REFORM Elixir for Walls System

Why was the elixir for walls update handled in this way in the first place? (for both updates, really)

Here was the root cause that players had which led to the update in the first place:
- Established THs from roughly TH7+ were able to finish their big ticket elixir upgrades before they were adequately finished with their gold/DE upgrades (meaning they weren't "ready" for the next TH lvl yet), leading to having overflowing storages which lost considerable value to that specific player at that specific point of their progress.

What SC did was allow for walls available at those TH lvls to be upgraded using elixir, without any restriction. The players who had no more need for it at that TH lvl could dump it all and help their wall progression. Seems great for them. But those players who previously had overflowing storages also fueled the economy for newly upgraded THs. Even not so newly upgraded THs still required elixir to progress their offensive levels to be on par with other THs of the same level, so that they could overcome the loot penalty from upgrading in the first place. Almost overnight, that led to the elixir shortage, which led to the dismal loot situation overall.

This update reverts TH7/8s back to what it once was, which restores whatever problems were experienced by those levels. It also helps TH9s, to the extent of raiding TH8s. But it didn't completely restore all issues for TH9, and this will do nothing to solve the problems TH10s have been facing from it.

My question to Supercell is this: why wasn't an alternative approach to handling the elixir for walls update looked into this time around?

- - - SOLUTION - - -

Re-introduce elixir for walls for lvl 7+, but place a restriction on it. In order to use elixir for wall upgrades, you must maintain the minimum elixir levels in storages which provides the storage loot cap for raiders at their TH lvl, PLUS the amount for which the wall upgrade costs.

Example: I am a TH8, and I want to upgrade my purple wall piece to skull. Cost is 500k. In order to offer the max loot to raiders of 300k, I need to have ~2.150M in my elixir storage (2,142,857 to be exact). Add 500k to that, and in order to upgrade a wall to skull, I need to have at least ~2.65M in storage (2,642,857 exact number again).

This approach would work for every TH lvl, with lvl 11 walls simply requiring that you have 8M in your elixir storage to upgrade it. That hits the actual loot cap, but again, there is only maybe a couple hundred thousand of elixir spillover wasted from one attack at most from this, and only for upgrading the very end-game level of walls.

The end result of this is that the issue of overflowing storages is still resolved, but the more devastating issue of established bases having levels of elixir that won't even cover the cost of the cheapest army is also a thing of the past.

- - - - -

I'm just an idiot who barely got his college diploma, but I can't see how that shouldn't have been considered the best solution to this problem. Please tell me where the gaping flaw in my logic is here, if I'm not seeing it.

One flaw I can see is your initial assumption as to why the initial update occurred. It is my belief this was done as a compromise to the complaints about expensive walls. I felt this was a far better solution than simply dropping the prices. I'd also wait and see what the effects on TH10s are. I think they will benefit due to the trickle down effect. Common complaints are that TH8s are being fattened up for slaughter, but TH9s can be just as much at risk. Most TH9s simply can't just dump 1M elixir into walls everytime since upgrades are so much more expensive.

What's unavoidable is that upgrades aren't that expensive at TH8, but they still have access to mounds of loot that higher THs can get. An overly efficient TH8 player will naturally have more loot than he can spend.

So really my point is to wait and see how this update affects the economy before passing judgement. TH8s will still have an easy time while offering up more for the higher level players, in theory. There are worse things than having too much loot at one TH level.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Scuba061

One flaw I can see is your initial assumption as to why the initial update occurred. It is my belief this was done as a compromise to the complaints about expensive walls. I felt this was a far better solution than simply dropping the prices.

So really my point is to wait and see how this update affects the economy before passing judgement. TH8s will still have an easy time while offering up more for the higher level players, in theory. There are worse things than having too much loot at one TH level.

---

Yeah I guess that would in part be the other reason for them doing this back in September, a combination of having elixir of little value to them (overflowing) and also the fact that walls get pretty expensive around lvl 8+. And yes, elixir for walls is a far better solution than simply lowering the cost of walls. Walls are there as a resource sink and to separate the dedicated from the casual players, which is why it makes sense for them to cost 2.2B to completion. Lowering the cost would not be fair to those who grinded them out previously, and also devalue the resource sink as a whole.

I just think that it's fair for some of us to judge the way this reverted update was implemented b/c a few of us called out exactly what was going to happen with the initial update. This isn't some guess and check theory that we happened to get right, it's simple economics and understanding optimal player behavior based on opportunity costs of the game.

We hit the nail directly on the head with the effect of the initial update not b/c we were lucky, but b/c it was predictable. I can promise that this will fix any loot problems TH7/8s had (which were minimal for TH8, maybe non-existent for TH7), and partially restore TH9s, insofar as raiding TH8s goes. TH9s and TH10s can still dump their resources in exactly the same fashion as they could during the first update, so it will not fix anything for TH10s, or at most the improvement will be marginal, statistically insignificant.

While I agree that there are far worse things than having too much loot (see: the past 3 months of having no elixir to loot, haha), I think that this feature should either be done away with entirely (pre-update), or it should be restored to lvl 7-11 walls, but needs to be reformed so that it doesn't break the economy/game like it did the past few months.

I vote let every1 upgrade with walls and remove loot penalty. If lower TH's will not stock up in resources then the loot penalty should be the same across all lvls :rolleyes:

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Seikijin

I vote let every1 upgrade with walls and remove loot penalty. If lower TH's will not stock up in resources then the loot penalty should be the same across all lvls :rolleyes:

---

I mean what you're suggesting is to make massive overhauls to how loot is earned in general, which were changed a year ago. This isn't really the place for that suggestion.

What is being proposed in here would be a simple fix that could be done in the next update. I'm really just interested in hearing from people who see problems that would come from this, compared to what we currently have now. I personally don't see a single issue with this, and while I could see why it was done the way it was with the initial release, I don't understand why this approach wasn't considered as the best option in this adjusted update.

I see your solution to being able to upgrade walls w/ lix as plausible and an alternative to the system in place now, but i also see it as unnecessary.

I upgraded about half of my lvl 9 walls with gold before the lix upgrade came out. I love the lix upgrade and it definitely helped me finish my lvl 9's faster than i would have. I also think it's a bummer to lower th's that they gave you such a teaser -- a taste of how easy it was to upgrade walls w/ lix and then they took it away from you. But to be honest, almost everyone that has walls like i do has spent GOLD on them. It's not unfair that supercell is making you get at least lvl 8 walls before you get to use lix on them -- it's what the rest of us had to do.

I see your solution being able to work, but it just seems overcomplicated. If i was a th7 or th8, i sure as hell wouldn't want to have an extra 2.1 mil loot sitting in my storages all the time, begging higher lvl attacks on my base just because i needed it in there before i could use said-loot on my walls. The real solution is just planning things out ahead of time so you get most of your walls done about the same time as you finish all the lab upgrades. I don't think people that plan ahead will have too much difficulty there. perhaps a hassle, but not a difficult one.

Lastly, one of the things you said is that you "guarantee that the new update won't push more lix back into the game" (could be wrong on the wording as i didn't quote you). Thats just incorrect. It certainly has pushed plenty of lix back into the game --mostly around the th7 & the lvl, but we're also see QUITE a bit more loot in th9 & th10 because there are a TON of lazy-♥♥♥ th10's that refused to do walls before the lix update and are now accumulating it again because they can't dump it. Not to mention the edition of lvl 12 collectors adding loot to the game. Honestly, it was probably a pretty easy decision for supercell to make seeing as how dry the loot was at the time. In my opinion (and my clan mates who are currently swimming in loot), it was the right call.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Goobers

- - - SOLUTION - - -

Re-introduce elixir for walls for lvl 7+, but place a restriction on it. In order to use elixir for wall upgrades, you must maintain the minimum elixir levels in storages which provides the storage loot cap for raiders at their TH lvl, PLUS the amount for which the wall upgrade costs.

Example: I am a TH8, and I want to upgrade my purple wall piece to skull. Cost is 500k. In order to offer the max loot to raiders of 300k, I need to have ~2.150M in my elixir storage (2,142,857 to be exact). Add 500k to that, and in order to upgrade a wall to skull, I need to have at least ~2.65M in storage (2,642,857 exact number again).

---

This is a great idea! I saw one or two variations of it mentioned last week.

And I don't think it even needs to be implemented in a way to maximize loot up to the cap (2642857 in your example). It's not like every last possible drop of lootable elixir needs to be there. And anyway, someone could dump elixir until they reach the cap, then dump more elixir into their barracks (which they can get back later), so you're not going to be able to make the maximum available. But if you could make "close" to the cap available, with a nice round number like 2M or whatever, that would help.

Basically, the way I picture it, the wall might say 500000 elixir on the upgrade button, but the button would be red, indicating insufficient elixir, until they actually had 2500000 elixir in storage. When they click the upgrade button, the popup screen could have some sort of explanation of the cost being 500000, but the requirement of 2500000 to be available.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Caguggenmos

I see your solution being able to work, but it just seems overcomplicated. If i was a th7 or th8, i sure as hell wouldn't want to have an extra 2.1 mil loot sitting in my storages all the time, begging higher lvl attacks on my base just because i needed it in there before i could use said-loot on my walls.

---

As it stands currently, this is exactly what TH7s and TH8s are going to deal with again (and which all THs faced before the first update). The only difference is that TH7/8s have zero outlet for that overflowing storage elixir now--reducing the value of it to almost nothing again--whereas with this solution that elixir would still hold value, but it would be a "bonus" to use elixir for walls. You would have to farm it above that loot cap, and then it would be fair game to use.

The solution is also incredibly uncomplicated. I can go and break it down right now for you.
TH7: 1,562,500 + 200,000 = 1,762,500+ in elixir storages in order to upgrade a wall to lvl 7

TH8: 2,142,857 + 500,000 = 2,642,857+ in elixir storages in order to upgrade a wall to lvl 8
TH8: 2,142,857 + 200,000 = 2,342,857+ in elixir storages in order to upgrade a wall to lvl 7

and you get the idea for the rest. The last wall upgrade would simply require that a TH10 max their storage to 8M to upgrade to the 4M lvl 11 wall cost. This would be very easily implemented, not complicated at all.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Caguggenmos

Lastly, one of the things you said is that you "guarantee that the new update won't push more lix back into the game" (could be wrong on the wording as i didn't quote you). Thats just incorrect. It certainly has pushed plenty of lix back into the game --mostly around the th7 & the lvl, but we're also see QUITE a bit more loot in th9 & th10 because there are a TON of lazy-♥♥♥ th10's that refused to do walls before the lix update and are now accumulating it again because they can't dump it. Not to mention the edition of lvl 12 collectors adding loot to the game. Honestly, it was probably a pretty easy decision for supercell to make seeing as how dry the loot was at the time. In my opinion (and my clan mates who are currently swimming in loot), it was the right call.

---

You actually just said exactly what I stated, haha. I did say that for TH7 and TH8, it would basically resolve any problems they faced from the past 3 months as they are required to stockpile elixir after their upgrades again. I also said the problems TH9s were facing would ease up to the extent of farming TH8s, for the same reason. This wouldn't change anything for TH10s though, b/c this update was merely removed for TH7/8s, and not reformed so that the problems it caused wouldn't continue for bases at TH9/10, where it is still allowed and completely unrestricted.

Lvl 12 collectors are nice, but don't do anything regarding keeping TH9/10 players from draining both their resources out of the game via walls. That introduction will only help personal passive resource regeneration as well as farming new inactives who have upgraded the collectors (and we are seeing that inactives are being more aggressively removed from the queues), so basically I'm saying that the collectors were a nice thought, but weren't what was needed to solve the issues that players were facing.

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Xitra

This is a great idea! I saw one or two variations of it mentioned last week.

And I don't think it even needs to be implemented in a way to maximize loot up to the cap (2642857 in your example). It's not like every last possible drop of lootable elixir needs to be there. And anyway, someone could dump elixir until they reach the cap, then dump more elixir into their barracks (which they can get back later), so you're not going to be able to make the maximum available. But if you could make "close" to the cap available, with a nice round number like 2M or whatever, that would help.

---

I just figured the raidable loot cap would be the best number seeing as players with overflowing storages will be offering that anyway. And you are right, players could dump their elixir into walls until they hit the cap, then use more on a big ticket elixir upgrade, or to queue up spells, expensive troops, etc. But this is not new behavior, and players already do this with excess gold in regards to walls. That's just smart and efficient resource management. However, once you do finally finish your elixir upgrades, your ability to reduce your elixir below that cap will be limited, which is the entire point of doing this.

You are rewarded for your ability to farm so well via using excess elixir into walls, but you cannot simply dump it all into walls, which cripples the economy for higher level THs.

Thank you both for your input on this, by the way!

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by Goobers

Why was the elixir for walls update handled in this way in the first place? (for both updates, really)

Here was the root cause that players had which led to the update in the first place:
- Established THs from roughly TH7+ were able to finish their big ticket elixir upgrades before they were adequately finished with their gold/DE upgrades (meaning they weren't "ready" for the next TH lvl yet), leading to having overflowing storages which lost considerable value to that specific player at that specific point of their progress.

What SC did was allow for walls available at those TH lvls to be upgraded using elixir, without any restriction. The players who had no more need for it at that TH lvl could dump it all and help their wall progression. Seems great for them. But those players who previously had overflowing storages also fueled the economy for newly upgraded THs. Even not so newly upgraded THs still required elixir to progress their offensive levels to be on par with other THs of the same level, so that they could overcome the loot penalty from upgrading in the first place. Almost overnight, that led to the elixir shortage, which led to the dismal loot situation overall.

This update reverts TH7/8s back to what it once was, which restores whatever problems were experienced by those levels. It also helps TH9s, to the extent of raiding TH8s. But it didn't completely restore all issues for TH9, and this will do nothing to solve the problems TH10s have been facing from it.

My question to Supercell is this: why wasn't an alternative approach to handling the elixir for walls update looked into this time around?

- - - SOLUTION - - -

Re-introduce elixir for walls for lvl 7+, but place a restriction on it. In order to use elixir for wall upgrades, you must maintain the minimum elixir levels in storages which provides the storage loot cap for raiders at their TH lvl, PLUS the amount for which the wall upgrade costs.

Example: I am a TH8, and I want to upgrade my purple wall piece to skull. Cost is 500k. In order to offer the max loot to raiders of 300k, I need to have ~2.150M in my elixir storage (2,142,857 to be exact). Add 500k to that, and in order to upgrade a wall to skull, I need to have at least ~2.65M in storage (2,642,857 exact number again).

This approach would work for every TH lvl, with lvl 11 walls simply requiring that you have 8M in your elixir storage to upgrade it. That hits the actual loot cap, but again, there is only maybe a couple hundred thousand of elixir spillover wasted from one attack at most from this, and only for upgrading the very end-game level of walls.

The end result of this is that the issue of overflowing storages is still resolved, but the more devastating issue of established bases having levels of elixir that won't even cover the cost of the cheapest army is also a thing of the past.

- - - - -

I'm just an idiot who barely got his college diploma, but I can't see how that shouldn't have been considered the best solution to this problem. Please tell me where the gaping flaw in my logic is here, if I'm not seeing it.

---

For lv 10 n 11 wall is too much so it mean u can only make a wall at a time
example i can farm 8 mil gold n elix a day
and i setting 1 day gap between upgrade
i can make 2 elix wall but with your suggest i only make one and wasted 4 mil in next day farming bcoz i am overflowing with elix

If u want to do this than at least make no limit storage
or at least cap + storage as elixir limit safe

like elix max storage 8 mil cap at 4 mil
that mean 12 mil limit storage

so in my case i hit 12 mil max and make 2 elix wall get another 8 after that and go on

Quote:

---

Originally Posted by AlvinSoehendryWijaya

For lv 10 n 11 wall is too much so it mean u can only make a wall at a time
example i can farm 8 mil gold n elix a day
and i setting 1 day gap between upgrade
i can make 2 elix wall but with your suggest i only make one and wasted 4 mil in next day farming bcoz i am overflowing with elix

If u want to do this than at least make no limit storage
or at least cap + storage as elixir limit safe

like elix max storage 8 mil cap at 4 mil
that mean 12 mil limit storage

so in my case i hit 12 mil max and make 2 elix wall get another 8 after that and go on

---

I'm kind of doubting your ability to farm 8M gold and elixir in a day as a TH10, this update didn't really fix anything regarding the loot problem TH10s are facing. But that's not the point I should be debating here, haha!

Thank you for finding a speed bump in this proposal, that's exactly what I wanted--others to point out what I might not be seeing!

So the issue you have with it is that under this format, you can only upgrade a wall with elixir once when upgrading to lvl 10 and 11 walls (3M and 4M, respectively), and you may still be working on building upgrades other than just heroes at this point, so that you have to time out your builders and this cuts their wall upgrading efficiency (with elixir) by half?

That's a fair counterpoint, but keep in mind that the situation of you having all your builders locked up while upgrading TH10 structures will only be for a couple months, while the grind for walls is exponentially longer. Soon you will be at the point where you have at least one free builder at all times, and then this problem is resolved. Also keep in mind that prior to this elixir for walls update, that resource became almost valueless to that player after the elixir upgrades finished. But the incorporation of this update in its current form had an even worse effect: destroying the economy for almost all TH9/10 players in the game.

What this would be is a compromise: one that doesn't render elixir totally wasted like before, but doesn't allow for the nightmare that we experienced for the past 3 months (and which TH10s are still going to continue experiencing, given the way this recent update was handled). Would this not be fair as a compromise? (I actually think it's a better solution than undoing the elixir for walls update entirely, which I am/was? also in favor of)

EDIT: To drive home what I'm saying regarding the ability to only upgrade one wall piece per builder cycle being a temporary problem, I should have used an example with the upgrade from lvl 8 to 9 walls.

Those upgrades are 1M each. If a TH9 was able to farm very efficiently as well, that person would only be able to do 5 wall pieces with each builder cycle (maintaining 2,916,666 in storages) instead of 7-8. But you can't appease everyone all the time, and soon that player will have all his/her structures completed minus maybe heroes, and at that point the player will be able to dump elixir into walls as quickly as he/she can farm it, so long as the minimum is maintained. But having a free builder available is only a short-term, temporary speed bump when you compare the cost that is needed for lvl 9,10,11 walls.