edit: tl;dr (too long; didn't read) version:
...well, just read everything before the Considerations part.
I had an idea the other day that could make the game a lot more interesting. The numbers provided are not mathematically worked out to be the most efficient but rather to serve as an example for argument's sake, although it could be implemented as is and then tweaked. Read at least the main points before posting... I would suggest reading the considerations too but I'm not naive enough to expect you to keep your attention on a thread for more than 15 lines.
-Essentially, for every 1k kingdoms that you own (rounded to nearest 1k to reduce potential abuse), you are "open" to nuking for one hour per day. While you are "open", kingdoms taken from you with aftershock remain with 100% of their runes instead of 10%. Once per hour, if you are tected your "open hours" left are reduced by 1, stopping at 0.
-Tects and stones have a chance to fail relative to how many kds you own (50% if you have 2k, 33% for 3k, etc).
-There is a limit to how many kingdoms you can lose before you are immediatly no longer open regardless of how many hours are left. More details on this system below.
-The attack and defense penalties from corruption are lifted, but interest corruption is kept in to aid smaller players. However, this interest corruption would be capped at 40% so that you can still make 500m per kd, an amount close to what we used to make before corruption was added.
The "protection" system would ensure bigger players can't just profit nuke out smaller ones for free. It also ensures a clan can't go ahead and completely take out a big enough threat for near free by using well planned team nukes; the system I'm proposing would make it so if you want to blitz someone, it'll be expensive, or if you nuke them slowly to make it cheaper then the defenders will have more of an opportunity to prepare a counter strike/alch out/respond in some way. Keep in mind that without a limit of this kind, one could put together say 5 nukers and nuke out a noob with 1k kds for free in one hour before the opening is gone.
There'd be an "open kingdom count". At the end of dmu, this count is increased by 10% (5% with a DRC equipped) of their kds for each holder, but this would be capped at 10% (5%) and never go above that number with the exception of holders gaining kds. When you settle, overthrow, or are given a kingdom, your count goes up by 1. When a kingdom of yours is overthrown, this number goes down by 1, and when it hits 0, you are no longer "open" and cannot be profit nuked for the rest of the day unless you gain kds in some way. Your count does not go down after giving away kingdoms to avoid exploits. It also is reset to 0 before adding the daily 5-10% if it had previously gone negative, or it can just never go negative.
Considerations:
-Profit nuking does not mean the gold is kept in the server as Lord Sin pointed out in another discussion, since the original gold that was nuked with is permanently gone, and the new gold in the nuker's hands (if he manages to take it out quickly enough) was transfered from the victim.
-As of an old update, for every 900 kds you own in a plane, attacks against you on that plane have a 1% higher chance to be stealthy. Because of this, it would not be wise to hold a 200x200 plex under one character just because corruption would be now capped; it would be mad profit nuking (4k kds per day with the given numbers, and with insane stealth to make the nuking faster and tons cheaper). I have nuked plexes with 10-20% bonus stealth and I believe the difference is pretty large.
-With a system of this kind, it would be a more even playing field between smaller and bigger players, while not being utter bull****. If someone with 10k kds goes ahead and takes on a smaller guy with say 500, then he will stand a chance to lose a lot more since every day a good enough portion of his empire will be open for cheap nuking, implying that with good timing and skill, the smaller guy could even go as far as methodically taking 10% (5%) of the other guy's kds every day without having much external funding. The bully would most likely not stop at one person, and eventually he might just run into that guy with a few tril and the will to nuke that gives him at the very least a headache.
-With the ruleset proposed, there are a number of interesting side effects. For one, it makes the "rogue" nuke mule more viable and fun to play, as you could go around messing with just about everyone with relatively small funding, though you will obviously make a number of enemies. Also, if someone wants the most out of their gold when they nuke you, they will potentially stop after you go into "protection", after which point you don't have to worry as much about being nuked because they're wasting gold anyway.
-I can't think of smart ways to exploit this. If you use several characters to hold your kds to make more gold, then you will need a DRC for each of them if you want them all to stay at no more than 5% open kds. If you tect yourself to avoid being open every day, then you'll be spending more gold than you make with the proposed numbers, aka you're going negative and screwing yourself over anyway with no effort from your enemies. Keep in mind that your open count goes up by 1 every time you gain a kingdom, so settling a bunch of empties then nuking yourself doesn't really work.
-If you want to expand to more kingdoms and don't have 3 quad muled, then you will probably not be expading a lot, or you will do it with weak, easy to take kingdoms, or you will weaken your current kingdoms to make the newer ones defendable. And with this implemented, the more kingdoms you have, the more you will be open to near free or even profit nuking.
-Although more kingdoms means more advantage to macroers, if they don't pay attention then they end up banned to an account lock, and if they do then they're still spending hours sitting there probably not doing something that requires them to pay full attention (like playing another game), then they're at least still wasting time just as much as anyone else that doesn't macro.
-Corruption was not the solution. It does nothing but delay the inevitable and I can easily prove this if necessary.
-DRC would receive a defensive purpose again that is not a 100% must have kind of thing, yet quite helpful.
-Some other **** I forgot.
All in all, I think this would make the game more even, and make it so nuking is worth it in certain situations. For example, on s1 as it stands it would be pretty stupid unless you plan to fall behind people who aren't nuking. If you can do at least some nuking at small cost or even profit (And keep in mind that's if no one defends, and then taking out the leftover runes is still time consuming, as is nuking itself) then it makes more sense to go ahead and rape that expansion of weak kingdoms the big guy just laid out. Instead of "fair" wars being stalemates, being aggressive could actually yield an advantage and a winner; hell, both sides could nuke each other and use what they make to continue to nuke each other, instead of giving defense the undeniable upper hand. On s2, Rath and I would stop being mathematically impossible to take out, while by far still not a trivial task. With the suggested limitations, it is still not unfair to bigger plex holders in my opinion, while also not being unfair to smaller plex holders; I think this is excellent balance. Discuss/flame as your heart desires. Hate mail for wasting your time on a long read can go to my visitor messages or w/e they're called, or PM to keep the thread as clean as possible.
Kingdom related suggestion
