[Zatoichi]

I am a returning PA player from the old days(rd1-13) and played last round on a whim after many years absence just to see how things have changed over the years. I also wanted fo get a fresh perspective much like how a new player to PA would. Started late and was put in a inactive galaxy but I had fun anyway so thank you PA team. Did make noob mistakes like initiating too many roids and some other stuff but soon got the hang of things as PA is PA. Never got defense being a 1 man alliance except the occational 1 ship fake defense being attacked about 3 times daily but not complaining as that was fun too. I was just relearning the game after all so knew I would have no chance to be a top planet starting late without an alliance in an inactive galaxy. My observations of PA is that its basicaly the same strategy wise since round 1! Good alliance and reasonable activity is all you need to do well. I always felt skill was overated and still feel it is today. Big fish eating little fish to get bigger is how things are in PA. My active gang versus you and your smaller or less active gang determing who wins. This strategy for success has not changed in 55 rounds approaching a decade and a half now. At the same time, the player base has dwindled down more than a hundred fold from the old days to less than 1K players today. Why? Alliances. Yes, the very core of loyal PA players is also the the cause imo for its decline. Im sure thousands upon thousands of new PA players gave up because they still after all these years are just food for the veteran alliance players. Alliances have the ears of PA team but what about from newbies? IMO, its alliance players dictating what changes to PA are made but they themselves are the root cause for PA's non growth. The game today is predictable and mechanical as to outcomes. Im guessing many of today's players are vets of 40 rounds or more. Same every round. IMO, we should scrap alliances and politics all together. OR have 2 universes, 1 for alliances and another for new newbies and vet randoms in random only galaxies like this winter round. A newbie playing PA is like a pro football team against a grammer school team or pro boxer against a non athlete. No contest and the newbie's only purpose is cannon fodder. Unless PA team makes a fundamental DRASTIC change whereby newbies are an integral part to a winning strategy, PA will never grow its player base. No amount of tweaking stats or adding fancy features will help PA grow. The alliance player will bitch, moan and probably call this idea ludicrous and stupid but sacrifices need to be made for PA to grow. I was in winning alliances back in the day as well as having high ranked planets so know the feeling of wanting to play with " friends". However, what about making new friends every round. How about nurturing newbie planets in order for you and your galaxy to win? That can be fun too. I suggest a galaxy against galaxy universe with no alliances of any kind except the galaxy you're in and max 1 buddy pack per galaxy. Sure some gals may get all vets and some all newbies but the buddy pack members in each galaxy can coach the newbies as to what to do being they are pa vets. Make the only factor to winning be galaxy cooperation, coordination, and activity. Just my 2cents. Let the flames begin! lol.