Masteries are a well though out decision one has to make. As a player, I will never be against the option of making mastery reset free, but I don't see kabam doing so as it's been here for a long time, and people still have to work for it.
But Masteries needs a revamp or something new. 7 years with same masteries. Sometimes things needs updating. And I think it's time.
My best idea would be to find this balanced compromise: Make masteries swap free but implement 24hr cooldown so that would prevent people of swapping masteries every fight and plan your fights daily. Ofc there still could be an option to reset cool-down timer with some unit cost. It keeps the strategy aspect and everyone wins.
But I would never complain if Kabam made mastery swaps free all the time, just trying to suggest some Customer/Kabam friendly solution.
Tbh free mastery changes makes the game more interesting and players would want to play more. Keeping the player base engaged is a good thing and something they would want for the game. Once you paid for cores, the changing shouldn't cost a bomb everytime. Or atleast have few mastery presets. And changing those presets costing like 5 or 10 units. That way everyone's happy.
A lot of people had no clue how easily Kabam can turn off mastery costs. I think it really takes the fun out of the game when you have to make a business decision on whether a fight is worth redoing masteries or not.
Kabam would get a lot of points with the community if they remove the costs because it is long overdue. With all of the bugs and recent lack on content that is an easy win for the community and they can sell it as such.
100% with you, but it's clearly a business decision.
It isn't a business decision, at least not primarily: they almost certainly don't make much on mastery swaps, because mastery swaps are not a very common practice.
The primary reason is a purely game design issue. This is not the only game with this sort of restriction. Even games that don't charge for such changes restrict them in other ways that prevent them from happening while earning zero revenue. The reason is the same reason we don't just end up earning enough mastery points to turn them all on. If the logic is that once the player pays to unlock them they should be able to use them however they want, why don't people also ask for enough mastery points to turn them all on if they want (actually, scratch that: some people do).
Mastery swaps aren't free because mastery swaps existing at all is a compromise. The point to the mastery system is to present a choice to the player, or a set of them. Pick this, you can't have that. Take this, you get the benefits but also the deficits of that mastery. Players are supposed to make choices and then live with them. That's why the maximum number of mastery points earnable is carefully selected to ensure you can't have everything, or even a majority of everything without making sacrifices. Many games don't even allow any such respecification changes: they go to the extreme of not allowing such respecification decisions at all, at any cost.
Since there are issues with locking players into those decisions permanently, and those are compounded by the evolution of the game where different game modes place completely different pressures on mastery setups, the game allows for mastery changes up to a point. You can do them, but they'll cost. So players have to weigh the benefits of swapping with the costs incurred with swapping.
None of this is revenue driven: in fact it is much cheaper to respecify masteries now than in the past as many of the unit costs were removed. The cost is not there to make money, it is to make mastery configuration "sticky" so players have to stick with their decisions and live with them most of the time.
Designing and enforcing consequences into player decisions is a fundamental game design principle. It is why mastery changes aren't free, it is why rank down tickets are most non-existent, it is even one of the primary bases for why we have fixed inventory capacity. A lot of design decisions in this game are influenced by monetization, but this isn't one of them.
For you to say this has nothing to do with costs shows how little you understand Kabam. Kabam has many restrictions that are made purely on a time limit. You don't have to have masteries cost units for it to be restrictive. This is about units and Kabam willingness to not let it go.
There are players who switch masteries between every war, so maybe on the level you play the practice isn't common but that assumption is just not true.
A lot of people had no clue how easily Kabam can turn off mastery costs. I think it really takes the fun out of the game when you have to make a business decision on whether a fight is worth redoing masteries or not.
Kabam would get a lot of points with the community if they remove the costs because it is long overdue. With all of the bugs and recent lack on content that is an easy win for the community and they can sell it as such.
100% with you, but it's clearly a business decision.
It isn't a business decision, at least not primarily: they almost certainly don't make much on mastery swaps, because mastery swaps are not a very common practice.
The primary reason is a purely game design issue. This is not the only game with this sort of restriction. Even games that don't charge for such changes restrict them in other ways that prevent them from happening while earning zero revenue. The reason is the same reason we don't just end up earning enough mastery points to turn them all on. If the logic is that once the player pays to unlock them they should be able to use them however they want, why don't people also ask for enough mastery points to turn them all on if they want (actually, scratch that: some people do).
Mastery swaps aren't free because mastery swaps existing at all is a compromise. The point to the mastery system is to present a choice to the player, or a set of them. Pick this, you can't have that. Take this, you get the benefits but also the deficits of that mastery. Players are supposed to make choices and then live with them. That's why the maximum number of mastery points earnable is carefully selected to ensure you can't have everything, or even a majority of everything without making sacrifices. Many games don't even allow any such respecification changes: they go to the extreme of not allowing such respecification decisions at all, at any cost.
Since there are issues with locking players into those decisions permanently, and those are compounded by the evolution of the game where different game modes place completely different pressures on mastery setups, the game allows for mastery changes up to a point. You can do them, but they'll cost. So players have to weigh the benefits of swapping with the costs incurred with swapping.
None of this is revenue driven: in fact it is much cheaper to respecify masteries now than in the past as many of the unit costs were removed. The cost is not there to make money, it is to make mastery configuration "sticky" so players have to stick with their decisions and live with them most of the time.
Designing and enforcing consequences into player decisions is a fundamental game design principle. It is why mastery changes aren't free, it is why rank down tickets are most non-existent, it is even one of the primary bases for why we have fixed inventory capacity. A lot of design decisions in this game are influenced by monetization, but this isn't one of them.
For you to say this has nothing to do with costs shows how little you understand Kabam. Kabam has many restrictions that are made purely on a time limit. You don't have to have masteries cost units for it to be restrictive. This is about units and Kabam willingness to not let it go.
There are players who switch masteries between every war, so maybe on the level you play the practice isn't common but that assumption is just not true.
How are you refuting his point at all? Which restrictions have they made because of a “time limit”? What does that even refer to?
How else would you propose they make them restrictive that somehow also satisfies the community?
He never states that nobody switches masteries, just that there is a cost to doing so that discourages a wide majority of players doing it.
A lot of people had no clue how easily Kabam can turn off mastery costs. I think it really takes the fun out of the game when you have to make a business decision on whether a fight is worth redoing masteries or not.
Kabam would get a lot of points with the community if they remove the costs because it is long overdue. With all of the bugs and recent lack on content that is an easy win for the community and they can sell it as such.
100% with you, but it's clearly a business decision.
It isn't a business decision, at least not primarily: they almost certainly don't make much on mastery swaps, because mastery swaps are not a very common practice.
The primary reason is a purely game design issue. This is not the only game with this sort of restriction. Even games that don't charge for such changes restrict them in other ways that prevent them from happening while earning zero revenue. The reason is the same reason we don't just end up earning enough mastery points to turn them all on. If the logic is that once the player pays to unlock them they should be able to use them however they want, why don't people also ask for enough mastery points to turn them all on if they want (actually, scratch that: some people do).
Mastery swaps aren't free because mastery swaps existing at all is a compromise. The point to the mastery system is to present a choice to the player, or a set of them. Pick this, you can't have that. Take this, you get the benefits but also the deficits of that mastery. Players are supposed to make choices and then live with them. That's why the maximum number of mastery points earnable is carefully selected to ensure you can't have everything, or even a majority of everything without making sacrifices. Many games don't even allow any such respecification changes: they go to the extreme of not allowing such respecification decisions at all, at any cost.
Since there are issues with locking players into those decisions permanently, and those are compounded by the evolution of the game where different game modes place completely different pressures on mastery setups, the game allows for mastery changes up to a point. You can do them, but they'll cost. So players have to weigh the benefits of swapping with the costs incurred with swapping.
None of this is revenue driven: in fact it is much cheaper to respecify masteries now than in the past as many of the unit costs were removed. The cost is not there to make money, it is to make mastery configuration "sticky" so players have to stick with their decisions and live with them most of the time.
Designing and enforcing consequences into player decisions is a fundamental game design principle. It is why mastery changes aren't free, it is why rank down tickets are most non-existent, it is even one of the primary bases for why we have fixed inventory capacity. A lot of design decisions in this game are influenced by monetization, but this isn't one of them.
For you to say this has nothing to do with costs shows how little you understand Kabam. Kabam has many restrictions that are made purely on a time limit. You don't have to have masteries cost units for it to be restrictive. This is about units and Kabam willingness to not let it go.
There are players who switch masteries between every war, so maybe on the level you play the practice isn't common but that assumption is just not true.
How are you refuting his point at all? Which restrictions have they made because of a “time limit”? What does that even refer to?
How else would you propose they make them restrictive that somehow also satisfies the community?
He never states that nobody switches masteries, just that there is a cost to doing so that discourages a wide majority of players doing it.
Because it’s easier to say “Kabam bad, Kabam want money” than actually think about the points made.
A lot of people had no clue how easily Kabam can turn off mastery costs. I think it really takes the fun out of the game when you have to make a business decision on whether a fight is worth redoing masteries or not.
Kabam would get a lot of points with the community if they remove the costs because it is long overdue. With all of the bugs and recent lack on content that is an easy win for the community and they can sell it as such.
100% with you, but it's clearly a business decision.
It isn't a business decision, at least not primarily: they almost certainly don't make much on mastery swaps, because mastery swaps are not a very common practice.
The primary reason is a purely game design issue. This is not the only game with this sort of restriction. Even games that don't charge for such changes restrict them in other ways that prevent them from happening while earning zero revenue. The reason is the same reason we don't just end up earning enough mastery points to turn them all on. If the logic is that once the player pays to unlock them they should be able to use them however they want, why don't people also ask for enough mastery points to turn them all on if they want (actually, scratch that: some people do).
Mastery swaps aren't free because mastery swaps existing at all is a compromise. The point to the mastery system is to present a choice to the player, or a set of them. Pick this, you can't have that. Take this, you get the benefits but also the deficits of that mastery. Players are supposed to make choices and then live with them. That's why the maximum number of mastery points earnable is carefully selected to ensure you can't have everything, or even a majority of everything without making sacrifices. Many games don't even allow any such respecification changes: they go to the extreme of not allowing such respecification decisions at all, at any cost.
Since there are issues with locking players into those decisions permanently, and those are compounded by the evolution of the game where different game modes place completely different pressures on mastery setups, the game allows for mastery changes up to a point. You can do them, but they'll cost. So players have to weigh the benefits of swapping with the costs incurred with swapping.
None of this is revenue driven: in fact it is much cheaper to respecify masteries now than in the past as many of the unit costs were removed. The cost is not there to make money, it is to make mastery configuration "sticky" so players have to stick with their decisions and live with them most of the time.
Designing and enforcing consequences into player decisions is a fundamental game design principle. It is why mastery changes aren't free, it is why rank down tickets are most non-existent, it is even one of the primary bases for why we have fixed inventory capacity. A lot of design decisions in this game are influenced by monetization, but this isn't one of them.
For you to say this has nothing to do with costs shows how little you understand Kabam. Kabam has many restrictions that are made purely on a time limit. You don't have to have masteries cost units for it to be restrictive. This is about units and Kabam willingness to not let it go.
There are players who switch masteries between every war, so maybe on the level you play the practice isn't common but that assumption is just not true.
Units are free in game..... Anyone can get them through content and arena. So.....tell me again how this is about money?
A lot of people had no clue how easily Kabam can turn off mastery costs. I think it really takes the fun out of the game when you have to make a business decision on whether a fight is worth redoing masteries or not.
Kabam would get a lot of points with the community if they remove the costs because it is long overdue. With all of the bugs and recent lack on content that is an easy win for the community and they can sell it as such.
100% with you, but it's clearly a business decision.
It isn't a business decision, at least not primarily: they almost certainly don't make much on mastery swaps, because mastery swaps are not a very common practice.
The primary reason is a purely game design issue. This is not the only game with this sort of restriction. Even games that don't charge for such changes restrict them in other ways that prevent them from happening while earning zero revenue. The reason is the same reason we don't just end up earning enough mastery points to turn them all on. If the logic is that once the player pays to unlock them they should be able to use them however they want, why don't people also ask for enough mastery points to turn them all on if they want (actually, scratch that: some people do).
Mastery swaps aren't free because mastery swaps existing at all is a compromise. The point to the mastery system is to present a choice to the player, or a set of them. Pick this, you can't have that. Take this, you get the benefits but also the deficits of that mastery. Players are supposed to make choices and then live with them. That's why the maximum number of mastery points earnable is carefully selected to ensure you can't have everything, or even a majority of everything without making sacrifices. Many games don't even allow any such respecification changes: they go to the extreme of not allowing such respecification decisions at all, at any cost.
Since there are issues with locking players into those decisions permanently, and those are compounded by the evolution of the game where different game modes place completely different pressures on mastery setups, the game allows for mastery changes up to a point. You can do them, but they'll cost. So players have to weigh the benefits of swapping with the costs incurred with swapping.
None of this is revenue driven: in fact it is much cheaper to respecify masteries now than in the past as many of the unit costs were removed. The cost is not there to make money, it is to make mastery configuration "sticky" so players have to stick with their decisions and live with them most of the time.
Designing and enforcing consequences into player decisions is a fundamental game design principle. It is why mastery changes aren't free, it is why rank down tickets are most non-existent, it is even one of the primary bases for why we have fixed inventory capacity. A lot of design decisions in this game are influenced by monetization, but this isn't one of them.
For you to say this has nothing to do with costs shows how little you understand Kabam.
For you to say this shows you keep forgetting you're talking to someone who regularly discusses these topics with Kabam developers.
Generally speaking, when monetization is an important consideration the devs haven't been afraid to say so in discussions about similar subjects. So far, it hasn't come up as a significant issue yet in this context. So I think my understanding in this case is very well informed.
Presets would be awesome, even now that masteries are free and I've been swapping them around this week, it's annoying having to put each point back in 1 by one and seeing that slow animation. 5 minutes of resetting masteries should just take a couple seconds switching between preset setups.
I'm not saying that Kabam is bad, I'm saying its a business decision based on the amount of units earned. If you lose units it all adds up, so for anyone saying that you can farm units, thats a duh. It still takes away from the pool you can use on crystals or completing end game content.
I could honesty careless to anyone's proximity to developers. It is still a business and currency is revolved around units period.
Examples of Kabam making restraints via time limits is Battlegrounds, AQ, AW. Those are all time limit restraints where you need more powerful champions to take down enemies within a time limit. So I absolutely stand by what I said. And your backlash has now made this topic toxic whereas I was simply advocating for a pro player exchange that will approve the level of enjoyment for most players.
You think it is funny to want want free mastery changes? I don't see your point.
I specifically removed that part so it won't seem like I'm opposing free mastery setups. But yes. Presets with cost in between would be fine for me
This is one thread that I actually don't want to derail the topic and I could see it coming. That's why I didn't tag them in my responses. We need to stay on track for sure. It's crazy that more people haven't responded. I think the lack on responses is shocking.
While i agree about making a decision, this isnt an mmorpg where you choose a race, specialization, and are stuck with it for the rest of the game. I consider it to be a character building fighting game. You switch masteries based on the champions you prefer. But lets face it, currently the meta is mainly towards roster width, where you need multiple solutions to many niche problems. thats why you can respec masteries. But in a deck building game, especially now which focuses on roster width, it is absurd to have to keep having to use units to get the most out of your champions. I'd counter argue that free swapping of masteries will make ALL champions desirable, since i can perhaps use the potential of my WHOLE deck, rather than some aspects of it that i'm currently preferring due to a static mastery build.
I'm not saying that Kabam is bad, I'm saying its a business decision based on the amount of units earned. If you lose units it all adds up, so for anyone saying that you can farm units, thats a duh. It still takes away from the pool you can use on crystals or completing end game content.
I could honesty careless to anyone's proximity to developers. It is still a business and currency is revolved around units period.
Examples of Kabam making restraints via time limits is Battlegrounds, AQ, AW. Those are all time limit restraints where you need more powerful champions to take down enemies within a time limit. So I absolutely stand by what I said. And your backlash has now made this topic toxic whereas I was simply advocating for a pro player exchange that will approve the level of enjoyment for most players.
Earlier I said it was all about money but doesn't DNA make a good point? It's a basic game design thing that's there to force players into a tough decision.
I will keep asking for free switches, but it's probably not about the money.
Honestly I think his point sounded good but had very little substance. That's my honest opinion. Kabam's actions shows that unit draining is #1 on the priority. It not hard to explain when MCOC is obviously a business. This isn't rocket science. I don't blame Kabam for it, I just think they should let this one go.
They finally gave us an avenue for more gold after years of people on the forums complaining with the all around 3% boost and no one really complains anymore.
I'm not saying that Kabam is bad, I'm saying its a business decision based on the amount of units earned. If you lose units it all adds up, so for anyone saying that you can farm units, thats a duh. It still takes away from the pool you can use on crystals or completing end game content.
I could honesty careless to anyone's proximity to developers. It is still a business and currency is revolved around units period.
Examples of Kabam making restraints via time limits is Battlegrounds, AQ, AW. Those are all time limit restraints where you need more powerful champions to take down enemies within a time limit. So I absolutely stand by what I said. And your backlash has now made this topic toxic whereas I was simply advocating for a pro player exchange that will approve the level of enjoyment for most players.
Earlier I said it was all about money but doesn't DNA make a good point? It's a basic game design thing that's there to force players into a tough decision.
I will keep asking for free switches, but it's probably not about the money.
Honestly I think his point sounded good but had very little substance. That's my honest opinion.
Fortunately for me, the developers of the game seem to disagree with you. But to be fair, it is just the arbitrary opinions of the people who actually make the game.
While i agree about making a decision, this isnt an mmorpg where you choose a race, specialization, and are stuck with it for the rest of the game. I consider it to be a character building fighting game.
Once upon a time MCOC might have been that in concept, but it hasn't actually been that for a very long time. The trend in development has been for the game to be a hybrid MMO-light roster-building game since before v12. Someone familiar with deck building games that played from the start would have seen the game consistently drift farther and farther away from the game concept they were familiar with from day one, while people familiar with MMOs have seen the game dejavu itself into more and more MMO tropes over time.
Heck, v12 itself was an MMO trope. Mobile game players were saying at the time how ridiculous the v12 changes were, while MMO veterans were mostly yawning, as almost every MMO that lasts long enough has a v12 of its own.
While i agree about making a decision, this isnt an mmorpg where you choose a race, specialization, and are stuck with it for the rest of the game. I consider it to be a character building fighting game.
Once upon a time MCOC might have been that in concept, but it hasn't actually been that for a very long time. The trend in development has been for the game to be a hybrid MMO-light roster-building game since before v12. Someone familiar with deck building games that played from the start would have seen the game consistently drift farther and farther away from the game concept they were familiar with from day one, while people familiar with MMOs have seen the game dejavu itself into more and more MMO tropes over time.
Heck, v12 itself was an MMO trope. Mobile game players were saying at the time how ridiculous the v12 changes were, while MMO veterans were mostly yawning, as almost every MMO that lasts long enough has a v12 of its own.
I would agree with you in some way but i dont see MCoC as an mmo, rather a pokemon style game. It is actually Marvel based Pokemon game, is all it is.
Comments
But Masteries needs a revamp or something new. 7 years with same masteries. Sometimes things needs updating.
And I think it's time.
Make masteries swap free but implement 24hr cooldown so that would prevent people of swapping masteries every fight and plan your fights daily. Ofc there still could be an option to reset cool-down timer with some unit cost. It keeps the strategy aspect and everyone wins.
But I would never complain if Kabam made mastery swaps free all the time, just trying to suggest some Customer/Kabam friendly solution.
There are players who switch masteries between every war, so maybe on the level you play the practice isn't common but that assumption is just not true.
How else would you propose they make them restrictive that somehow also satisfies the community?
He never states that nobody switches masteries, just that there is a cost to doing so that discourages a wide majority of players doing it.
I would still prefer free masteries, but the idea of presets would also make me happy if they were a nominal amount
Just a friendly reminder. Lol
Seize the day!!
Generally speaking, when monetization is an important consideration the devs haven't been afraid to say so in discussions about similar subjects. So far, it hasn't come up as a significant issue yet in this context. So I think my understanding in this case is very well informed.
I could honesty careless to anyone's proximity to developers. It is still a business and currency is revolved around units period.
Examples of Kabam making restraints via time limits is Battlegrounds, AQ, AW. Those are all time limit restraints where you need more powerful champions to take down enemies within a time limit. So I absolutely stand by what I said. And your backlash has now made this topic toxic whereas I was simply advocating for a pro player exchange that will approve the level of enjoyment for most players.
I'd counter argue that free swapping of masteries will make ALL champions desirable, since i can perhaps use the potential of my WHOLE deck, rather than some aspects of it that i'm currently preferring due to a static mastery build.
They finally gave us an avenue for more gold after years of people on the forums complaining with the all around 3% boost and no one really complains anymore.
Heck, v12 itself was an MMO trope. Mobile game players were saying at the time how ridiculous the v12 changes were, while MMO veterans were mostly yawning, as almost every MMO that lasts long enough has a v12 of its own.