Some valid points assassin.
Although i definitely wouldn't say this world is dumbed down, once you delve into what exactly the "farm rule means" u see a world where u cant stack and go to sleep(sniping becomes the standard)
you see a world where complimented by the noble distances a lot of short range skirmish's
with no outside support you have 20 guys to your disposal not the usual 40
no outside support means you cant launch a train with bags of support, so if you wanna hold the village you going to have to snipe or retake from a retake.
Considering the noble distance and the farm rule, we are going to see 10x the amount of cats.
Cats even become a very legitimate neutralizer of players all the way till end game phase, ie once a vill is clear farm catted, you cant stop them.
considering nobles are spotted easily, these fanged fakes are not, so good organization on a player and a tribe level is required to pluck the cat's from the fakes.
This world i would be as bold to say requires the highest skill threshold of any previous uk world, u can talk about premium all you like, premium wont snipe a noble for you.
And attack gaps of any level could be cut up by any able player, t trains blag noobs head true, but if wanna be sure send from 4 different nuke/noble vills and time them within ms of each other and you beat any force ms gap.
The skill required to fire a T train? 0
The skill to time noble 1 to 5 within 5 ms? pro level
So what im seeing is defending is a lot more skill reliant, church's, farm rule, no outside support.
You need to be a very good timer to get buy as uber stacks are off the table, sniping will be handy as well, and a general high organization on a player and on a tribe level to provide activity and ability and stuff in the right place to deal with attackers.
Attacking becomes a lot more affective at the later stages, one maximum stack cannot hold a 20 wall, so even if you time in support after every nuke, your wall takes a hit, a maximum stack(with no timed support) can take 13 nukes approx, so no more whack 1 million troops in vill a b and c, and go to sleep. You cant follow nukes with support so even aggressive growers who can out nuke anyone still need a high defending ability.
Now find me any tribe on w13 where all its members already meet that skill threshold, if there is non then nobody needs another 20 dead weights.
Sure their is the growth argument, but if you never expended any nukes at war, never built defense and just focused nobling all day you would grow faster. But no one will argue that is the best way to play tw.