Could we perhaps make this game slightly more...compact?

I enjoyed the 100 Nora super imp, with the damage maxed out. Worked great because of stealth - people just see an imps been deployed and think it's no threat until you slap them about with that bad boy.

I can't remember the name of the player who popularised it - milanda, Miranda, something like that.

 

It's great to hear all the points are being considered
I have to point out though that out of these points, I think one and two (which are strongly related) are no longer as relevant as they were before.
For starters, in the current environment Speed doesn't seem as important as it used to be. You see champs with 6 speed being played all the time. I think this is partially due to the reason that, because of the powercreep, champions are just way harder to kill now and as such, damage and durability have become as important as speed.
In addition, the change to defense, removal of the attack stat and numerous new abilities associated with it have made defense far more valuable as well (I don't remember exactly what the damage formula was before but it was more complex and defence FAR less important).
I honestly think if the old system was still in place now, people would upgrade a far greater variety of stats than they used to. And if not, the solution to simply up the nora cost of speed is always there.

Point 2 is simply a problem with the Poxnora player base in general and honestly it hasn't really changed much. People still ridicule other players for using certain runes and, as you can see by the various threats on the subject, the amount of verbal abuse hasn't really decreased after the cp change. More reporting functions and stronger punitive measures are the answer here, not changing the game itself.

Point 3 however was and would still be a huge issue. It really WAS annoying having to reconfigure your whole battlegroup after a patch change. If an elegant solution to this problem could be found, I think something close to the old cp system, but adjusted to the current game would be ideal. I'm not a programmer so unfortunately I can't offer any suggestions on how to deal with point 3 but hopefully you guys at DoG can. Great work so far anyway

 

You now, reading Gedden just now, it came to me, what if you me some paths? like buff path, debuff path, defencive path and offencive path, every rune have these for paths, and the players pick one, the big diference its that path do not gives a single bonus, it gives a set of bonus:
-buff patch add ways to help other friendly champs. Like: battlemaster +divine favor +battle hymn
-debuff patch add ways to disable enemy champs. Like: rinder moviment +weary +hex
-defencive patch add ways to this champ survive more. Like: +10hp +2 def +reflect
-offencive path add ways to this champ kill more. Like: +3 dmg + fury +multi attack.
Now imagine that for each champ, never changing speed and range, will be crasy cool see a ranger with debuff patch or a elven mage with defencive patch or a elder garu with offencive path (yea i play only with old kthir runes...)
Its possive even to some thing like tree skill with the four path, then a strong version of the patch os some split path
---[]----[]----[]----[]---
[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]-[]

 

I think the simple solution is to keep the upgrade as it is, but make it free to every champ from start, ie have 2 of 4 options to choose, maybe even two preselected ones, but dont need to use any tookens or cp for doing so. It takes away some money for DOW BUT also it encourages players to experiment with more different decks/styles/factions, which in turn can give interest to buy more runes. One problem now and in the past was that if you have a new idea for BG, you need to spend tookens for upgrading some champs. If the idea is really good, you may do it, but if its a longshot, you may just not. If you try without the tookens spent, the BG will definately fail, so test is meaningless.

I do not like the old upgrade system simply because it gave too much variability to champs, making it more timeconsiuming to have to double check each champ ont he battlefield.

 

Really? I find the current system infinitely more time consuming to be honest. Checking a champs stats takes like a second...

The reason I don't like doing away with cp altogether is that first of all, it's very bad for business and second of all, it limits every champ to just a single role which makes a considerable amount of them 'suboptimal' and therefore useless in high ranked play. The power and ability creep that has taken place over the years is there for precisely this reason. In addition it sharply limits DOG's design space. What are they going to do in the future, just release more new abilities? That's the last thing we need.

Furthermore I have to say that under the old system, having to CP a rune was not NEARLY as much of a problem as it is now. That is because most runes were already very playable in their base state. They were more basic but also cheaper in nora. Even in high ranked play, level 1 runes were often used.
The only reason cping a rune has become so much of a grind is BECAUSE of the very system we have today. Having a rune at level 1 brings only disadvantages under the current system which is why that system needs changing.

 

I think in past, it was important with lots of variability because there were so few runes. Now when there are thousands of runes, you dont need so much variability on each rune. Keep a few (free) upgrade options to be able to use each champ in a few different ways, but dont put back the old system where in some cases after upgrading one champ only was different from another by the sprite on the screen.

 

That's not untrue, however if the amount of abilities on each champ is going to be reduced (which needs to be done regardless of what happens to cp), that variability will also be reduced again.
It's a really difficult decision. On the whole I loved the old customization system simply because it was just so much FUN. I spent literally hours just thinking of and trying out different options, often without even actually playing. I don't have that at all with the current system. Simply choosing between different runes is not the same, it feels no different from choosing between different cards in your Average Joe trading card game.

Either way, I don't envy you your decision Gedden. The player base seems fairly split on this issue so good luck Hope you guys come up with the best solution and that Pox remains unique (or hopefully becomes even more so).

 

That's a good point right there that I'd like to echo. With 30 rune docks and 1k+ runes we no longer have a viable option to have a complex upgrade system, at least for runes (perhaps you could keep this for avatars if you really wanted).

1) Flair
The most appealing option to me is having upgrades just be flair options (taunts, nick names, sounds, flair effect)

2) C/U/R - Basic vs E/LEG/LE- Complex
For C/U/R have upgrades be stat based only and be the same or based on class/race/faction what have you.
(+3dmg/+1spd/+8hp/+2def) is enough variety to change how a champ feels.
For E/LEG/LE let them be the current system as they can afford to be a little more complex (although they should be balanced so that stuffing a crap ton of them in all bgs will not be optimal)

3) Current system but with costs
Simply maintain the current system but associate upgrades with nora cost increases like the old system. The only issue here would be that you will need to have an option to NOT choose any upgrades.

4) STATS only
Reduce all upgrades to stats only.

5) Remove CP entirely

 

Your #2 idea will never be implemented Yobanchi, mainly because in the way you proposed rarity = power, and that´s not good for anybody.
My suggestion would just leave the system as is, but just making a standard on how many abilities a champ can have on base. Cuts down complexity creep to the bone. I mainly agree with DMR, though, this is a tough subject and warrants way more discussion.

 

Thank you for your input, however, I was mainly stressing that rarity SHOULD equal complexity...not power.
((although they should be balanced so that stuffing a crap ton of them in all bgs will not be optimal))

 

The reason is rather that the speed system got changed. The speed value used to be the maximum number of AP you can store, and you'd gain half your speed (rounded up) AP every turn. So 9 speed was actually 5 speed, and 11 speed was actually 6 speed. It was mostly just some KF runes with their bonus who'd get the "crazy" speed of 13, which was effectively 7... That's why leaving your speed at even numbers was stupid, as you'd basically waste another AP per turn for just a little upgrade. Another complication was that FF KF runes got 1 extra speed, so with KF you wanted to leave them even instead, unless you wanted to play those runes in a split, in which case you'd have to spend a token to reset the stats... I don't remember if the speed system got changed before the upgrade system got changed, but in any case that was the only reason for the 9 and 11 speeds. As you can see, powercreep has rather increased the average speed, not reduced it.

So that's really what it came down to: You wanted to keep your champ costs as low as possible in almost all the cases, with the exception of speed rounded to the nearest uneven number because it's more efficient, and then you'd usually round it out with some stats so that the nora cost is just close to the next round number. Not just because of how the cooldown system works, but also for things like efficient double deploys on the first turn. Round nora cost numbers are just easier to work with.

This created these "best" numbers and you needed a very good reason to deviate from it. Unleveled runes were still a liability mainly if they got stuck with an even speed number.

Laying off the rose tinted glasses, it just wasn't that great. A ton of complexity for fairly little value overall.

 

I think the pain that people are experiencing with CP is that a level 1 rune costs the same as a level 3 rune, so having an unleveled rune in your deck is always inefficient, and while long time players will have a deck with mostly leveled runes, new players will need to level a full deck, which is very time consuming.

I agree with Gedden's point that the old system resulted in multiple issues, but one thing that it did right was to make unleveled runes cheaper than fully leveled ones.

My suggestion would be to assign a nora cost to every champ at level 1. Each of the 4 upgrades would have a nora cost associated, and when a champ had them applied, the champ would cost that much more. I would make it so that at level 2, the first ability is automatically selected, and the second at level 3. Using Lich King as an example, let's say Teleport 2 is worth 8 nora and Curse is worth 5 nora. A level 1 Lich King would be 87 nora. A level 2 Lich King with Curse would be 92 nora, and a level 2 Lich King with Teleport 2 would be 95 nora. A level 3 Lich King with both would be 100 nora.

This would reduce the pain of having unleveled runes, would bring back some of option of running an efficiency or maxxed out champ, without introducing the out of control upgrades that we had before.

 

I think I like that... If the upgrade system is going to remain, I could imagine it to work like this:

• Allow all four upgrades to be selected. Each has a nora cost of course.
• Basic/common runes mostly get stat upgrades, to keep them simple.
• Legendaries get fancy abilities as upgrades instead, so they allow you to build (expensive) super champs or customize a champ for your deck, but you can also run them fairly basic. This way Legendaries stand out primarily through their flexibility.
• In-game, the champion is shown with 1 to 5 stars, depending on how many upgrades are selected. This way you can see on a glance whether a champ is the basic configuration or an expensive one.

Whether or not to stick with the CP system in that system would be another question, but it wouldn't hurt since running champs at their most efficient configuration is legit (as long as nora cost increases are realistic).

 

Everyone know that i like the current system but if it were to change i would do this:

-With leveling your champ it gains "Flair" as yobanchi sayd
-All champeons have 4 upgrades availables, 2 positives and 2 negatives. The positive ones makes the champ cost more and the negative ones make it cheaper.

 

While I appreciate that, this focus towards new players is getting tiresome, you can only do so much to acommadate them but to be fair if they are not willing to take the time and learn the game then your efforts to create a decent nux is for nought, you can only do so much but if they are not willing thats their problem.

 

I am not a new player but I am not going to play a dead game, which is what this is if it doesn't become dramatically more new player friendly. So please go fly a kite and let Gedden do his work.

 

Thank you for proving my point you did it perfectly, without players like you the game would benefit more, theres a word we have in league for players like you....trollz.

 

Of course, how dare I suggest that the developers know what needs to be done and to let them do their work. I'm such a troll.