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Active Splatters vs Invaders
Active Splatters vs Invaders
Active Splatters vs Invaders
I've heard from V that invaders are here to stay; sad.  I'm not entirely sure of their purpose in the game, but if an all-out removal of invasion forces is impossible, could we at least get them scaled back a bit?

I'm not entirely sure of the reasoning behind invaders, but here are my theories and my arguments (and if anyone else has any theories, post and I'll argue them as well :p).

1. Invaders are meant to "slow down" our progress on TA so that developers have more time to work on an update.

It's working!  Okay, in all seriousness, there's a difference between "slowing down" our progress and bringing it to a near standstill.  The 500k blocks had already put a damper on our estimates of when TA would be clear.

Invaders are getting out of hand for the number of players we have regularly splatting.  In a good week the target square might go down by ~1000.  Not too bad, but when you consider I've been taking out at least 500 a day (underestimating here), 3500 a week should be more accurate.  I'm not the only splatter (I hope), but even so, that's 2.5 invaders for every 1 normal monster killed, which is ridiculous.

2. Invaders are a response to players complaining about the lack of building on TA.

The most vociferous people I remember wanting more building are no longer active, and the building toplist has dwindled to a mere 94.  There's plenty of building to do regardless, and scaling back invaders will still allow for plenty of destruction in north city.


Well, those are my thoughts.  I know I've made a lot of posts recently about invaders, but they are taking up far too much of my time.  Every once in awhile I want a break from splatting...maybe head up to TA and find an unoccupied forest square to dig on.  

An official response on the plausibility of scaling back invaders would be appreciated.  Barring that, it would be nice to know if the market ever gets damaged whether or not we will lose all our items listed there.  (You know, so I can take a day off without becoming paranoid about losing 100k+ nubs.)
>1. Invaders are meant to "slow down" our progress on TA so that developers have more time to work on an update.

yes...because that one update every 3 years that isn't just a translation is hard in development.
Thank you for your sarcasm, Tyler.  You however don't count as an active splatter, or even an active player as I can't find you anywhere on the toplists.  It warms my heart that you still find the time to stop by the forums and complain.

I may be in a solid minority here, but I greatly enjoy the game, and the lack of updates doesn't bother me.  I was a little saddened when we didn't get a new king's mission last year, but every level is an update unto itself.  Once I reach 100 I might move into the complaining camp as well though.
Zeke, I do not share your endless commitment to the game. I agree, that every lvl up is update it self, but the result is, that I'm playing just one character to get these "updates". My splatter is usually parked on TA and I splat only when I'm bored to death, what means not more than 1000 monsters per month. It's smply no fun to kill monsters knowing that it's Don Quijote kind of fight. 
I'm pretty sure that I would use all my sub clicks on TA if I knew it makes sense (i.e. number of monsters is being reduced).
With reduced number of active players, I have parked also my robber. It's no fun to find active player's house once in 5.000 clicks.
And my digger is parked as well, as he is waiting for competition where he can win a diamond shovel. :-)
>Thank you for your sarcasm, Tyler. You however don't count as an active splatter, or even an active player as I can't find you anywhere on the toplists. It warms my heart that you still find the time to stop by the forums and complain.

No, I stopped playing when the game grew incredibly stale due to the abandonment of its continuation.
I've just taken (a small) part in a raiding party on TA. There were three or four players working together and hundreds of monsters were cleared from invaded squares in a matter of half an hour - they were far south on the teleport square and now it's all clear.

So all that it takes to deal with the invading army is to have 2-3 splatters working around the clock and we don't have even that!

I don't think it is really the problem in updates to the game being so few and so far apart or with the rate of TA invasion. Understandably, those people who have reached 100 with their characters may justifiably lose interest and there is playing fatigue with some veterans who are not there quite yet.

But for newbies all shoud be new (sic) and there should always be people that just start to discover the game. That obviously doesn't happen. I am sorry, but it amazes me that the owners are not able to incite interest in so few people globally needed to keep the game going. The only explanation I can think of is that nobody knows about it.

Try to enter the name in any search engine - most of the responses are from the official site, the Hun version or the last remaining fan site. Almost nothing in thousands of gaming referal sites and those few hits are years old. Many other games are advertised in the Larki game window for nonsubs - what's with reciprocal links on those games' sites?!

I understand the economic logic, but with maybe a dozen serious players recruited every month for really no or minimal extra cost, it could be possible to generate enough revenue to pay two weeks of developer's time annually and get that new king's mission or some new diamond shovel contest, whatever. We're not asking for much.

And even without any developments, new people (with their new houses to rob and backpacks to steal from) would reverse the trend and make some vetereans who are on leave to reconsider coming back. Otherwise, if the day comes that the TA market is damaged beyond repair, I don't know how many of the few of the resilient ones will stick. I'd have to think hard. Hopefully the right people will read this.

EG
I think the reason none of our posts about invaders have gotten an official response is that whenever someone reads them they burst into an uncontrollable fit of maniacal laughter.

Anyways, in a couple of weeks I will be taking a 2-month break from larkinor to live in the real world.  Thought I'd let everyone know that lovely scenic views like this one:

An army of 
128
 monsters is awaiting you towards west.
An army of 
79
 monsters is awaiting you towards north.
An army of 
80
 monsters is awaiting you towards east.

...will become topics of annoyance for some other poor splatter.  Yes, those were actual numbers up north today.

So the point of this post is two-fold: developers, please, please, please scale back the invaders.  We like seeing progress being made; it gives us some incentive to play.  And other larkinor players, please, please, please do not let TA become overrun much worse than above in my absence (or even while I'm here).
Thanks to D's request on the requests forum, Operator has scaled back the invaders.  As it's the first day of this, I'm not sure what this will look like yet, but THANK YOU!! from all of us!  Perhaps this will regenerate some interest in those players who have given up splatting altogether?

-lil
Great news!!! It definitelly regenerated my interest in splatting. :-)
How D managed this? Or was it just asking on right time right place?
TA is cleared of invaders now. There were 130 of them at the time of this post. One block was invaded with 5 invaders while clearing it. Another one with additional 5 few minutes later. At this moment I can't say how the numbers were reduced (frequency/number/other patterns?.
I recently cleared all the invaders (which wasn't that many) and waited until they re-appeared.
After 15 min... nothing. 
20 min - nothing.
30 min - nothing.
40 min - nothing.
45 min, there was 4 on square 10309 and 4 right above it on square 10274. The block to the right of square 10309 is the one that has 156000 monsters and increases. I wonder why this square produces the more than any other one?

Well thank you very much OP (and Mage Basher) for scaling back the invaders! It will be very easy to make progress and control those pesky invaders.

-PMF