot of tickets in our support system. If you don't get a reply (which is a very very VERY rare case) you only need to reply to it and it will flag it up.

I have never had and have no intention ever of having multiple accounts for Forge of Empires because I stand by the essence of fairness embodied in the rule to block same IP accounts. What I am trying to impress upon you is the unfairness in the manner in which that blocking has been carried out. I have illustrated that it can be circumvented, and be assured it can be. The implementation is flawed.

Yet from what i have seen you are attempting to help these "same IP accounts"?

I stand by my assertion that blocking purely by IP is grossly unfair to those players (small minority they may be) who through no fault of their own are unable to have separate IP addresses.

More factors than IP come into the banning process. I cannot go into details, but all bans handed out are fair and warranted.

 

[DeletedUser]

what about ability to sort own trades "by good" ?

 

[DeletedUser]

If someone was using multiple accounts, why would they need to upgrade all their cities, when Forge Points are given from the start. Surely if all the accounts are different levels, playing at different speeds, surely that would indicate that they are different people.

 

[DeletedUser]

what about ability to sort own trades "by good" ?

This is a discussion regarding the current update.
That topic may have it's own thread floating around.

If someone was using multiple accounts, why would they need to upgrade all their cities, when Forge Points are given from the start. Surely if all the accounts are different levels, playing at different speeds, surely that would indicate that they are different people.

Multi-accounters usually have their favorite/more active accounts. And sometimes accounts they forget about and remember later.
Apart from multiple other factors, these 2 reasons alone already create the variations you stated.

- L