Just an idea to talk about regarding "Garbage Troops"

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This is just talking, fantasizing if you will.

But I had a dream last night that the 100+ unusable troops in this game changed how they Ascend. In my dream the cards that have never really been usable and have remained that way up to level 20 Mythic… were suddenly changed both mathematically and thematically.

So in my dream, instead of a level 1 useless Peasant ascending to 20 and still being useless, the progression looked like this:

Peasant

  • Level 1-5 default card/spell behavior
  • Level 6-10 upgrades to Peasant Worker
    (Spell changed to destroy 3 gems in a row + 3 gems above them)
  • Level 11-16 upgrades to Peasant Leader
    (Spell changed to double the mana gathered)
  • Level 17-20 upgrades to Town Mayor
    (No longer destroys rows, but can “halt construction” for 1 round on a chosen gem color

Please don’t focus on the specifics of the spells, I’m only using that as placeholders. What I’m talking about is how s**ty cards that have never been usable and ever will be, can be made useful again.

I know I’m nowhere near the progression level of many of the top players here, but I can say honestly that at least 70% of the troops will never be used by me. I’m not saying 70% of cards are inherently bad, but realistically once I’ve found my first Bone Dragon, what the F do I care once I find a Dwarf Lord or Musketeer? They become nothing more than “hungry mouths” that I need to throw Souls and Stones on so I can upgrade my kingdoms… other than that… really nothing more than a bunch of cruft that I need to scroll past.

Anyways, just talking… wondering what others people think?

edit: I realize this isn’t something you trivially “bolt on” after a game has been designed. However, the fact that new un-necessary cards a released weekly and the bulging troop roster shows something needs to be done here…

edit: Seeing responses that are basically “yeah but this approach has problems”

Sure it does I don’t deny it. Meanwhile the elephant in the room is that 2-3 troops of dubious merit are added weekly. Where is this game going to be in a year with another 100+ troops that are rarely/never used?

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I’ve only been playing for about a week, but I was halfway expecting something like that to happen when you ascended a card - maybe not quite so drastic as changing the spell completely, but I expected something more than just a couple bonus skill points and being able to level it up a couple more slots.

I think something like this would be awesome, but I have no clue how hard it would be to implement and what unintentional side effects it’d have.

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Noble intentions, but that’s a lot of work and a lot of inconsistencies and special cases that would have to be remembered. You’re essentially creating 4 times the number of cards already present, to make half of them feel more useful.

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Fair points, but if you have lets say 100 cards that are “garbage” for lack of better word, and you allow a small % of them to eventually become really potent for end-game players. You still have, say 80 of them garbage, but at least a few become meaningful.

I’m not talking about cards with complex spell effects, etc. I’m talking about the ones that “do 20 damage” and that’s it. They can be expanded without really increasing the complexity of the top game.

edit: Also the team would not need to “create new cards” just adjust existing effect as the troop goes up. The last thing anybody needs are more crap cards. And if that’s a daunting task for the devs, oh well its their job to make this a good game! :slight_smile:

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I love this idea, but as @Zuboki mentioned its seems far to daunting a task to undertake.
What if, in addition to the stat bonuses already in place, every ascension also came with a reduction in mana cost.

1st Ascension- spell redux 1 mana
2nd Ascension- spell redux 1 mana
3rd Ascension- spell redux 1 mana
4th Ascension- spell redux 1 mana
5th Ascension- spell redux 1 mana

This would mean a common with a casting cost of 6, eventually can have its spell cast for a single mana.

Crazy? Or intriguing?

You decide… :wink:

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…but, this is creating new cards. Every change to a card, spell effect, etc. is a “new card” as far as balance is concerned, distinct from the cards before and after it in the progressions you propose. While I’m all for finding niches, possibly in alternate game modes, for the underused cards and rebalancing the hopeless ones, creating a system where a card behaves differently depending on its form is a needlessly over-complicated way of doing that, in addition to destroying the consistency of card level advancement as a game mechanic (“Wait, why didn’t X card get a change is spell like Y did when I levelled it?”).

As for your argument that “who cares if it’s work, devs owe it to us!”: They’re already doing more than most teams in similar games re:balancing and pushing content.

While I’m on a destroying dreams kick, commons, or any card, with a spell cost of below 3? Heavens no. Just what we need, 3 goblins spamming their spells that get filled in a single green match-3. No thanks.

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Besides, what you think of as garbage troop has its place in eg Arena.

We could do with a “Pauper” styled PvP though. No Epics or up allowed (or guild guardians), only one copy of a troop per team.

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So yeah, fascinating idea, but (1) utterly impractical to code and (2) too much of a change of direction now…

Manticore rules…

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I don’t find Peasant to be unusable.

Back in my day peasant was the meta. Circa 1989.

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You’ve taken my words and twisted them pretty well. Your first response was

Noble intentions, but that’s a lot of work

And then when I said it’s not my problem that the devs have to work on this game you twisted that into making me sound like a malconent whiner, when you shoved these words into my mouth

As for your argument that “who cares if it’s work, devs owe it to us!”

No. Just no. See the big picture and argue in good faith, or don’t argue please.

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While I think the intentions here are sound, I don’t think this is a good idea. In addition to the impracticality of essentially creating four or more troops (and balancing them) per Common, there’s also the fact that changing what a troop does as it levels would come as an unwanted surprise for some players. “But I liked the destroy-three-gems mechanic of Peasant! Give me that back!” The game would need to clearly outline that ascension would be changing the spell mechanics, and what the new mechanics will look like at level 6, 11, and 17 – way too much extra information for their existing UI.

I’d rather the devs focus on ensuring a healthy number of competitive cards at each play tier (including but not limited to endgame, which I inhabit), and that doesn’t require all cards to be competitive – just enough that the monotony of “yet another meta defense” is interrupted occasionally by something creative.

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I can’t imagine something like this making it into any kind of patch/update. But it might be something they can do when they do a sequel (Gems of War 2: We Be Gemmin’).

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I’ll be the first to admit its not the greatest idea.

I’m just getting frustrated with the insertion of new cards weekly which can’t ever be used. All the way from level 1 to where I am now I have never even touched 80% of the cards.

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Yeah, you can’t just bolt-on a fundamental change to a game’s underpinnings like this. If it were ever done it would have to be extremely limited in scope.

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Big picture? You’re the one who’s not responding to my points and instead focusing on my tone. But hey, you’ve already conceded to the other handful of people who brought up my very same concerns in different wording, so I guess there’s nothing more to be said. What a relief, eh?

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I guess there’s nothing more to be said. What a relief, eh?

If you feel that way, I couldn’t be happier.

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Break it up you animals.

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You know I don’t argue or fight. But i’m not going to sit and let a dingbat troll mouth off like that.

I’ve said my piece to him, there’s no further response necessary to that individual. You don’t need to be a peacemaker :slight_smile:

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A “dingbat troll running my mouth off”? Please. It’s so much easier to dismiss someone as a troll than to respond to their valid criticism, isn’t it?

Again, I offered clear counterpoints to your proposal that you ignored to go into your petty little crusade. If there’s anyone to blame for dragging this off topic, it’s you.

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Lets get back to the main issue here - useless cards. I hate the fact that I am unable to use the bulk of my cards in pvp due to teams such as the infamous ‘Mantibore’.
I won’t sit here and use my thesaurus to make my point seem informed or wax hypotheticals to debunk someone else’s point, but it does need to be seen to the amount of troops not being used.

I had an idea once, and as carelessly brushed off as it was, I still think it’s a good idea and could use tweaking by everyone.

TEAM Bonuses:

We have crap loads of cards without use, but what if…

Using team slots (or a new feature of the game like maps) you need to put together certain troops to gain certain bonuses, these troops may be from the same or different kingdoms, and these troops will hold maybe as low as a mana bonus for finding the correct 4 x combo.
Say you have the ability to find 20 different combinations that have better and better bonuses as you find them.
Say you need to use each team in this new feature or within another feature (much like hero class) a certain amount of times to maintain said bonus, or upgrade.
Say a new form of currency (heaven forbid) ‘energy’ is required to use the bonuses of each team, or even one at a time. Say it’s a totem pole or altar.
Perhaps you have to use a team combo to know if it is even a combo - place 4 random troops in this team and use them and viola! Team combo found.

These are not my definitive ideas, they are just ideas. Build upon it, grow it, make it contingent on reaching certain levels for the ability to find a new combo (eg, “combo 1 available at level 200” “combo 2 available at level 300” etc). Make it so the end user, while 100’s of levels beyond the rest, have something to do instead of grinding away in pvp for minimal result.

There must be a way to find a use for the cards no one uses (or the majority don’t use often), and you could even have ‘hint threads’ or even give out clues like codes. There is a way, it seems possible, and quite frankly, plausible, because it’s still keeping the essence of the game.

I think it’s a good idea, at least…

Edit: yes I know you have magic link bonuses or whatever for having 2-4x a card from kingdoms, or dragons and such, but this is an expansion on the idea to involve all cards to gain more bonuses