Hey you!
Today I’m gonna present to you an improvement for the early game phase of Grepolis.
We consider it to be specifically helpful to new players and to be appreciated by the adaptable longtime players as it offers more interactions early in the game.
The early game is of much importance to you and us as it determines if new players will stay with Grepolis and play with you as allies or enemies to fight with. So making them survive is key for a game world filled with players to game with. But currently we have the situation that a lot of them are loosing their first city very early and by this are conquered and eliminated from the game, with a high chance of not restarting again.
There are various reasons for them to be conquered. Sometimes it’s wrong decisions, missing information in the game, picking the wrong fight or starting in a bad neighborhood… but still we would all like them to prevail and keep on playing and fighting with us.
To increase the chance of survival and becoming good players we want to enable building a city much earlier.
Enabling those players to build the first colony ship much faster and letting them set up their second city in strategically better or safer position is what we have in mind. This second city will be their chance to survive and grow.
But not only new players will profit from that gameplay improvement. Colonizing itself will become a valid option in the game again allowing for a bigger variety of play styles specifically in the early game phase.
The change
- Make the technology “Colony Ship” available from academy level 13 instead of 22.
- Reduce the required harbour level to level 10 instead of 20.
Not changing
Some might fear that the “Conquest” technology will be put in earlier too.
But to explicitly point this out we are NOT going to enable the “Conquest” technology earlier in the academy. So conquering will stay and take place as previously known, from level 28.
Small quests changes
- The quest to build the Harbour level 10 will have the rewards increased to 5000 wood, stone and silver (from 3500 wood,2100 stone ,1500 silver).
These resources should provide a sound foundation for the player construct the colony ship shortly after finishing the quest. - The quest to construct a colony ship will have its reward changed from 5 Transport ships to 10 Gold instead.
We are looking forward to hearing your feedback and to discuss it here on the devblog with you.
Cheers
Nils
As Game Designer i'm doing my best to provide you with new game features, events and gameplay improvements. Therefore i analyze & play the game likewise to experience and feel the needs of a player. Reading the forums gathering and discussing feedback with my team and the community is part of this as well.
How can it be that I found more problems with that for beginners in a few seconds us you and your team?
Hi 19LEXX81,
might be that we saw the same points just from a different point of view or evaluated them differently in the team. Hard to say if you didnt share it here but maybe you will/or already shared it in the forum then we will read that in the following days.
Cheers your Designers
Hi Nils,
if I understand right, you will give the player a chance, to build a new city on an Island without any farming cities, After this it will be ok if the player loose the old city, is that right? In the very early game in a new world, there is no possibility, to set a city on an island with farming villages for about the first 28 days without a conquest. And as I think, your really know this. Which means, it is o.k. for you, if their lost their cities on island with farming village and without the battle points?
What do you think, should their do then.
Without Island Qest, without farming villages and so on.
Would you be so kind to explain, how the player will have then fun with Grepolis?
Why do you think this will meet your expectations? When someone lost his first city (so, the biggest one), it’s the most probably that he will end his playing as well because it’s simply very discouraging. These players are often kicked out from their ally and even if they’re not, they are still weak and easy target.
What about a ‘conquest protection’? It could expire after reaching some milestones (which indicate that player is ready for being ‘released’ to the game and he can defend himself) or, in case of inactivity, after certain time (e.g. 14 days). I admit that I haven’t though about that in detail. I am just worried that the change suggested by you won’t help. For gold (+ experienced) players, it’ll allow to expand an imperium even more quickly as they buy resources. It’s hard to feed 2 (or more) cities by 6 villages and 1 capital city which also needs a lot of resources for its building a recruiting orders. Last but not least, small cities are weak spots, they often get plundered. Discouraging again.
It’s better to be conquered (due to the Hope effect) than founding a city in a peace zone as you don’t have any tutorial rewards and often no BPs to build your farming villages. And keep on mind, these cities are founded on islands without villages as islands with them are full. Help from ally comes rarely. That’s true.
Hi Thass & Mim le fay,
im gonna try to answer to both of you in the same text for us from the Design Team.
First point of you
“when someone lost his first city (so, the biggest one), it’s the most probably that he will end his playing ”
Our numbers dont confirm that loosing the first city when you have 2 or 3 makes you leave the game. But if this first city is the only one you have and you loose it the amount of players leaving is huge.
Second point of you
What about a ‘conquest protection’?”
Concerning that protection that is basically what the beginners protection should be doing but currently its not doing good enough. But yes improving this point is on our mind too. Thats why we also are analyzing the different lenght of beginners protection and their impact on players “survival rate” right now. So we than can take action here as well.
Third point of you
“For gold (+ experienced) players, it’ll allow to expand an imperium even more quickly as they buy resources.”
You are partly right because they still need to generate the culture points which if they build up their cities they can do with the different options in the agora. But even for those they need to build up their cities to a high level up before to get the buildings to that level.(Which you already could before, but yes everyboddy including them is saving time until colonization)
Fourth point of you
“I am just worried that the change suggested by you won’t help.”
Its okay and good that you care for the game and you share your thoughts on it with us. We think that this step is only one part which will increase the survival rate of the players as it provides a chance to stay in the game with an active city. Its not a final solution to this issue. Often we need to applie a network of small fixes, changes and new stuff over a time to finaly tackle a problem.
Mim le Fays point
“..you will give the player a chance, to build a new city on an Island without any farming cities, After this it will be ok if the player loose the old city, is that right? ”
The goal we have is here to increase the chance of the player(s) to stay alive in the game, having the chance to build up again, get in contact with other players and surive and keep on playing. With this option we provide we offer this chance which a percentage of the players will make stay in the game. Even a small city with no farming villages and the rest of quests is considered to be better then being completely destroyed in tnhe first days which makes many players instanly leave.
And as you kept your culture level/points and the colonization is available earlier in you second city as well you have a chance to get another second quicker again.
We are not saying it will offer the gameplay with the most fun but it allows you to keep playing and for some this even will provide a challenge and even invest more time to rebuild and take revenge on the conqueror later on.
Greetings from the Design Team
“”””Our numbers dont confirm that loosing the first city when you have 2 or 3 makes you leave the game. But if this first city is the only one you have and you loose it the amount of players leaving is huge.”””
Did you take into account that lot’s of players only start for gold trading in the beginning of the game.
Those will normally leave after losing their 1st city but never had the intention to have more city’s than that
It’s more difficult to be strong again if you have small cities… I consider it’s better to start again. Yep, I believe he stays in the game if he still has some cities, but how active is he? And how long does he play? Maybe several days and just for a moment. So, protect them or persuade/show them that they can easily get all back even they lose their first & last city. Probably add another effects to New Hope? Or bring something absolutely new? What about granting bonuses to all players who start their playing later (after launching of a world)? These bonuses could be strong according to days which have elapsed since launching (respectively since possible ending of beginner protection for players who registered on the world as the first ones)- more days, stronger bonus (until a maximum, of course).
If you change the quest to build a CS I hope you´ll make an other one which show how important it is to found a new city
Good Job.. 🙁
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Very Good Job Guys..Thank You..
regards
Geisti
german Player
Unfortunately we encountered an error with the second file, causing it not to be displayed properly.
It’s now been fixed, apologies for the inconveniences and no need for sarcasm. 😉
Dear Design Team,
Of course, I see your points.
Quote:
And as you kept your culture level/points and the colonization is available earlier in you second city as well you have a chance to get another second quicker again.
Unquote
First of all let say, I am a beginner and I will play this game the first time. What says the beginner quest for the battle points? Yes of course, you have to spend them for farming villages. But this means, there are no battle points for victory processions, no culture points for get a third city very fast after loosing my first city, is there?
Secondly: During my experience, I do not believe, that during the starting phase an alliance will help so much as you need for building your city because they need it for themselves. Which means, you have to use game currency to buy the ressources, haven’t you? Really, I do not think, that will give more fun to all new players, but this is only my own opinion.
Players who use (much) gold, have the ability to grow faster their city, have more resources and complete the construction and research without having to wait, but also have more troops, that they can buy from the Phoenician trader or immediately train using the resources that they purchase at the market.
This also allows them to have more battle points and make more demonstrations. For this reason players who spend much, after a week from the beginning of the servers, have 4/5 cities, while players who do not spend it hard to get to the conquest.
I understand the need for the company to earn, but all this gold that you put anywhere ruined the game and move a research is not enough to solve the problem.
Thank you for your feedback, we are trying to find ways to make the game better for every type of player out there. For now we are looking for goods ways to improve the early survival of new players and one of our ideas is this research change. If you have any other ideas we would love to hear it.
Actually, a good way would be, to begin with the instant building and instant recruiting 4 weeks after the world has been started. So every player has a chance, to survive.
Another good idea will be, to start one world with Gold and another world without gold, just like you do it with tribal wars.
Furthermore you can give every player a chance to choice, if the player want to conquer a city and if he do so, it is possible to be conquered. If the player won’t do so, the player have a conquer protection for lets say 14 days.
If somebody have the intention to make the game more interesting for every kind of player, there are a plenty of possibility’s.
Again more valid insights, thank you Mim le Fay :).
Yes our goal is to make the game better and better for every kind or player, and it is very nice to see that we have such a dedicated community to help us.
The conquer protection idea is specially interesting, I will consider how that impacts the rest of the game to see if we are able to use it.
when will be implemented?
Hello Ikari,
We are still considering community feedback for this, so there is not a defined date yet.
This idea is only going to help the heavy gold users – they’ll be able to get a second city after the first day of the world. The biggest problem of grepolis, other than the end game, is how many cities heavy gold users can get by the end of beginners protection, making them able to wreak havoc uncontested once protection is over. If you’re really interested in protecting the game, nerf instant completion, even if it’s just disabling it until beginners protection is over.
Though of course, inno would lose money so I find it highly unlikely that any worthwhile change will happen
We are looking into a few ideas to improve the experience of the new players, this is not the only one, but we can’t add them all at the same time, unfortunately. More changes will come, and we are hopping that with every change we get closer to a better experience for every player.