Now that some tim has passed, how do you feel about King's Game buff.

I don't think it was a good decision to buff King's Game as they did (maybe they should have buffed it to original campaign difficulty). I have mostly stopped playing the game since. I was already around 3k stats when King's Game hit, so the only thing left for me to do was farm better gear.

If King's game had stayed as it was, I would have kept playing for a while longer for the sake of doing this. It may have been too easy, but at least I was actually seeing results (which made it fun) unlike doing an aqua or sky city survival runs with summoners out and not seeing a single supreme piece or ultimate piece drop over the course of many runs.

It may have dropped more supremes and ultimates than other maps, but the pieces still needed to be the right types, have the right stats, etc. IMO, the map is at the sweet spot in terms of making you want to keep playing to make sets of better gear. But it's just not fun to play anymore.

I pretty much agree with you on everything you said. Also, with the buff they should have given the map more DU. It's too open for only 115 DU (I don't count the 10 bonus DU since you can hit a gazillion of tiles and still not get it).

What buff? No seriously, we didn't buff anything we just fixed the bug. If memory serves me correctly it released with a bug that caused no enemy scaling to happen so that's why people were able to fly through it so easily. If the bug hadn't happened you'd have the map you have right now with this difficulty, then we would have seen players deemed it too tough and made adjustments. We still plan on scaling down the map at least 15% in the next patch since the player base believes it still quite a tough map. Also a lot of issues originally with it being such a tough map was mainly caused by the low mana count, timer, and goblin copters destroying things from distances that were unreachable. These issues have been addressed with the goblin copters still occasionally causing problems but far far less than they were before hand. We're seeing quite a few players play and beat the map as it is currently.

Now I know some players wanted it to be left the way it was with the bug but the issue with this is the fact you can get top end gear within a few hours/runs (depending on your RNG of course) and never need gear again. There would be no purpose to play any other map for gear as you'd be able to deck out in full ultimates far too easily for all your characters. It would also make older maps one time runs as your top end gear would make them quite easy and not fun or a challenge. New players would be able to reach full on final gear within a week and why play the other maps if they don't drop similar items that easily? In my mind some players play for gear, some for fun, some for a challenge, and some play with a mix of the above. From a gaming company perspective I'd think you have to in a sense balance for all 3. Now while I'm not in charge of balance, I do agree the map is still a tough map but the 15% should help those wanting a challenge and be able to enjoy it (of course get new gear too on top of it). It probably won't make it a map though that allows you to break easily into nightmare mode.

Edit: This became a bigger reply than intended, sorry about that. Just trying to explain everything I guess. :P

Now I know some players wanted it to be left the way it was with the bug but the issue with this is the fact you can get top end gear within a few hours/runs (depending on your RNG of course) and never need gear again. There would be no purpose to play any other map for gear as you'd be able to deck out in full ultimates far too easily for all your characters. It would also make older maps one time runs as your top end gear would make them quite easy and not fun or a challenge. New players would be able to reach full on final gear within a week and why play the other maps if they don't drop similar items that easily? In my mind some players play for gear, some for fun, some for a challenge, and some play with a mix of the above. From a gaming company perspective I'd think you have to in a sense balance for all 3. Now while I'm not in charge of balance, I do agree the map is still a tough map but the 15% should help those wanting a challenge and be able to enjoy it (of course get new gear too on top of it). It probably won't make it a map though that allows you to break easily into nightmare mode.

Edit: This became a bigger reply than intended, sorry about that. Just trying to explain everything I guess. :P

I understand what you;re saying, but even with King's Game as it is now people are skipping over a ton of the content. In the original cmapaign, people will basically just grind survival Magus Quarters for easy mana and Throne Room/Alch Labs for gear (and the Endless Spires campaign for some starter myths). The rest of the maps aren't even touched except for getting the achievements.

On the shards survival, most people will play on Misty (if they haven't gotten good enough gear from Throne Room) and then skip right to Aquanos. And for me Sky City isn't worth doing due to the difficulty and good loot falling off the map making it less worthwhile than Aqua.

I know I left a few things out, but even without King's Game the vast majority of maps on nightmare are obsolete. Not to mention that the only Shards campaign map worth farming for weapons is Sky City as not even the aqua weapons are comparable.

Ideally, I think the original campaign should get their drops buffed, King's Game should fall somewhere inbetween the original campaign and shards in terms of difficulty, and the shards maps should get a huge buff in loot drops so that they're better than king's game. But Trendy doesn't have the time to rebalance the game and loot, so even if King's Game was a bug, I feel that it was a good one and was making the game more fun for me at least. If the difficult was between the Summit and Mist, I feel that it would be pretty much perfect as far as reward vs time goes and it's the rest of the maps that are way out of balance.

I also did run it a bunch of times before they fixed it and am nowhere even close to being decked out in supremes and ultimates. Because you just don't need supreme and ultimate armor to drop, but it has to be the right piece, material and stats to be useful.

What buff? No seriously, we didn't buff anything we just fixed the bug. If memory serves me correctly it released with a bug that caused no enemy scaling to happen so that's why people were able to fly through it so easily. If the bug hadn't happened you'd have the map you have right now with this difficulty, then we would have seen players deemed it too tough and made adjustments. We still plan on scaling down the map at least 15% in the next patch since the player base believes it still quite a tough map. Also a lot of issues originally with it being such a tough map was mainly caused by the low mana count, timer, and goblin copters destroying things from distances that were unreachable. These issues have been addressed with the goblin copters still occasionally causing problems but far far less than they were before hand. We're seeing quite a few players play and beat the map as it is currently.

Now I know some players wanted it to be left the way it was with the bug but the issue with this is the fact you can get top end gear within a few hours/runs (depending on your RNG of course) and never need gear again. There would be no purpose to play any other map for gear as you'd be able to deck out in full ultimates far too easily for all your characters. It would also make older maps one time runs as your top end gear would make them quite easy and not fun or a challenge. New players would be able to reach full on final gear within a week and why play the other maps if they don't drop similar items that easily? In my mind some players play for gear, some for fun, some for a challenge, and some play with a mix of the above. From a gaming company perspective I'd think you have to in a sense balance for all 3. Now while I'm not in charge of balance, I do agree the map is still a tough map but the 15% should help those wanting a challenge and be able to enjoy it (of course get new gear too on top of it). It probably won't make it a map though that allows you to break easily into nightmare mode.

Edit: This became a bigger reply than intended, sorry about that. Just trying to explain everything I guess. :P

Is this how you feel about the loot RNG as well? If it were tweaked to be more reasonable, you feel people would collect gear too quickly and lose interest?

I found this post to be very enlightening, because it shows that the grand design for this game really was for it to be a massive grind fest. Grinding is fine, but the way they want it is simply insane. I mean really, it is now bordering on the realm of insanity in my mind.

*edit*

This may be out of line, but are you aware of how much time it takes to get gear WITHOUT trading with players? People don't want to be handed the best gear. People don't even care 'too' much about the chance of a supreme or ult dropping. What they do care about is when they DO drop, the stats are most likely going to be crap AND going to have a crap ton of negatives on it.

IMO, bottom line, the map was fine as it was/is, as so many other people have stated, Ultimate Weapons and/or Amor =/= End game gear.

I did about dozen survival runs, both pre and post buff, and I found no difference whatsoever from the loot form other maps, you still have to endlessly grind until you can find an actual upgrade for you.

I don't think the map was fine the way it was, although it made me want to play the game compulsively. It was too easy; plain and simple. However, what it did do was reward people for investing their time. It offered players a glimpse into what it would be like to gain upgrades more frequently than every 10+ hours played. Nobody wants to play for an entire work shift equivalent in order to find even one slight upgrade.

Now it's just as difficult (if not more so) than some of the shards maps. You might as well perform the fool's errand of grinding gear on Aquanos.

Is this how you feel about the loot RNG as well? If it were tweaked to be more reasonable, you feel people would collect gear too quickly and lose interest?

I found this post to be very enlightening, because it shows that the grand design for this game really was for it to be a massive grind fest. Grinding is fine, but the way they want it is simply insane. I mean really, it is now bordering on the realm of insanity in my mind.

*edit*

This may be out of line, but are you aware of how much time it takes to get gear WITHOUT trading with players? People don't want to be handed the best gear. People don't even care 'too' much about the chance of a supreme or ult dropping. What they do care about is when they DO drop, the stats are most likely going to be crap AND going to have a crap ton of negatives on it.

If that existed as in intent that's a double edged blade. If you grind that much there's no reason to play when you A. Feel like you can progress no further and B. When you get all your end game gear or C. When you get tired of the Rng acting as it was intended to be. So either way people can and will lose interest quickly. So Far all it has done I can see is make people mad and feel like they are being ignored. Good post.

I don't think the map was fine the way it was, although it made me want to play the game compulsively. It was too easy; plain and simple. However, what it did do was reward people for investing their time. It offered players a glimpse into what it would be like to gain upgrades more frequently than every 10+ hours played. Nobody wants to play for an entire work shift equivalent in order to find even one slight upgrade.

Now it's just as difficult (if not more so) than some of the shards maps. You might as well perform the fool's errand of grinding gear on Aquanos.

I love every post you make. Its like reading an article on a subject you like but not quite love.

What buff? No seriously, we didn't buff anything we just fixed the bug. If memory serves me correctly it released with a bug that caused no enemy scaling to happen so that's why people were able to fly through it so easily. If the bug hadn't happened you'd have the map you have right now with this difficulty, then we would have seen players deemed it too tough and made adjustments. We still plan on scaling down the map at least 15% in the next patch since the player base believes it still quite a tough map. Also a lot of issues originally with it being such a tough map was mainly caused by the low mana count, timer, and goblin copters destroying things from distances that were unreachable. These issues have been addressed with the goblin copters still occasionally causing problems but far far less than they were before hand. We're seeing quite a few players play and beat the map as it is currently.

Now I know some players wanted it to be left the way it was with the bug but the issue with this is the fact you can get top end gear within a few hours/runs (depending on your RNG of course) and never need gear again. There would be no purpose to play any other map for gear as you'd be able to deck out in full ultimates far too easily for all your characters. It would also make older maps one time runs as your top end gear would make them quite easy and not fun or a challenge. New players would be able to reach full on final gear within a week and why play the other maps if they don't drop similar items that easily? In my mind some players play for gear, some for fun, some for a challenge, and some play with a mix of the above. From a gaming company perspective I'd think you have to in a sense balance for all 3. Now while I'm not in charge of balance, I do agree the map is still a tough map but the 15% should help those wanting a challenge and be able to enjoy it (of course get new gear too on top of it). It probably won't make it a map though that allows you to break easily into nightmare mode.

Edit: This became a bigger reply than intended, sorry about that. Just trying to explain everything I guess. :P

You are correct there was not a buff per se. In fact the ogre's did not scale when they should have as the waves progressed. (see http://forums.trendyent.com/showthread.php?74704-The-King-s-Game-and-its-state-of-balance. and per Tsuda's 1st post in that thread:

I would like to start off by apologizing on behalf of the team for several problems that arose with this latest bit of content. If you know who I am, I am blunt and to the point. The balance of The King's Game was not working as intended due to a bug in the maps enemy difficulty scaling.

After reading through the 20 some odd pages of balance discussion, the thoughts of the community mostly reflected that of what we had intended.

The King's Game is meant to be difficult, but not as difficult as the previous maps. Fundamentally, the map is easier even structurally. The rewards are intended to be quite good, but not a joke (no pun intended) to get. We want players who have had trouble clearing some of the previous maps (especially the shards maps) a chance to get that extra push in gear to put them over the hill.

In the coming patch we will be increasing the enemy difficulty of the map, but for those having trouble on Nightmare as is, this should not be another brick wall. The quality of the rewards, although good as is, are being very slightly increased as a response to this mistake.

Again, I apologize for a botched map difficulty, enjoy the rewards while they are easier to get.

If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below and I will answer if possible.

Please keep this thread civil. :summoner:

However; based on what Tsuda stated, the corrected map is nowhere near what was stated as the intent of the fix. So in Tsuda's words:

The King's Game is meant to be difficult, but not as difficult as the previous maps. Fundamentally, the map is easier even structurally. The rewards are intended to be quite good, but not a joke (no pun intended) to get. We want players who have had trouble clearing some of the previous maps (especially the shards maps) a chance to get that extra push in gear to put them over the hill.

In the coming patch we will be increasing the enemy difficulty of the map, but for those having trouble on Nightmare as is, this should not be another brick wall. The quality of the rewards, although good as is, are being very slightly increased as a response to this mistake.

--- I think we can all agree that it currently is not this. And I believe that topic was run into the ground, with the consensus that it would not be a bridge after all.

I've run it several times since the bug fix. Not to completion and my stats are not bad (not great, but not bad) with some 3k toons and some 2.xk toons. But even going to 27, I don't see upgrades. Some of that is probably due to the go negative effect, but not all. But the map is harder than Aquanos as far as I can tell (mostly due to not having enough DU for such an open map - but also the copter-ogres do drop their ogre passengers off at times well beyond where anything can reach them and then you get super-ogres charging the wall (so I can't counter by dropping the ogre from the copter to reduce it's health). And it is short DU even with getting the extra DU from the tile (which can be spammed if you start on a low enough wave to ensure you get it by the time you need it). If the copter-ogres weren't dropped too early - then it might be a different story (also the copters still get too far out and will rain rockets while staying outside range until you go hunt them down with dps - which is rather deadly during the main parts of the wave). 15% might make all the difference in the world... but I would still rather have copters not dropping off their ogres too early to be countered.

EDIT: It is sad to see a trans/sup/ult piece that isn't an upgrade to the myth piece I am already using. Makes me question my sanity (insane=doing the same thing over & over expecting a different result).