An analysis and critique of Settlers Online game design
Economy
Build levels. Buildings have very hard breakpoints. For many levels 1-3 are relatively cheap and affordable. Levels 4 and 5 are incredibly expensive and generally prohibitive. A perfect example of this is the Noble Residence. It's cheaper to buy another Noble Residence than to upgrading the existing ones to level 4. In many cases it's cheaper to replace licensed Noble Residences with gem store ones and using the freed license to build another level 2-3 production building. The time to upgrade buildings seems largely irrelevant compared to these costs.
Shrinking units. One copper ore becomes one copper bar becomes one copper tool. Really straightforward. Then we get to iron. 8 iron ore become two iron bars becomes one iron sword. It would be much easier to increase the iron mine time by a factor of 8 and the iron smelting time by a factor of 2 and preserve the 1->1->1 relationship. Shrinking units makes it unnecessarily difficult to evaluate the relative cost of goods. Just as an example, an unbuffed gold chain only produces 37.5 coins per mine.
Coins. The issue of gold coins seems to be related to the above two points. The costs seem to be priced based before shrinking units is factored in. Because coin is so difficult to produce with the incredible price on gold mines and only getting 37.5 coins per mine (unbuffed), coins are almost exclusively produced by those with a significant amount of wealth to invest in creating a profitable gold chain. Without a hefty investment the chain is not profitable. The quests try to steer players into coin production early but this is misleading. This large investment is what makes higher level buildings very difficult to obtain.
Buffs. Buffs ruin the economy. Many high end goods have their value based on the cost of buffed chains. Gold is the most obvious example here. Compare this to Anno Online where buffing also increases the consumption rate. This leads to a lot of extra micromanagement to properly utilize chains and distorts the value of goods to make players that don't utilize buffs uncompetitive in the market.
Wells and wheat fields and mines. This is a huge, huge huge issue. I cannot stress enough that this is the part that breaks the game. A medium level island will require about an hour of replacing fields and wells per day. I can understand the game design perspective of encouraging users to log in every day but the values involved make this portion of the game terrible. These buildings need to have at least 10x as much goods with means of improving it further. (A good use for books!) Mines and quarries are in a similar situation, adding on an extra 30 minutes of just building per day and this isn't even including the micromanagement required for geologists. Again, compare this to Anno Online where the total time spent managing an island is only about 30 minutes per day. More time in Anno Online can be spent to optimize gains but there's no constant building spam just to keep pace.
To further detail this point there are gem store items to help circumvent these issues. The endless copper mine costs an absurd amount. The silo and watermill are poor buys compared to the village school (produces as much population as 1/8th of a level 5 bakery which requires 6 supporting licenses and 4 supporting silos and 2 supporting watermills, to make the school worth 7/8th of a license and 3/4th of the silo/watermill buildings). Gem store items ought to enhance the play experience. Not bypass the annoyance factor of replacing mines and farms and wells.
Trade
Friction. The trading post has a lot of friction. By only make trades all-or-nothing and not having a true common currency a lot of time can be wasted looking for trades of good value. Much of the trading post is filled with scams because one can make offers that may look good to an inexperienced player. 100 tools for 10c and 1000 tools for 90c and 1000 tools for 2000 copper ore are examples of multiple trade listings that could easily be simplified to facilitate more trading.
Combat
Unit strength. The relative strength of units seems very, very strange. Militia much, much more than recruits but only offer a modest increase in performance. Soldiers cost even more than recruits and still only offer a small gain over militia. The players recognize this and this is why recruits are the only unit ever mass produced. Stronger units should be more proportionally stronger relative to their cost to make other forms of army building other than sacrificial fodder useful.
First Strike. The design of many NPC armies and their inclusion of first strike units sorely limits possible army builds. The inclusion of first strike units typically prevents attacks with cavalry and bowmen, leading to even more recruit spam. There is no counter to first strike units. Melee + First strike requires bowmen to kill the melee efficiently, but first strike prevents bowmen from being efficient. The game needs more unit types like spearmen/pikemen to counter first strike units and protect archers. Alternatively, a different combat model that isn't nearly as deterministic about where damage is distributed.
Combat as a requirement. I understand this may be a key feature of the Settlers games but I really dislike how combat is required to progress. For island clearing it seems to make sense. But having to grind adventures and the required amount of micromanagement involved in running adventures makes it a chore. I enjoy this game for the economy aspect but without a way to earn experience outside of combat a lot of high level content is locked. There need to be other ways to earn experience. Perhaps a simplified adventure mode for more casual players that allows sending troops and having the adventure resolved automatically. Insert swords, receive exp. This would preserve existing production chains and cause minimal disruption.
Micromanagement. Combat requires a lot of micromanagement. The relatively large number of enemy units means guides are the safest bet to understanding how to optimize a clear. Also tying into above, as recruits are the best sacrificial units care is needed to optimize recruit/soldier ratios. Again putting emphasis on the need for guides. Rebuilding military is also time intensive with the ability to only produce 25 units per few clicks. The delay between sending and arrival to the adventure zone and the delay between attacking and being able to attack again further adds to the amount of micromanagement needed to run an adventure and reduces the enjoyment factor considerably. Compare this to Galaxy Online 2 where military is sent off and the combat resolves itself. Much less micromanagement involved.
Summary
In general I find Settlers Online to be a more in depth and complex experience with lots of room for economic growth and optimization. The game also seems to have more content than other games with the variety of production chains and their interdependence and the ability to include high value items in trade like magic beans. However the amount of micromanagement required to play this game is crippling and ruins the enjoyment factor for all but the most dedicated (or wealthy) of players. I estimate the micromanagement can by bypassed with approximately $50 in gems, but there are much better values for the entertainment dollar.
