Feedback St Patrick's Day Event

[xivarmy]

Yet not alot of constructive feedback just alot of yelling and stomping of feet

I can tell you why they arent listening
Whining and crying that the event is "to hard" isnt the type of feedback they want
What they want to know is if the event will operate without any bugs
The feedback thread is just a place for players to complain
If I remember the only thing they actually wanted our help changing was the official announcement
Not the actual event itself

As for the event its so simple to finish its laughable
The fact that so many players cant figure it out is even funnier
Cant wait for the complaints on live server (getting my popcorn ready)

A great number of the people complaining have acknowledged it can be 'finished'.

It's not fun is the top of the complaint list. It doesn't matter enough what choices you make (the difference between finishing with 9 pieces or 10 pieces barring huge mistakes like opening 5 out of 6 chests and getting stuck losing all that progress - something you wouldn't know without research so it's going to remain a substantial problem for people who just want to play the event)/you're forced to make choices you don't want to by the task system (hire this worthless manager or stop getting tasks this run). In short, you can play the event "wrong" and come up short - but you're not notably rewarded for making optimal decisions and playing it "right" vs just taking one of a few "not wrong" paths.

There's not really much choice in the prize system as to what you win either - you pretty much can choose to open all 6 or open 1 after a run through the mini-game. The absence of daily specials (usually the main avenue for player choice) is not made up for by this (pretty much all sets of 6 have left me going "ew, maybe next time" - the lesson from which for live being "just ignore what's in them, it's not going to be any better next time").

The set isn't exactly groundbreaking to inspire people to put up with an unfun event (unless their city is new). I've not yet decided if I'm going to bother with it on live (assuming it stays more or less the same like it appears it will). It is an improvement for me - but I'm not sure if it's enough of one for how much I'm going to be annoyed by the event.

That you feel every turd the developers present to you is gold does not make the complaints illegitimate. There was room for them to improve the event with small-ish changes (making the manager tasks something more flexible or letting chest progress be saved between rounds such that doing more rounds could make obtaining a kit from them cheaper) so that player's would feel they have more choice in how the game progresses for them rather than just feel they were being put through additional chores for rewards they don't really have a say in.

 

[Praeceptor]

I've been looking forward to having a break from events and this one will definitely get missed on live.

Way too much work for very little rewards.

 

[Rakshas]

It's really not that much work. It takes maybe 30 minutes or so of screen time for you to get a city at near full production. Like any event things are limited by event currency. I think a lot of you are just making work for yourselves. And then we have complaints about too much downtime. So which is it, too much work, or too much downtime? I think a lot of the complaints are actually due to such a drastic change in event style as well as the fact that you have to think a little more in this event. Though, honestly, it still doesn't take that much thought. The big thing that's missing is daily specials, and I think that's what's really going to drop the revenue. Spending diamonds for additional sets is also difficult because the chests double in price if you don't switch cities.

 

[DeletedUser]

. Spending diamonds for additional sets is also difficult because the chests double in price if you don't switch cities

Wut?

 

[Rakshas]

Wut?

Unless they changed it if you keep opening the set of 6 boxes it keeps doubling. First set of 6 is ~2000, second set is ~4000, third set is ~8000. Maybe it stops doubling at the third, but it's way too expensive by then imo.

 

[xivarmy]

It's really not that much work. It takes maybe 30 minutes or so of screen time for you to get a city at near full production. Like any event things are limited by event currency. I think a lot of you are just making work for yourselves. And then we have complaints about too much downtime. So which is it, too much work, or too much downtime?

It can be both. It's a lot of work at the start if you're trying to rush (which when you're first playing the event you might feel is important even though it ultimately isn't for the most part). The first half hour to two hours (depending on manager levels) there's frequent upgrades available and you may feel compelled to make sure you keep checking in super-frequently (unless you're able to discard the notion at the start that it matters how fast you finish the city - which for most people it won't; there's plenty of penalty to make the "advantage" of additional runs pretty much non-existent as they'll either cost significant amounts of pots of gold or only offer a limited amount of extra tasks). Then you get to level 250 festival/ferry with level 25 firework factory and it's time to just let it sit for a while. Upgrade them to 300 and then let it sit even longer.

So... people who want to do a lot get discouraged that after their hurry up session it's time to just wait.

And people who don't want to do a lot get discouraged at how much work it is to get it to the point where they can just let it sit for most of a day.

Noone's happy

Most important to me is the longer you play the event the more you come to realise the decisions and effort you thought you were making meaningfully ultimately didn't matter. That there's not much reward for doing the city faster/slower or with more tasks/less tasks - there's a slight amount of gain to additional runs and skipping some manager tasks in theory; but the time limit on the event vs time it takes to finish a city means it's not really a substantial gain available. Since there's no daily specials and the chests at the end of a run are meaningless there's also no trade off there. It's all just pointless busywork apart from a handful of obviously wrong choices (extra manager levels to finish a stage faster unless you're planning to spend diamonds and need additional opportunities to open 6 chests, using rushes at all, partial sets of end-of-stage chests opened wasting pots of gold without getting any real progress).

 

[Rakshas]

Most important to me is the longer you play the event the more you come to realise the decisions and effort you thought you were making meaningfully ultimately didn't matter. That there's not much reward for doing the city faster/slower or with more tasks/less tasks - there's a slight amount of gain to additional runs and skipping some manager tasks in theory; but the time limit on the event vs time it takes to finish a city means it's not really a substantial gain available. Since there's no daily specials and the chests at the end of a run are meaningless there's also no trade off there. It's all just pointless busywork apart from a handful of obviously wrong choices (extra manager levels to finish a stage faster unless you're planning to spend diamonds and need additional opportunities to open 6 chests, using rushes at all, partial sets of end-of-stage chests opened wasting pots of gold without getting any real progress).

That's kind of my point. After the realization you mentioned, the only real difference between this event and the others is the lack of daily specials. I could make the argument that all other events are just pointless busywork as well, just with daily specials added to the mix. I think it's easier to mess up this event at the beginning than others though.

 

[coolyfooly]

Daily specials are what many look forward to in events, which makes this one disappointing. at least for me. I just hope they dont make it a normal thing to not have any daily specials in events.

 

[xivarmy]

That's kind of my point. After the realization you mentioned, the only real difference between this event and the others is the lack of daily specials. I could make the argument that all other events are just pointless busywork as well, just with daily specials added to the mix. I think it's easier to mess up this event at the beginning than others though.

Except there is meaningful decisions in other events:
The best 'new' format events are probably the archaeology/hallowe'en event they tried out. You're constantly seeing new layouts and having to make decisions what's worth clearing/skipping and what's not while balancing tool usage in the approximate ratio offered by the most efficient package. If you do well at it you not only easily obtain the main prize, but get to pick up boatloads of other goodies along the way. AND you get validation that you were doing it well by the screams of others that it was impossible when you well exceeded the minimum needed.

The sporting events always have 'most efficient' paths that are worth analyzing. Usually different ones depending on whether you want daily specials or grand prize progress. While these strategies are usually simplistic there's also room for hybrid strategies that try to optimise both to some extent and then after doing so the temptation to deviate from them just a little to get extras that aren't 'optimum' but that you would like (i.e. that horribly inefficient FP player)

Summer casino offers tradeoffs between spinning on what you see, refreshing the wheel yourself to potentially get first crack at something good yourself, or checking in frequently to try and snipe good wheels when other people refresh.

This event only presents an illusion of tradeoffs for the most part. Whether you do more runs through the city for tasks or more rounds of chests purchased at the end of separate runs doesn't really offer anything 'extra' in either direction. More filler grand prizes you don't really want or more chest contents you can't really control with the same number of kits either way.

 

[Rakshas]

...depending on whether you want daily specials or grand prize progress.

It pretty much just comes down to daily specials imo. I will say I do like the archaeology event the most. This one is strange in that I enjoy some of the game play, but it does take more time than other events as well. Not much more time, but enough that you can't just spam tasks and leave like other events. However, I really don't think it's as bad as people are saying it is.

 

[DeletedUser8743]

Except there is meaningful decisions in other events:
The best 'new' format events are probably the archaeology/hallowe'en event they tried out. You're constantly seeing new layouts and having to make decisions what's worth clearing/skipping and what's not while balancing tool usage in the approximate ratio offered by the most efficient package. If you do well at it you not only easily obtain the main prize, but get to pick up boatloads of other goodies along the way. AND you get validation that you were doing it well by the screams of others that it was impossible when you well exceeded the minimum needed.

The sporting events always have 'most efficient' paths that are worth analyzing. Usually different ones depending on whether you want daily specials or grand prize progress. While these strategies are usually simplistic there's also room for hybrid strategies that try to optimise both to some extent and then after doing so the temptation to deviate from them just a little to get extras that aren't 'optimum' but that you would like (i.e. that horribly inefficient FP player)

Summer casino offers tradeoffs between spinning on what you see, refreshing the wheel yourself to potentially get first crack at something good yourself, or checking in frequently to try and snipe good wheels when other people refresh.

This event only presents an illusion of tradeoffs for the most part. Whether you do more runs through the city for tasks or more rounds of chests purchased at the end of separate runs doesn't really offer anything 'extra' in either direction. More filler grand prizes you don't really want or more chest contents you can't really control with the same number of kits either way.

I think you're overrating the other events. I like the mechanics of the Halloween/Archaeology events but the strategy is obvious and very simplistic. Anyone who screams that those events are impossible probably loses at tic-tac-toe.

The sporting events have little strategy. Just math to determine the player efficiencies and a decision on how much to focus on the event prize versus desirable daily specials. I choose the horribly inefficient FP player whenever available and don't have any problem getting the maxed out event prize. Summer event has gotten worse since I started playing. Almost never choose not to refresh the wheel. The Winter event has next to no strategy. These events also have a bunch of mindless clicking.

 

[wowo the woolve warrior]

Early indications by wowo indicate that the event as designed will provide the complete set and its upgrades - if I understand the strategy correctly.

yes, confirmed: i have (of course) followed my recommended strategy - here is my current status:

​

this is my fifth - and last - limbo-run. and the first with ship manager on lvl 1 (instead of standard lvl 3):

with shipmanager on lvl 1 and very slow levelling (to be able to do the last 250 upgrades) it took me four days to complete 35 tasks.
(well below the 5 days indicated in my strategy.)

note that you will probably need shipyard manager on lvl 3 to complete 36 tasks/fireworks lvl 75 in five days:
time skip indicates that with shipmanager @lvl 1 we are roughly 25% slower than @lvl 3 (7.6 aa/8hrs vs 10+aa/8hrs)

having collected a total of ~300 gold pots in incidents i will now finish one day early.

 

[DeletedUser8743]

It pretty much just comes down to daily specials imo. I will say I do like the archaeology event the most. This one is strange in that I enjoy some of the game play, but it does take more time than other events as well. Not much more time, but enough that you can't just spam tasks and leave like other events. However, I really don't think it's as bad as people are saying it is.

I agree. I think if INNO can make some tweaks in game play and add a bit more strategic choices this event could jump to the top of the events for me.

 

[xivarmy]

I think you're overrating the other events. I like the mechanics of the Halloween/Archaeology events but the strategy is obvious and very simplistic. Anyone who screams that those events are impossible probably loses at tic-tac-toe.

The sporting events have little strategy. Just math to determine the player efficiencies and a decision on how much to focus on the event prize versus desirable daily specials. I choose the horribly inefficient FP player whenever available and don't have any problem getting the maxed out event prize. Summer event has gotten worse since I started playing. Almost never choose not to refresh the wheel. The Winter event has next to no strategy. These events also have a bunch of mindless clicking.

I'm not saying the other ones are stellar, but that this one doesn't even live up to their low expectations for being interesting - that there's almost no (sane) consequential decision-making in it in terms of what do you the player want out of it. The gameplay was never going to be my favorite as I don't love idle games (and even amongst idle games this is a *bad* one - lack of next stage multipliers, lack of breakpoints where 'old' factories catch up enough to be relevant again) but as a shell it had potential for avenues of interesting decisions though. Analysis said it's less interesting than it looks as all reasonable paths lead to roughly the same result.

And there's a lot of subtleties to the archaeology event. I agree that the threshold for 'success' is pretty low, but there's definitely a fairly wide spectrum between 'loses at tic-tac-toe and can't complete this event' and 'ideal play getting every last bit of goodies you can from it'. It's obvious you want to use your premium tools in good spots but often there's choices where both shovel or dynamite is reasonable. Or where you can use dynamite/shovel where you're at or first brush forward one and then dynamite/shovel. You also sometimes find that after several screens you didn't have as many opportunities to use a particular tool as you usually would and need to force the use of one of them a little more often.

I think their biggest mistake is in introducing this new event they didn't make the first occurrence of it generous and fun. Rather it's tightly balanced with all paths adding up to the same blah results of "you did something really stupid and failed hard" or "you picked one of many paths that all lead to the same result of just enough pieces for a level 2 set (or at worst came up 1 piece short and can choose the least exciting piece to you to not upgrade)".

 

[wowo the woolve warrior]

I think their biggest mistake is in introducing this new event they didn't make the first occurrence of it

you worry me:
it's already plenty nerve-stretching and -straining to think this thing will go live ONCE.

 

[xivarmy]

you worry me:
it's already plenty nerve-stretching and -straining to think this thing will go live ONCE.

Carnival was one of the most loathed previous events (though I didn't mind it that much) - and I think they ran that one 3 times (plus it was an adaptation of an earlier soccer event if I remember right where you took penalty shots). This one will be back no matter how much people hate it - the only question is how much will have changed

I imagine a significant number of resources are required to develop a new event style and that they're committed to using said events at least a few times to justify it.

 

[DeletedUser8743]

I've been doing the more runs approach. I have 6 kits with only 1 being from opening the chests. Finishing up this run now and then doing one more run will get me my 7th kit (16th grand prize). Could have stopped after the last run and waited a couple days to get the POG to open a 2nd set of chests. Without the time lost due to bugs, I think I could have done enough runs to get all 7 kits from grand prizes.

 

[wowo the woolve warrior]

Carnival was one of the most loathed previous events (though I didn't mind it that much)

true. i didn't particularly like carnival either.
for the same reason as this one: to play successfully, you had to log in several times (or just stay logged in).

however there were two significant differences between carnival and st. patrick's:

* you could choose when to log in and spend your tickets or doublons or whatever
* you could ignore the additional rewards path and simply go for spending everything on the guaranteed chance

this awful event here however requires a significant minimum log-in amount and time leaving you no choice but the binary:
not to do the event at all.

 

[Amdira]

It pretty much just comes down to daily specials imo. I will say I do like the archaeology event the most. This one is strange in that I enjoy some of the game play, but it does take more time than other events as well. Not much more time, but enough that you can't just spam tasks and leave like other events. However, I really don't think it's as bad as people are saying it is.

Nah ... pls don't break it down for daily specials. Most of these items can be bought at the Antiques Dealer anyway. Pls just make it possible to get the complete set by doing several runs without being stuck with these manager tasks. My suggestions for a solution have been laid down several pages before and repeated after and after. I don't ask for missing them out at all, just let us skip them and do them when possible. In earlier events running out of event currency just meant missing a daily price - here it means missing the main price, because you are losing a whole day production and with this up to 10 or more tasks you could have done in meantime. Don't get me wrong. On some reason I still like the mini-game and also the set - but ...

 

[xivarmy]

I've been doing the more runs approach. I have 6 kits with only 1 being from opening the chests. Finishing up this run now and then doing one more run will get me my 7th kit (16th grand prize). Could have stopped after the last run and waited a couple days to get the POG to open a 2nd set of chests. Without the time lost due to bugs, I think I could have done enough runs to get all 7 kits from grand prizes.

Seems plausible yes. That's a high task count run every 1.5 days. My most recent test has been a fest 1/ferry 1 run and that's still just over 2 days (think it's going to clock in at 50 hours). So if you've got the flexibility to login at any hour, yes I can believe you could do 7 kits via grand prizes. The point is : this is basically no different in terms of results than wowo's 5-6 run strategy in result. You'll each have gotten comparable amounts of other crap that gets shoveled to the auction dealer and next to nothing else other than the set that you actually want. Hence it's not a meaningful choice to do more runs instead of opening chests. Sure you can - but there's no trade-off.

What I'd like to see is a strategy that gets you say 11 kits + the 3 pieces from questline for a total of 14. Something tangible for extra effort to build a decent overlapped multi-set. I'd even be willing to ride the line of 'might need to spend a few diamonds' for it. But there's no way I'm spending the 'standard' 7k diamonds for it (1750 diamonds getting 2000 pots, 1900 pots get burned for an extra kit).