Mar 27th 2024, 12:01:26
I'm of the opinion that the most disappointing thing to happen in the game (besides the player count plummeting) is the culture shift many years ago that implies the two have to be separate. I feel clan servers are already mostly designed to accomplish the goal being suggested by simply allowing large group cooperation - players changed the meta themselves. At some point attacking, stealing resources from, and/or destroying an opponent became taboo and those that joined or rejoined this community after that shift simply accepted it as truth.
Primeval hit the nail on the head. In the early 2k's a struggle started between the netters and the fighters. Established strats were around but weren't widely available to most players. PvP was the wildcard, magnified by the extensive proliferation of multi's on the server. You could net, but you had to know how to grow a country with defense, have an alliance that had your back and was able to retal. Belonging to a strong alliance meant protection, and it was need in 1a. If you were a small alliance or even worst untagged, you were gonna be farmed.
Somewhere along the line, everyone on started singing kumbaya and looking for a safe space. Bot's replaced land grabbing, and you didn't need defense unless you agreed to a war. Point is, the players made the change in the game culture and the Devs I imagine made some concessions to appease that (latest being clan gdi). There's been some great ideas on this thread, but the best and easiest change to be made is the one the players can make themselves. Theres no need to join an alliance if no ones going to grab you, make the clans mean something again.
We need to change the culture
Hindsight is always 20/20. I fought the culture changing to what exists now tooth and nail back in the day, and was labelled as toxic, evil, uncaring about the game community, and as interested in driving people out of the game :P
A lot of people at that time weren't that interested in the game anymore, and only stuck around for their friends. They wanted to run all XP countries that took 10 seconds a day to play, and to be otherwise left alone. Not leaving them alone (grabbing them) was seen as driving them away from the game.