First impressions thread

At first the game was great fun, the tutorial gave you an overview of everything you need to know and while challenging at times did not feel unfair or frustrating. This all changed however in the level 10 range. The massive spike in difficulty of the missions, and the utter cheapness of some of the maps and enemy combinations(skeletons and slimes immune to psychical damage, imps with massive range and slows that can run indefinitely) lowered the fun a lot for me. If I choose to keep playing though it and hope for better hands, I can only imagine what other cheap tactics and overpowered enemies are rolled out at the higher levels.

If this game is to have any mass appeal, I feel the balancing to be more fair and fun needs to be done of many of the encounters.

 

Ah, I think you might be missing the point, Zeetchmen. There's not much "cheap," "overpowered," or, for that matter, "poorly-designed" about those adventures: it's a videogame standard that enemies must get stronger than the players to MAKE UP FOR your superior strategic skills.

So we're talking about strategy. It's just like how you had to change your strategy in earlier adventures when, say, enemies with Parry rendered your melee attacks futile. You'll see thread after thread on these forums where people said "Uh, how do I get past THIS ridiculous challenge?" and then other folks gave a dozen different ways to proceed.

Ask yourself: you ARE changing your strategy, right? Likewise, changing your decks to accommodate each new challenge? And if you already are, have you considered how differently your decks would play if you ALSO changed your characters? As I said, you already know how to deal with physical-immune enemies due to the Parry foes: so, when facing Skeletons and Slimes, why not just render their defenses 100% irrelevant by hitting them with magic (or removing their Armor)? Adventure complete.

The game is designed to appeal to the strategic gamer. In fact, it's designed (blatantly) to appeal to the "old-school" gamer . . . who's used to a higher difficulty level. The difficulty in Card Hunter has already been dropped REPEATEDLY after player feedback.

And still, we'll have threads like this:

http://www.cardhunter.com/forum/thr...ture-its-unfair-its-impossible-et-cetera.2171

Everyone has something different that they'll find difficult. I say Return to the Astral Shrine, all the way up at level 14, is the hardest. Almost no one agrees with me. Most recently, a huge mass of people said the hardest was The Compass of Xorr at level 8 (below your level 10 mention). Here:

The War Monkeys . . . have since been weakened in response to player feedback! So if you can find a real game design problem, then by all means post about it and explain why. These people are very responsive. It's just that you might be better off "asking for help" instead of "declaring that these people can't appeal to gamers if the game isn't fun."

 

Ok, I played Beta for a couple weeks and now that it's run down - here are my first impressions:

1. The feel of the game is good. Your race/class determine which items you can use, and your items determine the card composition in the deck you use to play - I like that. I also like the simple mechanics.

2. Balance of items / cards is somewhat hard to judge. Probably the most frustrating thing was playing an all dwarf team and coming across someone who had multiple cones of cold. I immediately tossed my Dwarf team and started over using humans and elves.

3. Overall, "what does this game need to maintain long-term interest?" That's simple: it needs a coop vs coop mode or at least a coop vs ai adventure mode. Being able to run through a few battles, teamed with a couple friends, seems highly necessary to maintain interest. The ability to create Clans that pvp against each other. There is a lot of potential for building teams - but the social interaction part could probably be expanded upon.

I liked the game to buy pizzas in the Beta. I look forward to the game going live tomorrow, and I definitely look forward to being able to play it on my tablet.

 

I'm pretty sure I read somewhere that a coop mode is definitely on their list post launch. Can't wait!

 

Hello everyone. Players and devs, alike. I'd just like to say that I have not smiled so much playing a computer game in a long time! From the very first load screen, which harkened back to the days of the iconic D&D modules, I knew I was in for a treat. The game is a strategy lovers dream! Turn-based, luck-based rolls, skill based card decisions (with more luck thrown on top of that for draws)...I just love it! It's random, but it also has a lot to do with what you do with the weapons at hand. It's a combination of the old gold box SSI games, mixed with MTG, and that's pretty awesome. I love that the monsters, and characters aren't figurines, but the old school cutouts on stands. So cool. Everything is a throwback to the old days, and this old school D&D fan loves you for it! It is the main reason I had to give you guys money. Bought the starter, with no reservations. Anyone who takes me back to those days of wonder as a kid, holding those old tomes, and having a blast with friends and family, just plain gets it. PLEASE!!!! Never lose this old school feel. You hit the nail on the head!

I love the in jokes as well, mostly coming from the back and forth between your DM, and his friend. The neo-otyugh reference had me laughing. Good stuff!

I'm still getting used to everything, and I am only on the Level 5 or 6 adventures...can't remember, I got kicked out for maintenance. I am not mad, however, because I am really digging this game. I only wish you could have more characters in your party! I would also like to see more races and classes. But, I am sure if the game is popular enough, that will come with time.

Anyway, I don't know how long I can keep paying for it, as for long term, it's kinda pricey to keep the club membership. But, I did it, because that's where it's at if you want to outfit your guys with bonus items. So, I see why you did it this way, and I can't fault you for it. I could have played it for free. But, I chose to give you guys money, because I can tell you guys love these types of games, and old school D&D, in particular.

Keep up the good work!

 

Welcome aboard! Yeah, those "Adventure Aid Cards" are something else . . .

 

Loving Dreamsleep's portrait! The view to the left of my computer. Straight back at ya!

 

Sweet! Mine is in storage, lol. But, Erol Otus is godlike!

 

I dug all mine out and read them as research for the game. Try it.

 

This game is something special. It's the highest quality F2P browser game I've ever seen and definitely the best game I've played this entire year.

I can only imagine the stress the devs are under at the moment, but I hope they keep a cool head and don't get scared into reducing the complexity by the host of newcomers given pause by the tougher challenges. What they have here is addictive enough to reel them back in and do what it takes to push through.

That said I hope somehow the game gets enough traction that it can shed the payment-exclusive gear/content and thrive purely on cosmetics like PoE. The current model feels like it's obstructing a much more enjoyable experience I'd gladly pay for without any bonuses.

 

I love this game the tutorial is a bit long and easy but then it gets harder but maybe make an limit on how many armour pieces you can have because it gets alittle annoying when you deal o DMG with an 10DMG attack to the trogs with 4 armour(dont remember their names)

 

Started playing yesterday. Boy, is this game original. Got a little turned off by those exclusive pizza adventures (not so much about club rewards), but no biggie. I seem to have some funding problems though, especially since good equipment is worth quite a bunch, and you're expected to switch your strategy every now and then. This may lead to excessive grinding to acquire a particular set of equipment to counter a certain strategy. Luckily, I still haven't bumped into such a problem (level 5 so far).
Overall, wonderful game. Loving the Equip/Card system, just hoping to get some tokens soon =(.

 

Just to clarify, the shop prices are dependent on the item rarity but also on your level.
There's a price multiplier for any items above your level so the prices will drop as you level up.

Besides, you don't usually need to buy that much from the stores, the loot from the adventures is often quite enough. I generally buy only commons/uncommons that look clearly better than something I already have.

 

Totally agree with Zeetchmen. I love the game, love the story/theme, love the nostalgia. But the difficulty ramp at level 9/10/11 is making me give up.

1. Were there individual gear setups per dungeon I could swap around and try things more. As it is it's very difficult swapping gear for a specific dungeon/tactic and then swapping it out for a completely different tactic next dungeon.

2. I stopped playing MtG because it quickly became a game of not "Let's have fun trying to beat each other" to "I have this deck that prevents you from even playing". The geomancers, the fast imps, the 10 zombies, all feel like they use one cheap tactic that I have to completely change my gear and tactics to overcome along with requiring a lucky draw with limited attempts.

3. It seems crazy to think "Oh, if I just had 3 wizards I could beat this" and then level up 2 more wizards to level 11.

I'm very torn between giving up and playing games that are exciting all the time, versus grinding the couple level 10/11 dungeons that I don't need to get lucky to beat until I level up and maybe can beat other dungeons.

 

Then there are a few things to consider.

First, if only the front page of the site were working correctly right now, I could link you to some game design philosophy. It might be this one, because I linked it right after Farbs said:

You are supposed to enjoy changing your deck. Yes. The devs explicitly fought to make fights shorter so that you would spend more time on your deck. If it feels like a chore, then that's really unfortunate, and worth considering in more detail.

It shouldn't seem crazy to think of leveling up another party. It's the most extreme measure, yes . . . but when people come to us asking for help with an "unfair and impossible adventure" (cough, cough, linked this already), an interesting thing happens. We'll suggest everything else they can change, and they'll say they can't do it, and then sometimes they'll come back and tell US that they did the extreme measure of changing the PARTY and . . . suddenly the game was fun again. Change your strategy, change your build, change your party, and the game is fundamentally different and exciting.

It's not that the enemies are cheap. Parry renders your melee attacks completely pointless, and yet you defeated Rescue from Shieldhaven Prison. Imps have literally no defenses, and so it makes sense that you would defeat Ruby Demon Portal just fine, but NOW you're struggling with later Imps. Why the change-up?

You say that you can change everything AND THEN still depend on luck. That shouldn't be the whole story. What's more likely is that you, as with all the other people posting concerns, are overlooking something. Ask for help and we can help you.

If you just don't want to play a strategic deckbuilding game, then you don't have to be frustrated. But still, I hope you'll find it rewarding enough.

 

I understand, and seems like many people have beaten them fine. To get very specific, here are what would improve my experience in the game:

1. Ability to save a "Group" as in the members and gear. I.E. I put on all my fire wizard gear and have a "AE" group, put on all my movement gear and label is "Geomancer", all my penetration attacks and label it "Anti-armor". To me this would make it quicker to change between dungeons that require drastically different equipment.

2. The ability to create new members that are equal or a few levels below my current members. I don't tend to replay games and am not enthusiastic about playing 3 new guys from level 1, but if I could quickly have 3 level 11 wizards I would try them against the Geomancers and likely win easily.

3. Some easing up of the "There's 3-5 hard fights, you get 3 total chances, and if you lose 3 times you start all over". I don't see a middle-ground, I understand they don't want people to try endlessly, but when level 1 and 2 of the Arena Finals are tough and a mistake or bad draw can lose a try or two, it's hard to make multiple tries at the 3rd fight.

4. Some minor amount of progression from the first fights. I get the concept of no XP until I beat the dungeon. I get that there are supposed to be gear drops from earlier fights that upgrade me. Fighting fights 1/2/3 multiple times and getting no upgrades and not being able to beat the last fight feels like wasted time. Maybe if there were a chance for slight upgrades to existing items, I.E. Instead of 3 Minor Heals this one has 2 Minor Heals and 1 Heal, I'd feel like I could gear up off normal fights. As it is, it seems like when I repeat a dungeon 95% of the gear I see is automatically equal or less than what I have.

5. I really hesitated on putting money in because I'm used to iOS games constantly tacking on costs and never being able to judge how much a game would really cost me by the end. I ended up putting in $20 for the modules and a month of the club, but I would have jumped in a lot faster if I knew those were all the adventures ever, or if you were planning on offering some every week/month, if I knew what the max level was, etc. Maybe if there were a listing of how many modules were for each level and also listed the paid modules for those levels, then I'd know they were nicely spread out and filled out all the current levels.

 

You are lucky. Most of your concerns are already solved.

1. Is in the game. You can use the store/retrieve button to do exactly that.

2. Is in the game. At level 12 or so a tavern opens up where you can recruit lvl 10 characters for 100 gold.

3. Why not just spend the 15 gold to ressurect your party? It really is a rather piddly amount.

4. This I agree with. It can feel frustrating. However even the first few chests can give you epics/legendaries, they are not much worse than the last chest.

5. Yeah the developers suffer from the reputation of other predatory f2p games. I was hesitant at first as well for the same reason. They could be clearer that purchasing the treasure hunts give you access to all the missions in the game.

 

And a response to all 5: thank you, with all sincerity, for coming back and explaining yourself so well. We get a lot of angry people sometimes, and a lot of "I don't personally like this, therefore it should change for me" people. The whole internet does, as I'm sure you know.

Also, yes, the 15 gold to resurrect my party is my single greatest gold-sink. I can understand that they DON'T want early-adventure rewards to be huge: if that were true, you'd be better off replaying the first map over and over instead of beating the whole thing. Uh, like I did.

 

Hey, I just started last night and I'm really digging the way the game pans out!

Overall, the game is enjoyable and even in the early stages of the game it doesn't feel draggy and there's an immediate sense of immersion. The Equipment-Deck system is fresh and interesting and makes customizing decks much more interesting and convenient as opposed to traditional single-card swapping. The party system is cool, and the game flows well.

I do, however, have a couple of nitpicks at this stage:
1) Inability to 'un-"Move"'. Misclicking a movement card or deciding you suddenly don't want to move after selecting the card can sometimes mess up your strategy. I get that you can see your movement range when hovering over the card, but as you can deselect other action cards, I don't see why you can't deselect movement cards.

2) Armor cards man. They be OP early game, especially when your early cards' damage values are usually <= those of AI armor block values.

3) Certain tooltips can be misleading. For instance, when an attack card says you can 'Select up to 2 targets', it suggests you can either select 1 -or- 2 targets, but the game forces you to pick two targets. Can be troublesome when you have, for instance, your Cleric in range alongside a long enemy.

4) It's kinda annoying to hover over tiles to determine their nature. Things like Barrels are obvious, but in some early maps there are pillars which appear flat but upon closer inspection are solid obstacles. Perhaps elevate terrain elements that are solid obstructions?

Other than that, it's all good and now I've got to get back to my party and oh look at the time another 6 hours has past!