Hello fellow commanders!

Before I start a topic under "suggestions" I want to make sure I got the game mechanics right. As I new player I stumbled upon 2 serious problems - at least I see them as such, being new to BD and comparing this game to my prior gaming experience.

So, #1: after just a couple of my first ticks (this counts for all realms of BD, perhaps galaxy also) my newly established outpost was attacked and conquered. Now, during the tutorial I've spend quite a sum of resources to build that outpost and in the end there is no way I will be able to keep it as a newb, but the resources are just a minor problem. Of greater concern is that (I believe) most new players who will experience such an attack from stronger players at he beginning will be turned off from the game and think that BD is rather unplayable (getting bullied from the start). I mean - what can you do if you're surrounded by top-LVL-players, a maxed out alliance whose members attack you from the start? My first impression is - take a leave, what possibly can I do to grow while in the midst of 10 biggest players on a server... in the very heart of their territory? I was told that I still have a chance to grow, though I'm yet to find out - HOW....

#2: at least one small step to a possible "solution": when I came to the part of the tutorial, where I was asked to establish a base I wasn't given the chance to see the conquered territories of all alliances currently present in the world. I think the tutorial should be corrected in a way that before building one's headquarters, the player is told about alliances, their impact on gameplay and a TURNED ON option to see their territories, while searching for a place to build the first base. I would have never started amidst a big alliance if I knew the borders of their territory. I would've starter somewhere near an alliance that still has free slots for members and a chance to be competitive, so I can add to it's strength, or at least started at a place where the influence of bigger alliances isn't that strong, or they are scattered.

What do you think? Am I missing something, that's not yet obvious to me, being new to the game, or do I have a point?

hey there, first I would like to welcome to the game.

second, to answer ur first point, yes most newbies usually have their tutorial OPs taken. However, you have the option to skip the tutorial, which most of those who know a bit about the game are doing. In fact, OPs are a crucial part of the game and we can't leave them out of the tutorial, nor we can have anything that protect the OP to avoid abuse. So newbies having their OPs taken is one thing we can't do anything about. If u have a better idea, please don't hesitate to post it up.

About the second point, u can see the top alliance (top 12 alliances) territories (colonies, OPs and conquers) by clicking the 4th button from the left on the top right of BD, below the minimap.

EDIT: Please don't forget to visit our AANC viewtopic.php?f=416&t=1036, where you can apply for yourself a mentor, who is an experienced player volunteered to teach newbies and show them the rope in the games.

Not when you're placing a colony Which is when he wants it

u can see it when placing a colony, the only time when u aren't able to is tick 1, which is when the era is paused. At that time, there are no alliance yet and the alliances aren't registered in the data yet. So there are no way to see it. Plus u can see it when the era is unpaused, and the differences between tick 1 and tick 2 is close to none. Not to mention there are not much to see anyway...

Exactly starwa7s, I was talking about the part of the tutorial where you make your first outpost and at that moment most of the buttons you wrote about aister are simply not there yet (DURING the tutorial for a newly entered player). That's the point - change the tutorial so that before building the HQ, the player get's all the information about the current state of the world and can decide where to place his HQ (main building - castle/space station/whatever...). This way new players will be warned about big alliances and will not appear amidst enemy territory at random, they will rather have a chance to start somewhere safer (at least a bit).


Sure, I will probably skip the tutorial next time I start in a new world, it's ticks refreshed, BUT I'm talking about the "short life of a newb" here from the perspective of a new player and in a couple of days/weeks I myself won't be that newb anymore and won't be able to give you that valuable "first impression" feedback on BD. As a new player I needed the tutorial and I always do them the first time I enter a game, for this reason I'm suggesting to make it more user-friendly and welcoming, so that new players don't feel anything negative about the game (which comes up when the first outpost is instantly taken away by a stronger player). In Real Life Terms, bullying is a phenomenon that shouldn't be taken lightly, as it happens in all of the countries around the world (USA...) and remember that many killings in schools (Littleton, etc.) happend because of this. Thus, in a game when a stronger player attacks a weaker one from the start, without any proper understanding of game mechanics, it leads to negative emotions and I don't believe you seriously want that in your game, especially if you want to have a bigger playerbase.




I do, right from the start. A couple of solutions, actually.

SOLUTION #1:
You have the MAIN BASE protected, why not make the FIRST OUTPOST (only the first) protected together with the main base? Make it clear, that only the first outpost that was build DURING THE TUTORIAL counts as protected and the protection will be lifted together with the protection of the main base. Explain a bit how important outposts are in the gaming process and that (if entering a world at tick above 50 or 100 - you should know better) outposts of newbs will ALWAYS be conquered by stronger players and it makes no sense building more until one get's stronger. This way you have explained to a newb what an outpost is, how to build it and have let him keep it.

SOLUTION #2:
After the first outpost is build (DURING the tutorial), make a mission (next tutorial step) to raze the outpost and as a reward for this the player gets the same resources back that were needed to build the outpost. You can also make this mission OPTIONAL (cause if a world is new and only a couple of ticks old there is no danger of losing it, no stronger players out there yet), but explain, that his first outpost will be taken away from him anyway and it's advisable to do the "raze outpost mission" in order to regain resources for faster HQ development. Again, this way you have explained to a new player what an outpost it, how to build it, how to raze it and let him have more resources to develop his base faster instead of pointlessly losing it and feeling bad about the inevitable loss.

In addition to those solutions: the way it is now, having new players create outposts that can be taken over by strong one's lessens competition on a wide level impacting gameplay as a whole. It's easy to take this newb-outposts for existing players, and there is more luck, than skill involved in the process of gaining more territory for alliances, because an alliance on whose territory more newbs spawn their cities (mostly randomly) gets stronger the easy way without any tactical moves.
All IMHO, of course...


Thank you, I'll try that. Having someone ready to answer all kinds of basic questions is really nice for a beginner.

i've just checked, even before u place the colony, u can see the top 12 alliances' territories. It's the 4th button from the left under the minimap.

the game's harsh environment for newbies is something we all aware of. That's why we always try our best to offer more things for newbies to learn about the game, and the AANC is one of them. However, there are things we can't do anything about. And the tutorial OP problem is one of them.

I'll talk about your two suggestions when I have more time, for now I'll need to leave. But while waiting, maybe u should try going in a random server, and check whether u can see the top territory button. If you can't for some reason, please make a screenshot and post it here.

Yes, indeed, you're right about this one. I've just tried Mars-2 (won't play though to preserve space) just to check if the button is activated and it is. But it's good that we sorted this one out. It brings me to another point: while new to the game I was completely unaware that this button/option exists and thus going through the tutorial It didn't come to my mind neither to search for it, nor to activate it before building my MAIN base. Perfect - the button is there, now the only thing that's left to do is to TELL about this button in the tutorial BEFORE giving the player the mission to build his HQ. Best - in the same mission. Like: "before you create your first base, take a look at the map, switch on the button that shows the territory already conquered by alliances and choose wisely, where you want to start! Best not to start amidst an existing alliance that's maxed out and won't recruit any more members" - something like that. I'm not a native English speaker, so you'll surely find a better and shorter formulation.

This need to be tweak. This is because when the server is at tick 1 (when the tick froze), this button is rather useless. Even when you go to the community > alliance button, it will says that no alliance had been created. So, maybe the newbies will hardly know its real function.

Sure, I agree alienzseventh. As I said the easiest way to "tweak" it, is simply to explain it in the tutorial. Right words and a short formulation is all that's really needed, instead of more coding and extra hours of work. It won't be much of an issue before tick 50-90 (I guess), still even at the beginning new players should be made aware about the importance of alliances here, and that without alliances most of them (apart from a few oldie-players) simply won't achieve anything unless it's a special event world that's FREE-FOR-ALL and no alliances can be created. Battle Dawn is really not about SOLOing, at least not for 99% of it's players.

alright, to your suggestions

about the first one, as I've said, we didn't have protection on the tutorial OPs due to several reasons, one of them being abusing. One can upgrade the OP to gates and practically gate tons of units to the middle of the enemy's territory.

Another example is nuke, having an unknown nuke next to ur colony is dangerous, but having an unknown protected nuke next to ur colony is even more dangerous, and u can't do anything about it but wait till the nuke is launched, and u'll waste 250 energy ion it, that is if you are online in time.

Even when u make it so that u can't upgrade OPs while being protected, the OP is basically safe till they break out of protection, which is completely up to them (except when the protection ran out which is not the case I'm talking about here).

When we are playing, we always try to keep our territory clean of neutral OPs, not just for normal resources gained from razing, but to make it so that our territory is as safe as possible so that we can focus on expanding. And the suggestion practically made this impossible.

about the second suggestion, razing an OP require 24 control ticks, and to be honest, rarely any tutorial OPs are left for 24 ticks.

I've noted ur 3rd suggestion about an interface tutorial, I do agree that there should be something somewhere that explain the interface as well as each windows do. However it shouldn't be in the tutorial, as the interface might change sometimes in the future, with features being added / removed or even a totally new graphic being implemented, and it would be tiresome to update the tutorial every time. A place in BattleDawn Wiki should be enough for it I believe.

About your "addition", I believe I've said about it above, we take tutorial OPs (or any other OPs, it doesn't really matter if it's a tutorial, or an OP of a guy trying to relocate, or a random OP for any reason u can think of) not just for expansion or raze for resources, but it's also crucial to keep ur territory clean of neutral OPs for security reason.

And about your point saying this is "bullying", I do agree that this is a little bit too harsh for some newbies, but we don't bully at all. Most experienced players are friendly and will be willing to help you with the game shall you ask nicely. Note the word "most" though, since some won't bother to. But at least, we aren't laughing at you, unless u are annoying and pretend that you know everything.

The game is harsh, you have ur OP taken and probably your two armor inf killed after placing ur colony 4~6 ticks, you have an incoming right after u come out of protection and got conquered soon after, then later got attacked again when u got ur first crystal. It's like the game don't want you to play. But if you can get over it and learn from it, you can improve, get better and eventually become successful.

Just like life don't u think?