More than a year on from the original announcement that Inno were going to make this better and I still find myself in neighbourhoods that are very unfairly weighted.
On one world I play, not only is half my hood in a higher era, but they are 10s of millions of points ahead, and dozens of percentages ahead in the army bonuses. As points are calculated in part from buildings in your city, and battles won, this shows where a lot of the disparity arises.
No account is given to the attack and defence bonuses that players have. Great Building bonuses are very clearly weighted to be in favour of the attacking player, with very few defence GBs available. Even the occasional special event building doesn't help to get you anywhere near the bonus you need to be able to actually defend yourself from some of these players, and when those buildings do show up you have to spend a considerable number of diamonds to get enough of them to make any kind of difference.
Into state that Forge of Empires is a "free to play strategy game" however it has very clearly shifted focus to become a "pay to defend yourself from those with the mentality of a bully, war game". By that I mean the mentality of some players is "if you don't give me what I want in aid or by donating Forge Points to my buildings, then I will plunder you and take what I want by force because I know you can never beat me". This is very clearly the case with many of that type as the instant you can win and start to do it to them, they run and hide, with some using the tavern city protection option.
City Era and attack/defence bonus should be considered when mixing neighbourhoods.
To make it clear, this is not a whinge.
I do attack players for points or when any Quest requires it, but I never plunder, unless I am plundered first.
I have no issue with any player attacking for points or when any Quest requires it.
I have no problem being plundered by someone when the fight is fair and I have a chance of retaliating fairly. That adds to the enjoyment of the game because you BOTH have to have an actual strategy.
But when a fight is clearly and massively weighted against you and you have no possibility of defending yourself or retaliating, then that is just insane.