With the way things are now, I would say the best option, until they make any big changes in the future, would be to build the best M2M that you can build. That would be the only way to avoid the majority of drawbacks from different tactics. The other option would be to have 3 players with top notch OD, and play a 3-2 against everyone. I’ve seen that work for a lot of teams, even against LI and LP. Unfortunately, we get what we pay for, and the fact that this game is free for anyone, outside those of us who have paid for supporter here or there, really limits the potential for huge game engine changes. BB could decide to go for at least minimum supporter required for play, which would probably allow for some amazing changes to the game. If they went this direction though, how much user base would be lost? Also, could the fact that is became pay to play allow for enough progression that a good amount of paid users would flow into the game? If it failed, BB would disappear all together. It looks as though they have just decided to take the current on and off supporters, Ali with the free players, which keep the game alive, over risking the game entirely to make this into a more advanced game engine. I apologize for any typos and such, I spent 20 hours on a plane recently and I’m just worn out. Do you think BB could survive dropping down to 500 or 1000 paid users, in order to support a better overall game? Would the game advancement draw in enough paid users to keep it going after that?
Or maybe they could run a promotion on supporter, setting a goal for total amount of money needed to pay for support that will be needed to create a more advanced game engine. Once the goal is reached, the outside help could be hired, the game engine improved, and then back to the way things are. These additional programmers needed would be hired just for the purpose of creating this better game engine, would be paid for that time, and then they could go back to doing what they normally do for a living. I think if the BBs talked to some programmers who have the ability and the time to do this, get a total cost amount, and then ask us for that amount to be purchased in supporter packages, that you would see the community respond more. Of course, as the paying players, they would have to set the exact goal, and keep a running counter to show how close we are to reaching that goal. Once the goal is reached, they could hire the support needed and start making the changes. I think with a new and more advanced game engine, BB would have a revival, and with the increased users, there would be additional supporters, thus making everyone happy. It would make it easier to have the revenue needed to keep up with user demand on changes that really need to be made.
The way things are now, we can keep going for as long as the game survives, but eventually, all good things come to an end. I’ll play it until I no longer can, but it would be amazing if we had a completely renovated and updated game engine, more in line with today.