Long Term Itemization Problems

Right now the overall balance is fantastic with regard to item quality between players. Please for anyone responding don't talk about the current state of the game. I agree it is mostly fine when talking about item balance between players.

In 6+ months there will be a huge gap between new players and old ones. Most importantly, they will have no good way to catch up. Why is this true? Two reasons. The first is that you have capped the number of PvP wins a player can do per day. The second is that the store arbitrarily rewards people that have been playing the longest.

Current (bad) ways to get infinite items:

Grinding normal campaign maps for items is an option to catch up. A mindless grind is not a good option that you can expect to attract many players, though. Perhaps by adding some additional PvE aspects you could give players an option here. However that likely won't appeal to your PvP customers.

Buying lots of purple chests for items is the second option to catch up. I don't have a problem with this if it happens since it supports your company (a lot). However, this is only going to be a very small % of players that are willing to d this. These are the only two options for catching up right now. There should clearly be another option - allowing people to PvP more.

Problem one:

Here is an example that illustrates the first problem well. Two guys play your game a lot. One has been playing for 4 months and plays 12 hours a day. The other has been playing for 1 year and plays 4 hours a day. Both of these guys have played the same amount of time. If you compare the rewards these two players will have in the end it it is not close on who will have the better items. The first guy has arbitrarily way better items for the same amount of effort.

This example is not that great, though. Realistically the second guy will just limit his play to ~4 hours a day... and never fully catch up. Eventually he might mostly catch up, assuming BM doesn't add too much new content... but that is not an optimal way to have designed the game. Ultimately a lot of people are going to realize this and just decide to quit due to a pretty significant disadvantage.

Solution for problem one:

The PvP chain should reset immediately once it is complete. On this reset the gold chests should be placed evenly instead of like they are in the current system. This is to prevent people from angle shooting the system by getting a few easy gold chests at the tail end of their session. This change alone allows people to play your game more if they want to. It linearly rewards hardcore players on the hours they play.

Combined with this change a forced reset should no longer be used. Instead, after X hours players should be given an *option* to reset the ladder. Primarily this is because a grinder shouldn't have to play games in exactly 20 game intervals in order to succeed. This change makes playing schedules less rigid than it is currently. It would pair up very well with my proposed change because 40 games or 60 might be a bit too much for some people. In addition, recreational players now have the option to go after the epic chest over the course of several days. Even if you don't take my advice on the first solution this change just seems like it will improve everyone's playing experience.

Problem two:

The shop rewards hardcore players based on how many weeks they have been playing. Someone playing 30+ hours a week, with a membership, will have enough gold for all of the good items that come up - as long as they shop somewhat carefully. Thus, the bottleneck is the shop iteself.

Someone that has been playing for 12 months they've has 35 more sets of items than the guy playing 4 months. This is likely going to be a few great legendary item difference. This creates a situation where the person who has been playing longer is being arbitrarily rewarded for it.

I (think I) understand why you don't reset the rarities shop daily. This is because the game would become pay to win. The way the game is currently set up is that a person who plays for 20 wins a day is about on equal footing to the person that buys pizza and turns it into gold. Both guys will have enough gold to cover all the best items in this shop. So that is great design by your company. However you might not have realized the long run implications of this system.

Solution for problem two:

I haven't got a good solution for this. One solution is to reset the items daily but take away the ability to buy gold with pizza. That isn't a great solution from a business perspective and I understand that. Heck, it isn't even a good decision for a casual versus hardcore perspective: I think being able to buy that great legendary item for 15 dollars a week is a great way way to keep everyone on equal footing and to give casual players a way to stay caught up.

However, there is still clearly a problem here and perhaps there is a solution to it.

TLDR:

*Players get rewarded for how long they have been playing, not for the amount of time they spend playing.
*There is no good way to clear the gap between new and old players right now.
*Allowing players to play as much PvP they want - and be rewarded accordingly - is a great way to mostly solve this problem
*The rarities shop is another facet of this problem that isn't easily solved

 

"*Players get rewarded for how long they have been playing, not for the amount of time they spend playing."

I been playing since last Sunday and I love it, so could you please expand on this for me?

How and why are older players being rewarded more than me for example, even if I play more hours dailly?

 

Often times it's power creep which solves that problem for games like this. Much of the good equipment now will be mediocre at best six months from now, new players in six months will be getting the new stuff as they play (mostly) so catching up won't be such a problem.

Card Hunter has the additional advantage that many common / uncommon items are really quite good. Unlike in some games, the rarity of an item here doesn't necessarily reflect its strength. This means that acquiring a playable set of equipment isn't too difficult.

Also, now that I think about it, if there is some gap that new players need to cross that could pretty easily be addressed by the PvP store that sells premade parties. Just keep those up to date, with reasonably current equipment, and everything's fine.

 

*Players get rewarded for how long they have been playing, not for the amount of time they spend playing.
Not true, if you haven't played enough, then you won't get the gold to buy items

*There is no good way to clear the gap between new and old players right now.
There should be a gap between old and new players. New players face people of their own level in PvP. They can easily gain new items through playing.
Right now I am running mostly common items. the one legendary can be easily swapped. 3 wins a day and I sit comfortable at 1200.
Yes, some legendaries can OP. But strategic deckbuild counts. Tactical playing counts.



*The rarities shop is another facet of this problem that isn't easily solved

I don't see a problem with the rare shop. It gives you a full week to gather funds if a good item pops up

 

Players initially get a large boost of items from completing the campaign and quests. This is a one time thing only. Once that is over they are limited mostly to 20 pvp wins a day. I am arguing that this limitation is arbitrary and should not exist.

I would agree that this would help solve the problem. However given the way power tokens work lower level items will always be relevant. Thus, I expect there to be little/no item creep... except maybe some cheesy low level card builds like firestorm might become obsolete.

This is true to some extent. However the very best legendary items are indeed considerably better than common/uncommon items. For example heavy armor with 3 arrogant armor. Another example is the divine weapon with 2 inspiring presence. Another is the weapon with 6 nimble strike.

This is a plain fact. TBH I stopped reading your post there.

 

This isn't the case. Have a look at the power token progression for higher levels:

http://wiki.cardhuntria.com/wiki/Power_Tokens

No-token equipment becomes obsolete at level 36, minor token equipment becomes obsolete at level 39, and major token equipment becomes obsolete at level 45. No telling how long it'll take for the level cap to get that high, but it'll happen eventually.

It makes me a little sad, since my only good legendary is a no-token item, but I (and everyone else) will have to deal with it.

You're right about the small number of very powerful legendaries. The thing is, given how hard they are to get I don't ever expect a point where very many players have them, even amongst long-term veterans.

 

That is quite interesting and I hadn't seen it before. If they increase the level cap by about 10 per 6 months then I can see how that delays the problem I am talking about. On that chart they have listed a maximum level but I guess they can just keep adding them forever.

Also I am pretty bummed to see there will only be 2 classes of tokens in the end. Seems like that will take away most of the customization of the game. I also really liked the idea of keeping old items relevant forever. I really thought the end game was going to look like 1 tokenless, 1-2 blue, 2-3 gold, etc. Oh well, should be interesting to see what the game is like in the future.

Are they really *that* hard to get? I've got about 20 legendary items so far and that has been in 23 days. There is about 225 legendary items in the game. I've also got money for a few when they appear in the shop already. So in 10 months time I think it is reasonable to say, based on this, that people will have most of the legendary items in vanilla card hunter. That assumes they are doing the PvP grind daily.

Or maybe I am just getting really lucky in my play so far?

 

Do you think you'll be still grinding this much 10 months from now?

 

I'm not sure maybe. It really depends on if the game is still fun in that time. It isn't unheard of for people to play a lot of the same game for a very long time...

 

Typical problem for free to play games.

Solution (already implemented) is also rather typical. There's limited number of items any one player can use. So while grinding broadens options it doesn't necesserily help in a single match. After finishing campaign, new player has item for a decent build or two. Probably not a build he would want, but some reasonable build with reasonable items. After doing easier quests and some PvP and checking shops there should be quite a bit of different options.

Ratings should also help to keep PvP meaningfull. Although for most part it will be happy mix of bad players with good cards and good players with bad cards.

Oh and having unlimited PvP might be nice. However it would just make things worse faster. New players would have more catching up to do, some might benefit slightly, but that would probably be small minority. On second thought, campaign is faster grinding anyway if you play reasonable amouts (after getting 3, 6 or 11 PvP wins)

 

I completely agree with Kardnel on the itemization issues, specifically the need for multiplayer chests to reset after a full clear, OR to simply expand the chain after you get your purple chest in some fashion. Singleplayer allows infinite farming in a much much more efficient manner, and multiplayer caps you out on the good chests, and allows you to farm trash at an extremely inefficient rate after your last purple chest.

Basically, I fully support improving multiplayer rewards for hardcore players.

 

Yeah I've noticed a lot of the guys with the best items don't play much pvp. I asked and they said they can firestorm through campaign maps like nothing. That is pretty stupid too in my mind...

 

I disagree that unlimited PvP is the way to go, if anything improve the single player mode. That way you can grind to your heart's content if that's the goal without having to limit people to PvP. Personally I'd rather replay the entire campaign a few times over than get bogged down in ELO hell, I don't enjoy playing other people in that environment and I've seen a number of players who agree with that sentiment unfortunately.

Also, Firestorming missions may be faster sometimes, but then again you're mostly getting lower grade chests for the time invested. In addition, in my experiences with them, PvP is definitely much faster for the better items if you have a limited timeframe since the quality of chests is much higher for the invested battles.

 

What are you even talking about when you say ELO hell? This term came from LOL and other moba games because at a low rating you are paired up with horrible allies and people that leave and ruin the game. In this or other games there is not "elo hell".

 

This is a free to play game where much of the revenue comes from the monthly club memberships. Rewarding players who have been sticking around for the longest periods of time is not likely to be considered a flaw by the developers.

 

That 20th win epic chest is worth way way more than you guys think

Common: 70%
Uncommon: 20.8%
Rare: 7.5%
Epic: 1.5%
Legendary: 0.2%


So to grind a common quest. Mathematically you would need 100 games before you can get an epic.

 

... 1.5% chance averages to 1 in 66, those percentages are per item, and campaign battles can be cleared much faster than PvP when you're experienced.

 

It's gone beyond that in my experience. Used for any morass of elo pairing that is unfun and a chore to get through. In which case I feel it's appropriate here. As for whether the term applies in this or other games, that is your opinion that it doesn't exist even if reality is contrarily displayed.

I think you mean when properly equipped as well as experienced. Though I'm not against people grinding, I just do not see why we must favor a PvP unlimited approach when a very large group of the playerbase don't like and would not likely affect MP at all with their spoils.

I'd also like to remind everyone that MP does have level limits based on the adventures. Theoretically this should mean with the limited completion chests for both sides that the straight acquiring percentage numbers aren't as straightforward as they seem IF you're looking for something in particular.

 

That doesn't match up with my results; frankly I get better treasure from SP. I average around one rare or better per adventure in SP, often earning multiple rares or an epic or better item (which balances out the times you get only uncommons). With good items (and a plan) it takes me 10 minutes or less to beat most SP modules. In an hour I can easily put down 6 modules, where I'd expect to earn an epic and 5-6 rare items (plus a lot of extra items/treasures to sell). However, MP does offer a far more engrossing game experience against real opponents. Grinding SP is a lot more repetitive.

But, with the same amount of time, I would expect less results from MP. I would definitely get fewer overall items, meaning less gold from selling stuff, but I also doubt I'd reliably get through the first two early gold chests in that time, which is what it would take to get a similar number of rares. After the 3rd MP chest, it's get's a lot worse in MP, where as SP adventures maintain a more linear payout.

In my experience, I couldn't get anywhere near the same results from MP (even with good items). Eventually your ELO get's higher and opponents get tougher and your games take longer (as they should). I think this is why you see people toss games to drop their ELO, but that still costs you significant time in waiting for your next match up.

I tend to think the better fix is through shops, but I support efforts to increase MP rewards.

 

59 items on average for epic+. 3 map adventure gives 8 items. Which makes ~7,4 adventures.

Ofc MP also gives normal chests, so let's say 9 adventures for last 9 MP wins. Which for me is clear win for SP. Then again, MP is much more volatile, it could take couple of hours, it could take 6.

Rare chest are bit more efficient, so getting few or all of them might be a good idea.

Now, whether or not it's a good thing can be debated. Personally I think it's a good thing. Efficient grinding doesn't mean fun MP games, usually the opposite. Even when reward comes from wins, there's still annoying & fast ways to grind if so desired. In SP everyone can do whatever the want without ruining matches for bunch of other people.