Examining "the 10 Square Rule" as a cause of war

I think the 10 sq is used as a default because it is built into the mechanics of the game with tenaril and exodus. I'm sort of indifferent to it myself, as personally I'm comfortable with seven, and have allowed settlements a bit closer than that in certain cases. If no policy is posted on another alliances profile specifying their policy I don't feel bound by this "rule" at all, but won't place anything closer than seven.

Le Roux wrote: Hah !  Everything that Epi is opposed to causes players to quit !

Epidemic wrote: A lot more active players would quit this game if the 10 sq rule was taken away. All who would be left are part-timers who never bother to open the world map and huggers...

I don't really see the problem with asking people if you can move to a spot. I always say yes when people ask me unless they want to move to an exact square I already had plans for which is rare. And most people I have asked have allowed me to move less than 10 away to them (yes, this includes people from both sides of the current war who have happily agreed to have a city move closer to them). I have made a fair amount of friendly acquaintances from these types of polite emails. If someone moves closer than 10 without asking me, it annoys me a bit, and I tend to warn them that they should ask in the future and mention which spots I plan to sov, but I am rarely aggressive about it.

Obviously some people are less forgiving than me... but the exact same problems would happen with a 8 square rule or any other rule.. In my experience people who don't ask first are just as likely to move 3 away as 8 away... normally new players who just don't have a good sense of how illy works or the occasional rude player who just can't be bothered.

And if there weren't any 'rules' (meaning guidelines that much of the illy community agrees to abide by) there would be even more conflicts because people would snitch spots without ever asking and it would be hard to plan ahead in your region.

I agree 10 squares seems a bit arbitrary at first and perhaps larger than is really necessary for things like sov. On the other hand, it agrees with the 100 percent official built-in rules about how exodus and teleport works... which makes it pretty convenient and actually less arbitrary than making it some other number. I would be fine with the rule-of-thumb changing but after playing illy for awhile I have been pretty won-over to the side of thinking that the current 10 square rule does more good than bad. Like any rule it is meant to stop trouble but can of course still occasionally cause trouble if not everyone agrees with the rule.

Edited by Alcie - 01 Mar 2014 at 22:29

seems the title of the topic is a misnomer, then. more aptly "Examining the 10 Square Rule as a cause of anxiety".

i've come to appreciate the ten square rule, though it wasn't my favourite when it began. if this seems to generate a lot of controversy, i'll consider an opposing topic entitled "how i learned to stop worrying and love the ten square rule".