**Attention Summoners**
Due to issues surrounding Defensive Tactics, points from the current matchup in Alliance Wars will be removed after the season.
War Rating will remain untouched.
We are reducing the minimum matchup cutoff from 5 to 4 for this season.
We will continue to monitor the impact of this decision.
Due to issues surrounding Defensive Tactics, points from the current matchup in Alliance Wars will be removed after the season.
War Rating will remain untouched.
We are reducing the minimum matchup cutoff from 5 to 4 for this season.
We will continue to monitor the impact of this decision.
Fix Battlegrounds in three easy steps (that we can argue about until the end of time)
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t shift all prizes out of VT and into objectives. But I believe shifting *some* into participation objectives or objectives with a gross fight victory requirement (as just two potential examples) would alleviate the pressure on consecutive wins and the sense of futility that permeates BG at times. I also think there should be some advantage in the objectives to being at least TB or Paragon—hence the suggestion to open all objectives at Bronze (Win 1/2/3 and Play 3).
Sure—a *comprehensive* solution that fixes everything for everyone would be super nice. So would a lot of other things that aren’t very realistic. And a comprehensive solution will take a while, will require entirely new things to be built and just may not work as intended (I know that never happens, but…).
So try shifting incentives and creating more opportunities for players to enjoy success playing the mode. And turn the majority of the team’s energy toward policing cheats and making BGs a much less bug-ridden mode.
Dr. Zola
I've already stated my position in this discussion. If people are aiming for an angle to keep others from getting reasonable Rewards, I'm going to speak on it. It's one thing that there will be new design advantages. It's another to expect them to get little to nothing.
There is quite literally nothing I suggested that will eliminate prizes for players winning along the VT. Lower accounts can continue to claim what they claim already and they can continue to face similar sized accounts all the way to GC.
The relief they and all other players would see is a marginal de-emphasizing on winning multiple sets of consecutive matches to gain BG tokens. That’s across the board— not just for upper end accounts.
VT remains essentially the same as always—personally, I’d suggest keeping tokens and marks about the same and increasing rewards slightly overall, but I’m fine if there’s a concern with over-rewarding if VT prizes decrease to keep things close to where they are today.
That’s not threatening to lower accounts—in fact, it might actually get more of them playing.
Dr. Zola
When someone asks for clarification, clarify. When you say “I think we can stop at trying to prevent Players in the VT from getting Rewards” in one sense all suggestions, including all of yours, can be claimed to do that. Someone is getting rewards they wouldn’t if anything changed. Someone is not getting rewards they might otherwise get if *nothing* changes. So on a certain level, everyone is vulnerable to this accusation, which also means it is a meaningless statement, because it is a truism. Is true for everyone, will always be true for everyone.
The *presumption* is that’s not what you meant, so for this statement to be more than a meaningless jab, there should be a specific context in which this is *uniquely true* for some line of discussion. Because absent that, I don’t count myself among the “we” in that sentence. And at the moment, I can think of no valid one. And saying “hey we all know” is the last refuge of the circumpartisans.
Someone suggested doing away with the Rewards in the VT. That's what I was responding to in terms of keeping Players from Rewards.
As for the reallocation, that seems counterintuitive to what's already being put into place.
I think an arena style system which grants some trophies for a win within the match (arena grants 100 battlechips for individual wins even if the overall match is lost). Right now, the objectives offer 800 trophies for 3 matches (with one win). This and some of the VT rewards can be combined to offer some trophies per win in a match (could be 20 or 50, where ever the math balances out). This would encourage participation, even if win rates remained low.
What the Objectives already do is encourage people to do just that, participate. You get 600 no matter what, and an extra 200 for the Win. Regardless of my somewhat tender views on people starting out, it is still a competition. There will be Wins and there will be Losses. There's really no getting around that. Every Player, from the bottom to the top, will have to accept losing sooner or later, and all that will do is make it advantageous to hang out in the lower rungs because "taking it easy" is still paying enough out to not try that hard.
The motivation needs to be winning. Otherwise it just results in the same thing we see in War.
Alliances that are playing lightly and taking advantage of the easy kills. That skews the whole system.
*If you really wanted to motivate people, you could swap the Objectives. 200 for participating, 600 for a Win.
What makes a comment a characterization is when it doesn't address the details, it attempts to apply a judgment. If someone suggests moving rewards from here to there that only takes reward away from players if the opportunities are not reasonably similar. If there's no obvious attempt to do so, and none can be pointed out, that would be an unfair characterization. We should try to avoid those.
If someone were to suggest eliminating VT rewards and adding them to GC rewards, it would be fair to say that is removing rewards from VT caliber players and adding them to GC caliber players. But that's now a conclusion not a characterization, because it is both obvious and easy to demonstrate for completeness that this removes rewards from a very large class of players (players who remain in VT) who will have no access to them. And the counter-argument that any VT player could get them if they just get into GC is itself counterable by the clear observation that the game mode is not designed to allow everyone into GC. The fair argument would be, for anyone suggesting moving rewards from VT to GC on the grounds that everyone *can* get to GC, is would they support attempts by Kabam to make it easier for everyone to get into GC. If the answer is no, then their argument falls apart.
That's a reasonable way to make the assertion that someone is trying to "take rewards away from players" in this made up example of mine. It is fair, it is reasonable, it targets the explicit details of the suggestion, and it is supported by clear logical thinking. This is what I think most people would like to see when challenging a suggestion. If it is flawed, we should uncover and examine those flaws. But characterizations alone do not further the conversation in that direction.
There is a fine line between concern for the overall system and wanting to see those who have benefited cauterized and penalized somehow. People have what they were asking for being implemented. Which is great. I'm still going to look out for the other Players in this because no one participates in a system very long if they're marginalized. Call me sensitive, but it's a concern for me. A little kick in the bum is motivation. Ignore them completely, and the numbers will dwindle. I feel confident in saying that. If it sways too much to one side, we will see some months from now.
No one likes to be told their gaming experience is inconsequential. That includes with actions as well as words.
So happy about this...I guess i wasn't so wrong..
Tough break.. start progressing...
I think the kneejerk reaction that strawmans this as “taking prizes from little guys” not only misses the point, but in fact misses the entire argument.
As I understand your suggestion, there’s a marginal reallocation that *softens* the impact of losing streaks (or, to be more precise, the absence of frequent winning streaks). Nothing reallocates prizes away from any particular segment of the player base—in fact, overall prizes may be increased by a (again) marginal amount.
I assume you favor an approach like this precisely because it is marginal—it doesn’t require a massive overhaul, it can be easily undone and/or tweaked, and it works within the existing system to encourage participation while preserving the idea that this remains a competition. Parts of the existing system can still be tuned as well if needed. It is playing “small ball” (to use a dreaded sports analogy)—incremental change to try to accomplish at least one or two of the things needed to keep the mode viable. Why build an AI-driven mechanical algorithmically precise nail driving machine when a $5.99 hardware store hammer will do just fine?
However, perhaps I misunderstand you. There’s a lot of that going around, apparently. Please elaborate or correct if I’m off base.
Regards,
Dr. Zola