Hey, IceIX (or any other devs)

DFiPL

Can I share a thought about the "roulette wheel" aspect of the Vault?

The term "confirmation bias" gets thrown around a lot, and while it's not directly applicable here, I'd focus on one key part of that: the idea that negative reinforcement amplifies things you otherwise might not pay as much attention to. It kind of feels like that's what's going on with the vault's "roulette wheel." When the "wheel" shows a couple really cool prizes in a row before stopping on the 2* whoopee cushion, and does that consistently, it's those 2* pulls the user is going to walk away remembering.

I went back and looked at all my taco vault pulls so far, and the occurrence of 2* really isn't "worse" than it should be...but that's not how it feels. Because what I remember is "tick...tick...BOOM," where I see two covers I want (or HP or ISO) teased in a row before I land on yet another Ares or Hawkeye.

This isn't a criticism of the Vault mechanic itself. I like that 2* odds are significantly lower than previously, and I'm glad to see 4* covers available. I pulled one on mobile the other day, which was the first 4* I'd had from any source but the daily login reward, on either mobile or PC, in maybe six months. So that was a really cool moment. I do like the vault.

I feel like the animation's "tease," combined with the lack of user control over payout, unnecessarily beats down most users, though.

Malcrof

I decided to spend some HP to go after some much needed 4*'s this vault (all 3 are ones i really need!) so far at 36/300 with only 1 3* pull, and it was not one from the week and not one that i needed. I do have 60 health packs and i got about 1k HP back.. but cmon, after pulling over 10% of the total vault, you would think i would have gotten at least 1 reward from the first page...

Punisher5784

I feel as if the vault tacos are worse despite the vaults purpose of increasing our odds for better rewards. Under the original system, I use to open a weeks worth of tacos to pull at least 2 3*s. Now with the new vault, last week I opened 20 tacos and got no 3*s characters. However, I did open 1500 HP (1000+250+250) which is enough to buy any 3* cover I want, but in reality it paid for my Antman roster slot. I'm not too fond of the vault thus far and I would like to see improvement as I hate being teased a 4* Thor only to open the 2* one.

I have read other players ideas, it would be cool to see a "Try Again" token. Reduce some of the 2*'s with these "Try Again" tokens or replace some 2*'s with boosts. There's just too many 2*'s in the vault for me to get excited about every time I earn a token.

DFiPL

Punisher5784 wrote:

I feel as if the vault tacos are worse despite the vaults purpose of increasing our odds for better rewards. Under the original system, I use to open a weeks worth of tacos to pull at least 2 3*s. Now with the new vault, last week I opened 20 tacos and got no 3*s characters. However, I did open 1500 HP (1000+250+250) which is enough to buy any 3* cover I want, but in reality it paid for my Antman roster slot. I'm not too fond of the vault thus far and I would like to see improvement as I hate being teased a 4* Thor only to open the 2* one.

I have read other players ideas, it would be cool to see a "Try Again" token. Reduce some of the 2*'s with these "Try Again" tokens or replace some 2*'s with boosts. There's just too many 2*'s in the vault for me to get excited about every time I earn a token.

I'm not in favor of eliminating 2* from the Vault, because there ARE players who need them. Not everybody who plays the game (or even DDQ) is someone who's been around for months and maxed their 2* roster. Some will be new players, and DDQ gives them a guaranteed route through that transition rather than the crapshoot that the standard tokens offer.

The problem is that for those who need the 3* and 4* rewards, that's what they're chasing when they redeem tokens, so a mechanic that teases what they want before giving them what they don't seems unnecessarily cruel. Maybe they would have had exactly the same results with a blind opening, the way the old tacos worked, but they're going to remember a 2* pulled in this fashion more, because the tease reinforces the negative feelings that go along with "aw, man, another Onslaught?"

So even though the odds are improved, both in terms of 20% lower 2* pull odds overall, and in terms of "if you whiff on the first nine tacos of a 5-day cycle, that 10th taco will have better odds of a desired reward than the first one did, so be off good cheer," that isn't how it's going to FEEL to most people.

And, yeah, I'm aware of the mathy types who say "once you pull something good, your odds of pulling anything else good are worse after that," but that's misdirection of a sort - people in that boat have already pulled at least one desirable reward. Maybe more. So, yes, the odds of getting future desirable rewards are worse, but they've had some success already.

This is more an example of "not only did you fail to get something you want, but the way we present that information to you is designed to make you feel it more keenly."

JVReal

I hold my thumb over the icon, wait about 5 seconds then double tap, and I get what I get, I hate seeing the logo's fly by and then tick by showing me what I didn't get, increasing the disappointment.

I've not been thrilled with what I've pulled since the Vault has been instituted, but it hasn't been any worse than the old way. It has not been better though.

Lidolas

I'm still holding all my tacos. I want really good chances at the 4 s I want.

Punisher5784

DFiPL wrote:

Punisher5784 wrote:

I feel as if the vault tacos are worse despite the vaults purpose of increasing our odds for better rewards. Under the original system, I use to open a weeks worth of tacos to pull at least 2 3*s. Now with the new vault, last week I opened 20 tacos and got no 3*s characters. However, I did open 1500 HP (1000+250+250) which is enough to buy any 3* cover I want, but in reality it paid for my Antman roster slot. I'm not too fond of the vault thus far and I would like to see improvement as I hate being teased a 4* Thor only to open the 2* one.

I have read other players ideas, it would be cool to see a "Try Again" token. Reduce some of the 2*'s with these "Try Again" tokens or replace some 2*'s with boosts. There's just too many 2*'s in the vault for me to get excited about every time I earn a token.

I'm not in favor of eliminating 2* from the Vault, because there ARE players who need them. Not everybody who plays the game (or even DDQ) is someone who's been around for months and maxed their 2* roster. Some will be new players, and DDQ gives them a guaranteed route through that transition rather than the crapshoot that the standard tokens offer.

The problem is that for those who need the 3* and 4* rewards, that's what they're chasing when they redeem tokens, so a mechanic that teases what they want before giving them what they don't seems unnecessarily cruel. Maybe they would have had exactly the same results with a blind opening, the way the old tacos worked, but they're going to remember a 2* pulled in this fashion more, because the tease reinforces the negative feelings that go along with "aw, man, another Onslaught?"

So even though the odds are improved, both in terms of 20% lower 2* pull odds overall, and in terms of "if you whiff on the first nine tacos of a 5-day cycle, that 10th taco will have better odds of a desired reward than the first one did, so be off good cheer," that isn't how it's going to FEEL to most people.

And, yeah, I'm aware of the mathy types who say "once you pull something good, your odds of pulling anything else good are worse after that," but that's misdirection of a sort - people in that boat have already pulled at least one desirable reward. Maybe more. So, yes, the odds of getting future desirable rewards are worse, but they've had some success already.

This is more an example of "not only did you fail to get something you want, but the way we present that information to you is designed to make you feel it more keenly."

I agree that the animation of the vault is more of a tease than anything. My argument is there are so many ways to earn 2*'s now that the 2* transition can be a month at best. I see more 2* players rocking 3*'s, skipping the 2* entirely (which I disagree with). The point is, even 2* players do not want 2*'s, we've had enough of them. The 3* transition is much quicker that they need to focus on making 4*'s more obtainable, which they are trying to do but it is not enough. The vault is not the answer.

Virus_Type_V

I hit on Hawkeye icon...
it stopped on Fist...

..opened health packs

optimus2861

My distaste for the vault animation is that it may make an unsuspecting user feel like they're in control, that if they just pull again, and play close attention, they'll click at just the right moment to hit that desired reward. Thus creating the expectation of a 'slot machine' mechanic, even though it's all just smoke & mirrors; the moment you click the token, the server has already determined your outcome.

It feels like there's an attempt at psychological manipulation which is just slimy, and this game shouldn't stoop to it.

Punisher5784

optimus2861 wrote:

My distaste for the vault animation is that it may make an unsuspecting user feel like they're in control, that if they just pull again, and play close attention, they'll click at just the right moment to hit that desired reward. Thus creating the expectation of a 'slot machine' mechanic, even though it's all just smoke & mirrors; the moment you click the token, the server has already determined your outcome.

It feels like there's an attempt at psychological manipulation which is just slimy, and this game shouldn't stoop to it.

I find it amusing that sometimes I'll click on a 2* and it just stops, no additional movements, just gives me the 2* but if I click on Starlord it moves a few places. I rather the devs give us an option to turn off the animation altogether, waste of time, no additional excitement.

Unknown

Virus Type V wrote:

I hit on Hawkeye icon...
it stopped on Fist...

..opened health packs

And that's when I chuck my phone for the day.

Personally, im not sure if its the vault or my finally being on the verge of 3 star transition, (my 2s are all full covered, and some are near level cap) but the vaults just made me start doing what I never did in the past, and that's hoard tokens. Im still not at the point I earn guaranteed 2 a day, mind you, but I think its best to just hoard and wait till its a week I need the featureds and have a healthy amount of tokens to swing for them.

I still feel it's whale bait, hoping a player with disposable funds will see a vault with something they want and will foot for a large pack of tokens. Personally, the pulls are still over costed for me, so it's not encouraging any purchases from me, (for me, any RL money is going toward roster slots at this point) but maybe they're having luck with it.

rawfsu

I would LOVE to see the Sweet and Savory Vaults mirror the Independence Vault. Fifty rewards total instead of 300 on a rotating schedule weekly schedule. I know that would be a heavier load on the developers, but then again, I've been reading about players able to "shake" their vaults at will, so perhaps the Vaults are preprogrammed already? Also, I think with the introduction of Growth Industry, there's a possibility to cross this over to the Vault rewards. Perhaps for clearing similar challenging events for veterans, we can get a token that eliminates 2* pulls, leaving just prizes and 3* and 4* covers. Even better, maybe these new events can get their own vaults with no 2* covers. Either way, I think the current system can be tweaked. I highly doubt anyone is ever going to put up the money to buy out a sweet or savory vault with 300 prizes in it, so why not make it more tempting by lowering the amount of prizes available?

udonomefoo

REALLY wish I had a bunch of hoarded tokens for this weeks vault. PX blue, lots of witch blue and panther blacks. Plus the randoms have several I need.

I'll have 5 tokens tonight, prob pull them during/after my sub end grind (I've been hoarding sweet and pulling savory). I don't like pulling tokens when I don't need health packs, which is a kind of weird side effect dynamic.

Buret0

Punisher5784 wrote:

I rather the devs give us an option to turn off the animation altogether, waste of time, no additional excitement.

You are forgetting Buret0's second rule of Puzzleland.

MarvelMan

The problem I have with the vault is that it overly encourages hoarding. I know that the more tokens I have, once I start opening the better odds Ill have to pull one of the things I need/want.....so I hoard. And Im doing it even more than the previous version of Tacos. And I feel worse about it because I have been pulling fewer 3* covers, let alone the ones I need. I know that once I decided to start opening it will be better, but talk about delayed gratification.

Plus, as mentioned above it feels slimey in the mechanics of opening as well as if you have a good vault and open your 40 Tacos...but get nothing, you would be tempted to pay since you know that your odds are up.

nwman

On the plus side, at least now you know you can spend $500ish max for a cover, before you could spend $1000's and still miss a color of a 4* you needed. And health packs are better than 2*'s. You can get 2 vault 40 packs for around the cost of 1 other 42 pack I think.

In the thing PVP event I think the odds of the thing were 6%, he was the only 4* available. Imagine the cost to hit all 3 color covers, or at least that 1 or 2 you need to get the 1st of each. Sure some luck out right away, but imagine the guy that spends $1000 and still doesn't get one of the colors. How pissed would you be, and when do you cut your losses.

There are still too many 2* rewards in the vault however i think, even take 50 - 100 out.

Also, all tokens should have health pack and hp rewards like the vault in place of some 2* rewards. The way I see it, high HP rewards (1000+) are almost like a wild card to buy a covered cover.

The only issue with health pack rewards are they have to come when you either have 10+ or 0 - 1 near the end of an event. If would could have regenerating health packs separate from purchased or won ones it would be a lot more useful, like many have suggested.

Unknown

but it hasn't been any worse than the old way. It has not been better though.

DFiPL

Kirestananderson01 wrote:

but it hasn't been any worse than the old way. It has not been better though.

In terms of rewards, it hasn't been worse. Maybe slightly better for me, when you consider that under the old system you had about an 80% shot of pulling a 2* cover. I'm at about 58.5% pulling 2* covers since the introduction of the vault, so that's an improvement overall! Whether I'm pulling ISO, health packs, 3* or Hero Points (I've yet to pull a 4* on Steam, but have done so once on PC), the "usability" of my rewards has been much better than the old taco system.

The problem, really my ONLY problem, with the vault is the perception. The "tick, tick, BOOM" I alluded to upthread. When you get the good reward-good reward-LOLno progression as the wheel 'slows' after a click. Those duds stick with you (at least they do with me), and so even if my overall pull rate is better than what you'd expect based on the odds at 0/300 pulled, it doesn't FEEL that way. I have to look at my spreadsheet to remind myself. Without that tease, I suspect having pulled 9 3* out of 40 tacos would be closer to top of mind.

ThePLAV

I just spent a token (Moonstone) specifically to double-check this.

You can skip the ticking by tapping the screen again.

spectator

The vault is mostly great and those that dont think so may not be looking at it correctly. For the 2 to 3* transitioners or 3* players hunting for more 3*, nothing has really changed from the old taco system. You hoard for the rounds that you need the character then go crazy trying to pull what you want. For the 3* to 4* transitioners, the vault is not really what you should be using to transition. Hoard and use vault tokens for health packs when you need some for your PVP pushes, no point hoarding for 3 months just to try and guarantee yourself a 4* cover since you should be regularly getting them in PVP anyway. 3 months is equivalent to about 36 4* if you hit the 1000 progression every pvp. So really the additional 3 from the vault is really insignificant. Everyone should just use the vault as you would the old taco system and revel in the fact that you now also have a very small chance of getting 4* and 10000 iso rewards.

GothicKratos

Short Answer; I like The Vault. I hate the animation.