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ImaginaryNumb3r

Faction Designer
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  1. As a matter of fact, this is not possible. We are constrained by the technical limitations of the unit-logic that is provided by the game. There is a module called "TrampleRevengeDamage" that can be attached to units which then gain this passive ability. This module can then be modifies by several parameters, such as damage but we cannot limit it to certain types of size. Naturally, having more control over the logic would give us more powerful and fine-grained solution but in the end, the things we can change about gameplay essentially boils down to "modding" existing logic. Everything beyond that would require reverse-engineering of the game's binaries.
  2. Obviously, Frost benefits much more from smaller maps because they are the only T1 which lacks a swift unit. Larger maps means that other players can get a more advantageous position and prevent Frost from building up momentum. Nerfs of Mortar and Phase Tower already resulted in Frost (and Nature) being noticeably more viable. This was best observed in the tournaments so far. In fact, Master Archer spam coupled with Wintertide repeatedly and reliably killed Dreadchargers in the Shadow matchup. For the Shadow player it is exceedingly difficult to avoid taking damage from MA + Wintertide to the point where it cannot be stopped anymore.
  3. Thanks for letting us know. This doesn't have a high priority but it should be fixed regardless. Unfortunately, the latter isn't possible. Of course this card would deserve a bug, but I see problems arising in pvp if we improve this card. If we buff the card too much, it hard-counters Giantslayers in T3 and if we buff it too little, I'm afraid it will remain weak.
  4. Indeed, it is a common complaint that the building protection of frost splahes are too powerful. However, our focus in pvp lies at stabilizing all the T1 matchups at th emoment. Nature and Frost have some severe disadvantages that can be exploited. However, Frost and Nature also scale very well as the game goes on, so we really need to focus on the T1 before we should move on with substantial T2 changes.
  5. If I recall correctly, the dropped units of Corsair used to be able to capture orbs and monuments but this caused problems in pvp. Corsair is definitely lacking and should absolutely get a buff in the future. But it's not really a high priority to be fair.
  6. I'm excited in working together with the great team behind Skylords. I'm astonished at how far the game has made it so far and I hope it will get even better from now going forward. I welcome the challenges that await us and want to forge the game into the best shape it can be. Balancing is delicate and there are many conflicting visions about the game, but I want to have an ear for every voice among us Skylords. - Imaginary
  7. I think this sums up the current situation quite well. Absolutely, adjusting the difficulty would be a dream. However, to me this seems like a considerable effort and I don't think this would be a realistic change. Further, I agree on the notion of having a "rpve 9.5" as well as purely elemental maps. But I'm afraid making new factions is even more of a substantial effort.
  8. You are completely right. It was in the heat of the moment and I got carried away... I sincerely apologize to the people who are still doing all the maintenance, bugfixing and all other aspects that we don't notice from the outside. And it seems like there is actually some progress in making balancing changes for the better. Thank you @Devs
  9. I feel you. In pvp Fire/Shadow had the exact same problem with decks slots and it always felt like you were playing with only haf a deck. You miss out on powerful cards of pure faction and end up with a compromise, that forces you to patch your holes with additional cards. If I understand you correctly you want a mechanic that essentially gives you T3 monster cards for free. Given the slot pressure, that's not unreasonable. However, I don't think this is a "be-all end-all" change. With this ability, we first must have valid Twilight units to begin with. Realistically, the only T2 Twilight cards you play in pvp are Brute + Vileblood, of which both are mediocre. Vileblood could morph into Mutating Maniac and Twilight Brute into... Twilight Creeper? The target card for evolved Twilight units seems rather arbitrary to me. But admittedly, this is better than nothing. The proposed alternative is that units "level up", as you reach a new tier. But here I see the the big problem with player expectation and game readability. A "T3 Vileblood" must be visually distinct from a "T2 Vileblood", this is a must (I am speaking from experience). Otherwise you can confuse your opponents with mixing T2 and T3 Vilebloods and expect them to make a bad choice, this is just toxic. You are also introducing a whole range of new de-factor cards that need to be balance and tested, which isn't trivial. Now, this doesn't mean that we shouldn't explore this but in terms of deck building, I can't help but feel like using duct tape, rather than having a diverse deck. And again, this make the assumption that all of the Twilight Cards are worth using. To me, it is clear that the first step must be to make the Twilight Cards viable. I have reservations against "Twilight Evolution", but I'm not fully opposed to it. However, I think with this proposal we get ahead of ourselves. The first step must be to fix the Twilight Cards, there is no way around this. And I don't think the current "Twilight Transformation" is completely unsavable either. You are right about its issues, can't we fix those issues for the mean time? Just give transformed units full health and not make them use a charge. That alone could make it a good ability to have. On another note: You mention "players using Deathglider instead of hurricane" -> Why don't we just buff Death Glider instead? Death Glider has essentially the stats of Mana Wing and might be the worst unit in the game. A flying S-counter with S-knockback could be a powerful tool in F/N. I don't care how strong a "T3 Evolved Deathglider" would be, I want it to be good in T2. Back on the topic of deck slots: I think the deck-slot problem would be mitigated a great deal with more Twilight cards were like Gladiatrix. She's anti-L, she's anti-air and provides a slot-free Disenchant. If the Twilight Cards were multi-purpose oriented we would effectively mitigate the problem with free deck slots. In the Discord the idea has been raised to make Twilight Hag a T2 unit, I think she would be a perfect candidate. Now, with good Twilight units making up for the shortcumings of F/N you might not even need to change Twilight Transformation and we could play around transformation abilities. Imagine Twilight Minions costing 50e: Suddenly, you have a cheap way of increasing the damage output of your Twilight Units. I know it costs a deckslot, but I think this is a fascinating facet of the faction that shouldn't be discarded. In general, I think more abilities should trigger if Twilight Units transformed. E.g. if Nightshade plant triggered its effect on transformation, it would be an interesting unit for mass-CC. But again, I am not completely opposed to Twilight Evolution, I think this can only be a "second step" in making Fire/Nature better. And the Evolution should be very well thought out and designed. For example, a unit should only be able to use Twilight Evolution once. Otherwise a Twilight T2 card is effectively 3 cards (T2, T3 and T4 version), which is unfair towards other decks. But first things first :-) #MakeTwilightGreatAgain Edit: One thing I'm not keen on is forgoing orb restrictions. We should be making Twilight better instead of giving it more access to cards like Frenetic Assault. With Enlightenment and Amii Monument, there are already ways to ignore certain restrictions and I think adding more ways is hurting the game more than it helps.
  10. I absolutely believe you. But how many people like you are there? Certainly not all of the current players. And for most people, this will be the third time they need to start over from zero. Can't say that sounds like a recipe for fun. And ultimately, there is no new experience to be had. By now, most people already had their fair share of nostalgia, there is little more to be gained from now on. And all of this only takes the veteran players into account. If the game wants to be a success, it needs to attract more players. Really, you need to keep new players as much as possible. *Start Rant* This can only be addressed with careful game design that should have been addressed years ago. Card Balancing is one obvious major factor, but achievements and unique rewards for trying out new and weird things also factors into this. But all I can see is a painfully slow process on a questionable re-work of the BFP income. For those reasons, I fear the worst for the longevity of the game. *End Rant* Edit: Just today I decided to log on again... and nobody was hosting even a single game. It doesn't feel like there are many people left that feel in charge and do their best for the future of the game. *Sigh* And now with Kubik gone, I just don't know man... I try to stay positive, but I can't help but feel a little naive for that.
  11. Fair enough, it was made clear earlier that this decision was made by MrXLink. I am really concerned for the game and got passionate near the end. Yes, I'm sorry for that statement. Clearly not everybody shares this same opinion in the team. The huge problem is that balancing is an incremental and iterative process. Many cards have a straight forward fix. Balancing some cards causes a ripple effect that ends up taking extra time. And some factions such as Nature T1 need a full blown rework. Changing the numbers is fast but Balancing involves playtesting and testing out a new meta. This is the true time sink and you won't see any meaningful results early on. And with a game the scale of Battleforge you really need all the headstart that you can get. I see why you wouldn't tackle a big undertakging such as rebalancing Nature T1 since this can _potentially_ with the expectation of players. But everybody wants better internal balancing so making a decks is more fun. Especially in pve there is only little you can do wrong and there are plenty of cards that simply need a points reduction. Now, I don't claim to be an educated expert but I've been working on RTS balance for years so I know the difficulties that happen when you get your hands on balance.
  12. On top of this I don't think anybody who hasn't been playing in recent years doesn't even know the card stats anymore. And what is worse, we are losing valuable players. I have seen this with so many other games... the moment a game becomes public its lifecycle begins. And the game in its current state is not sustainable. The playable cards are the game's greatest assets but 80% of the cards are utterly useless because of bad internal and external balancing. I mean, do the devs seriously think that people feel "nostalgic" when they run into the same bugs that persisted since the game launched? I get why you the devs are intimmidated by starting the balancing process, but at the very least they can start fixing bugs.It doesn't seem like many people even care anymore. When the project and the open beta launched we had some vivid talks on the forum and it has almost completely vanished. We could have used that momentum to keep the game going. I don't see what the devs are waiting for. The new BFP earning system? For how long have we been waiting for that? Sigh... Edit: People have been playing Battleforge for years now and I don't think the reset will provide a big influx of players. For all intends and purposes, the game seems "released" to the public. And if there is nothing new after the reset I don't see why the current players should come back. The nostalgia is spent and I don't want to participate in the same old grinding again.
  13. I see no valid reason why this shouldn't be done. From what I can tell, virtually nobody could tell a difference. This is a quality of life improvement that should have been there to begin with the launch of the game.
  14. I'm not sure how I can phrase myself more accurately without writing 3 times as much text. I don't think we are even disagreeing on many parts, but it comes down to understanding. However, given that nothing I say has any relevance in the grand scheme of things this is getting a bit too pointless for me. I think I just leave my points as they are. It's not like arguing changes anything. ... no offense, but I don't think you understand the concept of balancing and the difference between viable and optimal builds. I can't continue, this is pointless.
  15. I appreciate the time you have put into the reply. Now, I don't question the economics behind it I never claimed anything differently. I'm sure this has been well thought out and tested and I know from firsthand experience that the final parameters always require some fine-tuning. Likely, the parameters will still be adjusted after launch. So the power of the system actually comes from its maintainability. ... but can't you just make Boosters untradable? It's fair to critizie that this is a clunky system and it can be improved in a myriad of ways. But a reward system that is structured into phases isn't bad per se and gives an incentive to play just one more game to be rewarded. The real issue is that, right now, the reward is all-or-nothing on a non-trivial objective. I wasn't stating a personal opinion. Among my friends I know several people who started the game and most left immediately after they finished the campaign missions since "there was nothing more to do". Yes, there is also pvp, but this has a high entering threshold in many regards. And other things like speedrunning is really just fringe-content for the diehard fans. I don't doubt that there are some good community maps, but accessibility is just as important as quality. ... so, I wonder, is that being worked on? I completely understood that part. My original point was that I'm afraid of the concept not working so well a pull-factor that improves player motivation. Since getting a dynamic amount of BFP can't be as tangible than getting a virtual box that you can open. I understood the concept by a 100%. But I'm confident that at the very least not a 100% of the playerbase is going to understand it. I absolutely believe you, but most people I know ingame have one. A good reason RTS games have different factions to begin with is that everybody can choose one or more playstyle they like. Which is also Battleforge's ultimate selling point. I personally can't stand being forced to play one way over another and I just can't stand the slowness of frost. I try to be hopeful that the balancing process is going to fix/mitigate the issue. In theory, Battleforge offers so many cards to choose from but in reality a vast majority is useless or sub-average. Sure, you can get by with some random cards that you find aesthetically (or financially) appealing, but that only goes so far. You simply need an optimized deck to win higher difficulties (and I don't even mean the broken stuff like LSS or Amii Monument). With more valid cards, everybody would win, even speedrunners. Btw. I enjoyed the GDC talk Pillars of Eternity and Proper Attribute Tuning, if you are into that stuff. It's only partially applicable to Battleforge, but the game also suffers from the divide between "optimal" and "valid" decks. Yes, it is technically not the same, but on average both resources will correlate. It was more a critique on the resource system as a whole and I've seen other games tackle this wonderfully by making you play different parts of the game for different resources. But that is a whole topic by itself... I think it depends on the drop rate of boosters and, ultimately, how many cards will be changed into something valid. Given all the crap cards, I'm afraid making boosters rarer just makes disappointments more bittersweet.
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