[Feedback & Suggestion] Quickdraw

I've been tied up since the weekend so here are my somewhat late to the party thoughts.

A few quick rebuttals before I get into the meat of my thoughts. First, identifying that something is a rare occurrence is indeed a legitimate reason to forgo making a major overall change for its sake (though this does not preclude finding a minor tweak that might help a certain corner case without disrupting the overall current state). Secondly I've now heard different individuals complain because a) QD is always won by the team with the most warriors, b) QD is an auto win for anyone with 3 wizards, and c) QD has an unfair advantage to an all priest team. It would seem that clearly these three sentiments can't all be right. I would also further note, I have won against all three of these team compositions. Additionally, I have played with and against "cycling" decks, I have beaten them and been beaten while running them, so I'm not convinced they're overpowered even if they obviously cause some people problems. (I even played against a team that had a wiz with so many traits that he only had 3-4 actual cards in his deck - just continuously drawing his traits he hit the draw limit on both rounds 2 and 3, and yet I won the match; cycling does not equate to an auto win.)

Now to my general thoughts: Maybe I have a different perspective because I played QD on the test server when it came out when it was only 5 cards. I still thought it was fun then, but it was so much more of a cycle-your-cards game then, that now seems pretty fair. *It's worth noting that the difference between 5 and 7 cards is HUGE and the cycling you see now is not anywhere close to what it was on the original test version. That said let me note a few thoughts of why I like QD as it stands now.

1) It's different. We already have standard MP, and we already have fixed deck leagues, I'm not wanting to make it more like either of those. They're both fine, I play them and enjoy them, but if I want a game with fixed cards I already have leagues and if I want a game with a larger deck I already have MP, I don't want QD to become more like them, they already exist. Let's not make QD more like something we already have.

2) QD is neither a fixed deck nor a pre-built deck league, it's a draft. I know, you're thinking: "Duh!" But here's the thing, the draft is part of the game. What I mean by that is that the nature of a draft means that your card choices will directly affect your chance of winning and losing - and they should! I'm not universally opposed to constraints upon a draft (in the current state there are already a number in place), but I don't want to see changes that will greatly undercut the strategic aspect of drafting. I like the fact that to really excel at QD you have to be both good at deck building and play, it can't be only one or the other. It gives the draft weight, otherwise we might as well just have randomly generated hands.

3) It's about deck building, and deck building on the fly. Normally when a deck is built a person selects items from their collection with a planned strategic synergy, they can take their time to mix and match, start with a foundational idea and build up from there. In QD you generally can't walk in with any preset plan. It forces you to be much more thoughtful in what choices you are offered, but make your choices rapidly. Your deck building must adjust for team compositions and available cards. Furthermore, you have to develop the plan as the cards are revealed and hope that the strategy path you start on remains viable, or choose to change course mid-draft (usually not recommended). Are you going for offense or defense? Control or damage? Rush the victory square(s) or hang back? Based off your opponent's team composition what might they be doing? Can you counter it? These all make for intriguing decisions with great variety from one game to the next which is one of the best things about QD!

4) It's great for learning new strategies. One can no longer "always play wizards," or whatever their standard choice might have been. If you want to be good you have to be able to adapt. It also means you have to think about what makes a good deck, and yes this means maximizing good cards and minimizing bad ones. It also means learning to prepare for and handle potential tough decks to play against including a deck that may have a draw advantage. I've gotten beat by a build that I was entirely unprepared for, but I've learned and the next time I faced a similar one I had selected cards to counter it. QD had forced me to learn new card combos, think of strategies I would have never tried before and work many styles of play that don't all come to me naturally. In QD I can't select a build to fit my style, I have to modify my style to match my build.

5) Every card counts and you can count on every card. In standard MP it's not too hard to hide one or two bad cards in your deck without adverse effects. Meanwhile stronger cards will only be seen once or require multiple copies. Most games only see 1/3 - 1/2 a players deck. In QD that's far from the case. It matters if you have bad cards, you can count on seeing your good cards, each card makes a greater effect on your build. Furthermore you can strategize for certain cards. Drew Impetuous Slash? Try to get next to a bunch of enemies at the end of the round, you know the card is coming up. Have a Loner in your deck, better watch your positioning. There's all kinds of layers of new strategy with smaller decks where you can anticipate your cards as well as your opponent's!

There are other things that I could add, but this post is already long enough. But suffice it to say these are some of the reasons that I dislike the idea of adding fixed cards or making the deck sizes larger. I think doing either in any significant way will greatly change the feel and strategy of QD from what it is now.

 

It could mean that single-class parties are OP. I made a suggestion during testing that it should not allow duplicate races or classes in the same party.

 

You could be right.

 

It could also be that people have observational biases and aren't actually collecting statistics.

 

My last Quick Draw was really frustrating. For 2 games in a row I got a crappy combination of race/class and the worst possible options for each character, which leaded to 2 very easy defeats. I was so frustrated by this that I even resigned in my second match, which I think was my first resign ever. I still think this league is great, but also wanted to share my last experience with it. The most problematic thing I see is Nimbus. It's maybe the best card for this format due to the lack of counterplay (only a priest and only if they got offered some Purge card type).

 

There is definitely a true reality that a draft will result in more frequent good and bad luck. But one has to expect that in a draft. I'd argue that control wizard cards, as well as bash and barge warrior cards can often deal with nimbus just fine.

 

True, but with the difference that with a priest it's more likely to draw the card you want to draw (Nimbus) every turn due to their drawing cards, traits and 2 or 3 duration buff's cards, while it's more difficult to have the same consistency with a wizard and a warrior (unless you have more than one card that could deal with it, as having TK and GoW on the same wizard).