Ideas thread: Winning side in duel decks

Volrak

We've seen it in ZvE, and we're seeing it in DvK: One side is more popular than the other and can be expected to win nearly every time.

This thread is for suggesting and discussing ideas on how to spread the wins around between the duel deck sides more evenly.  This is a desirable goal because it'd allow players (especially new players) a chance of earning the winning side mythic no matter when they start playing duel decks or which sides they've chosen in the past, and would add more dynamism and interest to what can otherwise feel like a foregone conclusion.

Rebalancing to make each side equally powerful and/or equally fun to play is an obvious suggestion, and I support attempts to bring the sides closer in that way.  But in practice, balancing the two sides so finely that it's a coin flip as to which side will win on any given event seems close to impossible.  And even if the balance is brought closer, whichever side the balance favours will remains static.  So while it can help, I don't think it can be a full solution.  Hence this thread, to think of other ideas.

I'll start with the following:

• Add a bounty to the losing side which grows each time the side loses the duel.  E.g. after Zendikar wins one event (or possibly once there's a winning streak of 2+), then in the next ZvE event, Eldrazi gets (for example) a 50 crystal bounty on top of the normal winning side rewards.  Each time the winning streak continues, the bounty increases.  Sooner or later, the bounty will become large enough to entice enough players to choose the side they wouldn't have otherwise.

Tremayne

@Volrak - I like your thinking, but perhaps it is a bit premature to conclude Kalemne is a sure win each time?

I suggest one of these ideas to the loosing side:
A cumulative mana bonus increase, like +2 to the lowest mana bonus or +1 to white and black or a combination there of.

Start the game with your most expensive creature on the battlefield.

Start the game with the support necromancer’s Covenant on the board.

Volrak

Tremayne said:

perhaps it is a bit premature to conclude Kalemne is a sure win each time?

Perhaps.  I actually expect Daxos to win at least once (maybe next time), since nobody will have his mythic yet but most people will have Kalemne's.  But I don't like the odds of Daxos winning much again after that, because the current event shows more than just a mild preference for one side.

I suggest one of these ideas to the loosing side:

A cumulative mana bonus increase, like +2 to the lowest mana bonus or +1 to white and black or a combination there of.

Start the game with your most expensive creature on the battlefield.

Start the game with the support necromancer’s Covenant on the board.

So to generalise, the losing side gets some extra help the next time around, not a bad idea.

Heartstone

I like it :-)

TomB

I'm probably wrong here, but I recently bought Elspeth2 as well as Daxos, who's kind of aura-dependent like Daxos, and I've had a tough time finding worthwhile auras to include in either deck. There's a couple fair ones, and I found 1 or 2 more in Legacy, but overall I'd rate them as teh suck.

Maybe the way to improve Daxos' chances would be to print a few more decent auras?

jtwood

TomB said:

I'm probably wrong here, but I recently bought Elspeth2 as well as Daxos, who's kind of aura-dependent like Daxos, and I've had a tough time finding worthwhile auras to include in either deck. There's a couple fair ones, and I found 1 or 2 more in Legacy, but overall I'd rate them as teh suck.

Maybe the way to improve Daxos' chances would be to print a few more decent auras?

Daxos doesn't need more auras at the moment. He's plenty OP thanks to Tymaret's broken buffing code. Once they fix that bug, then Daxos will maybe need a little balancing.

That said, I generally agree about the playability of most auras. I've managed to make E2 work, but it took Reverberation + Chromanticore to make it happen.

Bubbles_CS

I like the bounty idea

jtwood

Bubbles_CS said:

I like the bounty idea

Agreed. It's a fun idea. Hopefully, it is something they can technically support.

Larz70

I would also like to suggest that the Leading side not be known until the final duel to prevent players from picking whoever is winning during the Duel phase.  In Nalthazar's video that previews the event, he mentioned that the player is going in blind with no indication of who is winning until the Final Duel Phase, but that is actually not the case - just like ZvE, the leading PW is clearly indicated during the duel phase.

I also like Volrak's and Tremayne's idea to incentivize the losing side.  To add to Tremayne's idea, I would suggest an "underdog's support" which doubles the score earned by that side to help them catch up faster.  To make it fair, the "underdog's support" could switch sides if the previously losing PW now has a sizable lead over the other, or not be in use when they are within a certain range from the lead.

Lastly, instead of a slider to indicate the winning side, why not just show the total accumulated points/ribbons for each side?  This way, we'll know for sure if winning with all objectives met really makes a difference over just winning the match.  Also, one can do some quick math like, "We're down by 5, so if I play my last 2 matches I could earn 6 ribbons, and my team will be in the lead!"

Scydrex7

My suggestions are not necessarily about balancing the sides on duel deck events, but more about improving the overall experience. Here they are:

First, I second Larz70's suggestion of not showing which side is winning to a player who has yet to pick a side. If you see either faction ahead, the natural choice is to join it. Once players start choosing the side ahead, it would probably lead to it snowballing until that side becomes unstoppable.

Another thing that I would change is not allowing players to choose a side once the final phase starts. It is unfair for players to be able to join the side that's likely to win and cash in the rewards while players who may have played the event to its entirety get the same rewards (or lesser rewards if they chose the losing side).

On a final note, these events should be weekday events. To have them competing against the time devoted to coalition events really puts a strain on players whose free weekend time is stretched thin as it is.

FindingHeart8

@Volrak

I like it, even if it costs me victory rewards for not knowing which side is going to win beforehand