Why do you have to rebuy traps?

So, a few of us agree that PP shouldn't slavishly mimic CoC nor should PP avoid the good ideas in CoC; that is, "CoC shouldn't constrain PP". A noble ideal but troublesome in the details. ;-)

IMO, PP would benefit from some refinement (well, additional complexity) in "recovery from attack". This thread reveals three options: heal autonomously, be repaired, and be replaced. Currently, mines have to be replaced and everything else (in my experience) heals autonomously. I suggest PP would be more interesting if, for example: hall, ship and all resource collection and storage remained autonomous healing; mines, fences, and other obstacles to movement require replacement, and civilian infrastructure (everything else) requires repair.

Requiring repair of items makes their placement more interesting -- should I use the Tavern, Guild Hall, and Academy to soak up attackers but suffer repair costs or should I move them out of harm's way to avoid repair costs but suffer more direct attacks on resources?

I think repair cost should be done in three ways: time, resources, or gems. The costs should be non-trivial but not onerous. For the sake of discussion, I'll say 5% of build time/cost. So, a player could simply wait 5% of the build time, spend 5% of the build resources, or spend gems equivalent to 5% build time to repair an item.

That said, we don't want to scare off the newbies, so perhaps a better cost is use the hall level as the repair cost percentage.

 

Interesting take on it, but I worry that requiring repairs after every time you got attacked would cause a lot of players to be more upset, especially if you get attacked a lot, but never enough to activate a shield. Then the next attacker starts off at say 15% destroyed without deploying a single pirate.

 

Where this would fail is in the builders. If the builders are tied up, for days in some cases, your base is FUBAR. That would drive me to just not play untill a builder frees. Also what happens to a building that is under construction? Does it now take longer?

I agree with the OP that the current way mines work is irritating.

However; I'm also at the point where mines are less effective. They used to cripple an attacker now they just slow it down. So resetting them is a lower priority.

IME, I win that first attack where the mines all go pop, but I still lose a good bit of resources. I lose the defense to the guy that comes after my mines have popped, I lose the resources still but get a good shield.

I don't break that shield until a builder frees up currently, to reset mines. So I effectively don't play untill I can reset. Yet I'm wondering if I shouldn't just ignore them since they get popped, I get robbed and only 38% of my base is gone so no shield.

 

I don't think Builders should be required for repair just for building, upgrading, or replacing items. My notion is this: civilian infrastructure is repaired by civilians (civilians aren't being simulated explicitly they're implicit) given the resources.

I wouldn't change or effect the build time/resources for a building under construction/upgrade.

I, too, find the one-shot mines irritating. I'd like it better if an exploded mine remained in existence until the shield activates or the user returned to the game. I like to set up ambushes by trapping the obvious avenue of attack. So, I do well against the first attacker only to have an "open door policy" for the next few attackers. Hmm, maybe a mine with a couple of "reloads" would work.

 

Since the current approach doesn't seem to carry damage from attack to attack, I wouldn't degrade reparable items between attacks. Everything except the mines seems to reset to 100% healthy between attacks. That's fine with me.

However, when the player returns to the game, they have to deal with the damage done by the attacks. The damage of an item should be IMO the maximum (not cumulative) damage of the attacks. This information should be available since we get to see movies of the action. Computationally, this would be Order(kn) were k is the number of buildings and n is the number of attacks; since both k and n are small, the computation shouldn't be burdensome.

However, if determining maximum damage of all attacks by item is impractical, I'd be fine with repairing the damage of the last attack (generally, the worst attack that activated the shield) or of the worst attack. The system already has an algorithm for determining how well a defense did in an attack, the system could use it to select the worst attack to determine the reparable items damaged.

 

Ok, now that you've explained it further I see your point. I concede that it would add an element of realism to the game that most certainly would set it apart from so many others. I don't feel that people are picking up this game for the realism of it, and for that reason I don't see your idea as being beneficial to the gameplay, even if it is a cool take on the whole thing.

If it helps - imagine that the townsfolk are hard at work repairing things from the inside after an attack

 

Realism and the Tower Defense format are pretty much mutually exclusive in my mind.

Otherwise my Bombers would be in their Tavern buying rounds Before I attack.

The troops that don't die in an attack would come home too. That however just reinforces the "Farm the Weak" mentality that inevitably drives players to other formats.

 

I'm not looking for realism (this is a pirate game with magic in it afterall!). ;-) I'm looking for more challenges in designing and managing a base, its resources, exploration, and combat.

PP has a great collection of buildings, pirates, and pirate skills. The game introduces them nicely - simple stuff with few items gradually become more different items, more of everything, and greater skills. The game grows more complex in these few dimensions. There are other dimensions where a little more complexity would enrich the game.

 

Have any other games solved the "farm the weak" problem? I try, as a matter of principle, to not farm the weak, but it seems the game's scoring structure drives me to attacking more weak players than strong players. That is, I lose big by attacking poorly and then am presented weak opponents whom I clobber; then I get more points until I'm overmatched again and the cycle repeats. I go up in points more slowly than I go down.

I have no solution, only a kind-hearted spirit of not bullying the weak -- hmm, probably not the best attitude for a pirate.

 

A weak town should give weak rewards (gold, battle points, etc...).

But IMO, the auto-repair-at-no-cost is the best solution and mines should repair the same way.
Canons have infinite ammo, isn't it?

 

More so it should act like a penalty. If you are PH7 and attack a PH 3 you should receive 20% less than if you attacked a PH 5.

 

Hmm, having finite munitions is an interesting notion. Here's an idea:
1. Each weapon has a relatively small quantity of on-hand munitions. Let's say 10 shots for discussion.
2. There's a new building type, Magazine, that holds lots of munitions. Let's make the quantity stored dependent on magazine level; e.g., lvl1 - 50 shots; lvl2 - 150 shots.
3. Weapons are implicitly resupplied from the Magazine, until the Magazine is destroyed. Then, each weapon switches to its on-hand quantity.

So, the island designer has more to consider: e.g., how many Magazines, when to upgrade them, and how well to protect the Magazine(s)? The attacker has another tactical goal: knock out the Magazine(s) first. Hee, hee - more design and tactical problems to solve.

Some experimentation is needed to determine these quantities (I'm not smart enough to do so analytically), but the quantities mentioned above illustrate the general idea.

 

I would like to chime in to say it would be nice to not require a builder to reset traps/bombs. As it is, I have days now on building upgrades and I have to keep one builder free just to reset traps after attacks. I don't mind paying for them. I just wish I could put my last builder to work instead of having to save him just for resetting. Thanks!

 

That's why I'm saving for builder 4

 

Personally. I don't like the idea of limiting munitions. That would be an game exit worthy change in my book. I would be happy with auto regeneration on traps, but just having the ability to rearming is simple and would work great. I don't use mines now as it is simply because I hate buying them from the shop. But if all I had to do was tap an icon and pay to rearm them. I'd use traps constantly.

 

I also wish we could level up traps. And that's only possible if they are permanent fixtures. Unless they retained their level when returned to the shop.

 

In my humble opinion the mines should have to be replaced and not just repaired as if you think about it in reality mines would not just be repaired as they are destroyed when activated. That said I don't think it should need a builder to redo the mines and they should just be bought and not built. Maybe have a scurvy or slave created to sort the mines out rather than one of the limited number of builders.

 

Bar wench can haul a mine

 

I stopped using them as well. Some form of protest I guess. Too annoying to go in and buy them 1 at a time.

 

This is interesting to me because it's very rare that I find an enemy island that uses traps