Another joyless GW day ruined in battle #1

Guild Wars
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All-too-frequent type of day today.

  1. I get to sit and watch in battle number 1 while RNG delivers everything Defense needs to repeatedly Famine me into non-action while simultaneously devouring my team, at no time offering me a glimmer of hope.
    2, Since I’ve just lost 1 battle, I’m now screwed, so no matter what happens it’s a bitter, joyless experience that I can’t win.
  2. I proceed to then easily win battles #2-#5, because winning and losing in GW is really just a coin-flip and has almost nothing at all to do with which battle it is, what stats are, or anything beyond RNG whim really. Plus I derive no joy from the four wins, since I know that I’m screwed no matter what, anyway.
  3. Wind up with less than half points, even after winning 4 “harder” battles after the “easy” one I lost, making the entire exercise a frustrating, annoying experience I’d have rather skipped.

Not the kind of fun experience that GoW used to be, frankly.

How to fix this:

  1. Make all battles count the same, so that if RNG hands you a loss in battle 1 or 2, the rest of them aren’t a waste of time.
  2. Rework Devour and Death Mark (and Famine) so that battles aren’t decided by who gets to charge first and wipe out the other team in seconds, making the entire battle a coin-flip instead of anything resembling skill or strategy.

I can’t believe people find this fun…

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Less QQ more Pew Pew…
All of those things you complained about are what makes GW so exciting and unpredictable.
What would be the fun if you win all the time?

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This has been covered in several threads already… I grow weary of my broken record response so ill change it up a bit…

@EricBLivingston i have a better idea… How about we mandate a 4x peasent defense for everyone in GW and nerf peasent to cost 75 mana and give him 1 atk health and armor while simultaneously giving everyone all troops fully leveled and traited and include an instant win trait on all troops except peasant

Then ppl will stop regurgitating the same weak argument that there is no skill involved in this game

Frankly i am insulted every time someone starts yelling “i lost a GW battle because skill doesnt count” when i have played every battle since GW started and i have only lost one

Guess im just lucky huh?

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Yes, actually I do think you’re just lucky. Random chance creates a “bell curve” that will naturally produce some players that happen to win a great deal, and others that happen to lose most of their battles. It’s a basic part of how random works, and you are a lucky person that happens to be on the “high side” of the random curve. Lucky for you.

Obviously, I’m not saying that “winning all the time” is the idea. What I’m saying is that the way GW is structured and the points are tallied, that if you lose battle number 1, the remaining battles are not very fun at all, because you know you’ve already lost most of your points. That just adds to the basic frustration of losing due to simple random chance giving the opponent all the gems they need, and you receiving none or hardly anything you need.

What GW lacks, that the rest of GoW has, is “recoverability”. In a particular battle, GoW does show some recoverability, at least some of the time. It’s possible to be down to one troop and still win through various means. So often even if you’re “way behind” you can catch up and prevail. And that’s a good mechanic.

Unfortunately, GW does not replicate this. Once you’ve lost one battle, there’s nothing you can do to recover; you’re stuck with 50% points at most, likely fewer, no matter how well things go. There’s absolutely no way to regain that or come out on top, you’re just “done” which is why the remaining battles aren’t very fun, at least for me.

What I’m saying is that I don’t believe a single battle should be so devastating to your overall GW performance for a given day. I believe that incurring one loss should only lose you 20% of so of your possible points, so that you can still get the majority of your points if you win the rest.

Look, I get this is subjective. Some people would just love a system where it’s all-or-nothing; Lose even one of the five games, and get zero points, but if you win all five, get max points. That sort of “high stakes” stuff is great for some. I tend to hate it.

My preference is a system that’s more lenient and allows you to still come out ahead and feel good about your overall results even if you have a loss or two along the way, especially since I believe that wins and losses are largely governed by random chance.

So, for me GW isn’t very fun, because a single loss has far too devastating an effect on your overall performance. That’s it.

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I have to agree with Vangor. Why should guild wars be made easy? The 5th battle against paragon is supposed to be toughest since they get the most bonus from sentinels. It should be worth more points. If you want a cheap easy win, set a 1 troop def and play regular pvp.

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If you believe that the points from battles 1-4 are worthless, then as soon as you lose a battle, there is a convenient “Skip Guild” button on the screen which will finish the rest of your battles. Now you are free to go do other things!

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Ok… so much like others, you’re using a strategy to try to re-cast what I’m saying into something ridiculous, which isn’t fair and I wish people would not do it. I am not saying that I “want a cheap easy win” and I think you and others know that. Saying that is a technique to try to reshape what I’m saying deliberately into something that’s easily countered.

What I am saying, again, is that I’m fine with winning and losing. And frankly it’s not even about the “random vs. skill” thing - if people want to think that GW and GoW in general is more about skill than luck, great. I think there’s a spectrum there that goes from 100% luck to 100% skill and GoW falls somewhere in there, and we can debate on exactly where it falls, but I think largely that’s subjective.

My main point, again, is that I feel that a single battle in GW should not have the immense impact that it does on overall outcome for the day.

This also is a spectrum. One could imagine a system where a single loss means you’re disqualilfied and lose all points at one end, and at the other end a system where if you win even one of the five battles you get all points, and up to four losses is forgiven. Most people I think would want something in the middle somewhere.

My opinion is that GW currently falls too far to the left on that spectrum. I feel that a single battle has too much influence on overall outcome, and I’d prefer a system wherein one loss had less of an effect. One way would be to have all five battles be worth the same. Another would be a ‘graduated’ approach that had the first battle you win be worth the most, and then it trails off, so that winning 4 battles would be almost as good as winning five.

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I would use the ‘skip guild’ button in a heartbeat, absolutely - but I know my guild can use whatever minor points I can toss into the pot, so I play the other battles anyway, even though it’s not fun or interesting to me to do so.

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The point is, you lose one battle, you know you can not get the big points! I agree, the remaining battles are a chore because in fact you have already lost.

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Exactly - the basic idea is just that: I’d prefer a system where 1 loss didn’t punish you as severely as the current system does.

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Before GW all we heard was how easy it was, the lack of challenge, etc.

Now it seems like people just wanted something to complain about and really want 100% success…

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is it that Player versus Princess game mode? :grin:

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Ok… so again, you’re restating the point and argument in ridiculous terms in order to counter it simply. As you of course know, I didn’t say I want “100% success”, but you cast it that way to make it seem like I’m just complaining and am being unreasonable.

I also didn’t complain about “lack of challenge” or about “how easy it was” so casting what I’m saying in those terms is also deflecting from my actual point.

My point, again: I’d prefer a system where 1 loss didn’t punish you as severely as the current system does.

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I understand your frustration and the need to vent about it, too, Been there, done that.
I especially understand your frustration with Famine chokeholding your team between its Jinx trait crippling your manageneration and its spell resetting your manaprogression completely. It happens sometimes and it sucks.

The point system could definitely be slightly tweaked to be a little less infuriating when losing, though making it strictly linear would take all of GWs flair away, and basically just make it regular pvp grind with a fancy name.

You have a point with remaining battles feeling very empty and joyless after an early loss, and maybe in the future they can add more elaborate systems to it, jokers, keeping a cap on maxpoints but introducing bonuspoints or battles, really whatever they might think of to slightly soften the blow from an early loss and keeping one interested in performing well in the remaining battles, it would be an improvement.

With expressions like everything is just a coinflip or how you can’t believe people find this fun, you won’t get much positive responses from the community in here, as you basically alienate anyone that invests time and finds ways to soften the impact of rng in the game and succeeds for the most part and those that …well do enjoy GW.

The “fun experience that GoW used to be” is still there too, you can still play regular pvp to your hearts desire, 5 GW battles are finished in a couple of minutes if you are not really into it but want to do it for the guild, no issue.

Anyways you vented, and it’s ok, you get a vent appreciation like from me, now cool off while doing something that brings you down, Cheers.

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Why? Why does it need to make it easier to win? Why shouldn’t you get punished for a loss? It’s 1 loss in 5 battles and it’s good for the system of not everyone always wins. How else do you differentiate?

And most people do many more than PvP battles than their 30 for GW. There’s a lot more game here than GW. It was around for a couple of years before GW.

I’m sorry, but all I hear are people wanting a participation trophy.

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Ok… so again, you’re recasting what I’m saying in terms that make it appear ridiculous. I did not say that I “need to make it easier to win”. I did not say that you “shouldn’t get punished for a loss” either.

My point, again: I’d prefer a system where 1 loss didn’t punish you as severely as the current system does.

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Making it so you can’t get to the Paragon fight by losing one battle is good. Otherwise, what incentive does anyone in the first 3 or 4 levels of your guild have to win defense? Knowing that even as the second tier in my guild, that a win prevents that person from earning the highest possible points makes it more meaningful.

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Gouki, points taken.

“Everything is just a coinflip” is too extreme. I do feel that random chance plays a huge part in any given battle - both in terms of sometimes handing you and easy win, and other times handing you a fast and inevitable loss. I don’t think random chance is 100% of it, but I think that it’s enough of a factor to make single-battle outcomes too chancy to have them impact overall performance as much as they do.

Also, I didn’t mean to imply that I can’t believe how anyone could find GoW in general fun, of even GW in general fun. I was talking about that particular situation that I had, and actually I really do have a hard time imagining someone losing game 1 and all those points and at the end of it all, after being barred from playing battle #5, thinking “wow, that was really fun!” but I concede that there are all types of folks and perhaps some would in fact find that entertaining. I’m just not one of them. Losing that many points from an early loss doesn’t make the rest of the battles very fun for me, in particular.

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I get that some people will like the current system. In fact, there are those in my guild that liked the previous system where the points ramped up even more. I’m just not one of those people. For me, I’d prefer a system where a single loss didn’t have as much of a devastating impact on the overall day’s performance.

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pretty much lately