Epic Project Feedback [ Edited ]

[l-Sheppard-l]

Epic Project Feedback:

I like the idea of this new feature to mix up the gameplay, however some of the issues I aim having with Epic Projects are as follows:

• 1.  Points rewarded should be proportionate to the items requested.  I have had Tasks request a high production value item (Refrigerator) for 1 point and Tasks request lower production value items (Concrete) for 3 points.  Higher tier items should have greater point values.  I've even had an instance when two different Tasks were requesting 5 Backpacks each and one of the Tasks was offering 1 point as a reward while the other Task was offering 3 points.   ...   ...How is that NOT a bad thing?
• 2. I'm having multiple Tasks requesting the same items for the Task.  That's fine if I just want to make all of the same item for submissions to the Tasks, but...   I suppose I expected more intuitive diversity for the Tasks.  I'm currently stuck w/ 4 Tasks requesting the same 2 high production-time items.  (I don't foresee me completing this Epic Project in time.)
• 3. It would be nice if I could request a new Task (pending a 5 minute time delay).  Per my previous note, stacking multiples of the same items requested for a Task severely reduces the ability to fulfill the Tasks. 
• 4. The Global Market seems to be an integral part of the Epic Project experience as not all of the randomly, unexpected Task requests can be prepared for and produced in advance.  Greater diversity of items offered via the Global Trade HQ is a MUST!  75%-ish if the items offered in the HQ ads are currently Lifebelts, Ship's Wheels, and Scuba Masks...  It's a little hard to find what you're needing when you don't have any options to choose from.  I'm not convinced that a item search is needed because that could place a bigger hit on specific items, thus making them unfindable, but at the least, making an option to refine HQ searches to Commercial building type would be a HUGE help.  Place a option to search for items produced by the Gardening Supplies or Donut Shop, for example, to help find items being offered by other players that we might be in the need of.  That would be better than randomly scouring the Global Trade ads for extended periods of time [NOT building our cities] hunting for items that ultimately end up snatched away from us when we FINALLY find them. (What an extremely frustrating experience.)

I think the Epic Projects are a fun edition to the game for the specialized/custom building upgrades.  The Speed-Up Tokens are quite nice, but I still don't understand why the more advanced buildings, such as Nano-tech Factories, don't have more benefits baked into them other than just zero Dirty Radius.  I'm still trying to get my 1st Nanotech Factory, but if these structures included at least a 5-10% increased production speed...  Wow, that'd be great!  After all, we can upgrade the Commercial buildings for increased production efficiency, why not Factories too?

[mauidude]

Remove the 24 hour time limit.  It's almost impossible to get to 160 points in 24 hours unless you spend days stock piling meat, backpacks, and cheesecakes. The items I seem to repeatedly get asked for.  Also the ability to request a new item would help, like you can while upgrading buildings. 30 minutes and a new item is requested.

[lisarmand]

It is totally impossible to fulfill the tasks that are being asked.  I have been trying for the past 3 days and the best I could do is around 90.  Even though I spent hours trying to find things in the international market, spent all of my money, and already used all of my "speed" tokens.  I totally agree on what has already been said.

i'm so sick of trying I think I'm gonna quit playing.

[wizardelo]

tips for completing projects:

<> first of all there ar 3 lvls for each project: bronze 10 tokens / silver - 80 tokens / gold - 160 tokens. You do not have to do the 160 one.

                    - you can settle for silver, bronze is doable by anyone.

                    - completing any stage will give you an epic building - the quality of speedup tokens is based on the project level you finished.

<> read project info (i) before starting it, and see which speciality it refers too, if you have very few buildings of that speciality i recomand not doing it.

<> after starting project you will notice that some tasks give less tokens then others, even if requests are the same. this is based on building quality not request amount, the cheaper the building was to make (less keys) the less tokens will give, so don't do those tasks, unless you have abundance of that specific product

<> try to build more high quality specialty buildings required by project before starting.

<> stock up on products before starting epic project

<> use market to buy products while epic project is running

<> dont start a project if you are going to be very buzy the next 24h, and wont be able to log in the game often.

[l-Sheppard-l]

My current strategy is simply this...

• Upgrade 6-9 standard builds buildings to Bronze-level Epics and stockpile Turtle Speed-up Tokens.  (Very easily done.)
• Use the Turtle Tokens to upgrade at 6-12 buildings to Silver-level Epics and stockpile Llama Tokens.
• Then I will use the amassed Llama Speed-up Tokens to race for Gold-level buildings for those mighty Cheetah Speed-up Tokens.

[Bellevue1523]

I got lucky.   I agree it was very difficult  in the beginning. The most challenging one when I failed to complete a gold level as I ran out of time and my points was already 156.  But somehow it was a bit easier now to complete all the tasks.  My third gold-level epic building was completed within 4 or 5 hours.   I would love to have an option to upgrade the building once the bronze or silver level is achieved without waiting for 24 hours deadline. Thank you.

[sundevil1992]

I completely agree with the OP on all of the points.  I have one additional comment to add regarding the epic projects (and the new expansion and item types).

New towns have added new items in order to expand the building as well as new territory items to expand beach and mountain areas.  Unfortunately, the city storage was not updated at all for the players to accommodate these additional items.  There are significantly more items to store and now the storage item thought bubbles are shared with beach and mountain items.  The epic projects require a consider amount of stored resources if a player realistically wants to get to the gold level.  Coupled with the well documented trouble with the trading system, it is very difficult to complete all the new features without an extremely high level of frustration.  I recommend either giving all players a little bump, or consider making it easier for players to increase their storage capacity.  Or improve the trading system to make it easier for players to expand the city storage.