Depends on the galaxy. Right now MW is 1 ally.

I agree that big alliances should be avoided.  I played Planetarion for awhile before IC and it did have that issue as well.  However, I think the current solution isn't the correct one.

Unfortunately, finding the correct solution requires a refreshed perspective on the problem.  It's been years since the current IA rules were introduced and the player base has declined significantly which means the context of those rules is now very different.  I propose we do away with the IA rules entirely and experience the pain for at least 1 round.  That's the only way we can know exactly where the imbalances are.  Otherwise we're really just guessing.

Certainly true.

Mmmh, just abolishing any IA-restrictions isn't really a "refreshed perspective". And the given reason that it would help smaller families is obviously wrong, it will be the other way around. Not sure wether really a lengthy explanation is needed, so just some catch-words:
* small families are small because the players are new and inexperienced or inactive or a mix of it... not exactly the right conditions to expect that they will be able to handle the needed extra effort to organize a strong alliance of several families when under attack by a bigger family
* but a strong, well organized family of experienced players, knowing lots of other players,  those will be the most likely ones to get all teh advantages of bigger alliances... and they will hate it at the same time because it will be horrible boredom.

There are some interesting restrictions you could put on the size or power of alliances, like something along the line of:
* The sum of an alliance's NW mustn't exceed 30% of the biggest existing alliance (in the beginning the biggest alliance would be just  the rank 1 family, so lower families might gang together but the rank1 family couldn't.
But since it is dynamic (=NW changing), it is not so easy to implement over a whole round.

Nevertheless I think that's still a dead track.

What's needed are new and more players and to keep them in the game and to give them a chance to have fun. And I still think that the too high specialization in roles, especially the banking/attacker split, is the main problem. Get rid of that and you have lessened the farming problem, you will also have given back the whole game of IC to the players and not only a small specialized role.

Addon:
The latter is probably why people like Orion so much at the moment. Over a longer period it will become a bit lonely, too lonely, though, to play in single player families. Orion lacks the other qualities IC has: organizing a group of players, diplomacy, teaching new players, talking with each other.

Addon2:
Another important thing is activity. There need to be hard-coded changes to lessen the burden of needed activity to stay competitive. The deciding factor should be strat & tact and organization, not being online for much too much time pressing the attack button over and over again.

Addon3: 2 suggestions
1) High specialization and especially the banker/atttacker split is easily killed by imposing a severe cost on "aid" while it still allows helping out a family mate in need.

2) The most simple way to ease the activity burden: Give a good growing bonus to players which haven't done a defined set of actions within the last 8h, 12h, 18h. This still allows hanging around, chatting, using the family forum and taking part socially and perhaps some actions can be still done but not attacking, sending explos and some other stuff. And if you are hyperactive, you can still do everything but the other players won't fall behind that much due to their time-out-bonus. Boni could be a percentage of the production like +10%, +20%, +25% but also more morale (better get rid of it together with the high specialization, though), more spells and operations. This way you might handle a RL AND IC.

this Thread makes me miss Xeno...

Enforce the rules. or get rid of them them... war has no rules so i vote to have the rule removed. because its not people who do this get punished anyways, so why even have it?

Only people this potentially hurts are the old timey vets that we see EVERY ROUND nap with each other, spend 4/5 of the round farming smaller families, and then have a big war at the end. 

and I'm all for hurting those players.