Deck Mechanics Suggestion

@Haz, thanks for the tips. I've also actually been getting better at dropping slugs and creating combos. It's more than that for me though; I just don't enjoy managing slugs, or combos, the way it's currently implemented. I don't see what added value slugs have in my game experience. It's a mechanism used to encourage me to not do something (not wear a particular kind of armor, not keep a small deck, etc.). It is negative reenforcement, and in my mind it needs to be replaced with something more positive. I just have a regular 'ol keyboard -- more power to you and those with fancy gaming rigs, but is a bit of a turn off for me if the entry requirement to enjoy SotA combat is to go out and buy a gaming mouse or keyboard/keypad.

 

Understood.

I got lucky and bought the game pad years ago at a yard sale for $12 and since I was an old man then, you can guess what I am now.......a grumpy ol fart. I will say that the game pad has increased my enjoyment of each of the games I have used it in. I damaged my right hand in the military back in '73, so using my left for the pad is great. Haven't even thought of how I'll use the "make a macro" function yet, muhahah.

 

I don't think a maximum deck size is needed, but if they want to put one in I won't complain.

The minimum deck size combined with the increasing cost per level of skills forces you to go into other trees and also to pick up copies of skills you don't like, just be cause they are cheap. I found my decks getting overly defensively focused just because there were a bunch of skills in the armor trees that were cheap and didn't require a specific weapon. I had to use them even if I knew I would have been better off with more attack cards for easy mobs.

You also have a much harder time creating a deck with any coherent theme as the deck size gets large since your chances of getting key skills or skill combos keeps going down fast. What's the point of being able to switch between two decks if they have to be largely the same anyhow since you're pressed to just get to the minimum deck size?

 

Didn't you find that picking up more of the defensive skills (while keeping the same number of slots), actually diluted the offensive potential of your deck though?

Keep in mind, if you have 5 copies of fire arrow, 5 copies of fireball, 5 copies of lighting bolt, and 5 copies of fire fist, when you are at level 20, then by level 41 you have had to add 10 more glyphs to your deck with the same number of slots. That means the odds of your offensive spells coming up are getting diluted as you gain levels and that is no bueno.

Static decks have the same potential always, but a player using R11 deck mechanics will become less powerful as they progress in levels. If that continues would that eventually mean that there is a level where using the static decks becomes clearly more efficient? if so that needs to change.

 

As the minimum deck size increases into 25 or later, you need to adjust the other deck variables. Adjust the number of slots so the number of cards changes the odds of being dealt the cards you want. Change to a higher dealing speed so that cards are dealt more often. And change the discard speed so that there can be at least one open slot to deal glyphs into. Using the other variables I was able to keep have glyphs continually that I wanted to use, and I wasn't less powerful I was more powerful because the other glyphs were coming up as often as the first ones were.

I tried the locked, static decks and found the no where near as interesting as the random deck. I found I was constantly waiting for glyphs to use. Where as with random decks, even with a minimum 30 glyph deck, I could fire off chained attacks of the same type without the wait of the locked deck. I found that using the locked deck I was using auto attack while I was waiting more than I was when using a random deck.

 

I already had 9 slots by that time so I could not add more slots. I could also still fire off chains of attacks after my deck was up to 35 minimum, but it definitely was a weaker deck than it was when the minimum was 25. I was far more powerful at level 30 then I was at level 41, by a long shot.

So can a person 10 levels lower than you beat you in PvP... yes. Not because leveling isn't exponentially more powerful... it is because leveling makes you weaker at a certain point. --At least that was my experience.

 

My mention about a maximum deck size wasn't a suggestion for the actual system, but more as the needed limitation if every skill is equally interesting. At the moment, having a maximum deck size is irrelevant, since the interest is to have only the best attacks your character can use. If defensive skills were made into active counters and different attack skills represent real choices instead of a list of equally powered attacks i use... that may change where the limit is set.

I agree with you Isaiah, and that's exactly the feeling i'm against.

If you need to invest your power (skill points) to compensate for the lack of power induced by the increase of deck size, you're getting less powerful since you get the same outcome as in a lower level, only enhanced by the attributes you raised. Besides the Focus tree (deck customization) doesn't belong the level where it's actually implemented imo; it's above skill trees, since it manages how glyphs are dealt. They're different in the same way contents are different from containers. Same for the attributes.

Sorry If i'm overly critical, but the more content they add keeping the current way of design, the more they'll move further from what i think it would be best design fitting the deck system. Just trying to be constructive.

 

After reading through all the comments, I have to say that I am still inclined to stick by my original suggestion. The more control you can give to the player, the more diverse combat templates will be..................this can't be a bad thing.

 

To me, best non-outdoor PVP (therefore more controlled) i ever had was in WoW. I had lots of skills, and i had control over many of them. Almost 30 bindings at my fingertips, ready to be unleashed whenever i see fit. However, after getting used to it, fighting with two mates against three foes in the arena... the way of playing it was a perfectly timed dance. So perfectly it ended being boring. It depended of the setup we faced, of course, but in the end i needed to interrupt certain spells everytime the enemy could cast it, as I needed to sinchronize my Crowd Control with the one my mates had to make sure our damage was maximum. That were just two examples of being in control of your character, and the first matches we managed to do that was amazing... but in the end, i felt i was playing the same sequence, and it grew boring.

My point is i'm happy with the degree of chaos the deck system adds, and sort of happy with the way decks are handled. A big aspect of control is added allowing us to climb whatever skill tree we want to, and that's one of the issues the system has. If everyone has everything as an option, skills needs to be balanced carefully to avoid everybody fighting in PVP with a halberd and full plate. Even ackowledging the interface issues, the factor that undermines the deck experience is more in the skills, not in the way they're handled.

In my opinion, if your suggestions were to be implemented with the current skill set, most players would choose a max of 20 skills, 5 instances of its 4 bests attacks or 4 of its 5 (mostly because that's what everybody ended doing before deck size increasing). Increasing the hand size will mean they will always have a copy of every skill, so randomly dealing fades away a bit. Being able to assign a certain key to your combos remove the cost of combining them, thus making them a best option without any additional cost for the player. I think your suggestions allow players to find another way of finding an optimal setup, and if there's something optimal, there's no choice; only people who have the best setup, and people who don't.

To me, the container is a bit rough on the edges, but fine. It's the contents i'm worried about.

 

Regardless what technical issues we are commenting about, we should also keep in mind we are critiquing the R11 leveling system. That was just the first pass of leveling and not only have they heard feedback on this issue I'm sure they have some more pieces to implement. R8 combat was fun, but it did change a bit over the next few releases. What we have no is far more complex (reagents, leveling...). Not even all the skills are implemented yet. I'm certain they will tweak this a bit in the later releases.

Surely there was nothing at this point that seems like a deal breaker. My only concern was the diminishing returns on the deck system, but I really liked how they implemented the skill gain, and the gaining of attribute scores (str, dex, and int). Technically we could keep raising those until it becomes unrealistic to raise them anymore due the the skill point cost increase vs the diminishing skill point gain as we attain higher levels. In any case the attributes might keep us from spending too many skill points on other unrelated innate skills that would have made every character progression path start to feel like all characters have the same abilities.

 

Raising passive skills sort of has a diminishing return built in, the number of skill points needed to increase them even a little. Once you get into the 20s and number of skill points you getter level, it can take two levels just to raise one of the str, int, or dex levels. And there might be another barrier to how many points can go into passives. Chris mentioned that they were considering having a had split between the number of skill points that go into actives versus how how many go into passives. So you might see that a certain percentage of skill points can only be put toward actives and passives for a given number of skill points.

In any respect, there might be an interesting set of changes when the release opens up.

 

Tbh i'm a little anti on the split for passives, I dont really see the need if they let you control your hand/deck size. Also I just see it as another restriction that will choke the diversity of templates.......not a good thing.

 

Yes, I definitely saw the offensive power of the deck become diluted as the size grew. I even tried lowering my passives so I could afford more attacks and I still would run out of attacks as melee since they can't use other weapon trees in the same deck.

 

Invidia, I think you and I have nearly opposite opinions I think the game will be better off by decreasing the number of user controlled knobs related to deck management, size, combos, and slug count. Player diversity should come from skills, enchantments, and gear, and not from the card dealer I keep in my pocket. Adding too many controls is off putting for me. If the deck system stays, my vote is to simplify it and keep the card dealer as constant as possible.

 

The current deck size at higher level is simply too big to allow the efficient executions for both offensive or defensive skills when needed. I think the devs had mentioned somewhere regarding fixing this problem.

A proper adjustment of min deck size / level should be able to reduce a lot of the problems. Since if a player wants more offensive skills will no longer needing to stuff the deck with random skills just to avoid the slugs.


Edit: meant to say MAX deck size/level

 

I disagree, I don't see anything currently more appealing as a melee combatant than locking a handfull of glyphs and dumping everything else into passives. no matter how you work this equation, if the minimum deck size increases with level your gimping yourself by taking more glyphs of the same thing simply because those who arnt are becoming stronger and stronger through passives. Math ...... I hate it lol, just kidding really lol.

 

Actually I was meaning to say the max number of the deck should be decreased somewhat at higher level, I made a typo.
I do agree that based on the current system having all locked skills with passives backing up provides the most consistent play. Especially in a short term combat where you do not need to worry about using up your Focus vaule too quickly.

 

IMPORTANT LEVELING ISSUE #2!

It occurred to me that once we hit a level that raises our minimum glyphs per deck we automatically start getting slugs thrown into our decks.

We should get a chance to go to a trainer first before having to deal with the slugs in our decks. Otherwise we deal with the same issue of becoming weaker after gaining a level. We shouldn't ever be hindered by gaining a level.