New Plunder Points scoring

If it helps at all, you can pause your streak safely at any level where you gain a chest, so you can do it in batches of 5 wins without any counting as a defeat.

(5/10/13/15/18/20/25/30 wins are all safe to pause and leave the app after attaining, its only the intermediate levels you can't leave during).

I'd suggest mixing streaking with gemming for plunder points if you were already planning on gemming the wins, should chests be a concern. Gem out a batch of five battles during a rumble, let the 3330 points help out the guild, and get the next tier of chest. You can still win for fairly cheap in the low 400s, where you get 666 for a win; not as cheap as the 1 gem sniping battles down at PR1, but its an option that kind of splits the difference.

Another option, if your guild doesn't rumble every day, is to streak on days when you aren't rumbling, and then get your rank back up for the rumble, jumping up and down in rank depending on your guild's schedule.

Something other players I know do is go to a lower rank, get a bunch of easy wins/chests at the start of the rumble to get the streak started, and then climb up in rank and fight higher ranks with your streak bonuses. The first couple battles won't count for much, but after your streak gets going to a decent level, you'll be at a PR where you get nice points, with a grog and hire time reduction and some perks to help out!

 

Am I the only one who finds it problematic that you have no access to the chat during streaks? It is by far the thing that annoys me the most in PP

 

This is a common complaint, but they never really intended for people to spend all their time in a streak - and the entire time you're streaking you're really intended to be actively playing, and its not exactly going to be easy to chat with someone mid-battle. They never really wanted us to be able to do them without speeding up every fight, so this is just an extra indirect deterrent for that.

If you do want to chat, I suggest using Slack, and swapping to it on a level when you get a chest (every 5 battles). On iPads you can even pin it side-by-side as a makeshift guild chat, although I'm not sure how clean that will work, as I haven't tried myself (
http://ios.wonderhowto.com/how-to/run-two-apps-side-by-side-your-ipad-ios-9-0162416/)
.

 

@Skye running Slack in your sidebar on an iPad does work; but you need to be mindful not to spend too much time on the sidebar as the game does recognise you are inactive and will give you the time out warning and ultimately drop you out of the game

 

It's been some time sence I posted, but this topic has drawn my attention.
First, I have to say that I am happy with this change...to a degree.

There are two issues I see here. The first issue is that the change is preventing players from doing successful streaks and rumbles simultaneously. To streak successfully one must drop rank and then 1 star bases in order to save time and money. With the new ruble scoring system, one must have a high PR, which makes successful (efficient) streaking a clear disadvantage.

If the rumble scoring system is to be balanced, there should be an added win (or defense) bonus based on PR. I have a maxed PH 10 base and there is no benefit for me to be of a high PR, but if there was a bonus, to cover the cost of being in a high PR, then there might be some impression of balance in the game.

The new scoring system seems to be intended to encourage higher PR, but it is actually more punitive in nature.

Please consider my suggestion of adding an attack or defense win bonus for high PR players. That would make the game fair.

 

Dang this sucks. We are currently in a rumble and I've ranked up to 450ish and there's no grog to be seen! I need at least 400,000 grog to break even and that's for a crew that can't even touch those insane angle bases that have almost max walls. I must have hit next a million times so far trying to find a base I can three star or get my grog back. It seems any base that has a good grog amount is too damn hard to take down. Its just frustrating as hell right now.

Oh, and don't get me started on why bombers will not go for wall anymore, good god they kill me.

 

If you kaboom a wall, your bombers (and likely HG) will almost certainly try to go through it. It just has to be pre-damaged a bit. Try that.

In the low 400s there's plenty of weak PH10 bases you can beat with an extremely cheap army (<200k). Or, every other battle, snipe collectors and forfeit. The 3* from the second battle will be enough to make up for whatever PR you lost from the forfeit, and you get an extra 385k grog per attack to play with. I find plenty of full collectors when I'm ranked in the low 400s.

 

Thanks for the tips. I know about Kaboom but on max walls (two deep) my bombers will not go for it always then walking around the walls to the stupid ground pounder trap/flame gate entrance and then game over.

Normally when I'm farming I don't care about my rank but now with the rumble tweak I'm just loosing grog left and right only because I don't have the time to sit down and play the game for hours on end gemming or waiting for my troops to recruit.

I still think Midoki has tweaked the attacks and or defenses, because not only am I not beating bases I normally do but my crap base layout is actually working keeping me protected from seeing a three star defeat. Yes it still happens but the crew they throw at me is nuts....4 WD's, 4 HG's and a billion gunners and Juggs. Weird.

 

sad to see the game is one step closer to suicidal mode.

as for development of PP, Midoki is becoming more and more like SNK, rather than Nintendo at earlier stages of this game. Nintendo's success partly stems on a huge customer base including non-hardcore gamers, just like their game Mario; whereas SNK, despite having excellent games such as King of Fighters, mainly focussed on a nitch market for hardcore gamers. the cruel reality of this industry is nitch market focus = path towards bankruptcy.

this latest change on plunder points scoring is doing exactly this, making the game more suitable for hardcore gamers, while less hardcore ones will find the game increasingly difficult and may quit one by one, which is what i'm seeing in the last few days. the problem is once these non-hardcore gamers left the game, the hardcore ones will find the game lack of people playing and will gradually quit as well.

maybe it's time for Midoki to reconsider positioning of this game, before it is too late. also my two cents, comments in this forum are mostly from hardcore gamers, which may not necessarily represent those of non-hardcore ones.

 

The bomber and HG AI has to be addressed over the rumble scoring systems as it is Ruining the game. The Pirates simply do not do what they used or are supposed too. If this game was on a console, a patch would of come very quickly or gamers would revolt and simply stop playing/supporting it. This may happen soon. If midoki does not fix these basic issues with AI. this used to be such a badass game for EVERONE! now it's a crapshoot as to where your pirates are gonna go. And for someone who has spent the time to level them up to max academy 8, these basic coding problems on a game of this type are laughable. I've been in several guilds of late trying to find a home. 60% of the ones I landed in were dead. People hadn't played in weeks or months. The writing is on the wall. This isn't clash. It
Simply can't compete. So maybe stop trying and just fix the AI so it's like it used to be. Way to make rumbles better midoki! But with so little grog to be had up high in the ranks how are the Pirates stumbling around the base getting shot?! I know.... Bad AI or a purposeful nerf to focus players on upping legendaries. Gamers aren't stupid. It's quite the opposite. Your treading dangerous ground here. I will not spend another dime in this game untill the AI is fixed. I'll just stay low and farm. Then sell my account to some kid who doesn't realize there are so many other better games out there. Boom beach AI smokes plunder pirates. And that's just sad.

 

Midoki are so focused on the almighty gem, and those players who spend through the nose, that the Middle ground regular player is being forced out. Our guild is abandoning rumbles because we cannot compete in this new world. We will farm and streak and eventually get bored, but rumbles will be a thing of the past for many of us. Thank you Midoki, it was fun while it lasted, but as @roland put it, this game is in suicide mode.

 

Agree with Darth. Every other update that has changed the way tings are done, I have managed to adjust, get used to it, accept it and move on but this new system for plunder points has me defeated. As a mid level player, still trying to upgrade, I find it pointless now to try. A high rank gives me too tough of bases so I'm lucky to 1 star...not many points in that and troop cost no covered so basically I am going backwards. I am constantly wiped out due to matchup in rumble (as it seems we are always paired with a top gemming team) and have not been able to upgrade or train anything in weeks. If I drop rank, the points are even worse so what's the point?? It seems every new update is geared towards gemmers/top guilds and is not considering mid level players or mid level guilds. Not to mention all the other bugs, I have seen a lot of players give up with this last update. It used to be fun when you could do many things at once but now seem forced to choose and that's just not right. Very disappointed.

 

My view on the latest changes to Plunder Points is it did not help the gem buyers. It benefited those who rely on quality over quantity. Gemmers depend on quantity to win battles. This latest adjustment gave skillful players a chance to get twice as many points as gemmers, for far less cost. Granted, still issue with lack of grog in the mid-upper ranks. I think many are doing as I do, farm grog in the lower ranks until it is almost full, then move into the mid ranks to rumble. Then drop and farm again.

And I agree, rumble matching needs to be fairer to the guilds that don't gem heavily. Think limited player base is preventing Midoki from making changes that will solve that issue at this time.

Some may be aware I am in a very competitive guild. Many are not aware my alternate accounts hang out in guilds that have the same struggles many here are talking about. Not a chance of winning most rumble match ups due to getting matched against more competitive guilds. In those guilds. we play the hand we are dealt and try for a win if possible, or just farm if not. Still enough positive aspects to the game to keep my interest.

 

I understand what you are saying. There is the option of riding that elevator over and over but unfortunately not everyone can be on the game for hours on end every day. I'm sure there are a lot of people like myself that lead busy lives and just don't have the time to fluctuate pr so much.
Yes, the match making is deterring many from rumbling now (as well as the new point system) and that's disappointing. Perhaps they should match up by rumble average (as seen in guild profile) and not by number of members in a guild. When 2 guilds of same member count are 48 and one averages 579,000 and we average 98,000....why would anyone even attempt it....just hand it over right away as we know that even if we had 100% participation, we would never be anywhere near the running. If matched by average, the guilds you get would be a little more evenly matched and make the rumble a little more exciting and competitive.

 

and not being a gemmer or a skillful player.....where does that leave players like me?

 

We appear to not be rumbles 'target audience'

 

I here what you are saying about rumble matchups. Needs to be done by average score not by number in guild and ph composition. Since the new scoring system has been introduced I have noticed scores have decreased dramatically. Our guild used to average around 75-80k, its dropped to around 60k. I have noticed the drop from the guilds we have rumbled against as well. Hopefully when/if players increase rank scores will increase.

 

Someone of less skill should not be able to put up as many points as someone of more skill, unless the person of less skill spends enough to increase their fight count to balance it out. And both players spending equal amounts, the person of more skill should be getting more points. Someone of less skill still gets some points, which is a contribution, but will likely have to spend either more gems or more time to make up for their decreased skill. This is the same in any game - someone who isn't as good isn't going to score as high, and it would be silly to think they should. The differential between skill levels might be worth examining, but there definitely should be one.

Matching by score punishes gemmers. If a gemming guild always matches other gemming guilds, they're forced to gem every single time. Easy fights are important so that when there is a tough matchup, people aren't burned out. If it was a tough matchup every single day, people would get tired of the higher stress much quicker. Also, this opens the door for the following exploit: Every day, start a new guild with a fresh score, and fight weak guilds. No matter what age guild you require, a player could just have a guild premade with a new account in bluestacks, make a couple rumbles off the free gems and score 0 points in all of them, and then all the real players can rotate through a set of new guilds to always fight low-scoring guilds for easy wins. When the guild has been in a battle, either it does a bunch of 0 point battles to bring the average back down, or the account is just scrapped and replaced by a fresh one.

I probably know much more about how the AI works than the typical player, which gives me a tremendous advantage there (I don't even think about AI when I really attack though, I just drop everything and hope for the best anyways most of the time), but I have not noticed bombers or HG behaving unusually compared to how they are supposed to behave.

Bombers will only bomb through a wall if it is faster to do so than walk around it - with their huge bonus to wall damage, this increases the chance. But as soon as the wall has been even slightly damaged, they become extremely likely to bomb through it. Use your kaboom to damage the wall, and they will go through, no matter how thick it is - I've gotten them through a 6-wall-thick section before, during this patch, so its certainly possible. In fact, most troops will see a damaged wall and fight through it even if it looks faster to go around, especially HG with their insane damage, so use your kaboom to tell them where to fight through. Only low dps troops like juggs will usually walk around after it has been damaged, and even then sometimes you can get juggs to fight through. Or just use enough bombers to completely destroy it with a kaboom, or send two batches of bombers if the first kaboom won't be enough. Bring bombers on your GS for an extra Kaboom cooldown!

Bombers will see buildings that are COMPLETELY enclosed as a distraction and run off to them if they get close enough, as always, but kaboom will still make them pause and damage the nearby wall even when this is happening. I suggest sniping enclosed buildings first, and then using your bombers, so this doesn't happen. If there is even a one tile gap anywhere around the building, it will not be a distraction.

HG have a very fast fire rate and high amount of DPS, with a slow walk rate, so destroying a damaged wall, even if it seems like it will take a while, looks like the easier path if you go by numbers. And once they pick a wall, even if a close by wall is more damaged, they aren't going to switch.

A neat little fact, due to the limitations of the iPhone 4s, the game breaks the battlefield into groups of 4x4 tiles to do basic path calculations to save cpu time, so that explains why an opening a tile away gets avoided sometimes - because the game considers 1 and 4 tiles away to be the same if they're in the same 4x4 block, and 4 tiles away would have been slower. It also explains why units sometimes walk funny paths around buildings and walls.

With the incredible emphasis on needing a GP to hit troops several times to have any chance at winning, giving defenders a way to force troops into its blast zone is a requirement of winning a defense. And its the attackers job to find a way of using the AI and troops to kill the GP in a layout before troops walk into the blast zone. As soon as the GP is dead, or the troops have bypassed it, you've mathematically won almost any battle. If you can't do that, you definitely don't deserve more than 1* for the victory. 1* is still a victory btw, and a loss for the defender, which many people fail to remember. A lot of players seem to be in a "if I don't get a 3* almost every time, the game is too hard" attitude, which makes things impossible for us that prefer defense and are struggling to keep players from a 1*, nevermind that 3* being demanded. Expect to spend dozens of attacks failing against a hard base until you have a good strategy for it, if you could easily beat it within the first couple tries, defenders would have even less of a chance than they do now.

Go sit up at PR800 with any layout, and I promise you'll be lucky to see a single defense that isn't at least 2*. Troops are working just fine for these players. There isn't a base I can't beat with 3*, and I don't ever use GS troops, and I rarely bring an LP. You definitely don't need them to win, so if you're using them, you're more than fine. It may take me a couple tries, and I make mistakes or just half-ass it sometimes and fail spectacularly, but they are always possible.

If you want more accurate or impressive AI, push for terminating support of the iPhone 4s. Until the handful of players using it still are forced to upgrade, a lot of changes just cannot happen, simply because its 5 years old and way too slow. Apple doesn't support it anymore, but for some reason it still has a slight market share and Midoki hasn't cut support yet. If you know someone still using it, encourage them to stop living in the past so we can have nice things!

 

part of the problem with us "less skilled" payers is that during a matchup, when we get creamed by top guilds and constantly wiped out....we are unable to train troops! You have to admit that getting a fully trained troop helps in you skill level.
If gemming/top guilds get paired with the same and you feel they would get stressed etc....how do you think us mid level guilds feel when we are paired with them??
I have a iphone 6+ so bypassed the iphone 4 fyi part.
I don't expect to 3* every time as I did before as I have advanced and expect it to be harder and I accept that BUT not being able to train troops or afford defense upgrades (which luckily I was able to do before all this took place....but probably won't be able to do when the next level comes out) because 1) loot not found 2) top guilds in rumble are greedy little pirates lol. I leave my ph out in the open undefended and still they take take take.......which I accept (albeit can piss me off <chuckles> sometimes when I'm trying to save up) cuz they want the full pp but that leads to again, how to become skillful when you can never get anything going? Yes I could farm but that takes my pr down.....so skilled or not....doesn't help the team in a rumble does it?
PS: I would love for all the top skilled players to start a new account and start from scratch and see how easy it is now, how quickly you can upgrade academy or mystic mortors while trying to get/upgrade LPs, see how hard it is to advance. A lot of changes made in the past few months have made it very difficult for ......well, people that didn't join the first couple months the game went live. If you or any top player or developer, put themselves in the majority of players shoes, I think we would be hearing something different.

 

At pr500 I can get 5-6 million in grog in less than 20 min with no gems. I know 20 min might be a long time to play all at once. But as you progress in game you must commit more time to upgrades. Things should not get easier the further along u go