Best Of

I have really enjoyed playing this game.  I'm not one for constantly reading the forums and posting since I'd rather be playing, but in this case I'm making an exception.  As I said, I have really enjoyed the game, until now.  I posted on the facebook game page about how the Diplomacy feature was impacting the game in a negative way and was encouraged to see a response that the upcoming changes would make me very happy.  Now I'm thinking that was a joke, right?  And the joke is on me!  I'm not going to rant and threaten because that gets players nowhere.  I've played these types of games for years, starting with Everquest.  I know making money is what drives the continued development of a game.  However, in this case, you have just handed this game to the deep pockets and run everyone else off.  I logged in last night hoping that what I was reading was just an exaggeration by players that like to play at 100 mph 100% of the time.  I was so disappointed to discover they were right.  I have thrown tons of time and resources into research, only to discover that my 9 min 40 sec recruit time for 140 troops is now in outer space!  Healing time on these same troops is +23 minutes.  I finally came to accept the increase repair times on my castle burning and thought, well, it won't be so bad.  WRONG!  I had no longer completely repaired my castle for the first time in a week, had my defenses at 1.50M and along comes one of the french alliances on my server.  This player was 10 levels lower with half the attack of my defense.  Oh no problem I thought.  WRONG!  8 battles later, with support from another alliance member, my castle is again burning.  Why?  because, even though we were successful at defending for 5 of the 8 battles, we were now out of troops.  They were all kicking back in the hospital.  This guy just kept buying troops with gems and coming back until he eventually won.  So the change has done nothing to slow down these types of players and has done everything to completely cripple the "average" player.  I do buy gems when I have a little extra money to do so.  I won't be anymore since the only person it benefits are the players with the deep pockets!  It gives them even more opportunities to gain from hitting me after all my hard work.

My suggestions that I posted on facebook,  I thought were fair to all players.  During the war, once a castle is engaged in a war with another alliance, the "shield of piece" would be extended so that no outside players can attack that castle for the duration of the war.  The duration needs to be reduced to 36 hours.  Anything else is way too long and expensive.  As for honor/fear loss-It seriously needs to be reduced!  It wasn't so hard to make up the loss when my honor level was 5 or 6, but at 15, it takes several battles just to keep what I had prior to the honor loss.  Then it takes several more to add to it.  At over 1 million honor, the loss is very noticeable and discouraging.  Now with the increased attack times and healing/recruiting times, in addition to the increased repair times dumped on already long building times, there really isn't any point in playing the game at all.  Why would I want to spend hours online staring at my monitor while I watch countdown timers on buildings and troops?  Isn't that equivalent to watching paint dry?  That is what the game has been reduced to.  I also think that if higher level players attack players that are too much lower than them and lose honor, the same should go for lower level players attacking higher level players way above them.  This is what we experience all the time with the deep pocket players.  A level 19 should not be able to burn a level 31 castle.  That level 19 shouldn't even be capable of creating a big enough army to do so in the first place, but if they do, they should lose honor for attacking a player that much higher above them.  It would also be very nice if the quest and tournament troop awards were adjusted according to player level.  At level 31, I have no need for level 1 bowmen.  I would greatly appreciate level 3 or 4 bowmen though.  On the opposite side, a level 12 or so, shouldn't be getting level 5 troops from the alliance tourney rewards.  All those rewards should be according to the player level.  Besides, everyone knows that the level 5 and up troops are "throw away" for most of us because they take a ton of gems to heal and are expensive to feed.  Those boys are pigs when it comes to food!  I use them if we have a large target we are attacking as a team knowing they will be a one time attack troop or keep them in my castle for defense for the same reason.

I truly hope to see the recent changes reversed and a lot more consideration being given to player input.  These changes need to be readjusted very soon as so many people have already given up and moved on to another game.  I would like to say I'm being patient and waiting to see but I too won't wait for long after what I experienced last night.