Discussion Guild Battlegrounds Watchtower and Siege Camp Ability Re-balance

[Yekk]

The point isn't to assert what the bias is - just that biases exist *and* are hard to quantify. So the poll isn't representative.

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I'm sure the core decision points will be based on in-game metrics rather than the forum poll.

I had figured they did the poll this time just to stop what happened with PvP arena where people kept making polls of their own that'd get deleted because they wanted the feedback contained in the main thread. But I guess Juber *is* reporting on the poll data for whatever merit it may have.

In terms of in-game data, they have seasons and seasons of data on what participation/playstyle was like without the change, presumably with some troubling underlying numbers that they opted to try making changes.

One season in they'll have kneejerk reactions to the change. Some uptick in participation just to see what it's like, some downtick quits in protest. But nothing too usable.

A second-third season with the change will give them a bit of a trend as to whether it seems to be helping what they want it to or not. As well as whether it's hurting too much in other areas that are important to them. Do some of the initial returns just go away again because "pfft, beta. i'm only here for the sneakpeek". Do some of the initial quits return, because while opposed to the changes, GBG is worthwhile to them still in its new form?

If it's murky I expect around that point they might do the "not enough data, we need to test this on a live realm".

Alternatively, this could be something that's decided it's going ahead in some form no matter what - so after the 2nd/3rd season it might go to all live realms as long as the numbers are not catastrophic. With any revisions pushed down the road.

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As for why just this change first, I expect that's because it's the one aspect that is completely against their design goals for GBG - i.e. that attrition be the reason we don't "play all day". It may not even be the biggest problem from the players perspective - but they probably want to see if they fix it, if some of the other problems might accidentally go away as well.

Juber is far from the only person to have made this suggestion - dating all the way back to when GBG is new people have posted the idea to have siege camp bonuses be treated independently rather than additively. Most of his ideas thread was a collation of ideas other people have posted over and over in various forums, usually his versions were very watered down to the point of being inconsequential - where this version of the change is decidedly not (and may be pushing things a touch too far even - i don't really think we need the 66.6 cap when the multiplicative alone would have someone with 8 camps still taking 11.1% attrition, and 8 camps is far from the common situation, requiring at least 3 good bordering sectors). I don't really think we can call this "Juber's change".

Beta does not do GBG like live does. To many national guilds (Russian, Italian, German, French, ect. ) some of which do not speak other languages whereas other servers are for the most part one language. What is learned here is rubbish as a result... It is not a question of does this need live testing but a need to do so.

 

[SabreHawk]

People tend to resist change. Also, many of those who either like the change or don't dislike the change, or haven't noticed any change, will not comment here. Mostly only those who feel as if their ox is gored will reply.

One thing I like about the change is that no longer can the large guilds just use lots of resources and ride roughshot over everyone else because they suffer little or no attrition. If they expect to win, they will now have to actually coordinate attacks and/or bring more people in on the attacks themselves. Or, they may just have to actually take time to attack rather than letting the AI do it for them.

My recommendation is to keep it in beta for at least three seasons and see 1. How many leave Beta and 2. Let people get used to the change. Then ask for comments.

Perhaps another approach to contemplate would be to not allow as many slots to place Siege Camps, or Watchtowers, etc. as there are now. That may just accomplish a bit of leveling of the playing field that you seem to be attempting to accomplish, without all the whinning and crying, especially if you don't tell them at first what you are doing. Also doing it gradually would be less shock to their inbred resistance to change.

Just as a side note, I have noticed that a number of guilds no longer make it "mandatory" for their members to participate in Guild Battleground. And in talking to a number of their members it appears that they are tired of not being able to make much progress against the larger guilds. Maybe this will help bring them back to activity in Guild Battleground.

 

[Thunderdome]

We will probably get a second test round here on beta with the same balancing, but have not yet received confirmation. I will post it in the announcement, once i know it for sure.

Translation: "It's here to stay whether you want it or not".

Sorry, but it has been a "throw it out in the open, let everyone have a go at each other with it in place, stand back as they are mercilessly bombarding each other, and just say a few words after the damage is done" kind of 2 weeks. Now, we got to go through this again without any changes or announcements of how our feedback (or better yet, which of our feedback) was handled...

You've got to be kitten me!

 

[Thunderdome]

My recommendation is to keep it in beta for at least three seasons and see 1. How many leave Beta and 2. Let people get used to the change. Then ask for comments.

Or pull up some kind of analytic that would see how many are not using the GBg feature instead of relying on how many are logging into the game to get their answer. I can be logging into the game to collect and then log off. If Inno translates my logging in as something for GBg then we are all in trouble.

 

[Sha of Ra]

If you're going to remove a benefit, I feel that something should be offered in return. It can be hard for the smaller players. Without the chance of free fights, their rewards will be cut significantly which will hinder their growth. How about increasing the chance of getting a reward?

 

[mintbunnies]

No, it does not need to go to live servers to test it out. Does INNO like to purposefully upset their customers?

"Hey we thought of neat idea! Why not have everyone's Arc at zero and have them start again? Let's try it on the live servers to see if this will be popular!"

Messing with your customers trust is an excellent way to lose sales. An idea that is strongly and vocally opposed to does not guarantee it an equal right for testing just to see what happens.

People have spent money and diamonds to build their city up in a certain way. To have all your work yanked out from under your feet is a slap in the face. Cities will have to be redesigned. FP oriented instead of attack bonus.

I can tell you in live server I added over 100+ attack and 100+ defense this past event and was able to increase my attrition by 5 points to 90 instead of 85. Those 5 points will give me 15 more fights here? Big whoop.

The only suggestion I have read so far that would be tolerable to me is to have attrition slowly fall back down to zero every 4hrs. It limits the fights any one person can do at one time but ensures if you are dedicated that you can still play throughout the day. This will keep people signing back online every 4hrs. This is what other apps do, to give you hearts that replenish over time. To keep users active and keep signing online regularly.

A small but good guild with good organization can make a push on the map, regardless of size and camps. A 15member guild can make a decent push into the center. A large guild cannot count on smaller guilds burning out early and must always be on their toes.

 

[Yekk]

People tend to resist change. Also, many of those who either like the change or don't dislike the change, or haven't noticed any change, will not comment here. Mostly only those who feel as if their ox is gored will reply.

One thing I like about the change is that no longer can the large guilds just use lots of resources and ride roughshot over everyone else because they suffer little or no attrition. If they expect to win, they will now have to actually coordinate attacks and/or bring more people in on the attacks themselves. Or, they may just have to actually take time to attack rather than letting the AI do it for them.

My recommendation is to keep it in beta for at least three seasons and see 1. How many leave Beta and 2. Let people get used to the change. Then ask for comments.

Perhaps another approach to contemplate would be to not allow as many slots to place Siege Camps, or Watchtowers, etc. as there are now. That may just accomplish a bit of leveling of the playing field that you seem to be attempting to accomplish, without all the whinning and crying, especially if you don't tell them at first what you are doing. Also doing it gradually would be less shock to their inbred resistance to change.

Just as a side note, I have noticed that a number of guilds no longer make it "mandatory" for their members to participate in Guild Battleground. And in talking to a number of their members it appears that they are tired of not being able to make much progress against the larger guilds. Maybe this will help bring them back to activity in Guild Battleground.

20% of the players pay for this game... 80% just play... this change will affect the 20% most... Beta has testers, we don't leave. We test... It is made up of some of the best long time players. On you get a chance to fight. A strong guild can still stuff you and it is easier now. Brute force paired with the discipline of a top guild can make your life tough for 11 days still. Yes you may get out but with limited attrition your guild will fail quickly.

 

[King Flush]

As has been mentioned many times in this thread, the poll is absolutely not representative. There's a well-known selection bias when it comes to forums that people who are unhappy are more likely to show up to give feedback than people who are happy.

As an example, let's pretend the "true" split of the feelings on the change was 50/50. But that unhappy people are twice as likely to come to the forums to post/vote. This would result in a 2:1 "majority" in the poll and is not implausible.

Unfortunately, I don't think it's so consistent to be something that can be easily corrected for in the polling. So if anything, the poll is meaningless

There's also the principle that game designers should not always listen to their players - because players will always want more, but that does not necessarily lead to a good/enduring game.

you're grasping at straws it is only your opinion that more people will voice their unhappy views than those that will praise something

As an example, let's pretend the "true" split of the feelings on the change was 86/14 against. But that people for the change are twice as likely to come to the forums to post/vote. This would result in the same 2:1 majority against

see we can both just come up with BS statements, see no reason to believe the views here are not representitive, if anything I would suggest that the majority in the 'for' camp don't have a true grasp of the consequences so maybe their votes should be worth less, bit like if you were to poll parents and children whether they should have nothing but sweets for their school meal you may find the results show that majority want this but let's listen to the parents more than the children the children will appreciate it in the long run rather than having rotten teeth.

 

[Owl II]

Beta does not do GBG like live does. To many national guilds (Russian, Italian, German, French, ect. ) some of which do not speak other languages whereas other servers are for the most part one language. What is learned here is rubbish as a result... It is not a question of does this need live testing but a need to do so.

Beta doesn't play like the living. They won't be able to figure out how this change will affect live servers by testing it here. They will only understand how it will affect the platinum league and below, at best. Unfortunately, I do not have data on beta fights for past seasons. But in the previous season (with the full support of the camps at the waterfalls) we had 67 k fights. We made 45 k fights in the first season with the changes. Let me remind you that waterfalls have almost twice as many provinces available for battle with the support of camps. We have in the living world with full support of camps 90-120k fights on the volcano map and 120-160 k fights on the waterfall map (unless we got an absolutely dead group). This is heaven and earth. This is a turtle compared to a cheetah. And we are not the record holders for the number of fights in the living world. how can you test anything on a turtle, expecting it to work with a cheetah?

 

[kawada]

As has been mentioned many times in this thread, the poll is absolutely not representative. There's a well-known selection bias when it comes to forums that people who are unhappy are more likely to show up to give feedback than people who are happy.

but check how many new forum accounts (including myself) showed up just to speak up about the GBG change specifically. I would say it’s quite representative — they were more or less OK with all the previous changes, but now people made efforts to share HOW MUCH unhappy they are )

 

[kawada]

what happened to math: why is it more than 100%?

 

[xivarmy]

View attachment 8184

what happened to math: why is it more than 100%?

you're allowed to check both yes and no - i guess as a hedge of a "sorta kinda ok with it"

 

[Knight Roland]

The poll is a part of the feedback.

So in this case, transparency is not helpful, sadly.

If you guys really came to that conclusion in the end, it’s sad. And wrong. But it‘s their game, they can do anything they want with it *shrug*.

However, i would greatly appreciate if you could adress three concerns i have with the changes (maybe if you could ask the devs about it):

What about Obsi, Atomium, AI core becoming largely obsolete because much less siege towers are going to be built?

What about the ingame market, it will largely come to a halt, because why trade any goods when they are not longer needed to refill the guild vault?

What about those GB’s which produce unrefined goods (babel, lighttower etc) becoming even more useless than they already are (why produce these goods when they are no longer needed to be traded to refill the guild vault?)

 

[Owl II]

If you guys really came to that conclusion in the end, it’s sad. And wrong. But it‘s their game, they can do anything they want with it *shrug*.

However, i would greatly appreciate if you could adress three concerns i have with the changes (maybe if you could ask the devs about it):

What about Obsi, Atomium, AI core becoming largely obsolete because much less siege towers are going to be built?

What about the ingame market, it will largely come to a halt, because why trade any goods when they are not longer needed to refill the guild vault?

What about those GB’s which produce unrefined goods (babel, lighttower etc) becoming even more useless than they already are (why produce these goods when they are no longer needed to be traded to refill the guild vault?)

I think the guild treasury and its sources will be fine. It seemed absurd to me to assume that the role of traps would increase at first. But the more I think about it, the more I realize that the dominant guilds will be able to use them in order to keep the map. If it is impossible to fight, then you should find another way to maintain the advantage

 

[Knight Roland]

I think the guild treasury and its sources will be fine.

i agree the guild treasury will be fine, because it will accumulate far more goods than will ever be needed.

But that wasnt my concern. My concern is that the sources for the guild treasury become largely obsolete because the arch will be more than sufficient to keep the guild vault filled to the brim

 

[Owl II]

i agree the guild treasury will be fine, because it will accumulate far more goods than will ever be needed.

But that wasnt my concern. My concern is that the sources for the guild treasury become largely obsolete because the arch will be more than sufficient to keep the guild vault filled to the brim

I don't think. If you read the message you are quoting, in full, you will find there my assumptions where the treasury will be spent.

 

[Knight Roland]

I don't think. If you read the message you are quoting, in full, you will find there my assumptions where the treasury will be spent.

The part about the traps is only wishful thinking. No one has placed them before and no one will use them after, because no one will have an interest in purposedly reducing the massively reduced number of fights even more.

 

[TheSovereign]

If we go by that logic, 250 out of the 300 "no" votes are fake too! Because I have not seen 300 different players complain about it!
Ok, by all seriousness: What reason should there be to manipulate the vote? It is one factor we use to forward feedback to the devs. We would lie to ourselves, if we did that.
The poll is not there for players to see, but mainly for us. Because of this, we will set it to private, if we do it again. I wanted to to have it public so players could get a better insight on how we do things, but it seems to have a worse effect. So in this case, transparency is not helpful, sadly.

One can imagine the poll results just by reading the comment thread. For the new changes, I came, I played, I have come to my conclusions. And I've read all the comments and concluded the overwhelming consensus is not positive. Taking the poll private doesn't change anything. And who will participate in a poll where the results are secret?? That just adds another skew to the results.

My biggest issue with this whole debacle is that I still do not understand WHAT ISSUES INNO was/is trying to address and solve with this 66 attrition solution? And that's even true after reading every message in this thread!!! All I know is I've played FoE for a few years and it's worked for me overall. Until this just-concluded GBG season. Now, the 'economics' of the entire game have been radically altered. The proposed change is in GBG, but the blowback from this change ripples through the whole game experience for me and, as I've expressed my perspective previously in this feedback thread, I'll not repeat it here except to say that, after reading the messages here and playing through what was, for me, a thoroughly frustrating and disappointing GBG season, my perspective on your poll numbers is that I think that they probably are a pretty accurate representation of the collective assessment of the 66 attrition change.

 

[Knight Roland]

My biggest issue with this whole debacle is that I still do not understand WHAT ISSUES INNO was/is trying to address and solve with this 66 attrition solution?

because they clearly have lost track of any vision where to go with this game. You can see it in almost every step they took in the last months: The canceled event center, the guild perks debacle, the copy-paste ages, the copy-paste events, the ingame-ads.

 

[HunZ95]

The part about the traps is only wishful thinking. No one has placed them before and no one will use them after, because no one will have an interest in purposedly reducing the massively reduced number of fights even more.

the coast may be full of traps. The big guilds occupy the coast once, then leave a trap there, so at least everyone feels the result of the balancing act. Then can continue to scold the top guilds, how badly they play...