Scripted battles are even worse than bad RNG

Gameplay Chat (PC/Mobile)
41

Didn’t they say previously that the AI on console wasn’t made by them but rather by the prior developers? I thought that was part of the explanation for why the console AI behaved differently, and also why the AI has seen significant changes since the game has been ported (first to PC and now to Mobile)? In a sense, it’s not “their” AI and they too are struggling to adjust it.

Assuming I’m right about all of that, it’s pretty easy to see a non-conspiracy at work: Everyone agrees that the AI of the other developer is inferior. Re-writing it from scratch is likely a huge undertaking, so they’re trying to tweak it here & there to get it basically the same as before. But that’s a very complex operation since there are a lot of dials. It takes time, lots of playtesting, etc. and it’s probably not even possible to make it “identical” without a complete re-write.

Just so we’re clear, we’re not talking about a Candy Crush game where they manipulate the difficulty of the game by (a) giving you fewer turns than you can possibly win in and/or (b) modifying the likelihood of “good” drops based on the player’s skill, both of which are used in order to get the player to buy boosters and lives so they can beat a board and progress to the next.

It doesn’t even make sense that they would do the latter. The game isn’t based on boosters and lives, and losing in a really frustrating and clearly RNG way doesn’t encourage people to spend. If it’s abundantly clear that it’s an RNG problem then spending doesn’t solve the problem and the only possible result is that it enrages players and drives them away. The only way it would make sense to make RNG that punishing would be if they sold some sort of “RNG booster”. Which they don’t.

42

My worry with the update is that it looks like the devs don’t understand player frustration.
It is not about losing, it’s about losing in a frustrating way, like a troop you just drained fills on a lucky drop and starts a looping hell combo that kills you in one turn.

Since the update, gems generation and effect on gems matches have made it really frustrating, and yet, each new big troop generates gems and have traits that activate on matches.

They just don’t understand what is frustrating, as shown in the Kerberos nerf, probably the worst thing I have seen in a while, clearly showing the misunderstanding.
The Devour happening is not the main issue, it’s the randomness attached to it that made it frustrating when it worked 3 in a row.
So what do you think happens when it happens 3 times at 40%??? It’s just even more frustrating!!!

2 Likes
43

I’ll try to make this short rather than my usual wall of text. It is every bit as easy to win as before. It is every bit as easy as it was to lose before - one mistake or bad cascade and the best teams will wipe you out or lock you down, it has been this way for a long time. With Unity, it now more likely that the “loss” situation will occur as a result of completely out of your control, and you can also undeserving stumble onto a “win” situation easier as well. With the AI upgrade, you have less control over preventing the “loss” situation from occurring in the first place.

In short, Unity give us less necessity to make good decisions to reach a win state. The AI buff lowered the impact making good decisions have on preventing a loss state. Agency is the thing that is lost. I said basically the same thing even before AI buffs were proposed, but I always knew we were going to end up here eventually. At its core, this isn’t really fixable without reverting, which is not something I see happening. Going forward, we will see a completely different style of gameplay.

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44

I’m in bracket one, and I went 29/1 this week. But that one loss was before the change. Slow the speed to 1/2 speed and take your time. It worked for me

2 Likes
45

Ah the schadenfruede is so sweet. I remember us complaining about console and Mab/Justice and PC/mobile players being like “ah you are whining, git gud and stop exaggerating”.

The problem with GoW is it’s a RNG based game. The skill is a factor as is your team construction but overall people are winning way more often that they are losing because over time RNG evens out.
However GW does not take RNG into consideration. You have only 5 shots and if any of them misses because RNG favors the AI you’re out of luck.

46

This is so patently false is completely ridiculous. The console AI is superior hands down every day of the week for 2 years.

HOWEVER, it is very hard to see with the Gem spawning algorithm as it stands now. The two are different (AI & gem spawning). Confusing the two is constantly a problem on the forum, global chat, and the clubs.

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47

This favoured visual aid of mine seems relevant here again. @venar’s point about frustration is spot on. The RNG/cascades are the issue, making faster spikier games that can swing suddenly (either way) in a hail of skull hits and spells all charged from nowhere. How do we feel about that?

howIfeelaboutRNG

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48

That’s fair. When I and most everyone complain about the “AI” we really mean the “gem spawning algorithm”. I’m also not crazy about the AI (specifically the programmable AI) but that’s a separate matter.

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49

I think you’re overstating the issue. The AI has gotten tougher and luckier, but it’s not unbeatable. I’ve only lost 2 GW battles since the update, and one of those was due to the mobile game-crash bug they introduced (the one major issue with this update IMHO).

I don’t like a “cheater” AI but the GoW AI has always been a ‘cheater’, it’s just that before the update it was more likely to take a dive than play to win. For example I’m sure you noticed with the old AI that it would frequently pass up a double-match move but reliably make a move to destroy the double-match pattern so the player wouldn’t get it either. In other words, the AI was aware of the double match but chose to pass on it, not for strategic reasons but to make it more likely that the player win.

I do agree that it makes “strategy” games more closely resemble “story” games where the actions are circumscribed and the outcome predestined, and I dislike that… but it is what it is. I notice this in virtually all games I play these days.

50

Just pointing out that PC does not have the console AI now, it has an AI that console players have been told will be less challenging. I am using the term AI to cover both its behaviour and cascading ability, each needs to be addressed.

51

IMHO, you are underestimating complexity of GoW. I am a half-decent chess player, not a national master level but not that far behind. So, my personal thought process while playing chess and GoW are very similar and I try rational approach. I’m not a gambler. I try to evaluate the board, see what moves are available and then I try to evaluate the outcomes. In GoW there is an extra chance/probability factor that has to be included and there is limited depth. Whereas in chess, there is more depth and no chance/probability. Both games have strong pattern recognition for faster gameplay. Denying advantages of forward thinking and pattern recognition is unwise IMO.

For another analogy, we can take a look at rational gambling in, well, let’s say, poker. There is some psychological aspect to consider for poker even in its online version but obviously, this aspect is limited for GoW and in online poker, it plays little role. So, to me, it is obvious that a thinking player who better evaluates his hand and his chances at pulling through with whatever he can based on his hand and dynamic estimation of probabilities is going to perform much better, faster, and more reliably. Same is in chess, same is in GoW. It is a universal advantage of human brain function. Otherwise, if you feel lucky, you might just as well play some slot machine. In backgammon, which is way simplified chance game, patterns are very few, limited, and easy to recognize. Random is also limited and probabilities of dice throws can be reliably estimated within seconds.

GoW does not have this simplicity and combinatorial aspect is essentially unlimited. It is quite hard to estimate the outcome correctly. This makes it more rational as forward thinking player in the long run will always perform better than just simple button-mashing gambler. So, no, you have considerable, although not fully guaranteed, influence on the outcome. And it is not as primitive as backgammon.

Now, what OP here and quite few others are trying to explain is that recent changes are taking away that rational aspect, making a big dent into it, and that might result in quite big changes in player base. And no, it is not about winning or losing some silly Guild war battles or having bad or good day. It is general and does change perception of the whole gameplay process. You cannot just say game is now easier or harder, it is irrelevant. You can say it is less rational or more rational, this is what made a lot of players quit.

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52

Uh, you are confused or probably simply misunderstood. I did not say anything about some conspiracy or something like that, no. And really, I don’t think anybody is trying to hide anything or cover up something inappropriate, that is indeed unlikely. However, rational thinking tells me that:

  1. pRNG streak are common and have heavy influence on human perception. Unless rounded to some reasonable results which have minimal influence on perception.
  2. Simple features like color/skull storms might somehow influence gem spawning in some way. And this is just one example, there might be other complex relationships between various parameters that affect spawn mechanics and that due to complexity of these interactions, developers are simply unaware of it.
  3. Any manipulation of complex process can create some unpredictable ripple effects provided that the system is large enough and complex enough. So, changing anything might influence something else. We know of some bugs which were accidentally caused by fixing other bugs, etc etc.

Now, really, you must be some kind of authority to make these rather bold claims unsubstantiated by actual facts… And no, I don’t mean to troll, just joking around. :wink:

53

could be. like how people discover that defense team power score have major influence in opponents you faced in pvp, even though dev say they shouldn’t.

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54

I just remind that the AI had an unfair number of 4-turns compared to the player on the Adobe AIR.
So it means it’s possible for devs to tweak the gem-drop algorithm [GDA].

Is there something to be surprised? If you listen to what Console players told us since ages, you shouldn’t. 5 same gems dropping at the same place, multiple cascades resulting in extra-turn, etc.
My guess is that Unity devs did their own GDA without putting some limitations to avoid such behaviors.

Now why releasing a wild GDA when your players are used to trained one? That’s the question…

1 Like
55

Never ever went worse than 3/2 and that has only happened a couple times! If I go 4/1 i’m about to throw the xbox out the window! 0/5 I would probably quit the game! Good you are more patient than I am!

56

Don’t disagree with anything you’re saying here. Those complex interactions are occurring, it’s why the combo breaker bug was so well hidden before. My comments are primarily directed at the claims of the game “deciding to win” or cheating or giving itself an unfair advantage. Strange stuff is definitely happening due to these “complex processes”, but it’s happening equally to the player and the AI.

Also, I don’t think the issue is really the complexity of the things happening or a lack of understanding of the various pieces. Personally I think that it’s simply that these properly working pieces aren’t synergistic enough in the end product, they work but aren’t fun. Luckily, I think many of these things can be fixed with a few tweaks rather than major changes. I think the gem overwriting adjustment is a step in the right direction.

I think another important change which I’m hoping for is that the devs will make the combo breaker start working the way Sirrian originally detailed, rather than the previously “backwards” or “always on” broken state or the current “almost always off” state. Many have claimed that the artificial board manipulation is the problem, but right now there is the least amount of “developer interference” that I have seen, and there seem to be more complaints then ever. The devs had it right before when they were manipulating things more, but people complained so they pulled back and let it be “more fair” as many players mistakenly requested, but in practice it’s worse than ever.

57
  1. AI was stupid, now it is much more smarter. It prefers more devastating spells than automatically linking skulls so game is more challenging.
  2. After a week of play I did not notice any cheating. I won every match. It as harder but AI was not cheating. You are weak players if you say AI is cheating now :wink:
1 Like
58

Can someone tag me when a Cliff’s Notes version of this thread is published? K thanks.

Just a little humor.