Limit on buying & selling war supplies?
As of this morning, nobody in my club is able to buy or sell more than 1 war item per spot in the Trade Depot. Does anyone know if this is a bug or is it a change? It's very inconvenient.
Forum Discussion
@lesorsier Good point. I should point out, however, that @PinnacleValley is correct insofar as the answer received from one of EA's representatives. Allow me to explain.
I think what's going on here is that there is an issue that has gone unaddressed by EA/TrackTwenty: namely, depot manipulation, as evidenced in the picture you showed. After quite some time of legitimate players complaining about hackers in club wars to EA and not seeing any resolution, I believe that many non-hacking players have decided to fight this as best they can, short of actually manipulating game code, and turned to setting up entire clubs of 18-level cities that hit the war button for no other purpose than to collect war items and do deliveries, and couldn't care less about winning. (I saw this when our club did a 'reset' over a year ago and we would match against teams that wouldn't even fire a single shot or less than a handful, at most; basically, next-to-no effort to engage in war and this was prior to Shield Buster, so imagine how frustrating this was).
At this point, I would go out on a limb and say that between the hacking war players duplicating their depots and the non-hacking players using excessive numbers of feeder cities to try (in vain, in my opinion) to combat the hackers, and all the frustration that activity caused (if the comments in the Facebook groups is any indication) EA has seen a significant enough drop in war participation and therefore, card pack purchases, to feel the need to step in. They tried it first with the proverbial carrot when they introduced more war-related CoM tasks. I don't think that worked out so well, as the players who had abandoned club wars due to the cheating, dug their heels in and simply refused to do those tasks, even to the detriment of their CoM scores EA then tried it with the cephalopod monsters, meant to get us to engage in war and buy more card packs (note, they also (temporarily?) introduced a "Monster Card Pack" offer at the same time, trying to recoup lost earnings from diminished war card packs. That REALLY didn't go over well, as the majority of players I've witnessed have taken a hard pass on Steve & Friends (with the exception of the recent "community event" that required minimal participation). Since the carrot of doing more to get "more" (that's debatable, I know) didn't work, now it's come time to try the stick approach.That, I believe, is what this new change of 1-war-item-per-sales-slot represents.
So, instead of addressing the reason why non-hacking players turned to excessive feeder creation - that reason being the hackers duplicating their depots - EA has chosen instead to blanket punish everyone with this solution. I mean, that is until the hackers find a way to crack the code on the limit, at which point, the only players who will suffer are the non-hackers...once again.
As it appears that EA isn't moved to do anything to combat cheating if it doesn't affect their potential to sell non-hacking players war-related packs, my only suggestion to those of us who do not hack is to stop buying any and everything in this game in order to give EA the same 'stick' it is giving us. We have given them plenty of time to find ways to address the hackers that doesn't have to involve punishing non-hacking players. The only thing they understand is loss in revenue. I don't say this lightly, either. I spend money in this game, monthly. I don't honestly think I would play it daily if I reverted to a free-to-play mentality, but I'm so frustrated with the lack of effort on the company's part to fix what needs fixing and not break what doesn't need fixing, that I can't think of any alternative. If that means I eventually abandon the game, then I guess, so be it. Obviously, this would have to be done on a massive scale to move their profit in the negative direction downward, which is to say, I don't believe it will happen as a concentrated effort, but rather naturally over time (it probably already has begun) as players just get frustrated to the point of giving up on their own. I'd like to see the game get saved from that fate with a more targeted and coordinated effort, but that's likely just wishful thinking on my part.
For everyone disagreeing with PinnacleValley stating that a second city is a feeder and therefore against the rules (with the response to back up that statement, I might add), I do not see what the disagreement is. I think the explanation by EA's representative was pretty clear. Play a second or third or fourth or whatever number city as a legitimate separate game, and that isn't considered against the rules. Once your additional city/cities stop all functions except 1) acting as additional storage for your first city and/or 2) act only to "Feed" your main city with items, then it has transitioned to a "Feeder" and therefore is not considered within bounds. (I should admit, I don't like this since it doesn't address the actual hackers in this game who continue to have an unfair advantage over non-hacking players in CoM as well as wars, but it is what it is. See my previous comment regarding what I think should be done on our end for those who do not hack.)
You can dislike the answer, but no need to shoot the messenger, y'all.
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I didn't see the hard discussion part but yes, people try to be calmed and relaxed , after all is just a game, hahaha I'm the first one who rage everytime inside the game when I see cheaters, I understand the passion, but yes,is just a game... 🙂
@robotechnology80 wrote:For everyone disagreeing with PinnacleValley stating that a second city is a feeder and therefore against the rules (with the response to back up that statement, I might add), I do not see what the disagreement is. I think the explanation by EA's representative was pretty clear. Play a second or third or fourth or whatever number city as a legitimate separate game, and that isn't considered against the rules. Once your additional city/cities stop all functions except 1) acting as additional storage for your first city and/or 2) act only to "Feed" your main city with items, then it has transitioned to a "Feeder" and therefore is not considered within bounds. (I should admit, I don't like this since it doesn't address the actual hackers in this game who continue to have an unfair advantage over non-hacking players in CoM as well as wars, but it is what it is. See my previous comment regarding what I think should be done on our end for those who do not hack.)
You can dislike the answer, but no need to shoot the messenger, y'all.
I... Think I agree with Pinnacle ...?? I think, I understand the pain about seeing multiple enemies feeders cities and dead clubs, and I understand Pinnacle is just sharing the statement of EA by email. But once again, I believe, even when that was the message, feeders cities aren't illegal, I have 2 cities since I started the game (almost and pretty long) , I never got any message from EA, block, or something, I did it because when I reached high levels unlocked burgers, pizzas, sofas and my market got destroyed and I realised that so much later that was easier upgrade my storage and expansions areas in low level, since we can't filter the items on the market... you know how the market works, so in a city with level 14 you can open the market and find vu items, storage parts, some rare items like planks, veggies... and of course I share with my main, also in my club almost all have a second account, is a normal thing, there are some as president in other clubs, so when someone is too busy in real life they can go to a secondary club to play slowing.
No one get banned or something from EA never, and you can find clubs with a lot of feeders cities and never get banned, I agree also that we can't find this information anywhere, is not showing for all of us as normal players, we have to contact EA and after several messages get a response like Pinnacle did. That is why I don't think this is a real rule, just I said, there is no way for EA to know this, acting as additional storage for your first city is something hard to find out, especially in a cooperation game, so if I only share some coins and items with my friends EA can get confused and says oh this is a feeder city, nope, as I said, there is a - symbol on items so you can reduce the price to 0, I sens tons of items with low price, and also coins with my teammates when they need, they said I'm playing COM and I'm ruined, and I share with burgers some money putting with low cost... and I'm playing this game years ago, again, never got any kind of punishment. Pinnacle contacted EA years ago,so this isn't like a new movement for EA, except the new rule about items that I dislike completely.
well... debating again about the new rule, I stay saying that is bad that we can't share those items, when the whole war is about cooperate for the win, if I have spiders with a good level, then I want ammos and I can give all plungers, those I get in deliveries, with the partner who have BMM with more level, and strategize with the players online, share items... you know... the game... so bad that this had to happen because by the fault of cheaters our own game is getting refrain
feeder again,.. 🙂
What dead clubs? in arena 5 and 6 they are pretty much alive and hyperactive.
If EA wants to remove feeders, it is pretty easy. Block app cloner and similar apps on android, block emulators on pc and mac. On ios they don't have to do anything. Problem solved. 1 city per device.
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@robotechnology80 Mac I appreciate your insight, knowledge and kind words. Don’t quit, you’re much too talented a player for that...
@BlazinsZ I also appreciate your perspective and simply walk away agreeing to disagree - still with great respect.
Take care.
@BlazinsZ Hey, I completely understand the appeal of a feeder (even outside of the application of helping with club wars), but I just think the writing is on the wall, here.
I don’t think EA can state plainly that “feeders are illegal” because, as someone else pointed out, they would then have to clearly define what constitutes a feeder and then justify applying that definition to any city they would then designate a feeder and remove to Naughty Island. That just opens them up to all kinds of PR disasters and additional work in trying to investigate this when we already know they’re loathe to investigate real cheating. They don’t currently have and won’t invest in the manpower required to do that for millions of cities.
I don’t think we can mistake this move of limiting war items sales as anything other than what it is: an attempt to curtail feeder activity. Again, we can disagree on what cheating is or isn’t as it relates to what is or is not in their terms of service, but the fact remains, EA clearly does not want us using additional cities for competitive advantage, even if we are not hacking, and even if it is done to actually combat the hacking they themselves won’t stop.
I got 4 cities on 4 different phone/tablet. 4 different level , one is only level 11 and it will stay like that because I get buy stuff for my other cities. I spend real money instead of hacking. I put times in cities that I build. EA should focus on HACKERS !!!! and not players that are spending money in the game.
This is the biggest mistake EA made and it will * of players of that great game.
