PVP Changes; Platoon Infamy

Goldendoodle · 8 Jun 2018, 7:10PM

Hello Commanders,

Given the recent changes that were made to PVP, I wanted to check in and discuss their impact, as well as what mitigations can be made to make improvements.

Why were changes made?

There were two main reasons:

First, the biggest issue we were trying to address was the practice of intentionally bubbling friends/alliance mates. The issue with this strategy is that there was no counter play, and it created a situation where if you weren’t doing this, you couldn’t compete on the leaderboard. Any strategy that can’t be defeated is inherently unfun for all those participating.

Secondly, prior to the change, 100% of important PVP was fighting other players’ bases. While this should remain the foundation of PVP, Platoon versus Platoon fights should still matter.

What was changed?

As listed in the patch notes:

Intentionally bubbling an alliance mate will now result in Infamy loss.

This is self explanatory. If you’re abusing damage protection mechanics to protect a friend, you should have to pay for that

Voluntarily leaving damage protection results in a cooldown

Again, this is self-explanatory. If you choose to leave damage protection, you shouldn’t be able to immediately re-enter an invulnerable space

Destroying an enemy platoon gives Infamy

The goal here was to make it so there are sources of Infamy outside of just players’ bases. Platoon versus Platoon battles are more fun, and it makes the World Map more dynamic and interesting. We were afraid of it being exploitable, however, so we did this:

We removed inflation from Platoon versus Platoon battles. In normal PVP battles, an average of 75% of the Infamy gained is from inflation inherent with the formula. By removing this, all platoon battles are zero-sum; sitting around with friends attacking each others platoons will result in no Infamy gain. It also means that if you attack an account’s platoons with 0 (or close to) Infamy, you’ll gain nothing. This stops you from “farming” low level platoons of a friendly, or alt, account.

What went right?

Instances of friendly bubbling are down slightly. This is moving in the right direction. In addition, PVP activity has increased, which is again a positive change.

What went wrong?

We made two mistakes:

This post should’ve been made sooner; and
The cooldown of 5 minutes is not long enough.

What will we be doing about it?

We will be increasing the cooldown of 5 minutes to 10 minutes immediately. This will take effect today. If that isn’t enough, we’ll keep bumping it up
We’ll monitor the rate of Platoon versus Platoon infamy exchange. If it’s too high, we’ll lower it

Please let me know if you have any questions, comments, or concerns!

Axel L · 8 Jun 2018, 8:16PM

Thanks a lot for the information. On the other hand, it would be great if there was a slight UI change to platoons on the world map which cause the amount of infamy you could gain from destroying the platoon to be displayed like it has been done with player bases.

FriendlyFixer · 8 Jun 2018, 8:16PM

I agree! I may or may not have a ticket for that exact change.

BadlyTheTruthHurts · 8 Jun 2018, 8:16PM

@Goldendoodle said:
Hello Commanders,

Given the recent changes that were made to PVP, I wanted to check in and discuss their impact, as well as what mitigations can be made to make improvements.

Why were changes made?

There were two main reasons:

First, the biggest issue we were trying to address was the practice of intentionally bubbling friends/alliance mates. The issue with this strategy is that there was no counter play, and it created a situation where if you weren’t doing this, you couldn’t compete on the leaderboard. Any strategy that can’t be defeated is inherently unfun for all those participating.

Secondly, prior to the change, 100% of important PVP was fighting other players’ bases. While this should remain the foundation of PVP, Platoon versus Platoon fights should still matter.

What was changed?

As listed in the patch notes:

Intentionally bubbling an alliance mate will now result in Infamy loss.

This is self explanatory. If you’re abusing damage protection mechanics to protect a friend, you should have to pay for that

Voluntarily leaving damage protection results in a cooldown

Again, this is self-explanatory. If you choose to leave damage protection, you shouldn’t be able to immediately re-enter an invulnerable space

Destroying an enemy platoon gives Infamy

The goal here was to make it so there are sources of Infamy outside of just players’ bases. Platoon versus Platoon battles are more fun, and it makes the World Map more dynamic and interesting. We were afraid of it being exploitable, however, so we did this:

We removed inflation from Platoon versus Platoon battles. In normal PVP battles, an average of 75% of the Infamy gained is from inflation inherent with the formula. By removing this, all platoon battles are zero-sum; sitting around with friends attacking each others platoons will result in no Infamy gain. It also means that if you attack an account’s platoons with 0 (or close to) Infamy, you’ll gain nothing. This stops you from “farming” low level platoons of a friendly, or alt, account.

What went right?

Instances of friendly bubbling are down slightly. This is moving in the right direction. In addition, PVP activity has increased, which is again a positive change.

What went wrong?

We made two mistakes:

This post should’ve been made sooner; and

The cooldown of 5 minutes is not long enough.

What will we be doing about it?

We will be increasing the cooldown of 5 minutes to 10 minutes immediately. This will take effect today. If that isn’t enough, we’ll keep bumping it up

We’ll monitor the rate of Platoon versus Platoon infamy exchange. If it’s too high, we’ll lower it

Please let me know if you have any questions, comments, or concerns!

So you want to bump up the time to make it no one would think about popping their bubble to protect a friend

You know how many times you can get flattened in 10-15 minutes if there is no bubble??

I have already seen people lose 400-500 infamy in the 5 minute cool down

Just driving players away with these new changes because you dont listen

ShadowStacy · 8 Jun 2018, 8:18PM

First off, the cooldown doesn't stop 69, it helps those doing 69. Now they can get their friendly bubble, go out and hit a bunch more while no one can attack them for 10 minutes. Secondly, the only ones who lose in this platoon infamy crap is the ones with infamy. Its bull that I can be offline and lose over 300 infamy because some jack wagon comes along and kills my toons but can't touch my base. So basically you at kixeye have shot yourself in the foot. Why would people take damage to their toons to attack a base when they can go kill toons on the map and gain so much more. You guys are really missing the boat on this one. You know who will lose in the end on this? Kixeye will. There will be far less base hitting and far more toon hitting and that will result in lost revenue for you.

Alok r · 8 Jun 2018, 8:20PM

Absolutely amazing. Some of us had stated this right after last update that 5mins cooldown isn't long enough and there was a simple workaround for those who intentionally abused the protection bubble times.
Also loving the platoon vs platoon infamy gain. This takes care of the situations where infamy hoarders would have their bases covered with layers and layers of toons on the map thus making it almost impossible to get to the player's base.
I only request one thing in upcoming changes/updates. Get rid of the retreat function in platoon battle. Let us enjoy actually destroying the platoons of other players if we are getting rewarded infamy for it. At present the only platoon vs platoon battles are when you kill toons of offline players.
And to that effect, please add a leave platoon fight button.
Overall amazing update to PvP. Loving it. Kudos team!!!

HEISENBERG_NL1 · 8 Jun 2018, 8:23PM

This "cooldown" is horrible. Like stated above, it will make you able to hit one player and gain a little infamy, meanwile you can be hit multiple times. Go gain a 100 to lose 400?

Good luck with that. Also plz change the amount of infamy gained from toons. 5 buggies shouldnt give more then the base itself

Garey_S0 · 8 Jun 2018, 8:24PM

Getting infamy from platoons is total crap! You didnt shoot your self in the foot you shot your self in the HEAD! IDIOTS

HEISENBERG_NL1 · 8 Jun 2018, 8:29PM

The way i play: jump in and start hitting and pop constantly or at least a couple times, that style of playing makes no sense now. At least not for gaining infamy.

Alok r · 8 Jun 2018, 8:32PM

@ShadowStacy said:
First off, the cooldown doesn't stop 69, it helps those doing 69. Now they can get their friendly bubble, go out and hit a bunch more while no one can attack them for 10 minutes. Secondly, the only ones who lose in this platoon infamy crap is the ones with infamy. Its bull that I can be offline and lose over 300 infamy because some jack wagon comes along and kills my toons but can't touch my base. So basically you at kixeye have shot yourself in the foot. Why would people take damage to their toons to attack a base when they can go kill toons on the map and gain so much more. You guys are really missing the boat on this one. You know who will lose in the end on this? Kixeye will. There will be far less base hitting and far more toon hitting and that will result in lost revenue for you.

I think you didn't understand how the cooldown period works. If you voluntarily end damage protection, the cooldown period will make sure you don't get a bubble in that time. That doesn't stop upu you from getting hit by players and getting your base 100% destroyed. Infact you can be hit multiple times in that cooldown period and lose infamy and still not get a bubble. This takes away the instant 69 thing which has been taking fun out of PvP.

Alok r · 8 Jun 2018, 8:36PM

@HEISENBERG_103 said:
The way i play: jump in and start hitting and pop constantly or at least a couple times, that style of playing makes no sense now. At least not for gaining infamy.

This style of play has been the same since the start of the game. But some idiots ruined the fun by exploiting it by using instant 69 so that even if you pop multiple times, others can't hit you cos you get instant bubble from a friend/alt account etc.
If you wanted to gain infamy, make sure you hit a sector without getting noticed. That's how it always used to be since the beginning. Once you get spotted and don't have backup, you get over run by sector residents.

Joeybagadoughnuts · 8 Jun 2018, 8:37PM

Let the rumba line begin at my base doors ..flat 234 flat 234 LOL

Goldendoodle · 8 Jun 2018, 8:38PM

I appreciate the feedback.

Based on this, I'm currently planning to also decrease the amount of Infamy that can be exchanged through platoon battles.

Given the concerns posted above, do you think 7 minutes would be a more appropriate cooldown timer to start with?

Regards,
Goldendoodle

ShadowStacy · 8 Jun 2018, 8:39PM

Alok r said:

@ShadowStacy said:
First off, the cooldown doesn't stop 69, it helps those doing 69. Now they can get their friendly bubble, go out and hit a bunch more while no one can attack them for 10 minutes. Secondly, the only ones who lose in this platoon infamy crap is the ones with infamy. Its bull that I can be offline and lose over 300 infamy because some jack wagon comes along and kills my toons but can't touch my base. So basically you at kixeye have shot yourself in the foot. Why would people take damage to their toons to attack a base when they can go kill toons on the map and gain so much more. You guys are really missing the boat on this one. You know who will lose in the end on this? Kixeye will. There will be far less base hitting and far more toon hitting and that will result in lost revenue for you.

I think you didn't understand how the cooldown period works. If you voluntarily end damage protection, the cooldown period will make sure you don't get a bubble in that time. That doesn't stop upu you from getting hit by players and getting your base 100% destroyed. Infact you can be hit multiple times in that cooldown period and lose infamy and still not get a bubble. This takes away the instant 69 thing which has been taking fun out of PvP.

Yes I didn't understand that right, thank you for clarifying. That is ok then, but still don't the toon battle infamy crap.

xxCroftYxx · 8 Jun 2018, 8:44PM

To be fair most of us pointed out 5 mins was not enough when this was first discussed but it is a good addition. On the other hand the infamy gained / lost from toon battles has screwed the entire battlefield up. It is probably 10 x the amount it should be. You have turned the game into buggy commander. Now all everybody is interested in is hitting toons as in reality they can pay more than the actual base.

xxCroftYxx · 8 Jun 2018, 8:47PM

HEISENBERG_103 said:

The way i play: jump in and start hitting and pop constantly or at least a couple times, that style of playing makes no sense now. At least not for gaining infamy.

there were always going to be winners and losers with this system. I agree it is an issue if you are happy to pop often but if its slows down 69 it is probably worth the sacrifice .

Goldendoodle · 8 Jun 2018, 8:50PM

xxCroftYxx said:

To be fair most of us pointed out 5 mins was not enough when this was first discussed but it is a good addition. On the other hand the infamy gained / lost from toon battles has screwed the entire battlefield up. It is probably 10 x the amount it should be. You have turned the game into buggy commander. Now all everybody is interested in is hitting toons as in reality they can pay more than the actual base.

Agreed. We're going to turn down the exchange.

It's good that Platoon battles matter now, but they probably matter too much right now.

Right now we're looking at reducing the current exchange rate for platoon battles by 66%. Do you think that's enough?

Regards,
Goldendoodle

blade.e · 8 Jun 2018, 8:57PM

this is geared against high level players again like war path some level 42 hit two toons and took over a 100 infamy from me and i flat his base and got 10 its crazy !!!

Alok r · 8 Jun 2018, 8:58PM

@Goldendoodle said:
xxCroftYxx said:

To be fair most of us pointed out 5 mins was not enough when this was first discussed but it is a good addition. On the other hand the infamy gained / lost from toon battles has screwed the entire battlefield up. It is probably 10 x the amount it should be. You have turned the game into buggy commander. Now all everybody is interested in is hitting toons as in reality they can pay more than the actual base.

Agreed. We're going to turn down the exchange.

It's good that Platoon battles matter now, but they probably matter too much right now.

Right now we're looking at reducing the current exchange rate for platoon battles by 66%. Do you think that's enough?

Regards,
Goldendoodle

Can we have concrete numbers on how much infamy (what %) do we get from platoon battles. Then we can give a feedback on the reduction %.
But as I posted in discord, it would be great if the infamy gained from platoons is correlated to the units in those platoons. Legacy and SF era units give very low infamy, while faction era units give medium and unique units in platoons give high infamy. Something on those lines would be nice. Will actually bring back strategy in platoon battles.

blade.e · 8 Jun 2018, 9:05PM

Goldendoodle said:

xxCroftYxx said:

To be fair most of us pointed out 5 mins was not enough when this was first discussed but it is a good addition. On the other hand the infamy gained / lost from toon battles has screwed the entire battlefield up. It is probably 10 x the amount it should be. You have turned the game into buggy commander. Now all everybody is interested in is hitting toons as in reality they can pay more than the actual base.

Agreed. We're going to turn down the exchange.

It's good that Platoon battles matter now, but they probably matter too much right now.

Right now we're looking at reducing the current exchange rate for platoon battles by 66%. Do you think that's enough?

Regards,
Goldendoodle

the amount of infamy gained from toon battles should have no reflection on the amount of infamy a player has or what level he is . it should be a set amount like 10 infamy for a kill and five if the toon is retreated imo

Mercy PHAQ · 8 Jun 2018, 9:26PM

I think that instead of the cool down period, there could be a system similar to warpath in place at all times, and say you can only bubble a player once every 12-24 hours. This would help cut down on people using alts and such to bubble themselves

AJ62 · 8 Jun 2018, 9:37PM

Something else that needs to be considered, now with infamy from hitting toons, I see people out there now going after toons being used to collect thor, res, Shad op Bases etc. With the pop up that comes up when you complete the base, it takes even longer 30sec or more to leave base, so toon gets snipped and may be destroyed. I normally do these bases while in bubble, so units that get damaged can be repaired to use when battling other players. This practice has increased now with these new changes

xxCroftYxx · 8 Jun 2018, 9:47PM

Spyro312 said:

I think that instead of the cool down period, there could be a system similar to warpath in place at all times, and say you can only bubble a player once every 12-24 hours. This would help cut down on people using alts and such to bubble themselves

that would be a bad idea, say we have a high level enemy player jump in to our sector, most of our hitters are offline. We are left with a probability of the player being free to roam the sector as there could be nobody to re-attack him .

xxCroftYxx · 8 Jun 2018, 9:49PM

blade.e said:

Goldendoodle said:

xxCroftYxx said:

To be fair most of us pointed out 5 mins was not enough when this was first discussed but it is a good addition. On the other hand the infamy gained / lost from toon battles has screwed the entire battlefield up. It is probably 10 x the amount it should be. You have turned the game into buggy commander. Now all everybody is interested in is hitting toons as in reality they can pay more than the actual base.

Agreed. We're going to turn down the exchange.

It's good that Platoon battles matter now, but they probably matter too much right now.

Right now we're looking at reducing the current exchange rate for platoon battles by 66%. Do you think that's enough?

Regards,
Goldendoodle

the amount of infamy gained from toon battles should have no reflection on the amount of infamy a player has or what level he is . it should be a set amount like 10 infamy for a kill and five if the toon is retreated imo

To a point I agree with you, but then it would be open to massive abuse. Just keep spamming buggies from an alt acc and gaining infamy. I think the current system is ok, just the numbers were WAY off the mark

Mercy PHAQ · 8 Jun 2018, 9:54PM

xxCroftYxx said:

Spyro312 said:

I think that instead of the cool down period, there could be a system similar to warpath in place at all times, and say you can only bubble a player once every 12-24 hours. This would help cut down on people using alts and such to bubble themselves

that would be a bad idea, say we have a high level enemy player jump in to our sector, most of our hitters are offline. We are left with a probability of the player being free to roam the sector as there could be nobody to re-attack him .

Well there is that, but its either that or lose tons of infamy from repeated attacks from mini accounts. One high level player can flat someone and then have a smaller player sit outside and enter and end attack repeatedly, draining the player of infamy without ever deploying a unit

xxCroftYxx · 8 Jun 2018, 9:54PM

Goldendoodle said:

xxCroftYxx said:

To be fair most of us pointed out 5 mins was not enough when this was first discussed but it is a good addition. On the other hand the infamy gained / lost from toon battles has screwed the entire battlefield up. It is probably 10 x the amount it should be. You have turned the game into buggy commander. Now all everybody is interested in is hitting toons as in reality they can pay more than the actual base.

Agreed. We're going to turn down the exchange.

It's good that Platoon battles matter now, but they probably matter too much right now.

Right now we're looking at reducing the current exchange rate for platoon battles by 66%. Do you think that's enough?

Regards,
Goldendoodle

yes 66% minimum. We should not be afraid to guard our own base for fear of getting a buggy sniped and loosing 50+ inf. Hell I retreated a heavy toon yesterday and lost 100 inf. The numbers need to be in single digits, so they mount up but not so they become the main focus.

Panther48 · 8 Jun 2018, 9:55PM

i losted 200 infamy tonight to a guy that attacked 3 plats outside my base when i was offline.
Note: he didn't even attacked my base.
Loosing infamy to smart guys who just attack plats is stupid and is killing the game.
And you didn't solve the problem of 69.

rakibforyou · 8 Jun 2018, 9:59PM

u don't even take in account some player use autoclick just sit in base gain infamy what's u gonna do about that. @Goldendoodle

AJ62 · 8 Jun 2018, 10:00PM

I understand that players 69ing is becoming very bad , but another thing you have to remember, the longer your base can not be bubbled if you pop, the more people will not pop. Example you pop your bubble to go hit someone, you get attacked and get 3 stared, and if kix increases this to 10 mins the player or players can keep attacking you and all they have to do is attack end attack, which takes like 30 sec, and do not need to deploy anything or do anything and they going to gain infamy. you could lose so much infamy in that time. So why would people pop and this will kill pvp.

GR7_MIKED · 8 Jun 2018, 10:06PM

hello all, the most of this are very good but for inf from toons this is not fun at all...

Gen_Ulyses · 8 Jun 2018, 10:06PM

Ty kixeye for making the game worse.These latest changes are pathetic,You have now made it easy for me to quit.No more of my $$$ for you unless you change it.

General Discussion

PVP Changes; Platoon Infamy