That’s one nail in the engineering coffin..how about another?

[Ripple1972]

And therein lies the real question. What separates strategy from being an exploit. Absent arranged matches with cookie cutter maxed bases, there is no such thing as a perfectly even match. Another facet is that the clan war structure itself emphasizes offense over defense. It makes sense to sacrifice so defense capability and have higher attack capability. I can attack twice to gain up to 6 stars. I can only lose 3. As long as that disparity exists, there will always be a strategy or exploit to emphasize attack to a certain degree. I think they've addressed .5s pretty well. Or we're all doing it so there are a lot making it easier to match. The .11s are the ones that give us fits. We can smash them consistently with our heavy 10s but we have a very difficult time defending the extra high 11 attacks. With that said, there is a lot of difference between a good 9.11 and a th9 with baby king, queen and warden. The good ones though, just roll over our 10s. That's where it feels like it crosses the line to exploit to me. It creates an imbalance that is also impossible to overcome. I am also fully aware that it's very much a what I do is strategy, what you do is an exploit type of thing. If I'm honest, my clan is exploiting the matchmaker heavily with our several .5 bases. The fact they we intend to max them doesn't change that.

If you are smashing 9.11’s with th10’s can I come visit? I’m still waiting to get smashed.

[Noctaire]

If you believe .5 is strategy but not engineering I will bow out of this discussion.

It's difficult to argue otherwise. Getting from beginning to end is an upgrade strategy. X.5 is an upgrade strategy. I definitely see it as being a bit on the edge of exploit, but it's not designed to achieve an unfair advantage - if anything, it's intended to achieve the opposite. I've been able to 3-star many an X.5 opponent with my level just below theirs and, when they had maxed everything but not moved on to the rest of the upgrade path, I had to use one of my higher level attacks to take them out instead. Fully maxed X.5s that aren't being upgraded so the clan will secure a more favorable match is definitely an exploit, but I do not see how you could possibly separate that from the legitimate upgrade strategy. For a while, these games were a problem for the matchmaker but they don't seem to be such anymore. (For the record - you'll never see one of my games in anything less than a fully deployed state within a few days of upgrading.)

Some argue that rushing is also an exploit. I do not wait to move up through the TH levels very long - I drop everything, run some key upgrades, then move on to the next level. My main TH11 has L9/L10 walls, most buildings maxed (I think I have another level of Mortar and some Cannons left to upgrade), and a L40 BK; as soon as TH12 drops, I'll be upgrading.. My other TH11 is a bit further behind and still has level 7 walls, not to mention heroes in their 20s; that one will upgrade right away as well. I seldom upgrade walls before upgrading to the next TH level on any of my games. (Although I do tend to spend more time at TH7 and TH9.) I'm not exploiting anything in these upgrades - everything is dropped and at a relatively high level; I want the new toys. Weight-wise, they will come in as lower TH12s but I would think that's how it should work and why rushing a game (with full deployment) isn't an exploit.

[BoBoTheGoat]

It's difficult to argue otherwise. Getting from beginning to end is an upgrade strategy. X.5 is an upgrade strategy. I definitely see it as being a bit on the edge of exploit, but it's not designed to achieve an unfair advantage - if anything, it's intended to achieve the opposite. I've been able to 3-star many an X.5 opponent with my level just below theirs and, when they had maxed everything but not moved on to the rest of the upgrade path, I had to use one of my higher level attacks to take them out instead. Fully maxed X.5s that aren't being upgraded so the clan will secure a more favorable match is definitely an exploit, but I do not see how you could possibly separate that from the legitimate upgrade strategy. For a while, these games were a problem for the matchmaker but they don't seem to be such anymore. (For the record - you'll never see one of my games in anything less than a fully deployed state within a few days of upgrading.)

Some argue that rushing is also an exploit. I do not wait to move up through the TH levels very long - I drop everything, run some key upgrades, then move on to the next level. My main TH11 has L9/L10 walls, most buildings maxed (I think I have another level of Mortar and some Cannons left to upgrade), and a L40 BK; as soon as TH12 drops, I'll be upgrading.. My other TH11 is a bit further behind and still has level 7 walls, not to mention heroes in their 20s; that one will upgrade right away as well. I seldom upgrade walls before upgrading to the next TH level on any of my games. (Although I do tend to spend more time at TH7 and TH9.) I'm not exploiting anything in these upgrades - everything is dropped and at a relatively high level; I want the new toys. Weight-wise, they will come in as lower TH12s but I would think that's how it should work and why rushing a game (with full deployment) isn't an exploit.

It seems you just pay to play (not a bad thing), and your upgrade pattern is not very common. I don't know anyone with 40/50 heroes and only 2 million HH. All the new buildings for each TH are easily mowed down with under developed walls.

[Piper139]

If you are smashing 9.11’s with th10’s can I come visit? I’m still waiting to get smashed.

Assuming we are meaning the same thing, no eagle, no inferno, 2 to 3 bows, yeah, our better 10s smash those. I don't think we've encountered a fully maxed defenses, walls and 4 xbows yet. We do see max heroes, and all th9 defenses maxed to 11 with at least l11 walls. We also see high heroes, but lower defenses ones. I'm sure there are ones that we can't beat but we've been pretty successful. Where we fail is the stronger anchor 11s at the top with our relatively new 11s.

[joshsgrandad]

Yes, but there’s a huge difference - the BB was designed with all of this in mind. The HV/CW was never designed with the foreknowledge of the level of exploits that have evolved over the years. You simply can’t do the same kind of things on the BB because it was designed in such a way as to prevent it. Seeing some of that come over to classic Clash is a good thing.

Engineering made it such that lower level players just couldn’t win at war. It isn’t the “optimized way of playing” - it’s an outright exploitof the matchmaking algorithm designed to achieve an unfair advantage over other players. We don’t need stats or a finger on the pulse to know it - there’s been ample complaints on all of the forums, blogs, and YouTube for years on this one. Plenty of players who were clear why they were no longer going to war. I engineered a couple of defenseless bases a while back - after playing with them a bit, I just felt it was unsportsmanlike and dropped the rest of the defenses.

And it’s not maxers vs the world either - I’m no maxer by ANY stretch of the definition. I’ve been a huge advocate for rushing for my entire time at the game and on the forums, and I will be rushing a couple of my games to TH12 this week at that. Nothing that SC has done or is doing will limit rushing or general gameplay but it will open CWs to a much larger audience and that’s a good thing IMNSHO. Rushing is the optimized way to play the game and that’s why I advocate for it.

Separately...I’ll never understand the angst over losing TH sniping. I get that it was easy loot gain/retention, but this is a tower defense game. What sense does it make to leave the tower in an open, easy attacking position in a tower defense game?

The removal of incentivized sniping and engineering are good moves for the overall health and longevity of the game, opening it to the greatest number of players. I only see good in that.

Whilst I can agree with a lot of the original post, I feel your judgement, or feeling the need to justify your ideas, is somewhat clouding your OP.
Getting the engi bases out of mid hall wars, I totally agree with, as they are a disadvantage in bigger wars, so they are inconsequential there. Using xp as a marker tho.. I cant see the link, nor the necessity. xp is gained throughout the game, for almost anything you do, and it is the actual account that is most relevant, which has nothing to do with xp.
But this follow up, I feel is a result in you trying to justify your OP (which you did not need to). But, I agree that SC had already learned lessons when releasing BB, so a build all stops engi, whilst allowing one to rush to top hall, before starting the max process, and a good idea. BB falls short on matching and AI, but that's not relevant here.
Next, I agree it makes it impossible for lower clans to war. We disagree about the optimisation tho. To optimise is to have the best possible, which of course is engi. So they are both optimal, and an exploit.
Next part I agree. Non engi does indeed take moral high ground, in that, so long as roster engineering isn't employed, they are simply looking for level play. Rushing, same thing, only a lack of discipline, or uncontrolled desire to get to the top, is inhibiting the chances of successful war, whether engi is involved or not. If we are talking war, then rushing is the least optimised. It is the most popular, but certainly not optimal.
Sniping.. Don't even know why people use sniping in their arguments. It was a win/win for both parties whilst it lasted, but nothing much was lost once they took the free shield away.
I also think the changes will be good for the game in the longer term. In the short term, nothing much will change. For this reason, I doubt the build all change is a stand alone move, as it wouldn't make a lot of sense to do a half job.

[BoBoTheGoat]

Sniping.. Don't even know why people use sniping in their arguments. It was a win/win for both parties whilst it lasted, but nothing much was lost once they took the free shield away.
I also think the changes will be good for the game in the longer term. In the short term, nothing much will change. For this reason, I doubt the build all change is a stand alone move, as it wouldn't make a lot of sense to do a half job.

Did you play clash during the time of free th snipe?

Taking it away was a lot more than a win win. People would say things like, how dare SC tell me how to play. How dare SC take away what I like and enjoy. How dare SC correct something even though it is fundamentally flawed.

These are they same things we hear today.

[Noctaire]

It seems you just pay to play (not a bad thing), and your upgrade pattern is not very common. I don't know anyone with 40/50 heroes and only 2 million HH. All the new buildings for each TH are easily mowed down with under developed walls.

<Sigh> 27 HV games, 12 BB games, ranging TH6-TH11 and BH4-BH8. I both pay and raid, as well as just boost collectors. On my main game, GG is 300M, EE is 296M, and HH is only 2M; even when I wasn't playing, I was still boosting collectors and hitting them daily so I'd imagine that's why the HH is low. I did take full advantage of a couple of recent $99 DE packs. to boost my heroes from L35. Even on my games where I've never spent a dime on resources, the HH is low because I've just nurtured them along turtle style from the collectors. It's how I've built so many games up over the last few years and still maintained a measure of sanity.

(Not that any of that matters.)

As to walls...they've been largely pointless since SC started adding ways over and through them. The new Siege Machine makes them even more unhelpful to the defense. I was pleased to see their cost is coming down finally; that might get me to start upgrading beyond L8/L9....

Whilst I can agree with a lot of the original post, I feel your judgement, or feeling the need to justify your ideas, is somewhat clouding your OP.
Getting the engi bases out of mid hall wars, I totally agree with, as they are a disadvantage in bigger wars, so they are inconsequential there. Using xp as a marker tho.. I cant see the link, nor the necessity. xp is gained throughout the game, for almost anything you do, and it is the actual account that is most relevant, which has nothing to do with xp.
But this follow up, I feel is a result in you trying to justify your OP (which you did not need to). But, I agree that SC had already learned lessons when releasing BB, so a build all stops engi, whilst allowing one to rush to top hall, before starting the max process, and a good idea. BB falls short on matching and AI, but that's not relevant here.
Next, I agree it makes it impossible for lower clans to war. We disagree about the optimisation tho. To optimise is to have the best possible, which of course is engi. So they are both optimal, and an exploit.
Next part I agree. Non engi does indeed take moral high ground, in that, so long as roster engineering isn't employed, they are simply looking for level play. Rushing, same thing, only a lack of discipline, or uncontrolled desire to get to the top, is inhibiting the chances of successful war, whether engi is involved or not. If we are talking war, then rushing is the least optimised. It is the most popular, but certainly not optimal.
Sniping.. Don't even know why people use sniping in their arguments. It was a win/win for both parties whilst it lasted, but nothing much was lost once they took the free shield away.
I also think the changes will be good for the game in the longer term. In the short term, nothing much will change. For this reason, I doubt the build all change is a stand alone move, as it wouldn't make a lot of sense to do a half job.

Not so much looking to justify my ideas as simply discussing them. To be perfectly honest, someone disagreeing with me is not likely to change my opinion as formed over the last 3 years and, regardless, I doubt SC cares what I think or have to say on the matter. Of course, if they did, I'd fix every problem in a matter of days....

I really do hope there's more to come as I firmly believe the engineering is detrimental to the game long term. I think it has singlehandedly ruined much of what Clan Wars could be - where it was headed before semi-defenseless games and engineered rosters took over. For high level play, it's not a problem but there seldom are any issues for those at the top of the food chain.

Of course, one might also argue that I already play entirely too much and the last thing I need is something to give me more to do on this game....

[judayer]

The change in this update is great and hopefully signals the beginning of the end. Like has already been said here the matchmaker is more important though. It’s somehow gotten worse in recent months after an initial improvement. We were actually getting fair matches for a while. Now it’s guaranteed we will face an engineered clan every time. It could be just more engineers out there by now but something needs tweaking or completely overhauling.

[2222]

.5 is engineering. There is room for discussion about whether the matchmaker should be changed to allow .5 type engineering within one hall weight but not more lopsided engineering, but it is engineering. A player intentionally not building the strongest defense to help them protect their loot and/or trophy push in multiplayer because they think the defensive weight isn’t good for war is engineering. .5 is engineering.

[2222]

....The next step is to prevent these lopsided, engineered games from even being able to participate in Clan Wars. It shouldn’t be too hard with the must-place-all requirement in force after the update - just render any game that does not have all buildings from the previous level as ineligible for war. ......Right now, we have a TH8 and lower CW going on one of my clans. The opposing clan has a TH11 near-defenseless - with several max level troops - and it came in at #10 on their rankings. It weighs in as a TH7 (and not even a maxed TH7)....

That type of war change is inferior to making every base have a minimum defensive weight based on its hall level. A minimum defensive weight based on hall level also has some problems, but it is much better than restricting who can war. As for that th11, remember it weighs as a th7 on defense. You aren’t seeing the offensive weight or the other ways it impacts the match. Also, some, Onyx is one, think the gold reflected in the storages isn’t being used for war matching now anyway.