Norse Lands Shield Knights - BUG - devs take note

[teleshoes]

today, for approximately the 10 millionth time, someone in this forum has been confused by the 'feature' that archers require shields to join knight squads.

1) make the shield store a permanent fixture, shared between both sides, like bows and hammers. or at LEAST make it appear 100% of the time, like the scythe store, in the first open spot, on at least one side. the current arrangement just makes players hate berserkers, which would otherwise be a cool and fun feature, but now just mean you have to expand your walls unnecessarily because the RNG hates you.

2) add a ghost as soon as you get your first knight, telling you to build one wall if you dont have a shield shop yet, and then when the shield shop 100% appears, telling you to purchase a shield to train your viking squad.

3) or better yet....just dont require shields for knight-soldiers. this has the added plus of not punishing the players for having played other flavors and expecting that the basic rules dont change for absolutely no discernible reason.

i mean, shields are cool, and useful....but forcing players to use a feature you think is fun+flavorful doesn't increase enjoyment, especially when it doesnt add any strategic challenge, AND when it adds artificial difficulty when the RNG gives you two berserker shops, a scythe store, and a power upgrade station instead of a damn shield store, so you have to cut down a vagrant camp just to get a shield, and then you rage quit and make a long-winded post about it on the forums

[Stardustfire]

1) it is shared, you will see archers from the other side wander by and take a shield if the side where the shop belongs to let a shield stay long enove.

[teleshoes]

yes, it is true that you only need one shield store, although one can appear on both sides. but i meant located centrally, so that is shared EQUALLY among both sides, like the bow+hammer shops. the different distance between the outer wall on each side and the central camp would make it so that the mechanics might require being tweaked; a single archer/worker would target each shield and run to it, like the sword shop, only it would need to select the side that has fewer shields.
maybe instead make the shield shop part of the outer wall, like the march-off-to-war flag where you send knights to attack portals? again, the best solution is to just drop this counter-intuitive requirement completely.

[Sapador]

Originally posted by teleshoes:

the best solution is to just drop this counter-intuitive requirement completely.

Yes.

[Stardustfire]

greed steal from shops, so a shield shop outside the wall woudend be very handleable.
a more central shop woud indeed be helpful, or a hardcoded place where it spawns at both sides. got dragged enove games with tons of free space and without shops (all the near outer wall ones with different number of cases) that shoud have spawned dont do that.

[teleshoes]

there isnt enough room, aesthetically, just inside the outer walls.

so, there is one 'hardcoded' spot on each side of the camp, the wall one shop-sized distance away from the main camp on both sides, before the RNG sets it.

im pretty sure this problem would be solved by guaranteeing that the first open spot is a shield store (and the second open spot is the farm store, instead of first), and a ghost that appears once you have a knight and a shield store.

[Stardustfire]

shield before skyte woud kill starting economy, also when i remember right shieldshop is higher tier, not basic tier

[teleshoes]

shield before scythe on just ONE side wouldnt kill economy. its just, instead of farm+powerStatue, you would have farm+shieldStore.

also, yes, for farms+powerSwitcher, you need the 9-coin main camp. for shields, you need the 12-coin main camp. since shields are so important, making the store available at the 9-coin upgrade would be great.

[teleshoes]

also, i want to point out that i know they already added a ghost the first time you unlock the shield store....which is ABSOLUTELY NOT when the ghost needs to appear. you unlock shield store, probably on the first island, and you cannot unlock knights until the second island, possibly an hour or more later for new players.

honestly, the current ghost makes the problem WORSE, because the user THINKS that they now understand what shields do, see that they are almost useless, and never buys one again.

[Stardustfire]

seriously the ghost needs to NOT APEAR AT ALL outside of tutorial, let them first fix this ancient bug, than they can let him appear at more ocasions if he is wanted....

and what you think a player dont realises after using shieldwall and seeing his shielded workers get damaged without droping there weapons or coins? someone must be really stupid to not get what shields do after seeing it in action.
but yeah, ok, we are not 30 years ago anymore where ppl where able to realise Computer game mechanics by observing and manuals.
and game difficultys gone in the wrong directions since than, hurray to handholding mechanics that lowered the newer player generations mental capabilitys.

[Sapador]

Originally posted by teleshoes:

honestly, the current ghost makes the problem WORSE, because the user THINKS that they now understand what shields do, see that they are almost useless, and never buys one again.

Perfect description.

Originally posted by Stardustfire:

and what you think a player dont realises after using shieldwall and seeing his shielded workers get damaged without droping there weapons or coins? someone must be really stupid to not get what shields do after seeing it in action.

We're talking about the first 2 islands, right? At this point my subjects don't even take damage. They're all well cosy behind the walls. Buying shields at this point is a complete waste of resources. It doesn't require much of observation to understand this. And this is why new players don't buy shields on the early game, and this is why they will never understand they need shields to destroy a portal, without looking on the internet.

The amount of posts talking about this same topic is ridiculous. And it has only diminished on the last year, because wherever you look at, be it here or on Reddit, you can easily find dozens of threads about that, no matter which keywords you chose.

[Fulano]

I'd love to see the power switching thing pushed way down on the priority list... definitely after the shield building.

Also I still get no buildings spawning next to the castle from time to time. I should probably send in a save of that happening, but it's especially bad in the norse lands when it blocks the shield building from spawning.

I'm suspecting the shield mechanic was added as a way to keep people form assigning all their archers to knights and soft locking the game... though I don't think it was a great way to handle it either. Didn't they already change it to make sure one archers stays as an archer or something?

[teleshoes]

Originally posted by Fulano:

Also I still get no buildings spawning next to the castle from time to time.

just checking; are you sure that you've upgraded the main camp to the 9-coin base? (you wont get any buildings at all, anywhere, until you do, and shields wont appear until you upgrade it to 12 coins)

Originally posted by Fulano:

I'm suspecting the shield mechanic was added as a way to keep people form assigning all their archers to knights and soft locking the game... though I don't think it was a great way to handle it either. Didn't they already change it to make sure one archers stays as an archer or something?

i dont think that is the reason. i would guess their motivation is just to require shields to beat the game, because its an interesting mechanic that they want to immerse the player in. the devs also wanted to make it so you HAVE to use the shields to defend the walls (i read a dev somewhere saying this is the reason for the weakened wall strength in norselands and the main new crab baddie) but you dont actually ever need the shields....except to destroy portals for some reason that doesnt ACTUALLY fit in aesthetically with the rest of the mechanic. (yes, 1-2 archers do seem to stay free to hunt, although they wont leave a knight once they've pair-bonded to their mommy)

[Fulano]

Originally posted by teleshoes:

Originally posted by Fulano:

Also I still get no buildings spawning next to the castle from time to time.

just checking; are you sure that you've upgraded the main camp to the 9-coin base? (you wont get any buildings at all, anywhere, until you do, and shields wont appear until you upgrade it to 12 coins)

Ya, it'll stay empty all the way through iron tech, and exit portals won't even spawn in the spots this happens. It always seems to have a single torch in the middle of the space when it happens.

Otherwise ya, I think the best fix would be to remove the shield requirements for archers to join the knights, and just let people grab shields if the player decides to use them. I rarely send guys outside to defend the wall as well. Once crabs show up they just mow down any defenders.

[Stardustfire]

than you need to improve your playstyle, shieldwall pushes back crabs, like EVERY other enemy. you only cant just brainless run your shieldwall before the wall and let it get trampled from a crab when the crab comes in minutes later. keyword for useing shieldwall is "timeing".
if you have squires or even knights in yoru shieldwall units its not only possible but granted each crab that got forced back is instantly killed.

[teleshoes]

last week, i played a casual run of norselands on cursed difficulty, and beat it on day 50-something, and i did not use a shield wall once. the waves up to that point arent strong enough to destroy even a stone wall, except during retaliations, and sleipnir takes care of those alone