[Discuss] Alliance Merging

[madman2k30III]

i suppose many ppl like me re in a medium size alliance like me, get very upset and irate wen they look at the alliance ranking and notice that sum alliances dissapear and others suddenly grow due to merges. these merges are accepted and done by the admins, eventhough it is still classed as cheating the admins do it anyway.

I know u guys are thinking wat is he onabout y dont he just STFU and get to the point. so i will now!

So my suggestion is ban asking the admins to do merges and do it the proper way by uitting 1 of the alliances and waiting out on the ticks. maybe they could reduce the waiting time to say 40 ticks instead of 72.

please tell me your feelings towards this

[Neferti]

Why?

[wakey]

I've raised this with PATeam many times, there are many elements to merging which do border on 'cheating'.

Not only can you buy yourself a ranking out of it that potentially your rivals have no way of stopping but an almost instant merge gives a huge advantage on defence and attack.

If people are going to be able to buy out of a 72hour wait period like this allows it shouldnt certainly be all gains and no losses to it. Be it make them be allianceless for 72hours but join automatically at tick 72 or find some other way for them to pay for the instant advantage it gives them

[NitinA]

I think alliance should be able to merge, just not split (which is currently not allowed, as you have to leave the alliance and be allianceless for 72 ticks).

-NitinA

[Fyodor]

If Leaving your alliance garners a 72 hour wait for you to join another alliance, then merging your alliance should also. In essence, even though it is a merge, the people are leaving their alliance to join another. If it isnt built into the game, then it shouldnt be manipulated by the PA team. As many times in the past, they have not acted completely arbitrarily. (not talking of merges here)

[NitinA]

Originally Posted by Fyodor

If it isnt built into the game, then it shouldnt be manipulated by the PA team. As many times in the past, they have not acted completely arbitrarily. (not talking of merges here)

Merging alliances is built into admin tools, so it's built into the game.

-NitinA

[Fyodor]

Thanks for the clarification.

One more question though. Are all allinces merged who agree that they want to merge?

[NitinA]

I'm not sure, you'd have to ask a game admin about that.

[wakey]

Originally Posted by Fyodor

Thanks for the clarification.

One more question though. Are all allinces merged who agree that they want to merge?

You need one person from each alliance to agree. So no the alliance doesnt have to actually agree with the merge.

Anyway NitinA it hardly matters if its in the admin tools or not, it is technically a cheat. The normal 72 hour wait is implemented for a reasons and those reasons are still a factor be it one member leaving of joining another or a whole alliance being merged and as such the same or atleast simerlar anti cheat methods should be employed

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by wakey

You need one person from each alliance to agree. So no the alliance doesnt have to actually agree with the merge.

Actually, the majority of both alliance's HC must agree to the merge.

[wakey]

Originally Posted by Ultimate Newbie

Actually, the majority of both alliance's HC must agree to the merge.

No they dont, trust me all it takes is a mail from one person from each alliance. There is NO checking that the rest of the HC agrees

[Ultimate Newbie]

Originally Posted by wakey

No they dont, trust me all it takes is a mail from one person from each alliance. There is NO checking that the rest of the HC agrees

I have observed at least two and possibly three instances of alliances attempting to merge on #support. the very first thing taht phil asks them is 'where are the hcs from both alliances and does the majority agree to the merge?'. I dont know of the instance(s) that you are talking about, but to me at least there seems to be a proceedure that is followed.

[wakey]

Yes they may ask the representative IF theres a majority decision in the case. However they DONT confirm that s the case. They take the persons word for it rather than doing a check

[ph8]

Merging was created a couple of rounds ago because it was hugely inconvenient for alliances to make all their members resign and join up with the new alliance. Along with the 72 hour waiting period. Merges do happen and in an effort to support the community we created a function to facilitate this. If you have any recommendations as to how we could improve the function I'd be all ears. From your current viewpoint you're saying that all the members of the new alliance should be allianceless for 72 hours during a merge? I don't think they'd like that

[ph8]

Oh and personally, i make sure the majority of HCs in both alliances send me an in-game mail before merging. As far as i'm aware wakey, that is the procedure.

[Lunar_Lamp]

No we do not Wakey.

I have performed several merges and have demanded confirmation from HCs involved from both alliances. I'm sorry Wakey, but you are wrong on this point.

[Kal]

technically someone who is doign merges needs to receive pamails aksing for it form the majority of the hcs in each alliance i belive - it is explained in the manual

[madman2k30III]

ok so y dont we get rid of the waiting time to join aliances! it's not fair having two seperate rules 1. for the alliance who can instantly move there alliance into another 2. the individual who has to wait. u tell me wats fair about that? if u give me a reason i can accept i will happily kill this off

[wakey]

Originally Posted by Lunar_Lamp

No we do not Wakey.

I have performed several merges and have demanded confirmation from HCs involved from both alliances. I'm sorry Wakey, but you are wrong on this point.

If you are going to try and bullshit me you should atleast make sure you arent talking to someone who doesnt know better. Did I get any kind of request for confirmation last round with the merger that almost destroyed F-Crew, No I didnt. This round when one of my fellow hc talked to you (collective you) about allowing a one of these 'RL Friends Group" allliances join us did i get asked for my confirmation. Again no I didnt.

If theres merging policy in place (no matter how flawed it is) you should be sticking to it everytime rather than ignore it and then spout the PR bullshit like this to persuade people you do.

[wakey]

Originally Posted by ph8

. From your current viewpoint you're saying that all the members of the new alliance should be allianceless for 72 hours during a merge? I don't think they'd like that

Do you think people who quit or are kicked from an alliance like waiting 72 hours? No they dont but that still happens because its in the intrest of the game to do so as the situation is abusable. The system shouldnt allow defence to be 'bought' for an alliance which is something thats currently possible with the merge system as it is

[Kal]

if we had an alliance fund, mergers could cost money

[wakey]

Originally Posted by Kal

if we had an alliance fund, mergers could cost money

Even then you couldnt have it merge immediatly. As I belive I said on one of my posts here about my view on how to use the alliance fund, you cant allow an immediate merger. At the very least you need a shirt 'admin' wait to prevent any immediate advantage such as gaining a rank towards the end of the round or buying defence fleets

[Kal]

mergin isn;t allowed in the last 2 weeks of the round anwyay i believe, so no one can gain right at the end

[wakey]

Originally Posted by Kal

mergin isn;t allowed in the last 2 weeks of the round anwyay i believe, so no one can gain right at the end

Two weeks isnt really that much time Kal, you can merge for ranking still and the rivals not be able to do anything about it. The 72 hour period is the chance for the boost to start to be countered, if you can damage those merging before it happens they gap can be recoverable. Otherwise it might be too much

[madman2k30III]

Originally Posted by madman2k30III

ok so y dont we get rid of the waiting time to join aliances! it's not fair having two seperate rules 1. for the alliance who can instantly move there alliance into another 2. the individual who has to wait. u tell me wats fair about that? if u give me a reason i can accept i will happily kill this off

i still haven't had a respomse to this yet

[Kal]

the issue of merging is not a simple one, yes there are problems with the current system, and yes the system should be changed. The current system in place is a simple and temporary system which will be replaced, and there are plans for it to change for next round, though its not at the top of the list as their are more critical problems.

The proposed system basically means the majority of the HCs in each alliance need to authorise the merger. At the moment this would happen instantly. Would people like a delay in the merger or for the alliances to be disbanded for a short period? THe problem with disbandment is it largly makes the system useless as it would make more sense for one alliance to disband and to send its members over the normal way.

Ideally what I would do is have a 72 tick delay after the decision is made - during this period the merger is announced to the world so that anyone objecting to it can do something about it. In an even more ideal world we would have an alliance fund and have a cost associated with mergers (and yes wakey I do like your buy your way out of an alliance thing)

[Kal]

Originally Posted by wakey

Two weeks isnt really that much time Kal, you can merge for ranking still and the rivals not be able to do anything about it. The 72 hour period is the chance for the boost to start to be countered, if you can damage those merging before it happens they gap can be recoverable. Otherwise it might be too much

2 weeks is a significant portion of a round though - 1/5

[A2]

The system that was used when Spinner added the admin option to change is was thus:

In order to merge at least 2, and preferably more HC from each alliance involved had to mail me personally requesting the merge and stating what the new alliance was to be called. If the mails didn't match then they had to start again. If there were a large number of HC in one alliance then a larger number of HC agreements was required. If there was only 1 HC then a majority of the officers also had to mail. The coordinates that mailed me were then double checked against the alliance lists, and as (in general) I'd gone to bed/work in the meantime it took more than 5 minutes to accomplish.
The alliances were then merged, and all the officer/HC positions in both alliances were retained. A message was also pasted in the joint alliance HC channel and the public channels of both alliances stating what had happened.

Admittedly this system was knocked up on the fly the first time round, but it seemed the fairest method at the time.

[Blixxard]

I merged four alliances into two alliances this round.

I asked 3 HC's from each alliance to join a channel. I ask them if this is what they want to do. Once they are all in agreement I merge the alliances. Which takes less than 30 seconds.

[wakey]

Originally Posted by Kal

the issue of merging is not a simple one, yes there are problems with the current system, and yes the system should be changed. The current system in place is a simple and temporary system which will be replaced, and there are plans for it to change for next round, though its not at the top of the list as their are more critical problems.

The proposed system basically means the majority of the HCs in each alliance need to authorise the merger. At the moment this would happen instantly. Would people like a delay in the merger or for the alliances to be disbanded for a short period? THe problem with disbandment is it largly makes the system useless as it would make more sense for one alliance to disband and to send its members over the normal way.

Ideally what I would do is have a 72 tick delay after the decision is made - during this period the merger is announced to the world so that anyone objecting to it can do something about it. In an even more ideal world we would have an alliance fund and have a cost associated with mergers (and yes wakey I do like your buy your way out of an alliance thing)

I would probally do the following

1) Alliances decide to merge and put the request in.
2) Request Accepted
3) The alliance merging gets put into holding. Members are allianceless but have guarenteed places in the other alliance.
4) The other alliance has its membership cap cut to (Limit - Merging Alliance Member Count)
5) Upon leaving holding they would immeditaly join the new alliance

How long would holding be for....

- Base time is 72hours (Still an advantage here as they all join at once, rather than manually tricklng in over a space of a day)
- Time reductions would then be purchasable via the alliance fund. Both sides would have to buy a reduction with the average being taken. So if A bought 20 hours reduction and B 10 it would be 15
- Max reduction would take holding down to 12 hours (shorter but too long to directly interfere with incoming)

The amount the value paid would be im not sure, but should probally be done relating to size of alliance so two small alliances would pay a combined fee alot less than a big and a small would.

As for what to do with the resources, rather than lose them id like to see them reinvested in the lower end of the game somehow

[madman2k30III]

Originally Posted by wakey

I would probally do the following

1) Alliances decide to merge and put the request in.
2) Request Accepted
3) The alliance merging gets put into holding. Members are allianceless but have guarenteed places in the other alliance.
4) The other alliance has its membership cap cut to (Limit - Merging Alliance Member Count)
5) Upon leaving holding they would immeditaly join the new alliance

How long would holding be for....

- Base time is 72hours (Still an advantage here as they all join at once, rather than manually tricklng in over a space of a day)
- Time reductions would then be purchasable via the alliance fund. Both sides would have to buy a reduction with the average being taken. So if A bought 20 hours reduction and B 10 it would be 15
- Max reduction would take holding down to 12 hours (shorter but too long to directly interfere with incoming)

The amount the value paid would be im not sure, but should probally be done relating to size of alliance so two small alliances would pay a combined fee alot less than a big and a small would.

As for what to do with the resources, rather than lose them id like to see them reinvested in the lower end of the game somehow

i say reduce the waiting time to 48 ticks

make the max reduction to 20 ticks

and instead of reinvesting it into the game wipe 80% of the dispanding alliance fund

[CrazySpoon]

What about, the HC's of alliance X have a page where they can decide if they want to merge with an alliance or not. All the HC's will have to set something to "Yes". Same goes for alliance Y. As soon as both sides have voted "Yes", there is a 48 hour waiting before they get merged. Like that, the alliance X will be able to defend their members for 48 more ticks, so noone will have a disadvantage from a 72 tick period without allies. After the 48 ticks the alliances will be merged. With this you will avoid an advantage on defence matters etc. like stated in one of the earlier posts.

[wakey]

Originally Posted by CrazySpoon

What about, the HC's of alliance X have a page where they can decide if they want to merge with an alliance or not. All the HC's will have to set something to "Yes". Same goes for alliance Y. As soon as both sides have voted "Yes", there is a 48 hour waiting before they get merged. Like that, the alliance X will be able to defend their members for 48 more ticks, so noone will have a disadvantage from a 72 tick period without allies. After the 48 ticks the alliances will be merged. With this you will avoid an advantage on defence matters etc. like stated in one of the earlier posts.

The problem with that is why does an alliance who wants to be involved higher in the game allowed to get around the allianceless period for no loss while a solo player who wants the same thing does. If they get around the allianceless period for no loss then the solo players should do also

[CrazySpoon]

The topic started about alliance merges... So thats what I replied to. People leaving their alliance or being kicked and get a 72h penalty is not related to the first topic. Tho it is something I also think should change.

[madman2k30III]

Originally Posted by CrazySpoon

The topic started about alliance merges... So thats what I replied to. People leaving their alliance or being kicked and get a 72h penalty is not related to the first topic. Tho it is something I also think should change.

actually yes it does because thats the whole point about this post! i created this post as i was sick of the cheating happening due to merging! like i sed on 1 of my earlier posts it was cheating because x alliance was skipping the 72 hour wait period before they could merge!

[god113]

Would some kind of poll be possible on this?

Because it seems the Sinnd thing pissed a lot of people off...

[Makhil]

There's no question a merging is part of the 'political' game. The problem comes from 2 things :
- it is not an ingame feature, but requires the intervention of some supreme being (aka PA team admin).
- it is unfair to individuals who suffer the 72 hours penalty
I don't think it is difficult for people to agree on these 2 points, nor is it difficult to tackle these problems.

As suggested, an ingame option in the ally page, to allow both HCs to vote for a merging would be nice. As soon as the quota is met the new ally is created and the old ones are dissolved. It is now up to each individual to apply, no 72 hours wait, but the organization and effectiveness of the new ally will depend on how fast everyone can react and how good the HCs have communicated. In addition the ally dissolving could appear in the News

[Gumbie]

1) The penalty is in place to stop players rapidly moving from one alliance to another, depending on how they think the round is going.
2) The current system is designed that commitments have little blocking them. An individual can join an alliance with no penalty. Leaving is where the cost is. Should SiN and ND decide the merge isn't working, the 72 hour penalty would apply to the seperation, as does the individual penalty applies to the leaving of an alliance.

An easy way to explain my view is to reduce both an individual, and the alliance, both as an entity.

Entity A wishes to join an alliance. There is no penatly for joining, but one for leaving.
Entity B wishes to join an alliance. There is no penatly for joining, but one for leaving.

Now can someone tell me if entity A or B was an alliance or an individual? If you can't, then you can't really say there's much of a difference between a merge, and a person joining an alliance. The only difference is the scale.

[Kal]

Originally Posted by Makhil

There's no question a merging is part of the 'political' game. The problem comes from 2 things :
- it is not an ingame feature, but requires the intervention of some supreme being (aka PA team admin).
- it is unfair to individuals who suffer the 72 hours penalty
I don't think it is difficult for people to agree on these 2 points, nor is it difficult to tackle these problems.

As suggested, an ingame option in the ally page, to allow both HCs to vote for a merging would be nice. As soon as the quota is met the new ally is created and the old ones are dissolved. It is now up to each individual to apply, no 72 hours wait, but the organization and effectiveness of the new ally will depend on how fast everyone can react and how good the HCs have communicated. In addition the ally dissolving could appear in the News

hmm so u basically put the HCs in the new alliance, but kick evertyone else but withotu a 72 hour penalty - that actually sounds interesting - as that even makes sure the merge has to be the will of the whole alliance.

[wakey]

Originally Posted by Gumbie

1) The penalty is in place to stop players rapidly moving from one alliance to another, depending on how they think the round is going.
2) The current system is designed that commitments have little blocking them. An individual can join an alliance with no penalty. Leaving is where the cost is. Should SiN and ND decide the merge isn't working, the 72 hour penalty would apply to the seperation, as does the individual penalty applies to the leaving of an alliance.

An easy way to explain my view is to reduce both an individual, and the alliance, both as an entity.

Entity A wishes to join an alliance. There is no penatly for joining, but one for leaving.
Entity B wishes to join an alliance. There is no penatly for joining, but one for leaving.

Now can someone tell me if entity A or B was an alliance or an individual? If you can't, then you can't really say there's much of a difference between a merge, and a person joining an alliance. The only difference is the scale.

yes your vaugue statements can be assigned to both alliance and soolo players BUT that doesnt make your agument valid.

A solo player joining alliance doesnt bring 1/10th of the advantages a merge brings an alliance and as such you cant consider both of them to be the same.

A solo players brings an alliance the following advantages
- One more defender
- One more person to take part in attacks (allowing them to maybe cover a couple more planets)
- More score
- More activity

it Might also bring about the following
- More experiance
- More commanders
- A better rank


Now for the alliances they get
- Many More defenders
- Many More Attackers (Enough to make an extra target or a better target a possability)
- Much More Score
- Much More Activity
- More experiance (after all you will get some experiance guarenteed from a largish number of players)
- More commanders (You now have two peoples command staff thus making it easier to gandle all defence/attacks ect)
- A much better rank
- More appealing recruitment wise


You get so many bonus its simply wrong for a merger to be allowed to go through without some kind of punishment to counter balance it. It may be annoying having to wait 72 hours to merge especially the alliance whos members are allianceless for that period but its a small price to pay for the advantage you get. if you think its too long then maybe 48 hours might be a good comprimise but at the same time solo players should have their wait time reduced.

And it needs a built in wait time to prevent free movement of players for defence purposes. You dont want alliances merging to get defence do we

[Neferti]

'Annoying' to wait 72 hours? Deadly, more like... it would mean the likely complete and utter destruction of every (ex) member.

[Gumbie]

Now correct me if I'm wrong, but did I not say the difference was the scale?
And did not chika join ND last round, and give them a better rank (other skills aside, the 25 mill he provided was a rank changing perk. And yes, I know he had to wait 72 ticks, and got lots of inc for it.
The difference between single player movements and alliance movements is just the scale, but get this, if SiN leaves ND before round end, we're stuck for 72 ticks, just as if 1 person left an alliance.

There shouldn't be blocks for people moving together, but penalties for doing it recklessly, or frequently (the cost is leaving based). What you don't want, is for SiNND to now start purging the less than average activity members, and merging again. That is the only rankwhoring merging strategy available, and the admins can block that at their discression. A one shot merge is the same as a 1 shot member join for purposes of desirability for me.
I'd like to see Hidden Agenda "aquire" borg, for more rank 20 shenanigens, maybe then merge with coven for rank 15, and so on, providing higher level competition. SiN "aquired" Amnesia and myself, and I saw no outcry. The only reason for this bitching is because people were inconvienienced from their easy (easier) ride. If you cannot beat SiNND except when they were seperated, or with a 72 hour allianceless raiding time, you didn't "deserve" to beat them as players.

The merging system is fine as it is. Marriage is free, divorce is a touch harder.

Also, if you're merging for ranks, you won't have space for recruitment?

[wakey]

1) Its more than just scale, theres alot of things guarenteed by an alliance merger which cant be got or are unlikly to be got on a solo basis

2) Before claiming its all bitching about this merge, i suggest you take a look at the start date of this thread. Its BEFORE the merge

3) Inconvinanced from their easy ride, Its actually normally the alliances merging who are taking the easy ride rather than those they bypass. I'll use Covens merges this round as an example, F-Crew for one have battled our way upto 16th, and above us is coven who have got there simply due to mergers. It will be the same for the likes of Ven who have spent the round battling past ND and now find that they are below ND again.

4) Alliances always have room to recruit even SiNND would find room if a 2mill player turned up looking for a home. And also alot of merges even for rank dont fill the quota up. As we found out at F-Crew this round we lost out on alot of members due to Coven and APA merging making them more appealing than us. Players with a bit of experianced whom would have been an asset to bringing the lesser player through

5) All alliances doing this show a complete lack of disregard to the game in general. They sit there and say things like ND are of "We only had 10 players still motivated and taking part so we needed this for teh good of the game" but how do you think every member of an alliance thats battled their way past either ND or SiN now feels. Its a kick in the teeth, its like PATeam has turned around and told them that their hard work was completly pointless.

6) If we cant beat you combined we dont deserve to beat you. That hardly rings true.,Theres 9 alliances who have done better than ND this round and deserved to beat them and theres 18 alliances who did better than SiN this round and deserved to beat them. I think s its more that if you cant beat these alliances ingame you dont deserve to beat them because you managed to merge your way up

[Gumbie]

Except we haven't just merged our way up. We as planets still had to fight for that score when seperate, and without the resources we have now. Being able to beat us gimped is much the same as not being able to beat us as all, as it doesn't prove much. Now there's a challenge above you you'd actually have to battle to get past, instead of having 30 more players (SiN to f-crew comparison only) with a lower average score.

[Haarken]

a.) Merging is part of the politics of the game and thus should be free and unhindered. This is a game of war and politics and merging for score, members, rank etc should be a valid tactic. NewDawn is a good example, in the past YHQ, TWD and G-II all merged into ND they all provided ND with members, score and rank, simply put merging has prevented the demise of many good alliances and has kept many people in the game, paying for planets.

b.) Giving ordinary members the choice of whether they should merge with an alliance is ridiculous, HC's are voted/appointed/created to act on behalf of their members, if someone doesnt like it they can quite easily leave the alliance.

c.) Within 48 every single planet in an alliance could be destroyed if they couldnt get the defence bonus, even 24 hours is a serious handycap. If you are intent on stopping merges just say that dont try and sneak it into the rules by making a merge so unpalatable that no alliances in their right mind would choose it.

d.) SiNND would not have room to accomodate another player no matter how big, and if any player was to join SiNND it would be a member who was previously in either ND or SiN before the merge it would not be one that came from outside of either of these alliances.

e.) The alliances below us may indeed be unhappy that we passed them due to a merge, but we do not disrespect them or their efforts. Indeed if they had not been so successful in their efforts the merge may not have taken place. So really it's everyone who attacked our planet's fault...

f.) The SiN-ND merge may actually make the rest of this round interesting, after all did anyone really want to see WP fence sit their way to victory?