Tournament Changes

[DeletedUser19598]

I work in user experience field and maybe my pessimism comes from being so deep in the workings of product experience, but this change is extremely counter motivating to play Elvenar any further. Before anyone says 'we need to test and see for ourselves' or 'benefits outweigh costs'; I have already followed that in beta and MinMax's formula is 100% accurate. My thoughts on this are not based on personal opinion, but rather on numerical objective facts.

Let me explain why I feel so, there are two aspects of Elvenar;
1. Build and progress your city. Without this aspect there is no more reason to log in anymore or play any further.
2. Put the outcome of your effort to test and get gratification for the time and thought you put in it.

Without the second aspect of testing, choices and planning done for the first aspect become pointless. That reward system that tells you how well you did is what pushes you towards wanting more out of your city.

Let's look at the things that fall under first category, Build and Progress aspect; Research, Expansions, Building and leveling AWs, upgrading buildings, improving layout, optimazing number of building types (culture/residence/WS/resource buildings).
Inno's business model relies on people wanting more out of their cities or wanting it faster. Collector's drive is particularly a big push for wanting more AWs and keeping event buildings and therefore needing more space, as well as hoarder's drive for people wanting more resource buildings hence needing more space for them (and the residence/WS need they create). Even when I know I am being tricked into their business model I didn't have a problem with paying money for what I want, that extra space that will satisfy my drive of wanting more.

And that drive was gratified by the way Inno set up how I can put my effort and (time and money) investment to test: Spire and Tournaments. I enjoyed doing better than before once I invested a bit more into planning as well as time/money.

Now it is a clear fact, (not an opinion but rather a mathematical calculation reality) there are two high optimum points in terms of how well your city can perform in the test part. One is as early as Orc chapter, other is mid-15 chapter. If you do the optimized Orc chapter build, you can stop there and your progress will only make your success in spire and tourney worse till you hit that next optimum point at chap 15. And beyond that there is no rewards, just downsides to any change you do in terms of build and progress.

I do not like the idea of stop progressing at such an early chapter at Orcs, and intend to keep pushing to 15. But knowing that at point I will have to stop makes me really unmotivated to progress faster. Knowing that there is nothing more I will want out of my city at that point, combined with having no reason to want it faster; makes me disengaged. What baffles my mind is that it is 100% againt Inno's business model interests as well!

My thought is that they assumed players would never know about these facts, but we DO know thanks to efforts of many. One would think that since this is the case now, Inno as a business would improve things. But sadly I am involved in how things work enough to know that; Inno upper management decided that this game has enough content and it should cease development costs for more content; then some middle manager was tasked with reducing player progression speed; and some developer was tasked by that middle manager to accomplish that. At this point admitting their work is poor quality will make that developer and the middle manager look bad, so they will pressure community manager to keep people happy, and paid community manager will pressure unpaid volunteer moderators to achieve that. Those moderators who one day want a paid community manager role will try to do so. And this will be the end of the story. A sad end to a beautiful game..

Could you detail the sweet spot in chapter 15? Could it be completing all the military investigations down to the frog and nothing else?

 

[qaccy]

@qaccy
1. Yes, some expansions helpimprove your city in the tournament since space lets you upgrade your barracks, or add factories for catering etc. but if you use space for decoration, FA, events, or settlements, those are going to hurt you going forwards. Buying space used to either help you, or at worst was neutral.
2. Again, some AW help your city with tournaments, some like the BTG do not. This comes down again to space hurting you.
3. Yet again, some techs increase your abilities in the tournament, most do not. Inno claims the balance favors progress, but they are mistaken.

A few points of clarification:
Yes, choices should matter, that's what makes games interesting, but the choice to not advance or grow or improve shouldn't be encouraged.
Inno's basic mistakes in their calculation are conceptual. E.g. if you upgrade a wonder that increases your catering ability by 1.1% and increases the costs by 1% then inno thinks this is a win for the player. The problem is if you don't cater 100% of the time then that 1.1% drops well below the cost increase and you have hurt yourself by upgrading your wonder.
--------------------------------------
The old system was simple:
"oh these SS techs will make the tournament a little harder, so I better push on and get that next barracks upgrade"
and either the barracks upgrade made you better than you were before, or not quite.
If it wasn't quite enough, you could hang out for a bit and "grind" by upgrading wonders, clearing the map for expansions to increase goods productions, etc. Many options were there and they were all good.

Now every choice comes with a downside that almost always outweighs the good because each difficulty increase is multiplied by each other and affects both catering and fighting but the upsides do not.

You're missing a bit of the point as well, unfortunately. I'm not speaking in terms of just tournaments (or the Spire, for that matter). These balancing factors consider the game as a whole. Even if an AW doesn't directly help with the Tournaments, you're presumably still getting a benefit from it elsewhere. If not, why did you build it? Same deal with expansions and research. It can be argued that it'd be 'better' if the only things that affected tournament/spire difficulty were things that only impact military strength and goods production, but to try saying that anything that doesn't directly boost either is now somehow worthless or a net negative isn't accurate, because these things are still providing benefits to your city as a whole.

In short, I don't believe any of these factors add up to the right idea being not to increase them simply because it's also going to make numbers in the tournaments/spire go up. Taken as a whole, the benefits of each still look to outweigh this drawback.

 

[Pheryll]

Even if an AW doesn't directly help with the Tournaments, you're presumably still getting a benefit from it elsewhere. If not, why did you build it?

Where do you spend the majority of your orcs, coins, supplies, goods, etc.? With the new tournament system, it could easily be the tournament and spire. Moving through the chapters increases the tournament/spire expenses more than it increases your production.

 

[Deleted User - 1178646]

You're missing a bit of the point as well, unfortunately. I'm not speaking in terms of just tournaments (or the Spire, for that matter). These balancing factors consider the game as a whole. Even if an AW doesn't directly help with the Tournaments, you're presumably still getting a benefit from it elsewhere. If not, why did you build it? Same deal with expansions and research. It can be argued that it'd be 'better' if the only things that affected tournament/spire difficulty were things that only impact military strength and goods production, but to try saying that anything that doesn't directly boost either is now somehow worthless or a net negative isn't accurate, because these things are still providing benefits to your city as a whole.

In short, I don't believe any of these factors add up to the right idea being not to increase them simply because it's also going to make numbers in the tournaments/spire go up. Taken as a whole, the benefits of each still look to outweigh this drawback.

Yeah like rankingpoints, more relics, or faster trough new chapter. or rewards that are "fractional" at best, like the supplies from excavation which are a fraction of a proper workshop setup, or supplies from tome of secrets which is both fractional and something you cannot control as it's bound to your scout.
Or yeah, broken rune fragments lol how awesome is that?

Some wonders are at best nice to have, you build them for fun, "just because you can" or to gain rainking points.
Each wonder cost both space (expansion) and wonderlevels that both add to the difficulty.

The fact stays they are detrimental to the tournament experience. no matter how you try to spin it.

 

[StarLoad]

This is a GAME and for a game to be successful it needs to be fun, this isn't a win/lose game, so fun is what it must be and with a challenge too.

Take the fun away and what is left... very little and that is how it is starting to feel no fun and all work. I refused to progress into Ch 15 as I can see nothing but work and struggle ahead, and no fun. Now as I finally focus on just AW that becomes an issue as it may/may not cause my tournaments to become harder and I will not get the KP for going deep in the tourney like everyone before me in CH15+ did. So I am screwed there too and hey remember its just a game and the FUN aspect...... NOT in my city now

Not sure what I will do but retirement is an option

 

[Iyapo1]

Some wonders are at best nice to have, you build them for fun, "just because you can" or to gain rainking points.

This has always been true. ? Most wonders are less than wonderful and were never worth their footprint.

Some players want them all. Okay, great. That does not mean they were ever worth having to competitive players.

 

[Henroo]

Another giant arse nerf we didn't need: the new tournament format will MASSIVELY screw players over in events, since now you're going to be forced to gobble up map encounters for both the, "solve 4 encounters OR 16 tournament encounters", etc... type quests, and the "gain X relics" quests...

It *used* to be that during events, I could for example, after the first round of the tournament do things like:
a) when getting a "solve X encounters OR Y tournament encounters", I could complete just 3 of the 4 encounters, and move on to the next province, there by leaving the relics unclaimed.

b) for the "gain X relics" quests, I would be able to gather up the single fight from the highest paying provinces, thus saving a few extra encounters for the inevitable next round of the "complete encounters/tournament encounters" quests.

But now? I'm fethed over completely, because the idiot devs are too lazy to fix the specific "encounters or tournament encounters" quests, meaning you're now basically forced to do potentially 10x (or more!) map encounters, as the tournaments don't count for jack anymore!
Even worse, your crafting is now basically forced to waste resources & keep a relic pack waiting to collect as a way to help make the "gain 20-30+ relics" quests even remotely sustainable.


Great change Inno - way to feth up the game to nearly unplayable levels.

Surely they will change the requirements for tournament encounters in future events to reflect that there are now only 25% as many available. It would be crazy not to.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

Surely they will change the requirements for tournament encounters in future events to reflect that there are now only 25% as many available. It would be crazy not to.

Like someone else pointed out, they already did that weeks ago.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

This is a GAME and for a game to be successful it needs to be fun, this isn't a win/lose game, so fun is what it must be and with a challenge too.

Take the fun away and what is left... very little and that is how it is starting to feel no fun and all work. I refused to progress into Ch 15 as I can see nothing but work and struggle ahead, and no fun. Now as I finally focus on just AW that becomes an issue as it may/may not cause my tournaments to become harder and I will not get the KP for going deep in the tourney like everyone before me in CH15+ did. So I am screwed there too and hey remember its just a game and the FUN aspect...... NOT in my city now

Not sure what I will do but retirement is an option

And what is work for some players is fun for a lot of other players. If no one thought the newest chapters were any fun, Inno would have stopped adding chapters or just shut the whole game down.

 

[The Unbeliever]

Surely they will change the requirements for tournament encounters in future events to reflect that there are now only 25% as many available. It would be crazy not to.

They've made them even - ie: solve 4 encounters OR 4 tournament encounters

The problems though become:
a) The new tournament difficulty is literally a giant 'feth you' to every single paying customer, and an especially harsh ganking of end-game players...
The more expansions (idiotically including premium expansions) a player has, the harder the tournament becomes.
The more AW levels a player has, the harder the tournaments become.
The more you research and advance your city, the harder the tournaments become.

b) You are now forced into an 'all or nothing' gambit with the tournaments.
ie: no longer can you say, complete 3/4 encounters per tournament province and thus, save completing it for the relics for the next quest/s down the line.

Because of the above, players are now basically forced to choose between:
1. race through chapter progression as fast as possible due to much higher world map expansion
2. accept infinitely higher costs on the world map
3. ignore events so you can proceed at your own pace
None of that is good, and is basically just Inno forcing their way to play down our collective throats by removing player choices & strategy.


In essence, they decided that players were earning too many KP's for their liking in the weekly tournaments, and have basically decided to burn down the house to kill a single spider. >.<

 

[StarLoad]

And what is work for some players is fun for a lot of other players. If no one thought the newest chapters were any fun, Inno would have stopped adding chapters or just shut the whole game down.

Learn to read better, the post is written in the first person all about I and my and nowhere did I apply it to others so your reply has nothing to do with my post and Sorry upfront if you take offense to this reply. I am not in a good mood about this whole matter

 

[StarLoad]

In essence, they decided that players were earning too many KP's for their liking in the weekly tournaments, and have basically decided to burn down the house to kill a single spider. >.<

I heard it was a mouse, but yeah same effect

 

[SoggyShorts]

You're missing a bit of the point as well, unfortunately. I'm not speaking in terms of just tournaments (or the Spire, for that matter). These balancing factors consider the game as a whole. Even if an AW doesn't directly help with the Tournaments, you're presumably still getting a benefit from it elsewhere........Taken as a whole, the benefits of each still look to outweigh this drawback.

I get your point, I just think you're wrong.
The tournament and spire consume the vast majority of an active player's resources especially the military in the late game and absolutely in the end game.
You can't brush off such a major aspect as being just a part of the whole.

 

[Henroo]

I have written down the scores of my cities from this tournament since it is the last one under this format. Gonna put the paper in a drawer and hold onto it. I am curious to see how far in the future and how much I have to advance before I match these scores under the new format.

 

[Deleted User - 1178646]

This has always been true. ? Most wonders are less than wonderful and were never worth their footprint.

Some players want them all. Okay, great. That does not mean they were ever worth having to competitive players.

There was no real downside at building them. so it was more like "why not?"

Now the main question is "why build them" and "why place expansions" and "why advance in the tech beyond chapter 15".

I have written down the scores of my cities from this tournament since it is the last one under this format. Gonna put the paper in a drawer and hold onto it. I am curious to see how far in the future and how much I have to advance before I match these scores under the new format.

Top scores will be lower (sustainable, you could always throw in many reserves)
And thats fine btw, my only gripe is that player A has SS / goods cost X and player in at the same stage in game cost Y. and that these cost differences arent a few % but runnning un the hundreds and thousands of %

I also do not like the more "spire like" enemies.

 

[Yogi Dave]

It's a new game in many aspects and the same game in so many others. It will take adapting to just as it always has with other changes Inno has thrown at us. So, you learn what works and what doesn't and go from there. I plan on progressing my city through the chapters and upgrading AWs. I will be getting rid of a couple of them to begin with and probably a few more as I see what ch 17 brings to the table. Right now I have 308 AW levels. Next week it will be down to 300. That will just drop my base squad size from 1012 to 1002. If it had been 1 battle per prov this week, but no other changes, my base SS would have been 930. Next week the lower prov numbers will have very very little troop lose, but the higher ones will have more. I just have to judge how high to go so I can sustain week to week tourneys. I won't be able to go as high as I could before, therefore I'll be getting fewer KP. Oh well. That's the way the cookie crumbles. It's on with the game for me. … and yes, I'd like some changes to the changes with the tourneys, but it's been almost 2 and 1/2 months since it was released in beta. I doubt there will be any real changes for a while.

 

[Darielle]

They say that the difficulty in the old tourney system is the same per star ... in other words the first province on the first star has the same difficulty as the 10th province on the first star. I find that hard to believe. I cater, and the cater costs are significantly higher with each province. Do you mean that it's only equal difficulty if you fight, but higher difficulty if you cater?

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

They say that the difficulty in the old tourney system is the same per star ... in other words the first province on the first star has the same difficulty as the 10th province on the first star. I find that hard to believe. I cater, and the cater costs are significantly higher with each province. Do you mean that it's only equal difficulty if you fight, but higher difficulty if you cater?

The amount of stuff you need does go up with every province, including troops. But the 1st star of each province, the enemy only has 85% of your troop size, so the fighting was always the same difficulty in province 1 or province 100 for the 1st star.

 

[Darielle]

The amount of stuff you need does go up with every province, including troops. But the 1st star of each province, the enemy only has 85% of your troop size, so the fighting was always the same difficulty in province 1 or province 100 for the 1st star.

So it simply costs more the higher you go, but you aren't in more danger of losing? Is that the crux of it? Thanks.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

So it simply costs more the higher you go, but you aren't in more danger of losing? Is that the crux of it? Thanks.

In the system that ended today? Yes. In the new system that starts Tuesday? No.