Quote Originally Posted by Zebastian View Post
I am reposting this in this thread because I think its a very important issue and it might not be seen in the gigantic complaining thread :-)

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Hi Dave

I haven't seen the biggest problem this fix has created addressed yet. The fact that it has changed defence in a major way. The ability to move troops out when under attack and online to defend is a crucial part of gameplay.

Previously... when under attack... a player could move troops out and set up a proper defence to have a long and drawn out battle (this is a war game yes?) Now... if a player has 2 mill cav and 500k phracts in their city and is under attack, they will have to truce, port, holiday or stay with gates closed to save their troops because they can't be moved out. Where's the fun in that for anyone? If they want to set up mech defence... it is now virtually impossible unless they have another city within a few miles of the one being attacked.

If they want to save any troops at all and store them in a valley... they can only save 1 million ( a very VERY small number by today's standards) and then lose all ability to stage a counter attack because all rally spots are full.

This change has completely changed the way defence works in this game... and not for the better.

Why can't the exploits have been fixed by just asigning the correct times and food consumption to travel times between valleys? Instead of crippling defence?

People will get used to not having the exploits but the defence issue is going to be very very hard to get around.
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Quote Originally Posted by davemata View Post

Good call, I missed it.

You mentioned, "virtually impossible unless..." fixing this exploit does mean some previously established strategies will have to change. In high school I was taught naval strategy in WW2 - no longer relevant due to changes. This is a comparable situation, you know a strategy which is now obsolete, and a new one will rise in its stead.

Defense was not crippled. One strategy is now obsolete because we fixed a bug. Initially we had intended for valleys to be hot spots where wars played out before an attacker got to a defender's city. Now in the current status quo a player will send an attack directly to another's city, where the defender will open gates, and it starts a troop v. troop war. It becomes more difficult to self reinforce, but it doesn't change the fundamentals of defense - the city's garrison defends from attack.
I'm very glad the altered defense strategy that this causes was brought up. And Dave, I would love to hear your explaination of how the defense is not crippled. The only defense that I am aware of when a mech wave is coming is two part:
1. Pull the layers from your city
2. have mech of your own in the city

Now, both parts of that defense used the so called "exploit". When someone ports a city next to you and sends a mech wave there isn't enough time to get your million warriors and 500k swords to your other city...only option is to reo them to the closest valley. Now that can't be done. The second part of that strategy is having mechs in the city. Without having the fast transfer rate that the valley "exploit" gave us there is no way possible to get your own mechs to the city fast enough when someone ports withing a couple miles of you and sends in their mech.