Empty vessels make most noise.
Interesting reading, five pages of people with largely little knowledge of the workings of the top 20 teams. Many of the top 20 today were in the top 20 in the old medal system. There is a reason for that, they know how to fight. It's no use Hobbit Zombies complaining about sandbagging when out of their top 10 only 2 players scored double 5* in a recent war against very weak opponents. Just looking at their chat forum highlights a significant absence of time and effort invested in running wars, battle tactics, and weapons operability. Compare this with the battle academies of teams like UA, USAE, First Dynasty, Elite Response, and the gap is huge. Much of that expertise has been constructed from top players who have worked consistently hard on researching methods for their comrades over the last 2 years.
The fact remains that a common theme runs in the management of most of the top alliances - command, communication, control and power. Outside of those factors players can moan all they like but the game boils down to winning. Teams that consistently perfect their scores with their top players all in double 5's wins are coordinated by top generals and excellent planning. Yes stalemates frustrate, especially if resolved on 0.01% error or similar in damage calculation. But the top teams move on, they don't fight only on Tuesdays and Saturdays, they fight everyday rolling constantly. This kind of effort separates the more 'professional' alliances from those who pretend to play for fun and joy. Well it's just a game say the back pack - NO ITS NOT - and certainly not to players who perfect their protocols for war.
This doesn't mean there aren't problems in the game. Players at the top have long been concerned about issues since the game started and have often had their input taken on board by Nexon. However, they have also been ignored by Nexon like for example when they led a players protest; and where was the back pack then to support them? Everyone is in much the same boat in this game but what separates them is the ability to fight. I would suggest some of you improve your fighting ability and earn the glory moan.
Although you bring up some valid points, it's ultimately a perfect example of elitist ignorance that would be damaging for the game if those running it were to accept or think like this.
I dont know anything about Hobbit Zombies, other than they have some nice folks on the forums and are a fairly active alliance that probably is much like mine, somewhere inbetween your "not for fun, only winning pros" and the " just for fun back pack" (haha love that term for the 95% of active alliances not in the top 20). The fact of the matter is that both demographics need to be taken care of. Not once in any of these threads have people stated alliances like 1D, UA, USAE, KA, etc dont deserve to be the top war alliances. Most alliances not in the top 20 have equally as much fun trying to make the top 100 leaderboards, or even just winning a fairly matched war. And because they dont perfect every opponent, or arent as "good" as you doesnt mean they should be subject to a terrible game experience.
But, the ignorance part comes from the lack of your being able to recognize just how bad the sandbagging problem is. The top advancement alliances face zero risk of going into war facing a team that the top half averages two ages above their opponent. If you had to face a team of 20 space age max bases, and 20 iron age bases, with your global average - you would have no chance, any sort of strategy or ability is simply thrown out the window. And, if it happened war after war after war, Im pretty sure you would take your professionalism to another game. I know the space age example sounds silly, but that is exactly what the teams in the EA/IA/Early global average alliances are experiencing over and over again in war.
Top advancement teams deserve to shine, at least the very well coordinated and experienced ones. You are absolutely right that there is a difference in how the teams are organized and run, and that effort deserves to be rewarded. But, the best rewards should not come at the expense of ruining the rest of the community. Right now, the best rewards for any team, good or bad, come from manipulating war matchmaking equations at the expense of others. And for every 1st Dynasty (just randomly picking a good team, not singling them out), there are 20 Hobbit Zombie teams. The importance of the "back pack" is at least equal, if not more, than the top 20 teams. Both need each other to survive, and both should be very interested in seeing both sandbagging, and the factors encouraging it (stalemates, lack of defensive balancing, terribly flawed glory point award calculations, war matchmaking times, etc) fixed. Otherwise, the game dies for both.
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