Do not delete the accounts.
What about this idea:
Transfer their kingdom to the zombie area of the map. So the punishment for not being active is being relocated, but you still get to keep what you had, just in a different spot.
And assign their previous position in the map to newbies. So players who play a lot will be close to each other.
How do you handle newbie protection?

I will reply to this here, since this topic is more suitable for general stuff about the game.

Inactive players have to be removed from the game, otherwise it will be totally infested with inactives after a while. Transfering to "inactive area" won't work for this game because here you have limited offices. An inactive player should not block an office...

There is no need for newbie protection because there is no individual PvP. The only combat is between groups of players (kingdoms). The protection of smaller kingdoms will be done via power/prestige difference (attacking much weaker kingdom yelds no reward).

There is no need for newbie protection because there is no individual PvP. The only combat is between groups of players (kingdoms). The protection of smaller kingdoms will be done via power/prestige difference (attacking much weaker kingdom yelds no reward).

... Which does not stop people from mashing noobs. There needs to be a hard, mechanical STOP sign that prohibits players from doing that at all.

Unless you have a really small space to work with (CPU, RAM, HDD wise), there is no reason to delete people. Players aren't drawn to games that have small figures -- a game claiming to have 100k users sounds better, and barelly anyone cares to check who is online anyway (given it's browser based, people may play at any time, so activity at certain hours isn't a measure here).

Vassal system
It seems I have no choice, like 50% of people I ever spoke to were very excited about the ugly hierarchical vassal system. I will have to include it no matter the drawbacks

There are 5 tiers of ranks.
Tier 1: Peasant, you start here
Tier 2: Commoners (craftsmen, merchants, lower clergy, minstrels, etc)
Tier 3: Noble knight or abbot [can have vassals]
Tier 4: Noble baron or bishop [can have vassals and a castle] {vassal quota required}
Tier 5: Noble count or archbishop [can have vassals and a castle] {vassal quota required}

Up to tier 3 you can upgrade yourself with pure in game advancement (althrough, you might want to stop at tier 2 if you want to play a commoner). To enter tier 4 and 5 you are obligued to met a quota of real human vassals.

The king is an office, it does not change your "standard rank". Althrough, to be a king you have to at least be a noble. King is elected by kingdom members.

[quote name='Acharis' timestamp='1319023146' post='4874247']
There is no need for newbie protection because there is no individual PvP. The only combat is between groups of players (kingdoms). The protection of smaller kingdoms will be done via power/prestige difference (attacking much weaker kingdom yelds no reward).

... Which does not stop people from mashing noobs. There needs to be a hard, mechanical STOP sign that prohibits players from doing that at all.

Unless you have a really small space to work with (CPU, RAM, HDD wise), there is no reason to delete people. Players aren't drawn to games that have small figures -- a game claiming to have 100k users sounds better, and barelly anyone cares to check who is online anyway (given it's browser based, people may play at any time, so activity at certain hours isn't a measure here).
[/quote]Login to the prototype http://europe1300.eu/ and click "Ranking" (the last round button). Right now there is no deletion of inactives, all those with skull icon are inactives. Do you like it?

If you point them out with contempt, then no, I do not like it

Why make is so obvious? Why do you care so much to have a "pure" game? Even if they are inactive husks, they can provide good sport for raids, and if there is a mailing system attached, who knows, maybe some players could be drawn back in by an e-mail or a friend request.

Just read the agriculture thread and this one.

I think I really love the direction you chose for this game. If you manage to make the whole management of the estate worthwhile (no stupid clicking like in all those facebook games) and interesting (some choices to make that have meaning - like a none trivial crop selection) I will love it.

If you point them out with contempt, then no, I do not like it

Why make is so obvious? Why do you care so much to have a "pure" game? Even if they are inactive husks, they can provide good sport for raids, and if there is a mailing system attached, who knows, maybe some players could be drawn back in by an e-mail or a friend request.

This notion seems to be fairly common and I don't get why. Why does anyone want to raid inactives? Why does anyone join a game with 1k active and 99k inactive players? I have joined so many browser games, clicked the highscore, looked up rank 1k+ and decided the active community is too small...
Anyway I think deleting them is harsh if you are unable to go online due to unforseen circumstances. I think you should auto-delete everyone on tier 1 due to inactivity. Tier 2 and above should be put in some vacation mode for at least a month - maybe two.

It might be true I'm trying to make the game too "pure"

As for raiding inactives, no matter how many times I repeat that you can't raid individual players, no one listen I guess, the Ogame/Travian games style made such huge impact on players brains that they will always assume ruthless combat and bottom feeding So, in a futile attempt I will say it again, there won't be raiding other players of any kind at all, even the tiniest small bit

Estate management will be probably OK, but I doubt it will be the selling point of the game. There is a limit how much interesting I can make that part. It will be basicly about spending your stamina (time) in the most efficient way. Your choice will be affected by your workshop type (specialization - you can change it for a price) and by current market prices for various goods.

I hope to develop the vassal system more, since so many people were excited about it...

Deleting inactives. I can keep them up to 3 months. Longer is pointless I guess. But offices had to be removed earlier (so other players can get them).

@acharis
If you don't focus on controlling geographical areas, like tribalwars and stronghold kingdoms, I would go away from the middle age's vassal system.
I'd rather go for the more "democratic" system in rome. A country exists primarily of a few important towns/cities, and it is here you rise through the ranks.

You start of as a poor citicen, but can gain wealth. You get better jobs, maybe be rewarded (or buy) a farm outside the town (managed primarily by slaves), etc.
Eventually you may start to try to make claim to the limited positions. These are typically political positions, and you're in direct competition with other players over these.

So, no vassal system, but you can gain job seats, that are limited, and the best seats, only a few players will get. They give you political powers.
You may have limited options in directly targetting individual players, but city leaders deciding to ban brothels, can have a big impact on the players who owns them.

There are problems in having a king as a player, but if power is spread out over many individuals (a senate), then I believe that could work out much better.

I also believe you should consider the use of npc's being controlled by "game masters".. A powerful positions, would not be player controlled,
nor would it be a static ai. It could be controlled by a game master, trying to make the game more interesting and dynamic.

@acharis
If you don't focus on controlling geographical areas, like tribalwars and stronghold kingdoms, I would go away from the middle age's vassal system.
I'd rather go for the more "democratic" system in rome. A country exists primarily of a few important towns/cities, and it is here you rise through the ranks.

You start of as a poor citicen, but can gain wealth. You get better jobs, maybe be rewarded (or buy) a farm outside the town (managed primarily by slaves), etc.
Eventually you may start to try to make claim to the limited positions. These are typically political positions, and you're in direct competition with other players over these.

So, no vassal system, but you can gain job seats, that are limited, and the best seats, only a few players will get. They give you political powers.
You may have limited options in directly targetting individual players, but city leaders deciding to ban brothels, can have a big impact on the players who owns them.

There are problems in having a king as a player, but if power is spread out over many individuals (a senate), then I believe that could work out much better.

I also believe you should consider the use of npc's being controlled by "game masters".. A powerful positions, would not be player controlled,
nor would it be a static ai. It could be controlled by a game master, trying to make the game more interesting and dynamic.

King as a player position has to stay. That's the kind of game it is. I know about the potencial problems, I'm willing to pay the price. But I will reserve the right to dissmiss any king level position by the game staff, also additional roleplaying rules will be imposed on such players. In short, if you want a total freedom you have to play some lower level role.
Anyway, a king is not the biggest problem, the real one will be the Pope position

But the amount of power the king has will be limited.

I agree a vassal system is not ideal for such game but... there are too many players that want it, I simply can not let them down Generally, I plan the vassal system as a paralell to kingdom structure. Everyone belongs to a kingdom also you usually have a senior(lord) which not necessarily belongs to your kingdom. The vassal structure is not affected by the king (he has no power over such structure), it basicly ruled by the topmost lord (usually a count, rarely a baron). This also would help soften the problem of kingg's power you mentioned.

The kingdom will have offices (amount of offices depends on kingdom size and kingdom infrastructure). Each player can have up to 3 offices. The offices will come in different "value", so there will be enough low level offices to give to relatively new & unimportant players (I plan to let at least 50% of players to have at least 1 office). Offices are distributed by the king (and can be revoked anytime; this can be especially expected when a new king takes the throne ).
The kingdom "attributes" (like stability, kingdom income) will partially depend on the skills of people who hold offices (so, the king might try to give taxcollector office to those who invested in accountiung skill; of course only after his supporters get rewarded first since keeping the throne is a priority ).
I'm also thinking to let some higher nobles (barons, counts) distribute some offices. Each of them can build a castle, so they could give some castle offices to their vassals. This could be useful for some stronger groups within a kingdom that don't like each other with the king, they won't need to depend on him that much for offices.

I was thinking about inactive players. Maybe indeed deleting after a month is too harsh...

Maybe like this?
- after 14 days of inactivity the player gets easily visible skull icon, also if that player is a ruler he can be "forced to abdicate" by any citizen ragardless of influence.
- after 30 days of inactivity the player disappears from the ranking list (but still appears on the kingdom list and city list), also his workshops does not count in the global game statistics.
- after, I don't know maybe 3 months, the player's character is deleted (the account stays, when he/she logins next time a fresh one will be created).

I don't know if it helps, I played a game similar to the concept but it was set in modern age, I think it was called Coloniam. It has implemented a voting and political party system and you vote for the people that you want for the president.

Just my piece of mind.