What's our stand on "tech raiding"? The reason being we can probably attract more people if we allow it. The question is, would we really want those people? If we have it (and I personally don't really think tech raiding's all that crash hot to be honest but anyway), I'd be thinking something along the lines of: Must be a nation that hasn't been active for 7 days. Must NOT be a member of an alliance which might cause us problems. The raid must be approved by someone. A message must be sent to the proposed victim announcing our intent. If a reply is received before the next 2 updates, the raid is called off. Otherwise, if 2 updates have passed since the sending of the message, the raid can begin. The raid will be called off the minute someone complains about it.
Its more trouble than its worth, a lot of alliances ZI tech raiders for the hell of it even though they aren't involved.
I was wondering that. Having taken a look at some of the other alliances, I'm wondering if something more "vague" and about wars in general might be better. Most alliances seem to have something about approving wars. I'll draft something up though and we can decide then.
Most alliances are getting rid of those clauses, Legion had one until recently that said that members could attack whoever they want, but if they dig themselves into a hole they won't be getting any help. But that many Legion nations have attacked the GC its given them a bad name so its being scrapped. However, just because we don't officially allow war doesn't mean we can't turn a blind eye. Provided we pick our enemies carefully nobody need ever know. Since we already have GC membership lists we can just attack all the grey nations not in it.
What is tech raiding anyway? I understand It's about gaining tech, but is it only just attacking for the tech raid? or is it anything else? (Have been involved in maybe one war during my time on CN so I have very little experience.)
It's basically just a quick strike at a more-or-less abandoned nation in the hopes of stealing some valuables, preferably the ever-expensive tech.
It can be both fun and profitable if done correctly (or so I hear), but it causes problems in several ways if the victim "wakes up" suddenly and starts screaming for help.
A lot of times, the reason people get "caught" tech raiding is because they try to get the tech after a day of inactivity on the victim nation. The best way, as DU said, is to wait for about a week of inactivity, and then it should be safe. Sometimes, however, a ruler will have just been away for a week, will come back, and post on the CN forums that they were struck for no reason after being gone for a few days. These people are whiny bitches, and if they don't want stuff like that to happen, they should get nation sitters.
Tech cost more the more you buy so... If we say I buy 20 tech and give it to someone, will I buy tech for the same low price (as if I hadn't bought any tech before) the next time or will I pay the usual price (as if I had 20)? If I'll pay the low price then... then I could change my nation into a buy-and-give-away-nation, who send tech to those need it (in other words; those whose tech cost just a little bit too much).
All the successful tech raiders I've talked to say they only attack the day before an inactive nation is about to be deleted, to avoid getting entangled in people who are on vacation or just not collecting for some time. The reason being that once the target's troops are gone you can't steal more tech, just raid and destroy, and if the ruler is gone he can't buy more troops to restart the stealing process. I've never actually gone tech raiding but in principle I don't really mind it as long as it doesn't cause all sorts of nasty inter-alliance problems. So, all in all, perhaps an unofficial policy might be best: ask for permission, make sure you're hitting an about-to-be-deleted nation, and don't come whining if you're caught. Either that or just don't do it. As for TP: tech prices reset, so if you buy 20 tech and give it away, any more tech will cost the same as if you had never bought those 20 tech to start with. But infra will increase in price every time, even if you lose half of it in war. Hence the vicious circle of ZI:d people.
Surprisingly enough it was the GC, the most neutral alliance of them all that first developed and then put into practice the 'Permanent ZI' strategy, thanks to Experimentum who thought of it.
So it resets? Well, then I'll soon "fix" my nation, buy a foreign aid-improvement and start sending packages with, lets say... 10 tech each to those nations in the newly formed alliance. But, not now. My time will come, soon enough.
Don't forget to collect taxes before you're deleted for inactivity, though. (Since if you were going to abandon your nation I'm assuming you've been a bit inactive looking after it.) Is it 20 days now?
Yes its 20, but it'll probably be shortened back to 15 soon. The 20 day thing was only meant to be for the Christmas/New Year period. In the good old days it was 30 days and you only had to log in to be registered as active.
I'm not arguing with the 15 day period, but only registering as active those who have recently collected taxes (rather than those who have recently logged in) strikes me as utterly ridiculous. I wonder why did admin change that?
It's paying bills that makes you active. You can collect your taxes for a few days (i think 3) and then leave it at that, and 12 days later your nation will be gone.
Actually, I tried this today. I paid my bills and nothing happened, but when I collected taxes my beautiful nation earned that red thingamajig indicating I had been "Online in the last 60 minutes." If that signifies activity...
It was supposed to reduce server load. There used to be people who'd wait a month or more and then collect a huge lump of taxes, so for 30 days those nations did nothing but waste space on the server. By making tax collection compulsory at least once every 15 days Admin was able to reduce the number of inactive players and to delete nations that are created and then abandoned a full 2 weeks earlier than before.