Standardized Event Buildings(with tiers)

[MaidenFair]

This is an interesting idea. I think it could work quite well for the culture only buildings, but my concern is that also applying it to hybrid buildings removes the ability to tweak the city based on playstyle. Because...

Currently, all rewards except 1 are effectively eliminated by being inferior.
This proposal changes that in 3 ways:

1: An entire selection of different buildings would be "the best" and they would still have unique art and be offered during different events.

"The best" for whom? Whose playstyle is deemed to be the most important? The best building for my city probably won't be the same as the best building for your city.
For instance, I don't need any more culture in Khel. I only need 49K culture to get the 170% bonus in my city, and I already have 59K available before any neighbourly help. So when I occasionally place culture/pop hybrids, I always pick the ones that skew highest to population (which already feel frustratingly few). Conversely, I know some players have the opposite problem of always needing culture. If these buildings are all standardized to presumably some sort of even weighting, I won't be able to pick buildings with more population, they won't be able to pick buildings with more culture, and culture/pop hybrids will probably become practically unusable to both of us.

The only way I can think of to make this friendly to various playstyles would be to still have multiple building values within each value tier but make those standardized sets, so there are five Legendary 3x3 buildings with 1000/3000 and five with 2000/1500 and five with 3100/880, and so on. This has the obvious downside of losing the appealing simplicity of your original idea and being much more complex to implement and use.

 

[SoggyShorts]

"The best" for whom? Whose playstyle is deemed to be the most important? The best building for my city probably won't be the same as the best building for your city.....

It doesn't matter what your city needs, or what your playstyle or strategy is, there is currently only one building that is better than all others for that need. This proposal wants to make "best" into a category rather than a single choice.

Basically "The best" isn't subjective, it's just categorized, as you say here:

The only way I can think of to make this friendly to various playstyles would be to still have multiple building values within each value tier

and that's exactly the idea:
e.g.

The buildings that give 14,000 culture are "the best" culture buildings because they give more culture/sq than any other​

and

The buildings that give 6,000 population are "the best" population buildings because they give more pop/sq than any other​

Both would be Legendary

Spoiler: Example from earlier in the thread

All chapter 17 event daily prize buildings* that are 3x3 would be

Tier, pop/culture
Legendary 6,000/1,400 or 0/14,000
or
Epic 5,500/1,300 or 0/13,000
or
Rare 5,000/1,200 or 0/12000

When a Legendary daily exclusive event prize is offered, the chance to win is 5% in the "chest", but if an Epic is offered the chance that day is 10%, if it's a Rare prize the chance would be 20%

This way, in an event you could "expect" to win 16 Rare, or 8 Epic, or 4 Legendary prizes depending on which day(s) you spend your currency.

As for adding a third category with a good blend... is it as simple as adding the stats from a Goblin gift shop and a father tree together and then dividing by 2? I'm pre-coffee and might need to think further about this...

 

[SoggyShorts]

I like hybrids that have variety. I really dislike the buildings that offer too much population because they are really hard to justify selling or storing. So I can see why Soggy wants variety in the skins he sees. But I really love buildings like Venar's Rocks 3, Cozy Farm, Crab Hotel, Scream of Halloween, for example, because they give lots of culture along with the population. I don't see those buildings in this proposal. I also think that Elvenar offers variety of this type in each event, and I enjoy this feature.

See post above this one

 

[BrinDarby]

"The best" for whom? Whose playstyle is deemed to be the most important? The best building for my city probably won't be the same as the best building for your city.

@SoggyShorts , you see while you still whine about my CH ( 6 )
I am looking @ your proposal thru your CH lenz. ( 18-20 ?? )

I'm guessing you rarely have to decide..... do I take a worse bldg
that has "more" , or do I upgrade (RR) my "best of" bldg.......

So, unless its a "best of" bldg it is useless "to you", therefore
you want "more" "best of" bldgs, with different skins. By making
stuff more standardized, you personally can have a bigger variety
of bldgs..... Am I right ???

I personally like collecting "best of bldgs" knowing that they will
cost me bookoo RRs to use. Events aren't standardized either.... So,
there isn't 1 good bldg of each kind, and you have to pick/choose
which events you go all out in, and which ya just cruise thru...

Lets say you did do a 3 tier..... I'm thinking what that chest would
look like...... hmmmm
Lets say now that chest would be.......
Daily 6% , Troops 14% , Goods 20% , KP 25% , Supplies 35%

How exactly do you breakout the 6% ??
1% legendary , 2% epic , 3% rare ..... and is that a separate calc if
you win the daily, or is there now 7 different things to win
instead of the orig 5 ??? The RNG will be ultra cruel if you switch
from 5 things to win to 7 things to win.....

 

[Darielle]

Currently, all rewards except 1 are effectively eliminated by being inferior.
This proposal changes that in 3 ways:

1: An entire selection of different buildings would be "the best" and they would still have unique art and be offered during different events.
2. I also believe that the odds of winning a prize should vary per tier so that I couldn't win 20 Legendary GGS as I have thereby making all subsequent prizes worthless for the past 2 years.
3. Lower-tier buildings could be cheaper to upgrade using fewer RRs making them serve a purpose other than spell fragments.

Here's an example of the current rewards
Pop per square
689 Goblin gift shop
667 Father tree of candy canes
656 Winter star
658 Infirmary of white flame
625 Frostberry bar
600 igloo festival
589 winter pond habitat
567 red forest
511 ancient pond statue

Under the new system the
All 3 Legendary will be 680 pop/sq, 5% chance in event ches*t, 2 RR/sq to upgrade
All 3 Epics will be 650, pop/sq, 10% chance in event chest*, 1 RR/sq to upgrade
All 3 Rares will be 580 pop/sq, 20% chance in event chest*, 0.5 RR/sq to upgrade
*Clarification: Different days would have different prizes just like now- I'm not suggesting multiple buildings in one prize chest

So the goal is to make other prizes viable choices rather than eliminating them.

I like it.

 

[SoggyShorts]

@SoggyShorts , you see while you still whine about my CH ( 6 )

Sorry Brin, but I wasn't thinking about you specifically at all,
I don't recall "whining" about anything, and
I really don't care what chapter you are in.

This proposition is applicable to ALL chapters.

The current situation is that for all players of all chapters with all playstyles there will be 1 daily event prize that is best for them.
The idea is to make a few prizes that serve a similar purpose equal so they can have a little variety in their city.

By making
stuff more standardized, you personally can have a bigger variety
of bldgs..... Am I right ???

Yes, that's exactly the purpose of this idea -- to make a greater variety of buildings useful to everyone.
Would I personally benefit? Yes, of course, everyone would.

Lets say you did do a 3 tier..... I'm thinking what that chest would
look like...... hmmmm
Lets say now that chest would be.......
Daily 6% , Troops 14% , Goods 20% , KP 25% , Supplies 35%

How exactly do you breakout the 6% ??
1% legendary , 2% epic , 3% rare

As I said:
"Different days would have different prizes just like now- I'm not suggesting multiple buildings in one prize chest"

So, to use your example,
On days 5 and 20 of the event, the chest would have
6%* chance of a Rare building, Troops 14% Goods 20% , KP 25% , Supplies 35%

On days 10, and 25 of the event, the chest would have
4%* chance of an Epic building, Troops 15% Goods 21% , KP 25% , Supplies 35%

On days 15, and 30 of the event, the chest would have
2%* chance of a Legendary building, Troops 16% Goods 22% , KP 25% , Supplies 35%

***Again though, as stated, "all numbers are for illustrative purposes only, using round, easy numbers rather than balanced ones."

 

[hvariidh gwendrot]

better stats for bldgs as you advance seems like a no brainer, can we throw in add better rewards to FA's with this

 

[SoggyShorts]

better stats for bldgs as you advance seems like a no brainer, can we throw in add better rewards to FA's with this

I am fully on board with that

I've always wanted just a little something for each and every spot (a couple of KP, a little timer instant, something)
As for the main prizes in the FA, A rare prize for the first map, then epic, then a Legendary would work nicely
Tomes of course, so each player could choose if they wanted (for example) a pop, culture, or blended building!

If I'm being honest, I think these should be in addition to the existing prizes (artifact books)

Edit: what do you like better?
E.G.
Option 1:
Regardless of how many spots you fill as long as you reach the top you get a prize, and it gets better in maps 2 &3

or

Option 2
If you complete 2/3 of the routes you get an Epic reward for that stage, complete every single spot and get a legendary for that map?

 

[Darielle]

I am fully on board with that

I've always wanted just a little something for each and every spot (a couple of KP, a little timer instant, something)
As for the main prizes in the FA, A rare prize for the first map, then epic, then a Legendary would work nicely
Tomes of course, so each player could choose if they wanted (for example) a pop, culture, or blended building!

If I'm being honest, I think these should be in addition to the existing prizes (artifact books)

Edit: what do you like better?
E.G.
Option 1:
Regardless of how many spots you fill as long as you reach the top you get a prize, and it gets better in maps 2 &3

or

Option 2
If you complete 2/3 of the routes you get an Epic reward for that stage, complete every single spot and get a legendary for that map?

Option 2

 

[SoggyShorts]

Option 2

I agree, always a fan of "do more, get more"

 

[Pheryll]

Yeah, I can't think of another way to stop buildings from being overpowered though. Any ideas?

If things are standardized then people will tend not to spend RRs as they can get the harder prizes throughout the year instead of only at winter.

 

[SoggyShorts]

If things are standardized then people will tend not to spend RRs as they can get the harder prizes throughout the year instead of only at winter.

I'm not really seeing that. When you enter a new chapter you'll still need RRs for any evos and set buildings you want to upgrade, and being able to replace a couple of your other best event buildings if you wait for the next event and are lucky shouldn't have too much impact on RR spending.

Keep in mind that the buildings would only be standardized within each tier. The change would simply be that prizes that are within 5-10% of each other would become equal.

Also, part of this proposal is in limiting the number of ultimate buildings one can get rather than allowing players to simply pick the day that gives the best prize and grab 20 of them. This would be done by reducing the % chance to win a daily when it's a legendary building.

But, if the devs (for some reason?) want to only give out the best buildings in winter, that can be maintained (although I don't see why it should)
Simply offer fewer (or zero) Legendaries throughout the year except for winter, or a higher % chance in winter.
All of that is infinitely tweakable.

The main goal is simply to avoid the current situation where 2 buildings are offered in the same event with the exact same size and chance of winning but one has 5% worse stats.

 

[ajqtrz]

Great question.

If you're parked for over a year you could replace some buildings seasonally for a more thematic city, or work on replacing Epics with Legendaries. The stagnation issue that already exists for parked players shouldn't get worse with this idea at least. I think.

In general, I do not believe that the game should cater to players who choose not to progress. They need not be additionally penalized for parking, but rather incentivized to progress.

While "progressing" may be one of the ways the game is played, "parking" is another. I usually park my city for six months to a year between chapters and have noticed that length of time growing as I move up. I'm in 19 now and once I get the research done for all the researches that don't need the specialized guest goods, I'll park. Why? Because I'll then spend a lot of time upgrading everything I can to as high as I can, including AW's AND/OR making my city a nice FA type city to help my fellowship in the FAs. That's my way of playing and thus, though it may look like I'm parked, and maybe some day I'll actually park, it shouldn't be penalized for being my way of playing.

But of course, you do state they could be incentivized to move on. But isn't stopping and raising everything before moving on also an incentive? It appears to me this is another way to conform or improve the game so that people who play a certain way have a better experience. I'd like to see it expanded/modified to benefits all players, parked or not.

AJ

 

[Katwick]

But of course, you do state they could be incentivized to move on. But isn't stopping and raising everything before moving on also an incentive? It appears to me this is another way to conform or improve the game so that people who play a certain way have a better experience. I'd like to see it expanded/modified to benefits all players, parked or not.

AJ

Also, if folks have good reasons to linger in each chapter, that reduces the pressure to develop new content for fewer and fewer speed-demons.

 

[BrinDarby]

Lets see if I have this straight then Soggy....
You've been playing for years, you are a smart collector
and have all "best of" bldgs, and you're tired of see'n the
same bldgs in you're city, or events where there's nothing
you persoanlly can use cause they are inferior bldgs to yours.

So your solution is to have std bldg stats for all bldgs so then
you can finally start winning new bldgs that aren't inferior to yours
and see new stuff in your city..... Do I have this about right ???

Lets say I have a Frozen Father Tree and I move up Chapters. That
bldg is a "best of" or damn close.... So either in feb-mar I spend
RRs to upgrade or I wait for next winter and hope it comes around
again... If we have std bldgs, then I dont need to wait because there
will just be a comperable bldg in a event sooner...

So yes, your proposal does create a situation where far less RRs
are need'd and used, thus a decrease in diamond($$$) sales.

It would be a even more boring game if every pure culture bldg
in every event was standardized to a best of bldg.... and what about
all those newbies that really need that 1st or 2nd culture bldg ???
Now they have an even smaller chance of getting stuff, especially
if they hit a run of a bad RNG.... and we know that happens to
players all the time already.

If Inno wanted to limit dailies they already could, so ppl didn't just
do as you said and win 20 of something. In the End tho Soggy, Inno
doesn't care about what you and I, and the playerbase wants/needs.....
All they care about is spending the least amt of time/$$/effort while
collecting the most $$$ thru selling stuff. They allow uber-overpowered
cities, farming, and flat out cheating, so after a couple years here I have
very little hope for those meaningfull changes that would make
Elvenar a "best of" game.

 

[SoggyShorts]

Lets say I have a Frozen Father Tree and I move up Chapters. That
bldg is a "best of" or damn close.... So either in feb-mar I spend
RRs to upgrade or I wait for next winter and hope it comes around
again... If we have std bldgs, then I dont need to wait because there
will just be a comperable bldg in a event sooner...

No, because not all buildings need to be offered in every event.
Frozen Father trees(and equivalents) for example can be Xmas only.

So yes, your proposal does create a situation where far less RRs
are need'd and used, thus a decrease in diamond($$$) sales.

No, because not all buildings need to be offered in all events, and the "best" can be made rarer than others.

it would be a even more boring game if every pure culture bldg
in every event was standardized to a best of bldg.

That's not what I'm proposing, not even close.

what about
all those newbies that really need that 1st or 2nd culture bldg ???
Now they have an even smaller chance of getting stuff, especially
if they hit a run of a bad RNG.

No, because different tiers can have different probabilities.

All they care about is spending the least amt of time/$$/effort while
collecting the most $$$ thru selling stuff.

How much $$$ do players spend on buildings that aren't better or at least equivalent buildings to what they already have?
Zero, that's how much.

---

 

[hoopity]

This seems like a solution in search of a problem. As I understand it, you want to allow long-time players to swap out old buildings for more visually exciting buildings with the same stats, rather than hanging onto a cache of over-tuned buildings from 5 years ago.

That just doesn't seem like a big enough gain for the cost of flattening and constraining inno's design space for new buildings.

 

[SoggyShorts]

This seems like a solution in search of a problem.

The issues being addressed by this proposal are that
1. it sucks to be offered a prize that is ~2-7% worse than another prize, especially within the same event.

E.G. offering 1 building that gives 1280 culture and another that gives 1250 is lame.​

2. It's unbalanced to offer the exact same chance to win the best prizes as inferior ones, especially in the same event.

It makes more sense to me that players should choose to win a bunch of good, many great, or a few awesome prizes.​

As I understand it, you want to allow long-time players to swap out old buildings for more visually exciting buildings with the same stats, rather than hanging onto a cache of over-tuned buildings from 5 years ago.

Actually, It's about up-and-coming players mostly. Long-time players would just get new skins, but the overall impact to balancing and interest in event rewards would include the entire player base. Also, you may have missed the part about adjusting the rarity of prizes, because that clearly impacts newer players even more than old-timers.

That just doesn't seem like a big enough gain for the cost of flattening and constraining inno's design space for new buildings.

There's no such downside.
In fact, it would make things much easier for inno as they can simply hit "epic" on a building and the stats would populate. If they wanted to create a building (like an evo) that was unique, well ta-da! there's a rarity category called: Unique!

Most simple event buildings would fall under the category of Rare, Epic, or Legendary, but some don't, like teh ones craftable from the build tab( Common), or AW, and evos are clearly Unique.

 

[BrinDarby]

We know how this works..... more event currency spent = better chance
of winning the daily prize. We also know 4 of 5 events a year are only
like 22 days, 1/2 of those dailies aren't usually bldgs, they are instants/goods.
I don't see how there are enuff bldgs offered to then subdivide by 3 and
still offer any usefull variety of bldgs.

All this proposal does is make winning any (great) daily bldg harder to win
and very prone to gett'n hosed by a bad RNG. Will you Soggy, then answer
every angry player that complains to support about spending boo-koo
currency and not winning a single bldg ??

The winter event is PO box style, therefore No percentages for dailies.
That also means No events 30 days long will be effected, just the 22 day ones.

The reason players choose certain chests to open is because they have
a big % chance of hitting the daily, now that is cut by 3 ?? They prolly need
that day's prize..... Like the current event : Only 1 pure culture bldg is
offered, therefore if thats what you need then even if its only Epic and
not Legendary, you have won what you need'd. Otherwise, you have to
offer 3 different pure culture bldgs, on 3 different days to have 1 of each,
Or you have to have 3 different %s within the same chest or a dbbl % calc.

Soggy, I commend you for being a "best of" collector, but you've collected
yourself right into a corner, where there's nothing good to win anymore.
I see this as your Kobieahhshie Maru senario, and just like Capt Kirk, your
solution is to change the rules (cheat), then its no longer a no-win senario.

If Inno arbitrarally makes winning anything decent, harder ( <% to win )
then I see this proposal as a force multiplier to the workload of poor
Inno's staff of support ppl, cause they gonna a buttload of piss'd off ppl
when they don't win hardly anything, then complain.

 

[Mykan]

Interesting Idea. Regarding the Downside #2 Since I know you were stopped in a chapter for a long time and others are or have been do you think that the game should recognize this fact or ignore it as it is not the intent of the game? I guess you can say its a penalty for stopping. Thereby making it a positive?

I don't think this idea will impact that as I don't see it as the reason people park towns. While it happened prior to the tourny change it was far less common and didn't really have a name like it does now. Major reasons are boredom (or just stuck) with increasing complexity/space required of new chapters or penalties (perceived or otherwise) of progressing (directly related to tourny/spire). Some also do it to focus on wonders but this often relates to the first reason. The last couple chapters kind of force you to park as due to the slowness of pace not an actual desire.

People who park towns se it as beneficial and the event/reward structure won't impact that. The game should recognise this fact and address it as it is not the intent of the game but events rewards are not the thing that will impact it one way or the other.

These towns over time optimise their buildings regardless of this idea or not. For example turn all residences blue from winning prizes in spire. Or buy premium expansions with saved diamonds.

How is the current system where there is one building better than all others offered better?

Is that a subjective one as in I view one as better than the rest and you view a different one as best? I am certainly missing which building is best in the current event. I already see the game as having the system you are suggesting it just isn't precisely as you suggest. It looks like they do have tiers but use a range within that tier. The buildings you suggest to standardise pop all have variable culture, that is what balances them out and adds variety to the game and events. Those with more pop get less culture and vice versa, it creates flexibility to adjust my town as things change.

For example if I have a pop/culture building and the one on offer in the current event I feel doesn't suit my needs then I look to focus on different rewards. By the next event or 2 my situation has changed or I have changed chapters and then the next pop/culture might be appealing to me. This idea to me feels like things get too standardised and then I am just trying to win a skin for a certain building type. I also see the issue with RR as my first thought is great, don't need RR anymore I just get replacements in the next event (or 2 or 3).

I think the variability in the prizes within the tiers allows for greater flexibility and more decision making and variety in towns. This I think would see a little less variability than what there currently is even if that is in building type and not in skin.