Want two of the same legendary from the Daily Deal?

I tried it with The Daily Deal and I got the same stock both times. I suspect the normal shops are different because they have different stock for every player. The Daily Deal has the same stock for every player. It's probably a quirk of the implementation that it behaves like Wavy has documented.

Stupidly, I didn't buy anything from The Daily Deal before refreshing so I cannot confirm that it restocks the same items but I can confirm that it had identical, Day 2 contents both before and after refresh. The Legendary was Taltec's Staff, the Epics are Atchocl's Spear, Blessed Mail and St. Bethan's Charm both times, like listed by Timeracers here: http://forums.cardhunter.com/threads/todays-daily-deal.7405/

@timeracers, might I suggest writing a new post every day instead of updating the same post as that way your new entry would be picked up by the New Posts forum functionality. Now one has to manually search for or to bookmark your very useful thread. What do you gain by not writing a new post? It's easy to automatically jump to the unread posts in the thread (just click a bolded thread name) if you're worried that the latest post would be harder to find than the first post. In any case, thank you for the volunteer effort!

 

I can confirm that this works like Wavy said. It is possible to get two copies of the same item from The Daily Deal.

I left my PC logged into Card Hunter over the daily reset at 0:00 UTC/GMT. After the reset, I entered The Daily Deal and bought Focused Healer (one of The Daily Deal items for Friday, July 10th, 2015). Then I closed Card Hunter and logged in again. The Daily Deal again had a star over it on the map to signify that I hadn't entered it yet for today Friday. I entered the shop and Focused Healer was in stock again.

Thanks again for the remarkable find, @wavy! This will change some things in Card Hunter, especially multiplayer.

 

Two observations about our new plaything:
- You can buy a single copy of an item from The Daily Deal without making it impossible to get two copies of something else the next day (but only if you didn't buy two copies the previous day). The way to do this is to stay logged in past the reset time without visiting The Daily Deal that day so the star is still shown over the shop icon, like you normally do for double-dipping. Then you can enter the shop and buy items. Then reload the game. The shop star is now again there, but don't visit the shop now. Stay logged in past the next reset (there's no rational reason to stay logged in all the time, just log in sometime before the reset time and stay logged in past it) and voilà, you're again set up for a double purchase.
- On those days when you have exhausted the shop for the day (when the star is no longer visible over the shop icon), if you stay logged in past the reset time and visit The Daily Deal (without reloading the game) the shop will have the items from the previous day. If you need to collect more gold for an important purchase, you can keep The Daily Deal shop stock frozen in time this way. It only restocks when you enter it with a star shown over the shop icon. The more you know.

 

I some games this wouldn't be called "a revolutionary technique that is changing the multiplayer scene" but "abusing a bug to gain an unfair advantage".

Just a thought.

 

How is it unfair when it's public knowledge and anyone can do it? There's no secret cabal guarding the ritual with their sleeved card decks. It's not a bug, it's an emergent property of the system. Card Hunter is full of them.

Complex systems will always have edge cases in them and in a mature environment they tend to become common knowledge and then they are either removed by the developers or accepted as part of the game. Card Hunter has a long history of such edge cases being a part of the playing environment, see e.g. Loot Fairy double- and triple-dipping.

Does using it violate some code of player ethics or sense of fair play? It takes an effort to use it but so does any advanced technique in a complex game. Is it unfair to learn the cone pushback directions for all angles or the burst square affecting order by heart to know which square to target? It's a similar case of knowledge and effort giving an edge to a player.

I don't agree with your view at first sight but I would be interested in hearing you elaborate on it. Why do you feel it's abuse?

 

Thinking about it more, it does widen the gap between the haves and have-nots. If one has the gold from successful or extensive play or the Pizza-purchasing resources one is able to buy e.g. two excellent legendaries in a single day while a starting or a resource-poor player wouldn't have that kind of buying power. I don't know if it's enough to call for regulating this submarket. I guess it depends on how capitalist-friendly official Cardhuntrian trade policy is.

 

Fairness-wise, well, anyone who reads the forum and has thousands of gold to spare already has a huge leg up on a new or less dedicated player. This is a drop in the bucket as far as the "item gap" goes.

But an emergent property can also be a bug, and it's pretty obvious that the Daily Deal isn't intended to be a twice-daily deal. I dislike this bug from a design perspective because
a) rollover tricks are tedious, so it sucks when they're optimal
b) This makes item collections more homogenous (more similar to other players)
c) This makes item collections more homogenous (more copies of a single relevant item)

I don't know offhand how much B or C matter, but they might. Say another legendary item approaches old Violent Pain status and it shows up in the Daily Deal. Suddenly all the top ranked MP players can get enough to build around it... doesn't sound like a fun metagame that day.

But I am just armchair nattering. This doesn't affect me, so I'm not looking to get into a scuffle over it.

 

Good points. I'd like the property go away, myself, as utilizing it would require leaving my PC running overnight which is getting way too far into OCD territory for comfort. The reset time is currently at 3 am for me.

I don't have to use it, of course, but knowing it's there might prove to be too much of a temptation, sanity reputation be damned. What if there's Doolittle's Ultimate Wand Of Troll Domination in The Daily Deal tomorrow and I could have gotten two copies of it? It might be too much to bear. And now the expansion is coming out with lots of new, potentially essential high-rarity items...

Actually, an unfair property of the property is the reset time compared to local daylight hours. It's a lot easier to utilize the technique when the reset occurs during one's prime gaming hours instead of in the small hours of the morning.

 

All proper pvp systems should rely heavily on transparency. These type of officially undocumented features undermine that design.

It is clear that this is a bug though: there has been cases where abusing bugs has lead to sanctions in other games I have played.

 

Well, not anyone can do it easily .. as you said, shop reset is @3AM for you, 2AM for me .. its not near that easy as if it were at 2PM .. :/
And running PC overnight every night? That's not an option (at least not for me) ..

 

The loot fairy also has this inherent unfairness. The idea of a 23/25 hour shop/adventure reset to combat this advantage was discussed here and is probably worth looking at again if rumors of the fairy providing even better loot in co-op after the expansion are true.

More on topic, this is most certainly a bug that should probably be fixed. Abusing the lack of synchronization between the fairy and daily resets is feels wrong enough; using a second account/external resource just to check the Daily Deal everyday takes it to another very undesirable level. You won't find me complaining if Jon waits until a week or two into the expansion to take a look at this, though.

 

The cone pushback directions and burst square affect order are not officially documented anywhere, either, as far as I recall. There are lots of details in a complex system that will never be officially documented. It's the same for any large game system. It's common for involved players to document such systems extensively. They become an unofficial part of the game knowledge base. Is official documentation really the dividing line between abuse or sanctioned behaviour? Developers would have their work cut out for them if they needed to document every nook and cranny of their systems themselves to keep things above board.

I agree this particular issue potentially has a large effect and needs to be considered more seriously than some minor implementation detail.

It's not at all clear to me that it's a bug because of the history of such issues in Card Hunter (I agree it does not sit well with the seeming design intent and history of the feature: give access to a single copy daily and no more. I myself argued for less high-rarity item availability when it was developed, Randimar's was proposed to have 10 Legendaries every day, same items for everyone at first iteration, The Daily Deal appeared in the second round).

If Loot Fairy multiple dipping has been allowed to exist for so long with no opposing developer comments or actions as far as I can recall, how does this differ? I agree it muddies the multiplayer waters and is not transparent at all; it took this long for one of us (Wavy) to even find it!

I can guarantee you there will be no sanctions for the use of this technique based on previous Blue Manchu policies and developer behaviour. Besides, we're taking about it in plain public and developer view. Strangely self-incriminating behaviour from a bunch of abusers.

If the developers wish for the exploit to go away, they're maybe one IF statement away from doing that.

I agree the property is problematic but I do bristle at classifying it abuse and hinting at sanctions. How much more above-board can we be than hanging all the dirty laundry out to dry in the main hall of the forum building?

 

This is definitely not working as intended. "Bug" is a strong word for this accident, though. In terms of fairness, I don't see how the opportunity to double-dip on the Daily Deal is too different from the opportunity to log in two days in a row. Not everyone can play this game for the same number of seconds as everyone else. Am I missing something obvious?

 

Because the reset happens at the same time every day, it exclusively advantages people that are able to be logged on at that specific time of day. If the shops reset at 3:00 a.m. where you live and you aren't able to be logged in at that time, you can never take advantage of these quirks, regardless of how many days or seconds you play.

 

*Cough,* *cough!*

I think Flaxative's point is that the aspect of the game being discussed is possible for all players, it's not restricted to only certain accounts. And while it may be naturally harder to take advantage of for some players over others, this is due to an aspect outside the game (their sleep schedule). Thus it's comparable to other aspects outside the game that result in one player having an advantage over another (such as the amount of time one can dedicate to playing).

 

What reasoning is that?

Daily Deal reset is @2AM for me .. I'm not going to play at that time, and I'm not leaving my comp over the night EVERY day. So that Daily Deal exploit is not an option for me. Its almost the same as it is not possible for me.

And this is definitely not an "aspect outside of game". If that reset was at 2AM for every player, and some would be willing to play at that time (as I often did as a kid) that would be an aspect outside of the game and that's perfectly fine.

I just dont want to call this option "a fair one", as it isnt a case. (and with upcoming expansion, thats actually a quite unfair one)

And leave Loot Fairy double dipping out of this, that's really a minor thing, Loot Fairy gives usable items soo rarely that it doesnt change anything.

 

I was just clarifying what Flaxative was saying, not arguing for or against the situation.

And whether I agree or not, if you want to say:

I'm fine with that. But I'm not sure how you're perceiving your sleep schedule and/or the time zone you live in as something in the game.

 

Here, have a lozenge, that sounds uncomfortable. I said officially . You know I'm aware of, appreciate, utilize and evangelize your work.

It seems to me Balor doesn't count forum-only information as official so I discounted your excellent FAQ for the purposes of this discussion -- not that I in any way begrudge you the fine opportunity for some information dissemination, though.

 

There is announcement coming...

Spoiler: Announcement

I will be making an allusion shortly...

Spoiler: Shortly there after

Wait until Monday.

 

I for my part am quite unclear on what exactly Flaxative was talking about in this quote:

I can think of several interpretations but I sure wouldn't have the confidence to claim I know which was the one intended by him.