Hero masteries were made completely useless about a year ago. The curve for the capped out percent was reduced from 100% down to something around 74%. You can have 10,000 mastery and I think it is only around a 72% surge chance. The entirety of masteries in GoW are useless because a balanced build is literally the only viable option. Focusing on 1, 2, or even 3 would make your hero weaker in the current setup of GoW.
Completely useless, no. Newer players still get benefit. There is still a ābuildingā of character that is realized as you approach the cap.
Useless to an end game player, yes. Iām there and I agree with you. Iām within 30 levels or so of 1K, so I feel your pain. I recall when they had an importanceā¦ now, I donāt care about levelingā¦ Iām happy they are all āmaxed?ā and I receive those benefits despite the cap, but further points seem to have a meaningless impact at this pointā¦ and that seems by design.
End Game is always a problem for any developer on an RPG / Loot hook design. How do you further a playerās power to keep them interested, without breaking your game? (i.e. 100% surge chance).
There are a number of options here, just as in other games.
What if for example, each kingdom had a positive and/or negative affect on surgesā¦ due to the region they were located in on the map? What if the kingdom itself also had some kind of variable impact or on your relative magicā¦ armor or health? Perhaps fire based skills had a bonus while water based spells received a negativeā¦ and list goes on, but you get the idea.
What if that was further compounded by the level of opponent you were battling and even the standard that they brought to battle?
The point is, with enough countering variables at play, enhanced based upon level of opponent you were encountering, then they wouldnāt have to artificially cap you, they could let a player take their base percentage to surge all the way to 100%ā¦ or even beyond from a ābase chance to hit a surgeā number as that based chance could then be augmented by a number of variables at play.
They could also stretch out the power curve, putting the perceived āmaxā mana surge chance at the end of the leveling number, so you always received an improvement along the way, and they could even front load the curve so players received more benefit from leveling early and less as they progressed only seeing finite improvements in chance to surge.
Thereās a number of possibilities, and these only scratch the surface.
Frankly, capping surges is just a quick and dirty fix for a power curve problem. In my world, we call it a knee-jerk or quick fix to an underlying problem. A much more sophisticated (and time / coding heavy) approach is never to ātake away or capā the end userās experience artificially, but to structure the world and encounters - the experience such, that there is always a hill to climb as levels and encounters progress.
I have no doubt these folks will get thereā¦ but for the time being, surge cap was quick fix.
Just thought Id share:
For any iOS users out there, PQ2 full version is currently on sale for only $2.99 grab during the Holiday Sale.
Started playing through and was struck by a few things:
- I love and miss the Wild Card Multiplier!! This should be a mechanic in GoW.
- I hate the No More Moves= Mana Drain!! Thank GOD this was removed from GoW.
- Seeing the hero with a weapon with 5 spells below in PQ2 looks ALOT like a Hero with a weapon and 4 troops below in GoW??? (This should happen!)
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Giving the Gems of War hero the ability to cast multiple spells based on its class would be insanely cool. It would likely have to be a minigame if ever added to GoW as there doesnāt appear to be a way to give a single troop multiple spells nor a way to balance 1 troop occupying 4 slots.
It could be a minigame where each class has 4 specific spells and you have to fight other single hero teams with those spells.
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@Tacet I was actually thinking of the possibility of a hero with an equipped weapon being ever present in that wasted space on the screen to the right and left that still shows a small portion of the Kingdom Pic. Introduce the GAUNTLET GEM, ala PQ1&2, and ALL Hero weapons now require this Resource to cast. Then your Hero still brings forth his 4 minions as usual.
Something Like This Maybe: (Excuse my horrible Editing Skills)
This would even allow for armor/shields to be equipped which can be activated to add special mechanics as well, utilizing the Gauntlet gem.
Even if they just made a Class Specific Armor that is auto-equppied when you select your classā¦
I am geeking out over the possibilitiesā¦
EDIT: Added poorly edited pic
I might be wrong here, but I always assumed that the āwasted spaceā was how the game accomodated older form-factor phones that had a less-widescreen aspect ratio.
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Edit was perfect! 
Oh btw PQ2 is free on android xD
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ā¦actually, there was talk of doing that for a BOSS mode, where the enemy occupies all four slots, and has 3-4 different spells to castā¦
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Wow there was a talk about this in GoW? When, where? 
Me like it 
A long time ago in a forum far far awayā¦
Also random and back on-topic thought: my title is, of course, a PQ referenceā¦