Aloyzo's Arsenal Official SUBMISSION Discussion Thread

It's less a matter of 'if they'll ever make it available to players.' which is just supposition, but of being 'an example of the common trait among non-player cards, of being grossly undervalued in quality'

Whether or not it'll be permissible due to player balance is irrelevant, since it almost certainly won't currently be released due to card balance, which seems to rather firmly exceed current player-available card strengths.

The end result is certainly the same, though.

 

Hey guys, just stopping in to read the commentary between rounds.

A few notes on things many of you got wrong.

• not having an obvious sci-fi theme
• using accelerate time
• making cheesy overpowered weapons
• referencing non-BM IP in your item names (we can't print anything with "Jedi" in its name, for instance)
• including cards that don't appear on items, e.g. Meltdown, which you can't assume are balanced to be on items

But a bunch of you submitted pretty good items. Overall worse than previous months I think due to the difficulty of the assignment.

Also, a lot of you seem to be giving good advice to each other, so nice job on that!

Cheers!

 

For those of you who didn't get the naming of my item, here's the reference.

I don't regret including Meltdown as it was by and far the most appropriate time to include it.

I do like the winning item though, so congrats!

 

This is something that's been said a few times now, in videos and comments. I'm just curious about what makes a submission 'cheesy'? Is it just that the weapon is overpowered? Or is there more to it?

Also, the videos have been getting shorter. I always really look forward to seeing your opinions on the submissions, and the feedback's always a lot of fun. I think perhaps it's the thing I look forward to the most about contests, even! But then, a lot of it would just be repetitions if they were longer, so I guess it makes sense.

 

I don't think 'cheese' is a definable quantity, you just know it when you see it (but think putting easy traits on a weapon to drop its rating)

 

You would consider Meltdown as a too strong effect? I think it is not, because it has Mandatory Action, so you have no influence when the effect takes place. But maybe it should be paper, because it has a lot of influence on the game and as mage it can be nice to have lava around you.

 

Can't really follow the argument that the laser failure cards per se are off-limits, they are in the game and got their share of testing. Meltdown is a poor fit since it isnt instantanious, but battery explosion as card on an item would hardly be a stretch. Mages already got their laser sprays.

 

The contest has a level limit, submitting cards that haven't yet received a rating seems counterproductive.

 

@hello world:

Drained Battery, Battery Explosion, and Meltdown are each rated E, black quality, no + or - modifier, thus -3 on a three-card item.

 

I've said this a dozen times probably: cards that haven't been printed on items haven't been carefully rated. You can argue that they're properly rated, but you can't gotcha me I'm just giving you a bunch of advice, take it or leave it!

 

Someone (I don't mean you, Flax, I mean one of us) probably should make a ranked list of the item generation 'rules/advice' roughly ranked in order from mandatory to minor importance, like:

Including one classes' cards in the item of another.
Using monster cards (unless stated).
Stacking powerful cards with relatively harmless drawbacks.
etc.

Then we can spend the time between AAs arguing about the order of the list! I mean, it would be a succinct and handy guide for old and new players to refer to, and keep the quality of submissions high (apart from mine of course).

 

I'm going to give honest feedback here: I don't like this Aloyzo's Arsenal.

I don't know what happened to the management of Aloyzo's Arsenal, or the game in general, because there was extreme sloppiness in handling for over a month. The release was really, really late, things were off schedule and there were multiple pointless promises about when things get "released". I generally feel dispirited about the game because the developers themselves seem dispirited in handling the game.

The quality of selected items and and the quality of selecting them seems to be subpar this time around. Watching the video, I could see how @Flaxative and (mostly) @CT5 were trying really hard to find something to say about the selection of items. It doesn't come off as natural. There were some really good submissions that didn't even make the video. Some submissions that did make the video were unnatural and gaudy, including the winning item which truly felt subpar not just in balance but in design. There's something about CT5's submissions always getting in the video that makes things seem like a mockery (though this time around his item seems deserving.

I was convinced by Flaxative's statement that the contest was for fun. Now, though, I feel that this is no fun. Try this: watch the videos of each Aloyzo's Arsenal in sequence. Notice how, with each AA, CT5 and Flaxative seem to disagree more. How CT5 appears less happy in each rendition. How the video gets shorter. How the start of the video started to be about throwing out apologies and not actual AA discussion.

A lot of Cardhunters (guildies, actually) have been speaking of retiring from the game and getting tired of it. I'm also getting tired of the game. I think this is a sign. Maybe if the developers can't handle monthly events and can't make them more fun than dispiriting, they should just abandon these regular events altogether. All that time wasted on something people don't enjoy and something that does nothing for the game could go to patch development or better yet, balance changes. There hasn't been a single balance change in 1.5 years. Maybe all that time spent on AA could go there.

Maybe I'm wrong. But I think if I am, I'm still pretty close. I'm sorry if this hurt but I think this must be said. After all, if one can't learn from another's criticism then one is bound to make the same mistakes repeatedly.

 

Part of reason why late releases happen is because they are doing other things like balancing things and making AI(whatever that is). Obviously they aren't going to do a lot of balance changes when they are releasing new sets(except balancing the new set while on the test server). They released EttSC a little less than a year ago(so stuff has happened within the last 1.5 years).

 

I was sincerely shocked that the winning item was probably the tamest of the proposed.
Even excluding the ones with the "forbidden" handicaps, there were some worth the attention.
I understand we player aren't (probably) the best evaluators, but... I guess if there was a "people's winner" before the official choice, no one would choose that one. It's borderline useless IMO.

 

I'm okay with it, it's a campaign item for firestorm co-op parties clearing Lootie in the lower level modules.

 

I think after the rocky road this AA was, they should have thrown the invested players a bone.

 

The reason for delays with AA is that there isn't "all that time spent on AA". We're prioritizing actual work on new content. AA, being a fun side contest, took a hit. It's amazing to me to what extent people feel entitled to their vision of AA—when it has explicitly been a fun side contest from the start, done in my free time as a freebie to the community. But it seems like maybe a quarter of the negative feedback we get suggests we shouldn't run it at all. I appreciate the honesty, but I've honestly spent more time managing AA expectations than actually working on AA management/implementation, and that's a losing ratio.

For the videos, there was a lot more to say when I was including negative feedback in them. Every month I feel I have fewer new criticisms to offer; the same mistakes get made and it's just not interesting to point them out every time. I also caught some flak for calling out bad designs in the videos so they got shorter and shorter. You may recall that at some point I was considering skipping the video, and announcing the winner without a video—people wanted me to keep doing them, and people wanted CT5 on them. Is our routine aging? *shrug*

I readily accept that I may not be doing the perfect job of managing the contest (though I'm not sure what the 'perfect' job would look like since people have different ideas and give me contradicting feedback), but I am confident in the item evaluation and selection. For the former I am open to feedback and changing the format (should there be a video? no video? what should the video cover?). For the latter, the feedback usually looks like sour grapes.

 

I'm pretty sure the entire management of Aloyso's Arsenal consists of Flaxative. His selections are subject to approval from Jon. He also has a real job and a real life. It's something you run into in indie games when your staff position depth is 1, and he's out for a couple of weeks.

He did. There was only one bone to throw, and he threw it.
I don't understand why Flax picks what he picks. Some I consider playable, some I don't. None rival the best-in-class items, nor should they without playtesting. Don't expect any meta changing items from AA.
I suspect AA has always been Flax's project, and is intended to be fun. If it becomes more irritating and divisive than fun, it should end.
Or at least take an extended sabbatical.

 

EVERYTHING IN THIS POST IS SAID OUT OF CHARACTER!

Spoiler: Explanation of the joke

Since some folks are noticing a whooshing noise as my jokes go over their head, let me make myself clear. MY PERSONA ON HERE IS PURELY ROLE PLAYING. Everything that I say that comes across as furious, disillusioned, hateful, resentful, entitled, or rebellious IS AN ACT! I get a kick and a laugh by playing up the ridiculous and petty nature of my character. DO NOT TAKE ME TOO SERIOUSLY. My feud with Flaxative's Aloyzo character is entirely a manufactured conflict and is not representative of any real malice.

Spoiler: TL;DR

This account is a joke about being an angry SOB. IRL I am a perfectly happy and content individual. Feel free to play along with my riots, but please recognize that they are performed in jest as opposed to legitimate outrage.

Spoiler: TL;DR of the TL;DR

I like being angry about nothing. There is nothing to be angry about. Everything I say angrily is a joke. Either play along or deal with it.

Spoiler: TL;DR for the TL;DR of the TL;DR

I like turtles.

 

This is mostly what I expected.