A few words before 3.3

[Grundulum]

@Kurokazna

tl;dr

Holy crap. Most appropriate custom title ever.

Edit: thread title (“a few words before 3.3”) is now wildly inappropriate.

[Eika]

@Grundulum

Edit: thread title (“a few words before 3.3”) is now wildly inappropriate.

This totally got me.

[efh313]

Good to see you again @Kurokazna!!
I see your time away has NOT taught you brevity!
I miss these long, well thought out, coherent responses.

For what it’s worth, 3.3 looks very promising, with the new raid and other “super secret” mode breaking up the monotony of GW every week. Perhaps you can make a full return and give it a shot?

#ImissGemVETS

[Jainus]

That’s exactly what I was thinking…

[Kurokazna]

@efh313

I see your time away has NOT taught you brevity

Actually, I’m rather reserved and don’t ramble on nearly as much elsewhere. You’d hardly recognise me on social media, though I’m fairly easy to find if one knows how to look for me.

Presently on mobile and about to check out for the night, but i wanted to throw one thing out there first.

@efh313

Perhaps you can make a full return and give it a shot?

This isn’t likely. The game is nowhere near as fun without a guild, and I’m never going to be able to put in the kind of effort required to maintain membership in one. I couldn’t even make login requirements if i tried.

Plus, after being part of Intrim in its prime, nothing is really going to be worth the kind of long term investment this game would take to enjoy to its fullest. Maybe some day that will change though. Who knows?

Edit: I still check for tags every week or two. Use this knowledge of how to perform the summoning contract wisely and responsibly.

[efh313]

@Kurokazna

I still check for tags every week or two. Use this knowledge of how to perform the summoning contract wisely and responsibly.

I will wield this power with the utmost responsibility.

In all seriousness, it was nice seeing you again and I hope that life continues to treat you well! Take care @Kurokazna

[Slypenslyde]

RE: “Immunity to everything on defense is GOOD. It means you have to ADAPT.”

There is a chasm between endgame and midgame players.

Endgame players have the tools to adapt, and I really want endgame players to be able to use those tools. I’m going to be endgame one day, too.

Midgame players can’t adapt the same way. By definition they lack the resources. So I worry if we do something to make even more teams that are easy for endgame to handle but difficult for midgame, we’ll have fewer endgame players over time because people will “quit”, not “graduate”.

But it’s also possible, given the large-scale changes in PvP, the devs believe our current game state is broken and would like to slow it down. That would mean a lot of the “grief” defense teams we complain about today are perhaps more like what the devs intend the new experience to be. That’s going to make a lot of people exceptionally angry. After that dust settles, we’ll get some reasonable discussion about whether it’s better or worse.

I kind of like how fast PvP matches go now, but I agree it means there’s a kind of tedium to it that doesn’t have universal appeal.

[Razzagor]

@Eika

My whole point is that Human can adapt their team so it’s based to counter a given defense team and its immunity traits etc. Which ofc CPU can’t do, which gives sometimes Humans a great advantage already before a given match has started.

Sure Eika, but having said immunities forcing us to change our strategies and teams is not detrimental, it breaths diversity into our experience. In a “perfectly imbalanced” enviroment we wold need to exchange teams regularly. It would also be perfectly healthy to the economic balance that players wouldn’t steamroll the hardest battles with the same “blazing-speed” team over and over. But some opinions would probably differ as some people are too engaged in getting faster and better results trying to reap as much resources as they can.

I believe having more immunities helps, equally, defensive and offensive diversity, if the devs do it right.

@Kurokazna

This man reads my stuff and perfectly understands my reasons for things,

I give credit where it’s due, you sensed a problem way back in the past and shared your experience. And couldn’t ignore your post because i knew it was true.

More so, i understood why it was true at the given time you decided to leave the game… You felt pressured to optimize your gameplay because you were in a competitive guild trying to achieve something amazing…

@Kurokazna

This. And when every battle is effectively fighting four peasants, because enemy team comp doesn’t matter, as it doesn’t with certain teams (Green Seer/Giant Spider/Kraken/Kraken is an easy example of this), ya kinda get bored and burn out, ESPECIALLY after competing with fifty nine other Intrim players and Gard knows who else, for the top spot on the leaderboards during the first ever iWeek that helped push them to the #1 spot on the guild boards.

… but i dare to say you merely… jumped forward in time . As you would eventually, no matter what, get tired of the game i guess.

@Kurokazna

If a single one of you decides to debate against the statistics rather than the point demonstrated by arbitrary numbers that are being simply used to illustrate a point for this man as well, I will concede that I have lost all hope for the masses on these forums, and start dismissing any comment that isn’t made by someone with a name I recognize as unimportant.

I feel flattered, but i’m using a Bucket of Wisom, which is really good to carry water too by the way, but numbers are better left to my specialist:

@Slypenslyde

RE: “Immunity to everything on defense is GOOD. It means you have to ADAPT.”

There is a chasm between endgame and midgame players.

Endgame players have the tools to adapt, and I really want endgame players to be able to use those tools. I’m going to be endgame one day, too.

Midgame players can’t adapt the same way. By definition they lack the resources. So I worry if we do something to make even more teams that are easy for endgame to handle but difficult for midgame, we’ll have fewer endgame players over time because people will “quit”, not “graduate”.

Hopefully they will do the necessary changes right. We were assured that Nimhain is working in troops’s reworks, so it’s more than likely that midgamers will have a better variety of good troops to use too.

[Ashasekayi]

@Eika

In a game where the win % for invades is sky high it is wrong to feed the human with more immunity traits, after all its humans that get the better out of it.

The problem is that it is bad game design to have players feel that their losses are due to arbitrary RNG. The goblin first turn “loop o’ death” doesn’t feel good to the average player. It doesn’t matter that the player could get an equally RNG fortuitous board that allows them to loop the AI to death in one turn. This is the psychology of the situation.

I have no problem losing when I made a mistake and picked the wrong gem, or I used a risky team to fight the meta instead of a safe one. For the game to lean towards strategy instead of slot machine, it “must” have mechanics and counter-mechanics. This gives the human the best chance of crafting teams with strategy in mind instead of just bringing a brain dead team of explorers with AOE.

To solve the win rate issue, the devs need to step up the AI coding. It makes no sense to me that the AI doesn’t avoid targeting troops with an immunity to its spell or that the AI doesn’t target troops with a weakness to its spell. I know this can be coded in Unity without diving into the more complex areas of coding AIs.

TLDR:
Make the game more challenging with a slightly smarter AI not by spiky cascades and arbitrary RNG losses (ie. goblins).

[Arelana]

@Ashasekayi

I have no problem losing when I made a mistake and picked the wrong gem, or I used a risky team to fight the meta instead of a safe one.

Ding ding ding! We have a winner!

@Ashasekayi

The problem is that it is bad game design to have players feel that their losses are due to arbitrary RNG.

QFT. Please give this kitty a cookie.

@Ashasekayi

Make the game more challenging with a slightly smarter AI not by spiky cascades and arbitrary RNG losses (ie. goblins)

This.

[Eika]

@Ashasekayi

The problem is that it is bad game design to have players feel that their losses are due to arbitrary RNG.

And I have said that I take those few extra losses due to RNG, rather than not, since without those losses I would pretty much not lost any matches. I do by all means not talk for everyone, but share my opinion only. Eventho its RNG and feel unfair from time to time, it still feel a little more like a game for me even if its some ugly losses in between.

@Ashasekayi

TLDR:

Make the game more challenging with a slightly smarter AI not by spiky cascades and arbitrary RNG losses (ie. goblins).

I also hope that they will be able to make the game more challenging with a slightly smarter Al without all the RNG luck they seem to have, but after being in this game for over two years, it is hard for me to see that ever happen, but lets hope I am wrong.

[efh313]

@Ashasekayi

The problem is that it is bad game design to have players feel that their losses are due to arbitrary RNG. The goblin first turn “loop o’ death” doesn’t feel good to the average player. It doesn’t matter that the player could get an equally RNG fortuitous board that allows them to loop the AI to death in one turn. This is the psychology of the situation.

This! Exactly this!
All of my arguments are not about I should be lucky and the AI should NOT. I have no problem with losing. It’s about the psychology of player feelings. When a player feels BAD about a loss, it leads to players leaving, rage quitting, and this is bad for business. Period.

Thank you for saying so succinctly @Ashasekayi!!

[Ashasekayi]

@Arelana

QFT. Please give this kitty a cookie.

Yes please.

[Ashasekayi]

@Eika

I also hope that they will be able to make the game more challenging with a slightly smarter Al without all the RNG luck they seem to have, but after being in this game for over two years, it is hard for me to see that ever happen, but lets hope I am wrong.

I’m a bit skeptical it will ever happen either, but I hold out a tiny bit of hope.

[awryan]

@Eika

I also hope that they will be able to make the game more challenging with a slightly smarter Al without all the RNG luck they seem to have, but after being in this game for over two years, it is hard for me to see that ever happen, but lets hope I am wrong.

You have been playing longer than I have. But you yourself have experienced at least 2 radical changes that made the AI more difficult.

1. “Combo breaker” - The player used to easily be able to control the board every match without the AI even getting a turn… RIP Courage.
2. The introduction of the gem sliders removed the tactic of “skull baiting”. Though sliders were removed. The tendency for the AI to cast instead of going for skulls remained. That also caused an increase in difficulty for players…RIP insurance against Famine.

But since I brought it up. “Gem slider’s” made the game so much more interesting. Every single opponent in PvP was unique despite the Meta defenses at the time. Because if the individual player messed up. Then the AI could be ready to cast the entire match and yet never cast. On the opposite end… If the player set it perfectly. It would be like playing an actual human being. Because the AI would do nothing but actual smart moves. It was that variance that made the game Defenses actually interesting. Originally, they removed it to fix it so that players could use them better. I myself would mess with it whenever my defenses were underperforming. Had no clue how they were “supposed” to work, but the trial and error added extra depth to it. So when I saw wins for my defense. I felt a sense of pride like I myself had won the match! The solution for ignorance is not the removal of a feature of the game. The solution is an improved tutorial of all the features of the game. There have been many changes to the game that I may not be a fan of. But I get it overall. And I have gotten used to changes to the point that I don’t notice them anymore. I do enjoy the game daily and play way too much of it. It’s been 6 (?) Months and I still miss the gem sliders.
@Sirrian, with all due respect. The permanent removal of gem sliders is a huge mistake. A quick solution would be to not make the sliders available until level 500+ . A tutorial on how to use the sliders would be the best solution, but understandably, would take the longest time to implement. The addition of 24 Unique troops points has made me quickly realize the importance of defense teams. Yet, I feel handicapped due to the inability to have any effect on how the Defense plays outside of setting 4 troops and a banner. The return of coding that is already built into the game…Would add thousands of more hours of entertainment and fun to thousands of players. Thank you for your time.

[Ashasekayi]

@awryan

The solution for ignorance is not the removal of a feature of the game. The solution is an improved tutorial of all the features of the game.

This. All day long. I loved the AI sliders. It’s a much better solution for making the game more challenging than spiky cascades/crazy RNG.

[Slypenslyde]

@awryan

The solution for ignorance is not the removal of a feature of the game. The solution is an improved tutorial of all the features of the game.

I don’t think your first sentence is a maxim, but I can very much get behind the second. I can’t tell you how many mechanics I’ve had to understand by chasing a weird daisy chain of forum posts and articles on the support site. I’ve been playing for months and I still feel like I don’t know how a large number of the features I use daily work.

Like: the Paragon/whatever ratings in GW? I was Paragon one week, now I’m not? What happened? What does that even mean? I haven’t asked so far because I bet the answer isn’t recorded anywhere, I just have to take someone’s word for it that heard it from a friend who read it in a post that referenced a dev stream.

[awryan]

@Slypenslyde

I don’t think your first sentence is a maxim

Well it’s true. They removed it because people weren’t using the sliders “right”. People weren’t using them right, because they didn’t know how to use them right.

The Paragon is the player who scored the highest in Guild War points for that guild. The previous week.

[VenusBlue]

@Slypenslyde

Like: the Paragon/whatever ratings in GW? I was Paragon one week, now I’m not? What happened? What does that even mean? I haven’t asked so far because I bet the answer isn’t recorded anywhere, I just have to take someone’s word for it that heard it from a friend who read it in a post that referenced a dev stream.

While i absolutely agree that a better tutorial is needed (there are a lot of unclear or vague areas) there is a pretty solid post about this in the community guidlines. Guild wars explained (mostly), i don’t know how to link or i would. Anyhoo, it shouldn’t be up to the community, or forum itself, to explain basic mechanics. I was lost for the first month or so before i found the forums. Hell, i didn’t fully get some things (like gw defense colors don’t matter) til after level 1000. A clearer tutorial would be extremely beneficial. I don’t care if it takes longer, i wanna know wth i’m doing.

[awryan]

So much time wasted and difficulty raised playing PvP matches when I started. Simply because I didn’t know what Traitstones were for nor how to use them.