The main goal of balance in Kingdom is to both ease inexperienced players into the game's mechanics while providing a challenge for veteran players who are trying to accomplish feats. It's important that the player feels like their actions matter, their choices matter, and they can see their impact on the game. Finally, balance sometimes means smoothing out rough edges in designs that are complex or difficult to grasp. Complexity in Kingdom comes from the interaction of systems, and we strive to keep each individual system simple on its own. We try to avoid dominant strategies, both because it makes the game dull to only have one way to win, but also because it fails to reward player creativity.
With the Conquest Update, we've made a large number of small changes to give the whole game a refresher, not just the upcoming Norse Lands content. In Kingdom Two Crowns we introduced decay, a penalty that reflects the erosion of your kingdoms (loss of citizens, walls crumbling) while the ruler is in another land or the loss of your crown. In the coming update, you'll see changes to the way that Decay works, but also ease some of those rough edges in the current system. For example, while losing a reign will result in a big amount of decay, an island with many high-level walls will see more units remain active. And units like Pikemen that previously would always disappear, now decay gradually, like other units. Finally, we've fixed bugs that caused Gems to disappear when you died in a cave attack, or if they were left on the ground on another island. Taken together, all of these fixes and changes make Decay from losing a Crown or staying away from a location less punishing if you have built your Kingdom(s) strategically. The intent is to better reward players for sticking with it and picking up where they left off, rather than feeling like its no better than starting a new Campaign. But beware, late in a campaign Decay can still result in some real damage, so plan well Monarchs! Next week well discuss Beggar Camps.