http://forums.earthempires.com/Forum.php?threadid=26672

nothing we asked for in primary

Primary doesn't reset for like a month!

My plan is to remove Off allies though.

I think that would be a good change. How about fixing the harmful ops success rate too? At least make it somewhat defensible if you get your SPAL to a respectable level and have more spies than the attacker. Right now people are helpless against it.

Give up, they are not gonna change anything we have requested. I dont see how any of the intended changes affect Primary at all, the changes are designed and made by what happened in 1a the previous set. We just gotta adapt Primary with changes intended for 1a.

Requested/required Primary changes (in order)...

Remove Off Allies
Add steal tech to the list of harmful spy ops restricted by GDI membership.
Remove/restructure tech allies

Thoughts on restructuring tech allies? That's something I wouldn't mind doing for all servers anyway....

Xinhuan had an idea, but it seemed to focus it too much on techers in my mind... his was to make it so that your TPT gains 1/10th of your research allies TPT....

Something like that or the other solutions that have been pitched are the only way to do it, really... If you don't tether research alliances to doing actual research, it can always be abused. Maybe this is something only suitable for the solo servers if giving free tech is a clan strategy you want to protect, or maybe it's fine to apply everywhere.

Yes, a solution like this will prevent arrangements like trading a massive def ally for tech, but honestly, fair exchanges in that vein are pretty uncommon and it's worth cutting them loose if it will prevent freeloading.

Right; but it really becomes a strat-specific pact then; if we could make it so techers could use it for TPT and indies/farmers/cashers/oilers could use it for production, then that would seem more balanced...

Isn't it more or less entirely strat-specific now...? Techers only give research allies to other techers if they know what they're doing.

that's true

That is the only thing that levels the playing field for small countries.

Cheers
Qazulight

BigBen had a better idea, and that is the TPT gained from your allies should be the current formula, multiplied by your Labs%. To paraphrase:

Tech gained from tech ally *= (Labs/Acres);

This will prevent leeching completely, and keep it the way it currently works.

we're discussing revamping some of the spy ops in general.

That's exactly how it should be on solo servers Xin.

This is a really elegant and simple solution, though it makes tech starts a bit more difficult to 'get right' (which is a minor thing really...). It would be impossible to get the full 10% though, given that you're always going to have CS and/or indies - this may not matter much.



I also like this idea - just keep it as above, where you gain 10% of whatever your ally is producing, restricted by the number of {production bldg}/total acres = %

Yeah, my original idea is that your own TPT is boosted by 10% of your allies TPT (that 10% TPT gain cannot be more than 10% of your own TPT, so it caps at 30% of your own TPT for hsving 3 tech allies).

This means you actually need to spend turns as a techer (and tech) to gain any benefit from tech allies.

Both ideas are equally workable.