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How to make PvP more attractive (Discussion)


RadicalX

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I am fully convinced, that PvP in Battleforge is a fantastic gamemode, but has certain flaws, that we might need to adress in order to make the game mode more attractive, especially for newer people. I want to make a longer post to get a discussion going about what we can do to get a more attractive gamemode and a larger playerbase, especially post reset. I'm following the current thread, where new player experience got discussed, which mainly focussed onto reward system, so I will move away from that in this thread, trying to adress some other problems and possible solutions. If you are looking for the discussion it is linked below. 

 

Balancing

While there was alot of dicussion in the seperate balancing discord, we haven't seen any progress for a while, because access to the testserver has benn denied. In terms of PvP balancing we somewhat got to a consensus about what needs to be adressed, but it was hard to find a solution that really fixes the problem. We really need access to the testserver in order to make a progression, so we can implement changes, that make the majority of players happy 

 

What I'd like to talk about the most is the T1 diversity. With Nature and Frost being very underwhelming, alot of deck variety gets shut downed, especially for 1v1s. With only Shadow and Fire T1 being consistently viable at a high level, the amount of T1 matchups we can watch, consists of:

Fire vs Fire - Shadow vs Fire - Shadow vs Shadow

This is only a small part of what would be possible. If all T1's would achieve a "viable state" we could see 7 additional T1 matchups:

Nature vs Nature -Nature vs Shadow -Nature vs Fire  - Frost vs Frost - Frost vs Nature - Frost vs Shadow - Frost vs Fire  

In order to win with Frost or Nature you either have to play much better than your opponent or abuse the enemies inexperience with the matchup, which just is not a consistent win condition, especially if you want these factions to be played more frequently. With a static gamestate alot of people get frustrated about the current balancing situation. 

In addition to that, there are 3 T2s (pure Nature, stonekin, pure Frost), that completely get shut downed by this deficit. Their T2 strength is actually decent, but you just don't want to play that frost or nature T1. 

 

Back then I really advocated nerfs to mortar and Phasetower and I'm still fully supporting this idea. It is not possible to make healthy balancing changes around these two cards with their current stat cost efficiency and an almost nonexisting building counter system in the early stages of the game. That said, in order to fix the entire T1 issues, we need to adress more than just these two cards (but that would make a good first step). 

Nature is too weak at defending a +1 well situation. Even after taking a lead in initial fights, you won't be able to well up as split attacks are just destroying the faction, that can't fight on low unit number with these units being super expensive. Similar issues occur once you get into a T1 vs T2 situation with more bound power than your opponent. The dps/power against M and L units is just way to low in order to allow healthy defences. 

Frost got gutted through Homesoil getting nerfed and the faction can't fight on open ground effectively. You always need a power well close to your unit in order to contest. Against Mortar and Phasetower you can't even win these close well situations making things alot worse.

 

Current proposals from the skylords balancing discord:

Phasetower: 

Nerf idea 1: Decrease the damage by roughly 20% 

Nerf idea 2: Increase the cost per Tower by 10  

 

Mortar:

Nerf idea 1: Increased costs by roughly 15 power 

Nerf idea 2: Cooldown increase 

Nerf idea 3: Adding an initial cooldown to weaken the card against high tempo. 

 

These are different single nerf ideas and NOT a single combined proposal!  

 

 

Maps

I've seen many players (especially newer ones) complaining about the map pool and also some people seem to dislike map X for various reasons. Just to give some examples. 

-> Lajesh has Walls close to the main base. Once you make a mistake and give one up to the opponent, he might win the game of that, especially in lower elos. 

-> Some people seem to dislke Yrmia for making some matchups very difficult to play

-> Alot of people dislike Whazai as you can cliff onto the main base.  

While there is the issues of generated maps not being included to the ranked pool for some reason, I think it might be a good thing to just widen the map pool rather than reworking the existing PvP maps. I think we could work out some more balanced, fun and interactive maps to get less repetitive games. High ranked players could work around some balanced maps and we've got really good map creators, who could easily create those maps if they're willing to work with us here. After some testing you could consider which new maps might be introduced into the new ranked pool, which would give us some fresh, new content. 

 

What does a good map need? 

I think we need some different maps, that adress different kind of win conditions to give different decks and playstyles small advantages or disadvantages. Battleforge has very low RNG based components in the game, so games might feel repetitive on the same map, if you play the same matchup or player many times in a row. 

 

1) The amount of Monuments 

I think having a range from 7-8 is the best number for orbs on 1v1 maps. 

2) Orb placement

I think T2 should be easily achiveable for both parties. Maps like Uro do have this poor condition, where Frost doesn't get to T2 without contesting it, which is really bad. T2 should be uncontestable, for T3 the case can be different. Lajesh for example has good orb placements in my opinion. If the map is played without offensive wall action, it can provide strategically interesting gameplay. 

3) Well distance

Needs to be carefully selected as there are alot of components, that make matchups either toxic or snowbally 

4) Center of the map

Can grant a strategic advantage due to shorter attack paths, but shouldn't be a win condition itself as some colors simply can't contest in these early fights. The center on Simai is a good example for a healthy  center positioning.

5) Terrain/Cliffing

Choke points are very important to increase the value of cc and AoE, while open space allows more micro management based fighting. In addition to that, important well & orb positions shouldn't be accessable by cliffs to avoid long range Sieges without proper counterplay. 

 

There are more important aspects, but this could be discussed internally with the people, that are willing to work on these kind of map creations. In the end there could be community votings, if a finished map should be included into the ranked PvP pool. Maybe there could be specific tournaments to promote and test these maps beforehand.    

 

 

Activity requirements

I think they are straight up too high. 1 match per day is way too much for a game like Battleforge in order to stay relevant in the leaderboards. Right now alot of players are inactive and aren't motivated to play 30 ranked games with long que times, lower game quility compared to current sparring matches & the low comparability based off your current rank. There are probably about 

Suggestion: Lower the acitivy requirements to about 10 games per month. This makes the leaderboards alot more interesting and meaningful, because you can compare yourself to a much larger playerbase as base elo is the much more relevant stat. Since we are a rather small community I feel like this is important to keep people motivated after dropping inactive.

 

Player Base

We need a higher amount of players to enable fairer matchmaking. There are large skill gaps in and they lead to very snowball based games. Top 5 base elo beats Top 20 base elo with 90%+ wr, Top 20 base elo beats Top 50 base elo with 90%+ wr etc. leading to very frustrating game experiences between stomping and getting stomped. Games are very fast and you don't really get to enjoy the game, especially when you haven't experienced the great games of PvP, that happen upon facing an enemy on a similar skill level. 

Ideas for improvements: 

-> Increased game promotion to attract newer players 

-> Support the current Tournaments like the Stress Test Open 

 

 

Overall it would be nice to collect some ideas on what we could do, to give people a better experience while playing PvP, especially post reset. So let me know your ideas, so I can implement them into this thread.

 

TL DR;

-> Balancing changes are important: Getting a testserver to evaluate proposals would be huge to make progress

-> Adding more maps would be nice, maybe someone of the community map creators could work with PvP players on this

-> Activity requirements are too high, especially when there is a rather low ranked participation

-> We need to build up a solid player base after the reset (attract new players, keep the current ones)

 

 

Best regards, 

RadicalX

Edited by RadicalX
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Your comments about t1 imbalance, i fully agree with. nature and frost t1 both are not up too par (for different reasons and it would be hard to find balanced fixes for this imo. damn, now i wrote an essay about it... again...).

still, we should also examine fire and shadow t1 as well as they do contain some quite problematic elements. mostly it's the towers, but i feel that overall, ranged units seem too dominant in t1. in almost any matchup a ranged unit spam is par of the course (with some exceptions in the form of thugs spam, which needs a nerf), where as in t2 you can see much more variety in units being played. as there are 2 primary ranged units per faction, this often leads to a real lack of variety in what is being played and the ranged units matchup is a big part of why nature t1 and frost t1 fail as well.

this is especially prominent in the nature t1 vs. shadow t1 matchup, where you can't even dare to start with a swift unit as the nature player on the vast majority of maps. you can forget about dryads as well for the most part and you usually start spearmen and hope your lack of swift does not get abused too hard when you so much as dare to take a well. your t1 basically got reduced to two s units, none of them swift (unless you play werebeast but i am not convinced of those yet). I don't see how your suggested changes would fix this. with the amazon buff, fire t1 would be in real trouble tho. I think the cost reduction on the swap is too much to ask for as it can already be quite usefull. I get that you want it to be better vs. split attacks, but this is going overboard. scavangers already need to avoid the unit due to the damage reduction, which helps quite a bit. Main problem with this is also that it doesn't help vs. shadow (pretty much nothing aside from -5 on werebeasts is), which means that we have a matchup specific solution only, which might get a problem if you want to further buff the faction to do better vs. shadow t1 as well.

 

i'm not saying that counters should not exists, but in t1 it has gotten to a point where you can just entirely forget playing certain units in certain matchups. even in some very problematic t2 matchups, it is rarely this one-dimensional in terms of unit-viability. in t2 you see burrowers being played into pure fire decks and harvesters against frost-splashes. even if viable counters exist, those cards aren't just removed from the game like it is the case with t1 and can turn the game if used in the appropriate situation. T1 tho? Not so much. In some matchups you are basically playing half a deck and that just isn't going to work out. i feel this needs to be adressed if we want to have a properly balanced t1, but i don't think it would be possible to find the support needed to make this happen, so best can likely do is buff frost t1 and nature t1 into viability somehow, which comes with its own set of issues:

 

nature t1 is amazing when there are 3-4+ units on the field and some power is avialable for spells. cc often gauarantees favorable trades and allows to kite back and heal units without much counterplay in open field. damage reduction, s unit counter spell, mele unit counterspell, units with heals, archers with multishot and a very good healing spell, not to forget shamans, all scale like crazy into mid and late t1. problem is, as you pointed out, that this advantage is gone when split attacks are used and the units are costly on top of it, so you can really abuse the faction hard.

but what is the fix to that supposed to be like? Make the units cheaper and you will hit the power-spike sooner, making the faction really good in a mid-fight without wells and a terror in late t1. On the other hand, so much of nature t1's power comes from the synery with cc and heals, so you most likely can still chesse the faction as usual. Don't get me wrong, it's entirely ok that the faction has issues when dealing with split attacks or otherwise low power levels. It's just too extreme to properly balance that out considering just how well the faction scales. You often feel forced to just go t2 as otherwise you are pretty much guaranteed to get steamrolled if you don't play t1 towers.

Personally i think some of the utility nature t1 has needs to adjusted while the units get a bit of a buff to be able to hold their own on low power levels. the t1 heal is really strong, especially considering cc and damage reduction can be used to juggle damage and keep units alive. root and hurricane destory the vast majority of staple units of other factions in late t1, which in my opinion is really out of line. the issues are not as prevalent in t2, where cc is ubiquitous and cost efficient aoe damage spells present some working counters.

 

frost t1 is so map dependent and passive, it's not even funny. aside from the loss of map control and the voulnerability to swift unit rushes, the faction can barely fight in open field, has problems counterattacking (at large well distances. good luck grabbing a clost well tho, since the enemy would love to fight you in open field and you have no swift) and lacks any sort of meaningful engage to start a fight (if you do it right, you can just mass firesworn vs. frost t1 without giving much of a change for the enemy to go t2 and make them lose because they can't force a fight. it's just really dumb!). In short, 90% of the time you are forced to play reactively and hope the enemy messes up somehow (like walking into an obvious gylph of frost in a mid-fight). on the bright side, any non-cheese attacks likely don't get very far. home soil, glacier shell and ice guardians are so good at defending single wells, most player don't even try anymore. but how on earth do you buff frost? make the units good enough to reliably counter swift spamm cheese tactics? what about large maps? what about mid-fights? what if you want to engage without having your ig kitet around?

let's say you managed to fix those issues somehow, but then what? how am i supposed to attack frost t1 then? standard attacks are not working out already it will only be worse if the faction is buffed. do i still get to try the swift unit cheese even if failure is much more likely? if that strat goes bad, it tends to go really, really bad. the matches would essentially be very volatile and still very map dependent.

 

In short, frost t1 and nature t1 are problematic and fixing them without, making them op in situations those decks already excell at, will be much harder than excpected.


As for pvp maps, i really think we should have a contest, preferably an official one where maps get added to the ranked pool. Making good maps takes quite a bit of effort and it sucks not seing them played at all and maybe just winning a few bfp in a contest. I agree that with some measure of care taken for cliffs, center of map balance, map size and t2 oppertunities, we can make some really good and interesting maps and it would be great to roll out new maps for when the game gets released. This should be really low effort for the devs, since the community is going to be in charge of making those maps and voting for them in the end. Since it was already possible to remove random maps from the ranked pool, i am hoping it should be rather easy to add maps as well.

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As I already said:

adding/removing "official" maps to/from the ranked pool is literally 1 number, and 1 comma in the code.
random maps have one (not publicly disclosed) disadvantage for us, but if team decide to add them it is same as above. (Fiki is working on solution to get rid of that disadvantage)
random maps was not removed from ranked pool, I need to write that pool from scratch, and I did not know EA have them in ranked pool :P so because of the disadvantage I did not add them.

adding community maps would be much more complicated, especially because EA's file checking is broken, because each player can have different map just with same name.
Zyna, and Ladadoos should be already working on converting community map to "official" map, and after that it would be same as above.

Changing units/cards on test server is not a problem, changing it ONLY on test server is, because of how EA made the game (this one actually is not blame to them). Aviator is working on new updater, that will allow us to overcome this issue. (But MrXLink said no changes before release)

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I agree to everything stated but Imo it's only part of the problem. The game also needs more pvp players to provide a healthy pvp experience. Especially for new players. I tell from my silver or gold elo perspective. Atm you can play through the ladder to top 50 in 20 games or so. 

Allready back in the days under EA it was like that. 

2-3 game vs players that do nothing then leave. 

Then some games vs player that not have basic knowledge of the game. F. E. do things like play defencive towers so you can just grab wells instead fight. 

Then some OK games. 

And then you reached top 50 and must face veterans. Some of the games might still be ok but you also allready might get crushed by them. 

Summerized short we have too less games of each elo or too less players. And I doubt there are so many waiting for the reset. I guess we would need about 3000 pvp players online at one time to make a healthy pvp experience. 

 

What can we do? Is it allowed for you to do any sort of promotion after release? Like events or let big influencers do a video on it. You should support any people like @Toggy that do events and broadcast skylords reborn. Imo you shoud gather ideas for promote the game in any way. The game has incredible unused potential. 

Kind Regards 

LagOps, MrDanilov, RadicalX and 1 other like this
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My opinion is just raise the deck slots for pvp to 30/or atleast 25/ with some condition like 5 cards in the deck minimum must contain T4 and buildings cards.

Yes we need make T4 viable in PVP,cause i feel the game one-armed giant without  the full card collection capability and the 20 card just restricted the gameplay too much,after a while when the battleforge unique attraction is gone u realised that the game become pretty repetitive,cause if u dont want that t1-t2 heavy playstyle u havent got enough option per tier to make decision between some various strategys or creatures just calling down what is momently available without any thinking,following the pre planned path.

So some point of view the game with the current card slots is already slightly decided at the deck creating process what not favor the long time enjoyment as the ingame strategy changing and the freedom of choosing are limited aswell.

Poor english i know,but i hope was understable.

Edited by wYrmYxY
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Make t4 viable is not bad idea in general (at least for 2 vs 2) but has not much to do with deckslots. There are obviously some t4 cards that were meant to be pvp cards. See F. E. colossus ability, witch is useless in pve. But to achieve this you would Imo have to nerf many t3 cards and or change the cost of tech up. 

Pls correct me someone if I m wrong. :-) 

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3000 PvP players :O we did not have that much players online at same time ever.

We are allowed to make promotions, but Hawk decided no promotions or support for tournaments until release (I think he is not that strict on this one any more).

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Thanks for the comments! I edited the main post. I included the aspect of creating a larger playerbase for better matchmaking.

@LagOps I agree with the Nature & Frost part, we probably need a larger set of changes with compensation nerfs to reach an acceptable balancing state for T1. The ideas I initially posted were aimed to support T1 vs T2 scenarios. I removed this part from the main post, because I think it will be better to discuss specific ideas within the actual balancing threads/discord. I don't think, that T1 is too ranged heavy though as ranged units mostly are more micro demanding and I feel a decent amount of melee units are in a decent state. The only thing that might need to be adressed at some point is the opressive single unit spam in some matchups (Frostmagespam, Fireswornspam, Dryadspam). 

@Kubik Thanks for your input here! If we get to apply changes to just one server at some point though, is there a chance of just testing balancing changes before the wipe? Even if nothing goes to the main server pre reset, testing several proposals can help alot to improve them. As this is quite time consuming, it would be great to start as early as possible. 

And do you know anything regarding the possibility of changing activity requirements?

Edited by RadicalX
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As I said Aviator is working on new updater, that should support having 2 versions of the game (one for main server, and another for test server) based on his feedback he is progressing slowly. After that I think we can start making changes on test server.

Activity counting is fully under our control, so changes are possible, you must ask MrXLink, he is "Game Lead", and "Design Lead".

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@RadicalX mele units in t1 are in a decent state and as you pointed out it's the spamm occuring in certain matchups... which typically involves spamming ranged units to the point where mele units often don't feel viable anymore. that was pretty much what i meant when i said ranged units are too dominant - the point of them becomming opressive is reached too early in my opinion.

As for nature t1 struggling against t2, well that's not exactly suprising considering how scaling-heavy the faction is, which often results in mid-late t1 being avoided by the non-nature player. After adjustments to the faction to adjust the power-curve, i would expect the matchup vs. early t2 to be a lot less of an issue.

 

I really would like to discuss this in more detail, but i feel such a discussion would be pretty pointless as it would start all over again once balance changes can be implemented on a test-server.

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 11/28/2019 at 6:42 PM, Karl Lavafeld said:

Make t4 viable is not bad idea in general (at least for 2 vs 2) but has not much to do with deckslots. There are obviously some t4 cards that were meant to be pvp cards. See F. E. colossus ability, witch is useless in pve. But to achieve this you would Imo have to nerf many t3 cards and or change the cost of tech up. 

Pls correct me someone if I m wrong. :-) 

 

On 11/28/2019 at 4:16 PM, wYrmYxY said:

My opinion is just raise the deck slots for pvp to 30/or atleast 25/ with some condition like 5 cards in the deck minimum must contain T4 and buildings cards.

Yes we need make T4 viable in PVP,cause i feel the game one-armed giant without  the full card collection capability and the 20 card just restricted the gameplay too much,after a while when the battleforge unique attraction is gone u realised that the game become pretty repetitive,cause if u dont want that t1-t2 heavy playstyle u havent got enough option per tier to make decision between some various strategys or creatures just calling down what is momently available without any thinking,following the pre planned path.

So some point of view the game with the current card slots is already slightly decided at the deck creating process what not favor the long time enjoyment as the ingame strategy changing and the freedom of choosing are limited aswell.

Poor english i know,but i hope was understable.

I am personally not against increasing deck slots, although a careful analysis would need to be done. It may also not be possible.


But about t4, imo there is no place for t4 in pvp. If you really have extra slots everyone will just take earthshaker, but t4 cards are so crazy OP that you can't even consider having proper counters and healthy gameplay. Even in t3, 90% of t3 cards are just basenuking or countering a base nuke. Games won't reach t4 (even if there are slots) unless wells and orbs get an additional hp buff, but then that will mean games won't end in t1/t2.....

(btw, random thought but I wonder if it might be cool to have maps with different hp levels for different wells/orbs? That might be a cool way to spice maps up, and might also prevent certain rushing from happening, for example if the wells on wazhai cliffs had like 2500 or even 3000 hp, the person who wins the center fight may not auto win....)f

 

But anyway, even if wells had a ton of health so t4 was the norm, nothing in t4 is balanced for healthy gameplay. There is a community map called something like "maze of survivors" which is kinda cool because you have to t4 fight your opponent, but after playing this map a couple times it is clear that t4 fighting is pretty silly and frequently reaches stalemates....

 

 

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 4 months later...

So, im experienced player from earlier, mainly playing frost.

Here are my experiences, and suggestions, trying to answer some of the issues.

- t1 nature, frost

- adding t4 to pvp

- make ALL cards viable

- get all Maps, no matter the distances to work technically. (so asymetricly balanced no matter how u design the map. more freedom in such)

theese are the goals to fulfill, and from there, you get players. and if you get players, you get the rest.

 

1. t1 nature: yes nature has awesome synergy with a summoned up rush with archers and healsers, wind against small units, root agains melee, frost can outplay this, but new players never get this done. lets also invite young players getting things done. for this, i have one general suggestion,

 

which is to strengthen the defensive power, because yesterday i had a good match, where one player did play defensive towers and utility buildings alot, trying to compensate me having the economy and tier.

I would like to see, that towering with t1 is more effective, than having 2 or 3 wells in advantage, so that you are not THAT dependend of economy.

So in general, i would make towers cheaper, and/or faster to build, restricted to t1 defensive structures, so they stop to cost all your economy, while the opponent can grab wells.

tower spam can be devastating already, once they are up, it takes quite a effort to get rid of them again, but this doesnt apply to t1 towers, as there are siege units alot in t2, high range, so it would not hurt to see towers being more viable. getting more range if placed by a well would be an option.

this would have effect, that you retard the gameplay to higher tier, so t1 is not the only tier new players will see coming. you must be able to rush them still, thats why 10-20% cheaper, faster to build in t1 would not destroy that a rush on an unprepared player will fail. with a group of soldiers, those towers are easy to destroy, but not if there are many towers. so they must be more flexible to play, and not hurt the economy flow as they are not moveable, you need that economy disadvantage softened in the beginning.

so let the first 5 towers not lower the economy flow, with gradually less bonus, the more towers you have... you say it.

this would lead to nature also be motivated to defend, playing less archers and heal power, if their t1 attack gets thrown back.

it would also kill the split army abuse, because T1 natuer can defend better, so it softens the hard effectiveness in its t1 rush, and also the weakness of nature.

 

frost gets less penailty to set up some towers at start, having somewhat more time to get into the game because it relys on getting into position, by game design it shall win with less wells and map control taken, but once in offense, the cheap frost units compared to other colors, have good ability to siege, and only have weakness at start, becoming pretty strong until late-t2-t3 they usualyl have a huge problem with the giant units of the other colors like harvester, ashborn pyro, burrwer, siege units in general, so you are forced to shield your wells, but cannot play units, which hurts mostly if the number of units you can play is very low.

- so in general i would add granularity to the economy, or the unit numbers. but that is ofc. lots of work to redo, but adapt the pvp economy might be easier, raise the start money alone would work, add more wells to the map in general, reduce their cost in general, but is would lead to t1 becoming obsolete, so there must be a phase where t1 can interrupt a player going to t2.

what hurts me often, is the low time needed to build the sphere (it is a valuable step that should need more time for the enemy to react), which should be gradually longer for each tier. (in pve this is a bit problematic bcause of time limits, but in general, make the tier differences more distinct would be good.

i know my suggestions seem a bit wild / not focused enough, to you, but that comes later. theese are approaches, that you can pick off some, dont need to take everyting. just need some adaption to what is doable, and are most likely to work if done to end. i know there are some factors, that you need to care for. i think this is solveable, ask me if you dont know.

I have large large rts experience, but have not so much discipline to play to top ladder things, instead i observe and try to improve the game itself, instead of adapting my functioning brain to a non-functioning concept. maybe you think im failing somewhere, but just dont stop going on until every aspect is solved.

 

this is enough text for once. lets start here and not stop until we have a good rework.

 

 

 

Edited by Kampfkekskrieger
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  • 6 months later...

Tbh I think the biggest problem with pvp is the small player pool and if we're being honest a new player will get absolutely destroyed in tier 1....

 

In starcraft or warcraft you'll at least be in game for a decent amount and realize you're not building an army soon enough and that's why you die... in battleforge I'm seeing players just lose matchups they shouldn't do from lack of information.

I've invited a few new players to BF and while they enjoy the game after 2-3 games in pvp they pretty much felt like they're not going to pvp anymore. 

 

While I think this is a daunting task to ask but I feel like Halo Wars 2 card pvp was a lot more nooby friendly and would be a better mode to intro/ push people into pvp. 

Edited by Darmonic
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Majority of rts players play vs AI, thats normal. Or if they play pvp, its team games.

There are problems in pvp duels with map pool and balance, but the biggest problem i see is the lack of comeback mechanic and poor win condition together.

A small mistake can lead to defeat very fast.

(Giving out lvl 120 pvp decks for free was a good idea)

As for T4 not being viable in pvp is normal, and should be never viable. 

 

In Dawn of War 2 which is very similar game to BF, the pvp is same and the "problems" are the same. Some players argue that T3 (equal as T4 BF) should be more viable in 1v1, but they only say this cos the game offers those units, but u wont use them and its a heartbreak.

In DW2 one comeback mechanic (opjective) is the area control for victory points, which leads to victory also.

But getting resources are very important too (its also has 2 type of resources instead of 1 like in BF), however losing resource farms, doesnt cut away unit production or it is not tied directly to victory condition. This is not the case in BF.

Everything is tied to the resource buildings. If you lose the building you lose everything. there is only 2 option to make this better.

Either make the buildings tankier or introduce  a 2. objective/ win condition for the game. 

As for making a building tankier, we could have buffs with long cooldown which can be activated and affects all orbs and power buildings, making them invulnerable for x time. This is something Dota is using to compensate.

Another help could be also giving powergain by default for orbs.

 

Fog of War: playing  BF again i was shocked that there is no fog of war in pvp. this should be enabled?

Edited by Ypulse
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  • 3 weeks later...

Hi, I am also an old battleforge veteran. Though I played mostly 2v2 back then, and some 1v1's. (But I wasn't really good, probably just average).
I loved playing pure frost, shadow / frost or shadow / shadow.
I didn't really mind the t1 differences back then, well atleast not on my elo. I simply played and when I lost really hard, I would look into the forum, like "How to play as X vs Y".
These t1 changes are surely well-thought and probably needed, but maybe they aren't the best start to get more players to play pvp.
(Though, Maybe green would like an "Ice Barrier", which grants immunity to knock-back.)

BattleForge is a very complexe game, especially about balancing. So, I wanted to share just some (out-of-the-box) Idea's here, which I mind-stormed.

1) Increase the starting energy on some maps. Maybe this could bring more variance and help with certain rushes or defending on early t1.

2) Introduce Tier-2 PvP Maps. Before Queueing, you select a monument color, with which you start on the map, and the next unit you summon decides the t2 color / monument.
Though I don't know how easy / difficult this would be.

// Add PvE Elements to make the transition smoother. PvE -> PvP
3a) Add bandits / twilights (1-3 mobs) to the map on key-points or bigger well / orb fields. Then I can decide, if I want to go for a better positioning or an easier well.
3b) Add friendly spawning camps, where every X Seconds an Archer Unit spawns of my T1 Color. (For Beginner Maps / Beginners)

4) Add an Mixed-PvE-PvP Mode, where I have to clear an PvE Camp first, to get to my first wells and tier2.

Dear regards,
ClownCombat



 

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  • 6 months later...

Hi everyone,

the first thing I want to say is that I'm damn happy that Battleforge has been brought back to life. Thanks to everyone who made it happen! I never understood why a game of this class was crushed. Economic aspects... ...at most economic mismanagement. BF was and is one of the best games of all times. 

Now I just stumbled upon Reborn by accident and I was sooo happy. But the joy about Skylords Reborn gave way to the realization that (for me) the best part - the PvP - is nearly dead. Therefor my thoughts on this topic. PvP was and is a pearl of the game. Making it better by balancing and new maps is certainly a laudable goal, but it will hardly help attract more people in the current situation. I understand the idea behind the free PvP decks, but I don't like this part of Reborn at all. My main motivation in the good old days was always to try out new decks and combinations for PvP. Unfortunately, this motivation is currently completely absent, because nearly everything is already there and usable. So why still spending time in unlocking something? Ok, so I just play PvP because it's fun, but wait ... there is nobody around to play with... and why should I wait long time when I already know what's coming. Unfortunately, the individuality is just as wasted as the motivation. Sure I could play PvE and laboriously put together my own deck, but I don't like PvE at all and I got not that much time as I had with 25.
I think the point is obviously... and the solution is simple: The easiest way to get people to do something is to reward them for doing it - that's human nature. 😉


Therefor my suggestions are:

1st: Let all the old BF-Veterans know, that Battleforge is back. I'm sure there are a lot such people outside and new players will follow. If dady plays it, maybe his son will try too.

2nd Reward the PvP better, much better! How about some kind of ELO-Survival-Scaling. The better the opponent and the longer you hold out, the higher the outcome?

3rd Compensate the difference in Elo between the players. For example by letting the "weaker" one choose the map after the game is "logged in".

4th Reduce the free PvP-Decks to a few but competitive variants. 1 for each color / base-mixes. Don't make everything accessible to everyone - let some space for grinding and trying "new" stuff.

5th I like the idea of new maps. What is still completely missing in Battleforge is a "closed" map - one on which you cannot attack and defend at 7 different places at the same time. 1 or 2 narrow passages that have to be held / where you have to break through, would be nice. Maybe this could be a way to reduce speed and bring higher tiers on the board aswell. More over I particularly like the idea that has already been mentioned here. Mixing PvE and PvP would be really great. The PvE-part could act as a buffer between the players and would be an additional challenge. Alternatively, the AI could intervene at a certain point, e.g. when the first 3-sphere monument is built or something like this.


Regards Teex

 

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Hey VyTeex, welcome back! 

1, easier said then done 😉 We do have a marketing position open in our team, so we definitly wish for this to happen too. How did you stumble upon the game? 

2, interesting idea, though im not sure if this is technically possible at the moment, and we would have to look into possible abuse of the system

3, not sure if thats technically possible.

4. in the beta, it was shown that PvP was competely unattractive because of the unfair matchups and grinding. We dont want to force players to first play a huge amount of PvE before they can even start in PvP. The current free pvp decks will be altered a bit though, which might result in more experimentation. In higher levels you already see this a bit, with people swapping out cards (the free pvp decks are alterable! Not everyone is aware of this)

5. RadicalX can better reply to this, but this thing is absent for a reason. Some factions are definitly better at such positions than others, and it would reduce playstyles. 

Finally, I would like to point out that every wednesday you can get some PvP going during Toggy's fightclub stream, and there are also 1vs1 tournaments being held every few weeks (next weekend is another one!)

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I disagree that the solution to pvp attraction is "obviously and simply" more rewards, because if that would be the case, devs would have amped it up already (and gladly i guess).

The main issue is, that pvp for many players is stressful, especially 1v1 because it puts you on the spot. Nobody to blame (except balance :>, though devs doing a great job of improving it) and your opponent preys on your errors unlike the AI in PvE. As I read though, there are PvP-Modes in development which are more like Arcade (like Deathmatch Arena) and therefore less stressful. I think that is a step in the right direction.

There was a chat-discussion recently where players interested in pvp argued that they would get roflstomped by veteran players if they would queue up. I responded that if at least two of those rookie players teamed up, they could play sparring games against each other instead of feeding their ladder points.

Following that thought, I started a format this evening called the "Rookie-Fightclub"  (shameless copycat) and repeatedly invited players via chat to join my spectator 1v1-lobbys to either play, observe or discuss pvp-questions. Main issue so far was driving out the seasoned players who would "just watch"; but by doing so blocked the lobby and startled the rookies away.

Nevertheless my first attempt went promisingly and I am going to continue this format during the next weeks. 

qudekRa, Kapo, Volin and 3 others like this
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My personal oppinion about pvp is that its a bit too fast for me. I mean im a bit slow player I like to build up my army and reach the XL units where I can smash everything. In pvp its usually over in the first few minutes if you are a rookie you can not recover, maybe if we start matches with 2 orbs that would be a whole different level (might be even more aggressive) Anyway I like to fck around in a 2v2 map with friends, I usually like to give 5 minutes for each side to prepare for a great fight its much more fun for me. More game modes I can say and it will be popular 😄 anyway keep up the good work guys!

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11 hours ago, Xanatoss said:

I disagree that the solution to pvp attraction is "obviously and simply" more rewards, because if that would be the case, devs would have amped it up already (and gladly i guess).

The main issue is, that pvp for many players is stressful, especially 1v1 because it puts you on the spot. Nobody to blame (except balance :>, though devs doing a great job of improving it) and your opponent preys on your errors unlike the AI in PvE. As I read though, there are PvP-Modes in development which are more like Arcade (like Deathmatch Arena) and therefore less stressful. I think that is a step in the right direction.

There was a chat-discussion recently where players interested in pvp argued that they would get roflstomped by veteran players if they would queue up. I responded that if at least two of those rookie players teamed up, they could play sparring games against each other instead of feeding their ladder points.

Following that thought, I started a format this evening called the "Rookie-Fightclub"  (shameless copycat) and repeatedly invited players via chat to join my spectator 1v1-lobbys to either play, observe or discuss pvp-questions. Main issue so far was driving out the seasoned players who would "just watch"; but by doing so blocked the lobby and startled the rookies away.

Nevertheless my first attempt went promisingly and I am going to continue this format during the next weeks. 

That's a great initiative! 😄 

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Hi Majora,

thanks for the quick answer. In a nostalgic moment I entered "Battleforge" in the Google search and came out with a YouTuber called HandOfUncut. I also think that would be the best answer when it comes to attracting new players for free: Contact YouTuber and win them over to contribute. In return, you could lure them with a big BFP-account ingame, so they may have the opportunity to show their audience what's possible.

This may be the wrong thread for this topic, but I would be interested to know what your none-profit agreement looks like in detail. Because the next best way would be to reach an agreement with EA and break these limits. If you offer a company to invest neither costs nor risk, but maybe a profit, then I cannot imagine that this company would say "no". Given such an agreement, wouldn't it be possible to get the game with indy-conditions on Steam?


Back to topic:

I fully agree with Xanatoss and Bking that PvP is too fast and too stressful for many players, sometime including me :P. But I think this problem and also Bking's suggestions could be solved or implemented. On the one hand, this could be solved via map design. Larger map, less open, further paths, more walls and orb spots with 3 or 4 wells. On the other hand, wouldn't it be possible for you to create a second duel area in which different starting conditions apply? Then you could provide a pool with larger maps and / or let the players start with 2 monuments and more energy.

Another simple option would be to significantly reduce the costs of walls in PvP.
 

On 7/18/2021 at 11:29 PM, Xanatoss said:

I disagree that the solution to pvp attraction is "obviously and simply" more rewards, because if that would be the case, devs would have amped it up already (and gladly i guess).

That may be right. Unfortunately, I don't know what is possible for the developers and what is not. I only make suggestions - from my naive consumer point of view. Of course, it is also correct that this does not automatically win more players for Reborn, but you would give those who are already playing an incentive. Whether I grind PvE or PvP to get new cards makes no difference (at least for me). I would choose the option that ends up being the most effective thing in terms of time - and that's a basic human decision-making scheme. A double PvP reward weekend would be great to prove this. 😛

Edited by VyTeex
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52 minutes ago, VyTeex said:

Hi Majora,

thanks for the quick answer. In a nostalgic moment I entered "Battleforge" in the Google search and came out with a YouTuber called HandOfUncut. I also think that would be the best answer when it comes to attracting new players for free: Contact YouTuber and win them over to contribute. In return, you could lure them with a big BFP-account ingame, so they may have the opportunity to show their audience what's possible.

We definitly want to do this, but the Outreach Coordinator (Marketing) role is not yet filled. Personally im not a fan of giving youtubers a big BFP account, since I feel we should treat people fairly and they can always play on the test-server if they want a full-account, but that would be something for the outreach coordinator to decide. But short answer: yes, we agree and we definitly want to reach out to more youtubers.

 

55 minutes ago, VyTeex said:

This may be the wrong thread for this topic, but I would be interested to know what your none-profit agreement looks like in detail. Because the next best way would be to reach an agreement with EA and break these limits. If you offer a company to invest neither costs nor risk, but maybe a profit, then I cannot imagine that this company would say "no". Given such an agreement, wouldn't it be possible to get the game with indy-conditions on Steam?

I wasn't around when this agreement got made. As far as I know, we are not allowed to make money, or pay money (thus have other people earn money) from battleforge. EA still owns the IP. And while I understand your logic, I don't think EA follows it. If I remember correctly, Battleforge got shut down back in the day not because it wasn't making a profit, but because it didn't fit EA's new guidelines of ''each IP of us has to make at least x% of our total profit''. Big companies can have weird rules, and we are already very grateful we get to not only release, but further develop a property we don't own ourselves. 

58 minutes ago, VyTeex said:

I fully agree with Xanatoss and Bking that PvP is too fast and too stressful for many players, sometime including me :P. But I think this problem and also Bking's suggestions could be solved or implemented. On the one hand, this could be solved via map design. Larger map, less open, further paths, more walls and orb spots with 3 or 4 wells. On the other hand, wouldn't it be possible for you to create a second duel area in which different starting conditions apply? Then you could provide a pool with larger maps and / or let the players start with 2 monuments and more energy.

Another simple option would be to significantly reduce the costs of walls in PvP.

Im sure RadicalX can dive more in debt about these points, but my first reaction would be that reducing the costs of walls would not work.
A - you also give pro's that reduction, and they will probably better know what to do with it
B - it creates a false sense of security and/or longer games. New players might already have lost without them even realising, and suddenly their PvE-like defended wall gets either destroyed or just warped through. 
C - Same for making maps bigger, matches will last longer, but I doubt it would reduce the ''my opponent is better than me'' feeling. In starcraft, I might not rush my opponent, but if i have 4 expansions to his 1, he is still going to feel completely outmatched, even if the game is technically slower (read: lasts longer)
 

1 hour ago, VyTeex said:

That may be right. Unfortunately, I don't know what is possible for the developers and what is not. I only make suggestions - from my naive consumer point of view. Of course, it is also correct that this does not automatically win more players for Reborn, but you would give those who are already playing an incentive. Whether I grind PvE or PvP to get new cards makes no difference (at least for me). I would choose the option that ends up being the most effective thing in terms of time - and that's a basic human decision-making scheme. A double PvP reward weekend would be great to prove this. 😛

I completely understand, and definitly do keep giving suggestions that might seem obvious. We have a couple of examples where a simple change was actually a great quality of life improvement. I just wanted to explain why we dont always change things that seem obvious to change 🙂 

We are looking into things like specific time slots that reward more PvP rewards to try and get more people into PvP at the same time by the way. 🙂 

Metagross31 likes this
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8 hours ago, VyTeex said:

I fully agree with Xanatoss and Bking that PvP is too fast and too stressful for many players, sometime including me :P. But I think this problem and also Bking's suggestions could be solved or implemented. On the one hand, this could be solved via map design. Larger map, less open, further paths, more walls and orb spots with 3 or 4 wells. On the other hand, wouldn't it be possible for you to create a second duel area in which different starting conditions apply? Then you could provide a pool with larger maps and / or let the players start with 2 monuments and more energy.

Another simple option would be to significantly reduce the costs of walls in PvP.

I think it is possible to make custom PvP maps, which have all of the things you mentioned here. I also think new PvP maps will be surely added to the official pool at some point in the future, but only after extensive testing. Also, all of the points Majora mentioned still have to be considered. But hey, maybe someone will create some bigger/slower maps, which are decently balanced at some point 🙂

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