{suggestion} how to retain players

Quality of life updates are frequently suggested and there's certainly a lot of them. For example, right now you need to manually scroll by the characters in your keep to access ones bought later when there's already a drop-down bar implemented for buying costumes. There's also things like inventory folders, arrangement of decks in your collection, chat rooms with multiple people not in a group, changing character costume colours and the like that could be added.

The problem is, with such limited staff, effort is probably better spent working on new content to attract more players to come and spend to support the game. QoL is always going to be pushed on the backburner. And I don't think we can blame the devs for it, however much we'd like better UI. 'No one's going to say 'wow, I'm going to play this game because the UI has improved.' What we have right now is usable and we'll likely have to make do until the game reaches a state where more people can be brought to the staff.

 

Was it @Lucky Dice who was talking about all the improvements that were made to Worms once it was handed over to the players after the devs were done with it?

 

As someone who hardly ever plays anymore, I can tell you that the main thing I find lacking is singleplayer stuff. I don't give a darn about meta or elo.

If I ever do come back for real, I'll maybe found a SP coop-focused guild to help keep it fresh for me. It's not so dull when you're doing it with nice folks.

 

While I'll always be grateful for the work previously put into Campaign mode, save for Mauve Manticores and the Caverns of Chaos, I'm never gonna care about or be grateful about anything MP-related. MP is catered nearly completely to three specific types of characters over all others--it was nearly irreparably ruined when I came to CH 22 months ago, and it's nearly irreparably ruined now. MP is nearly impossible for me to enjoy because of this extreme shift and favor towards one type of character, and BM doesn't seem to care. At all. I guarantee you Jon knows about this massive shift, but, he and Flaxative has done almost nothing TRULY worthwhile to fix it, besides allow map creators to make what is almost mirror images of the same catering, map-wise, across the board, with the arguable exception of the Halloween 2015 maps.

Campaign, however, imho, isn't nearly so boring, isn't nearly so entirely predictable, and the love and care put into what exists so far [again, besides CoC and the vast majority of MM's] shows. From Greenfang's Challenge all the way to Sanctum of the Cyber Tyrant, you can tell that MASSIVE amounts of thought and planning [and in nearly all the right places] took place. I'd support CH forever if it would only expand this truly beautiful and truly bestest part of CH. It's really top-notch compared to all other CCG's. THIS is what I'm thankful for--a 1P meta that isn't entirely unforgiving, isn't the same old same old, and doesn't just cater to the same 3 types of characters; it allows ALL 9 types of characters to shine [yes, even the Elf Wizards].

I haven't really seen any sign of the same love, care and thought since Expedition To The Sky Citadel was released. Not kidding. That needs to come back, and it's never coming back by pumping more stuff in MP than into Campaign. So far as I'm able to see, the biggest and best results would be achieved by giving more love, care, updates, fixes, nerfs, buffs, and all the rest to Campaign mode, since it's played first, and is, really, the centerpiece of this [MP-aside] wonderful game.

 

I can see one option to make the game fairer, limit meta abuse and ultimately retain players.

Make most healing occur over time

Removing most instant healing, especially heals like greater heal, help the weak, etc., would clean up the meta so much. We could still retain some heals as instant. Say, misguided heal, team heal (a skill-intensive heal, encouraging you to rotate damage throughout your team), and inspiring presence.


The prevalence of instant healing at high elo levels is mind-blowing. Silver healing ring is a nasty, nasty item. Mitsuaki, who got to rank 1900+, has a dedicated priest with talented healer, at least two silver healing rings, and even song, to not just abuse mid-battle healing ,but give cantrip for more damage next round.

But I truly feel it is NOT nerfing talented healer that would make the difference, but the heals themselves.

One option to implement non-instant heals, or delayed heals, could be an "unpurgeable" heal stack. I.e it just hovers over their head like a halo (thematic), and then unravels to have the heal occur at the end of round. Means that only one heal can occur per round too (besides the above-mentioned instant heals). I know this complicates the game a little but its one way to quickly retain healing card as they are without having to nerf each indivudual card / item associated with it.

Plus think how much love misguidead heal, team heal, and inspiring presence would then get!! These cards are so underused. Items like God-touched mace are actually dying to be built around

I truly believe instant healing is the biggest bane of this game by far. (second is vibrant pain)

Sorry to harp on about it, but there is nothing more disheartening, than unloading the majority of your saved up damage by a character, only to have it nullified by some healing cards while said character gets destroyed, meanwhile the other one goes back to full health. Rinse and repeat!

 

Decided to bump this thread again, I dont have time to read through the thread so I will just post my point here:
A lot of players leave just because they think they are at the end of the game and there is nothing left which is completely not true, there is just a lot of features hidden which most players just dont notice.
I am talking about things such as map making, guilds and the forums themselves. I cannot think of any place in the game which references these things at all, so any new player would completely overlook them.
Adding some ways for newer players or all players altogether to find these features easier would be very beneficial.
For example adding a window to the left or right of the login screen where you can choose to enter the Campaign or Multiplayer lobby which has a list of buttons with useful links such as the forums and meta pages.

 

Another idea is to include the forum contests in the story between Amy, Gary, and Melvin during the next single player. I used to think there was going to be a next single player expansion.

 

Just for the record, you can click any non-GM username to get at least one profile (including your own if you never even visit the MP lobby), with the [META] profile leading to guild information, and the menu button in the upper right includes a Forums button.

@tolkien reminded me, though. There was one early MM which had a battle between the Sorcererers and some other guild. Pretty hilarious. Lol! $E^ b

Anyway, just readin' for the most part. Carry on, carry on.

 

Unless i buy a new expansion, for months and months i just play the loot fairy map. Or for months and months i just get bored/tired of the game and quite altogether. B/c of no new MAPS/expansions for the game, or the because I get tired of the card grind. Playing the same maps over and over only to get the same lame cards that I already have... It gets tedious. At least on the loot fairy map you are guaranteed two rare or better items, and since purple or higher card drop rate is SO LOW, i tend to not have many of those cards, and so at least the loot fairy map gives a higher chance of dropping a card that i do not already own.

So a couple ideas instead of just complaining all the time haha

1. increase the gold from sells or lower cost of cards from the shop. If the drop rate is so low, at least give people an opportunity to BUY better cards at a less painful time sink. I mean some of these card prices are just so unrealistic. I know it might undermine the 'rarity' of the cards... but if you play for months and can only afford one legendary, that is not very good time/reward ratio. It is actually quite demoralizing.

2. have a daily login bonus. for every consecutive day you log in, a player gets some reward. this could be things like gold bonus, extra gold, a card, a treasure chest, an ever increasing chance of getting better cards. just SOMETHING to offset the terrible grind.

 

@haho, I've considered suggesting a "daily log in bonus," but every time it comes to mind, I remember, oh yeah, the Loot Fairy is kind of that daily log in bonus. Hm. (EDIT: You are playing Loot Fairy in co-op for even more items, right?) Otherwise, if it's taking you months to get a legendary, I have to ask, are you playing multiplayer? The ranked and league rewards are a lot more lootacious than the campaign, even granting treasures at a higher rate so I understand. (League chests from the shop offer no treasures, since shop chests have no treasures, but 50g to enter and get three Magnificent Chests guaranteed -- and if you play some, you might win some MP chests and increase your shop chest rewards.)

 

I personally don't play co-op, nor multiplayer. I used to try to do the dual account thing, where I'd be logged into two separate accounts and just play in two different browsers, but that got old fast. I've never been interested in the PVP aspect of this game either. Sometimes I'll spend the 50g to enter, but I'm 99% PVE. I think if loot fairy were not buried on another website (http://sorcererers.dotq.org/loot-fairy.php) and perhaps a pop-up within the game itself indicating where the fairy is... i know that kills some of the 'suspense' but with new players who haven't been around around for years, and not following the forum etc they might never know about the tracker. The bandit is also frustrating. I think i get it once every 6 or so months. Although, granted I do not have the time to play through all the levels in hopes of finding it...

I see I joined the forum Feb 11, 2014 and I still don't have all the cards from the original game (not to mention the expansions) I think it is a pretty big buzzkill to spend years and not be able to get at least 1 of all the cards. Sure there are other means, like buying chests, or pvp, but I think taking years in PVE (due to the RND of cards awarded) is pretty harsh.

I think for PVE I would much prefer at least 1 guaranteed treasure to drop so a person is able to sell for gold, and can ever-so-slowly work their way to building up enough gold to buy some cards they don't have. Since the treasure you can sell for gold is also RNG and never guaranteed to drop, it just makes things very frustrating all around.

 

Play multiplayer. It's lots of fun. I've just begun the opposite: playing through all the single player quests. Blu Manchu has a lot here before we fuss too much about adding content.
Personally, Ive suggested many new ideas for content but I'm contenting myself playing all the stuff I haven't played yet.

 

I now have at least one of everything from all but the latest expansion, but it's a long grind. I know I'd have a better shot if I played PVP, but I don't because I don't enjoy it. As you allude, true randomness can be pretty harsh. Or it can be very generous to some. If I didn't still enjoy this game, I'd have quit by now.
I'm glad to see you're still playing, and wish you better luck.

 

eh now that i have read they are working on another game, i expect nothing to change. i mean hardly anything has despite the hundreds of suggestions over the years, and now their focus will be elsewhere. Soon this game will probably become abandoned since they'll devote more time on their new game, and only hardcore people who invested so much of their $$ will keep playing.

 

What new game is blue manchu working on?

 

The only mention of a new game I have seen anywhere is this:

https://twitter.com/FarbsMcFarbs/status/922664307267051525

 

Blue Manchu also said it in a Kongregate profile status or reply, iirc.

 

so what was the point of this topic?
I go away for 6 months nothing changed lol

anyway, i saw mention of another game being worked on here http://forums.cardhunter.com/threads/4th-class.6660/page-3#post-132444