Join us in our Fellowship Adventures!

[DeletedUser1108]

The level of animosity towards what are called "diamond players" in these threads confuses me to no end. Surely it has to occur to you that those players make all the rest of us possible! Without diamond spending players Inno would trash this game in a heartbeat. They are a business and if they do not make money then they move on to the next project and all the free players have no game! I have learned to be grateful for those folks spending all that money because they make it possible for me not to. Sure, I'll never be able to catch them in score, but so what?

One of the remarkable things about the previous adventures is that lower ranked fellowships have finished quite high due to outworking others; that indicates to me that there more fairness to it then y'all seem to want to acknowledge. The prizes are indeed woefully inadequate, we finished 5th in each of the 2 so far and a mana hut and one instant is all we had to show for it - that is an issue that they clearly need to address, but we all had quite a bit of fun and came together with a lot of remarkable teamwork.

All that said, the new changes being described by beta players make it sound like an utter train wreck and I would not be at all surprised if they hold off rather than foist this mess onto the regular servers and risk an all out boycott of the thing. My group has done quite a bit of prep and we will be disappointed to find it was all for nought, but that is exactly what I suspect will happen. The other wrinkle that I see coming is that if Elementals comes out first, then those of us in that chapter will not even have the ability to do Necklace or statues due to the changes in our tier one factory options.

 

[Pheryll]

The announcement has just been made: Thursday, February 1st

 

[Ashrem]

The level of animosity towards what are called "diamond players" in these threads

I think you're interpreting something that isn't there. In my opinion, the animosity isn't toward diamond players, but toward Inno for how much effort they put in to getting everyone to be diamond players. The fellowship adventures have been modified so that they will not be fun for the vast majority of those who don't spend lots on diamonds. That is not a criticism of diamond players, it is a criticism of the design.

The other wrinkle that I see coming is that if Elementals comes out first, then those of us in that chapter will not even have the ability to do Necklace or statues due to the changes in our tier one factory options.

The Tier one factory options will only change for currently-non-boosted factories that are leveled into the 20s. Your boosted factory productions will be unchanged, and any non-boosted factories that are lower than 20+ will not change.

One of the remarkable things about the previous adventures is that lower ranked fellowships have finished quite high due to outworking others; that indicates to me that there more fairness to it then y'all seem to want to acknowledge.

I ran 55 workshops, 45 level one boost factories, and 15 each of my non-boosted T1. Others ran close to the same. We did not make the top 20 on our server.

 

[DeletedUser1108]

Sigh...Far be from the developers to admit a mistake! What could possibly have deluded me into thinking that this time they would. If they roll out Elementals in the midst of this trainwreck it will be another major mistake. Not fixing the Magic Academy to make it possible to collect spells individually is yet another ridiculous oversight as we have all mentioned repeatedly. Why in the world does Inno solicit our opinions if they choose to ignore them completely?

I imagine that we will try it anyway so does anyone who has done the beta event have any opinions as to what paths to take each round? By all reports doing them all is no longer possible. I've heard green, green, orange and blue, green, orange so far.

 

[DeletedUser9601]

Not fixing the Magic Academy to make it possible to collect spells individually is yet another ridiculous oversight as we have all mentioned repeatedly.

That is not obviously an easy fix: no other building in the game functions this way.
Further, this is a change that benefits a few players for 1 week every few months (during FAs), and is a pain in the butt for the rest of the time for all players. I don't want to see this fix, and the work-around that @SoggyShorts pointed out is just fine.
Further, its obvious that the FA is in many respects based on gating the pace of play. So its not in Inno's interest to make these quests easier to accomplish.
Further, if they made this change, and people were able to queue up 3 spells prior to the FA, and basically start the FA with 3 badges from the spell completion quests, they'd bake that into their analysis. The FA would probably just require 3 more badges.

 

[Ashrem]

Even more awesomeness! None of the new badges require any of my boosts, so I can't make any of them without relying on the trader. Thanks for guaranteeing my non-participation, Inno.

 

[DeletedUser9601]

All that said, the new changes being described by beta players make it sound like an utter train wreck and I would not be at all surprised if they hold off rather than foist this mess onto the regular servers and risk an all out boycott of the thing. My group has done quite a bit of prep and we will be disappointed to find it was all for nought, but that is exactly what I suspect will happen.

Even if they made all of these changes, FAs are still trash. You're still devoting a ton of city space and effort for some garbage prizes. Unless you're top 3 on your server. And at that point, does it matter if the FA mechanics are painful and clunky? No, because its the same torture for those 10-20 FSes that push hard for top 3, mainly for the ranking points.

 

[DeletedUser9601]

Even more awesomeness! None of the new badges require any of my boosts, so I can't make any of them without relying on the trader. Thanks for guaranteeing my non-participation, Inno.

I know this is sarcasm, but you should be genuinely happy you have a reason to skip

 

[Laochra]

I think easiest are Green>Green>Orange this time.
Trying to minimize the 24 and 48h ones.

My fellowships have decided to opt for Blue-Blue-Orange...only because this route minimizes the demands on the MA & some newer members have not yet unlocked their ability to make the MM.
We don't expect to finish this time around, but we are at least hoping to capture 1 flag.

 

[Ashrem]

I know this is sarcasm, but you should be genuinely happy you have a reason to skip

That was a happy post.

That is not obviously an easy fix:

True, it is a significant change in design and might require some innovative thinking. One thing that comes to mind, is instead of levels, have each "upgrade" be a separate 2x2 building (after the initial 3x3), and you can only make one spell in each building, so you need to have all 5 of them if you want to make all five spells. The buildings would be like a set, so only one road connection required and you end up with a little mage village. The boost from having the buildings touching would be the increase in production speed.

 

[shimmerfly]

How long will the torture be running? I agree with whoever said 'it is not fun'. I would rather take out the garbage or do laundry.
It may be time to get some painting done or start the spring cleaning early, or bake some cake!

 

[samidodamage]

How long will the torture be running? I agree with whoever said 'it is not fun'. I would rather take out the garbage or do laundry.
It may be time to get some painting done or start the spring cleaning early, or bake some cake!

I vote for cake!

 

[Laochra]

@SoggyShorts can have the top piece & everyone else can share the rest!

 

[Ashrem]

.

 

[Laochra]

@Ashrem , I am no longer wanting chocolate today....at least for a little while!

You & @SoggyShorts can have ALL of that cake!!!

 

[ajqtrz]

Well, it appears the thing will be more difficult for many but at least they made the cycling easier.

On the matter of small fellowships finishing higher than expected it may be nothing more than the amount of space they dedicate to workshops and goods manufactures. I counted the top finisher's number of total workshops in the last FA and found they had over 700 among their 25 players. The average, if I remember was 35. There score may have reflected the space dedicated as much as anything. My own fellowship had over 400 and we were, at the time ranked about number 50. We spent no diamonds or which I'm aware and we finished number 20 or so. We don't expect to finish that high this time around, but maybe if we are lucky and figure out the changes and a good strategy for coping with them we'll do well enough.

The FA should, I believe, be difficult to actually finish but if it is then it should reward the finishers at any level, with significant prizes. As the first two show, a large fellowship with a good focus can finish early and spend the last days just cranking out things for the whirlpool. In my opinion the whirlpool was designed exactly because once you finish you have your score, then what? If you didn't do all three paths another fs finishing after you could have a higher score so all your speed meant nothing. Sort it's sort of necessary to insure smaller fellowships who cannot do the orange path with it's large goods requirements (and thus the need to produce those goods), have a chance to finish near or even at the top. We did the first stage orange last FA and that helped but there was no way we would have been able to finish the second orange stage let alone the third.

The prizes suck, that is true, but must say we don't really do it for the prizes, but to build team spirit. The FA's are really about getting as many players in your fs committed to communicating and contributing as possible, which, we have found, greatly reduces turn over and increases cooperation in the rest of the game. It's not an individual adventure, it's a Fellowship one. Which is why, I suppose, many fellowships would do better to skip it. After all, some fellowships are more or less a bunch of individuals banned together to have just good reliable trading and visitation partners than in truly being a bunch of people who have "fellowship" together. There's nothing wrong with that so skipping the FA in those cases might be a good thing since FA's are more stressful.

So far the FA's re not perfect or even nearly so, but they are about as good as what other games do along the same lines. The balance between giving rewards versus getting people to pay for things is difficult to keep since if you give too much you get a lot less but if you give too little the "diamond spenders" race ahead. Making something free and fair and paying for it is a delicate matter and getting it right nearly impossible. The FA is a good thing overall and the tweaks appear to make it more difficult, but overall I thinks it's an improvement. Maybe I'll change my mind after this next one, but who knows, maybe I won't.

AJ

 

[Ashrem]

It's hard to compare past to the one coming, because we don't know how many of the top teams took advantage of rotating extra cities in and out of the fellowship to complete badges. If those badges are now lost during a fellowship entry, and there is an inability to participate in the current stage prizes, it might be a different game.

 

[DeletedUser1461]

Not telling me what the new prizes are will not catch me again. The time and effort going into the fellowship adventures simply does not justify the prizes. That is all I have to say.

 

[Shellizzie]

The prizes suck, that is true, but must say we don't really do it for the prizes, but to build team spirit. The FA's are really about getting as many players in your fs committed to communicating and contributing as possible, which, we have found, greatly reduces turn over and increases cooperation in the rest of the game. It's not an individual adventure, it's a Fellowship one. Which is why, I suppose, many fellowships would do better to skip it. After all, some fellowships are more or less a bunch of individuals banned together to have just good reliable trading and visitation partners than in truly being a bunch of people who have "fellowship" together. There's nothing wrong with that so skipping the FA in those cases might be a good thing since FA's are more stressful.

This is why we will do the FA. Because it is more about accomplishing something as a group and working together as a team than anything else. It is so much less about the prizes.

 

[DeletedUser4833]

I agree with Shelizzie. I see an uptick in group activity during and after every FSA. I'm wondering what the new prizes are though - I have a couple of players who have said they won't bother because the prizes haven't been worth it, and I'd love to be able to lure them back to it...