REQUEST: Preview of New Blocks Yet to Land on the Board.

MrHappyface

I find this game infuriating! I am not merely saying this because I am a poor loser. I get my ♥♥♥ kicked all the time in MOBA & fighting games, but I can still enjoy those games. When I make a mistake in those games, I can usually see alternative moves that could have been made & understand how the consequences of the mistake could have been avoided.

In this game, when you destroy blocks, new blocks will fall down to replace the destroyed blocks, sometimes the replacement blocks will just conveniently share the same color & coinciding create a chain reaction, doing massive damage. I am not talking about the pieces that are already on the board (where you can see) & merely fall down. I speaking of the new pieces that weren't on the board previously. Because of this, destroying block on the bottom half of the board is usually more advantageous then destroying the block near the top edge of the board.

Unlike most puzzle games, such as "Tetris", there is no preview of the new incoming blocks that would appear from the top of the game board, so there is no way to prepare for them, offensively or defensively.

Many times, chain combos will just happen by accident & sometimes for massive damage; sometimes for you, sometimes against you. That is a HUGE reward that is being giving out, not for any brilliant strategy or careful planning, but just by sheer randomness. Unless one team is heavily more over-powered than the other, without a preview of the next set of falling blocks, the outcome of the match relies too heavily on luck. You might as well be playing a slot machine.

I realize that the game User Interface is crowded enough as is, so perhaps instead of cramming the preview box on the same screen with everything else in the game, how about we keep the preview screen hidden, until the user push a button, or click on a link, or scroll off screen?

So what cha think?
Leave feedback plz!

Unknown

Someone has never played Bejeweled or any Puzzle Quest before. It won't work. You just have to make those matches hoping that the RNG gods will cascade.

Nonce Equitaur 2

I could see that working with colored lines or something similar.



There should be an option to turn it on/off if something like that is added.

GumisK

That's not how Puzzle Quest games work. If you're annoyed by the unpredictability, stick with Tetris. I greatly enjoy the luck factor involved - I curse and despair when it's against me, and exalt in glory when it's in my favor. That's part of the game. Don't you dare take it away from me.

Dayv

Doing this would completely change the strategy and balance of the game. It's something you either design in from day one or never do without a complete overhaul of every mechanic. And the idea of toggling it on or off is silly -- it's such a huge helper that toggling it off would basically amount to enabling "always lose" mode.

Nonce Equitaur 2

Gambit, Psylocke, and Spiderman all have minor precognitive skills, so it wouldn't be out of the question for Gambit to have something like this as a passive ability.

Dayv

Nonce Equitaur 2 wrote:

Gambit, Psylocke, and Spiderman all have minor precognitive skills, so it wouldn't be out of the question for Gambit to have something like this as a passive ability.

It should be out of the question, because it would be a game-breaking, overpowered ability.

Nonce Equitaur 2

DayvBang wrote:

Nonce Equitaur 2 wrote:

Gambit, Psylocke, and Spiderman all have minor precognitive skills, so it wouldn't be out of the question for Gambit to have something like this as a passive ability.

It should be out of the question, because it would be a game-breaking, overpowered ability.

Even if it's just a preview of a single line? So, you're telling me that being able to get a fore-warning of a single line would be more powerful than Daken's red, Panther's black, or BWGS's green? That if Gambit had this single power, to foresee one line of info, you'd choose him over Mags and Spiderman, even though he'd only be able to do match damage?

Unknown

Nonce Equitaur 2 wrote:

I could see that working with colored lines or something similar.



There should be an option to turn it on/off if something like that is added.

That would be an awesome, yet unfair advantage to who you are playing against. So I'm down.
Kidding. Actually, as much as I hate the cascades that crash down sometimes, I would much rather have the gamble aspect of what's about to happen. Kinda like using Storm's Green feature.

Nonce Equitaur 2

I'm thinking this should be a passive for a single character like Gambit ... Or maybe Loki. Those that might use a stacked deck. The more Foresight covers, the more info they get.

MrHappyface

DayvBang wrote:

It should be out of the question, because it would be a game-breaking, overpowered ability.

OK, educate me: How would this be overpowered & game-breaking?

I can see this being game breaking if only certain characters had access to this feature,
but if EVERY character had access to this, then how does this give any character/player an unfair advantage over another?

It's not like I'm saying only "premium" members should have access to this feature.

Unknown

But the problem is half the fun in this game is the unpredictability of the board. This isn't Tetris or Robotnik Mean Bean Machine. It was broken in Puzzle Quest 1 when enemies on the highest difficulty was able to see everything that was about to come down and was programed to make the biggest cascade. Three extra lines is broken use the eight lines you got to make the best moves you can make.

MrHappyface

Kuchiri wrote:

But the problem is half the fun in this game is the unpredictability of the board. This isn't Tetris or Robotnik Mean Bean Machine. It was broken in Puzzle Quest 1 when enemies on the highest difficulty was able to see everything that was about to come down and was programed to make the biggest cascade. Three extra lines is broken use the eight lines you got to make the best moves you can make.

So in PQ1, did both the player & the enemy ai have a preview, or was it only the ai that got to see it?

So, EVERYONE in here favor chaos over control?
You guys would rather "get lucky" rather then say,
"Yep, I've earned that. Your death came by my calculations!"

OK, so let's nerf this preview idea then.
Would just ONE or two line(s) of blocks be game breaking?
Or what if you have to use a boost/iso/coins to get the preview?
Or if that preview only lasted for "X" number of turns.
Or if the preview only shows up when your team is down to it's last character.
Or if the preview will only show up for "X' number of turns when certain conditions are met:
such as killing/losing a character or matching "X" number of blocks.
Or the preview will only show up if your previous turn didn't take longer then "X" amount of seconds.
Or the preview is only available for certain events.
Or in order for the preview to be available, both players have to have it enabled in the option menu.

I could probably come up with hundreds of restrictions & limitations.
Or if the preview was only available for Mac user & not Windows user. TROLLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL!!!

Unknown

I'll answer all your question in order.

It's not favoring chaos over control, that is how the game has been played for over a decade.
That's most the fun in PQ and MPQ is that awesome feeling of almost dying and you keep on matching. In PQ you got bonus EXP and an extra turn.

In PQ1 only the hardest difficulty AI got to see all lines. You couldn't ever. You had to hope you did enough damage to kill them within a few turns.
Spending money on Preview would make this game unplayable.
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER

There I believe I answered all of your questions.

Unknown

Sometimes I am lucky, sometimes AI is lucky. I see no problem in that although I get mad sometimes too.

Unknown

Being able to see 3 lines ahead would eliminate any risk to matching something on the column of X in a RRXRR since you know where the red, if any, falls.

Even being able to see one line would just make it overwhelmingly dominant to simply take any move that cascades into one more based on what drops above.

And of course being able to see this information literally means the AI has to totally throw every game or they'd completely annihilate you with the same knowledge.

MrHappyface

Kuchiri wrote:

There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER
There should be no preview EVER

Seriously? even 1 line of blocks for only ONE turn would be game breaking?

Kuchiri wrote:

That's most the fun in PQ and MPQ is that awesome feeling of almost dying and you keep on matching.

You can get that thrill from any fast paced game. I get it all the time from fighting games & FPS & MOBA.

Unknown

WeakAssNewb wrote:

You can get that thrill from any fast paced game. I get it all the time from fighting games & FPS & MOBA.

Okay now we are getting somewhere. Let's say in League of Legends in Patch 4.6 they made it to where you see the entire map at all times, no wards are needed, hiding in bushes does nothing. Would you like that update?

MrHappyface

Kuchiri wrote:

Okay now we are getting somewhere. Let's say in League of Legends in Patch 4.6 they made it to where you see the entire map at all times, no wards are needed, hiding in bushes does nothing. Would you like that update?

Seeing ONE line of blocks for ONE turn hardly equates to
seeing the ENTIRE map, plus invisible characters, for the ENTIRE round.
You seriously think that's a fair comparison?
That would be like me accusing a teacher for being a NAZI when I get detention.

Seeing ONE line of blocks for ONE turn is more equivalent to buying a ward.
A preview of 8 lines of block available for the entire round would be more equivalent to your LoL example.
Currently, MPQ is like playing a LoL game where wards are banned & no one on either team are allowed to call MIA;
Random ganks with very little warning signs to avoid them.

Unknown

You missed my point entirely.

This game... Hell the match 3 genre for years have been played this way. One line for one turn will make this game dull for whatever the reason.

If that fact makes you sad. Then play another game.

GumisK

Kuchiri wrote:

You missed my point entirely.

This game... Hell the match 3 genre for years have been played this way. One line for one turn will make this game dull for whatever the reason.

If that fact makes you sad. Then play another game.

That is exactly the case. Maybe some examples from other games would make it more clear: there are some games, which rely solely on the players' strategic skills and knowledge, like chess. There are also some games, which mix strategy and thinking process with luck, like bridge. Those are actually two different genres. You propose a change towards the first, when I would like it to stay the latter. I was an eager Magic: the Gathering CCG player for quite a few years. The game required complex tactics and having a firm, yet flexible gameplan. All in all, even very experienced players with fantastic decks lost some matches due to bad luck, and I remember being furious when that happened to me. Still, I wouldn't change it even a bit, because that's the way the game is played. Maybe you have chosen a wrong game to play, if you're not enthusiastic about the randomness involved - look for other games, entirely skill-based. There are tons of those.