Is this vacation? or something else?

There is a good reason for vacation mode and for assigning associates that will protect a dwelling while somebody is on vacation. I guess we see this a lot during the summer months when people tend to travel more.

However, I am a little skeptical when I see a player on "vacation" for an extended period of time, during which time the associated player doles out the global resources to various neighbors. (leaving none for the "vacationer", of course)  This situation can go on for the duration of the game, the sole reason for the hero to continue to exist being (not to play the game) to proved sulfur, sheep, gold, and incense to her neighbors and to be an endless farm for alliance members. 

For this reason I would like to suggest a cap on the amount of time that a player can remain in vacation mode and the time an associated can manage the resources. My suggestion? Two weeks max - after which the standard absence count-down begins.

I totally agree. To "lend" every resource is very much so proof that a hero is not being played, but used to keep space from other people who are actually playing. 

Just one problem though that I see anyway is the fact that the associated player is actually logging in to the account on vacation. At least that is my assumption, and by logging in as that player it would likely reset any timer implemented. 

I agree with all of you, when someone doesn't need to play anymore then he/she should delete on his/her own or let the time run for auto deletion. It's not ok to sit on the land and block in this way other players who need to play and can't develop their country for this reason! For Bers it will be hard to control such missuse.

I have to agree with this.  When Bers implements the proxy service I hope there would be some safeguards to protect against abuse. 

However, there might be circumstances in which a player takes over another's account but still plays the hero fully and could be unfairly restricted by time limits and such.

So, while I'd like to see misuse of the system such as we are currently seeing addressed, I'd also like to see players, whose accounts are legitimately being played temporarily by a friend, not be unfairly restricted.

However, there might be circumstances in which a player takes over another's account but still plays the hero fully and could be unfairly restricted by time limits and such.

I wouldn't agree that people should just "take over" fully developed hero accounts that do not belong to them. Permission given or not. Not sure I would consider this to be quite kosher.

However, there might be circumstances in which a player takes over another's account but still plays the hero fully and could be unfairly restricted by time limits and such.

I wouldn't agree that people should just "take over" fully developed hero accounts that do not belong to them. Permission given or not. Not sure I would consider this to be quite kosher.

I think that is exactly what the proxy system will allow for:  temporary (and I stress that word) play of another player's hero by a friend.  The current system results in association when such things occur.

I don't see a problem with abandoning a hero to let other player play it - it's just as if it was another hero of that player. Many people have at least one hero that they use as a "farm" - not for their other heros of course, but for their alliance. As this game limits the heros to 5 (some other games have stricter limits) it shouldn't be a big deal, provided that:

- it's not the 6th (or further) hero for the player (that clearly breaks some of the game's rules)

- it is used as a farm for sending resources via markets and not via plundering - with plundering it can be used to achieve trophies and even if not, the neighbouring heros from the same alliance that know there's no defenses, etc. can gain far more res than is allowed due to the daily help limit. That clearly also breaks the rules.

How to enforce that I have no clue...