I wanted to ask the developers, how hard would it be to open up a new server?

All the best,

Duran

I personally like the one server idea.

I can see your point with the speed but this is something I also love about this game.

Playing through the whole day.

That would be great.

The only think that makes me worry is about the people.

What if they get separate between these two servers and in the end non of them is active enough?

These are just my concerns.

One thing I would enjoy is an Illy classic server without a lot of the innovations like hunting and crafting and the newer buildings. Those are fun, but there is something to be said for the simplicity of one building slot for each building and the crash of troop vs. troop without worrying about equipment or elite divisions.

/me faints

Land Claims here, Mass stack piles there...The city size limit increase making it impossible for me to even engage with any notable player after a WHOLE year of building up.

By playing, all I seem to do is irate old players, give them little content.. then they just wipe me out. 

How long do you have to play? or how much IRL money should one commit just to play a little game?

I expect all veterans and old accounts to have massive advantages. But not to the point where they can wipe me out up a Montanan, behind a wall with 100,000's bloody spear units from a single city. Strategy!?!?! 

Most players who pick this up, do simply not have that ability to become instantly competitive in this game where 10+ years have passed and players who all of a sudden want to become militarily involved with their hoards of gear and tons of gold to run negative upkeeps. It does make it unfair to the player who is typically starting illyriad off. I do hope the developers find a way to fix that issue. 

One of the things they did bring up at illycon as an idea was the removal of account limits. At the time, I was against this, but over recent years I've found myself more and more in favour of it.

Allowing many accounts has several benefits:

-It rewards activity. It takes a lot of effort to build up multiple accounts and then maintain them. It'd decrease the ingrained advantage held by semi inactive players.

-Could break the current stalemate that the wars find themselves in, while also increasing the potential for infiltration tactics and close range warfare. Many who may not want to be publicly associated with war could give it a shot on burner accounts.

-It removes the advantage given to those who are currently breaking the rules. It's hardly a secret that there are people multiaccounting, and the only reason why that is a problem is because it is against the rules. 

-It could potentially shake up the diplomatic side of things. I wonder how many people would take the opportunity to have anonymous accounts to cause 'friction'. 

The main negatives? It could lead to overcrowding. It would ruin the terra market.

Yes, old players have an advantage. It is a lot less then people think though. If you know what you are doing and put in the work it is easy and fast to catch up. The main problem in my opinion is that Illyriad is a complex game that needs a lot of understanding and optimization - and most people play it like a mobile game, as in "login once a day, build/queue anything, log off".

I got to 100 cities in less than 3 years - with buying 90% of the Prestige with gold. I made a lot of mistakes - i think that i could do it in 2 years without buying any Prestige with real money. I got to rank 1 in around 3 years. The ranking advantages are a lot bigger - as most of the ranking categories are a long grind and not that easy to "cheat".

My point: Yes there is an advantage. If you know what you are doing its fast and kinda easy to catch up.

eowan the short wrote: One of the things they did bring up at illycon as an idea was the removal of account limits. At the time, I was against this, but over recent years I've found myself more and more in favour of it.

Thats in my opinion a horrible idea. Do you really want Quentin and me to have 10 (or even 100 accounts) with 50 cities each? We are already a huge influence on the economy and tournaments - that would make it a lot worse. Would be fun for me though ... ;)

The current system already rewards activity. Get more cities, get more power. Optimize your cities and you get more power. Thats enough work - more accounts wouldn't really make a big difference. There are only 3 accounts with 50+ cities, 8 with 40+ cities, 26 with 30+ cities and 126 with 20+ cities. There is a lot of power the gain and stuff people can (and should) still do! Isn't it better to have 2 accounts with 40 cities each than 8 with 10 cities each?

If you want more/better PVP then a) get more (PVP) players and b) fix the combat system. Anything else isn't really going to change anything in my opinion. Other than that, i do think there are a lot of interesting and different ways to play Illy. Most other games do not have them - why try to improve something that most other games are already have and are good at?

Sure, provided that I could have 5 or 10 times as many with 6-7 towns each with their tenarils. Unlimited accounts could easily lead to the end of the super-large account, beyond the currently existing ones because if you want 100 cities, it's easier to make a lot of mid-sized accounts than a few huge ones imo.

In tourneys, I could swarm squares with accounts and if I lose a few? Who cares, plenty more eowans ready to take up arms in service of whatever whim currently takes my fancy.

As for the economy? I mean, sure, you can produce a lot, but it'd also be possible for me to produce a lot with swarms of mid-sized accounts. 

Tbh, the same logic with oversized individual power applies to the increase above  the previous 10 town maximum. At least this way, said concentration of power can be rivalled by new players relatively quickly through activity intensive build up. In addition to this, power becomes less brittle- losing a town for a large player would no longer bring with it the prospect of a large rebuilding campaign. Could help nudge people into PvP.

I don't see your point about 8 accounts at 10 towns being worse than 2 at 40. I'd much rather have 8 at 10 due to flexibility, increased tenarilling / exodus / rebuilding capabilities, and increased alliance networking. That's an aspect of play that could come out in a many account game. Two diverging strategies; do you go for a few super-sized accounts or a swarm of mid-sized?

I agree, a fix to the combat system would be good, but the thing is an overhaul there is labour intensive. Gotta shoot for stuff that's possible- they're still fixing boar spears. All it would take for the many-account change is rewriting a few lines in the ToS. 

Alfred wrote: I stand by being militarily worthless with an 7 city account 80% troop boosted sov.

80% sov is..well... not that much. 300% is the standard for military players. 

Alfred wrote: I guess, rather than playing it, I should of just mooched off a training alliance and boomed my way up on 0% tax for months before capping the dropped accounts.

Yep, that's the way to do it.

Gold goes on buying more to grow.

The hard part is to get to 10 cities. After that its in my opinion almost linear up until ~35-40 cities - after that it gets harder. And really hard at 50+ cities.

eowan the short wrote: In tourneys, I could swarm squares with accounts and if I lose a few? Who cares, plenty more eowans ready to take up arms in service of whatever whim currently takes my fancy. As for the economy? I mean, sure, you can produce a lot, but it'd also be possible for me to produce a lot with swarms of mid-sized accounts.

That would be fun for you. But not for 95% of the playerbase.

eowan the short wrote: Tbh, the same logic with oversized individual power applies to the increase above  the previous 10 town maximum. At least this way, said concentration of power can be rivalled by new players relatively quickly through activity intensive build up.

I think you are missing the point. At the moment my "power" is limited by the maximum amount of cities. Without an account limit there isn't really a limit. And no, a new player cannot rival that power. Growth in Illyriad is exponential. The more "finished" cities you have the easier it gets to grow - as they produce a lot of resources and/or gold. I can get a city from 0 to 30k+ population in a day. A new player cannot really do that.

eowan the short wrote: In addition to this, power becomes less brittle- losing a town for a large player would no longer bring with it the prospect of a large rebuilding campaign. Could help nudge people into PvP

In my opinion the problem is that the players do not want to do PVP. When i have 40/50 cities - do i really care if i lose a few? No. I still have a lot and i am still powerful. I do not really need to change anything. On the other hand, if i have 10 cities and lose a few i  lose a lot of "power" and kinda have to rebuild.

eowan the short wrote: I don't see your point about 8 accounts at 10 towns being worse than 2 at 40. I'd much rather have 8 at 10 due to flexibility, increased tenarilling / exodus / rebuilding capabilities, and increased alliance networking. That's an aspect of play that could come out in a many account game. Two diverging strategies; do you go for a few super-sized accounts or a swarm of mid-sized?

The more accounts you have the harder it gets to organize and optimize them. Having a sheet of your 1000 cities that tell you what they do and are used to sounds like a really annoying system. Probably even more work outside of Illy needed instead of playing the game.

If you want to be efficient it is either grow or have military. As you said a mix of both does not really work well.

I do not really know what your problem was. But as far as i know TCol is a reasonable alliance. And yes, they have their land claim - but there is enough space for other players in the rest of Illy. And yes, you won't be able to fight a PVP alliance as a 7-city player. Not sure why you expect that?

Alfred wrote: I guess, rather than playing it, I should of just mooched off a training alliance and boomed my way up on 0% tax for months before capping the dropped accounts.

I built up 100 of my 102 cities from scratch. So no, you do not need the cap inactives to grow fast.

You do need a lot of resources though. An alliance (or an active hub) helps a lot there. That one of the points of an alliance though.

Other players would have the same tools at their disposal, and I imagine with the decreased value each individual account would have, localised skirmishes or even full blown wars could arise. Intense, close range battles over the areas of tourney squares.

THirion wrote: I think you are missing the point. At the moment my "power" is limited by the maximum amount of cities. Without an account limit there isn't really a limit. And no, a new player cannot rival that power. Growth in Illyriad is exponential. The more "finished" cities you have the easier it gets to grow - as they produce a lot of resources and/or gold. I can get a city from 0 to 30k+ population in a day. A new player cannot really do that.

You yourself make the point that managing many accounts would be cumbersome. Could a new player rival the theoretical power of a long standing many account player? No, but they would also never be able to rival the theoretical power of a long standing player in the current system without out-spending said player in prestige. Time is a very important factor in determining power in Illyriad. All other things being equal, I'd always bet on the older account due to the increased stockpiles of equipment they could have.

New players get a chance where there is inefficiency and complacency. Due to the higher level of activity that would be demanded by having multiple accounts, these chances would become more numerous under an unlimited account system.

Then, due to the increased military potential of having multiple accounts, a player could potentially perform a powerful surprise attack, catching the complacent player off guard. Tenarilling in 10-20 towns for multiple simultaneous sieges, while also using several anonymous accounts that were settled in key areas would probably be a good way of pulling off such a surprise attack.

Thirion wrote: In my opinion the problem is that the players do not want to do PVP. When i have 40/50 cities - do i really care if i lose a few? No. I still have a lot and i am still powerful. I do not really need to change anything. On the other hand, if i have 10 cities and lose a few i  lose a lot of "power" and kinda have to rebuild.

Of the accounts who have more than 30 towns, how many are pvp accounts? Tourneys don't count as there's a very low risk of losing towns there.

I'm willing to bet it's none.

RUM's got a couple, but I wouldn't really say they're a pvp alliance or have pvp players. They're a tourney alliance.

A fear of rebuilding is at least part of the reason for the lack of large pvp accounts. 

Another part is that pvp players who set out to be pvp focused probably don't have the city builder mindset. They don't want to have to spend 2-3 years building up, provided that they don't lose towns too often, so that they can then maybe be a strong military player until they lose towns in pvp and have to rebuild again. Oh, and when they're building up, their towns are going to be extremely vulnerable due to high food consumption and low military sov.

Terrain and resource distributions also likely play a part in it. The most powerful military accounts are often situated in high-military but low-food sov areas like deserts. They certainly wouldn't want to be near water as water tiles are useless for military sov, but they do have great growth potential.

And again, you like it. I to some extend like it. But as i said, in my experience most of the Illyriad playerbase does not like it.

eowan the short wrote: You yourself make the point that managing many accounts would be cumbersome. Could a new player rival the theoretical power of a long standing many account player? No, but they would also never be able to rival the theoretical power of a long standing player in the current system without out-spending said player in prestige. Time is a very important factor in determining power in Illyriad. All other things being equal, I'd always bet on the older account due to the increased stockpiles of equipment they could have. New players get a chance where there is inefficiency and complacency. Due to the higher level of activity that would be demanded by having multiple accounts, these chances would become more numerous under an unlimited account system. Then, due to the increased military potential of having multiple accounts, a player could potentially perform a powerful surprise attack, catching the complacent player off guard. Tenarilling in 10-20 towns for multiple simultaneous sieges, while also using several anonymous accounts that were settled in key areas would probably be a good way of pulling off such a surprise attack.

You do not seem to get the problem. At the moment after 2 years of "almost perfect" gameplay you are at the maximum power. Thus with "almost perfect" gameplay you can get to the same level as other players in 2-3 years. After 2 years of "almost perfect" gameplay you are at a point were you cannot increase your power by too much. You cannot get more cities. Yes, you can get more gear, but at some point thats not helping too much anyway (you do not need 10m+ terrain gear). Thus at the moment there is a hard cap on the advantage old players can get.

With an unlimited account number that cap is gone. In 5 years i could have 1000+ cities. In 10 years i could have 10+k cities. Thus in 10 years i could have an advantage of 12 years compared to new players. And it would be impossible to catch up - as i could still (exponentially) grow.

And yes, that is an extreme and theoretical case, the core point is still valid though for a realistic case.

With 1000/10k cities - do i really care if a new players surprises me with 10 cities and maybe capture/razes 10 cities?

eowan the short wrote: Of the accounts who have more than 30 towns, how many are pvp accounts? Tourneys don't count as there's a very low risk of losing towns there. I'm willing to bet it's none. RUM's got a couple, but I wouldn't really say they're a pvp alliance or have pvp players. They're a tourney alliance. A fear of rebuilding is at least part of the reason for the lack of large pvp accounts.  Another part is that pvp players who set out to be pvp focused probably don't have the city builder mindset. They don't want to have to spend 2-3 years building up, provided that they don't lose towns too often, so that they can then maybe be a strong military player until they lose towns in pvp and have to rebuild again. Oh, and when they're building up, their towns are going to be extremely vulnerable due to high food consumption and low military sov. Terrain and resource distributions also likely play a part in it. The most powerful military accounts are often situated in high-military but low-food sov areas like deserts. They certainly wouldn't want to be near water as water tiles are useless for military sov, but they do have great growth potential.

What does that have to do with the point i was trying to make?

I was trying to argue that the fear of losing a town is mostly irrational. Big players do prefer building and not PVP. PVP players prefer PVP and not building, thus they do not have many cities. In my opinion thats the reason why we have the current disparity. That does not mean though, that something else would be (a lot) better.

( South Park - World Of WarCraft Killing Boar's )

But as I said, if illy is doing well, then my petty concerns matter not :P

Illyriad is not a PVP game. It has a ton to offer, but not good PVP. And with the current military balance i do not think that its going to change.

This game is amazing for crafters, builders, tournament and "sandbox" players. With that it has its own identity. If you want to play an easy PVP RTS brower game chose one of the 100 other games that already exist. I have not found a browser game that has the depth of Illyriad. Why change that?

And no, you do not need to "meta farm" in this game. Find one of the areas you like (that is non-PVP) and you can play/participate from the beginning.

Alfred wrote: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbDcOjDP4C8 " rel="nofollow - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbDcOjDP4C8  ;( South Park - World Of WarCraft Killing Boar's ) That old clip sums up I feel 8)

That is not what happened though. To me it seems like you thought that after a year you could fight a whole PVP alliance that is playing/fighting for years alone (which should be never possible in a good game?). Do not be aggressive against any of the few PVP alliances and you can do whatever you want.

Of the accounts who have more than 30 towns, how many are pvp accounts? Tourneys don't count as there's a very low risk of losing towns there. I'm willing to bet it's none.

I think a new server would fit this game immensely. Especially if there’s a way to do so with keeping the current one in its state. 

Hiei

I think a second server could be possible as a temporary one, maybe with a victory condition. Probably 3x or 5x speed and production. I think a second permanent server isn't in the cards but a revolving temporary one could be the ticket for fresh starts and more adrenaline.