The state of the game

tomatus89

I really don't like the direction this game is taking. I want to play it, I want to spend a little money in it (a reasonable amount). But no story in new expansions, high prices, low drop rates, removing PWs without notice, apparently rotating sets out (see my other post)... All this is frustrating and pushing me out of it. I don't have a lot of time to play it, I haven't finished the story mode, I play events and quick battles very casually, so I don't gain a lot of runes/crystals, so I can't buy many new cards when a expansion comes out. This game doesn't care about the casual player who just wants to relax and play when I have a few minutes to spare. I would gladly pay a little bit each expansion to support the devs and to be able to catch up with more hardcore players who get more crystals in events/quick battles, but with all these issues I won't. If this continues like this I think I'll finish up story mode and most of the (not so impossible) challenges and be done with this game...

raidan

I think you hit this right on the head. It's becoming more and more obvious they do not care about those who are casually playing the game, likely because they hardly generate any revenue. At this point, they're going more for those who want to buy every card or who want to compete at the higher levels.

By rotating out cards and making constant limited time purchases, they are only further alienating casual players while putting more pressure on the whales. If enough players are willing to shell out high prices and also be willing to handle terrible drop rates, they have little incentive to lower prices or increase drop rates.

I have a lot of respect for the technical developers, who are in touch with the community and who are providing a fun game.

In the end, they are a company and their number one goal is to make money. The fine line they balance is keeping enough players interested so they increase their chance of a small % of them paying money. The higher the prices, the less people they need to reach their monetary goals.

glggwp

I bought nahiri last night but only noticed all those stupid changes today... They r making me not want to play this game immediately...

shteev

The change in my attitude to this game surprises even me. I was loving the PvP and getting ready to spend some real money on good value offers to support the game.

What a difference a day makes.

Is this some kind of psychological experiment to see how much you can piss off your player base without them quitting?

raidan

glggwp wrote:

I bought nahiri last night but only noticed all those stupid changes today... They r making me not want to play this game immediately...

Don't fall for the sunk cost fallacy. Any time or money you've spent on this game is gone and should not be used to determine if you want to continue playing or not. I'm in a similar boat as you are right now.

raidan

shteev wrote:

The change in my attitude to this game surprises even me. I was loving the PvP and getting ready to spend some real money on good value offers to support the game.

What a difference a day makes.

Is this some kind of psychological experiment to see how much you can piss off your player base without them quitting?

I think it's exactly that. A bold experiment to see if they can get more money by implementing surprise limited time situations than they lose money from upsetting the whales.

shteev

They could certainly sell off a server or two if all the casuals stopped playing. They could just make a bunch of sock puppets so the whales don't notice.

glggwp

The best days were pve event days... U get 400 for completion and buy 1 mythic and casually grind couple qb to afford a big box with almost all the cards available... And all the pw there too...

raidan

glggwp wrote:

The best days were pve event days... U get 400 for completion and buy 1 mythic and casually grind couple qb to afford a big box...

I think this is the exact reason they stopped the PVE events (at least for now). They rewarded casuals far too much and prevented whales from spending money.

Fitomagic

At least 1-2 month ago i stop spending money in the game, because the same reasons, low drop rates and high prices that dont assure good cards, i suggest all the players who are frustrated with this dont spent any money cause that will increase the frustración

jimilinho_

Welcome to the future.

The game is following the exact path of the marvel variant and you couldn't play that casually, It was either compete hard or don't compete. The coalition feature reinforces that. The next step will be the nerfing of old cards and P/W (Once enough of us have Kiora she will get hit hard with the nerf hammer) and release of OP new cards.

It's why I eventually stopped playing marvel PQ. If you weren't constantly playing and paying you just fall behind.

Just be prepared to expect the same from this

raidan

jimilinho_ wrote:

Welcome to the future.

The game is following the exact path of the marvel variant and you couldn't play that casually, It was either compete hard or don't compete. The coalition feature reinforces that. The next step will be the nerfing of old cards and P/W (Once enough of us have Kiora she will get hit hard with the nerf hammer) and release of OP new cards.

It's why I eventually stopped playing marvel PQ. If you weren't constantly playing and paying you just fall behind.

Just be prepared to expect the same from this

Thank you for the heads up Jimilnho! I never played MPQ before, so I was unaware of this transition. This is definitely tipping the scales into quitting territory. I'm just thinking of all the free time I'll have if I stop playing, it's becoming quite an attractive option.

tomatus89

Welcome to the future.

The game is following the exact path of the marvel variant and you couldn't play that casually, It was either compete hard or don't compete. The coalition feature reinforces that. The next step will be the nerfing of old cards and P/W (Once enough of us have Kiora she will get hit hard with the nerf hammer) and release of OP new cards.

It's why I eventually stopped playing marvel PQ. If you weren't constantly playing and paying you just fall behind.

Just be prepared to expect the same from this

This sucks... I really like the game, its really unique. But not giving an opportunity to the people who don't have the time to play all day long or can't invest huge amounts of money is bad...

As an example, I also play Hearthstone and at least in that game you have a chance. I happily buy Adventures with money because they give me good value and are fun to play (similar to story mode in this game), and I do daily quests to grind gold for the Expansions (to buy boosters packs). This is a good balance, I can (almost) keep up with the players who spend lots of money. Of course I'll never have all the cards and I can't play some decks because I don't have certain Epics/Legendaries, but at least I can be competitive, and I can beat most decks and reach high ranks.

tdellaringa

All freemium games are geared toward whales, that's just the way it works.

raidan

tdellaringa wrote:

All freemium games are geared toward whales, that's just the way it works.

When a successful game manages to upset and drive off some of its whales though then the decisions they've made are poor.

darksektori1

There are many issues no doubt, where to start.

Overpowered Plainswalkers, this applies to the optional ones you have to purchase, some of these are OK but others are insanely overpowered, to the point where fighting them in PvP battles, where it gives your opponent multiple advantages almost to the point where you get owned in the first few turns and have no fair chance whatsoever, I find myself having to quit most of the time because there's no point of even trying when you essentially lost the match from the word

Most of the time you spend actual money it's usually wasted. You could spend a small fortune of buying packs of cards that yield nothing of any use whatsoever. Usually it's a bunch of cards you already have and if you do get rare and mythic cards they are useless or duplicates anyway. I bought several pack bundles which was costly and every rare was a useless duplicate or just plain useless altogether, and no mythics. It just seems unfair to spend money on cards you can't use or you don't need altogether. Of all the packs I've spent real money on since I started playing 90 percent I've traded in as duplicates. There should be a card trading system implimented so players can get rid of duplicates in exchange of useful cards that they need. It would make deck building less tedious and easier.

There seems to be an ongoing tactic by players who decide to go idle the turn right before they will loose. Since you can't claim a win until they take their final turn they just go idle to prohibit you from winning, so either you have to quit which uses up your plainswalkers health and resets your Winstreak or wait till they grow a pear and actually take their loss, either way there needs to be some kind of countermeasures for this chessy ****, like a time limit one can remain idle for that automatically gives them a loss and won't effect the player who was about to win.

Story Mode, what story?

Pqmtg-

darksektori1 wrote:

There seems to be an ongoing tactic by players who decide to go idle the turn right before they will loose. Since you can't claim a win until they take their final turn they just go idle to prohibit you from winning, so either you have to quit which uses up your plainswalkers health and resets your Winstreak or wait till they grow a pear and actually take their loss, either way there needs to be some kind of countermeasures for this chessy ****, like a time limit one can remain idle for that automatically gives them a loss and won't effect the player who was about to win.

FYI, when you're playing pvp, you're playing against the AI running another player's deck. There's a current bug where the AI gets stuck and doesn't make a next move. I hope you haven't been wasting time playing chicken with the AI.


Hint : the AI will win

Plastic

All the SoI info before the patch hit was getting me excited and I was going to buy Nahiri, but after hearing about all this nonsense about phasing out sets and PWs? Nope.

Buret0

So many bugs in the new set, and coalitions are a bad idea. They will eventually make it so the top players all come together and get increased drop rates and push the more casual players to the fringe. It will also cause increased burn-out for the top players who have to keep playing over and over to get their alliance the top scores.

speakupaskanswer

I generally don't like too much whining (and I feel there's too much going on in this forum). I like the new set and most of the mechanics, as it really plays different than BfZ.

I don't understand the whole Planeswalkers thing (and I was saving for a new one too, which I'll have to wait for now). An (honest) explanation would be really helpful.

What bothers me most are how bugged the new set is. I really can't believe they put all that effort and advertising into cards that mostly don't work. Transform often happens randomly, many cards have individual bugs. It really feels like they released it untested because the bugs are so obvious.

Most players who complain are "whales" and have invested money, so their complaints seem reasonable. But that is one reason why I wouldn't invest a single dollar into a game like this. I really like the game and I'm playing more than I should. I feel, I can compete relatively well in everything but QB, which seems fair. I don't think you need to buy anything to still enjoy this game. The only thing in the way of enjoyment for me are the new bugs in an already buggy game.

Pqmtg-

Buret0 wrote:

So many bugs in the new set, and coalitions are a bad idea. They will eventually make it so the top players all come together and get increased drop rates and push the more casual players to the fringe. It will also cause increased burn-out for the top players who have to keep playing over and over to get their alliance the top scores.

Is there word on this or is that just speculation?

So far I have no clue how coalitions will work.