2.2.1: Trade Restrictions & Performance Fixes

[Mr. D]

Hi all,

Version 2.2.1 is going to appear on the Play Store and App Store in the next couple of days (subject to review times) and features several improvements:

• Earth View: fixed missing context menu with the option to "Open Fire" for standalone attack buildings (e.g. Guard Tower).
• Earth View: map filters are now permanent and persist through app restarts (uninstalling the game will reset your filters though).
• My Lands & Construction: pressing buttons (e.g. "Build", "Upgrade") and viewing overlaying windows no longer scrolls the view to the top, allowing easier interaction with long lists of bases or buildings.
• My Lands performance improvements: after the initial list of bases is loaded all subsequent views of the same window (or an individual base) will be faster as relevant data is now cached locally on your device.

This version also introduces an important update to the core game mechanics and land trading rules.

As many of you remember, the concept of Travel Points was introduced some time in the past to fight the increasing number of trade-related exploits.
Unfortunately, it seems that Travel Points slowed this process, but haven't actually solved the problem and by now many of our players accumulated enough travel points to resume the strategy of advancing base levels via reselling & merging of high-level lands between multiple accounts, which brings us back to square one.

I would like to remind everyone that contrary to popular belief the only correct way to advance in "Domination: Earth" is via real-world travels, capturing new locations and merging of your own lands.
The only reason land trading was added to "Domination: Earth" in the first place was to offer a way to exchange resources with some effort from both sides (i.e. to avoid new players "begging" for resources from veterans and not offering anything in exchange) and an alternative way to capture a new spot of land in a remote location without resorting to combat.

At no point it was intended that land trading would supersede real-world travels and be the fastest way to grow your base.
Land trade exploits have always been frowned upon (especially when it involved creation of multiple accounts) and are considered to be the second greatest in-game offense akin to the usage of Fake GPS apps.

Please review our Code of Conduct if you have any doubts:

Using multiple accounts to advance your primary account is also considered against the rules.

However, this is not the first time I've made this announcement and unfortunately it doesn't seem like it's having much of an effect.
Since tracking and punishment of trade-related abuse is very time-consuming and wasted much of our resources in the past, it has become apparent that a different course of action is needed.

Accordingly, as of version 2.2.1 it will no longer be possible to buy or sell any lands above level 1, as 99% of trades happening in the game above that level seem to be associated with ways to bypass travel requirements and land merging exploits.

It is very sad that it has had to come to this and I do apologize to the 1% of legitimate land traders existing in the game, but there doesn't seem to be any other lasting way to resolve this.

However, since we no longer require Travel Points to control this situation all land merges below level 100 will no longer demand these (it will be free to merge level 1 land with a level 5 land, for example).

Please note that these changes are server-side and will take effect even if the new version isn't downloaded (the old version is simply not going to display the associated error messages correctly).
But I will refrain from "flipping the switch" until both apps (Android and iOS) are live and everyone gets a chance to obtain these.

As always, please post if you have any questions!
 

[S Keillan]

With the change in merging to allow sub-100 lands to be form without requiring Travel Points, would it be possible for the merge message to be explicit in indicating that a merge could occur? I relied on the TP cost to see if a land was capable of expansion or not (no TP cost shown equals room to expand), but now it becomes a guessing game as to whether two lands are adjacent. This might become a concern when a land might be adjacent to more than one larger lands and there is a choice between which way to merge.

[Mr. D]

1 hour ago, S Keillan said:

With the change in merging to allow sub-100 lands to be form without requiring Travel Points, would it be possible for the merge message to be explicit in indicating that a merge could occur? I relied on the TP cost to see if a land was capable of expansion or not (no TP cost shown equals room to expand), but now it becomes a guessing game as to whether two lands are adjacent. This might become a concern when a land might be adjacent to more than one larger lands and there is a choice between which way to merge.

Hmm, interesting point!

I'll have a think about possible solutions, sure! 😉

[Ruvox]

Since it is no longer possible to buy lands above level 1 it makes sense to remove the "buy" button from those lands. But you removed the "track player" button as well on those lands which might not be intended? 

Now I could attack, buy or track a player from a level 1 land but only attack it if it is above level 1.

[Mr. D]

2 hours ago, Ruvox said:

Since it is no longer possible to buy lands above level 1 it makes sense to remove the "buy" button from those lands. But you removed the "track player" button as well on those lands which might not be intended? 

Now I could attack, buy or track a player from a level 1 land but only attack it if it is above level 1.

That does sound like an unplanned side-effect, sorry!

Will look into it.

[Олег Поленин]

On 4/11/2020 at 4:44 PM, Mr. D said:

Hmm, interesting point!

I'll have a think about possible solutions, sure! 😉

Yep. This was an issue reported many times before, and then the introduction of TP kind of solved it

A simple "are you sure" confirmation box (just without any resource cost) would be more than enough