How To Stop Exploitation in Strat Battles w/ AI Defense

[MrShine]

Here's how to prevent AI sign-up exploitation:

Bar clanmates/allies from signing up against their own clan/allies.  Period.
When someone applies, simply have a message pop up on the website saying "you cannot join this battle against your comrades!"

^ of course in order to get to this stage, there needs to be a way to group allies together.  The easiest way to do this would be to rely on the faction page. Perhaps even extend it to where you can't go against your faction in an AI controlled battle for 24-48 hours after dropping the tag.  Boom we're done. 

There are clear benefits to being in a faction (don't have to pay hourly upkeep, can trade easier, can see allies etc), so people who would exploit this system by being part of a faction without actually joining the faction would run into complications.


If you want to go the extra mile to do this against factions & their allies, you could have some sort of diplomacy feature added to the site, where faction leaders can set themselves as friendly with other factions (which of course would have to be confirmed by both factions in order to be made official).  The biggest challenge here would be to find a way to make it worthwhile to sign up as friendly to a faction, because if there is no benefits people won't do it. 

Some ideas:
-Have similar reduction in upkeep penalties when residing in a fief/castle/town of a friendly faction.
-Reduction in tax% with a friendly faction
-More visibility on the strat map



 

[CrazyCracka420]

I think a very easy solution to prevent no-shows from being an issue (both with people just forgetting to show up, and people purposely doing this to help their clan or allies), would be to just allow spectators to join the AI side after 5 or 10 minutes if someone who signed up didn't show up for battle.

The only way to punish ticket wasting/gear wasting, is to witness it, more admins (or 'junior' admins who only spec) are needed for this to happen.

[MrShine]

I think a very easy solution to prevent no-shows from being an issue (both with people just forgetting to show up, and people purposely doing this to help their clan or allies), would be to just allow spectators to join the AI side after 5 or 10 minutes if someone who signed up didn't show up for battle.

The only way to punish ticket wasting/gear wasting, is to witness it, more admins (or 'junior' admins who only spec) are needed for this to happen.

True, having a flexible period of time for specs would be nice to fill up slots, however we already have the 'reliability' meter on the site, which encourages people in general to attend battles they sign up for.  As long as those with a clear interest in the AI's loss are kept from applying in the first place I think it would go a long way towards helping curb the problem.

Yes ticket wasting/gear wasting is very difficult to police.  I went 4/12 yesterday in an EU siege which is pretty garbagy for me, but I was legitimately playing poorly (I also fell to my death like 6 times because I would lag off a tricky ledge).  I've also went 6 and 75 in one siege(http://c-rpg.net/index.php?page=battlesparticipated#!?page=battleroster&id=2934) where we were getting spawn raped, and I decided I would spawn with as much equipment as I could to burn it instead of let the attackers get it.  You pretty much NEED an admin to be there and make a judgment call in some of those situations.

[Havoco]

+structured diplomat tab, Ty.

[Miwiw]

A thing not directly against your idea, but a problem that would happen:

If you cannot join the AI side of the battle if your faction fight against it, what would hinder you to leave your faction for the time of the battle and rejoin afterwards (either Strategus or ladder clan)?
If something like that was implemented, there would also be a cooldown to join another faction needed.

[Knute]

I agree something should be done about people not showing up but sometimes there's grey area as to who's allied and who's not, seems like it'd be difficult to police.  When all of both EU/NA sides are at least loosely allied, NA players would only be free to defend EU fiefs on sucky ping and vice versa.  If there's just a couple people here and there signing up against their allies I don't think it's that big of a deal.  I think most people just want to take part in good battles and get tons of xp, they're not trying to exploit the game mechanics. 

If you look at your participated sieges, not just recent ones but really far back, while there sometimes a few people from the attacking clan/alliance who signed up for defense and didn't show, there's usually way more people from opposing clans or independent people who don't show.  Just looking at DRZ vs. Dhirim for example, Detective Panos style:

1 DRZ on defense who did well.

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There's one Nord on defense with a positive kd.

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Now the no-shows begin: 1 Bashi, 1 ANT and 2 random.

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5 Hospitallers, 1 TKoV, 1 Astralis, 2 green alliance, 1 grey, 1 HRE, 5 random

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3 SB, 1 BIA(or Wataga at the time?) and 1 HRE.

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So there's 2 DRZ allies (1 bashi, 1 grey)
Six I'd say were probably against them (2 HRE, 1 ANT, 3 SB)
And 17 possibly neutral at that time, random or I dunno (5 Hospitallers, 1 TKoV, 1 Astralis, 2 Green Alliance, 1 BIA(?) and 7 random)

My understanding of who's allied/against/neutral could be a little off but you get the general idea.

Then on the more recent BarLas vs Derchios castle these are the no-shows:
http://c-rpg.net/index.php?page=battlesparticipated#!?page=battledetail&id=3754

3 Allies: 1 DRZ, 1 Nord, 1 Union
14 Possibly against: 2 ANT, 2 TKoV, 1 Kapikulu, 1 KUTT, 3 Mercs, 1 NH, 1 Occitan, 1 HRE, 2 SB
8 neutral: 5 random, 1 AoW, 1 Caravan Guard, 1 Pillager

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Harold said they recently switched over to hiring system where it looks at your reliability/performance and that's all.  Level doesn't matter and you don't have to play before the battle to not get unhired.  It's hard to perform well every time, especially with random equipment and spawn killing.  People do have control over their reliability though so why not make it so if you don't show for any battle, you're reliability takes a big hit that would take a lot of battles to recover? 

That way people would be more careful about signing up for all battles and it would weed out people who don't show on a regular basis.  If you're not sure if you can make a npc fief defense, just don't sign up or drop out well before.  If you can't make a friends battle they could unhire you beforehand but if you sign up for someone who doesn't know you and you don't show up, they could punish you by leaving you on the roster so your reliability takes a hit.  Sounds harsh but it's an option. 

[MrShine]

A thing not directly against your idea, but a problem that would happen:

If you cannot join the AI side of the battle if your faction fight against it, what would hinder you to leave your faction for the time of the battle and rejoin afterwards (either Strategus or ladder clan)?
If something like that was implemented, there would also be a cooldown to join another faction needed.

That's why I suggested that there should be a 24/48 hour window where someone who left a faction still couldn't sign up for the AI against that faction.  It would make it more difficult to organize people to sign up for the enemy side.

[FRANK_THE_TANK]

As for a bonus for allies. 2 things spring to mind.

1 trade bonus maybe auto 25% so being allied to a clan gives an increased distance bonus.

2 allow allies to trade gear like clan mates so you can drop by and pick up/drop off gear easier.