Future of PoxNora Discussion

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by KTCAOP, Nov 3, 2019.

  1. PoxBot

    PoxBot I need me some PIE!

    As someone who owns 2 of everything and even some ¨hidden¨ runes that I shouldn't be able to have in my possession, I would gladly give up that collection just to see the continuity of this game's development.
     
    nytrequiem, Goyo, Gnomes and 3 others like this.
  2. Malthraz

    Malthraz New Member

    As a fairly new player I guess I have a fairly rare experience of Pox. One of my friends recommended this game because he thought I would be into it, and he was right. I have been playing on and off for about a year.

    I have done a bit of PvP, but most of my time in game is mostly just slamming the AI on normal to collect gold.

    I really like to complexity of the game from a deck building perspective, but when it came to PvP it was a bit tough because it was very difficult to know what capabilities my opponents had. With 1300 runes, it was very difficult for me to know what they could possibly deploy against me. Now with a bit more experience, I am doing better, but still get schooled by top tier players.

    My main issue with the game is the bugs and the issues with the game interface. Quite a number of abilities do not have adequate descriptions, some abilities do not behave as described, and some appear to be bugged.

    One key advantage of playing Pox when it was essentially unsupported was that there was no pay to win. I don't have a black pearl, but there is no other rune I am particularly keen to try out, that I have not already bought with shards. Also, using 5000 gold to buy a pre-made deck and then sharding it for over 1500 shards has helped me build several decent decks, for not too much grind.

    What I would really like to see is a reduction in the bugs, and improvements to the interface and information available to players. I find the combat log has a lot of unhelpful information, but often does not reveal information on spells, even after they have their triggered effect. As a new player you have to read through the 100 possible spells that could have been cast and guess what it was.
    It would be great if the game was made more appealing to old and new players, so there was not such a great length on ranked queue times.

    I think generating good will is probably the best thing that the development team can do at the moment. It seems like the legacy of Pox is currently that it was a great game that got shafted for a quick buck.
     
    nytrequiem, yuore, Sokolov and 7 others like this.
  3. yobanchi

    yobanchi I need me some PIE!

    Wow, Good to see you guys back.
    Was with you for a bit with Heroes of Maljara and was sad to see it putter-out.

    Take your time and get your mojo back.
    Regressing back to the previous java client sounds wonderful to be honest.
    Will keep my eyes out for the new poxnora ^_^ wish you all the best.
     
    Xirone, Valkyr and guokamoli54 like this.
  4. Braxzee

    Braxzee I need me some PIE!

    Can you change the maps out please....In the mean time
     
    guokamoli54 likes this.
  5. guokamoli54

    guokamoli54 I need me some PIE!

    Pulled out a Miraculous win tonight on the lava ud map with FW/ST dread vs a FF UD Fire Eater deck I still cant believe I managed to pull that one out.
     
  6. Nora That

    Nora That I need me some PIE!

    I disagree. I find the more intricate the abilities the more options and diversity. Same old same old becomes stagnant and boring. It wouldn't be long before one tires of it. Also you mentioned that in your first game after not playing for a while, you encountered abilities that you didn't know and you wanted to quit? Come on man, even if nothing's changed if you don't pay for a while you'll be rusty and have to re familiarize yourself with the game. Pox is complex and That's the BEST part about it
     
    aseryen, guokamoli54 and Valkyr like this.
  7. Nora That

    Nora That I need me some PIE!

    I read most of the posts and man, there was a lot of positive and negative. All I saw from the lot of it is that we Fricken LOVE POX NORA!!!
    My positive input: I love the complexity and diversity of the game. It is challenging and very stimulating. The deck building is a great part of it, the casual, chess like, turn based game play is my favorite.
    Negative: I most hated when a new IS champion came out and I learn about it and how to use it and we form a bond. So we start taking walks on the beach and getting ice cream (we liked vanilla/chocolate swirls) Then go home and dream about the next strategy we're going to employ ahhh........ AND YOU NERF IT! Omg how much I fumed over it. A lot of people screamed "it needed to be nerfed" Fek those people. Devs should test the new runes and make sure they won't need a nerf so quickly. FFS LEAVE BASTION ALONE (Brittney Spears fan voice/cry).
     
    aseryen and guokamoli54 like this.
  8. Nora That

    Nora That I need me some PIE!


    Did I mention I'm a zealot? Stronghold for life!
     
  9. Nora That

    Nora That I need me some PIE!

    What's your reason? I need specifics, not just a demand.
     
  10. Tai

    Tai New Member

    Hello, it's been a long time. I am not sure if I like this at all, I heard Pox was coming back a week or two ago and was overjoyed, decided to play again for the first time since I dropped it in 2017 due to abandonment and general lack of communication from the 'devs'. (Except Soko, love you bro). So first question, where is Gedden still hiding? He's disappeared since screwing up the pooch big time after making glorious promises, and hasn't shown his face since then, much less make a post on the forums. If he has, apologies, I haven't checked.

    So I am glad you guys will keep Pox around, I don't care about your other projects, why would I invest in people that abandon us? What's to say you won't disappear again after taking everyone's money. You come here now and expect everyone to fall under your feet after leaving this game and its people to die, like we're supposed to worship you now and throw our money at you simply because Octopi "is back". Yay! Right.... You opened a fundraiser for your other projects, then you come here and ask people to support you and donate AFTER abandoning people here for so long. What a joke. The arrogance is stunning.

    You realize trust is earned, right? You pop in here out of nowhere "We are working on new projects, Octopi is back, donate money to us bla bla."
    After years of letting this game to die, you ask its people for money. LOL is all I can say. I wish you the best and I hope this time around you guys can properly manage your games, but this is not a good look at all and certainly not a great start.

    Finally, I would like to note that this game hasn't failed due to its "complexity" I often see people blaming the failure on the game itself, which pisses me off to no end. This game failed due to lack of support from the devs, and poor management. Both Steam releases were utter failures, PS4 release was beyond a failure, new client busted, game incomplete and they decided to release it anyway, in a broken condition, instead of polishing everything up completely, make the game/client as good/smooth as possible, then release it. Of course no one would stick around, even if they liked the game. Why would they if the damn client wasn't working properly? Both steam releases brought in many people that liked the game, I spoke to many of them in chats, helping them around etc, some stuck around for a few months, most didn't, and that was all due to the poor client, or poor management. The 'complexity' has hardly scared anyone away. The game isn't difficult at all. It's just a learning experience, like every other ganme. I engaged with many newcomers after both steam releases, and this is how they felt. The game wasn't working properly. Not once did I hear from any newcomers "Oh the game was too difficult." The management has failed this game, not the game itself.

    Please just let someone buy the rights off Pox from you, or see if you can sell it to another company that will actually work on it, since you will be too busy with your "new projects". If possible, of course. I don't have any hopes for you guys at all, sorry. Somebody that actually gives a damn could make this game glorious.

    Thanks, sorry for the rant.
     
    Kampel, yuore, Heart and 6 others like this.
  11. aseryen

    aseryen I need me some PIE!

    Yes all this minus the bit about Sok, he’s the reason there’s a faction of players who think the game is too complex and believe they’re legitimized because of his time needlessly tinkering with the game while others abandoned it. There is no guilt with growing up from your toys to pick them back up. I’m more in favor of DOGs coming back with fresh eyes.

    To play devils advocate though (I agree with most everything you said) I’m not sure anyone ever working on the game was really able to throw the kitchen sink at it. However, instantly I just think of all the off the clock hours that should have been invested and I just wonder...

    Here’s to the true game of Pox, the forums, where it all comes down to communication and more than a paragraph of information.

    and @Tai please rant some more, your babbling can only be ignored by those with closed minds. Welcome to the Collective Forum of Poxnora
     
    guokamoli54 likes this.
  12. Sokolov

    Sokolov The One True Cactuar Octopi

    Hi Tai <3

    Just wanted to clarify something here - they aren't asking for donations. The "fundraising" being referenced here is with business partners, not players.

    It's true that the new client is... only semi-functional, but it did get delayed and pushed back and took about twice as long as it was intended. At some point you just run out of time for various reasons. So while I don't disagree that it wasn't ready - there really wasn't much choice at the time.

    The discussions regarding the complexity is a valid one, but not directly related to the success and failure of the product, but whether the reach could have been higher. Pox was a relatively successful game but never really broke out of the "indie" arena in a big way. It's a game that was designed for a specific type of player and the reason you rarely heard new players complain about the complexity is that if they looked at the screenshots/cards and downloaded it anyway... well, they probably had a decent idea of what they were getting into. One could argue that the game wouldn't have been more successful if it had more mass market appeal - but it's also true if that was the case it'd also be a different game - so it's a tough discussion to have.

    One thing that is true is that over time the game became more complex, especially compared to when it was most popular. At the same time, some of this complexity was very fiddly and crept it less by design and more as a consequence of the product having been through so many revamps and design iterations, leading to similar effects that were functionally identical most of the time with minor differences or even just a cost difference. Another piece of "complexity" is simply knowing which things worked in what situation due to bugs or idiosyncrasies of the code. And I think most people discussing complexity is usually lamenting this, and looking back at the older days of Pox when there were fewer abilities, fewer bugs, and a lower burden of knowledge threshold to compete.

    As for the management side of things, there's a lot to be said, particularly of the SOE era, but it's not really my place to discuss it at this time. Suffice to say that everyone recognizes that things could have been better, but it's always easy with hindsight and it's also difficult to appreciate what the limitations/demands were when you aren't privy/aware of them as players. Long story short, lots was going on at that time, much of which was not really in the devs'/creators' control.
     
    Last edited: Dec 13, 2019
    badgerale, guokamoli54 and aseryen like this.
  13. aseryen

    aseryen I need me some PIE!

    Unfortunately drafts were removed, along with skirmish matches and Drums of War. Outside of a pile of bugs there was no cohesion to the game once these were removed, and unfortunately it seemed like most of what was being patched in was a slide on the ole abacus. A point here a point there..."oh, is it time for my check? Hmm, someone else signed it...oh well...plus one, minus one; can't have ranged do that, no, no..."

    Ultimately what led to the end of days for PoxNora was that nothing new was done in regard to what was removed by the developers who were steering the ship. If we consider this decade-plus stretch of proof that these numbers work, it's time for that next step to challenge the genre, not the continuous rearranging of numbers. Skirmisher was removed, and yet there's no campaign-creator to set obstacles and paint a map. Steam Workshop was ignored; at the very least the pipeline was looked at with some kind of disdain; because if the developers had to sort through a mess of code they didn't want to open that can to an open community? In any kind of state, limited to just IS/FW perhaps.

    I look at Path of Exile as somewhat of a cautionary tale but a development pipeline to adopt in terms of whatever technical challenges the two genres inherently have. Hardcore has to have that new new, while Standard better well be stable to play for the vast majority of players stepping into such a...dare I say complex game...nonetheless there is an expectation on player and developers alike that these are the days we do this, and these are the days we do that.

    Of course because hindsight is 2020; GGG did enough right to develop their work day into a game so that when another person wants to test out an isolated server with just a few people, maybe no more the size of a development team, they could. Of course private servers need some kind of standard that their gameplay is bug free...and because of this tool that would need to be uniquely developed for the game we are expressly talking about (PoxNora) always and forever though with the analogies...the Standard(Stable) version of PoxNora needs a Hardcore(the past decade) of that new new so that when Pox2.0 comes out it has enough of the old; with plenty of developer tools added and gamified...without microtransactions...needless to say

    Give the players the sandbox already! I want to put up a server, with a high barrier of entry...something in the lines of complexity mixed in with split factions...dampen as a legacy ability...and a whole lot of AI running gambits in real-time on Tilt5 with an era-apocalypse where only the player with enough time set aside to play a grand game of warfare rips a hole in the enemies Avatar. But! when it's all said and done, and at the end of the day...its' all just a game. Emergent based on the micro:macro-Delta/Domain/LOADOUT/Garrison Vessel-Perspective.
     
  14. Tai

    Tai New Member

    Hello Sok, great to see ya. Thanks for the clarification, regardless my sentiments stand strong - ain't no one in their right mind that would donate to these guys, players or business. They don't exactly have the best track record going on there. I wish them luck with their projects, but I honestly don't see it going anywhere. They can't handle Pox, what makes them think they can handle other different, or bigger games? Until they learn from their mistakes and don't repeat them, we're gonna be sitting here again. Just to name one.... the abandonment issue needs change badly. Gedden still hasn't showed up here personally, has he? I thought so.


    I am aware, I was around at the time. My problem is that you had a plethora of players volunteering to help you in any way possible client-side, or game-side in general, nobody took them up. You literally had skilled coders offering up their services. You know very well there's more than a dozen players that wanted nothing more than to see this game succeed, and they'd be willing to invest their time/money into it as well, which a lot still do.

    There was plenty of choices to be made, the choice to create a new client which you couldn't control and had no time to fix properly was a poor one. Who said you needed to make that new busted client and release it on the PS4? All that time, money and effort was wasted, where you could've put elsewhere, and the new client and PS4 release is where it went completely downhill. It was a big mistake. You didn't have the time as you said, nor did you have the manpower. You guys rushed so much with everything. You chewed far more than you could bite, which again comes down to the poor management skills. And then they run away and disappear when it goes wrong, leaving the game to its fate.

    The problem wasn't that the PS4 people didn't like the game, quite the contrary, many loved it. The problem was the new client. You know that. A terrible client is an immediate uninstall for most people whether they like the game or not. I have seen a number of PSN players over recent days, so clearly people like the game enough to play still.

    I agree with you to say the game isn't for everyone, each individual has their own taste and preference in games, but to say it's too complex to succeed is ridiculous. This game had many opportunities missed to be elevated into greatness over the last decade. The game is not difficult in any way, people that like these sort of games like the complexity, so you appeal to those people anyway, which there are a lot of. I mean come on Sok, failure after failure yet people have stuck around for many years. The steam launches brought in hundreds of people that liked the game, the problem was retaining them, not that the game was too complex for them in any way shape or form. You have not been able to increase the population of this game not because the game is complex, but because you failed in management skills.

    Again I agree that over the years far too many abilities were introduced into the game, especially during the SOE era where powercreep really started to kick in. You were a part of that problem as well Sok, the problem with all of you was that you felt the need to constantly create new Bane Shift, new abilities, races every expansion. You talk about ability creep, yet create new abilities. Create new interactions. Really? Just make use of what already exists. You don't got to create new Bane Shift every expansion. Give people what they like in their themes or whatever, it doesn't have to have new abilities, races or interactions. You can do that once in a while, introduce new Bane Shift, but not every expansion. The fact that you needed so many revamps is because of you and the other devs over the years, not the game. And again that is poor management.... nothing to do with the complexity of this game

    It really irks me when people keep saying this game is complex. You don't jump into freaking YUGIOH as a newb and expect to be a master of all cards, know all interactions and thousands of cards by head overnight. Come on dude. This goes for every other game - it's something you have to learn and get used to. It's like learning a new language, at first you struggle to come up with the right words, but the more you speak it, the more you understand all the words available to you, the less you have to think about which words to use. Its called learning experience. I agree the curve was too big for some people in this game, but again that was due to poor management, not the game's fault. Quit blaming Bane Shift on the "complexity" of this game. You guys failed, not this game.

    I mean, it wasn't difficult to see that SOE's business model was to create absolutely bonker runes every expansion, have people buy them, and then nerf/change. That was intentional. Ultimately it was their greed that led to their downfall. I could go on all day about all the ways the game was letdown by SOE, yes it's always easy with hindsight, but it's easier with someone that actually knows what they're doing... So you don't have to sit here later and be like "Huh.... hindsight. Could've done it differently." When DoG came in and did the revamp and stuff, things were looking promising. But we all know what happened there, so I'm not even going to get into it.

    Anyway good to see ya again Sok, despite everything I still love ya because you're an awesome dude in general, and do genuinely care for the game. I didn't agree with you on everything, especially balance, but I do appreciate you for being there. Have a great day buddy.
     
  15. aseryen

    aseryen I need me some PIE!

    @Sokolov you take the flak, that’s why we love you.

    Happy holidays
     
    guokamoli54 likes this.
  16. newsbuff

    newsbuff Forum Royalty

    I would love it if they let a few community developers fix sh|t for free. They said making "tools" to do so would take a long time...just give us the source code...we can figure it out...

    Regarding the art book. I am a massive fan of pox artwork, but I have no use for an artbook. What would I do with it?

    Anyways, glad to hear there is some possible future for our beloved game.
     
    guokamoli54 likes this.
  17. polltroy

    polltroy I need me some PIE!

    From a busienss perspetive, I could even understand and accept this. Why not if thats what it takes to make peuple put more money into the game. However, it did not have to come with also a growing complexity. You could have worked with just the toolbox you had and created new "strong" runes in the new expansions that later could be nerfed. Without touching the old stuff that was balanced already too much all the time. And without creating new abilities new complexity new problems.
     
  18. aseryen

    aseryen I need me some PIE!

    What seems to be the issue is what I was talking about with Dampen and Tormented Priest so long ago; while Dampen removed/adjusted so that unique abilities and percentages could be phased out of the game, the question will always be where is the hard stop. The issue is will runes be assigned values that can be seeded out, or will Names and STATs always be variable based on developer whim? This is the fundamental concern most of us have, is what we come to find simple or complex going to be “balanced” to the point where there is no foundation?

    Anyone interested watch this; we are all desperately trying to make sense of the matrix that may have been used to build out Runes however I’m doubtful something as simple as a annually-updated punnet square was ever used to draft ideas


    I would like to believe Constructs we’re given a design note that explicitly states Upgrade line one is potentially shared with all other runes and that both Upgrade lines one and two are shared when Spare Parts is able to Bestow from one Construct to another; however I doubt that is the case because we have had so many development eras, that it seems all too complex, but really it has never been worked on in a relatively chronological order. The Cactar Crate has always been a joke and mostly a waste of time.

    What @Sokolov fails to understand regardless of whatever good may have come from his tinkering is that leagues (best example being DoW) was removed; this alone brings every single rune into one mixing pot and does not allow for any pooling of any kind of variable/keyword. @Sokolov still seems to think, along with many others; that formats such as standard and limited or commander if you want to bring in the whole TCG/Competitive format to the discussion is just another complexity to the system which apparently they think is futile. I only say this because that is never the connecting line of discussion, @sok somehow thinks that every new member or anyone he doesn’t remember the username of is entirely ignorant of any kind of practice that is widely adopted and standardized in a lot of circles. Development roadmaps have been common practice for well over a decade and it’s not that novel of an idea to be transparent.

    Always the excuse/reason to delay any kind of comprehensive long term plan that these are the numbers Race:Class:Faction has with Dmg:Type.

    Honestly for someone to say this game is complex and then think that games like Magic the Gathering are any less complex is ridiculous. Pokémon is now almost 1:1 statistically, if you map it out...are we really going to let Pokémon be the base line for the complexity of Poxnora?

    Im not sure what the layman’s bar for simple-complexity is but someone needs to be the forum idiot and just start saying mechanics that are complex for the individual; the ones reading this far will either /ignore you @poxrooster @Bondman007 @Sokolov or they will be constructive and actually try to make one system (of many) more approachable to the masses.

    I can record some videos on whatever system that needs to be explained.
     
  19. polltroy

    polltroy I need me some PIE!

    Id say the last revamp was a very good one and the complexity level now is good. This is not the issue. We are talking about past not the future.

    In the past with every expansion it followed several updates. In the updates alot of runes were fundamentally changed. Also with every expansion the complexity was increased with new special abilities etc. This created alot of frustration to some players like myself. First of all because it was hard to get updated on thousands of runes changed. Second because at some point in the game it was so complex it was hard to get an overview even as a veteran player. Third simply because collecting runes and making BGs became less fun when you knew it was very temporary. Any time your new idea or new BG or theme could be nerfed into oblivion and you had to start from scratch. So in retrospective I could suggest:
    1. business model of new expansion runes = more pwerfull is ok. readjust this with the new runes only, not with the whole runeset adjusting
    2. balance should be made mainly with nora cost so different strategies, BGs, runes etc are not totally changed. It will be easier to come back to the game after a few weeks or months stop and still be able to use and understand the old stuff
    3. less new complexity with new expansions. the old toolset was big enough. just find new combinations mainly

    anyway this are my thoughts about the past, not about the future. about future there are other much more important challenges for devs
     
    aseryen likes this.
  20. haroldkin

    haroldkin I need me some PIE!

    Logging in after many months. Quite honestly expected to find a 404 notice...... All I can say is 'Wow'. OK, now time to get caught up on news.
     
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