Summer Mermaids

[dbrad000]

I don't like the implementation of the random event system; some people are thriving and some people are suffering, all on the basis of RNG. Most players are frustrated while a few players are elated, and this does not make for a fun experience. The developers finally implemented a much needed change in the Fellowship Adventures (and received many thanks from the community and overwhelming participation), but they follow up that success with a frustrating, RNG-filled event that has left many players (myself included) frustrated and annoyed.


I'm not sure what metrics or feedback the developers are looking at, but many of the actions from the developers do not lead to a positive, enjoyable playing experience. Any system that relies too heavily on RNG is simply not fun for the player base at large. When multiple layers of the event are RNG-based, the system will simply be frustrating for an ever-increasing number of players. In the current implementation, there are four groups of players (among those who are actually participating in the event):

• players who get lucky with the corals quests and lucky with the event chests (these players will be elated);
• players who get lucky with the corals quests but are unlucky with the event chests (these players will be frustrated because they could not capitalize on their corals);
• players who are not lucky with the corals quests but are lucky with the event chests (these players will be frustrated because they will not be able to open enough chests to feel rewarded);
• and finally, players who are both unlucky with the corals quests and unlucky with the event chests (these players will be the quite unhappy indeed).

In other words, a large majority of the players who participate in the event will simply feel frustrated with the event. I doubt this is the outcome the developers intended.

 

[Sir Derf]

On the one hand, I understand the frustrations.

On the other hand, we're only 4 days into a 24 day event. Oh, bad luck so far in the 16% of the event we've done. People are doing better than me, I feel cheated. I'm out. Really?

I would like to point out that #s 2 & 3, above, are people who feel frustrated predicated on failed expectations. Mayhap over-estimated expectations.


There's also the people who will be happy to just be getting anything. "I didn't get the dailies I wanted, but I got a lot of instants." The glass half fullers.


As before, don't tase me, bros.

 

[Sir Derf]

Oh, and for full disclosure, so far I'm personally wrapping up quest 81 (in the 57s), sitting on just over 4000 corals.

So far, I've gotten Scout or upgrades 4 times (twice upgrade 1, twice upgrade 2), tech or upgrade 2 times (upgrade 3 and upgrade 2), 24 hour T1s twice, collecting 14 enchantments total, and complete 4 provinces.

My scouts take 2 days and I have no techs available at the moment, as I haven't built steel or plank refineries in Woodelves yet. I don't have a lot of room, what with my personal, possibly irrational, decision to not jettison any of my Willows or Fabricators, but have shoehorned a handful of temps in (less than I like to have for events).

I did plan ahead some, in that I do still have a couple of not-yet terminal residences and Marbles, as well as about 25 open provinces, and since I felt enchantments were my issue in the last event or two, I upgraded by Magic Academy just before the event to speed up their production.

I look at the reported possible quests for each stage, and do some guesswork planning, sometimes it succeeds, sometimes it only helps, sometimes it goes unused. And sometimes, those unused feel like I prevented myself from other preparations.


You can prepare, if not as fully as before. And you can get some unfortunate quests, or runs of quests. I find the randomness refreshing and different.


Don't tase me, bros.

 

[Sir Derf]

Just finished waiting 9 hours for my building upgrades, started from scratch.
Complete Provinces - got em.
Spell Fragments - got em.
T1 Boost 48h*3?!?!?!

Oh no. Bad Luck. Woe is me. I quit.

Or, guess I'll have to wait a while.

I mean, I could have dedicated some of my temps to making them at the beginning of the event, but decided to do other things with them at first. Instead, I only started them a little over a day ago. So, I only have to wait 14 or so hours. This time. While I sleep, as it is currently 11pm for me.

But even if I had to start them now, and wait 2 whole days, oh well. That's the way the game goes.

Don't tase me, bros.

 

[DeletedUser8158]

Really not liking this event. Too many Quests requiring upgrades, spell fragments and vision vapour.

 

[Deleted User - 384643]

I'm liking this event. Yes, occasionally I get stuck on the difficult quests, like "Upgrade 2 buildings to lvl 16", "Produce Toolboxes x6", "Gain 11 Vision Vapor", etc.
But eventually I complete those quests as well and I've already collected lotsa corals and won a lot of stuff I like.
And I think it's great that there is no end to the quests during this event.

 

[DeletedUser8632]

On the other hand, we're only 4 days into a 24 day event. Oh, bad luck so far in the 16% of the event we've done. People are doing better than me, I feel cheated. I'm out. Really?

You clearly did not read or understand the core issues of the event that people gripe about which are a) Province related quests and b) the continuous need for "boosted" production. Ad (a) read again the problems associated with that. There is plenty of evidence in this thread to see how this is not working for end-game players.
Ad (b) Like you stated correctly somewhere else, yes, you can be somewhat prepared. The problem is, for players with 2x2 boosted L1s this somewhat prepared requires twice the space. Again. And the randomness just escalates that problem. How many times did you get "Produce x 2day goods"? Lets look at your 57 bracket, specifically: 3x 2day, 7x 1day, 6x 9h. A reasonable preparation would be considering you may get ANY of these and a good likelihood you get them twice. Because the 2day goods are such a showstopper we are being very careful and prepare for the worst case of this quest showing up 3 times (and yes, this happens, I know of somebody who had to do it 4 times).
That gives us 9 factories for 2day goods, 14 factories for 1day goods and 6 for the 9h goods (only 6 because we are just going to slow down T1 production to catch the 9h goods with our normal production). Thats a total of 29 factories. To be "somewhat" prepared.
If your boosted is marble, thats 58 squares. If your boosted is steel, thats 116 squares.

Thats more than 2 whole expansions difference needed to be equally prepared. Explain to me how this is ok, @Sir Derf ?

 

[sunrae]

The event has only a few days to go on beta and I'm working on 3 other cities live now. I've had some long waits, and I've used time boosts quite a lot. I've had endless repeat production requests, including scounting and 1 day productions and clearing provinces etc BUT I love this new format. At last something really challenging. The random and difficult and frustrating quests are adding in excitment to this event that for the last couple of years has been lost (for me).

Not having a quest list does not mean we cannot prepare, its just we have to prepare even more. I am sure the devs have got a lot to think about from the player feedback before the next big event but I really hope they continue to come up with new ways of making the events this fun. I like the challenge (easy is boring) and I even enjoy the ahhh shucks moments when I have to repeat long cycles and make more room and build more workshops. Challenge is good, its why most of us play this game. So against apparently popular opinion (on the forum anyway) YAY keep it coming please.

 

[Sir Derf]

Explain to me how this is ok, @Sir Derf ?

Answer - it's not.

And, as I've stated before, I think it is unreasonable to expect that it could be. Unreasonable at the level of the entire event, and definitely unreasonable when focusing on individual quests.

I do have sympathy for systemic issue people - those who are currently 'overscouted' from rules change, those with larger L1T1s...

But then there are those who are temporarily inconvenienced by the normal ups and downs of the normal process of the game. Sometimes you're tight for space, other times you're flush. Sometimes you have troops and negotiating supplies, sometimes you don't. Sometimes you have plenty of tech to research, sometimes you're tech locked. Sometimes you have plenty of available encounters, sometimes you don't. These things happen regularly. Sometimes you have buildings to upgrade, sometimes you're either prevented from upgrading, or have all buildings maxed out. These things happen periodically. These things slow down normal game play - waiting to get resources to open the tech tree, waiting to get pop or culture to upgrade buildings, waiting to get resources to solve encounters - and they will slow down event play, too.

And I really scratch my head at the attitude of the end-game players. You're hitting the wall of the normal activities, or worse still completely done with the currently final chapter. No more techs, all buildings maxed. You've been successful and are now mostly blocked in normal play. I have a hard time empathizing about ending up blocked for events. I feel for you a little bit, but still.

Don't tase me, bros.

 

[Timneh]

But yet it takes 25, 30 or 40 scouted provinces to enter each chapter starting with Chapter 4.

Really not sure what your point is there but if it is what i think it is you're saying it is ok to get all those complete province quests because you need to do more provinces to get into the next chapter and you are correct but what about the players that have already completed the required number of provinces to get into the next chapter ? Those players are being forced to overscout which is exactly what the devs say they should not do.

 

[Sir Derf]

What, like me? Need 220 to start Sorcerers, have 289, and have like 25 open scouted provinces waiting? I earlier had to plan ahead by months, not weeks or days, because provinces started needing orcs to negotiate and I had no orcs, I I wanted to have them available for encounters and provinces in a future event. Planing, planing, planning. Choices, choices, choices. Risk/reward. Cost/benefit.

 

[DeletedUser8632]

What, like me? Need 220 to start Sorcerers, have 289, and have like 25 open scouted provinces waiting? I earlier had to plan ahead by months, not weeks or days, because provinces started needing orcs to negotiate and I had no orcs, I I wanted to have them available for encounters and provinces in a future event. Planing, planing, planning. Choices, choices, choices. Risk/reward. Cost/benefit.

So your advice is... ignore the advice of the devs?

Just because you are comfortable to ignore the advice of the Devs doesn't mean its ok to implement something that clearly asks us to do something that they have explicitly stated not to do. Every reasonable game development company knows not to do that.

 

[Timneh]

What, like me? Need 220 to start Sorcerers, have 289, and have like 25 open scouted provinces waiting? I earlier had to plan ahead by months, not weeks or days, because provinces started needing orcs to negotiate and I had no orcs, I I wanted to have them available for encounters and provinces in a future event. Planing, planing, planning. Choices, choices, choices. Risk/reward. Cost/benefit.

That was your choice to overscout. These quests are forcing players to overscout when they might not want to so basically they are being forced to ignore the devs advice by the devs.

 

[Sir Derf]

The earlier post was simply to point out that since most chapters require that you solve 25+ provinces to finish, I don't see too much conflict with events that occur, what, every couple of months, asking for encounters and solved provinces. There's probably enough "required" event encounters and provinces that you can easily do 2 events per chapter within the limits at first, probably 3 events in later chapters, without needing to officially overscout.

The later post was in response to the suggestion that I was not thinking of the difficulties to those who overscouted. Except, I myself am overscouted as I was pointing out. And that, despite this overscouting, I planned ahead to avoid hitting the orc-wall during the next upcoming event. Overscouting might be 'bad', but is not necessarily terminal.

You say these quests are forcing players to overscout. Except they don't. The player has the choice. They're not forced to participate in the event. They're not forced to scout to ahead of limits. And they're not forced to stay within the scouting suggestions. If they wish to both participate in events and only scout to the requirements of each chapter, then they should be making the decision to schedule their encounter solutions in and out of events accordingly. If they scout to the limit before an event, that was their decision.

As ever, don't tase me, bros.

 

[DeletedUser1874]

They're not forced to participate in the event.

One acronym: FOMO. Even without that, I've always found such an argument quite ludicrous. On par with "Do you guys not have phones?", really.

"Here's a major event that's the focus of the Summer Holiday Season, highly publicized by a pre-event, new art-work, new quest system, new splash screen and all... oh, and you better have overscouted weeks worth of provinces in order to have a shot at winning a decent amount of stuff"
*booing from the crowd*
"Did you guys not overscout like madmen despite us discouraging you from doing so?"

It's actually worse than "Do you guys not have phones?", and that's saying something.

 

[Timneh]

You say these quests are forcing players to overscout. Except they don't. The player has the choice. They're not forced to participate in the event.

So now you think that a player should sit out an event if they are at the scouting limit and they don't want to go beyond it ? or that players should adjust the way they play just in case there is an event(which is very likely but not guaranteed). As there is no way of knowing how many complete 1 province quests a player will get(with this new event format) in an event how many provinces do you think they should leave uncompleted ?
Players are not forced to do events or to overscout or to stay within the scouting suggestions, you are quite right about that but neither are the devs forced to put those scouting quests into events.

 

[Pauly7]

Whilst a lot of people are not happy that they can no longer look up spoilers in advance during this event, has anyone considered whether they are still winning the same amount of corals compared to what has been picked up in previous events?

I will add that I have not done any maths on this, but even whilst potentially having to wait longer it seems like a ton of corals quickly build up. Do we get more rewarded to us than in previous events? Also bear in mind that previously people were completing the whole quest line in about a quarter of the allotted time. So is there really a downside of taking longer over quests, but having the opportunity to keep picking up the corals for the whole month?

As a footnote I will just say, as I have before, and as others probably have too - The only difference with the new system is that Inno have taken away the ability to look up spoilers that are provided by 3rd parties. It was never at any point in their plan for this to be a part of the game. I am sympathetic to the frustration of suddenly having a "scout 1 province" or "build 3 fabulous fountains" and I also feel that frustration myself at times because I'm impatient. However I haven't felt any injustice and I prefer the new spoiler-free system.

 

[Sir Derf]

@Timneh - Well, yes. It's the logical conclusion to reach given the described situation. I break it down with the following:

Given
a) Mr. Player has scouted to the current chapter goal.
b) Mr. Player does not want to 'overscout'.
c) An event has started that asks you to scout and complete encounters and provinces.

Either

1) Having done (a) and holding to (b), your decisions force you to an early end to (c).
2) Having done (a), but wanting to participate in (c), you have to abandon the conviction to hold to (b).
3) Wishing to hold to (b), while wanting to participate in (c), you need to commit yourself far enough in advance to not end up in (a) when the event starts.


@Vetrinus I understand your FOMO. However, rather than getting stuck with overscouting during the event, consider instead under-solving before events. Major events come what, every 3 months, 90 days? If scouting takes 2 days each, that means you could scout 45 provinces. A leisurely pace could have you scouting 20 provinces per season. 50/50 would allow you to solve 10 provinces off-event, and have 10 provinces, 80 encounters for the event. If you want more, scout more, or adjust your percentages. Very sustainable. Where's the problem? Make different decisions, solve more encounters and complete more provinces off-event, well, you're just forcing your hand.

 

[Sir Derf]

@Pauly7 - Comparing to Phoenix, Carnival and Winter Magic (The three I have convenient data for)

Phoenix started at 8, Carnival & Winter Magic at 10, Mermaids started at 30 (with quest 2).

Quests through Mermaids Phoenix Carnival Winter Magic
10 270 99 112 112
20 654 241 255 254
40 1554 675 674 663
80 3684 2159 1947 2084

Now, all the others were dual questlines, so added 35 per day, but mermaids definitely is growing faster. Also, Phoenix capped at 134, Carnival capped at 80 and Winter Magic at 100 - Mermaids is endless, but probably gets way more difficult.

 

[DeletedUser5532]

Who ever said that the challenge of an event was meant to be easy ?

The game is all about resource management from the very start. I for one think the random quests are great, they challenge you in your game, and then reward you for succeeding.