I think the systemic problem with access to gold and ISO exists because Kabam mainly listens to big accounts who don't have this problem, and so the issue persists for lower level players.
Kabam isn't listening to bigger accounts over smaller accounts. The reason why the bigger accounts don't have Gold and ISO problems because they grew their accounts because back then, 4*'s were hard to get. So they've had them ranked for a very long time.
I still don't get some arguments on this post. Talking about new players being at disadvantage, a new player would not have all the resources to waste to build a 4* deck. Older players would have them all almost max sig.
This is true, but the rewards for the mode could give out rank up gems to help players develop a tournament roster, just like how gems are being used to help players rank up 6 and 7 star champs. There is an economy issue with getting ISO and gold, as well and this problem applies to ranking up all champions. I'm not able to level/rank up my 6 stars consistently because I have to wait for my iso and gold to replenish, so if this problem applies to the 4 star champs it would apply to the game in its current state as well.
So you can't rank up all your 6 and 7 stars, and your solution is to build a 4* deck... You have been playing for 9 years... You are doing something wrong.
You're misrepresenting my position. I haven't been playing constantly for 9 years, so when I come back after months of not playing I'll have been left behind in terms of roster and progression. Furthermore, I'm not the only returning player to this game, nor am I the only mid level player who has been locked out of BG because of the matchmaking. I'm sure there are thousands of other players who would very much enjoy battlegrounds but aren't able to play it because they keep facing much higher level players.
You could be right, but those mid level or returning players should not focus on building a 4" deck.
Someone did respond to this idea, and suggested that if we really wanted to be as fair as possible we should have a 3* battlegrounds tournament mode instead of a 4 star since it is vastly easier to rank and sig those champs. I partially agree, but I think the core of this problem is the fact that ISO and gold are inaccessible and not that the champions themselves are difficult to acquire. Rank up gems would solve the problem. I don't see why the MCOC team would have a problem providing uncollected, cav, and thronebreaker players with ranked up 4 stars since they aren't very usable in other game modes anyways.
I'm with you on the 3* for a tournament. I'd love to see a draft over 24 hours or so then do 3 matches within 24 hours and have everyone participate. May take 2 months to whittle down to the final but would be amusing.
A special event tournament would be cool for BG but permanently would not work. Like a lot of the summoners's said, it doesn't make financial sense for Kabam to do this on a regular basis. If everyone just focuses on 4 stars, Kabam would lose money on bringing in new 7 star champs, who would try to get them. Most end game players are the first to try to acquire them. For the most part monthly quest, side quest, incursions, AW, AQ doesn't require the newest champs, since any 6 star champs can handle it on a regular basis. BG is where end game summoners want the best attackers or best defenders. The newest annoying defender or the newest nuke attackers are desired. Kabam needs to be smart about this and make sure that the new champs that they invest so much time and money on will be desired by the summoners who spend. Your theory would be counter productive to their business model of making money to keep the lights on and the game running.
My idea is that the rewards for the tornument mode would be based on your progression level. For example a thronebreaker player might get tier 6 basic and tier 5 CC that would help them take 6 stars to rank 4 so they could achieve paragon.
But you're wanting everyone to use 4*'s but saying if a TB can beat a Valiant in this mode because everyone is equal deck wise, they still get lower rewards. How does that motivate anyone below Valiant to participate?
For war, this was done by rigging the matches by War tier, and lowering the rewards for lower tiers.
Would you rather have lower progressed rosters win more often with their 4 star roster, and get 4 star shards for their trouble?
My idea is that the rewards for the tornument mode would be based on your progression level. For example a thronebreaker player might get tier 6 basic and tier 5 CC that would help them take 6 stars to rank 4 so they could achieve paragon.
But you're wanting everyone to use 4*'s but saying if a TB can beat a Valiant in this mode because everyone is equal deck wise, they still get lower rewards. How does that motivate anyone below Valiant to participate?
For war, this was done by rigging the matches by War tier, and lowering the rewards for lower tiers.
Would you rather have lower progressed rosters win more often with their 4 star roster, and get 4 star shards for their trouble?
The suggestion is to have a 4* based BG tournament but have progression based rewards. It has nothing to do with AW or at least I can't figure our how you're connecting AW to this suggestion. OP wants everyone to have a "equal" playing field but different rewards.
So if I have the same 4* deck as a Valiant as a TB and I beat them, why should I get different rewards? The restrictions are the same for everyone. The only difference would be skill. Regular BGs only has progression based rewards in the store and that's it. If I ca climb the ladder in normal BGs, I get the same rewards as Valiant when I am TB.
Why would anyone want to spend time competing if the rewards are different for different progressions?
Something definitely to do during the offseason, sure, but not regular season. I wouldn't hate that in the off-season, when I'm just toying with champs who might be good in the upcoming meta, as I have the majority of all champs in my 3 to 4 star rosters. I get BG is a slog if you don't have 7 stars ranked up, but some of the fun is discovering "oh, hey, this champ they didn't block really excels against the champ they threw up for defense!" Like me discovering last night in this meta CGR gets wrecked by CMM. CMM actually regenerates as part of her kit when she's in binary mode, and if he gets a shock on you, it ramps her into binary mode quickly. Can't remember who they had as their matchup, but it being my second win guaranteed I advanced a rank and found my way back into diamond with three weeks to go.
I think what you mentioned is a prime reason that battlegrounds should be accessible to lower level players. Since you reached diamond I'm going to assume you're a high level player, which allowed you to experiment in battlegrounds. For someone who is cavalier or thronebreaker, there is virtually no way they could have a similar experience since they are matching with more powerful players. The way you are experiencing battlegrounds would be the same way a new player would be able to experience it if they had a tournament mode with an even playing field. It seems to me that most of the people who are disagreeing with this idea think that it wouldn't work because people should focus on developing their 6 and 7 star roster instead of focusing on the essence of the battlegrounds experience which is experimentation, planning and strategy. Of course the regular battlegrounds would be available for players who want to use their 6 and 7 star champions, but the tournament would at least be an option for those who don't have high level accounts.
I’m thronebreaker with one 7* and 1r4 6*, and I’m in diamond. This is not representative of all tb players.
Something definitely to do during the offseason, sure, but not regular season. I wouldn't hate that in the off-season, when I'm just toying with champs who might be good in the upcoming meta, as I have the majority of all champs in my 3 to 4 star rosters. I get BG is a slog if you don't have 7 stars ranked up, but some of the fun is discovering "oh, hey, this champ they didn't block really excels against the champ they threw up for defense!" Like me discovering last night in this meta CGR gets wrecked by CMM. CMM actually regenerates as part of her kit when she's in binary mode, and if he gets a shock on you, it ramps her into binary mode quickly. Can't remember who they had as their matchup, but it being my second win guaranteed I advanced a rank and found my way back into diamond with three weeks to go.
I think what you mentioned is a prime reason that battlegrounds should be accessible to lower level players. Since you reached diamond I'm going to assume you're a high level player, which allowed you to experiment in battlegrounds. For someone who is cavalier or thronebreaker, there is virtually no way they could have a similar experience since they are matching with more powerful players. The way you are experiencing battlegrounds would be the same way a new player would be able to experience it if they had a tournament mode with an even playing field. It seems to me that most of the people who are disagreeing with this idea think that it wouldn't work because people should focus on developing their 6 and 7 star roster instead of focusing on the essence of the battlegrounds experience which is experimentation, planning and strategy. Of course the regular battlegrounds would be available for players who want to use their 6 and 7 star champions, but the tournament would at least be an option for those who don't have high level accounts.
I’m thronebreaker with one 7* and 1r4 6*, and I’m in diamond. This is not representative of all tb players.
I'm aware it was not representative of all players and I never said it was. A personal anecdote isn't a valid response to a general statement because there are always going to be outliers and exceptions. If you're doing well in BG maybe you're a more skilled player or you got easier matches. This doesn't really change the fact that there are other players close to your level who are struggling and can't even get the battlegrounds objectives because they can't win matches.
My idea is that the rewards for the tornument mode would be based on your progression level. For example a thronebreaker player might get tier 6 basic and tier 5 CC that would help them take 6 stars to rank 4 so they could achieve paragon.
But you're wanting everyone to use 4*'s but saying if a TB can beat a Valiant in this mode because everyone is equal deck wise, they still get lower rewards. How does that motivate anyone below Valiant to participate?
For war, this was done by rigging the matches by War tier, and lowering the rewards for lower tiers.
Would you rather have lower progressed rosters win more often with their 4 star roster, and get 4 star shards for their trouble?
The suggestion is to have a 4* based BG tournament but have progression based rewards. It has nothing to do with AW or at least I can't figure our how you're connecting AW to this suggestion. OP wants everyone to have a "equal" playing field but different rewards.
So if I have the same 4* deck as a Valiant as a TB and I beat them, why should I get different rewards? The restrictions are the same for everyone. The only difference would be skill. Regular BGs only has progression based rewards in the store and that's it. If I ca climb the ladder in normal BGs, I get the same rewards as Valiant when I am TB.
Why would anyone want to spend time competing if the rewards are different for different progressions?
If a tournament mode were to be added there would be no reason to remove the normal battlegrounds mode. The tournament would be geared more for the lower level players to get progression based rewards, while the normal mode would have high level players compete with their 6 and 7 star champions for the best rewards. This way lower level players would still be able to experiment with battlegrounds and enjoy the game mode while progressing at their level, and the top players would still have a reason to develop a high level roster since the rewards would be worthwhile.
I also think there would be an incentive to keep competing in the tournament if the right rewards system was used. For example, players could earn regular rewards for winning matches and the larger rewards would be based on your final placement, the same way alliance war gives rewards.
Thank you for your comment, it's quite insightful as to how different level players experience battlegrounds. I'll try to respond to each point you made.
I absolutely understand your point about player experience impacting the likelihood of their success, and of course there are players like you who are substantially more capable with whatever they are given due to skill and knowledge. However, I would assume that the number of players like yourself are a small minority even among your peers in the valiant progression level. Because of this if a cavalier or thronebreaker player were to match against paragon or valiant it wouldn't be an instant roadblock for them because of roster size. If matchmaking were regulated like the GC with no safety nets I imagine the experience would still be better for lower level players, since it is far easier to accept that they lost due to poor planning and execution on their part. If I match against a high ELO player in chess.com and I lose (as I have done before) I wouldn't feel robbed as I do in battlegrounds because I understand that my opponent just planned and executed better than I did.
First of all, I'm not even close to the best BG player out there. Among *all* MCOC players, I'm a top 5% player in terms of knowledge and skill, but among end game players I'm probably pretty mid. Like maybe top 40%, top 35%, maybe. When I say that when deck matching was a thing I was destroying the competition, I'm not saying the absolute best players could do so, I'm saying the *average* end game player was probably doing so as well.
But more importantly, this is not a binary thing. There are tons of **** Valiants out there who have no idea what they are doing. There are lots of really strong Cavs and TBs out there who would put up a good fight against me even with my huge roster advantage. I've lost to Cavs, just like my Cav alts has beaten Valiant accounts. But there's absolutely no question that *on average* the players who have been here longer, or have achieved higher progression tiers, are stronger than those who haven't. And that statistical advantage will make itself known in BGs. It won't just be 8 year vets destroying one year newbees, it will be five year Paragons beating three year TBs 65% of the time as well. The overall advantage of experience is going to be a very heavy weight on the scales.
You say if you match against high ELO players in chess you wouldn't feel robbed because you simply take it as a given that such a player earned their rating, and thus they should win. But on Chess.com, you see rating. In BG, you won't. All you see is your opponent's performance and your record. When players lose, and lose often, they will always look for something to blame. Right now, its roster advantage. But what happens when you erase that obvious reason for losing, and new players continue to lose 70-90% of their matches but have no obvious thing to blame? Do you actually think that the complaints here on the forums and elsewhere will just stop, and everyone will take the L and be happy about it?
Unlikely. They will blame cheating. They will blame modding. They will blame the match maker for matching them against competition they cannot beat. Players aren't unhappy about *matching* against strong players, they are unhappy about *losing* against them, and looking for anything to blame. Roster is the easiest thing to blame, but as others here will be able to attest to, I've actually taken the time to analyze the competition of players complaining about "unfair match ups" when they've actually posted their BG history, and in a lot of cases while some of the match ups were against very strong opponents, others were not. But people only see what they want to see. If they lose ten matches in a row, it *has to be* because BG is unfair, and when they recall a couple of those matches were against very strong rosters, they have no problem claiming that BG is unfair because they are "always" being matched against Valiant players, when some of their losses were to Cav players with less than a million rating.
I can only speak for myself, but if there were a mode that gave everyone the same resources and allowed them to compete this way - even without rewards - I would still play it more than any other game mode, for the same reason someone would play chess, because the game is a reward in and of itself. It's hard to think I'm the only person who feels this way because of the popularity of similar games like risk, settlers of catan, and even clash royale before they introduced safety nets in ladder. I don't think victory track needs to go away if this mode was added to the game, and I don't see why top players would be losing anything if this was added.
And I have no problem expanding friendly matches to allow players more opportunities to experience a more low stress more peer-competitive rather than globally-competitive BG. I even suggested a "unranked mode" where players could enter BG and ask for match, but BG would only match you against players of equal progression and roster strength, but such matches would not award trophies. If the *other* player entered in normal mode, they could still win trophies against you, but you could neither earn nor lose them.
But this would be integrated with the main game mode, not a distraction from it. The game devs do not have the resources to give every player what they want, but even if they did, there's the separate issue that they shouldn't. In an analogous way to you asking for a different version of the same game mode to benefit players of lower competitive strength or desire, players have often asked for lower versions of, say, end game content. The argument is that end game content is unfair, because only end game players can play it. Why can't the developers make lower tier versions of the Abyss or Necropolis?
They could, but that would defeat the purpose of those things even existing. They exist to be an incentive to progress. If everyone could play the Abyss and the Necropolis and Act 8, there would be no need to progress. Everyone could do whatever they wanted whenever they wanted with whatever they wanted. This is not that kind of game. The game is a progressional game, and it encourages and incentivizes progress (as it defines progress), and so much of the game is composed of content "ladders" designed to give players opportunities to move up, get better, grow stronger. End game content is there to reward the players who make it that far.
Battlegrounds exists for one specific reason: to provide an opportunity for the players who want 1v1 competitive content to have that opportunity. The competition ladder is not a part of the mode, it is the mode, and everything else are compromises to integrate that opportunity into the game.
In terms of desiring fairness, I don't think the game needs a victory track to reward players for playing the game, even if there isn't a tournament mode, rewards during the season could be earned by winning matches (just like the battlegrounds objectives give trophy tokens right now), and the biggest rewards would be given at the end of the season based on their final placement, the same way alliance war works. I think the current victory track is a greater reflection of rewarding performance over effort because of the way higher level players are rewarded for having powerful champions over playing well. There are many skill based challenges in the game already like the Carina's where you can earn a 6 star crystal for completing realm of legends with a 6 star aegon or guillotine 2099, and I would see a tournament mode as being in line with those in terms of being a skill based challenge.
Yes, but mostly no. Which is to say, sure, the devs can give players rewards any way they like, but as I said above, BG is intended to be a competitive ladder. The rewards are there to reward competition. The VT is a compromise, allowing players to earn some rewards from participation, even if they are unable or unwilling to commit fully to earning the maximum possible rewards for their strength (it takes more than just being good to win rewards in BG, you also have to put in the time and effort to get them).
The presumption is that the VT rewards *encourage* players to get better to get more of them, and the better they get, the more amenable they become to becoming full fledged competitors. BG is not, and the devs do not want to make it, another arena. It isn't there to just mindlessly grind rewards. In fact, a lot of design elements are there specifically to reduce or eliminate that possibility. Going all the way back to beta (not the public beta, but the private CCP beta) the idea that BG could become another grindable mode was something the devs vehemently opposed the idea of.
The devs don't want a version of BG that everyone can casually grind, and another one where players actually have to compete. They want one mode that is about competition, with onramps designed to allow players who are intimidated by competition or not ready for it to still participate while they learn how to get better. Now, just like the story arcs and everything else in the game, not every player will eventually be converted. But they don't expect to convert everyone. They expect the mode to encourage it, and its up to the players to decide how they interact with it.
Over 200k players participate in BG. We know this with absolute certainty because we can tell from solo milestone leaderboards. We know on the order of 20k players make it to GC, also from leaderboards. And we know that this is approximately what the devs think is reasonable: we know this because when a lot more players entered GC, they publicly stated that they were adjusting things to reduce that number. The devs expect 90% of players to fail to reach GC, and those players will then fall somewhere on the VT ladder. Some will make it to Vibranium, some will make it to Diamond, some will only make it to Platinum or even lower. That's appropriate and reasonable, and the rewards reflect that. Just like everywhere else the devs expect that some percentage of the players will work to get better to climb that ladder, just like some percentage decide to push for Cavalier and then Thronebreaker and then Paragon and then Valiant. Some players will get stopped in Platinum. What will stop them? Losses. Losing is a part of every competition, and the VT is a kind of measuring rod to tell players how far they can get, and how much farther they have to go.
You're right: we don't need it. We can just throw everyone into GC and let the chips fall where they may. But we cannot just take all the VT rewards and throw them into more and more objectives or milestones, because that would turn BG into a grinding mode. I should say, we could do this, but the devs won't. If what you're asking eventually leads to that point, I can tell you that's where the idea would get stopped in its tracks. This game only has one arena, and some would say that's already one too many. Speaking as one of the few players who has been deeply involved with the devs in both arena design and battlegrounds design, I can say with some confidence there is never going to be two.
1 thing I want to be fair is Remove loading time from time
Calculate based on the time or don't show me the actual time & tell me that I lost because game loading time is 10 sec for me 🤷
If you look closely, the timer count down and actual fight times are different. BG will calculate your actual fight time minus any loading time.
If u look closely it says how much time left after u defeat the champ - if I start at 1:30 when normally 1:53 where does the rest goes LOL . Look close where
Thank you for your comment, it's quite insightful as to how different level players experience battlegrounds. I'll try to respond to each point you made.
I absolutely understand your point about player experience impacting the likelihood of their success, and of course there are players like you who are substantially more capable with whatever they are given due to skill and knowledge. However, I would assume that the number of players like yourself are a small minority even among your peers in the valiant progression level. Because of this if a cavalier or thronebreaker player were to match against paragon or valiant it wouldn't be an instant roadblock for them because of roster size. If matchmaking were regulated like the GC with no safety nets I imagine the experience would still be better for lower level players, since it is far easier to accept that they lost due to poor planning and execution on their part. If I match against a high ELO player in chess.com and I lose (as I have done before) I wouldn't feel robbed as I do in battlegrounds because I understand that my opponent just planned and executed better than I did.
First of all, I'm not even close to the best BG player out there. Among *all* MCOC players, I'm a top 5% player in terms of knowledge and skill, but among end game players I'm probably pretty mid. Like maybe top 40%, top 35%, maybe. When I say that when deck matching was a thing I was destroying the competition, I'm not saying the absolute best players could do so, I'm saying the *average* end game player was probably doing so as well.
But more importantly, this is not a binary thing. There are tons of **** Valiants out there who have no idea what they are doing. There are lots of really strong Cavs and TBs out there who would put up a good fight against me even with my huge roster advantage. I've lost to Cavs, just like my Cav alts has beaten Valiant accounts. But there's absolutely no question that *on average* the players who have been here longer, or have achieved higher progression tiers, are stronger than those who haven't. And that statistical advantage will make itself known in BGs. It won't just be 8 year vets destroying one year newbees, it will be five year Paragons beating three year TBs 65% of the time as well. The overall advantage of experience is going to be a very heavy weight on the scales.
You say if you match against high ELO players in chess you wouldn't feel robbed because you simply take it as a given that such a player earned their rating, and thus they should win. But on Chess.com, you see rating. In BG, you won't. All you see is your opponent's performance and your record. When players lose, and lose often, they will always look for something to blame. Right now, its roster advantage. But what happens when you erase that obvious reason for losing, and new players continue to lose 70-90% of their matches but have no obvious thing to blame? Do you actually think that the complaints here on the forums and elsewhere will just stop, and everyone will take the L and be happy about it?
Unlikely. They will blame cheating. They will blame modding. They will blame the match maker for matching them against competition they cannot beat. Players aren't unhappy about *matching* against strong players, they are unhappy about *losing* against them, and looking for anything to blame. Roster is the easiest thing to blame, but as others here will be able to attest to, I've actually taken the time to analyze the competition of players complaining about "unfair match ups" when they've actually posted their BG history, and in a lot of cases while some of the match ups were against very strong opponents, others were not. But people only see what they want to see. If they lose ten matches in a row, it *has to be* because BG is unfair, and when they recall a couple of those matches were against very strong rosters, they have no problem claiming that BG is unfair because they are "always" being matched against Valiant players, when some of their losses were to Cav players with less than a million rating.
I can only speak for myself, but if there were a mode that gave everyone the same resources and allowed them to compete this way - even without rewards - I would still play it more than any other game mode, for the same reason someone would play chess, because the game is a reward in and of itself. It's hard to think I'm the only person who feels this way because of the popularity of similar games like risk, settlers of catan, and even clash royale before they introduced safety nets in ladder. I don't think victory track needs to go away if this mode was added to the game, and I don't see why top players would be losing anything if this was added.
And I have no problem expanding friendly matches to allow players more opportunities to experience a more low stress more peer-competitive rather than globally-competitive BG. I even suggested a "unranked mode" where players could enter BG and ask for match, but BG would only match you against players of equal progression and roster strength, but such matches would not award trophies. If the *other* player entered in normal mode, they could still win trophies against you, but you could neither earn nor lose them.
But this would be integrated with the main game mode, not a distraction from it. The game devs do not have the resources to give every player what they want, but even if they did, there's the separate issue that they shouldn't. In an analogous way to you asking for a different version of the same game mode to benefit players of lower competitive strength or desire, players have often asked for lower versions of, say, end game content. The argument is that end game content is unfair, because only end game players can play it. Why can't the developers make lower tier versions of the Abyss or Necropolis?
They could, but that would defeat the purpose of those things even existing. They exist to be an incentive to progress. If everyone could play the Abyss and the Necropolis and Act 8, there would be no need to progress. Everyone could do whatever they wanted whenever they wanted with whatever they wanted. This is not that kind of game. The game is a progressional game, and it encourages and incentivizes progress (as it defines progress), and so much of the game is composed of content "ladders" designed to give players opportunities to move up, get better, grow stronger. End game content is there to reward the players who make it that far.
Battlegrounds exists for one specific reason: to provide an opportunity for the players who want 1v1 competitive content to have that opportunity. The competition ladder is not a part of the mode, it is the mode, and everything else are compromises to integrate that opportunity into the game.
In terms of desiring fairness, I don't think the game needs a victory track to reward players for playing the game, even if there isn't a tournament mode, rewards during the season could be earned by winning matches (just like the battlegrounds objectives give trophy tokens right now), and the biggest rewards would be given at the end of the season based on their final placement, the same way alliance war works. I think the current victory track is a greater reflection of rewarding performance over effort because of the way higher level players are rewarded for having powerful champions over playing well. There are many skill based challenges in the game already like the Carina's where you can earn a 6 star crystal for completing realm of legends with a 6 star aegon or guillotine 2099, and I would see a tournament mode as being in line with those in terms of being a skill based challenge.
Yes, but mostly no. Which is to say, sure, the devs can give players rewards any way they like, but as I said above, BG is intended to be a competitive ladder. The rewards are there to reward competition. The VT is a compromise, allowing players to earn some rewards from participation, even if they are unable or unwilling to commit fully to earning the maximum possible rewards for their strength (it takes more than just being good to win rewards in BG, you also have to put in the time and effort to get them).
The presumption is that the VT rewards *encourage* players to get better to get more of them, and the better they get, the more amenable they become to becoming full fledged competitors. BG is not, and the devs do not want to make it, another arena. It isn't there to just mindlessly grind rewards. In fact, a lot of design elements are there specifically to reduce or eliminate that possibility. Going all the way back to beta (not the public beta, but the private CCP beta) the idea that BG could become another grindable mode was something the devs vehemently opposed the idea of.
The devs don't want a version of BG that everyone can casually grind, and another one where players actually have to compete. They want one mode that is about competition, with onramps designed to allow players who are intimidated by competition or not ready for it to still participate while they learn how to get better. Now, just like the story arcs and everything else in the game, not every player will eventually be converted. But they don't expect to convert everyone. They expect the mode to encourage it, and its up to the players to decide how they interact with it.
Over 200k players participate in BG. We know this with absolute certainty because we can tell from solo milestone leaderboards. We know on the order of 20k players make it to GC, also from leaderboards. And we know that this is approximately what the devs think is reasonable: we know this because when a lot more players entered GC, they publicly stated that they were adjusting things to reduce that number. The devs expect 90% of players to fail to reach GC, and those players will then fall somewhere on the VT ladder. Some will make it to Vibranium, some will make it to Diamond, some will only make it to Platinum or even lower. That's appropriate and reasonable, and the rewards reflect that. Just like everywhere else the devs expect that some percentage of the players will work to get better to climb that ladder, just like some percentage decide to push for Cavalier and then Thronebreaker and then Paragon and then Valiant. Some players will get stopped in Platinum. What will stop them? Losses. Losing is a part of every competition, and the VT is a kind of measuring rod to tell players how far they can get, and how much farther they have to go.
You're right: we don't need it. We can just throw everyone into GC and let the chips fall where they may. But we cannot just take all the VT rewards and throw them into more and more objectives or milestones, because that would turn BG into a grinding mode. I should say, we could do this, but the devs won't. If what you're asking eventually leads to that point, I can tell you that's where the idea would get stopped in its tracks. This game only has one arena, and some would say that's already one too many. Speaking as one of the few players who has been deeply involved with the devs in both arena design and battlegrounds design, I can say with some confidence there is never going to be two.
I hate to admit it but I can see why this would be difficult to implement from a developer's perspective and how it is at odds with their design philosophy. Although I really appreciate that you took the time to construct a thoughtful argument and respond to my concerns seriously.
Even if this isn't a regular game mode, I would hope to see a summoners showdown kind of competition once a year to see some of the game's most skilled players perform. I think it would serve the game to have more competitions that engage the entire player base.
Thank you for your comment, it's quite insightful as to how different level players experience battlegrounds. I'll try to respond to each point you made.
I absolutely understand your point about player experience impacting the likelihood of their success, and of course there are players like you who are substantially more capable with whatever they are given due to skill and knowledge. However, I would assume that the number of players like yourself are a small minority even among your peers in the valiant progression level. Because of this if a cavalier or thronebreaker player were to match against paragon or valiant it wouldn't be an instant roadblock for them because of roster size. If matchmaking were regulated like the GC with no safety nets I imagine the experience would still be better for lower level players, since it is far easier to accept that they lost due to poor planning and execution on their part. If I match against a high ELO player in chess.com and I lose (as I have done before) I wouldn't feel robbed as I do in battlegrounds because I understand that my opponent just planned and executed better than I did.
First of all, I'm not even close to the best BG player out there. Among *all* MCOC players, I'm a top 5% player in terms of knowledge and skill, but among end game players I'm probably pretty mid. Like maybe top 40%, top 35%, maybe. When I say that when deck matching was a thing I was destroying the competition, I'm not saying the absolute best players could do so, I'm saying the *average* end game player was probably doing so as well.
But more importantly, this is not a binary thing. There are tons of **** Valiants out there who have no idea what they are doing. There are lots of really strong Cavs and TBs out there who would put up a good fight against me even with my huge roster advantage. I've lost to Cavs, just like my Cav alts has beaten Valiant accounts. But there's absolutely no question that *on average* the players who have been here longer, or have achieved higher progression tiers, are stronger than those who haven't. And that statistical advantage will make itself known in BGs. It won't just be 8 year vets destroying one year newbees, it will be five year Paragons beating three year TBs 65% of the time as well. The overall advantage of experience is going to be a very heavy weight on the scales.
You say if you match against high ELO players in chess you wouldn't feel robbed because you simply take it as a given that such a player earned their rating, and thus they should win. But on Chess.com, you see rating. In BG, you won't. All you see is your opponent's performance and your record. When players lose, and lose often, they will always look for something to blame. Right now, its roster advantage. But what happens when you erase that obvious reason for losing, and new players continue to lose 70-90% of their matches but have no obvious thing to blame? Do you actually think that the complaints here on the forums and elsewhere will just stop, and everyone will take the L and be happy about it?
Unlikely. They will blame cheating. They will blame modding. They will blame the match maker for matching them against competition they cannot beat. Players aren't unhappy about *matching* against strong players, they are unhappy about *losing* against them, and looking for anything to blame. Roster is the easiest thing to blame, but as others here will be able to attest to, I've actually taken the time to analyze the competition of players complaining about "unfair match ups" when they've actually posted their BG history, and in a lot of cases while some of the match ups were against very strong opponents, others were not. But people only see what they want to see. If they lose ten matches in a row, it *has to be* because BG is unfair, and when they recall a couple of those matches were against very strong rosters, they have no problem claiming that BG is unfair because they are "always" being matched against Valiant players, when some of their losses were to Cav players with less than a million rating.
I can only speak for myself, but if there were a mode that gave everyone the same resources and allowed them to compete this way - even without rewards - I would still play it more than any other game mode, for the same reason someone would play chess, because the game is a reward in and of itself. It's hard to think I'm the only person who feels this way because of the popularity of similar games like risk, settlers of catan, and even clash royale before they introduced safety nets in ladder. I don't think victory track needs to go away if this mode was added to the game, and I don't see why top players would be losing anything if this was added.
And I have no problem expanding friendly matches to allow players more opportunities to experience a more low stress more peer-competitive rather than globally-competitive BG. I even suggested a "unranked mode" where players could enter BG and ask for match, but BG would only match you against players of equal progression and roster strength, but such matches would not award trophies. If the *other* player entered in normal mode, they could still win trophies against you, but you could neither earn nor lose them.
But this would be integrated with the main game mode, not a distraction from it. The game devs do not have the resources to give every player what they want, but even if they did, there's the separate issue that they shouldn't. In an analogous way to you asking for a different version of the same game mode to benefit players of lower competitive strength or desire, players have often asked for lower versions of, say, end game content. The argument is that end game content is unfair, because only end game players can play it. Why can't the developers make lower tier versions of the Abyss or Necropolis?
They could, but that would defeat the purpose of those things even existing. They exist to be an incentive to progress. If everyone could play the Abyss and the Necropolis and Act 8, there would be no need to progress. Everyone could do whatever they wanted whenever they wanted with whatever they wanted. This is not that kind of game. The game is a progressional game, and it encourages and incentivizes progress (as it defines progress), and so much of the game is composed of content "ladders" designed to give players opportunities to move up, get better, grow stronger. End game content is there to reward the players who make it that far.
Battlegrounds exists for one specific reason: to provide an opportunity for the players who want 1v1 competitive content to have that opportunity. The competition ladder is not a part of the mode, it is the mode, and everything else are compromises to integrate that opportunity into the game.
In terms of desiring fairness, I don't think the game needs a victory track to reward players for playing the game, even if there isn't a tournament mode, rewards during the season could be earned by winning matches (just like the battlegrounds objectives give trophy tokens right now), and the biggest rewards would be given at the end of the season based on their final placement, the same way alliance war works. I think the current victory track is a greater reflection of rewarding performance over effort because of the way higher level players are rewarded for having powerful champions over playing well. There are many skill based challenges in the game already like the Carina's where you can earn a 6 star crystal for completing realm of legends with a 6 star aegon or guillotine 2099, and I would see a tournament mode as being in line with those in terms of being a skill based challenge.
Yes, but mostly no. Which is to say, sure, the devs can give players rewards any way they like, but as I said above, BG is intended to be a competitive ladder. The rewards are there to reward competition. The VT is a compromise, allowing players to earn some rewards from participation, even if they are unable or unwilling to commit fully to earning the maximum possible rewards for their strength (it takes more than just being good to win rewards in BG, you also have to put in the time and effort to get them).
The presumption is that the VT rewards *encourage* players to get better to get more of them, and the better they get, the more amenable they become to becoming full fledged competitors. BG is not, and the devs do not want to make it, another arena. It isn't there to just mindlessly grind rewards. In fact, a lot of design elements are there specifically to reduce or eliminate that possibility. Going all the way back to beta (not the public beta, but the private CCP beta) the idea that BG could become another grindable mode was something the devs vehemently opposed the idea of.
The devs don't want a version of BG that everyone can casually grind, and another one where players actually have to compete. They want one mode that is about competition, with onramps designed to allow players who are intimidated by competition or not ready for it to still participate while they learn how to get better. Now, just like the story arcs and everything else in the game, not every player will eventually be converted. But they don't expect to convert everyone. They expect the mode to encourage it, and its up to the players to decide how they interact with it.
Over 200k players participate in BG. We know this with absolute certainty because we can tell from solo milestone leaderboards. We know on the order of 20k players make it to GC, also from leaderboards. And we know that this is approximately what the devs think is reasonable: we know this because when a lot more players entered GC, they publicly stated that they were adjusting things to reduce that number. The devs expect 90% of players to fail to reach GC, and those players will then fall somewhere on the VT ladder. Some will make it to Vibranium, some will make it to Diamond, some will only make it to Platinum or even lower. That's appropriate and reasonable, and the rewards reflect that. Just like everywhere else the devs expect that some percentage of the players will work to get better to climb that ladder, just like some percentage decide to push for Cavalier and then Thronebreaker and then Paragon and then Valiant. Some players will get stopped in Platinum. What will stop them? Losses. Losing is a part of every competition, and the VT is a kind of measuring rod to tell players how far they can get, and how much farther they have to go.
You're right: we don't need it. We can just throw everyone into GC and let the chips fall where they may. But we cannot just take all the VT rewards and throw them into more and more objectives or milestones, because that would turn BG into a grinding mode. I should say, we could do this, but the devs won't. If what you're asking eventually leads to that point, I can tell you that's where the idea would get stopped in its tracks. This game only has one arena, and some would say that's already one too many. Speaking as one of the few players who has been deeply involved with the devs in both arena design and battlegrounds design, I can say with some confidence there is never going to be two.
I hate to admit it but I can see why this would be difficult to implement from a developer's perspective and how it is at odds with their design philosophy. Although I really appreciate that you took the time to construct a thoughtful argument and respond to my concerns seriously.
You're welcome. I hope I haven't dissuaded you from continuing to think about the game and how to improve it, because while I disagree with your ideas here, that's not to say you won't come up with something better later. For every good idea I come up with that eventually makes it into the game, there's a boatload of not so good ones everyone hates, and some okay ones the devs completely ignore. Nobody has a particularly good batting average there.
Even if this isn't a regular game mode, I would hope to see a summoners showdown kind of competition once a year to see some of the game's most skilled players perform. I think it would serve the game to have more competitions that engage the entire player base.
Heck, ideally the top 20-30 players would have some kind of tournament every season to determine who's the best. But that's impractical for obvious reasons. Some kind of top tier BG tournament would be the best way to decide who's the best of the best. Random turnstile match ups make sense in VT and lower GC where you have hundreds or thousands of players in the match range all looking to fight each other. But when you're down to just a handful of players at the same level, sometimes even just a couple, tournaments make more sense.
I just don't see how to do that in a way that is actually possible.
My idea is that the rewards for the tornument mode would be based on your progression level. For example a thronebreaker player might get tier 6 basic and tier 5 CC that would help them take 6 stars to rank 4 so they could achieve paragon.
If the rewards are based on progression then there is relatively equal reason for every progression to want to play the mode, meaning that valiant players will be going in with maxed out 4 star teams and mastery set ups that lower progression players are going to have to fight against. The only way this mode actually works in the way that you think it will is if the rewards are borderline non existent because otherwise it will actually push people that already play high end bgs to play this mode as well
My idea is that the rewards for the tornument mode would be based on your progression level. For example a thronebreaker player might get tier 6 basic and tier 5 CC that would help them take 6 stars to rank 4 so they could achieve paragon.
But you're wanting everyone to use 4*'s but saying if a TB can beat a Valiant in this mode because everyone is equal deck wise, they still get lower rewards. How does that motivate anyone below Valiant to participate?
For war, this was done by rigging the matches by War tier, and lowering the rewards for lower tiers.
Would you rather have lower progressed rosters win more often with their 4 star roster, and get 4 star shards for their trouble?
The suggestion is to have a 4* based BG tournament but have progression based rewards. It has nothing to do with AW or at least I can't figure our how you're connecting AW to this suggestion. OP wants everyone to have a "equal" playing field but different rewards.
So if I have the same 4* deck as a Valiant as a TB and I beat them, why should I get different rewards? The restrictions are the same for everyone. The only difference would be skill. Regular BGs only has progression based rewards in the store and that's it. If I ca climb the ladder in normal BGs, I get the same rewards as Valiant when I am TB.
Why would anyone want to spend time competing if the rewards are different for different progressions?
If a tournament mode were to be added there would be no reason to remove the normal battlegrounds mode. The tournament would be geared more for the lower level players to get progression based rewards, while the normal mode would have high level players compete with their 6 and 7 star champions for the best rewards. This way lower level players would still be able to experiment with battlegrounds and enjoy the game mode while progressing at their level, and the top players would still have a reason to develop a high level roster since the rewards would be worthwhile.
I also think there would be an incentive to keep competing in the tournament if the right rewards system was used. For example, players could earn regular rewards for winning matches and the larger rewards would be based on your final placement, the same way alliance war gives rewards.
You keep saying that this mode would be for lower level players who want progression based rewards whilst ignoring that if the rewards were progression based it wouldn't just be low level players playing it.
My idea is that the rewards for the tornument mode would be based on your progression level. For example a thronebreaker player might get tier 6 basic and tier 5 CC that would help them take 6 stars to rank 4 so they could achieve paragon.
But you're wanting everyone to use 4*'s but saying if a TB can beat a Valiant in this mode because everyone is equal deck wise, they still get lower rewards. How does that motivate anyone below Valiant to participate?
For war, this was done by rigging the matches by War tier, and lowering the rewards for lower tiers.
Would you rather have lower progressed rosters win more often with their 4 star roster, and get 4 star shards for their trouble?
The suggestion is to have a 4* based BG tournament but have progression based rewards. It has nothing to do with AW or at least I can't figure our how you're connecting AW to this suggestion. OP wants everyone to have a "equal" playing field but different rewards.
So if I have the same 4* deck as a Valiant as a TB and I beat them, why should I get different rewards? The restrictions are the same for everyone. The only difference would be skill. Regular BGs only has progression based rewards in the store and that's it. If I ca climb the ladder in normal BGs, I get the same rewards as Valiant when I am TB.
Why would anyone want to spend time competing if the rewards are different for different progressions?
If a tournament mode were to be added there would be no reason to remove the normal battlegrounds mode. The tournament would be geared more for the lower level players to get progression based rewards, while the normal mode would have high level players compete with their 6 and 7 star champions for the best rewards. This way lower level players would still be able to experiment with battlegrounds and enjoy the game mode while progressing at their level, and the top players would still have a reason to develop a high level roster since the rewards would be worthwhile.
I also think there would be an incentive to keep competing in the tournament if the right rewards system was used. For example, players could earn regular rewards for winning matches and the larger rewards would be based on your final placement, the same way alliance war gives rewards.
You keep saying that this mode would be for lower level players who want progression based rewards whilst ignoring that if the rewards were progression based it wouldn't just be low level players playing it.
You can have progressions level rewards for every progression level except paragon/valiant so that those players would only be playing the normal mode for rewards. Even if the valiant and paragon players chose to play the tournament mode and they are skilled they will end up matching with more skilled players. This is the same kind of matchmaking on chess.com where the higher ELO players will get matched with players of the same ELO. Even if you are on a winning or lucky streak you will reach a player who is so much better than you that you will eventually drop down and will be among similar skill players.
Comments
Remove loading time from time
Calculate based on the time or don't show me the actual time & tell me that I lost because game loading time is 10 sec for me 🤷
Would you rather have lower progressed rosters win more often with their 4 star roster, and get 4 star shards for their trouble?
So if I have the same 4* deck as a Valiant as a TB and I beat them, why should I get different rewards? The restrictions are the same for everyone. The only difference would be skill. Regular BGs only has progression based rewards in the store and that's it. If I ca climb the ladder in normal BGs, I get the same rewards as Valiant when I am TB.
Why would anyone want to spend time competing if the rewards are different for different progressions?
I also think there would be an incentive to keep competing in the tournament if the right rewards system was used. For example, players could earn regular rewards for winning matches and the larger rewards would be based on your final placement, the same way alliance war gives rewards.
But more importantly, this is not a binary thing. There are tons of **** Valiants out there who have no idea what they are doing. There are lots of really strong Cavs and TBs out there who would put up a good fight against me even with my huge roster advantage. I've lost to Cavs, just like my Cav alts has beaten Valiant accounts. But there's absolutely no question that *on average* the players who have been here longer, or have achieved higher progression tiers, are stronger than those who haven't. And that statistical advantage will make itself known in BGs. It won't just be 8 year vets destroying one year newbees, it will be five year Paragons beating three year TBs 65% of the time as well. The overall advantage of experience is going to be a very heavy weight on the scales.
You say if you match against high ELO players in chess you wouldn't feel robbed because you simply take it as a given that such a player earned their rating, and thus they should win. But on Chess.com, you see rating. In BG, you won't. All you see is your opponent's performance and your record. When players lose, and lose often, they will always look for something to blame. Right now, its roster advantage. But what happens when you erase that obvious reason for losing, and new players continue to lose 70-90% of their matches but have no obvious thing to blame? Do you actually think that the complaints here on the forums and elsewhere will just stop, and everyone will take the L and be happy about it?
Unlikely. They will blame cheating. They will blame modding. They will blame the match maker for matching them against competition they cannot beat. Players aren't unhappy about *matching* against strong players, they are unhappy about *losing* against them, and looking for anything to blame. Roster is the easiest thing to blame, but as others here will be able to attest to, I've actually taken the time to analyze the competition of players complaining about "unfair match ups" when they've actually posted their BG history, and in a lot of cases while some of the match ups were against very strong opponents, others were not. But people only see what they want to see. If they lose ten matches in a row, it *has to be* because BG is unfair, and when they recall a couple of those matches were against very strong rosters, they have no problem claiming that BG is unfair because they are "always" being matched against Valiant players, when some of their losses were to Cav players with less than a million rating.
And I have no problem expanding friendly matches to allow players more opportunities to experience a more low stress more peer-competitive rather than globally-competitive BG. I even suggested a "unranked mode" where players could enter BG and ask for match, but BG would only match you against players of equal progression and roster strength, but such matches would not award trophies. If the *other* player entered in normal mode, they could still win trophies against you, but you could neither earn nor lose them.
But this would be integrated with the main game mode, not a distraction from it. The game devs do not have the resources to give every player what they want, but even if they did, there's the separate issue that they shouldn't. In an analogous way to you asking for a different version of the same game mode to benefit players of lower competitive strength or desire, players have often asked for lower versions of, say, end game content. The argument is that end game content is unfair, because only end game players can play it. Why can't the developers make lower tier versions of the Abyss or Necropolis?
They could, but that would defeat the purpose of those things even existing. They exist to be an incentive to progress. If everyone could play the Abyss and the Necropolis and Act 8, there would be no need to progress. Everyone could do whatever they wanted whenever they wanted with whatever they wanted. This is not that kind of game. The game is a progressional game, and it encourages and incentivizes progress (as it defines progress), and so much of the game is composed of content "ladders" designed to give players opportunities to move up, get better, grow stronger. End game content is there to reward the players who make it that far.
Battlegrounds exists for one specific reason: to provide an opportunity for the players who want 1v1 competitive content to have that opportunity. The competition ladder is not a part of the mode, it is the mode, and everything else are compromises to integrate that opportunity into the game.
Yes, but mostly no. Which is to say, sure, the devs can give players rewards any way they like, but as I said above, BG is intended to be a competitive ladder. The rewards are there to reward competition. The VT is a compromise, allowing players to earn some rewards from participation, even if they are unable or unwilling to commit fully to earning the maximum possible rewards for their strength (it takes more than just being good to win rewards in BG, you also have to put in the time and effort to get them).
The presumption is that the VT rewards *encourage* players to get better to get more of them, and the better they get, the more amenable they become to becoming full fledged competitors. BG is not, and the devs do not want to make it, another arena. It isn't there to just mindlessly grind rewards. In fact, a lot of design elements are there specifically to reduce or eliminate that possibility. Going all the way back to beta (not the public beta, but the private CCP beta) the idea that BG could become another grindable mode was something the devs vehemently opposed the idea of.
The devs don't want a version of BG that everyone can casually grind, and another one where players actually have to compete. They want one mode that is about competition, with onramps designed to allow players who are intimidated by competition or not ready for it to still participate while they learn how to get better. Now, just like the story arcs and everything else in the game, not every player will eventually be converted. But they don't expect to convert everyone. They expect the mode to encourage it, and its up to the players to decide how they interact with it.
Over 200k players participate in BG. We know this with absolute certainty because we can tell from solo milestone leaderboards. We know on the order of 20k players make it to GC, also from leaderboards. And we know that this is approximately what the devs think is reasonable: we know this because when a lot more players entered GC, they publicly stated that they were adjusting things to reduce that number. The devs expect 90% of players to fail to reach GC, and those players will then fall somewhere on the VT ladder. Some will make it to Vibranium, some will make it to Diamond, some will only make it to Platinum or even lower. That's appropriate and reasonable, and the rewards reflect that. Just like everywhere else the devs expect that some percentage of the players will work to get better to climb that ladder, just like some percentage decide to push for Cavalier and then Thronebreaker and then Paragon and then Valiant. Some players will get stopped in Platinum. What will stop them? Losses. Losing is a part of every competition, and the VT is a kind of measuring rod to tell players how far they can get, and how much farther they have to go.
You're right: we don't need it. We can just throw everyone into GC and let the chips fall where they may. But we cannot just take all the VT rewards and throw them into more and more objectives or milestones, because that would turn BG into a grinding mode. I should say, we could do this, but the devs won't. If what you're asking eventually leads to that point, I can tell you that's where the idea would get stopped in its tracks. This game only has one arena, and some would say that's already one too many. Speaking as one of the few players who has been deeply involved with the devs in both arena design and battlegrounds design, I can say with some confidence there is never going to be two.
If its a skill test you already failed, content to progress is not that hard...
Even if this isn't a regular game mode, I would hope to see a summoners showdown kind of competition once a year to see some of the game's most skilled players perform. I think it would serve the game to have more competitions that engage the entire player base.
I just don't see how to do that in a way that is actually possible.
4* drain quite a bit of resources to rank up.
In my alli we did a couple of 3* tournaments. It was a lot of fun. Just ran out of steam to organize them again.
What are you talking about 4* BG? That's not fun