Coalition Events (GRN and past)

Laeuftbeidir

Brigby mentioned that the coalition event discussion has derailed in the update thread. I don't think it was off topic (to be fair, since he posted only a reminder and didn't delete /move anything it was probably also in his eyes not too far off), but since it triggered a lot of interest, here we go!

When I started, the following was normal :

We played two coalition events per week, with a day off in between the events. This was later a bit randomized, and since around 1-1,5 years we usually get one coalition event per weekend, and one surprise coalition event during the week every couple of months.

This has furtherly decreased with the addition of Duel Decks, which might be supposed to give a community feeling and replaces a C. Event whenever it runs. To me, it doesn't do this job, but there's already enough feedback about this one.

So we went from an average of two events per week to an average below 1

(i don't want to lobby for midweek events, but AWR is an event that would do a great job to give midweek content! It's just boring during the weekend) .

The sets that were developed before IXL usually had one PVP and one PVE event +  a PW introduction event (like hod, which was supposed to be run one time per pw introduced). Since IXL we have one event per set, either PVP or PVE. GRN looks like having none at all.

I won't start about the schedule here, but I lose players with every HoD run.

So, what's the problem here? There were other good events added - AcrIx as daily content, the great history of Dom events etc?

To me and most people I talked to, the coalition events are the backbone of the game. We're playing this game mostly for the community, on Slack, discord or wherever. The fewer coalition content, the fewer activity there, the fewer new players join us. And those communities are what hooks a lot of players and makes them able and want to win!

TL;DR

More and better balanced coalition content, please.

madwren

When Oktagon took over, they experimented with changing around the schedule a bit--and in some cases, had coalition events running consecutively without time in between.  There were a lot of complaints about that, and I wonder if they misconstrued the criticism despite numerous people specifically saying that it was the lack of a day in between that we hated.

Volrak

There are plenty of people who find mid-week coalition events problematic in general, regardless of gaps.  I believe there's been plenty of expression of this in the past, which shouldn't be misconstrued as anything else.  It's no surprise to have different segments of the player-base liking and disliking different things.  I think though that many of the "once-per-week" set would still have a strong preference for a coalition event every weekend (i.e. more frequent than now), and would also agree that regardless of what else goes on in the schedule, gaps of at least a day between coalition events are always preferred.

madwren

Volrak said:

 I think though that many of the "once-per-week" set would still have a strong preference for a coalition event every weekend (i.e. more frequent than now), and would also agree that regardless of what else goes on in the schedule, gaps of at least a day between coalition events are always preferred.

I agree. Duel decks isn't an acceptable coalition event substitute.

Brakkis

The schedule takes a back seat in my opinion to the the other more damning issue: the lack of new events. We've already been over the extreme lack of M19's event, which turned into the complete lack of Standard events (and the excuses for why don't hold muster). Now there's not even a new event coming with GRN.

This community is built on coalitions and groups forming and congregating within their groups and with other like-minded groups. Choosing not to create, let alone run, Coalition events for those groups to participate and compete in is detrimental to the environment of this game.

Prior to Ixalan, the norm was three events as @Laeuftbeidir pointed out. We don't particularly miss the PW focused ones that required we buy a new walker to fully participate; however, we don't much like the lack of both a new PvP and a new PvE event. I had assumed that that situation was being rectified with DOM's release. Sure, A Journey Through History wasn't a Coalition event but it was consistently run alongside AWR and so it wasn't as awful. Though AWR certainly didn't have enough content in it to run on it's own over the weekend either.

Now though, they somehow thought that Duel Decks could function as a replacement for Coalition events on weekends (It can't, not even remotely). Creating a daily event to "replace" AXLN is no better.

We need new events, with each set released, in order to keep content from becoming stale. We are already growing so tired of running HOU events that we ran for months as Hibernum closed. We don't want them. They're like that one song the radio plays 6 times in 3 hours. You've heard it so much that it's like nails on a chalkboard at this point.

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As for the schedule, I can understand the desire to not run a midweek coalition event for those that dislike it and I've always felt that a good middle ground is bi-weekly midweek coalition events and an every weekend coalition event. 

The other 2 weeks they could run a PvE event Tuesday-Thursday and two non-coalition PvP events; one Monday-Tuesday and the other Thursday-Friday. No need to participate in them, they're just for extra rewards outside of coalitions if you want them.

In addition to that

• Duel Decks, as it is, could run during the week. There isn't enough content to it (re: matches) to justify running it alone on the weekend.
• A World Reborn could run during the week. 2 nodes with 3 matches each, with the final node using Origins uncommons for it's creatures likewise doesn't justify running alone on the weekend.
• You could run these 2 together on the weekend but otherwise, they don't offer enough engagement to run alone over a 3 day period.

ManiiNames

Have to say am really disappointed we continue to see events like the current one.  I think it boils down to money.  Making new card sets and PW available generates revenue.  Events do not.  And while I grumble, I am still playing the ancient events because they are the only game in town.

Kinesia

I understand and agree with the frustrations about not enough content on the weekends and I know for some people the lack during the week is annoying too.
I find myself on the border since I have trouble keeping up when much more is added and need to ditch other things in my life.

Personally I think we need a lot more events that are NOT time-critical in any way...
Some of the solo PvE events could do with at least a day added, like Consulate last week... It hurts _noone_ to add a day to that, give people more flexibility on when to do it.
There are other things that are safe to add during the week if the time-pressure is relaxed on them.

For me (at least) the biggest problem isn't the number of hours, it's that those hours HAVE to be condensed into a specific 48 hour block instead of my being able to spread it out safely over 96 hours whereever _my_ work and life schedule allows.

I actually have the time, I just don't have it exactly when you are saying I need it.

The biggest advantage of this game is that I can usually fit it into my life in bits and pieces, here and there, but the problem with midweek events is usually that this gets overwritten with urgency. It's not about the playtime required, it's about the limited range to fit it in.

[Deleted User]

Currently, I prefer no weekday coalition events. I actually dont feel overburdened or as burnt out as i used to. Also my real life and mtgpq feels much more balanced now than before. 

The only weekday coalition event i could handle is AWR. And maybe only twice a month (i.e. every other week) 

But feel free to jam the weekday up with non-coalition events. 

[Deleted User]

Also i am just putting it here. But i liked the PW specific events, mainly because of the high reward stakes and also because it kind of hypes up/forces you to use a new PW before it hits the useless shelf. But honestly could go either way on the latter part. 

I dont know the older ones during kaladesh but post kaladesh HoD ones i do enjoy - they are a little overdone recently but still prefer them over most events.

Honestly its a combination of not too overburdening (3 nodes) and more time schedule flexibility (7 max game charges). Also the the reward for amount of effort invested is more balanced. 

Whereas 5 node events with 3/4  max charges... i want to shoot myself

UweTellkampf

Dont shoot yourself, I like you.

[Deleted User]

UweTellkampf said:

Dont shoot yourself, I like you.

I only own water guns. But still it would be quite an inconvience to get wet in winter 

Gabrosin

What's baffling to me is that creating events doesn't seem to be a particularly challenging piece of the overall job for the developers.  I'm only making guesses as to their architecture, but surely it's not too hard to copy an existing event, update its artwork, give it new secondaries, and provide some new descriptive text.  The amount of work they had to do in order to make Duel Deck events a thing is surely greater than it would take to produce new events based on current sets.

Yes, we would love to see innovative new concepts coming to events, but even the events that strongly resemble things they've already done, stuff like The Dragon War, have overall been well-received.  New sets come out once every three months... can time not be spared to make sure there's 2-3 different events for each one?  We spend too much time fighting yesterday's battles.