The Three Main Issues

[oak cloak]

Hi guys, so I played the OG version of the game. I quit long before the game disappeared from the App Store. Now I’m playing again, I remember exactly why I quit the first run.

1. Warehouses are absurdly expensive and require a huge storage capacity already. In order to build one, you already need something like 8 small warehouses. The amount of population that takes up is silly really. It means players early on cannot build other buildings. This prevents them from engaging with all the aspects of the game.

2. This one annoys me the most. Why does it require bars, teeth and gears etc to HEAL troops. For early players especially, they spend their hard-earned resources on building troops. Once they are lost in battle, it is very hard to gain these niche items to heal them. What eventually happens is the player just runs out of available good troops. And then they stop playing the game… I’m in this position now.

3. I know you will unlikely change this one because of…well…capitalism, but there should really be more ways to earn nanopods. Alternatively, have it that fewer things require them. Why do so many shops and buildings require them? Look at the top-level players right now. I guarantee that very very very few have many (if any) nanopod buildings. Why would you when you have so many units and vehicles that also require them?

Please do listen to these three points. I had many mates first run that played, and these are the reasons we quit. I know most my guild feels the same way. Look at a game like Clash of Clans. They have the balance WAY better.

I hope you sort this or I feel the game won’t last long.

[magic hornet]

Well I mean… in most games if your troops die they’re gone for goods, here we can build our army little by little even with loss and I think that’s a good feature

And for the rest I know what you may think, people this day want bonus and lots of free thing every day and are not accustomed to hard grind so maybe you have a point but is it in the spirit of the game?

[slim notch]

issues 1 and 3 are hopefully to be addressed once madrona is done reimplementing all desired features and content of the original game, which means that things will continue to suck for a while but they do seem to be open to changes like these based on their (fairly sparse) track record

issue 2 i can almost guarantee you wrote because of the tf2 units. absolutely agree that it's unfair for newer players especially since you unlock them way before encountering the rebels or unlocking naval battles, but imo due to their power scaling i think having more consistent ways to get t3 resources in the early game would be a better option

well, i really only say this for heavy and demo since they're really good units even later into the game. scout, soldier, and pyro shouldn't have bar healing in any case

[trail bramble]

while I agree the TF2 units are the most egregious example. Losing things like your tank, recon, etc early game just feels like a kick in the gut.

even if it's not as bad of a repair as the TF2 units

[slim notch]

oh yea for sure

i lost my recon to a nasty crit before unlocking oil and it felt like the game was specifically out to get me

[trail bramble]

Yeah I've had those days in the OG and in the rebirth of the game

there's days where your important unit gets crit randomly

[cosmic niche]

I think issues one and two can be combined to: Bad early game design.

If you do not buy the nano storage buildings (as I did, cause they are not upgradable), population is a huge headache. Same with t3 ressources, bars stop being an issue after you can continuously beat the AC.

But the slog from 20-40 is reallly off-putting. Without the nostalgia from OG Battlenations I would've quit I think.

When Madrona finally comes back to balance things out, I do think they need to overhaul population price, ressource price of a lot of early buildings and troops. Z2 wanted you to buy nanos to be able to play. In a modern gamesetting, you will not get the majority to pay, but to stop playing. Early nano noobtraps like the bazooka squad and the Howkey religions quest really are a roadblock in getting new blood into the game.

Well bugger me sideways, just read the announcement. So changes to early game (1-25) will be coming, love to hear that.

Honestly, Madrona did a lot good in the last months, think they need some feedback on that as well.