• Dear forum reader,

    To actively participate on the forum by joining discussions or starting your own threads or topics, you need a game account and to REGISTER HERE!

Discussion Tournament Changes (post-release)

CrazyWizard

Well-Known Member
You don't even need a "formula"

You could assign "hidden values" to each research. the sum of all those numbers could create a value that determines the tournament difficulty. similar to how it's calculated now based on a "value" thats determined at the start of the spire / tournaments.

Each chapter you set an expected difficulty adn then divide the values over the aviable researches.
This makes is so scalable and resistant to changes in the game.

Is a chapter over or underrated, change the hidden values, does a change in the game change the difficulty to much, change the hidden values
It's so insanely future proof and customisable.
It would also allow much more freedom in how you design chapters as you arent bound to a fixed rule decided by a formula.

Want to make a chapter with 0 combat in it? set the hidden values to 0 and nothing changes. want to make it very combat centered? add bigger hidden values to de reaeach.
Now some creative ideas might be shot down because it doesnt fit "the formula"
 

Deleted User - 81190

Guest
It probably doesn't need all the expansions you get. It's probably possible to get to the end of chapter 17 and have all three military buildings continuously working with ~100 expansions (probably even less), while you have 120 free expansions + 39 premium (that are currently better to place than free, if you can afford the diamonds). What would be the point to place these 20-60 extra expansions with what you suggest ?
Comfort. Just like with anything premium in this game, you don't NEED it - but it makes it more comfortable. I did the last couple of chapters on 120-125 total expansions. Can it be done on 100 or less? Perhaps, but anyone who played the last chapters can attest that it would be a very long and painful experience, even more so that it is currently. I wouldn't want to do it on 100 expansions. But someone might take on that challenge, and IMO anyone willing to endure that deserves benefits that can stem from this, i.e. cheaper tournaments and Spire. This is a choice that a player can make. And you pay for comfort - with real money, diamonds, penalties. How much you're willing to pay is very individual.

The problem is that right now there is no reason to take on that challenge - you might as well chill in lower chapters with a smaller footprint because this late chapter progression doesn't net you enough benefits.
 

Enevhar Aldarion

Well-Known Member
Well, whatever people like or hate about the new system, or how harsh going past province 25 is, it is having the effect that Inno wanted. On US1-Arendyll, I got 6000 points in the Marble tournament. In the old system, I would have been nowhere near the top 100, but I finished in 86th place. And in Gems last week, I got 6250 points and finished around 60th place. I was shocked when I saw I finished that high. Yes, some of that is players either quitting the game or giving up on the tournaments, and that is something I doubt Inno planned to happen.
 

PrimroseSylvia

Well-Known Member
Some people are surely upset with new system, but other are surely in love, and still do "older" points, as this pic on facebook official group says
148943290_10222344899465934_8205915879430270224_n.jpg
 

edeba

Well-Known Member
The way squad size is calculated results in exponential growth as players progress through the chapters and add land expansions and AW levels.

I found this picture of exponential growth with various tangent lines. There is no question that for the period that the new tournament was examined, there would have been little movement or change to the tangent line. With exponential growth, there is a period where the slope approximates the tangent line.

What I've seen in my FS on live is that everyone's tournament score has declined and as a FS, we are not getting strong and more capable towards getting extra chests, but we've tended to decline and I would say we are definitely averaging less chests now. Players are talking about seeing their tournament score declining. This is the regression that over 100 pages of protest was about.

It is like we've moved from the 2/7th difficulty increase slope to the 2/3 difficulty increase slope and with the current formulation, it will simply get worse with the next chapter.

1629735921690.png


So early minmax came up with a calculation that did a great job predicting squad size:

1629737419524.png


Developers may think they did something different, but the end result is that this calculation predicted squad size across the chapters and there in is the problem because it creates an exponential growth with increased expansions, AW levels and technology.

I have two suggestion to make this formula work for higher chapters as the penalty for the AW levels and expansions is too high a punitive.

So the AW penalty could be fixed by taking the square root of the number, so (0.003A +1)^0.5.

This would change this multiplier as follows:

------------current Sq Rt
AW levels ---- Multiplier
0 ----------- 1 ------- 1
100 ------- 1.3 ------ 1.14
200 ------- 1.6 ------ 1.26
300 ------- 1.9 ------ 1.38
400 ------- 2.2 ------ 1.48
500 ------- 2.5 ------ 1.58
600 ------- 2.8 ------ 1.67
700 ------- 3.1 ------ 1.76
800 ------- 3.4 ------ 1.84
900 ------- 3.7 ------ 1.92
1000 ----- 4.0 ------ 2.00
1100 ----- 4.3 ------ 2.07
1200 ----- 4.6 ------ 2.14

With the current formula, adding an expansion for someone with say 1000 AW levels automatically increases squad size 4 times as much as a person with no AW levels. By square rooting this part of formula adding an extra expansion for 1000 AW levels would cause an increase double the size of of a person with no AW levels.

The other penalty that is too high is on premium expansions. The benefit of premium expansions is declining, so the penalty of adding them should also be declining.

So to fix this part of the equation (2.75P + 3.67V -18) should have a declining multiplier on the 2.75P.

My suggestion is to take 99% of the value, so it would look like (2.75P*0.99^(P-1))

This would change this part of the equation as follows:

# premium
expansions --2.75P -- 2.75P*0.99^(P-1)
0 -------------- 0 -------- 0
5 ------------ 13.75 ----- 13.21
10 ---------- 27.50 ----- 25.12
15 ---------- 41.25 ----- 35.83
20 ---------- 55.00 ----- 45.44
25 ---------- 68.75 ----- 54.01
30 ---------- 82.50 ----- 61.84
35 ---------- 96.25 ----- 68.39
40 -------- 110.00 ----- 74.33
45 -------- 123.75 ----- 79.52
50 -------- 137.50 ----- 83.19

With this adjustment the penalty for premium expansions is declining, and it matches the fact that extra expansions are a declining benefit, and as the number of premium expansions increases, the cost increases so they should be less costly to your game progress.

The 1.00415M is the same for everyone and as I wish to look at ratios, it will cancel out so can be ignored.

(0.003A +1)*(2.75P + 3.67V -18) will vary with the number of free expansions and for this example, assume 100. So the next part is a comparison of a player with 100 expansion, no premium expansions and no AW to a player with 1000 AW levels and 40 premium expansions, and then with my suggested modifications.

Existing multiplier no premium expansions, no AW, 100 regular expansions.
(0.003A +1)*(2.75P + 3.67V -18) = (0.003*0+1)*(2.75*0 +3.67*100 - 18) = 349

Existing multiplier with 40 premium expansions and 1000 AW levels
(0.003A +1)*(2.75P + 3.67V -18) = (0.003*1000+1)*(2.75*40 +3.67*100 - 18) = 1,836

So, in this extreme example the squad size is 5.26 times bigger for having AW and for spending a fortune on AW levels. To put this into perspective, with the old tournament the difference between have done the optional squad sizes and not made the squad size about 1.4 times bigger, or in this example about 489 compared to 349.

With my two suggestions the base does not change, but with 1000 AW and 40 premium expansions the calculation is:
(0.003A +1)^0.5*((2.75P*0.99^(P-1))3.67*100 - 18) = 2*(74.33 + 367 -18) = 846.7

The starting squad size would be 2.43 times bigger for having added AW levels and the premium expansions. This is still significantly larger but it makes it so leveling AWs makes sense again, and placing expansions doesn't cripple you game. My chapter 15 beta game is way stronger than my chapter 18 game on live and I'm sitting on 12 unplaced expansions on beta because it is a total lie that Inno has told by saying these things do not hurt your game and it improves. It does not. There's no way in the world to get around the exponential nature of the equation and in two chapters players are seeing serious declines in their ability to maintain the initial tournament scores when this new tournament was introduced. My ability on live is down 25-30% and all of my reserves are stripped now.
 

Attachments

  • 1629737124088.png
    1629737124088.png
    114.5 KB · Views: 111

Maillie

Well-Known Member
Not only does the tournament need to be rethought, but nearly everything needs to be looked at. In how many more chapters are we going to be able to upgrade a Main Hall in less than a week ... or two? Scout a province in less than a week? I'm near the end of Chapter 18 and it's ridiculous. It no longer gives me time in hours any longer, I now get upgrade time and scouting time in days.

The tournament punishment is clearly the worst. We can adjust to ludicrous times for upgrading, but the tournament was a slap in the face for those of us that had paid for expansions with no warning that we would no longer be able to help our fellowship get 10 chests. You can get rid of an Ancient Wonder, but you can't get rid of an expansion.

it is a total lie that Inno has told by saying these things do not hurt your game and it improves. It does not.
Exactly. You created a wonderful game. You gave us the ability to pay you for your work. Then you devise a way to severely punish us for paying you. Now we no longer dare to pay you. This is what we call "shooting yourself in the foot." It's not a good thing.
 

Heymrdiedier

Well-Known Member
I think the problem is the business model of elvenar (or maybe i should say innogames).
They noticed they earn the most money from players in the first 6 months they play. So they focus on making those players pay more instead of trying to get income from all players. This results in changes that help players in these first 6 months, but hurt players who play much longer.

in everything they added recently, there is a crooked competition, tournament, spire, events with the recent leagues, even BSA. Competition makes people spend money, thats a good thing, but if they realise that after they spent a lot of money, they are still worse of then a newbie who spent nothing at all, they will just stop spending (and playing). A competition without a fair base thats equal for all, isnt a competition at all.

(so seperate map for bsa, less rng to determin your event payback, costs of spire/tournament not based on your city size/strength but on something similar for everyone (ex everyone gets xxx amount of troops/goods to use in the tournament and those can't be refilled untill next tournament, and everyones enemy troop size is the same)
 

Enevhar Aldarion

Well-Known Member
I think the problem is the business model of elvenar (or maybe i should say innogames).
They noticed they earn the most money from players in the first 6 months they play. So they focus on making those players pay more instead of trying to get income from all players. This results in changes that help players in these first 6 months, but hurt players who play much longer.

I think it is longer than 6 months for the average or more casual player, the ones more likely to make impulse purchases. An average player may take a year to get to chapter 8 and those nasty orcs, a chapter that has gotten a lot of players to quit in the past.
 

edeba

Well-Known Member
I think it is longer than 6 months for the average or more casual player, the ones more likely to make impulse purchases. An average player may take a year to get to chapter 8 and those nasty orcs, a chapter that has gotten a lot of players to quit in the past.
Even the Inno documentation does a comparison on the first two years, not six months.
 

edeba

Well-Known Member
it's all not relevant, the fact stands that inno has made this change for early players and doesn't care (on the contrary?) about pissing off older players
I think it isn't just about pissing older players off, they don't care that the only thing driving play in the older players is addiction and they've taken away the fun. If you read the posts of people that left, it is all "not fun anymore." I think my live game is extremely boring now. My beta game still has some chance for improvement. And I think that's a big thing, there's no improvement in moving forward, it is just decline.

They totally geriatriced the game. (my new word, geriatric-ed they made the game old and sick and getting worse)
 

Maillie

Well-Known Member
I'll never understand why game developers feel that in order to make a certain level, or type of character, whatever, stronger they must annihilate another, spelling the demise of an entire segment of players. This didn't make sense in WoW and it makes no sense in this game. The formula that's been quoted here is so ludicrous that it should have been reworked before making it to Beta.

As far as paying customers go, I may be unusual but I never pay for anything until I know I love the game. My money was spent long after I was a newbie and continued to be spent until I became part of the group being annihilated. I doubt that I'm the only one.

The entire concept of changing the tournament due to the multiple Fire Phoenix dilemma could have been resolved with a formula devoted to the building itself. A diminishing return on each accumulated Fire Phoenix would have eliminated the need to demolish everyone's tournament ability beyond Chapter 15. The ones that paid for the extra buildings would see an increase, which they paid for, but possibly not to the extent that no one could ever beat them.

I have no multiples of Fire Phoenix, why am I, and most in Chapter 18, being so severely punished?
 

Karvest

Well-Known Member
Due to fire phoenixes and expiring buildings we have increasing difficulty as we go through tournament provinces. But they have nothing to do with SS formula and punishing for progress after reaching some point, which looks like a pure design fault.
 
Top