Taking a break in a smaller alliance

PantherusNZ

I'm curious as to whether anyone else had needed a break from the pressure of stronger alliances and so voluntarily dropped to a lower one temporarily.

How did you find the adjustment, both going down and coming back up?

KDoggg2017

We have actually built our entire alliance (One Above All) on this concept. 6 months ago we had 30 members and a 500K alliance rating. We decided to recruit up and find stronger players who needed a break from the grind. Now we have 29 members with a 2.9 million alliance rating.
Quite a few of the members who joined were significantly stronger than the rest of us, with hero ratings above 150K... and in one case above 325K. We have learned so much from these guys and my hero rating has reached 100K, as a result.
The funny thing is that most of these guys agreed to join our chill, adult, family atmosphere on a temporary basis while they recharged their batteries... but to date not a single one of them has left.

**Shameless plug alert***
...If ur a strong player who just wants to enjoy the game while playing daily wherever you see fit, message me in game. If u want to talk to some of our stronger members about how they adjusted, feel free to do so. I am comfortable saying this bcuz several have told me we have the best alliance on the planet! :-)

Ground_Round1

I did this. I went from a top 5-6% alliance...maybe around 8 mil rating to a smaller alliance with the rating around 3 mil. It was nice and freshened up the game for me. No more map 5 crystals, but the game was much more fun without the constant pressure.

Also, my new alliance has a good, positive culture. It was nice to see guys being supportive. My previous alliance was successful, but it was cutthroat and like hanging out in a junior high boys locker room.

Now, my new guys are around 6 mil, and we have fun with a 44332 schedule in AQ. Very manageable.

Good topic OP.

Mcord11758

I have done this a couple times. Going down comes with frustration regarding pace and organization. Going back up required me some time to adjust and gain back some lost skill

FabiusBR

We started an 11 member "retirement" Alliance, 3.9mm rating, a few months ago after the big 12.0 changes. Most of us come from a former top 100 Alliance and three of us have been Alliance leaders in the past. The stress of high-level alliance play took the fun out of the game. And Kabam made it worse when they nerfed all the top champs. What's the point of all that stress if all it gets you is another mediocre champion?

Now we just relax and play when we want for fun. Map 2 in AQ and it's voluntary. One BG war. We're tier 3 in AW, so the rewards are decent and we don't stress about it. It's the only reason I still play the game. I'd quit the game or go Lone Wolf before I would rejoin an active Alliance again.

Speeds80

Our 8m +- alliance had a split and the big guns went to map 6 t4c alliances because we weren't gonna get there, we have settled back to a mid paced alliance we only allow members with 5 r5s to keep our prestige up so we can run 55533 and stay in the expert bracket for weekly t4bs and we run 2 war groups so people can take a break from war, this is a good balance for us and most of the people that have been in the t4c alliances are burning out and going to an alliance another retiring member started which is map 3 2 groups for aq and war, and if you don't join no pressure but if you do join then play that day

DaMunk

I recently stepped down a tier. Went from a weekly t4cc top 200 AQ and tier 1 or 2 AW to really good but weaker alliance. Stayed in the expert tier AQ and tier 3-5 AW. With all the bugs in the game it was driving me nuts. There's always going to be frustrations if you are competitive like me but I was about to quit the game completely. I don't mind spending a little money but it was getting ridiculous. I just got tired of paying for Kabams programming issues. So far I'm enjoying the break. If you decide to step down remember not to burn bridges because I'm sure given time I'll want to move back up.

Thecurler

I did it fairly recently. Dropped from an alliance doing 5x5 mostly clearing all 3 groups to a relaxed alliance doing 55444. The thing that struck me about it was the relative lack of organisation, no set paths in aq or aw. Can be frustrating and the rewards aren't so good but I've reclaimed a big chunk of my life.

R4GE

Ive done it a couple times. Only issue I really had was those lower alliances wanting me around all the time for boss kills.Ended up not being a break to be honest

R4GE

Theturdcurler wrote: »

I did it fairly recently. Dropped from an alliance doing 5x5 mostly clearing all 3 groups to a relaxed alliance doing 55444. The thing that struck me about it was the relative lack of organisation, no set paths in aq or aw. Can be frustrating and the rewards aren't so good but I've reclaimed a big chunk of my life.

And this as well

Thebgj01

If any of you ever want to join another ZERO pressure alliance, feel free to look us up. RID3RS

Most of us have 200+ rating and have never had dumb requirements or mandatory donations. We always do AQ and war but we play the AQ level we can afford. War- we get where we get and I stress to the team to NOT use potions, some still do and that's entirely up to them.

PantherusNZ

It's a tough situation - I've got a lot of good friends in my current Alliance and don't REALLY want to leave, but I've been playing abhorrently badly of late in AW and so having to buy a lot more potions/revives which has drained my unit stock; combined with a slew of disappointing 4*/5* Crystal pulls and I'm just generally feeling disenchanted with the game...but I don't want to quit.

The thought was maybe I could drop down and join a more laid back alliance that's not doing such hard War content, cruise for a while and maybe just get back on my feet...

The fear is that I'll quickly get frustrated if others aren't keeping up and of course the significantly reduced rewards will be aggravating...

R4GE

PantherusNZ wrote: »

It's a tough situation - I've got a lot of good friends in my current Alliance and don't REALLY want to leave, but I've been playing abhorrently badly of late in AW and so having to buy a lot more potions/revives which has drained my unit stock; combined with a slew of disappointing 4*/5* Crystal pulls and I'm just generally feeling disenchanted with the game...but I don't want to quit.

The thought was maybe I could drop down and join a more laid back alliance that's not doing such hard War content, cruise for a while and maybe just get back on my feet...

The fear is that I'll quickly get frustrated if others aren't keeping up and of course the significantly reduced rewards will be aggravating...

Considering what you said maybe you just need an alliance more equal to your skill to balance it all out and grow with them.
Your fear of getting frustrated with a lower alliance not keeping up with you also sounds a lot like you trying to keep up with your current alliance. If you're not holding your alliance back when not using items I don't see a need to leave. If you do constantly have to use items to keep up than you're really only hurting yourself the most.

PantherusNZ

R4GE wrote: »

Considering what you said maybe you just need an alliance more equal to your skill to balance it all out and grow with them.
Your fear of getting frustrated with a lower alliance not keeping up with you also sounds a lot like you trying to keep up with your current alliance. If you're not holding your alliance back when not using items I don't see a need to leave. If you do constantly have to use items to keep up than you're really only hurting yourself the most.

I'm probably about middle-of-the-road in the alliance, skill-wise. I'm possibly just putting too much pressure on myself - but we're at a stage where we're needing people to be able to solo their paths so that we can maximise exploration.