I remember bringing it up considerably with the first event that the values of the event buildings had been trashed for those three chapters.
The thing is, in terms of game play, there is absolutely no draw or interest to the event building through those chapters.
There is something fundamentally wrong in the variables and/or criteria select in how those values for the event buildings came into play that you end up with this massive correction from orcs to woodelves in terms of the event building values. It is quite possible the "rebalancing" actually needs to look at a BAD input into the assessment of how those number are derived. Never possible, there simple IS some very bad logic/input/variable in how the numbers for those chapters came about that really makes event buildings not worth the effort.
When you have BAD data going in, you are always going to get BAD data coming out, and there is something here in the choices and the design that is creating a massive imbalance in the values on the event building in these chapters, and as I don't have access to look at what you've done, or how you've done it, I can not point out the error in where the "balancing" has gone so wrong.
Wow, this is coming down
really hard on anyone in the first 3 Guest Race chapters. And it's particularly tough on Orcs players (of which I'm one
)!
I appreciate what you are saying Marindor, a broader view in looking at the balancing is needed, see comment above.
The change will indeed be relatively biggest for buildings on lower levels. In this case we basically had 2 options: Make these buildings totally non-upgradeable or take the pain of having to alter them to fit the balancing, also on higher levels. We didn't want to go for the first option, especially since we have many more chapters planned for this game, and the first option would take away the entire possibility to make these buildings more powerful on higher levels as well. Since most of our players are not that fond of getting rid of their old event buildings, we'd rather present an opportunity to keep them attractive, also on higher levels, even though it means making adjustments right now which are less nice in the short run.
Soggy, I see you've changed your tune compared to your comments when I was strongly arguing there was a problem here...
IMO the worst part of the change is nerfing buildings from chapter 8. All buildings in chapter 8 were already very weak when you consider the normal buildings you unlock in the next chapter.
I would have hoped that when doing a rebalancing that the massive jump from 8 to 9 would have been addressed.
I agree with you on how you make decisions about what to keep and what to get rid of based on the values and that you can not go back and get things that you could not justify keeping. This is a very strong case for inventory. Even if the inventory was just 5 building, with the ability to purchase more space if you want it, it would allow players to make some different decisions to help get around this issue.
My best guess is that the current re-balance is going to prove sufficiently painful to make me overly sad. I think it's going to be terribly unpopular on live, and going to lead to the kind of histrionics that lead to threats and rage-quitting.
We've had to make decisions since the first event about which buildings to keep, and which to discard. I've thrown out Blue tree enclosures from the winter event because my glossy gardens from a year ago were both more attractive and more functional. Now the developers have made a decision that will change this. I do not, however, have any-way to change my decision. The feeling of fairness is an important part of player retention. This does not feel fair, which is a bit of an issue
I sincerely hope you revisit the amount of the adjustments. perhaps they could be broken into smaller increments over the next couple of updates, or players could receive one upgrade spell for each event building they have deployed from a previous event, or just auto-upgrade buildings from the past to 1 chapter below where the player is currently. I think it is probably worthwhile to make some effort to ward off the fallout of this decision.
I can see that this kind of situation is going to cause another wave of quitting...
Wow, and suddenly, I am at NEGATIVE 2099 population. REALLY
@Marindor? What am I supposed to do with this? I slogged thru the battle system re-design. I have hung in through thick and thin with you guys through some major re-vamping. I play live and beta, I spend money on this game. But this is ridiculous. Orcs is freaking bad enough without nerfing the only decent bldgs it had. Sigh. I have been on the verge of giving up for a while now. I am so much closer now. I have finished halflings on live, I am stuck in orc hell on beta. It is really just not as fun anymore. Maybe I should take a break, and just let my
2099 population sit there awhile. I just don't have the energy to try to figure out WHERE I am going to make up that kind of pop. SMH.
I think there is a third choice, see my comment above and reexamine the inputs in how the game pieces for those three chapter that puts them so out of balance that they are utter useless and not worth any kind of effort to get at all. Bad data in, bad data out, and that's the problem here.
Hi guys,
Thank you once again for your feedback. We totally understand the feeling you have when the rebalancing meant that your population has dropped and of course, for us as well, it's not the nicest news to bring. However, please understand that we did have to make a choice here: Either discard the entire possibility to make event buildings upgradeable, or face the fact that the older event buildings needed these changes to prepare them for being upgradeable in the long run without seriously disrupting the game balance. Since it has been a huge request of our players to make blueprints work on event buildings, we decided to go with the option to prepare these older event buildings for that, even if it means taking a bitter pill on the short term. As some players already mentioned in this thread: Elvenar is still a young game with many planned years to come and unfortunately not all balancing has been perfect right from the start. This means that when we make changes in mechanics, like making buildings upgradeable which were originally never meant to be upgradeable, we have to polish these kind of things sometimes. We do hope you understand this and are able to look beyond the short term disappointment and see the benefit on the long term of being able to upgrade these buildings to all the levels/chapters that are still to come. For me, personally, I think it would be a shame if the upgrade possibility would be turned back because of too much negative feedback that's based on short-term vision.
For some of your other questions, like when exactly the Restoration Spells (that's what they'll be called) will appear in the game and whether or not there will be other ways to gain them than just tournaments: At this moment I don't have any details on this yet. I know that we're in the last stage of testing and polishing before implementing them, but we don't have an exact estimate yet. Of course we strive to implement them as soom as possible, so you will be able to get these event buildings to higher levels to increase their bonuses again to a standard which matches the current chapters you are in.