My thoughts

[Ambroscus Koth]

One suggestion I've been harping in favor of is randomizing the update order entirely; no concrete update order, no split-second triggering, script-aided or otherwise. I'm sure there are some negatives that I haven't thought of though.

Absolutely opposed to this until Estimated Update Times. After that, not sure.

[Severisen]

I suspect Reppy meant people writing scripts that aren't what they purport to be. If you mean "acquiring" passwords as in hacking or whatever, then that's already against the rules and strictly enforced. If you mean me putting a random sleeper into the world and asking for your password? That's not really subterfuge, that's good Gameplay and sloppy security, in my opinion. How does one differentiate between a genuinely interested would-be-native from a raider?

And agreed with Koth.


Edit: Raiders aren't the only ones using scripts... if you believe that, you've got blinders on

[Mirarea]

After this, the question is what else are the mods and admins willing to do in order to forcefully balance the R/D game?

It sounds like they could go further than estimated update times and update randomizing.

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

I'm curious what changes people think would help stymie or otherwise reduce the value of scripts in R/D. Besides the Estimated Update Timer update (which last I checked, is coming a lot sooner than you might think,) what else would help reduce the mechanical and therefore very script-heavy element of raiding and force it into a more level playing field where subterfuge and stealth are of greater value than precise update times? One suggestion I've been harping in favor of is randomizing the update order entirely; no concrete update order, no split-second triggering, script-aided or otherwise. I'm sure there are some negatives that I haven't thought of though.

At risk of getting too technical: the only thing that will significant cut script usage is to make scripts obsolote: either by providing a comperable service or by killing the purpose. Without randomization, estimated update times that are accurate to the second will cut script usage. Estimated update times that could be 5-10 seconds off will not. Randomizing update order would kill tagging for the sake of making raids a lot harder but librations near impossible, make things even more of a straight numbers game, and while cutting out update time scripts would probably increase ones that track nations in order to help maintain watch on an occupation. Unless the view has changed, last thing we heard from staff was that they didn't want to kill tagging- if they did, there'd have been many an easy chance to before.

On the timeliness of estimated update times: In replying to my thread in technical, ballo seemed to sound like he wasn't too far off; that said we haven't yet seen step one of the two step process he mentioned there where an api shard drops first before the timers are complete.

Reference: viewtopic.php?p=27783306#p27783306

Please Excuse typos, writing from mobile in airport.

[Flanderlion]

After this, the question is what else are the mods and admins willing to do in order to forcefully balance the R/D game?

It sounds like they could go further than estimated update times and update randomizing.

The update randomisation (of blocks, and the order of the blocks etc. or however they do it to make it impossible to predict via scripts better than the game tells us) etc. is part of the estimated update times, part of the R/D summit which was aimed to level the playing field, not imbalance it in one way as some kind of petty revenge. Everything a raider loses on the surface, they gain underneath. Anything preventing a region being raided is easily turned around through the use of sleepers etc. to make a region impregnable. Anything to make a region easier to liberate makes it easier to take a region in the first place. Balancing R/D is a nightmare, and admins only have limited time.

I'm looking forward to the Estimated Update Times, although I don't think it will change the face of R/D overnight. There will be the few weeks of adjustions like with every minor or significant update, but after that, everything will be similar, hopefully without having to use third party scripts for an advantage. If there is a way to get the region update order, someone will, and it'll be back to scripts.

I think tagging wise they are leaning more towards ditching it, especially after Cora, the biggest proponent of it is now DOS. I think making update time scripts obsolete, through randomisation (I love that word) etc, and Ballo said last night that it had gone from the back burner before to full steam ahead currently, so I expect to see it reasonably soon. Especially as Reppy dropped a 'subtle' hint above.

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

To expand briefly while at the gate: with randomization and without good times, defenders May have up to an hour and a half to respond to an attempted raid. However raiders still have the planning advantage and will probably win that numbers game in most cases, as well as employ more dedicated sleepers to further make that difficult. Once there is an actively defending raider delegate and some RO's too maybe, defenders will have next to no shot at a lib, as they can't jump close and anyone who moves will be ejected, and even attrition runs become near impossible since it's hard to get any number of people to update in the region even without the ability to move in right before update. The only reliable operation for a liberation would be large scale proliferation of defender sleepers, which iirc some are against, or larger raider infiltration to the level of gaining an RO slot. I don't think I'm being extreme in saying that unpredictable updates would affect defenders far more adversely than it would raiders.

[Klaus Devestatorie]

I'm curious what changes people think would help stymie or otherwise reduce the value of scripts in R/D. Besides the Estimated Update Timer update (which last I checked, is coming a lot sooner than you might think,) what else would help reduce the mechanical and therefore very script-heavy element of raiding and force it into a more level playing field where subterfuge and stealth are of greater value than precise update times? One suggestion I've been harping in favor of is randomizing the update order entirely; no concrete update order, no split-second triggering, script-aided or otherwise. I'm sure there are some negatives that I haven't thought of though.

Estimated Update Timer will only matter if it's either a; more accurate than the scripts, or b; people are simultaneously blocked from using the data in the regional data dump as well.

[Cormactopia II]

Another way that update randomization could negatively impact R/D -- and especially defenders -- is that late updating jump point regions would no longer be useful. This would certainly pose a problem for tag raider switchers, but for raiders more interested in stealth raids it would be less significant, and it would be extremely problematic for the storage of defender switchers.

That's in addition to the problem Souls and others have noted, that update randomization will also have the effect of making liberations much more difficult.

[Aurum Rider]

Unless the update order is randomized every day, or the EUT addition is accurate, there will be no reason to ditch scripts. The reason being that we can hone our tools to be more accurate, but we can't make the times the site provides any more accurate.

As for removing API data to make scripts less viable, they'd have to sort the data dump alphabetically or randomize it, which would probably be more work than it's worth, or they could remove the world happenings shard entirely, which would inconvenience more than just raiders.

The only way to kill scripts is to eithe render them obsolete (by making times completely random), remove the data they rely on (remove the happenings shard), offer something better than them (estimated times accurate within 5s), or start banning everyone who uses them.

[Flanderlion]

I'm curious what changes people think would help stymie or otherwise reduce the value of scripts in R/D. Besides the Estimated Update Timer update (which last I checked, is coming a lot sooner than you might think,) what else would help reduce the mechanical and therefore very script-heavy element of raiding and force it into a more level playing field where subterfuge and stealth are of greater value than precise update times? One suggestion I've been harping in favor of is randomizing the update order entirely; no concrete update order, no split-second triggering, script-aided or otherwise. I'm sure there are some negatives that I haven't thought of though.

Estimated Update Timer will only matter if it's either a; more accurate than the scripts, or b; people are simultaneously blocked from using the data in the regional data dump as well.

Randomising the update orders each update would make the estimated times more accurate than scripts. I'm not sure what time they said in the original thread, or if it has changed, I remember 10-15 seconds from something, but it could be something completely separate.

viewtopic.php?p=16342806#p16342806 - think this is still the general idea, randomising every update. I'm not sure if they're going to keep the same general order or not, and I'm not too precious.

[ChingisOtchigin]

After this, the question is what else are the mods and admins willing to do in order to forcefully balance the R/D game?

Yeah, I've been meaning to ask this for ages. After all, when are raiders gonna get the benefit of only having to jump inside a 10 second window, and not have to worry about anything bar that?

[Tim-Opolis]

One suggestion I've been harping in favor of is randomizing the update order entirely; no concrete update order, no split-second triggering, script-aided or otherwise. I'm sure there are some negatives that I haven't thought of though.

Honestly, full support. With how incredibly scripted the invader side of things has become, this seems to be one of the most effective ways in preventing it. As we've seen in this thread from Severisen's posts, it's been less than a week and invaders are already working on a legal version of Predator, which will allow them to once again basically automate any preparations they have to put into their runs. I'm sure that by trying harder and innovating a little bit they'll still be able to find an effective way to continue their invasions, and it'll add some serious balance to a game that's being continuously unbalance by their scripting efforts.

In regards to jump points, both sides have extensive experience in employing IJPs (Instant Jump Points), those being regions founded during update therefore ensuring that they don't update on that update. With the removal of tag raiding that we could anticipate a full randomization of update order will cause, we won't have much reason to keep storage regions of 50+ switchers each anyway. We'll only need 5 nations tops, perhaps, and that would easily be manageable.

[Knot II]

Full support, providing we use the defender argument of "boo-scripts-and-hooray-for-skill" and also remove the hard ejection rate limit of one nation per second in order to allow for greater variation depending on the ability of the individual delegate. Feel free to keep the limit or impose a harsher one on Border Control Officers, but delegates should be allowed to fully utilize the powers bestowed to them upon their legal election.

[ChingisOtchigin]

But muh tagging....

[Severisen]

Full support, providing we use the defender argument of "boo-scripts-and-hooray-for-skill" and also remove the hard ejection rate limit of one nation per second in order to allow for greater variation depending on the ability of the individual delegate. Feel free to keep the limit or impose a harsher one on Border Control Officers, but delegates should be allowed to fully utilize the powers bestowed to them upon their legal election.

I have to agree. If we're going to have the window of uncertainty mentioned in the GP Summit Change #7, it becomes a pure numbers game with regards to liberations... and less so for raids. On one hand, raids won't normally meet an active native delegate/RO that is capable of ejecting at the limit speed anyway.

On the other, a Liberation can become a near guarantee with this proposal. Say the window is 20 seconds long, that means that the liberating forces know that at worst the invader delegate can eject exactly up to 20-25 (20 seconds for the window, 5 seconds before the window) nations, and no more. That's if they jump 5 seconds before the beginning of the window and have the unfortunate luck of getting the full window. Say it becomes 10 seconds instead, this means the invader delegate will have 15 seconds to eject the 15 nations. If Defenders bring 16, they get the win, regardless of the Invader's skill at banjection. Now, they know how many they need, they know what the worst case scenario is in terms of window time, it becomes a pure numbers game at that point.

[The old wildlife pen pal]

I have to agree. If we're going to have the window of uncertainty mentioned in the GP Summit Change #7, it becomes a pure numbers game with regards to liberations... and less so for raids. On one hand, raids won't normally meet an active native delegate/RO that is capable of ejecting at the limit speed anyway.

On the other, a Liberation can become a near guarantee with this proposal. Say the window is 20 seconds long, that means that the liberating forces know that at worst the invader delegate can eject exactly up to 20-25 (20 seconds for the window, 5 seconds before the window) nations, and no more. That's if they jump 5 seconds before the beginning of the window and have the unfortunate luck of getting the full window. Say it becomes 10 seconds instead, this means the invader delegate will have 15 seconds to eject the 15 nations. If Defenders bring 16, they get the win, regardless of the Invader's skill at banjection. Now, they know how many they need, they know what the worst case scenario is in terms of window time, it becomes a pure numbers game at that point.

How is that any different to now? I'll give you a clue: it's not - it's just that you can more clearly see the top end number.

[The Bruce]

To expand briefly while at the gate: with randomization and without good times, defenders May have up to an hour and a half to respond to an attempted raid. However raiders still have the planning advantage and will probably win that numbers game in most cases, as well as employ more dedicated sleepers to further make that difficult.

This would certainly create a lot more actual "Gameplay" than arriving within seconds of the update and coming to the Gameplay forum to gloat about it. Anything that creates less "scriptplay" and more "gameplay" would be a vast improvement on the state of the R/D game as it currently exists. There's a reason why events, like the Zombie Apocalypse, are very popular. They aren't over in less than ten seconds.

[The Blaatschapen]

To expand briefly while at the gate: with randomization and without good times, defenders May have up to an hour and a half to respond to an attempted raid. However raiders still have the planning advantage and will probably win that numbers game in most cases, as well as employ more dedicated sleepers to further make that difficult.

This would certainly create a lot more actual "Gameplay" than arriving within seconds of the update and coming to the Gameplay forum to gloat about it. Anything that creates less "scriptplay" and more "gameplay" would be a vast improvement on the state of the R/D game as it currently exists. There's a reason why events, like the Zombie Apocalypse, are very popular. They aren't over in less than ten seconds.

Gameplay is like sex; it is more fun when it lasts longer than 10 seconds.

[Western Pacific Territories]

This would certainly create a lot more actual "Gameplay" than arriving within seconds of the update and coming to the Gameplay forum to gloat about it. Anything that creates less "scriptplay" and more "gameplay" would be a vast improvement on the state of the R/D game as it currently exists. There's a reason why events, like the Zombie Apocalypse, are very popular. They aren't over in less than ten seconds.

Gameplay is like sex; it is more fun when it lasts longer than 10 seconds.

And how would you know what that's like?

Anyways, can someone give me a TL;DR of this?

[North Arkana]

Gameplay is like sex; it is more fun when it lasts longer than 10 seconds.

And how would you know what that's like?

Anyways, can someone give me a TL;DR of this?

Dude... It's like... Sheep man... Don't question it...
*exhales smoke*
*coughs and hacks horridly*
Never... Doing that... Again...

[Severisen]

Is that why we go all update long, and sometimes for weeks at a time, Blaat?

[Ever-Wandering Souls]

To expand briefly while at the gate: with randomization and without good times, defenders May have up to an hour and a half to respond to an attempted raid. However raiders still have the planning advantage and will probably win that numbers game in most cases, as well as employ more dedicated sleepers to further make that difficult.

This would certainly create a lot more actual "Gameplay" than arriving within seconds of the update and coming to the Gameplay forum to gloat about it. Anything that creates less "scriptplay" and more "gameplay" would be a vast improvement on the state of the R/D game as it currently exists. There's a reason why events, like the Zombie Apocalypse, are very popular. They aren't over in less than ten seconds.

Sure, but I feel it'd be gameplay heavily in favor of raiders. We have weeks to get as many people on to jump at the start of update that we want. Defenders then have an unknown about of time between zero and 90ish minutes to frantically rally as many people as they can. If natives come online, it gets even messier - they'll be getting yelled at by both sides about who is a raider and who is a defender and who they should eject, all while the RMB likely fills up. That may not be as big as it sounds, you'd think it'd be easy to point out that one group is endorsing the native delegate and one group is not, but I've been in similar situations before (notable one with Neph versus rifty) where that basic logic didn't come very easily. If raiders have a good sleeper, it's again very helpful (gameplay, preplanning helps, but more so on the R side), both in terms of a word in the conversation about who to back, and if it's got BC powers, in actively ejecting defender incomers.

....and at the end of the day, you're still just as limited to update as you were before. And I think to say raids last all of ten seconds is cutting things a little short to begin with. In the case of tags, where that's far closer to true, I'd look at it in terms of many chances to act, but limited to update. In the case of operation jumps, well then we open the door to liberations...which are still limited to updates, and usually only the first two in. With randomization without a timer, liberations would be exceptionable squashable, and with a timer - well, there's what Knot said.

If you really want to open things up to more time, I'd recommend going to technical and checking out the "kill updates" thread, to read why that's getting shot down.

[Souseiseki]

This would certainly create a lot more actual "Gameplay" than arriving within seconds of the update and coming to the Gameplay forum to gloat about it. Anything that creates less "scriptplay" and more "gameplay" would be a vast improvement on the state of the R/D game as it currently exists. There's a reason why events, like the Zombie Apocalypse, are very popular. They aren't over in less than ten seconds.

Gameplay is like sex; it is more fun when it lasts longer than 10 seconds.

Gameplay is like sex; it's no fun when someone breaks into your room in the middle of the night and forces it.

How's that for a poor, heavy-handed comparison?

[Crazy girl]

Gameplay is like sex; it is more fun when it lasts longer than 10 seconds.

Gameplay is like sex; it's no fun when someone breaks into your room in the middle of the night and forces it.

How's that for a poor, heavy-handed comparison?

*** Warned for trolling ***

[Souseiseki]

Gameplay is like sex; it's no fun when someone breaks into your room in the middle of the night and forces it.

How's that for a poor, heavy-handed comparison?

*** Warned for trolling ***

I will accept I made a mistake in posting without thoroughly reading the sticky in the hopes this will not be interpreted as purely malicious when considering my history in future.