Rare Res and their Armies

 

I'm really glad those with the power have a chance to use it on something worthwhile now, since it adds such a more exciting dynamic to the game. When we create concrete, absolute rules like "first come, first serve" and "everyone should get a piece of the pie," the game becomes nothing but monotony, luck, and a heaping helping of whining. Since real lives and livelihoods are not in danger here, and in most cases neither are the cities people have been building for months or years, I see no problem in accepting that "might makes right."

 

Let's say a player twice your size claims a rare herb spot and kills your harvesters in the process, even though you were there first. Why do you deserve it? Because you saw it first? What about the amount of time and dedication that player put in to grow his armies and cities so that he/she could possess the power to lay claim to such spot? Does that take a backseat to you happening to see the spot on the map first, a factor which measures nothing other than chance and perhaps a little diligence?

 

As someone mentioned earlier, communication is key. Here's an example of a situation that occured today. I spotter a rare herb spot unguarded, about 8 or so squares from another player. I greatly desired to harvest the spot, as the rare herbs around my gatherer city were all strongly protected and I'm in no position to even barter with the behemoths around it. Before sending an army, however, I messaged the nearby player asking if he/she was planning to harvest there, and if not, could I occupy and harvest it? I got a reply back thanking me for the contact, and that I was free to harvest. Lucky me! I promptly threw together a few charioteers to race to the spot and occupy until my herbalists made it.

 

Unfortunately, when I logged on later today, I was notified that my soldiers had slaughters some poor gatherers who apparently had been sent out and moved onto the spot between the time when I sent my troops and when they arrived. I decided the best thing to do was send the player an apology message. Lo and behold, the player responded, thanked me for the notice, and said he/she didn't even notice anything had happened, recognized that it was accidental, and that was that.

 

Once I'm big enough to have a decent army, I would love to engage in some friendly competition, premeditated and organized, with my neighbors for the rare spots. I would also like to test out some shared harvesting systems where we take turns owning the spot and harvesting, perhaps on a weekly basis. Overall I'm very happy with all the updates and the fact that it seems to have stirred the denizens of Illy a little.

How long has your city been there?  If your city popped up next to someone else's harvest spot, should they automatically be expected to yield it?

I don't know the answer to this, btw, it is a difficult question.  On the one hand, newer players need a chance to grow.  On the other hand, existing players should not always be expected to automatically yield.  Personally I think a sharing arrangement would be ideal, but not everyone is going to agree with that either.

This happened to one of the spots I was harvesting.  The city didn't pop up there but was settled next to a plot I was harvesting about 2 weeks after harvesting started.  When the new guy bumped my cotter, I offered to share with the new guy (I actually gave him three choices, bump each other, fight or share).

His reply was a befuddled sorry, I didn't see your cotter and an offer to send me herbs and minerals.  I really didn't want his stuff, just some way to share that plot if he was interested in it.  I didn't reply and he hasn't bothered my cotters since.

I agree, new people should be given a chance.  If they are smart, they will offer to harvest for the bigger player and just send the bigger guy some sort of split of the herbs/minerals.  If they are not smart, they'll cede the location or try to fight for it.  With how the harvesting is set up there is plenty of opportunity for compromise.  I can only send 1 cotter to that spot but it could probably support 4 full time...

i dunno about this topic, but growing a large army and keep pop rising is a tad bit difficult.....

about newbies... and taking what is theirs and so on..

here, newbies have not to worry about aggression and are granted a safe growth, whit no fear of annihilation. a historical event in MMO. 

now, demanding minerals is a whole other story.. you can claim those in virtue of your vital space and the so called 10 square rule. 

but any rare resource should not be confused with basic minerals, basic herbs. those IMO are exactly what newbies should focus on. there is a time for the shininess later on.  cause, dear newbie, rares are more easy for advanced players to get compared to basics, this makes the idea a newbie is meddling around with ..say miners guild kinda infuriating.. new players with less than 4 towns should not even think about advanced resources, they should think to expand and get sound towns and a buck trough cotters. . .  

i think no one should man a basic resource plot ( maybe hides and wine) cause those are not really worth defending. 

Certainly, if it were that simple then no, I don't believe the community would bestow on the smaller player an inherent right.  But there are other scenarios I could conceive.  If a smaller player has been working the plot for a few weeks and if he/she has put forth the effort to build the infrastructure to pull the material from Elgea, would the community look on it as "fair" for a big player to send a larger army and claim the resource?  How about the scenario where it's the big player sitting on the resource doing nothing with it (that's happening right now) after taking it from the little player?

Certainly there are different scenarios.  It's a game, so really I don't believe there is an absolute "right" and "wrong".  I am convinced that there is a right and wrong for this community and it may not come down to a simple "might makes right" contest between the two claimants.  There may be a bigger force that decides otherwise.  It happens here and that's all I'm saying.